bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Characteristics of 61 Mexican American Adolescents Who Attempted Suicide
Authors: Ng Bernardo
Published: March 2007

A total of 61 Mexican American adolescents who were consecutively admitted to an inpatient psychiatric unit after a suicide attempt were studied. They were given structured interviews to study their demographic, personal, and family characteristics. The intent of the suicide attempts was measured with the Pierce Suicide Intent Scale. Compared to subjects in the low-intent group, those in the high-intent group showed a history of more frequent previous suicide attempts (p < .03), had lived with both biological parents for a longer time (p < .04), usually had at least one biological parent at home at the time of the suicide attempts (p < .001), and had lived in the United States for a shorter period of time (p < .04). Psychosocialfactors including the phenomenon of acculturation are reviewed in the discussion of these results.
Ethnicity and Nonelectoral Political Participation
Authors: Wrinkle Robert D. , Stewart Joseph , Polinard J. L. , Meier Kenneth J. , Arvizu John R.
Published: March 2007

Research on political behavior has generally ignored nonelectoralforms ofparticipation and has given scant attention to ethnic minorities. Part of the reason for these gaps in the literature has to do with the paucity of data. Taking advantage of the availability of data from the Latino National Political Survey, this work looks at whether nonelectoral participation by Mexican Americans, Puerto Ricans, and Cubans can be explained on the basis of culture, socioeconomic status, mobilization, or some combination of the three. Although mobilization appears to offer the strongest explanation, variables representing all three approaches have some utility. Furthermore, it appears that the factors affecting Cuban nonelectoral participation are notably different than for other Latinos.
Making Citizens or Good Citizens? Naturalization as a Predictor of Organizational and Electoral Behavior among Latino Immigrants
Authors: DeSipio Louis
Published: March 2007

In this article, the author draws on the Latino National Political Survey (LNPS) to contrast the political behaviors of naturalized and native-born Latino U.S. citizens. The author examines three types of political behavior-organizational participation, ethnic organizational participation, and electoral participation-and one form of community activity that may serve as a precursor of political activity-school-focused parental involvement. The authorfinds that the naturalized are less likely than similarly situated native-born Latinos to participate in electoral politics and organizational activity. The author also finds that the weight of the negative influence of naturalization is less than the weight of the positive influence on participation of increasing levels of education and of age. The consequence of these findings is that strategies for Latino political empowerment based on naturalization will have to recognize that naturalization is just thefirst step in making politically active citizens.
Language-Specific Response Patterns and Subjective Assessment of Health: A Sociolinguistic Analysis
Authors: Reichman Jill S.
Published: March 2007

It is a premise of many secondary statistical analyses of cross-sectional data that language choice acts as an adequate proxy to assess level of acculturation of Hispanic respondents. In this article, conclusions are analyzed that point to a tendency of Mexican Americans to make negative subjective health assessments. A sociolinguistic analysis is proposed, one that examines code switching as a communicative option that is available to the members of a bilingual speech community. From this perspective, cultural change provides an individual with additional linguistic and symbolic categories for expressing distress. It is discussed how a Mexican American's choice to speak Spanish at the time of the interview may not indicate that he orshe is prone to exaggerate somatic complaints or that he or she is less acculturated, but rather that the mother tongue is the language of choice to communicate psychic demoralization and somatic distress in the context of health-related interview schedules.
Gender, Ethnicity, and Classroom Discourse
Authors: WOLFE JOANNA
Published: March 2007

Ethnic and gender differences in classroom conversational styles are explored by comparing student involvement in face-to-face and computer-mediated discussions. The quantity of participation in these two environments is triangulated with student perceptions of the conversations in three undergraduate composition classrooms. White males participated more frequently than other groups in the face-to-face setting, and White women appeared to benefit more than other groups from conversations held in the computer-mediated setting. However, these gender-differentiated participation patterns did not apply to the discourse patterns of Hispanic males and females. Unlike their White female peers, the Hispanic women in this study participated frequently in the face-to-face conversations, spoke more than Hispanic males, and generally disliked the computer-mediated conversations.
Reading Material
Authors: MORTENSEN PETER
Published: March 2007

It is not uncommon to find literacy figured as “toxic” in discussions of its power to regulate and discipline social behavior. The author's aim in this article is to move from metaphor to material as he explores the toxicity inherent in the manufacturing processes that make print available for mass consumption. He argues that over the past century, the demand for print in certain regions of the United States, primarily the North and West, spurred the growth of commercial papermaking—and the spread of devastating mill pollution—in the South, where demand for print has historically lagged. He suggests that one result of this pollution has been the weakening of social institutions that typically promote and value normative forms of literate activity. With the industries that enable the mass circulation of print now going global, this pattern of uneven and unjust literacy development may well be repeated.
The Rhetoric of Explanation
Authors: CONNORS ROBERT J.
Published: March 2007

