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The disproportionate number of racial and ethnic minority children in the child welfare system concerns many child welfare professionals. Few studies have investigated how neighborhood processes may contribute to this disparity. This study examined how neighborhood characteristics are associated with rates of child maltreatment for black, Hispanic, and white children. Spatial regression procedures were used to analyze data from 940 census tracts in California. For black children, higher rates of poverty and higher densities of off-premise alcohol outlets were positively associated with maltreatment rates, but increases in population since 1990, a higher percentage of residents who had moved, and a higher percentage of black residents were associated with lower rates. Percentage of female-headed families, poverty, and unemployment were positively related to maltreatment rates among Hispanic children. For white children, the percentage of elderly people, percentage of poverty, ratio of children to adults, and percentage of Hispanic residents were positively associated with neighborhood rates. Reducing neighborhood poverty may reduce rates of child maltreatment for all children, but additional efforts to prevent maltreatment at the neighborhood level may need to be tailored to the specific demographic characteristics to be most effective.

The presidential candidates and Congress, after years of looking the other way, are competing over who has the best plan to address the problems of the inner city, responding to the polls that, at least for the moment, are suggesting Americans want something done. A message has been sent to the nation from Los Angeles, California, message that has raised our national consciousness and to which we must respond. It has been said that if people want to see their future, look to Los Angeles. First, in this nation so rich in resources, millions continue to live in grinding, depriving, demeaning poverty. The situation has steadily deteriorated in the past decade as the gap between the rich and the poor has grown to be greater than at any time since statistics were kept. The second great fault in American society is the inequality of opportunity and the fact that millions of Americans are excluded from the opportunity structure. When people are locked out of the opportunity structure and thus unable to realize universally held aspirations, they may adapt to this societal double bind in four ways.

Psychoanalytic theory been both a stimulus and an impediment to the development of the social work profession. Recognition of its ineffectiveness during the Great Depression and in the current War on Poverty has forced social workers to review their infatuation with this theory. As a theory, psychoanalysis is incompatible with certain basic tenets of the American creed--puritanism, scientism and optimism. It is pessimistic and highly libidinal. The theory had difficulty gaining acceptance by the medical profession because of its metascientific, psychological, rather than empirically scientific physiological, explanations of mental disease. This study explores the historical and political exigencies of the 1920s that influenced the American public's acceptance of psychoanalytic theory. This study explores the historical and political exigencies of the 1920s that influenced the American public's acceptance of psychoanalytic theory. Furthermore, it demostrates how the political climate of that decade influenced responsible experts, including social workers, to consider psychoanalysis as being scientifically correct.

This study explores factors that influence the general well-being (anxiety, depression, positive well-being, self-control, vitality, and general health) of low-income Korean immigrant elders by interviewing 206 older adults living in Los Angeles County and Orange County, California. Ordinary least squares regression results reveal that lack of English proficiency and longer residence in the United States were significant predictors of higher anxiety, higher depression,lower self-control,lower vitality, and lower general health among Korean immigrant elders. Losing a spouse was a significantly negative factor in vitality. Financial problems were significantly associated with lower positive well-being. Social support was a significant factor in lower anxiety, lower depression, higher positive well-being, higher self-control, and higher vitality. Spiritual coping was significantly associated with lower anxiety,lower depression, higher positive well-being, and higher vitality. The findings of this study show that low-income Korean immigrant elders are at high risk for psychological and physical health problems influenced by difficulties with the acculturation or adjustment and socioeconomic stress of living in a new society. The study discusses essential implications for culturally competent social work practice among low-income Korean immigrant elders.