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An individual's flourishing is sustained by and dependent on their community's well-being. We provide one of the first studies of a measure of communal subjective well-being, focusing on individuals' relationships with their community. Using two samples from the Greater Columbus, Ohio region, we provide evidence of the reliability and validity of the Subjective Community Well-being (SCWB) assessment. The five domains of the SCWB are Good Relationships (α =.92), Proficient Leadership (α =.93), Healthy Practices (α =.92), Satisfying Community (α =.88), and Strong Mission (α =.81). A community-based sample (N = 1,435) and an online sample of Columbus residents (N = 692) were scored on the SCWB and compared across domains. We found evidence that the SCWB scores differentiate between active and less active community members. We discuss the appropriate uses of the SCWB as a measure of well-being and provide recommendations for research that could profitably utilize the SCWB measure to examine community well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A wealth of research has suggested the West tends toward individualism and the East toward collectivism. We explored this topic on an unprecedented scale through two new items in the 2020 Gallup World Poll, involving 121,207 participants in 116 countries. The first tapped into orientations toward self-care versus other-care ("Do you think people should focus more on taking care of themselves or on taking care of others?"). The second enquired into self-orientation versus other-orientation ("Which of the following is closest to your main purpose in life? Being good at what you do in your daily life, Caring for family and close friends, or Helping other people who need help?"). We anticipated that self-care and self-orientation would index individualism (hence be higher in the West), while other-care and other-orientation would index collectivism (hence be higher in the East). However, contrary to expectation, there was greater self-care in the East (45.82%) than in the West (41.58%). As predicted though, there was greater self-orientation in the West (30.20%) than in the East (23.08.%). Greater self-care in the East invites one of two interpretations. Either these items: (a) index individualism and collectivism as anticipated, so in some ways the East is more individualistic and the West less individualistic than assumed; or (b) do not index individualism and collectivism as anticipated, so the concepts are more complex than often realized (e.g., collectivism may involve prioritizing self-care over other-care). Either way, the findings help complexify these concepts, challenging common cross-cultural generalizations in this area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A strong meaning or purpose in life, as a key indicator for psychological well-being, has been found to enhance health and longevity in a large amount of empirical research. In this study, we focus on gender differences in purpose in life. Using a large nationally representative sample, we found that women enjoyed higher levels of purpose in life. We further examined the role of altruism in accounting for much of the gender differences in life purpose. Women were more likely to have altruistic behaviors and attitudes, which in turn facilitated a stronger purpose in life. Our study suggests that men could plausibly attain a similar level of purpose in life if social norms encouraged men to nurture the growth of others through altruistic acts to the same extent as women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This reflective essay advances a model of transformative education based on the collaborative experiences of a professor and three students who sought greater opportunities for flourishing through reflective and contemplative methods in an instructor-created open space. Open space derives from research in education, child psychology, and anthropology and emphasizes an integration of cognitive, affective, and experiential forms of learning in a context of freedom and creativity. This may involve moving outside the walls of the standard classroom, extending learning activities beyond the confines of the semester, blurring the roles of student and teacher in order to cocreate opportunities for deeper learning, and flexibility with regard to syllabi and traditional boundaries of academic disciplines. Open space approaches offer more room for students and faculty to exercise their authenticity and imaginations, thereby promoting greater self-discovery, transformative growth, and other valued aspects of a flourishing life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because addiction is a socially isolating disease, social support for recovery is an important element of treatment planning. This study examines the relationship between social isolation, giving and receiving social support in Alcoholics Anonymous during treatment, and post-treatment outcomes among juvenile offenders court-referred to addiction treatment. Adolescents (N = 195) aged 14 to 18 years were prospectively assessed at treatment admission, treatment discharge, 6 months, and 12 months after treatment discharge. The influence of social isolation variables on relapse and severe criminal activity in the 12-months post-treatment was examined using negative binomial logistic regressions and event history methods. Juveniles entering treatment with social estrangement were significantly more likely to relapse, be incarcerated, and commit a violent crime in the 12-months post-treatment. Giving help to others in Alcoholics Anonymous during treatment significantly reduced the risk of relapse, incarceration, and violent crime in the 12-months post-treatment whereas receiving help did not. