Search Results

Most poverty and income inequality has deep‐rooted causes that can be removed only by structural (and often slow) interventions, although it is now increasingly evident that structural adjustment, premature financial liberalization, and uncontrolled globalization can exacerbate poverty by inducing protracted recessions and macroeconomic instability. One of the dominant responses to these policy‐induced problems has been the establishment of temporary social safety nets, of which the most popular type is known as ‘social funds’; these have become a prime policy choice for offsetting the social impact of policy reform. This chapter assesses the performance of social funds, arguing that have played a minor role in containing the social costs arising from liberalization policies and in reducing the number of unemployed, ‘adjustment poor’, and ‘chronic poor’. In addition, the emphasis placed on short‐term social funds may have diverted resources and the attention of policy‐makers from the extension and reform of standing social security arrangements that may more effectively address both chronic and adjustment‐induced poverty. The six sections of the chapter are: Introduction; The Historical Context Leading to the Mass Introduction of Social Funds; Adjustment‐Related Social Funds: Scale, Scope, and Structure; Effects on Incomes, Income Distribution, and Poverty: Macroperspective; Effects on Incomes, Income Distribution, and Poverty: Microperspectives; and Conclusions and Recommendations.

Most definitions of health refer to physical, emotional, and social well-being. This chapter focuses on the social component and reviews measures of social adjustment, social disability, social interaction, and social support.

This chapter examines how institutions becomes sites for structural discrimination and labelling by describing the reasons for the failure of students from Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) in one Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) during 2005–2006. The causes of academic failure were put down to their lack of social ‘adjustment,’ and did not include the deep roots of the process that characterizes a student from a socially stigmatized group as ‘not capable of success’ and as ‘destined to fail’. Using Erving Goffman’s theoretical ideas on ‘stigma’, the author analyses interviews undertaken with students from stigmatized groups and explains how stigma-based structural categorizations and labelling emerge, play out, and affect a student's academic achievement as well as social adjustment. The author also explains how institutions practise unwritten rules that distinctly identify individuals and groups who are labelled as disadvantaged by their structural location and status. Eventually, the cornerstone of the whole educational and social system encloses the underprivileged classes in the roles which society has already given them, which is only a result of their inferior social status. The author concludes by pointing out that policies and practices that identify, recognize, and label students within academic (pedagogical) and non-academic (non-pedagogical) contexts of the institution are detrimental to the success of SC/ST students.

Persons under the age of eighteen adopted by non-relatives constitute approximately 2–3% of the population of the United States. Although the majority of interfamilial adoptions have positive outcomes, there is some evidence to suggest that adoptees might be at an increased risk of maladjustment, especially when the adoptees are selected from clinical samples. Although adopted infants and preschool children do not differ significantly from their non-adopted peers, externalizing problems and conduct problems become more pronounced among adoptees in middle childhood. It is unclear, however, whether adopted children continue to exhibit greater levels of maladjustment during adolescence. This chapter reviews current research and presents data that explore adoptees' emotional, social, and scholastic adjustment in the transition from early to late adolescence. Although adoptees show less favorable outcomes in some areas of adjustment, the differences observed between adopted and non-adopted adolescents are negligible and not representative of an increased risk of psychiatric and educational morbidity. These results further indicate that in areas of social adjustment and social competence, adoptees fare better than their non-adopted counterparts.

Rural workers in Barbados, particularly women, were vulnerable to the vagaries of the planters at the micro level and the world market at a macro level. Farming was almost exclusively carried out by women in Barbados and it was also favored by them as it enabled them to earn more and fitted well into their household routine. Sugar was the preferred crop whereas a pig, or other stock, was equally viable investment as they were not dependent on seasons. Other avenues such as domestic service or home-based industries such as huckstering, sewing and straw plaiting were also open for the females whereas for males, migration was the only alternative to the sugar plantations. The moral economy in Barbados was premised on the right to subsistence and it led to a range of social adjustments based on the values of solidarity and communitarianism, which later on became the cornerstone of the nation. These values also provided an alternative model of citizenship to that proposed by the colonial authorities and metamorphosed into duties for those further up the social hierarchy.

Research suggests that competition can be adaptive in helping children and adolescents shape their self-concept and identity. Research also suggests that because of its aggressive and unsympathetic nature, competitiveness as an enduring interpersonal style may come with social costs that may include loneliness and greater difficulty making and keeping close, quality friendships. This chapter reviews research regarding the nature of competition in terms of general definitions, types of competitiveness, and the role that competition plays in friendship throughout the life span. It introduces an integrative model that examines (1) how gender and gender socialization may impact both the prevalence of competition in friendship and the social adjustment implications of competiveness among friends, and (2) the significance of culture in terms of the importance given to competitive values and how these cultural differences may play out in the context of friendship. Finally, conclusions and recommendations for future research directions are given.