Parent and child adjustment dual trajectories at the beginning of the COVID-19 syndemic

Children and their families have been significantly impacted by the unfolding of the COVID-19 syndemic. We sought to identify (1) groups of families with distinct profiles of joint trajectories of parental anxiety and child emotional distress and (2) protective and risk factors associated with these dual-trajectory profiles. A sample of 488 parents (65% White; 77% mothers) with 3- to 8-year-old children (M_Age = 5.04, SD_Age = 1.59) was followed from late March to early July in 2020. Survey data on parent (i.e., anxiety symptoms) and child (i.e., emotional distress) adjustment were collected at three time points. Using multivariate growth mixture modeling, we identified one group with low parental anxiety and child emotional distress (42.7%) and three other distinct groups with varying risk levels among parents and/or children. We also identified protective (e.g., positive parenting) and risk (e.g., child negative affect, negative parenting, perceived stress with racism) factors in predicting parent and child adjustment. It can be concluded that, overall, our sample (mostly middle- and high-socioeconomic status families) demonstrated family resilience amid COVID-19, consistent with prior disaster coping literature. At the same time, our findings also indicated the need to identify at-risk families and modifiable factors for post-disaster public health interventions.     

Book reviews

Darwin's Dangerous Idea, Daniel C. Dennett, 1995. London, Penguin. 587 pp., hbk £25, ISBN: 0–713–99090–2

Verificationism: Its History and Prospects, C. J. Misak, 1995. London and New York, Routledge. xviii + 254 pp. ISBN: 0–415–12597–9(hbk); 0–415–12598–7(pbk)

Abductive Inference: Computation, Philosophy, Technology, John R. Josephson & Susan G. Josephson (Eds), 1994. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press 306 pp.

Physics and Metaphysics. Theories of Space and Time, Jennifer Trusted, 1994. London, Routledge 210 pp.     

Bullying Victimization and Use of Substances in High School: Does Religiosity Moderate the Association?

Alcohol, tobacco and other drug use continue to pose serious public health concerns among youth. Bullying victimization has been identified as a risk factor and religiosity a protective factor for adolescent substance use. No previous research has examined the potential moderating role of religiosity. We explore the association between bullying victimization and substance use in adolescents with low and high levels of religiosity. A cross-sectional survey was conducted with a representative sample of high school students in greater Beirut. Binary and multinomial logistic models were used, adjusting for demographics, and stratified by level of religiosity. Of the 986 students responding to the survey, 65% were females; 48% had experienced some form of bullying; and 52% self-rated as low in religiosity. Between 10 and 30% were current users of alcohol or tobacco. Students of lower religiosity levels who had been bullied were more likely to use substances than those who self-rated as high religiosity. Religiosity may be a potential moderator of the association between being bullied and substance use, but the exact mechanisms and underlying reasons need further investigation.

     

Acculturation attitudes, perceived attitudes of the majority, and adjustment of Israeli-Arab and Jewish-Ethiopian students to an Israeli University

The authors investigated adjustment to an Israeli university by students from two minority groups, Israeli Arabs and Jewish Ethiopians, as a function of their different acculturation attitudes (J. W. Berry, 1990). Social adjustment of both Arabs and Ethiopians was contingent on acculturation attitudes supporting participation with the majority. Psychological adjustment of both groups was negatively associated with personal acculturation preferences that deviated from the shared acculturation attitudes of the respective in-group (i.e., assimilation in the Arab group, and separation in the Ethiopian group). The perceived attitude of the majority also contributed to the psychological adjustment of both groups. Major theoretical implications are that both attitudes of the majority and adjustment to the in-group play an important role in psychological adjustment of immigrants.     

Getting credit for OCBs: potential costs of being a good actor vs. a good soldier

Employing a sample of 197 employee-supervisor dyads, we explore whether employees’ attitudes and underlying motivation for engaging in organizational citizenship behaviours (OCBs) differentially relate to supervisors’ assessments of their individual performance and reward recommendations. We theorized that employees who perform OCBs with self-serving motives would be low on affective commitment and high on equity sensitivity, and that such individuals would receive lower performance ratings and fewer reward recommendations than those who are high on affective commitment, low on equity sensitivity, and more selflessly motivated. Our results suggest that employees with high affective commitment, low equity sensitivity, and high selfless motives were more likely to receive positive supervisor performance ratings and high reward recommendations. We also found that affective commitment moderated the mediating path of prosocial values (a selfless motive) on the relationship between OCBs and reward recommendations. Practical implications and future research directions are discussed.     

Book Reviews

Abstract

Derrida argued at great length early on in his career that texts live on in the absence of their author. The question remains, however, of precisely how this survival takes place. In this paper I argue that the life of Derrida’s own ?uvre is sustained through his particular practice of self‐inheritance. I justify this claim by focusing on one moment in the text Rogues: Two Essays on Reason, in which Derrida inherits from himself through self‐citation. In citing himself while at the same time modifying his citation, Derrida sets into motion a deconstruction of his own text that he does not seem to anticipate. It is this movement of deconstruction that enables Derrida’s text to live on.