Internet accessibility and usage among urban adolescents in Southern California: implications for web-based health research.

The World Wide Web (WWW) poses a distinct capability to offer interventions tailored to the individual's characteristics. To fine tune the tailoring process, studies are needed to explore how Internet accessibility and usage are related to demographic, psychosocial, behavioral, and other health related characteristics. This study was based on a cross-sectional survey conducted on 2373 7th grade students of various ethnic groups in Southern California. Measures of Internet use included Internet use at school or at home, Email use, chat-room use, and Internet favoring. Logistic regressions were conducted to assess the associations between Internet uses with selected demographic, psychosocial, behavioral variables and self-reported health statuses. The proportion of students who could access the Internet at school or home was 90% and 40%, separately. Nearly all (99%) of the respondents could access the Internet either at school or at home. Higher SES and Asian ethnicity were associated with higher internet use. Among those who could access the Internet and after adjusting for the selected demographic and psychosocial variables, depression was positively related with chat-room use and using the Internet longer than 1 hour per day at home, and hostility was positively related with Internet favoring (All ORs = 1.2 for +1 STD, p < 0.05). Less parental monitoring and more unsupervised time were positively related to email use, chat-room use, and at home Internet use (ORs for +1 STD ranged from 1.2 to 2.0, all p < 0.05), but not related to at school Internet use. Substance use was positively related to email use, chat-room use, and at home Internet use (OR for "used" vs. "not used" ranged from 1.2 to 4.0, p < 0.05). Self-reported health problems were associated with higher levels of Internet use at home but lower levels of Internet use at school. More physical activity was related to more email use (OR = 1.3 for +1 STD), chat room use (OR = 1.2 for +1 STD), and at school ever Internet use (OR = 1.2 for +1 STD, all p < 0.05). Body mass index was not related to any of the Internet use-related measures. In this ethnically diverse sample of Southern California 7(th) grade students, 99% could access the Internet at school and/or at home. This suggests that the Internet is already a potential venue for large scale health communication studies. Adolescents with more psychosocial risk factors or detrimental health behaviors were more likely to use the Internet. Therefore, if used properly, Internet interventions could effectively address the high risk populations. Additional research is needed to gain a more complete understanding of the positive and negative consequences of Internet use among adolescents.     

Counseling in the Philippines: Past,Present, and Future

The history of colonization and persistent attempts at self‐governance in the Philippines parallel the beginnings of counseling in the country, which were largely influenced by the United States. Because of the Guidance and Counseling Act of 2004 and the Psychology Act of 2009, counseling is on its way to professionalization and regulation. Counseling is growing in depth and credibility, as evidenced by applications in practice that are not only indigenous but powerfully relevant.     

A Liberation Psychology Approach to Acculturative Integration of Migrant Populations

This paper describes an acculturative integration approach that stresses the contribution of liberation psychology. Immigrant integration is a challenge for receiving countries in the Western world due to the frequent asymmetrical and oppressive conditions suffered by newcomers in their new settlements. The cross-cultural perspective connects integration with psychological acculturation, emphasizing harmony between acquisitions of the new culture while maintaining cultural heritage, and creating opportunities for intergroup relationships. In turn, liberation psychology permits an understanding of the acculturative transition as an empowerment and self-construction process by which immigrants acquire a new vision of the world and of themselves, transforming both structural conditions and themselves. From this perspective we conceptualize acculturative integration as the process by which newcomers become an accepted part of the new society through a reflexive and evaluative process, changing their social references and position, rebuilding their social and personal resources, and achieving a new agency in coherence with their new challenges and goals. In this process, they acquire critical thinking about unequal conditions, gain capacities to respond to the inequalities, and take effective actions to confront them. We illustrate this process using the narratives of nine Moroccan women who are living in asymmetrical and oppressive local contexts in Andalusia, the southern-most region of Spain.     

Diagnostic value of the Dominic Interactive Assessment with children exposed to intimate partner violence

This article reports on the diagnostic validity of the Dominic Interactive Assessment (DIA) in a sample of Spanish children exposed to intimate partner violence (IPV). The study participants included 55 children aged between 6 and 11 years whose mothers visited an IPV counselling centre. Psychopathology and functional impairment were used as the main criteria for assessing predictive and discriminative accuracy, as well as incremental validity, of DIA. The results indicate that DIA permits obtaining useful information from children. This information improves the prediction and validity of the process of clinical assessment of children exposed to IPV. Children's self-reports could prove effective in identifying cases in this high-risk population when developmentally adequate instruments and functional criteria are used.     

