Child Wellness and Social Inclusion: Values for Action

Participatory Action Research (PAR) with children and youth is at the intersection of child wellness and social inclusion. Exclusion and marginalization detract from personal and collective health. Inclusion, on the contrary, contributes to wellness. Hence, we should study inclusion and exclusion in the overall context of child wellness. This special issue offers a wealth of methodologies and lessons for fostering inclusion of young people through PAR. In an effort to synthesize my concerns with child wellness, inclusion, and the scholarly work of this special issue, this paper will (a) articulate the values underpinning the philosophy of social inclusion and child wellness, (b) suggest roles and responsibilities for putting these values into action, and (c) integrate the contributions of this special issue into the emerging framework for social inclusion and child wellness.     

The relationship between self‐perception of physical attractiveness and sexual bullying in early adolescence

The relationship between self‐perception of physical attractiveness and four measures of sexual bullying behavior (victimization, perpetration, having friends who sexually bully, and observation of sexual bullying among peers at school) was examined in a sample of 396 middle school age students. Students who perceived themselves to be more physically attractive than their peers reported sexually bullying others more, being sexually bullied by others more, observing more sexual bullying, and having more friends who sexually bully others than did students who perceived themselves as average looking. In addition, males who perceived themselves to be less physically attractive than their peers reported being victimized more and reported observing more sexual bullying in the school environment. These findings highlight the importance of physical attractiveness in the early initiation of sexual harassment. Implications for future research and interventions with early adolescents are discussed. Aggr. Behav. 36:271–281, 2010. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Thematic review of family therapy journals 2009

In this article the contents of the principal English‐language family therapy journals published in 2009 are reviewed under these headings: narrative therapy, child‐focused problems, adult‐focused problems, substance abuse across the lifespan, illness across the lifespan, family violence, couples, diversity, developments in systemic practice, training and research.     

Fibromyalgia and childhood abuse: Exploration of stress reactivity as a developmental mediator

The purpose of this paper is to explore whether the human body’s stress reactivity in response to trauma may be a possible developmental mediator between childhood abuse and the development of fibromyalgia (FM). Four points are emphasized in this article. First, studies that have examined the prevalence of childhood physical, emotional, and sexual abuse in FM patients are evaluated. Second, health and neuroendocrine differences between abused and non-abused FM patients are examined. Third, studies that tested the association between childhood abuse and stress reactivity characterized by neurobiological abnormalities are reviewed. Fourth, studies that have investigated the association between stress reactivity and FM are analyzed. The results of the reviews showed significant associations between childhood abuse and FM, childhood abuse and stress reactivity, and stress reactivity and FM, indicating that childhood abuse may be one of the etiological factors that could lead to abnormal brain development, affecting stress reactivity, and ultimately lead to the development of FM.     

Right–left approach and reaching arm movements of 4-month infants in free and constrained conditions

Recent theories on the evolution of language (e.g. Corballis, 2009) emphazise the interest of early manifestations of manual laterality and manual specialization in human infants. In the present study, left- and right-hand movements towards a midline object were observed in 24 infants aged 4 months in a constrained condition, in which the hands were maintained closed, and in a free condition. A left-hand dominance for approach movements without contact with the object, and a right-hand dominance for reaching movements with object contact was observed in the free condition. In the constrained condition reaching movements of the right hand decreased dramatically. These results are interpreted as strong evidence of manual specialization in 4-month olds, with approach movements having a localization role and reaching movements announcing future right-hand dominance for prehension and object manipulation.     

A probabilistic computational model of cross-situational word learning

Words are the essence of communication: They are the building blocks of any language. Learning the meaning of words is thus one of the most important aspects of language acquisition: Children must first learn words before they can combine them into complex utterances. Many theories have been developed to explain the impressive efficiency of young children in acquiring the vocabulary of their language, as well as the developmental patterns observed in the course of lexical acquisition. A major source of disagreement among the different theories is whether children are equipped with special mechanisms and biases for word learning, or their general cognitive abilities are adequate for the task. We present a novel computational model of early word learning to shed light on the mechanisms that might be at work in this process. The model learns word meanings as probabilistic associations between words and semantic elements, using an incremental and probabilistic learning mechanism, and drawing only on general cognitive abilities. The results presented here demonstrate that much about word meanings can be learned from naturally occurring child-directed utterances (paired with meaning representations), without using any special biases or constraints, and without any explicit developmental changes in the underlying learning mechanism. Furthermore, our model provides explanations for the occasionally contradictory child experimental data, and offers predictions for the behavior of young word learners in novel situations.     

Positioning theory as a discursive approach to understanding same‐sex intimate violence

This study focuses on same‐sex intimate violence, recognizing that violence in gay and lesbian relationships is as severe and prevalent as in heterosexual relationships. Positioning theory as a relational approach is used as an alternative to the dominant individual and structural accounts. Intimate violence is seen as produced through the assignment of rights and duties or positioning in couples' conversations. Two gay and two lesbian couples were interviewed. A basic discursive pattern was found from 25 accounts of episodes involving physical violence. Violence ensued only after the initiator of violence had claimed innocence or blamelessness and attributed guilt or blame on the receiver of violence. The findings are discussed in relation to the discursive production of power and violence.     

Factors predicting the probability of initiating sexual intercourse by context and sex

Despite men initiating sex more than women there is considerable variance within the sexes. This study is the first to consider the impact of multiple predictors from the literature, and investigates how factors, such as relationship length, sociosexuality, and different aspects of self‐perceived mate value among others, independently and interactively predict initiation of sexual intercourse in both short‐term sexual and long‐term romantic mating contexts, testing predictions from Sexual strategies theory. For long‐term relationships, positive partner bond increased initiative to sexual intercourse for women. For men, self‐perceived independence increased probability of taking the initiative, while relationship attachment decreased probability. For short‐term relations, the desire component of the sociosexual orientation inventory increased probability of initiation for both sexes, while male initiative was increased by pleasure reasons for sex. The impact of individual predictors on initiating intercourse is influenced by being included in a multidimensional model, and relationship context affects the impact of the predictors.