Mandatory diversity training may do more harm than good | HamptonRoads.com | PilotOnline.com

Mandatory diversity training may do more harm than good | HamptonRoads.com | PilotOnline.com

By Philip Walzer
The Virginian-Pilot
© October 5, 2008

For hospital employees of Sentara Healthcare, it starts with a required one-hour online class each year. The goal: “to deliver respectful care to people with diverse backgrounds,” said Pat Evans, director of recruitment and workforce planning.

BYU research finds less pot use by religious kids - Salt Lake Tribune

BYU research finds less pot use by religious kids - Salt Lake Tribune

BYU research finds less pot use by religious kids
A correlation is also found for tobacco and alcohol, but not for the use of harder drugs
By Brian Maffly
The Salt Lake Tribune
Article Launched: 10/02/2008 11:18:34 AM MDT

Brigham Young University sociologists analyzing survey data about drug use found that teens who are religiously active are half as likely to smoke marijuana or cigarettes or drink alcohol.
The findings, to be published this month in the "Journal of Drug Issues," suggest that kids' participation in religion counteracts the powerful pressure to smoke pot when their friends are getting high.
"After we accounted for family and peer characteristics, and regardless of denomination, there was an independent effect that those who were religious were less likely to do drugs, even when their friends were users," said co-author Stephen Bahr, a professor in BYU's sociology department. "The power of peers is less among youths who are religious, meaning if you are religious, the pressure from peers to use drugs will not have as much effect."
The researchers based their findings on an analysis of two data sets - a national longitudinal study that has tracked more than 13,000 students since the 1990s, and a survey of about 5,000 Utah teens Bahr conducted about a decade ago.
While most sociologists agree that peer pressure is a major determinant in the choices teens make, there has been widespread disagreement about whether religion plays a role in teens' choice not to use drugs. The Bahr study affirms the argument that faith plays a role not just in marijuana use, but also for alcohol and tobacco -
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even when kids' friends are puffing and drinking.
"We found it with heavy drinking, smoking tobacco - across the board, religiosity had a dampening effect both in Utah data, which is what you would expect, but we also found it nationally," said co-author John Hoffman, also a professor of sociology.
But the authors added a few cautionary notes. First, the study does not conclusively draw a causal link between religion and kids' drug choices. Moreover, the religion correlation was weak for heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and other hard drugs.
"We tried to look at more illicit drugs, but we didn't find a statistically significant effect, although it pointed in the same direction," Hoffman said. "It could be that once kids get involved in these types of drugs, religiosity doesn't do much for them."
The researchers also found that religious fervor within the community has little effect on teens' drug behavior.
"Previously, it was thought that if someone grew up in a religious community and went to church, then the community's religious strength would make a difference," Bahr said. "We basically found that this was not the case. Individual religiosity is what makes the difference."
bmaffly@sltrib.com

OES Wages, California LaborMarketInfo

OES Employment and Wages by Occupation
Wage data for all geographical areas have been updated to the first quarter of 2008 by applying the U. S. Department of Labor's Employment Cost Index to the 2006 SOC wage database. The wage data has not been validated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and are not official BLS data series, but LMID feels that the additional information is useful to users of our wage data. The occupational employment estimates are for May 2007.

The 2008 Statistical Abstract : Income, Expenditures, Poverty, & Wealth

Income, Expenditures, Poverty, & Wealth

This section presents data on gross domestic product (GDP), gross national product (GNP), national and personal income, saving and investment, money income, poverty, and national and personal wealth.

Wiley InterScience :: JOURNALS :: Sociology Compass

The Shift from Dating to Hooking up in College: What Scholars Have Missed
Kathleen A. Bogle 1*
1 La Salle University
Copyright © 2007 The Author
Journal Compilation © 2007 Blackwell Publishing Ltd
ABSTRACT

In recent years, research has been building that suggests dating has been replaced by hooking up as the dominant way for heterosexual students to get together on college campuses. Although recent studies have documented the phenomenon of hooking up, there is evidence that this behavior was likely in place long before it was recognized in the literature. Yet, for the past several decades, scholars have continued to examine 'dating' among college students. This calls into question whether scholars missed a fundamental shift in how heterosexual men and women form sexual and romantic relationships on campus. In this paper, I will (i) review the major findings on hooking up, (ii) explain the differences between traditional dating and hooking up, (iii) explore when traditional dating declined and hooking up emerged on the college campus, and (iv) discuss the effect of this shift on the literature.

The Sociology of 'Hooking Up' :: Inside Higher Ed :: Higher Education's Source for News, Views and Jobs

Many researchers rely on college undergraduates as subjects for studies of human behavior. For Kathleen A. Bogle, an assistant professor of sociology and criminal justice at LaSalle University who trained her scholarly lens on the students themselves, focusing on that cross-section was part of the design.

When people talk about “hooking up,” they’re referring to a subculture with a complex set of rules and expectations. Not surprisingly, most of what they know about student “hookup” culture comes from alarmist news reports of “risky sex” and the American Pie movies, not serious scholarship. In her new book, Hooking Up: Sex, Dating, and Relationships on Campus (New York University Press, 2008), Bogle wields the tools of the sociologist, employing in-depth interviews with students and graduates from two unnamed universities — one a large East Coast public university, the other a smaller Roman Catholic institution in the Northeast — and placing the culture of hooking up in a historical context. She answered questions via e-mail, shedding light on what she calls the “center of college social life.”