Psychometric Properties of the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire-Preschool Revision (APQ-Pr) in 3 Year-Old Spanish Preschoolers

Parenting practices should be assessed and taken into account at an early age, since it is well documented that they are strongly related to children’s development. This study provides data on the psychometric properties of a Spanish version of the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire for Preschool children (APQ-Pr). A community sample of 622 (310 boys and 312 girls) 3 year-old children and their parents, participated in the study. Data were obtained from parents’ reports and correspond to a semi-structured diagnostic interview and self-report questionnaires evaluating parenting and children’s psychological states. Confirmatory factor analysis supported a three-factor solution: positive parenting, inconsistent parenting and punitive parenting. These scales scores showed moderate to good internal consistence (omega values ranged from .54 to .86). Inconsistent parenting scores achieved the strongest associations with external measures of psychopathology, especially for externalizing and conduct problems, as well as for functional impairment, the poorest associations being for the positive parenting scores. Results support the validity of the Spanish APQ-Pr, which is potentially a useful measure for the study of parenting practices regarding preschool children and their relation to conduct problems.     

Do Women Accommodate More Than Men? Gender Differences in Perceived Social Support and Negotiation Behavior by Spanish and Dutch Worker Representatives

Historically, the role of worker representatives (WRs) is traditionally perceived as masculine. With an increasing participation of women in the workforce, the number of female WRs grows all over Europe. WRs’ main task is to negotiate on behalf of the constituency. We explore how male and female WRs perceive support from their constituency and how this perceived support is related to their negotiation behavior. We test hypotheses about the impact of gender and societal culture on perceived support and accommodating behavior in negotiations. The hypotheses are tested using a quantitative approach among 219 female and 495 male WRs in Spain and 166 female and 398 male WRs in the Netherlands. Following the research question there was no evidence indicating gender differences in accommodating behavior. Results show that a) WRs accommodate less to management in Spain than in the Netherlands; b) female WRs perceive less social support than their male counterparts in Spain, but not in the Netherlands; c) social support is negatively related to accommodating behavior only for female WRs in Spain, but not in the Netherlands. We discuss theoretical and practical implications.     

Longitudinal trajectories of bicultural identity integration in recently immigrated Hispanic adolescents: Links with mental health and family functioning

This study examined, in a sample of recently immigrated Hispanic adolescents in Miami and Los Angeles, the extent to which bicultural identity integration (BII; involving the ability to synthesise one's heritage and receiving cultural streams and to identify as a member of both cultures) is best understood as a developmental construct that changes over time or as an individual‐difference construct that is largely stable over time. We were also interested in the extent to which these trajectories predicted mental health and family functioning. Recent‐immigrant 9th graders (N = 302) were assessed 6 times from 9th to 12th grade. Latent class growth analyses using the first 5 timepoints identified 2 trajectory classes—one with lower BII scores over time and another with higher BII scores over time. Higher heritage and US identity at baseline predicted membership in the higher BII class. At the 6th study timepoint, lower BII adolescents reported significantly poorer self‐esteem, optimism, prosocial behaviour and family relationships compared with their higher BII counterparts. These findings are discussed in terms of further research on the over‐time trajectory of biculturalism, and on the need to develop interventions to promote BII as a way of facilitating well‐being and positive family functioning.     

Yoga Practice May Buffer the Deleterious Effects of Abuse on Women's Self-Concept and Dysfunctional Coping

Women who experienced abuse as children or adults can suffer from symptoms such as dissociations, physiological regulation difficulties, and mood disturbances that might not respond to traditional interventions. Given the benefits of yoga, we hypothesized that yoga practice would ameliorate the negative impact of abuse on psychological functioning. Our findings suggest that frequent yoga practice might ameliorate the negative impact of abuse history on self-concept and coping skills. In addition, our findings suggest that women who incorporate yoga into other areas of life could get the greatest psychological benefits. Given the preliminary nature of this study, further research into the benefits of yoga on women who have child or adult abuse histories is warranted.     

Power and conflict in cooperative and competitive contexts

Power and conflict are classic research topics in organizational theory and important practical management issues. The goal of this article was to analyse the influence of supervisor power bases and goal interdependence situations over intragroup conflict. The study involved the participation of 401 workers from a range of social service organizations. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that (a) supervisor personal power bases were negatively associated with task and relationship conflict; (b) supervisor position power bases were positively associated with relationship conflict; (c) cooperative environments were negatively associated with task and relationship conflict; and (d) that goal interdependence moderates the negative consequences of the use of position power. The implications for research and managerial practices are discussed.