Most rhetorical history has concerned itself with the theory of argumentative discourse as it developed from classical to modern times. This essay traces a parallel but much less investigated strand of rhetorical history: the theory and practice of explanation. The slow growth of a body of knowledge about how information could best be communicated without necessary reference to overt persuasion is followed from Aristotle's Rhetoric through the beginnings of a theory of written discourse in the American nineteenth century. A later continuation of this essay will trace explanatory rhetoric into modern times.
Physicists Reading Physics
Authors: BAZERMAN CHARLES
Published: March 2007

Reading, as well as writing, is a constructive activity. Interviews and observations of research physicists reveal reading processes permeated with individual purposes and schema. These schema, or personal maps of the field, include not only consensual knowledge about the phenomena being discussed, but also perceptions as to the most promising lines of current work, methods that are most likely to produce good results, and personal knowledge about the other workers in the field. Schema thus are formed around the active research purposes of the reader. Equally, purposes are framed within the researcher's schematic understanding of the field. With schema and purposes evolving dialectically, texts are read, not as static arguments, but as part of the dynamic process of research activity.
Writing in an Emerging Organization
Authors: DOHENY-FARINA STEPHEN
Published: March 2007

This study explored the collaborative writing processes of a group of computer software company executives. In particular, the study focused on the year-long process that led to the writing of a vital company document. Research methods used included participant/observations, open-ended interviews, and Discourse-Based Interviews. A detailed analysis of the executive collaborative process posits a model that describes the reciprocal relationship between writing and the organizational context. The study shows the following: (1) how the organizational context influences (a) writers' conceptions of their rhetorical situations, and (b) their collaborative writing behavior; and (2) how the rhetorical activities influence the structure of the organization.
Writing in a Political Context
Authors: STOTSKY SANDRA
Published: March 2007

This essay is an extension of recent research on nonacademic writing and represents an initial effort to explore the contexts for the letters citizens send their legislators. It focuses on only one aspect of this writing—its value. Most of the information in the essay comes from interviews with the author's state and national legislators and/or their staff. This essay suggests why the letters about political issues and personal concerns that citizens send their legislators are of great value to both the writer and the reader, and why the relationship between citizens and their public officials as writers and readers may deserve more intensive exploration.
Text Comprehensibility and the Writing Process
Authors: GUNNARSSON BRITT-LOUISE
Published: March 2007

Texts reflect the conditions under which they are produced. This means that the writing process can favor or counteract a comprehensible text. In this article, problems of law text comprehensibility are related to the legislative writing process. The drafting of three pieces of Swedish consumer legislation was observed at different stages, and the results of this study are summarized and analyzed in relation to rhetorical and sociolinguistic theories of writing. Law writing can roughly be described by a rhetorical model as regards the role of the main phases in the process. It is, however, found to be less reader-oriented and more oriented toward the speech community than the rhetorical model prescribes.
Sharing Words
Authors: NYSTRAND MARTIN
Published: March 2007

Understanding the effects of readers on writing development requires prior conceptualization of the relationship between writers and readers. Recently two major schools of thought have emerged concerning this relationship: social constructionism and social interactionism. Influenced by Saussure's structuralist concept of la langue as a set of language norms and Durkheim's concept of social fact, social constructionists emphasize normal, standard discourse: Their key principle is empirical consensus, their unit of analysis is the canon, and their level of social analysis is the community. By contrast, social interactionists, following Bakhtin, focus directly on situated, heteroglossic discourse and seek to characterize la parole, or language use, in useful terms: Their key principle is reciprocity between conversants, and their unit of analysis, as well as their level of social analysis, is the communicational dyad (writer-reader pairs; speaker-listener pairs). Because they focus on whole writer-reader communities, social constructionists deal with the effects of readers on writers in general terms, and they typically reify readers into “the Reader” when dealing with individual cases. By contrast, social interactionists, who concern themselves with describing actual, individual writers and readers, often in ethnographic studies, must articulate a principled analysis of writers and readers without analytic access recourse to group norms. This article first contrasts social constructionist and social interactionist approaches to the problem of discourse and then examines recent social interactionist studies concerning the effects of readers on writers' development, including investigations of word-segmentation skills, peer conferencing, and instructional discourse.
The Literate and the Literary
Authors: McHENRY ELIZABETH , HEATH SHIRLEY BRICE
Published: March 2007

