SAGE Podcast

Recent epidemiological data show that older adults comprise a growing age group of drug users and new AIDS cases in the United States. Prevention and intervention studies show that risk behaviors leading to HIV infection are increasing among older users, particularly among the socially vulnerable. Yet older adults remain an underresearched population of drug users and little is known about their risk behaviors. Our aim is to address this gap in knowledge on older users by comparing contextual factors that influence risk behaviors and harm reduction strategies practiced by older drug users living in different communities. This study is based on ethnographic fieldwork in suburban and inner-city neighborhoods in a large metropolitan area in the southeastern United States. Interviewers conducted face-to-face, in-depth, life history interviews with 69 older adults (ages 45 and older) who used heroin, cocaine, and/or methamphetamine. Findings show that while risk behaviors were similar among older adult drug users living in suburban and inner-city environments, the provision of harm reduction education and paraphernalia varied widely. The results show the need for the expansion of harm reduction services focused on older adult drug users who are homeless, uninsured, or socially isolated. This application-oriented research will inform health care and treatment providers and generate new directions for future collaborative harm reduction services aimed to decrease the spread of HIV and other infectious diseases associated with drug use.

Modern desistance research has examined many facets of desistance, in terms of theoretical predictors of desistance and recidivism, and in terms of differing types of offending. Though predicting desistance from illegal drug use is among these topics, no research to date has examined the predictors of desisting from prescription opioid abuse. This study uses longitudinal data from 318 prescription opioid users to analyze the effects of various predictors of desistance on declining nonmedical prescription opioid use, with an emphasis on gender differences among participants. Results indicate that theoretical and demographic characteristics correspond with differing rates of decline and further vary by gender.

Feminist scholars have critically analyzed the effects of sex segregation in numerous social institutions, yet sex-segregated sport often remains unchallenged. Even critics of sex-segregated sport have tended to accept the merits of women-only teams at face value. In this article, we revisit this issue by examining the underlying assumptions supporting women's and girls' teams and explore how they perpetuate gender inequality. Specifically, we analyze the 14 U.S. court cases wherein adolescent boys have sought to play on girls' teams in their respective high schools. The courts' decisions reveal taken-for-granted, essentialist assumptions about girls' innate fragility and athletic inferiority. While the courts, policy makers, and many feminist scholars see maintaining teams for girls and women as a solution to the problem of boys' and men's dominance in sport, the logic supporting this form of segregation further entrenches notions of women's inferiority.

Estimates of mental health disorders among youth involved with the juvenile justice system range from 50% to 75%, while general population prevalence is 9% to 20%. The system is ill-equipped to supervise these juveniles, and many are funneled deeper into the system due to noncompliance and often preventable problems. The authors used a retrospective design and evaluated a pre-adjudication diversion initiative utilizing specialized juvenile probation officers in Texas. Use of specialized supervision was effective at diverting youth with mental health needs from adjudication and increased participation and access to services by juveniles with such needs. Youth who received specialized supervision were significantly less likely to be adjudicated for the initial offense than those in a comparison group who received traditional supervision.

Southern men occupy a contradictory place in U.S. culture as the rest of the country stereotypes them as backwards and deviant, yet simultaneously celebrates Southern males as quintessential exemplars of American manhood. I explore this contradiction using interviews with musicians, participant observation of concerts, and an ethnographic content analysis of contemporary Southern rock lyrics and websites. I find marginalized men embrace a Southern rebel identity to meet hegemonic masculine ideals shared across social classes and geographic regions. Rebels reject the middle class roles and cultural capital most men use to signify their manhood by accruing authority and resources through education, career, and family. Instead, southern rebels empower the masculine self by protesting authority figures, dominating women and signifying their independence by drinking, using drugs, and brawling. While rebels define their selves in contrast to middle-class morals and practices, dismissing them as deviant and backward overlooks how rebels use the symbolic resources they have at their disposal to meet the hegemonic masculine ideals celebrated throughout the country.

In this video Francis Landy and Alain Bouchard, editors of Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses, tell us about the purpose of the journal to bring together different strands of the study of religion and their views about how the journal has developed in recent years as well as their thoughts about its future progress. Joe Velaidum tells us about the new book reviews system that has been adopted by the journal.