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Anarchist Yellow Pages (AYP), an international directory of anarchist groupings throughout the world, listed over two thousand organizations in 2005. This paper explores the types of these anarchist organizations and their geographic clustering throughout the world, with special emphasis on the 21 countries with at least 20 such organizations. The concentrations of anarchist organizations found in the AYP suggest that the movement tends to be strongly European-centered. North Americans are greatly involved in various media organizations; Spain, France, and Sweden have strong syndicalist tendencies; Italy and Germany tend to have a high percentage of physical spaces like social centers and info shops. The theory of political opportunity is used to interpret the global anarchist movement, leading to the general conclusion that rights and democracy are related to the concentration of anarchist organizations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is the latest installment in a series that is designed to bridge the gap between teaching and practice by developing classroom applications based on a current research article from the American Sociological Review. We discuss the ways in which a recent ASR paper on child care fatalities can be used to help students explore Burawoy's conception of "public" sociology in a manner that is consistent with a subject-centered pedagogical approach. To illustrate this approach, we offer three experiential exercises designed to facilitate the active engagement of students' hearts, as well as their minds, thereby linking our subject-centered approach to the increasingly popular notion of character education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociologists and psychologists have spent several decades attempting to improve our understanding of the factors that influence how people attribute responsibility for outcomes of social action, particularly wrongdoing. Members of two disciplines continue to refine Heider's seminal work in distinct ways, but have not developed a definitive test of attribution of responsibility (AOR) because of the ad hoc nature of existing research. To move towards a definitive test of AOR, we propose an integrated AOR model that is especially well suited to a neglected substantive concern: wrongdoing within organizations. In constructing our integrated model, we synthesize insights from the sociological and psychological research on AOR, while also incorporating concepts from organizational studies. An integrated model has the potential to provide a more stringent test of AOR in cases of organizational wrongdoing, which would move the field beyond its current stagnation and would carry important legal implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does the ethnic and immigrant composition of a community and existence of immigrant enclaves or barrios influence community level drug violence? This study explores the relationship between these and other factors in Miami and San Diego census tracts. We employ data about the distribution of Cubans, Central Americans, Haitians, Mexicans and Southeast Asians, controlling for social and economic influences of drug versus non-drug violence. We also analyze the impact of various waves of immigration and immigrant communities to understand the circumstances under which drug violence occurs or is limited at the census tract level. The findings lend some support to the positive and negative aspects of Portes and Rumbaut's (2001) segmented assimilation hypothesis in Miami and San Diego neighborhoods. The strength of this conclusion varies and is contingent upon ethnic composition, new versus old immigration, and the all-encompassing effects of economic deprivation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By incorporating the direct impact of ethnicity and immigration on crime, this article is the first to use multivariate methods to compare and contrast Mariel to Afro-Caribbean, African American, and non-Mariel Latino homicides in a predominately immigrant city. In the current study, Mariels were overinvolved in acquaintance homicides, but little evidence surfaced that they were disproportionately involved in stranger homicides or were unusually violent, both dominant themes in popular stereotypes. In fact, an analysis of homicide event narratives verified the mundane nature of Mariel homicides, implying that the legacy of Scarface is not the Mariel killer but the Mariel Myth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We contribute to the field of immigration and crime research by conducting one of the first contemporary examinations of Afro-Caribbean homicides. Despite the growth of immigration across urban America, social scientists lack an understanding of both the extent and severity of immigrant violent crime. Several important findings emerge from our unique data set on Haitian, Jamaican and Mariel Cuban homicides in the city of Miami. Most notably, Miami's homicide rate led the country at various points throughout the 1980s, but immigrant group-specific rates rarely exceeded the city total. By 1990, immigrant Caribbean victim and violator rates had declined to a level and rate far below the city average. Compared to other cities, Miami has a more diverse population and a greater potential for intergroup contact, yet most killings were between ethnic group members. In addition, while the "criminal alien problem" is a prominent image fueling contemporary attempts to restrict immigration, our findings undermine this conventional wisdom. We conclude with suggestions for future elaboration on the causes and consequences of immigration and homicide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article extends the city-level research tradition initiated by Marvin F. Wolfgang in a unique comparison of immigrant (Haitian, Latino) and native born (Anglo, African American) criminal homicide in the city of Miami, Florida. Although previous research has been limited primarily to Anglo and African American victims and offenders, direct access to Miami police records on 1,450 homicides for the period 1985 through 1995 allowed the authors to compare the homicide risk of Anglos, African Americans, Haitians, and Latinos. Although current policy debates focus on immigration as a contributing factor to rising crime rates, the results indicate that the groups with higher proportions of foreign-born members have comparatively low homicide rates. The findings underscore the need to extend homicide research to include diverse ethnic groups in designs that attempt to disentangle the relative influence of social conditions, ethnicity, and immigration on patterns of criminal homicide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]