Orality has been a feature repeatedly offered to typify African American language habits. Through anthropological studies of contemporary communities as well as literary portrayals and celebrations of cultural heroes such as preachers and political orators, the strong oral traditions of African Americans have figured prominently in discussions of the contexts of their literary works. This article argues for a balance of this image by laying out historical evidence on the literate values and habits of African Americans since the early 1800s. Literary journals, the Black press, literary writers, and literary societies, especially those of women, between 1830 and 1940 highly valued joint reading groups, creative writing efforts, and the role of literature in the lives of African Americans. Considerable work remains to restore accuracy and cross-class representation of African Americans in English studies, so as to resist tendencies to deny variation in the language habits and values of groups included in multicultural literature.
Writing Children
Authors: DYSON ANNE HAAS
Published: March 2007

Adult ways of writing—of constructing textual visions of—children are linked to their ways of envisioning themselves and, more broadly, to their perceptions of fully “developed” adults. Thus developmental visions have traditionally taken for granted the social and ideological worlds of privileged adults. This article aims to make problematic such writing by reviewing new visions of language and of development that acknowledge human sociocultural and ideological complexity. Within these visions, children's differentation of ways of using language is linked to their differentiation of their own place—potential or actual—in the social world. To more fully explore these new visions, this article also offers a concrete illustration of writing children as social and ideologically complex beings. It concludes by considering implications for both professional writing and classroom pedagogy.
Where Cognitive Psychology Applies
Authors: FOERTSCH JULIE
Published: March 2007

What sort of approach should we use to teach writing skills in today's classrooms? Many socially oriented scholars think we should teach context-specific writing skills that address the text's social milieu, whereas cognitively inclined scholars think we should teach more general models that can be adapted to a wide variety of writing contexts. As a number of composition theorists (e.g., Carter, 1990; Flower, 1994; Nystrand, 1989) have argued, a genuine synthesis between the cognitive theorists' general knowledge perspective and the social theorists' local knowledge perspective is necessary if we wish to teach students of diverse backgrounds how to write successfully in a variety of present and future contexts. This article attempts to bridge the misleading dichotomy between local knowledge and general knowledge by applying what cognitive psychologists have discovered about memory, expertise, and the transfer-of-learning to the question of appropriate composition pedagogy.
Introducing Chaos (Theory) into Science and Engineering
Authors: PAUL DANETTE , CHARNEY DAVIDA
Published: March 2007

Introductions in scientific journal articles invite the community to read, accept, and build on new ideas. Often they open with standard moves that bid readers to attend to new findings that fill a serious gap in the literature on an important topic, thus connecting shared communal ideas and new ideas. How do these moves apply to “revolutionary” disciplines that lack a shared literature? Do introductory moves influence scientists' reading strategies? In a two-stage study, we analyzed introductions of four articles on chaos theory and then asked 12 scientists to think aloud while reading them. To investigate effects of disciplinary maturity, we chose two recent and two early articles. The early “revolutionary” articles differed strikingly from the more conventional recent articles in space devoted to old versus new information, use of citations and equations, and the nature of opening appeal. Scientific readers reacted differently to the recent and early articles, commenting more on new information in the recent articles. Across articles, however, they commented more on shared information than on new ideas. These results underscore the importance of connecting new ideas to the literature even when using unusual techniques to introduce radically new ideas.
Cognitive Differences in Proficient and Nonproficient Essay Scorers
Authors: WOLFE EDWARD W. , KAO CHI-WEN , RANNEY MICHAEL
Published: March 2007

This article examines the behavioral differences of essay scorers who demonstrate different levels of proficiency for a psychometric scoring task. The authors compare three proficiency groups to identify differences in (a) essay features they consider, (b) their understanding of the scoring rubric, and (c) their decision-making procedures. Results indicate scorers with different levels of proficiency do not focus on different essay features when making evaluative decisions but their understandings of the scoring criteria may vary. Proficient scores are more likely to focus on general features of an essay when making evaluative decisions and to adopt values espoused by the scoring rubric than are less proficient scorers. Also, proficient scorers make evaluations by reading the entire essay and then reviewing its content, whereas less proficient scorers may interrupt the reading process to monitor how well the essay satisfies the scoring criteria. Finally, the authors discuss implications for scorer selection and training.
International Reading Strategies for IMRD Articles
Authors: BURROUGH-BOENISCH JOY
Published: March 2007

This article examines the strategies used to read science articles written in the IMRD (Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion) format. Drawing on the results of a survey conducted at an international conference of science editors, it shows how three reader roles—those of the scientist, editor, and reviewer—influence reading strategies. Overall, respondents were more likely to read in IMRD sequence as editors than as reviewers. When reading for personal gain as scientists, they read strategically, not in IMRD order. Other variables considered were the mother tongues (native English or nonnative English), ages, and scientific backgrounds of readers. Nonnative English speakers tended to focus on news-rich sections, especially when reading as scientists. No evidence was found of an effect of age, but there was some evidence of a difference between readers from the hard sciences and those from the humanities. The findings have implications for our understanding of the function and development of the research article and for teaching scientists how to write for publication.
a reappraisal of labor education
Authors: London Jack
Published: March 2007

