Systematically Identifying Relevant Research : Case Study on Child Protection Social workers' Resilience

Context: The development of a consolidated knowledge base for social work requires rigorous approaches to identifying relevant research. Method: The quality of 10 databases and a web search engine were appraised by systematically searching for research articles on resilience and burnout in child protection social workers. Results: Applied Social Sciences Index and Abstracts, Social Services Abstracts and Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) had greatest sensitivity, each retrieving more than double than any other database. PsycINFO and Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health (CINAHL) had highest precision. Google Scholar had modest sensitivity and good precision in relation to the first 100 items. SSCI, Google Scholar, Medline, and CINAHL retrieved the highest number of hits not retrieved by any other database. Conclusion: A range of databases is required for even modestly comprehensive searching. Advanced database searching methods are being developed but the profession requires greater standardization of terminology to assist in information retrieval.

Welfare regime and social class variation in poverty and economic vulnerability in Europe: an analysis of EU-SILC

In this paper we address a set of interrelated issues. These comprise increasing concerns about reliance on nationally based income poverty measures in the context of EU enlargement, the relative merits of one-dimensional versus multidimensional approaches to poverty and social exclusion and the continuing relevance of class-based explanations of life chances. When identifying economically vulnerable groups we find that, contrary to the situation with national income poverty measures, levels of vulnerability vary systematically across welfare regimes. The multidimensional profile of the economically vulnerable sharply differentiates them from the remainder of the population. While they are also characterised by distinctively higher levels of multiple deprivation, a substantial majority of the economically vulnerable are not exposed to such deprivation. Unlike the national relative income approach, the focus on economic vulnerability reveals a pattern of class differentiation that is not dominated by the contrast between the self-employed and all others. In contrast to a European-wide relative income approach, it also simultaneously captures the fact that absolute levels of vulnerability are distinctively higher among the lower social classes in the less comprehensive and generous welfare regimes while class relativities are significantly sharper at the other end of the spectrum.

Borders, Asylum and Global Non-Citizenship: The Other Side of the Fence

The experience of border crossing for refugees and irregular migrants challenges global border and migration controls in multiple contexts. Using qualitative field research in Tanzania, Spain, Morocco and Australia, Heather Johnson asks how a global regime of migration management and control can be perceived through the dynamics of particular border spaces: refugee camps, border zones and detention centres. She explores how irregular migrants are impacted by the increasingly security-oriented practices of border control, and how they confront these practices. Johnson rejects the characterization of border spaces as exceptional, abject and exclusionary, arguing instead for an understanding of politics as everyday contestation that reveals a radical political agency, re-imagining the global non-citizen as a transgressive and powerful figure. Building on recent scholarship that rethinks irregularity and non-citizenship, her conclusions have broad implications for how we understand irregular migration from a position of dialogue and solidarity.

The EU economic and social model in the global crisis: Interdisciplinary perspectives:Interdisciplinary perspectives

This book addresses the viability of the EU economic and social model within and after the global economic crisis. It identifies four key issues which warrant further discussion: (1) the asymmetry of the legal and policy framework of the euro and potential recalibration; (2) substantive tensions between the EU 'economic constitution' and its normative aim of social justice and impacts on national policy; (3) the role of civil society, including the two sides of industry in overcoming these tensions and (4) the EU's global aspirations towards the creation of a viable socio-economic model. Its chapters offer two perspectives on each of the four main issues. In drawing these debates together, the book provides a broad understanding as well as starting points for future research. Bringing together different disciplinary approaches, ranging from legal studies to political economy, sociology and macroeconomics, it is a valuable contribution to the debate on the European social model and introduces new insights by focusing on legal and political tensions, the impact of the financial crisis and other economic contexts as well as global dimensions. 

