Suchergebnisse

The present article aims to examine the ways in which social support may affect the adaptation of individuals to a novel social environment. A distinctive feature of this research was the assessment of social support both before and after entering a completely new network of social relationships. A cohort of international exchange high school students (N = 242) was administered a battery of self-report ques tionnaires dealing with personality traits, perceived social support, coping beha viors and emotional distress before leaving Japan and six months after living with a host family in a foreign community. Perceived social support abroad contributed to less emotional distress. This health-promoting effect of social support was found to be mediated by adaptive coping behaviours, and was not due to confounding by personality traits. Perceived social support at home was predictive of more emotional distress abroad. Subjects who reported high levels of social support at home were particularly vulnerable when they entered the completely new environment and found that such support was no longer available.

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- About the Editors -- A Curriculum for Human Behavior in the Social Environment -- Towards a Comprehensive Framework for Understanding the Social Environment: In Search of Theory for Practice -- Evaluating the Social Environment Component of Social Work Courses on Human Behavior and the Social Environment -- Social Work Textbooks on Human Behavior and the Social Environment: An Analysis of the Social Environment Component -- Reflecting on the Social Environment Dimensions of HB&SE: An HB&SE Faculty Member as Discussant -- Index

The Progressive Era prompted significant social and political reform in New York City's slums, and well as controversy over the best way to reform. Stephen Crane's 1893 novella Maggie: A Girl of the Streets epitomizes the reform mindset of the period. Maggie portrays an immigrant girl who is seduced and ruined by an Irish bar owner. Consequentially, her family disowns her, and she dies as a prostitute. In Maggie Crane depicts the social environment that constrains the socioeconomic opportunities of immigrants in the tenements. The novella not only depicts the need for reform, but also Crane's frustration with reformers who overlook the individual, the "Maggies," in an attempt to aid "the other half." In 1896 Theodore Roosevelt, the newly-instated police commissioner, came in contact with Crane through literary circles. Though Roosevelt attempted to restructure the police department, which had been corrupted by Tammany Hall, Crane remained frustrated with the behavior and management of the police force, writing about their misbehavior in several news articles. When Crane voluntarily defended Dora Clark, a known prostitute, in court for being wrongfully arrested, Roosevelt severed all ties with the novelist, later claiming him to be a man of bad moral character. In my presentation, I will analyze Crane's reactions to Roosevelt's management of the police force, as well as their reform philosophies, which include differing definitions of "moral obligation."