This analysis of the field of labor education is based on the Joseph Mire report, Labor Education: A Study Report on Needs, Programs, and Approaches (Madison: Inter-University Labor Education Committee, 1956). The particular interest of this reviewer was to extend the findings and recommensetions of the Mire report to a more critical examination, with particular emphasis upon liberal adult education.—J.L.
Personality Factors Which May Interfere With the Learning of Adult Basic Education Students
Authors: Puder William H. , Hand S.E.
Published: March 2007

This paper surveys the literature in several areas of psychological research in an effort to better understand the learning character istics of culturally disadvantaged adults and to study certain emotional factors which appear to inhibit both participation in organized educational activities and effective learning. The survey of literature attempts: (1) to examine the concept of self, as it may pertain to the adult basic education student, (2) to review Rokeach's hypothesis of the closed belief-disbelief system in an effort to relate it to the emotional make-up of adult basic educa tion students, (3) to describe the "closed" social environment which may give rise to the phenomenon of the "closed" mind, and (4) to identify some of the personality characteristics of the adult basic education student which may interfere with his po tential as a learner.
A Comparative Study of Administrative Principles and Practices in Adult Education Units
Authors: Ingham Roy J.
Published: March 2007

Adult education units exist in various types of organizations. The administrators of the different units attempt to achieve their or ganizational goals by applying principles, either explicitly or implicity. One source of the principles is the writings of those who study adult education phenomena. Little effort has been made to utilize some model dealing with organizations for analyz ing and explaining various principles and practices. An effort has been made in this paper to demonstrate the fruitfulness of one such model-the compliance model formulated by Etzioni. Two examples were presented to demonstrate the value of this model. One example showed that principles dealing with ad ministrative processes must be applied differentially to organiza tions, based upon their compliance structure. The second ex ample utilized the model to explain why the adult education unit in the public school is unable to prescribe the task requirements of its students as rigorously as the adult education unit in the university.

The analysis of these two examples also provides further evidence that the model is a valid one since the predictions made on the basis of the model were supported by the data. On the basis of this evidence, further application of the model to the an alysis of adult education units would probably yield fruitful results.
Leisure Styles and Adult Education
Authors: London Jack , Wenkert Robert
Published: March 2007

Participation in adult education is positively associated with certain leisure styles. One style is membership and participation in formal organizations (with the notable exception of labor union membership). A second is minimal engagement in a wide variety of diverse leisure activities. A third is frequent participation in cultural events, in social relations outside the immediate family or neighborhood or work situation, and in sports. Frequent par ticipation in one's immediate surroundings, in restricted friendship circles, and passive engagement in sports and the mass media, tend to be negatively associated with adult education participation. Essentially, people with broad and diverse leisure activities are more likely to participate in adult education. This finding con flicts with a prevailing view that adult education competes with other leisure pursuits for the interest and attention of a potential audience. On the contrary, one obstacle to participation in adult education is adherence to a relatively passive leisure style.
Perseverance Versus Nonperseverance Patterns Among Adult High School Students
Authors: Londoner Carroll A.
Published: March 2007

Parsons' instrumental internal-external model for classifying action orientations provided the theoretical base to test the relation between perseverance and nonperseverance patterns among sub samples of 134 adults in an adult high school. Preference for internally or externally oriented goals, as reasons for enrollment, were obtained from a questionnaire and crosstabulated by per severance (persons who enroll and complete the program) and nonperseverance (persons who enroll, attend a few classes, but fail to complete course requirements). Tabular multivariate analysis elaborated the bivariate distributions to determine the relation between external goal preferences and perseverance, and internal goal preferences and nonperseverance. Perseverers typically rated the external goals as a higher rather than lower reason for enroll ment. The internal-nonperseverance relation was partly confirmed. Spurious noncorrelations within the contingent associations indi cated shifts from internal to external preferences as one ages and faces the demands of the work world.
Teacher-Student Correlates of Goal Expectations
Authors: Londoner Carroll A.
Published: March 2007

The rank-order of importance of a set of educational goals to a sample of 134 adult high school students, composed of com pleters and dropouts, was assessed by 22 teachers of adults to determine how perceptive they were of the differences that exist between completer's and dropout's reasons for enrolling in adult education. Significantly strong associations were observed in the ways teachers and completers assessed the importance of the goals (rho=.78, df=9, p<.01) and the ways teachers and dropouts assessed the importance of the goals (rho=.65, df=9, p<.05). However, marked differences were observed within sets of ranks indicating that teachers and students had significantly different view-points concerning the importance of some of the goals to completers and dropouts. When length of teaching time was con trolled, experienced teachers were found more likely to misjudge the importance of the overall set of goals to the dropouts (rho=.57, NS).
Student Involvement as a Dimension of the Student-Perceived Teaching Behavior of Post Secondary Educators
Authors: Kerwin Michael A.
Published: March 2007