Readjusting our Sporting Sites/Sight: Sportification and the Theatricality of Social Life

This paper points out the potential of using sport for the analysis of society. Cultivated human movement is a specific social and cultural subsystem (involving sport, movement culture and physical culture), yet it becomes a part of wider social discourses by extending some of its characteristics into various other spheres. This process, theorised as sportification, provides as useful concept to examine the permeation of certain phenomena from the area of sport into the social reality outside of sport. In this paper, we investigate the phenomena of sportification which we parallel with visual culture and spectatorship practices in the Renaissance era. The emphasis in our investigation is on theatricality and performativity; particularly, the superficial spectator engagement with modern sport and sporting spectacles. Unlike the significance afforded to visualisation and deeper symbolic interpretation in Renaissance art, contemporary cultural shifts have changed and challenged the ways in which the active and interacting body is positioned, politicised, symbolised and ultimately understood. We suggest here that the ways in which we view sport and sporting bodies within a (post)modern context (particularly with the confounding amalgamations of signs and symbols and emphasis on hyper-realities) has invariably become detached from sports’ profound metaphysical meanings and resonance. Subsequently, by emphasising the associations between social theatrics and the sporting complex, this paper aims to remind readers of ways that sport—as a nuanced phenomenon—can be operationalised to help us to contemplate questions about nature, society, ourselves and the complex worlds in which we live.

Concept analysis in social studies

This project was undertaken because of a need to analyse concepts in social science more specifically and sequence them more carefully in a social science program. Concepts have been identified vaguely on many curriculum documents or left in isolation from each other when they are specifically identified. The project's aim was to identify a method for analysing concepts and sequencing their teaching on some rational basis. Once the method for analysing concepts was identified a questionnaire was designed and administered to a random sample of students at the grade three, five and eight levels. The questionnaire attempted to measure their comprehension of specific social science concepts at several levels which became progressively more complex. The major hypothesis was that there would be a direct correlation between age and achievement on the questionnaire. The raw scores were seriated and correlated with the ages of the students using the rankdifference- squared method. For the majority of areas tested it was found that there was a significant correlation between age and achievement on the questionnaire. Variation in the correlation coefficients generated suggests that comprehension of social science concepts is not simply a function of age but is probably a function of several inter-related factors such as reading ability, skill in Basic Thinking Skills and age. Thirty students completed each test. There were three tests in the questionnaire.

Ethics and Social Responsibility in the Life Sciences

Social Sciences and Humanities Research CouncilHomerton College, Cambridge, U.K.

Les formes de l'illégitimité intellectuelle: genre et sciences sociales françaises entre 1890 et 1940

Thèse réalisée en cotutelle avec l'École des hautes études en sciences sociales

Les chercheurs, leur discipline, leurs publics: l’orientation de la recherche en sciences sociales et humaines

Réalisé en association avec le Centre interuniversitaire de recherche sur la science et la technologie (CIRST).

La nature des représentations sociales des enseignantes du primaire à l’égard du domaine de l’univers social et de son enseignement : étude de cas à la Commission scolaire de l’Or-et-des-Bois.

Cette recherche vise à mettre en lumière la nature des représentations sociales des enseignantes du primaire au sein d’une commission scolaire québécoise à l’égard des disciplines liées au domaine de l’univers social, et aussi de l’enseignement de celles-ci. La recherche a pris naissance à la suite de nombreuses interventions dans les classes du primaire en tant que superviseur de stage et de discussions avec les enseignantes relatives à l’enseignement des sciences humaines. Ce projet repose ses fondements sur le constat suivant : l’apprentissage au primaire des savoirs et des compétences en univers social est déficient et ne répond pas complètement aux attentes prescrites par le ministère de l’Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport. Les enseignantes du primaire n’enseignent que très peu les savoirs et les compétences en univers social au Québec; ainsi, les élèves arrivent peu outillés au secondaire. Des recherches antérieures ont permis de cibler certains facteurs permettant d’expliquer cet état de fait. Or, nous supposions qu’il existait d’autres raisons pouvant expliquer ce phénomène et nous croyions que l’analyse des représentations sociales des enseignantes pourrait apporter des informations importantes dans l’analyse de cette problématique. Cette analyse des représentations sociales est basée sur les travaux et les théories relatives au noyau central (Abric, 1994a). Elle fut construite autour d’une recherche exploratoire au sein d’une commission scolaire en région où 21 enseignantes ont été interviewées. Utilisant une méthodologie qualitative avec une approche s’adressant plus particulièrement aux sciences de l’éducation (Merriam, 1998), les résultats de la recherche nous permettent d’identifier trois facteurs déterminants dans la création des représentations sociales des enseignantes à l’égard de l’histoire, de la géographie et de l’éducation à la citoyenneté. Ces facteurs amènent également les enseignantes à modeler leurs approches pédagogiques et didactiques quant à l’enseignement de l’univers social au primaire. Cette recherche a d’ailleurs permis de mieux comprendre la création des représentations sociales des enseignantes quant aux disciplines associées aux sciences humaines et permis de cibler plusieurs facteurs déterminants de cette réticence à enseigner cette matière aux élèves.

