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A comparison of the political sophistication of US & Swedish young adults, using data from an attitude questionnaire administered to students at the Us of Wisconsin & Texas (total N = 492) & at 5 gymnasia in metropolitan Stockholm, Sweden (total N = 783). Four basic ideological subdimensions were investigated: political-economic conservatism, racism, religion, & punitiveness, along with political party preference & political self-concept. The Swedes showed significantly greater levels of ideological coherence, political interest, ideological variance, & strength of interface between political party preference/self-concept & sociopolitical attitudes/values than did their US counterparts. Differences are discussed in terms of differences between the nations' political party environments; the effects of gender are also noted. 8 Tables, 65 References. Modified HA

Australian Aboriginal children are more likely than non-Aboriginal children to have markers of developmental vulnerability at school entry, tracking through to poor school outcomes and disadvantage in later life. The Seeding Success study will identify key drivers of positive early childhood development in Aboriginal children, and supportive features of local communities and early childhood service provision. The study will include children who started, or were eligible to start, their first year of full-time school in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, in 2009 and 2012, identified by linking Australian Early Development Census data to perinatal and birth registration datasets. Early childhood health and development trajectories will be constructed via linkage to administrative datasets relating to birth outcomes, congenital conditions, hospital admissions, emergency department presentations, use of general practitioner and mental health services, contact with child protection and out-of-home care services, receipt of income assistance and fact of death. Multilevel modelling techniques will be used to quantify the contributions of individual- and area-level factors to variation in early childhood development outcomes in Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal children. We will use the linked data to assess the impact of two current NSW government programs that aim to address early childhood disadvantage. These analyses will use propensity matching methods and interrupted time series analysis to identify comparison areas and groups and to compare outcomes between areas and groups. The findings will be relevant to those working in the health, early childhood, community services and education sectors.

Background: Armed conflict has broad-ranging impacts on the mental health and wellbeing of children and adolescents. Mental health needs greatly exceed service provision in conflict settings, particularly for these age groups. The provision and targeting of appropriate services requires better understanding of the characteristics and requirements of children and adolescents exposed to armed conflict.

Australian Aboriginal children are more likely than non-Aboriginal children to have developmental vulnerability at school entry that tracks through to poorer literacy and numeracy outcomes and multiple social and health disadvantages in later life. Empirical evidence identifying the key drivers of positive early childhood development in Aboriginal children, and supportive features of local communities and early childhood service provision, are lacking.The study population will be identified via linkage of Australian Early Development Census data to perinatal and birth registration data sets. It will include an almost complete population of children who started their first year of full-time school in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, in 2009 and 2012. Early childhood health and development trajectories for these children will be constructed via linkage to a range of administrative data sets relating to birth outcomes, congenital conditions, hospital admissions, emergency department presentations, receipt of ambulatory mental healthcare services, use of general practitioner services, contact with child protection and out-of-home care services, receipt of income assistance and fact of death. Using multilevel modelling techniques, we will quantify the contributions of individual-level and area-level factors to variation in early childhood development outcomes in Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal children. Additionally, we will evaluate the impact of two government programmes that aim to address early childhood disadvantage, the NSW Aboriginal Maternal and Infant Health Service and the Brighter Futures Program. These evaluations will use propensity score matching methods and multilevel modelling.Ethical approval has been obtained for this study. Dissemination mechanisms include engagement of stakeholders (including representatives from Aboriginal community controlled organisations, policy agencies, service providers) through a reference group, and writing of summary reports for policy and community audiences in parallel with scientific papers. ; Kathleen Falster, Louisa Jorm, Sandra Eades, John Lynch, Emily Banks, Marni Brownell, Rhonda Craven, Kristjana Einarsdóttir, Deborah Randall, on behalf of the Seeding Success Investigators