Although several studies of the student-perceived teaching behavior of postsecondary educators have recognized student participation as a dimension of teacher behavior, few, if any, of these studies specifically describe the instructor's involvement of students in the design and operation of an educational program. The Educational Description Questionnaire, which con tains items describing student involvement behaviors, was developed for this study to test the hypothesis that students perceive these behaviors as a dimension of teacher behavior. It was ad ministered to 961 students by seventy-four instructors in four two-year colleges. Factor analysis of each of the sixty items on the questionnaires identified student-involvement behavior as a significant factor. Further research on the student-perceived behavior of postsecondary educators should include items that describe student involvement behaviors.
Computer-Assisted Instruction In Adult Basic and Secondary Education: A Review of the Experimental Literature, 1984-1992
Authors: Rachal John R.
Published: March 2007

Computer-assisted instruction (CAI) in the adult basic and secondary education setting continues to attract the attention of researchers attempting to examine its effects compared to traditional methods not including CAI. All of the reviewed studies utilized control (non-CAI) and experimental (CAI) groups, and most examined any differences in reading, math, and/or other areas of achievement for statistical significance. A few investigations examined attitudes towards computers as well as achievement gains. Of 12 studies meeting the criteria for review, six indicated no statistically significant differences in achievement, two had mixed results, one had significance favorable to CAI, one had significance favorable to traditional methods, and two failed to report statistical significance. Implications are discussed.
Adult Education's Mislaid Mission
Authors: Miller Paul A.
Published: March 2007

Civic discourse has been weakened by the multiple, partial, and opinion-laden views of special interest groups. The contrast between discussion among citizens and the collections of personal opinion promoted in the media is an issue which needs more attention by adult educators than it now receives. A weakening focus on the common good has been replaced by the promotion of personal good. The education of citizens as advanced by the nation's founders has given way to preparing learners to meet the demands of the economic system. Suggestions in accord with future contexts are made to adult educators on how to recover earlier emphases on helping people become active and effective citizens.
Language, Power, and the Construction of Adult Education Programs
Authors: Rees E. Frances , Cervero Ronald M. , Moshi Lioba , Wilson Arthur L.
Published: March 2007

To explain the exercise of power through the use of language and its effects on power relations and program construction, verbal interaction between three planners in two program planning meetings was analyzed. The study revealed that political relationships enacted through the use of language situated crucial planning action. Specifically, learning objectives and adult education tenets as well as ethical imperatives took shape within a socio-political context constituted by the planners' "talk." For this reason, the negotiation of power and interests was a central feature of the planning process. It can be concluded, therefore, that program construction is contingent upon communicative action. One of the implications of the study is that responsible planners must not only be aware of many levels of meaning in discourse but must also know how to use language skillfully and politically to exercise the full extent of their agency.
Behaviorial Profiles of Adolescent Mothers and Partners with Varying Intracouple Age Differences
Authors: Lamb Michael E. , Elster Arthur B. , Tavaré Jane
Published: March 2007

Three hundred twenty-one adolescent mothers (M= 17 years) and their partners were divided into three groups: those with an intracouple age discrepancy less than one year; those with an intracouple age discrepancy between 15 and 36 months; and those with an intracouple age discrepancy of more than 42 months. Compared with those couples with the smallest age discrepancies, those with the largest had known one another for a shorter period, and yet were more likely to have planned and responded positively to the pregnancy. At conception, they were more likely to have been either married or casually involved. The mothers in the large discrepancy group were significantly younger and reported a significantly greater incidence of a number of conduct disordered antisocial behaviors, including school problems (dropping out, behavior problems at school), alcohol, nicotine, and substance usage, and earlier sexual initiation. There were far fewer differences between fathers in the three groups than between mothers.
Parenting Style and Parent-Adolescent Religious Value Consensus
Authors: Luft Gary A. , Sorell Gwendolyn T.
Published: March 2007