Réseaux, homophilie et discours de collaboration scientifique au Québec : étude comparée sur le capital social des chercheurs junior et senior (1990-2009)

Notre étude porte sur la manière dont les chercheurs universitaires junior et senior en sciences sociales au Québec établissent leurs réseaux de cosignataires et donnent une interprétation discursive à leurs activités de collaboration face à l'impact du changement institutionnel universitaire pendant la période 1990-2009. Plus spécifiquement, notre recherche s'intéresse à montrer que la création des réseaux et la collaboration scientifique par cosignature peuvent être identifiées comme des « ajustements professionnels » et se présenter aussi comme une ressource du capital social qui peut être mobilisé et qui peut produire des avantages aux chercheurs en accord avec leur statut junior ou senior. Il s’agit donc d’une recherche qui relève de la sociologie des sciences. Notre approche a été opérationnalisée à partir de l'étude de 15 membres d'un centre de recherche universitaire au Québec, et leur réseau de 447 cosignataires (y compris les chercheurs de l'étude), et à travers l'application de 7 entretiens auprès de chercheurs junior et senior du même centre. Dans le même plan opérationnel, depuis une perspective qualitative, la thèse permet d'identifier le sens discursif que les chercheurs fournissent à la collaboration et à la participation en réseaux de cosignatures. Ensuite, depuis l'analyse structurelle des réseaux, notre étude montre les connexions individuelles et leurs formes d'interprétation — spécialement la théorie des graphes et ses mesures de centralité (la centralité de degré, la centralité d’intermédiarité et la centralité de vecteur propre) — de même que l'homophilie par statut entre chercheurs. Enfin, depuis l'analyse statistique, elle montre la corrélation des périodes de l'étude et des attributs socioprofessionnels des chercheurs étudiés (sexe, statut universitaire, affiliation institutionnelle, discipline d’appartenance, pays, région du Canada et ville de travail). Notamment, les résultats de notre thèse montrent que chaque catégorie de chercheurs possède ses propres particularités structurelles et discursives en ce qui a trait à ses pratiques de collaboration en réseau, et vont confirmer que les chercheurs senior, plus que les chercheurs junior, grâce à leur capital social mobilisé, ont conservé et obtenu plus d'avantages de leur réseau de cosignataires afin de s'adapter au changement institutionnel et mieux gérer leur travail de collaboration destiné à l’espace international, mais surtout à l'espace local.

Multilevel multitrait-multimethod model: application to the measurement of egocentered social networks

Our goal in this paper is to assess reliability and validity of egocentered network data using multilevel analysis (Muthen, 1989, Hox, 1993) under the multitrait-multimethod approach. The confirmatory factor analysis model for multitrait-multimethod data (Werts & Linn, 1970; Andrews, 1984) is used for our analyses. In this study we reanalyse a part of data of another study (Kogovšek et al., 2002) done on a representative sample of the inhabitants of Ljubljana. The traits used in our article are the name interpreters. We consider egocentered network data as hierarchical; therefore a multilevel analysis is required. We use Muthen's partial maximum likelihood approach, called pseudobalanced solution (Muthen, 1989, 1990, 1994) which produces estimations close to maximum likelihood for large ego sample sizes (Hox & Mass, 2001). Several analyses will be done in order to compare this multilevel analysis to classic methods of analysis such as the ones made in Kogovšek et al. (2002), who analysed the data only at group (ego) level considering averages of all alters within the ego. We show that some of the results obtained by classic methods are biased and that multilevel analysis provides more detailed information that much enriches the interpretation of reliability and validity of hierarchical data. Within and between-ego reliabilities and validities and other related quality measures are defined, computed and interpreted

