Digital Commons Network^™

Bridging Or Maintaining Distance: A Matched Comparison Of Parent And Service Provider Realities (Full Report), Karen Frensch, Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

When service providers and parents engage with each other to improve family circumstances, do they have similar impressions of what is important and what is helpful? Our purpose in interviewing parents who have been involved in child protection services and their service providers was to understand how parents and service providers view each other, their interactions, and the services they are engaged in. We were also interested in the “official record”—the files that describe parents, children, their needs, and the services provided in response. A comparison of the perspectives of service providers, parents, and files highlights some of the barriers …

Invisible Lives: The Experiences Of Parents Receiving Child Protective Services (Full Report), Sarah Maiter, Sally Palmer, Shehenaz Manji

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Involvement with child protective services (CPS) may be expected to be a stressful experience for parents. Usually their involvement is involuntary, initiated because someone believes they are not caring adequately for their children: this tells them that the community, or someone in the community, does not approve of them as parents. As families who become involved with CPS tend to be economically deprived and socially marginalized, they may view agency intervention as one more sign that they are not accepted by their community. Moreover it brings the fear of losing their children, perhaps forever. In this context, it is especially …

Family Talk: Parents And Children Involved With The Child Welfare And Children's Mental Health Systems (Full Report), Marshall Fine, Deena Mandell

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Our project focussed on families who had been involved in services with child welfare and children’s mental health. Sixteen families were interviewed and asked to describe their experiences as clients, including positive and negative experiences, what they experienced as helpful and unhelpful, changes they identified as a result of their involvement, and characteristics and practices of the workers they liked most and least. We present their perspectives in order to build understanding of what contributes to making a positive difference in the lives of families in difficulty.

Bridging Or Maintaining Distance: A Matched Comparison Of Parent And Service Provider Realities (Summary Report), Karen Frensch, Gary Cameron

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

When service providers and parents engage with each other to improve family circumstances, do they have similar impressions of what is important and what is helpful? Our purpose in interviewing parents who have been involved in child protection services and their service providers was to understand how parents and service providers view each other, their interactions, and the services they are engaged in. We were also interested in the “official record”—the files that describe parents, children, their needs, and the services provided in response. A comparison of the perspectives of service providers, parents, and files highlights some of the barriers …

Predictors That Affect The Caregiver's Health Status And The Role Of Social Support On The Caregiver's Health Status, Hong Wang

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examines whether the caregiver's self-rated health status is affected by the caregiver's demographic characteristics (age, education level, and income), caregiver's stressor (the number of ADL and IADL), mediating variables of the caregiver's appraisal (willingness to help non-family members, level satisfaction with life, and financial burden), of and mediating variable of social support (information and/or advice from other family members or friends). Data were drawn from Chronic Illness and Caregiving, a national telephone survey conducted by Harris Interactive Inc. on behalf of The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Johns Hopkins University, and Partnership for Solutions. The sample size of caregivers …

The Formative Evaluation Of A Family Life Education Website, Brynn Marie Steimle

Theses and Dissertations

Hundreds of family life education (FLE) websites are now available on the Internet, allowing individuals and families unprecedented access to FLE information. Evaluation is critical to ensuring the quality of and improving FLE websites, yet few FLE website evaluations have been conducted. This study formatively evaluated a new family life education website, called Forever Families (http://www.foreverfamilies.net or http://foreverfamilies.byu.edu), assessing website utilization using Web-based software, and receiving visitor feedback through the use of an online survey. Quantitative survey items assessed knowledge gains, how interesting the content was, usefulness, attractiveness, ease of use of the website, whether or not the site met …

Child Care Quality Matters: How Conclusions May Vary With Context, John M. Love, Linda Harrison, Abraham Sagi-Schwartz, Marinus H. Van Ijzendoorn, Christine Ross, Judy A. Ungerer, Helen Raikes, Christy Brady-Smith, Kimberly Boller, Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, Jill Constantine, Ellen Eliason Kisker, Diane Paulsell, Rachel Chazan-Cohen

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

Three studies examined associations between early child care and child outcomes among families different from those in the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) Early Child Care Research Network study. Results suggest that quality is an important influence on children’s development and may be an important moderator of the amount of time in care. Thus, the generalizability of the NICHD findings may hinge on the context in which those results were obtained. These studies, conducted in three national contexts, with different regulatory climates, ranges of child care quality, and a diversity of family characteristics, suggest a need …

Sibling Death In Childhood: An Evaluation Of The Literature Regarding Inclusion Of Minority Cultures, 1990–2002, Joyce Kay L. Cherry

Community & Environmental Health Theses & Dissertations

This evaluation seeks to determine the extent to which the professional literature concerning bereaved children in the United States includes African American, Hispanic American, and Asian American children whose siblings have died in childhood.