Three dimensions of parenting are examined as they relate to value consensus between late adolescents and their parents. A sample of 222 college students completed a questionnaire that assessed perceptions of their parents' childrearing practices in terms of control, nurturance, and communication. The parents and students completed a series of items related to religious values or beliefs. It was found that for father-adolescent dyads, father control and nurturance interacted in relation to value consensus. A parenting style characterized as low in control and low in nurturance was associated with significantly less creedal assent and devotionalism consensus than were other styles of parenting. For mother-adolescent dyads, a three-way interaction between mother control, nurturance, and gender of adolescent was found in relation to religious relativism value consensus, and an interaction between mother control and communication was marginally related to creedal assent and devotionalism value consensus. A high control-high nurturance parenting style was associated with greater creedal assent and devotionalism value consensus than were other styles of parenting. A main effect for gender of adolescent was found in relation to devotionalism value consensus. Mothers had greater agreement with their daughters than with their sons.
Institutional Context of an Adolescent Transition
Authors: Baker David P. , Stevenson David Lee
Published: March 2007

The transition from high school to college occurs within an institutional context and this institutional context influences the academic transitional tasks faced by adolescents. Key characteristics of the institutional context of the transition to college in the United States were the size of higher education, the similarity among colleges in their admission applications, and the nonselectiveness of admission to most colleges. Key characteristics of the institutional context of the transition from high school to college in Japan were the use of different entrance examinations by each college, the links between the prestige of a student's college and labor market opportunities, and the selectiveness of admission to many colleges.
Dialectical Themes in Adolescent Conceptions of Death
Authors: Noppe Lloyd D. , Noppe Illene C.
Published: March 2007

A review of the literature suggests that adolescents' understanding of death may be described in terms offour dialectical themes. The biological dialectic reflects the tension between physical and sexual maturation, and its heralding of inevitable decline. The cognitive dialectic suggests that a fuller understanding of life's possibilities contrasts with the contemplation of death. The social dialectic involves the tension between greater reliance on the peer group and an increased sense of isolation. The affective dialectic includes the emerging sense of identity, entangled with depression and the loss of self. The implications of these dialectics for death education are discussed.
Systemic Patterns of Parenting as Reported by Adolescents
Authors: Johnson Bette Magyar , Shulman Shmuel , Collins W. Andrew
Published: March 2007

Parent behaviors are usually characterized globally in research on psychosocial outcomes, but mothers and fathers may show disparate patterns of control and influence. To examine perceived incongruence in parents' behaviors, 5th, 8th, and 11th graders' reports of each parent's childrearing practices were cluster analyzed Four clusters emerged: atn authoritative congruent pattern, in which both parents were accepting and allowed autonomy, with appropriate discipline; a permissive congruent pattern, in which parents were accepting and allowed autonomy but with lax discipline; and two incongruent patterns, in which either mother or father was perceived as authoritative, whereas thte other parent was perceived as rejecting, not allowing autonomy, and exerting a high level of control. Perceptions of incongruent parenting patterns were associated with lower self-esteem, school adaptation, and school achievement in offspring than were congruent perceptions. Compared to fifth graders, adolescents were more likely to perceive incongruent mothler-father patterns and less likely to perceive congruence in authoritative parenting.
Coping with Anger-Provoking Situations
Authors: Hart Kenneth E.
Published: March 2007

This article examines how adolescents cope with different types of anger-provoking situations. Also explored is the degree to which coping changes or remains the same across different situations. Results showed that focusing-on-the-positive coping was negatively associated with anger reactivity in the face of both affiliation and achievement stress. In addition, individuals who engaged in wishful thinking coping in dealing with angerprovoking interpersonal stressors showed exaggerated anger reactivity, whereas seeking social support was positively related to anger reactivity in the context of stressful situations that threatened achievement needs. Results supported the notion that the emotional consequences of being exposed to stressful anger provocations may be mediated by individual differences in coping, and that the adaptiveness or maladaptiveness of some coping strategies depends on contextual factors such as the nature of the stressor. Moreover, the present data also supported the conceptualization of coping as a dynamic, situation-sensitive process.
Gender Differences in Parent-Child Communication about Sexuality
Authors: Nolin Mary Jo , Petersen Karen Kay
Published: March 2007

Gender differences in factual, sociosexual, and moral discussions about sexuality were examined using questionnaire data gatheredfrom 84 mother-father-child triads andfrom focus groups of questionnaire respondents. Parent-daughter communication was more wide-ranging than parent-son communication for each type of sexual discussion, and gender differences were most pronounced for factual and moral discussions, communication most likely to transmit information and values directly. Son-daughter variation was largely due to the greater role taken by the mother in family sex education. Focus group data suggested reasons for the gender differences that were not revealed by questionnaire data. Sons may be more susceptible to cultural messages encouraging casual sexual encounters because lack of communication with parents has made them less certain offamily norms for sexual behavior Gender differences in family communication about sexuality may resultfrom, and serve to perpetuate, a sexual double standard.
An Outcome Evaluation of across Ages
Authors: LoSciuto Leonard , Rajala Amy K. , Townsend Tara N. , Taylor Andrea S.
Published: March 2007