In this video David Bossman tells us about the long history of Biblical Theology Bulletin, its journey from Italy to the USA, pulling out some of its distinctive qualities and pointing out what he looks for in a journal article. He describes in detail the articles in the first issue of 2012.

Today, boys generally underperform relative to girls in schools throughout the industrialized world. Building on theories about gender identity and reports from prior ethnographic classroom observations, we argue that school environment channels conceptions of masculinity in peer culture, fostering or inhibiting boys' development of anti-school attitudes and behavior. Girls' peer groups, by contrast, vary less strongly with the social environment in the extent to which school engagement is stigmatized as un-feminine. As a consequence, boys are more sensitive than girls to school resources that create a learning-oriented environment. To evaluate this argument, we use a quasi-experimental research design and estimate the gender difference in the causal effect of peer socioeconomic status (SES) as an important school resource on test scores. Our design is based on the assumption that assignment to 5th-grade classrooms within Berlin's schools is as good as random, and we evaluate this selection process with an examination of Berlin's school regulations, a simulation analysis, and qualitative interviews with school principals. Estimates of the effect of SES composition on male and female performance strongly support our central hypothesis, and other analyses support our proposed mechanism as the likely explanation for gender differences in the causal effect.

Community-based alternatives to conviction and imprisonment for adult offenders with severe mental illness are receiving increasing attention from researchers and policy makers. After discussing the justifications that have been offered in support of community-based alternatives, this article reviews the current empirical evidence relevant to such alternatives. The authors use the sequential intercept model as a guide and summarize the existing research at several points along the criminal justice continuum. They conclude by highlighting the gaps in existing research and discussing the need for further research in several key areas.

Editor Jane Schmidt-Wilk talks with guest editors Kathi Lovelace and Jane Parent and foreword author William Stixrud about the April 2012 JME Special Issue: Healthy, Wealthy and Wise? Educating Management Students about Stress, Performance and Wellness.

SLGR Social Media Editor Beverly Bunch interviews author Masami Nishishiba and panelists Anthony Sisneros and Omar Small about Nishishiba's article from the April 2012 issue of SLGR.

Lawrence Waterman, Head of Health & Safety for the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) discusses amongst other things the lasting legacy of the 2012 Olympics as well as what can be learnt from building such a large scale site as the London Olympic Village, and how an outstanding health and safety performance has been achieved in the run up to the 2012 Olympic Site. Lawrence Waterman is the Guest Editor for the March 2012 issue of the journal with a special focus on the Olympic Legacy.

This article examines why pregnant and mothering students did or did not stay in high school to see whether schools violated Title IX legislation by not providing equal educational opportunities. Examining life-story interviews conducted in 2002–2004 with 62 black, white, and Latina pregnant and mothering students in Connecticut, the author found that (1) while school policies and faculty were often hostile and unreceptive, mothers who dropped out were usually disengaged from school before pregnancy; (2) the presence or absence of school-based day care was a critical factor in school outcomes; and (3) alternative programs for pregnant and mothering students were experienced differently depending on whether students came from urban or nonurban school districts. In conclusion, the author argues that when our attention shifts from teen mothers to the problems of underfunded and overburdened schools, we are confronted with the larger systemic problems of economic and racial segregation and consequently educational inequality.

As a result of the financial crisis, several Adams County community service organizations went unfunded for three months in the summer and fall of 2009. Representatives of the community service organizations and Gettysburg College collaborated on this project to document the effects of that lack of funding. Community service organizations cut programs and staff and extended credit. Community partners stepped in to provide basic funding. Increased community cohesion resulted, as did increased awareness of community needs.

This study compares data from the Connecticut Offender Reentry Program (CORP) and retrospective data for inmates who received standard treatment planning services from the Connecticut Department of Mental Health and Addictions Services (DMHAS). Analysis of DMHAS data investigated characteristics (demographic, psychiatric, and prison classification scores) and recidivism rates of 883 individuals. A program evaluation was later completed on a separate cohort of 88 individuals who participated in CORP. Comparison of the study results found that 14.1% of the CORP participants were rearrested within 6 months of discharge compared to 28.3% of the DMHAS group. This study concluded that younger age and having a co-occurring substance use disorder appear to be predictors of recidivism. A distinctly smaller percentage of CORP participants were recidivistic, indicating support for specialized reentry programs.