A literature search identifies 58 articles, published between 1990 and 2002, concerning children under age 19 living in the United States whose siblings have died. Articles are sorted by time frame and classified by type. There are 31 descriptive articles consisting of five literature reviews, five commentaries, five case studies, and 16 narratives; there are 27 research articles. Analysis determines the extent to which race, culture, …

Siege And Response: Families’ Everyday Lives And Experiences With Children’S Residential Mental Health Services (Full Report), Gary Cameron, Catherine De Boer, Karen Frensch, Gerald R. Adams

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Purpose
Our purpose in interviewing parents with a child placed in residential mental health treatment was threefold: (1) to understand the functioning of children requiring residential mental health treatment before, during, and after treatment; (2) to characterize parents’ perceptions of their families’ involvement with residential treatment; and, (3) to address the popular notion that children requiring residential treatment come from highly dysfunctional and potentially harmful families by describing prevalent family functioning patterns.

Methodology
|This report is based on information obtained by interviewing 29 primary caregivers who had a child placed in residential care at one of two Ontario children’s mental …

Stories Of Mothers And Child Welfare (Summary Report), Gary Cameron, S. Hoy

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

The voices we hear describing the lives of mothers who come into contact with child welfare agencies are usually those of service providers and researchers. How do mothers make sense of their own lives and what happened to their families when they became involved with child welfare? This report provides an opportunity to listen to what 16 of these mothers had to say over conversations averaging 5 - 6 hours with each woman. Aspects of these stories will be familiar to some readers. Nonetheless, these stories challenge both popular and professional perceptions of who these mothers are and how they …

A Workplace Study Of Three Children’S Mental Health Centres In Southern Ontario, Carol A. Stalker, Deena Mandell, Karen Frensch, C. Harvey

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Rationale Recent cuts to resources for children and families requiring children’s mental health services coupled with an increase in the number of children needing these services have left staff in many agencies feeling extremely challenged in providing positive service environments for children and families. In this context, agencies are faced with the challenge of providing working environments that attract and retain staff, particularly in children’s residential mental health services. The purpose of this study was to explore sources of job satisfaction and stress, and why employees stay with and leave these organizations, in an effort to understand what contributes to …

A Workplace Study Of Four Southern-Ontario Children’S Aid Societies (Full Report), C. Harvey, Deena Mandell, Carol A. Stalker, Karen Frensch

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Rationale Children’s Aid Societies have experienced extensive change since the implementation of recent child welfare reforms in Ontario. Agencies are facing a number of challenges including recruiting and retaining staff, high workloads, extensive requirements for documentation and administration, and less time to serve families and children. The purpose of this study was to understand employee experiences as workers in child welfare.

Research Design A survey was distributed to employees of four children’s aid societies. Completion of the survey was voluntary and all individual responses were kept confidential. Completed surveys were returned directly to researchers. Six to eight months after the …

“Growing Pains And Challenges”: Grandfamilies House Four-Year Follow-Up Evaluation, Alison S. Gottlieb, Nina M. Silverstein

Gerontology Institute Publications

During the past decade, there has been increased awareness of issues facing grandparent caregiver families on the part of policymakers and service providers. This awareness has prompted efforts to document the numbers of children being raised by grandparents, to identify challenges faced by grandparents raising grandchildren, and to provide services to meet the needs of these families. National estimates suggest that the numbers of grandparent caregiver families are increasing. Recent estimates suggest that 1.4 million (2%) of all children under 18 live in “skipped generation” families in the United States; similarly, 29,000 (nearly 2%) of all children in Massachusetts live …

Long-Term Care: Informed By Research, Francis G. Caro

Gerontology Institute Publications

Health services research has contributed to health policy and service developments that have led to major improvements in the quality of long-term care in the United States. This policy brief highlights a few areas in which publicly and privately funded research has informed the long-term care field.