The goal of Across Ages is to demonstrate the effectiveness of a comprehensive, intergenerational mentoring approach to drug prevention for high-risk middle school students. The core of the project is the involvement of older adults (55+) as mentors to the students. Older mentors help children develop the awareness, self-confidence, and skills they need to resist drugs and overcome overwhelming obstacles. In addition to mentoring, the project engages students in community service activities that benefitfrail elders, provides a classroom-based life skills curriculum, and offers workshops to parents. The project targets sixth-grade students attending three public middle schools in Philadelphia's most stressed neighborhoods and has served 562 children during the first 3 project years. The evaluation results support the initial hypothesis that the multifaceted intervention approach would result in more positive changes in student knowledge, attitudes, and behavior concerning substance abuse and related life skills and that those whose mentors were most involved with them wouldfare even better.
Project Success
Authors: Richards-Colocino Nancy , McKenzie Patricia , Newton Rae R.
Published: March 2007

Project Success is a comprehensive, middle schoolprogramfor the early intervention of alcohol and otherdrug (ATOD) use by high-risk youth to reduce riskfactors and increase resiliency across environmental domains. Referred youth had high levels of ATOD use and risk, lowerself-esteem, more absences, and lower grades than normative peers. For 6 to 12 months, each cohort of students participated in a variety of individual and group interventions (e.g., counseling, tutoring, and community service). Interventions with parents (e.g., periodic contact, counseling, and parent education) also were conducted. Environmental interventions (e.g., training school staff in risk and resiliency strategies, development of an intervention team to access school resources, and the linkages with the community to offer positive alternatives) also were included. These environmental interventions demonstrated positive effects on participating students by maintaining lower than expected ATOD use levels, with reductions in risk levels andfailing grades.
Consultant Choice Across Decision Contexts
Authors: Finken Laura L. , Jacobs Janis E.
Published: March 2007

Differences among four types of decisions (abortion, medical, future oriented, and interpersonal) were explored by presenting vignettes to 169 adolescents 18 through 20 years of age. Participants ranked potential consultants including specif ic family members, significant others, friends, and various professionals on eight decisions. Analyses of the frequency and order of consultation of each consultee 's advice were performedfor all decisions. Consultation patterns for each type of decision differed, thus indicating that the choice of consultants was a function of the type of decision. These findings indicate that for late adolescents, different consultants were seen as useful for making abortion decisions when compared to making medical, future oriented, or interpersonal decisions. Given that the consultation patterns for these decisions were unique, research on decision making should address the role of context and avoid assumptions of generalizability. Details of the frequency and order of consultation for each type of decision are provided
Predicting Young Adult Competencies
Authors: Best Karin M. , Hauser Stuart T. , Allen Joseph P.
Published: March 2007

This study was designed to investigate adolescent era parent behaviors and adolescent personality development as unique and joint predictors of young adult competencies. The study sample consisted of 79 two-parent with an adolescentfamilies who, at the time the data used in these analyses were gathered, had beenfollowed in longitudinal research for 11 years. Parent behaviors theoretically associated with (a) the development of adolescent autonomy while maintaining relatedness to the family (Autonomy and Relatedness Coding) and (b) adolescent ego development (Constraining and Enabling Coding) were used to predict young adult educational attainment and ego resiliency. Results indicated that (a) adolescent era parenting behaviors and (b) adolescent ego development contribute to the prediction of young adult educational attainment and ego resiliency. The influence of parenting behaviors was mediated through ego development. Parent talkativeness and parent behavior interacted in the prediction of ego resiliency.
Divergent Realities and Perceived Inequalities
Authors: Welsh Deborah P. , Galliher Renee V. , Powers Sally I.
Published: March 2007

We examined mothers', adolescents', and observers' discrepancies in perceptions of family interaction guided by two approaches to discrepancies: divergent realities approach, which explores discrepancies in different peoples'perceptions of the samefamily member's interaction, and perceived inequality approach, which focuses on one individual's perception of discrepancies between family members' interaction. We used a video-recallprocedure to assess the videotaped conversations of 79 rural, working-class families. Results using the divergent realities approach support a developmental life-span perspective that posits that adolescents and mothers have different developmental tasks, which result in their viewing their behaviors with each other through different lenses. Adolescents viewedfamily interactions as more conflictual andperceived greater inequalities between themselves and their mothers. These discrepancies may contribute to the transformation toward more symmetrical and individuated parent-child relationships. Results using the perceived inequalities approach revealed that discrepancies between adolescents and their mothers were associated with adolescents' internalizing and externalizing symptoms.
A Person Approach in Research on Adolescence
Authors: Bergman Lars R.
Published: March 2007