Political Pulse | The Associated Press-Yahoo! News Poll on Yahoo! News

Poll shows gap between blacks and whites over racial discrimination
By CHARLES BABINGTON, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — Since the nation's birth, Americans have discussed race and avoided it, organized neighborhoods and political movements around it, and used it to divide and hurt people even as relations have improved dramatically since the days of slavery, Reconstruction and legal segregation.

Political Pulse | The Associated Press-Yahoo! News Poll on Yahoo! News

Poll: Racial views steer some white Dems away from Obama
By RON FOURNIER and TREVOR TOMPSON, Associated Press Writers

WASHINGTON (AP) — Deep-seated racial misgivings could cost Barack Obama the White House if the election is close, according to an AP-Yahoo News poll that found one-third of white Democrats harbor negative views toward blacks — many calling them "lazy," "violent," responsible for their own troubles.

AP Poll data - surveys.ap.org | The Associated Press

Youth suicide rate is still high - Los Angeles Times

Youth suicide rate is still high - Los Angeles Times

Youth suicide rate is still high

Note: Example of unintended consequences. Fear of a linkage between anti-depressants and suicide creates a stronger connection.

Scholarsphips: Slicing the Pie

The New York Times > Sports > Image > Scholarsphips: Slicing the Pie

FOXNews.com

Breaking News | Latest News | Current News - FOXNews.com

Living together no longer 'playing house' - USATODAY.com

Living together no longer 'playing house' - USATODAY.com

Mapping the Human ‘Diseasome’

Mapping the Human ‘Diseasome’ - Interactive Graphic - NYTimes.com

Gilbert Lab Homepage

Dan Gilbert: Why are we happy? Why aren't we happy?
Gilbert Lab Homepage

Facts on women candidates and elected officials

Facts on women candidates and elected officials

In 2008, 86 women serve in the U.S. Congress. Sixteen women serve in the Senate, and 70 women serve in the House. The number of women in statewide elective executive posts is 74, while the proportion of women in state legislatures is at 23.6 percent.

Congress: women hold 86, or 16.1%, of the 535 seats in the 110th US Congress — 16, or 16.0%, of the 100 seats in the Senate and 70, or 16.1%, of the 435 seats in the House of Representatives. In addition, three women serve as Delegates to the House from Guam, the Virgin Islands and Washington, DC.

Statewide Elective Executive: In 2008, 74 women hold statewide elective executive offices across the country; women hold 23.5% of the 315 available positions. Among these women, 44 are Democrats, 27 are Republicans, and 3 were elected in nonpartisan races.

State Legislature: In 2008, 1,741, or 23.6%, of the 7,382 state legislators in the United States are women. Women hold 423, or 21.5%, of the 1,971 state senate seats and 1,318, or 24.4%, of the 5,411 state house seats. Since 1971, the number of women serving in state legislatures has more than quintupled.

Women in the United States Senate - Female Senators

Women in the United States Senate

Women who have served in the US Senate, listed in order of their first election:

Women in the United States Senate - Female Senators

FORTUNE 500 2007: Women CEOs

FORTUNE 500 2007: Women CEOs

Women CEOs for FORTUNE 500 companies

There are more women running FORTUNE 500 companies this year than there were last year. Currently, 12 FORTUNE 500 companies are run by women* (up from 10 last year), and a total of 25 FORTUNE 1000 companies have women in the top job (up from 20).

Here’s Looking At You, Kids

Artists discover the Documentation Generation. But can we trust what they see?

Jennie Yabroff
NEWSWEEK
Updated: 12:25 PM ET Mar 15, 2008

When filmmaker Caroline Suh decided to make a documentary about the student-council election at New York's Stuyvesant High School, she was concerned about how the kids would react to the camera. It's an understandable fear: for those of us of Suh's age—she's 37—and older, the introduction of a movie camera has traditionally turned people into either hams mouthing 'Hi, Mom!' or zombies frozen stiff with anxiety. "When I was in high school, if someone was making a film, it would have been this glamorous, exciting thing," Suh says. Turns out she needn't have worried. During the year Suh spent making "Frontrunners," two other journalists were also documenting Stuyvesant's kids: one for a book about the school's academic pressures, another for a magazine cover story on the sexual mores of contemporary youth. And the kids, Suh says, were unfazed by the scrutiny. "They've all seen reality TV. They make movies with their cell phones," she says. "Being under the microscope is just part of their lives."

http://www.newsweek.com/id/123484/output/print

Implicit Social Cognition and Law - Annual Review of Law and Social Science, 3(1):427 - Full Text

Implicit Social Cognition and Law - Annual Review of Law and Social Science, 3(1):427 - Full Text

JV & Elvis Prank Call: Chinese Food

Rosie O'Donnell's Racist 'Ching Chong' Chinese SLUR

The Red Phone in Black and White - New York Times

The Red Phone in Black and White - New York Times

Hillary Clinton 3am Ad

Ferraro to Obama: Don't Antagonize Me