Cultural And Socioeconomic Influences On Divorce During Modernization: Southeast Asia, 1940s To 1960s, Charles Hirschman, Bussarawan Teerawichitchainan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The conventional model of a rising divorce rate during the process of modernization is a staple element of the sociological theory of the family. This generalization is challenged, however, by traditional high-divorce societies, primarily in Islamic Southeast Asia, which have experienced a decline in divorce with modernization. In this study, based on micro-level survey data, the authors explore the social roots of marital disruption in Indonesia and Malaysia and in another Southeast Asian society, Thailand, which has not been identified as a high-divorce society. Comparable survey data from the 1970s (from the World Fertility Survey) allow for an in-depth analysis …

The Mommy Track: The Consequences Of Gender Ideology And Aspirations On Age At First Motherhood, Jennifer Stewart

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

While there is extensive and compelling evidence that growing up in an impoverished background leads to early fertility, few studies explain why early socioeconomic disadvantage leads to early childbearing. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, I test whether gender ideology, as well as educational and occupational aspirations, mediates the connection between poverty and teen fertility patterns. Traditional gender ideology depresses age at first motherhood. Adolescent aspirations appear to act as protective factors in the production of early pregnancy.

Note: Handwritten Note, Edna Louise Saffy

Saffy Collection - All Textual Materials

Handwritten note about one final goal. Date: May 27, 2003

Married Asian-Indian Women's Attitude Toward Divorce And Its Relationship To Acculturation In The United States, Kavita K. Ajmere

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examined the relationship between married predominantly Hindu Asian-Indian women's attitude toward divorce and their acculturation in the United States. The final data set included a total of 66 participants (33 first generation and 33 second generation). These participants were administered The Majority Minority Relations Survey (MMRS), the Attitudes Toward Divorce Questionnaire, and a Demographic Information Questionnaire. Results showed on average, first generation participants endorsed more conservative attitudes toward divorce, higher levels of perceived prejudice by the majority group, and higher level of language usage in their native Indian language. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis showed that acculturation added 15% …

Seniors In Public Housing, Jan Mutchler, Francis G. Caro

Gerontology Institute Publications

In recent years, the Boston Housing Authority (BHA) discovered that nearly 40% of the seniors (residents aged 62 and over) living in their public housing developments were living in family housing developments rather than in senior/disabled housing developments. Administrators at the BHA were aware that some seniors lived in family developments, but they were committed to learning more systematically about this population and their needs. They turned to the Gerontology Institute at the University at Massachusetts Boston as a partner in this effort. With funding from the Boston Foundation, the collaboration resulted in a research and policy development effort on …

Chinese Parents’ Knowledge, Attitudes, And Practices About Sexuality Education For Adolescents In The Family, Wenli Liu, Carolyn P. Edwards

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

This study used a cross-sectional, multi-site survey design to examine Chinese parents’ knowledge, attitudes, and practices in the area of sexuality education for adolescents. Three cities in China were selected for the survey, and the final sample contained 841 parents with children ranged from 11 to 19 years. The majority of Chinese parents were found to have reasonably accurate knowledge about sexuality and positive attitudes toward sexuality and sexuality education. However, most Chinese parents reported that they never talked with their children about sexuality. Parental education was strongly related to both knowledge and attitudes. Gender of parent was a significant …

A Culture Of Relationships: Early Care For Italian And American Children, Carolyn P. Edwards

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

A culture of childhood is a shared vision – an agreed upon vision – of the needs and rights of children, including ideas about how the people of the community can collectively nurture them and at the same time be renewed by them. In other words, it is a set of values, beliefs, and practices that people have created to guide their way of nurturing young children and their families. The vision is about investing in young children and investing in the supports and relationships that children need to learn and grow, both for the reason that children carry our …

Premarital Education: Participation, Attitudes, And Relation To Marital Adjustment In A Sample From Northern Utah, Bryan D. Ramboz

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The purpose of this study was to investigate the attitudes, participation in, and potential effectiveness of premarital education as a vehicle to promote more satisfying marriages. A retrospective survey instrument, including existing measures of religious values, willingness to invest in marriage, and marital satisfaction, was used to gather data to answer research questions related to couples' participation in, and attitudes about premarital education, and their influence on marital adjustment and satisfaction. Information about the amount of Time spent in premarital education, breadth of Topics covered, Training of the provider, and whether or not Testing was performed also was gathered and …

Maternal Involvement In Preschoolers' Sexuality Education: A Comparison Of Single And Married Mothers, Ginger S. Sandweg

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study examined the responses to a sexuality education questionnaire completed by 30 single mothers and 43 married mothers with preschool-aged children. Chi-square analyses were used to examine differences between married mothers and single mothers; mothers of males and mothers of females; and married mothers of males, married mothers of females, single mothers of males and single mothers of females. Age at which their preschool children first exhibited behaviors, frequency of that behavior, and comfort level of mothers' responses to those behaviors were addressed for each topic: male-female differences, reproduction and birth, privacy or modesty, taboo or obscene words, genital …

An Assessment Of Marital Satisfaction, Marital Adjustment, And Problematic Areas During The First Few Months Of Marriage Among A Sample Of Newlyweds In Utah, David G. Schramm

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

A self-selected sample of 232 newlywed husbands and wives in Utah was surveyed to assess marital satisfaction, marital adjustment, and problematic areas during the first few months of marriage. The study utilized the Kansas Marital Satisfaction Scale (KMSS) and the Revised Dyadic Adjustment Scale (RDAS), in addition to a list of30 potential problematic areas created by Creighton University to measure these constructs.