Anàlisi de les revistes indexades al Journal of Citation Reports del Social Science Citation Index. Període 1997-2005

En aquest estat de la qüestió, s’hi presenten els resultats d’una anàlisi sobre l’evolució i les característiques principals de les revistes de geografia incloses al Journal of Citation Reports dins de la versió del Social Science Citation Index i, per tant, amb factor d’impacte. El període d’estudi escollit ha estat el que va de 1997 a 2005, és a dir, al llarg dels darrers nou anys amb dades disponibles. En total, hi han aparegut incloses trenta-nou revistes, una bona part de les quals ha romàs a la llista durant tot el temps estudiat. Hi ha hagut deu publicacions que han estat situades entre les cinc amb més factor d’impacte de cada any, i cap no ha estat la primera més de dos anys seguits. S’han trobat divuit temàtiques diferents en el conjunt de les revistes, en destaquen les de caire generalista i les de geografia econòmica i regional. Una gran majoria dels volums està publicada per editorials, Blackwell Publishing n’és la més destacada. L’origen de les revistes és clarament anglosaxó, només n’hi trobem dues d’escrites en una altra llengua. La segona part de l’article descriu totes les publicacions contemplades en els nou anys estudiats, amb una petita ressenya de cadascuna

Motivating farmers: insights from social psychology

We are social beings. What we do and don’t do, what we think, the decisions we take are all influenced by those around us. Sometimes we are conscious of those influences, often we are not. Those who influence us are not just our close family and friends, our own social and professional networks, but the wider societies and cultures to which we belong. The goals we espouse, the values we hold, the image we have of ourselves are all molded to a large extent by our interactions and relationships with other people. The social sciences offer a range of concepts and tools for exploring these influences. In this paper, I introduce some of these and illustrate them with recent research I and my colleagues have been doing at the University of Reading among livestock farmers in the UK, with a view to providing insights that can then be used to plan and implement more effective interventions.

Desenvolvimento Urbano e Cidades Inclusivas: Estudo Analítico do Princípio Constitucional da Função Social das Cidades

The reality of Latin America points out that the industrialization and urbanization are complementary processes associated each other. Thus, by consequence of the demographic growth, observes the aggravation of an urbanization completely disordered and without infrastructure capable of guaranteeing rights and basic services to the population. In parallel, the dissemination of information, the valorization of human dignity, promoted by social welfare, and expectations of consumption aggravates the tensions among social actors, leading to the Theory of the Right to Development to worry about the (re)construction of cities. Before this reality, the Federal Constitution of 1988 proposed a participatory urban policy, grounded in the ideal of confrontation of social exclusion of a more comprehensive, represented by the principle of the social function of cities, which must be stratified into four inclusion´s central axes, namely: the social in the strict sense, the economic, the cultural and the policy. The Analysis of each of these dimensions, keeping the focus on reality and the Brazilian legal system, composes specific objectives of this work. Thus, through deductive research, with use of technique bibliographical and interdisciplinary, this dissertation aims to make connections between social function and development, proposing an analytical concept for the proposing an analytical concept for the principle of social function of cities, through the study of its basic elements. With this, purports to demonstrate how results, firstly, that the juridical study, to fully understand the process of marginalization, must maintain multidisciplinary perspective, own social sciences. Also aims to demonstrate that the dimensions of inclusion are formed by fundamental rights, individual and collective, of liberties and of social guarantees and that without respect to all of them there is no way to talk about implementation of urban development and nor, consequently, about inclusive cities. At the end, after checking the main legal instruments of urban policy that emphasize the community participation, provided for in the Statute of the Cities, and that potentiate the breakup of the circles of exclusion, the work want contribute to the clarification and the awaken to the importance of a new perspective democratic of development in the country, grounded in the appreciation of the individual for realization of modern management, decentralized and that, therefore, inserts the effective participation of urban communities in the acting of the State