How Can Genetically Informed Research Help Inform the Next Generation of Interparental and Parenting Interventions?

There is robust evidence that the interparental relationship and parenting behaviors each have a significant influence on children's risk for emotional (internalizing) and behavioral (externalizing) problems. Indeed, interventions targeting the interparental relationship and parenting processes show significant intervention‐related reductions in child internalizing and externalizing problems. However, most evidence‐based parenting‐ and couple‐focused interventions result in small to medium effects on children's emotional and behavior problems. It is proposed that there is opportunity to improve upon these interventions through incorporation of knowledge from quantitative genetic research. Three core recommendations are provided for practitioners engaging in intervention work with children and families. These recommendations are contextualized relative to what quantitative genetic studies can tell us about the role of the interparental relationship and parenting behaviors on child outcomes.     

Trajectories of parenting and child negative emotionality during infancy and toddlerhood: a longitudinal analysis

The current longitudinal study examined trajectories of child negative emotionality, parenting efficacy, and overreactive parenting among 382 adoptive families during infancy and toddlerhood. Data were collected from adoptive parents when the children were 9-, 18-, and 27-month-old. Latent growth curve modeling indicated age-related increases in child negative emotionality and overreactive parenting for adoptive fathers and adoptive mothers (AM), and decreases in parent efficacy among AM. Increases in child negative emotionality were also associated with increases in parent overreactivity and decreases in maternal efficacy. Mothers' and fathers' developmental patterns were linked within but not across parenting domains. Limitations and directions for future research are discussed.     

Component structure,reliability, and stability of Lawrence’s Self‐Esteem Questionnaire (LAWSEQ)

Lawrence’s Self‐Esteem Questionnaire (LAWSEQ) was administered to 120 Year 1 pupils in six schools in Belfast, Northern Ireland. A principal components analysis indicated that the scale items were unidimensional and that the reliability of the scores, as estimated by Cronbach’s alpha, was satisfactory (α = .73). There were no differences between boys and girls on either total scores or the individual items comprising the LAWSEQ. A follow‐up study, involving 71 of the children in Year 3, confirmed these findings but the stability of the scores between the two occasions (as indicated by Pearson’s r) was extremely low.     

The ethics of randomized controlled trials in social settings: can social trials be scientifically promising and must there be equipoise?

In a randomized controlled trial (RCT), treatments are assigned randomly and treatments are withheld from participants. Is it ethically permissible to conduct an RCT in a social setting? This paper addresses two conditions for justifying RCTs: that there should be a state of equipoise and that the trial should be scientifically promising. Illustrated with a discussion of the RCT evaluation of the Wizards of Words reading programme, this paper argues that, first, the two conditions can give rise to genuine moral conflicts, and second, efforts can be made to ensure RCTs in social settings are scientifically promising. The argument of this paper therefore is a departure from the current debate on RCTs, where it is assumed these two justifying conditions should not come into conflict, either because research ethics is derived from the professional's duty of care, or because there is a strong distinction between the ethics of research and the duty of care. This paper also addresses critics who argue that in social settings RCTs cannot be scientifically promising and for that reason they are ethically impermissible.     

Diversifying Academic and Professional Identities in Higher Education: Some management challenges

This paper draws on an international study of the management challenges arising from diversifying academic and professional identities in higher education. These challenges include, for instance, the introduction of practice-based disciplines with different traditions such as health and social care, the changing aspirations and expectations of younger generations of staff, a diffusion of management responsibilities and structures, and imperatives for a more holistic approach to the “employment package”, including new forms of recognition and reward. It is suggested that while academic and professional identities have become increasingly dynamic and multi-faceted, change is occurring at different rates in different contexts. A model is offered, therefore, that relates approaches to “people management” to different organisational environments, against the general background of increasing resource constraint arising from the global economic downturn.

     

National Security Directive declassification

The secret character of National Security Directives (NSDs) impairs Congress's ability to pursue its constitutionally mandated policy making and oversight roles when the president employs these directives to unilaterally make national security policy. In addition, their typically classified status presents numerous problems for scholars who can monitor the president's unilateral actions when he employs executive orders, proclamations, or executive agreements, but cannot do so in the case of policy created by security classified NSDs. Many of these directives remain classified for significant periods, as the results presented in this article will show. Furthermore, classification and declassification policy is unilaterally set by the president and, therefore, may be arbitrarily altered to lengthen the time it takes for NSDs to become available for congressional and public scrutiny. The article concludes that a statutory basis could provide more government openness and enhance Congress's ability to provide effective oversight of national security policy made through NSDs.