Although the majority of the newlyweds in this sample were fairly satisfied and well adjusted, 11% of both husbands and wives scored in the distressed range on the RDAS, signaling that the first few months of marriage can …

It Does Take A Village To Raise A Child, Rebecca J. Boyd

Sociology & Criminal Justice Theses & Dissertations

Utilizing Cullen's (1994) Social Support Theory and Hunter's (1985) three dimensions of social life, this study is a quantitative, cross-sectional secondary data analysis designed to examine the relationship between institutional social support and rates of juvenile crime for counties and cities in Virginia for the year 2000. Resting on the contention that an inverse, significant relationship exists between measures of institutional support and rates of juvenile property and violent crime, this study examines types of support provided by the institutions of family, school, and the government. These measures of institutional support include 1) familial support: median income, marriage support; 2) …

Canadian Child Welfare: System Design Dimensions And Possibilities For Innovation, Gary Cameron, Nancy Colleen Freymond

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Ontario child welfare is entering territory where other countries have gone before. A decade earlier, jurisdictions in England, the United States and Australia implemented similar reforms and, not coincidentally, encountered comparable difficulties, creating high levels of dissatisfaction among service users and service providers. Our contention is that such frustrations are inherent consequences of the underpinnings of the “Anglo-American child protection paradigm”. To do better, it is helpful to look for ideas outside of what is familiar and to consider how useful approaches from other jurisdictions might be adapted to a Canadian context. There are two primary focuses for this paper: …

"Are You Beginning To See A Pattern Here?" Family And Medical Discourses Shape The Story Of Black Infant Mortality, Elaine R. Cleeton

The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare

Postmodern and poststructuralist theorizations of the interrelations of the particular and the universal have identified women's bodies to be the last frontier for scientific discovery leading to and satisfying the modern compulsion to stabilize and control life from birth to death. This institutional ethnography of one city's response to an elevated infant mortality rate among the babies of African American urban, impoverished women explores their discursive transformation from single mothers who cannot begin prenatal care before the second trimester because too few physicians will treat Medicaid patients, into sexually-immoral, illegaldrug- using women who deliberately harm their babies. The study locates …

Ua12/2/1 The Look Of Love, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Administration Documents

College Heights Herald Valentine's Day magazine with articles:

• Engle, Megan. Eight Years Later, The Rules Are Still Around for Some – Dating
• Riley, Cassie. Students Not in Love with Cupid
• Hellmueller, Anthony. Magazines Not So Different After All
• Robinson, Jocelyn. Creative, Inexpensive Gifts for that Special Someone
• Mills, Zach. Holiday Honors Saint Valentine
• Roberts, Amy. Candy Hearts Reason to Celebrate
• Holm, Hollan. Strip Aerobics Sweeping the Nation
• Sainlar, Lindsay. Broken Hearts Can Be Mended

Aboriginal Child Welfare, Deena Mandell, J. Clouston Carlson, Marshall Fine, Cindy Blackstock

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

As the relationships between Canada’s Aboriginal peoples and the state undergo changes, the issue of Child Welfare is in the foreground; for it is around the well being, education and care of Aboriginal children that much of the painful historical relationship between First Nations and Canadian government has been played out. In this paper we consider the major issues in Canadian Aboriginal child welfare, drawing upon an extensive review and synthesis of current theory and research. Although there is an abundance of material available concerning Aboriginal child welfare, much of it exists outside mainstream academic child welfare literature. Some of …

Understanding And Preventing Employee Turnover, C. Harvey, Carol A. Stalker

Partnerships for Children and Families Project

Child welfare agencies have identified worker turnover as a particularly problematic organizational issue. In children’s mental health agencies, turnover also seems to be an issue for residential care services. Do people voluntarily leave child welfare and children's mental health organizations because of the work itself, because of the workload, or because they find “success” difficult to experience? These are often given as reasons by departing employees, but to develop a comprehensive understanding why turnover takes place in these organizations, this paper looks at the research on turnover in organizations generally and in child welfare and children's mental health organizations specifically. …