Imbalanced sex ratios, men's sexual behavior, and risk of sexually transmitted infection in China

China has been experiencing pronounced changes in its sex ratio, but little research has explored the consequences of these changes for sexual behavior and health. We merge data from the 1999-2000 Chinese Health and Family Life Survey with community-level data from the 1982, 1990, and 2000 Chinese censuses to examine the relationship between the local sex ratio and several dimensions of men's sexual behavior and sexual health. Multilevel logistic regression models show that, when faced with a relative abundance of age-matched women in their community, Chinese men are slightly less likely to have intercourse with commercial sex workers, but are more likely to engage in premarital noncommercial intercourse and to test positive for a sexually transmitted infection. These findings are consistent with hypotheses derived from demographic-opportunity theory, which suggests that an abundance of opposite-sex partners will increase the risk of early, frequent, and multi-partner sex and, through this, sexually transmitted infection risk.     

College students’ attitudes toward abortion and commitment to the issue

Male and female participants were surveyed on abortion attitudes, commitment, and abortion experience. Results revealed a normal distribution of abortion attitudes rejecting the notion that the vast majority of the sample would have significantly pro-choice views. No significant difference was found in overall abortion attitudes of males vs. females, however, individuals with direct abortion experience were found to have significantly stronger pro-choice attitudes than individuals without direct abortion experience. Overall, college students reported a moderate degree of commitment to the issue of abortion. Females were significantly more committed than males, individuals with direct abortion experience were significantly more committed than individuals without direct abortion experience, and individuals with more extreme abortion attitudes were significantly more committed than those with weaker, more ambivalent, attitudes. No significant difference was found in level of commitment between pro-choice and pro-life individuals.     

THE SOCIAL MANAGEMENT OF AMBITION

This study of "the social management of ambition' (Hopper 1968) analyzes the changes in occupational expectations that occur among a group of ambitious high school seniors during the seven years after graduation. The predictions of a socialization and of a social reproduction model of the process of expectations change are compared using data from the National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972. Loglinear analysis is used to estimate a model, with a focus on the roles played by race, gender, social origins, and marriage. Less than one-fifth of the original sample remained "on track' toward achieving their original goals, most often members of already advantaged groups (whites and those from upper-middle-class homes). Married women were among the "cumulatively disadvantaged,' unlike their single peers. Marriage in particular had very different consequences for members of different social groups.     

Does structure find structure?: A critique of Burt's use of distance as a measure of structural equivalence

This paper examines some of the assumptions and consequences of the use of distance as a measure of structural equivalence, as implemented in Burt's STRUCTURE program. We take the general perspective that for a measure to be useful it should not confound separate types of information which are theoretically and mathematically independent. The mathematical relationship between distance and the Pearson product moment correlation coefficient is presented. We show that use of distance as a measure of similarity without proper attention to appropriate standardization procedures confounds information on differences between means and differences between variances with information on the similarity of the patterns between pairs of individuals, e.g. correlation. A detailed examination of Burt and Bittner's analysis of Bernard, Killworth and Sailer's Ham radio operator group is presented, and it is demonstrated that use of distance as a measure of structural equivalence led to nonsensical results.     

BASIC FAMILY THERAPY SKILLS,II: STRUCTURAL FAMILY THERAPY1

The Basic Family Therapy Skills Project has yielded empirically derived skills important for beginning family therapists. This article reports the results of ratings from the 103-member panel of experts who practice and teach Structural Family Therapy. A total of 100 competencies of Structural Family Therapy were rated in terms of importance on a 5-point Likert scale by the panel. Panelists were also given alternative responses such as “appropriate as a generic skill,”“inappropriate for beginning therapists,” and “don't understand what this means.” Rationale for the approach and results are discussed in terms of the importance of empirically based competencies for the practice of Structural Family Therapy.     

‘No Thought of Gender’: Bodily Norms in Swedish Rescue Services Incident Reporting

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) play an increasingly important role in the preventative and planning work carried out by rescue services, but to date there has been little research investigating how these technologies may be involved in the gendering of the organization. In this study, I seek to complement existing analyses of the gendered rescue service by focusing on a web portal used to collect, process and publish data about accidents in Sweden. Through the figuration of the ‘modest witness’ I suggest how an apparent absence of gender in the accident reporting process may actually be part of a wider organizational process of gendering in which only certain bodies are allowed to be visible and allowed to witness officially.