Search results

Background: Recent immigrants have better mental health than the natives ('immigration advantage'). Biculturals have better mental health than the monoculturals ('biculturalism paradox'). Material: Mexican immigrants have lower rates of psychopathology than the US population. This is less true for Cubans and not true for Puerto Ricans. The 'advantage' also occurs in other groups. Biculturals have better mental health and endorse both cultures. Discussion: The theory of demoralization predicts that borrowing values from both cultures and applying them judiciously are more conducive to mental health than indiscriminately subscribing to either culture. Conclusion: The findings are consistent with the theory of demoralization.

The literature on congressional committees has largely overlooked the impact of jurisdictional fights on policy proposals and outcomes. This paper develops a theory of how legislators balance the benefits of expanded committee jurisdiction against preferred policy outcomes. It shows why (a) senior members, and junior members in safe seats, are most likely to challenge a committee's jurisdiction; (b) policy proposals may be initiated off the proposer's ideal point for jurisdictional gains; (c) policy outcomes will generally be more moderate with jurisdictional fights than without these turf wars. We empirically investigate these results examining proposed Internet intellectual property protection legislation in the 106th Congress. Adapted from the source document.

Background:The objective of this article is to show that bicultural hybridization for the prevention of demoralization is anchored on the discovery of certain thematic areas (cultural receptors) in which social roles or cultural mandates are missing, unclear, ambiguous or congruent.Material:The specific setting is the history of Goa, a former Portuguese territory on the western coast of India. Both published and unpublished sources of information were studied.Discussion:Education, occupation and income, the three dimensions of social class, were less dominant than other aspects of the Hindu caste system, such as birth into a group viewed as a caste, observance of marriage circles, regulations of kinship and inheritance, and identification with a location. These other aspects were preserved as much as possible. The result was the conversion of the caste system into a system more akin to social class. Other examples of cultural receptors were found.Conclusions:A key step in the adaptation to acculturative stress is the discovery of cultural receptors in both cultures and the development of meaningful interconnections among those receptors. Psychotherapy attempts the restoration of morale. To be effective, therapists should consider the hierarchical organization of symbols and sentiments in the patient's culture.

The author grew up in Goa, a unique bicultural setting on the western coast of India. Goa came under Portuguese rule in 1510 AD and remained under the Portuguese until 1961 when it became part of India. The Indian and Portuguese cultures interacted in Goa and led the Goans to create an interesting blend in which elements of both cultures were made to reconcile. The author reviews his experiences in this setting and describes how his family background, his search for roots, and his exposure to two religions, two languages, and two cultures fostered his decision to study medicine, his passion for transcultural psychiatry, and eventual pursuit of an academic career in this field in the United States. Research and reflections are presented on the impact of colonization, migration, and acculturation, and the importance of the construct of demoralization.

The vast majority of papers written about interest groups' political influence focuses on the role of money in politics. Business and interest groups' participation in campaign finance, in the form of hard and soft money, has been the subject of hundreds of theoretical and empirical studies. Moreover, with the recent congressional moves to reform campaign finance laws, campaign finance studies have received a prominent position in public discourse.

Methods to make measurement both valid and reliable in a transcultural setting are exemplified from a study done in Goa, India, to examine symptom prevalence in two groups, Christians and Hindus. Access to Goan culture was gained through field consultants, library research, and field observations. The interview instrument consisted of multiple-choice questions on social characteristics, general health status, and symptoms. Two forms, one in Portuguese, the other in Konkani, were made equivalent in meaning by a translation and back-translation. Symptoms were defined within the culture. The Langner scale was used for questions on symptoms. Reliability and validity checks were included in the instrument itself as well as its translation and use. Bilingual physicians and bilingual experts in Goan culture worked in the instrument construction. Bilinguals and monolinguals were pretested and probed. Other steps involved: careful wording of questions, use of redundancy and decentering, provision of context, warning translators against biases and supervising their work, approaching subjects in local ways and through local leaders, and having the instrument administered by a bilingual physician.

AbstractThis article examines the economic influence activities (EIAs) of firms. We argue that firms invest in jobs and establishments in districts of congressional committee members that have oversight over their businesses and industries. This investment increases as legislators' power rises in Congress. Our theory makes three predictions. First, EIAs by firms will be higher in congressional districts where the legislators have substantial political influence over the firm, relative to districts where legislators have little influence over the firm. Second, EIAs will increase with the legislators' power on the focal committee. Third, when a legislator exits the committee, EIAs will diminish, but previous investments in the district will remain. We test these predictions by analyzing the Trinet census of establishments, mapped into the committee structure of the US Congress, by tracking the investment and employment of firms in each industry in each congressional district over time. Using fixed-effects models, we show the predictions of the theory find substantial support in the US Senate but not the House. We explore causality by using exogenous exits of politicians by death and scandals to further complement our analysis, and discuss why EIAs may be less likely to occur and detect in the House.