Research on adolescence has to face a number of methodological challenges, which tend to be particularly relevant for studies concerning this period of life. Some of these issues are addressed in this article. First, a metatheoretical perspective is introduced in the form of the person approach, which is based on the holistic-interactionistic research paradigm. In a person approach the individual as a “functioning whole” is central and not the variable, as is the usual case. This perspective has consequences both for the theoretical thinking and for the methodological approach. A short overview is given of major types of pattern-based methods often used for carrying out a person approach. Against this background, some methodological challenges for research on adolescence are discussed: Studying growth in patterns or configurations, interindividual differences in maturational tempo, a dynamic versus a static perspective, and prediction and explanation.
Serotonin Phase-Shifts the Circadian Rhythm of Locomotor Activity in the Cockroach
Authors: Page Terry L.
Published: March 2007

Serotonin, a putative neurotransmitter in insects, was found to cause consistent phase shifts of the circadian rhythm of locomotor activity of the cockroach Leucophaea maderae when administered during the early subjective night as a series of 4-μl pulses (one every 15 min) for either 3 or 6 hr. Six-hour treatments with dopamine also caused significant phase shifts during the early subjective night, but 3-hr treatments with dopamine had no phase-shifting effect. Other substances tested in early subjective night (norepinephrine, octopamine, γ-aminobutyric acid, glutamate, carbachol, histamine, tryptophan, tryptamine, N-acetyl serotonin, or 5-hydroxy indole-3-acetic acid) did not consistently cause phase shifts. The phase-shifting effect of serotonin was found to be phase-dependent. The phase response curve (PRC) for serotonin treatments was different from the PRC for light. Like light, serotonin caused phase delays in the late subjective day and early subjective night, but serotonin did not phase-shift rhythms when tested at phases where light causes phase advances.
The Intergeniculate Leaflet Partially Mediates Effects of Light on Circadian Rhythms
Authors: Pickard Gary E. , Ralph Martin R. , Menaker Michael
Published: March 2007

Photic signals affect circadian activity rhythms by both phasic and tonic mechanisms that modulate pacemaker phase and period. In mammals, the effects of light on circadian activity are mediated by the retina, which communicates with the suprahiasmatic nucleus (SCN) by two different anatomical routes: the retino-hypothalamic tract (RHT), originating in the retina, and the geniculo-hypothalamic tract (GHT), arising from a retino-recipient nucleus, the intergeniculate leaflet (IGL). We assessed the roles of these two afferent systems in mediating phasic and tonic effects of light on circadian activity in IGL-lesioned animals. Destruction of the IGL significantly affected phase shifts produced by brief light pulses (phasic effect) and modified the change in period (τ) of the free-running activity rhythm produced by changing the level of constant light (LL) (tonic effect). Phase advances produced by brief light pulses were decreased in amplitude while phase delays were increased in IGL-lesioned animals as compared to controls. The free-running period in constant dark (τDD) of IGL-lesioned animals was greater than τDD of controls, and the lengthening of τ normally produced by LL was not observed or was greatly reduced in IGL-lesioned animals. Entrainment to light-dark cycles was unaffected by the lesions, as were other aspects of the circadian activity rhythm that normally change in response to LL (e.g., activity-rest ratio, total activity, splitting). Our data support the interpretation that the IGL plays a significant role in relaying information regarding illu mination intensity to the SCN.
Pineal Melatonin Rhythms in the Lizard Anolis carolinensis: II. Photoreceptive Inputs
Authors: Underwood Herbert , Calaban Michael
Published: March 2007

The pineal organ of the lizard Anolis carolinensis acts as a transducer of photoperiodic information, since light can affect the pineal melatonin rhythm (PMR). The synthesis and secretion of melatonin may be a major mechanism whereby a circadian pacemaker within the pineal can control circadian clocks located elsewhere. An investigation into potential routes by which light could affect the PMR showed that ( 1) removal of the photosensory parietal eye did not affect the PMR as compared to controls under either a light-dark (LD) 12:12 cycle and a constant temperature (32°C) or an LD 12:12 cycle and a daily temperature cycle (32°C/ 20°C); (2) removal of both the parietal eye and the lateral eyes did not affect the PRM of anoles held in LD 12:12 (constant 32°C); (3) the PMR of blinded anoles re-entrained to a 10- hr shift in the phase of the LD cycle as rapidly as that of sighted anoles; (4) blocking light penetration to the brains of anoles, but leaving the lateral eyes exposed, blocked the ability of anoles to re-entrain to a 10-hr shift in the phase of an LD cycle. The data support the hypothesis that light directly affects the PMR in Anolis and that other potential photic inputs (parietal eye, lateral eyes) play little or no role. This conclusion is supported by previous neurophysiological and ultrastructural studies showing that the lizard pineal possesses functional photoreceptors.