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Research on teenage pregnancy and abortion has primarily focused on socio-economic disadvantage. However, a few studies suggest that risk of unwanted pregnancy is related to conduct disorder symptoms. We examined the relationship between level of conduct disorder symptoms at age 15 and subsequent pregnancy, child-birth and abortion. A population-based, representative sample of Norwegian adolescent girls (N = 769) was followed from early adolescence until their mid-20s. Even with control for socio-demographic and family variables, conduct disorder symptoms at age 15 were strongly associated with pregnancy in the 15-19 age group, and a weaker association persisted in the 20-28 age group. Similar results were obtained for abortions, but here a strong relationship with conduct disorder symptoms was found even after age 20. After adjustment, no significant association between conduct disorder symptoms and subsequent child-birth was observed. More targeted preventive programmes aimed at girls with conduct disorder symptoms may be warranted. (Contains 4 tables.)

This paper examines whether graduates of high academic quality (as measured by their university or university college Grade Point Average or GPA) are recruited to and remain in school jobs. Extensive data from Norwegian administrative registers are used. The analyses show that graduates from specialised and concurrent general teacher programmes go into and remain in school employment to an overwhelming extent irrespective of academic quality. Among those with less specialised university degrees, however, high-GPA graduates are considerably less likely to take a school job and they are also more likely to leave. Both groups of graduates generally earn more in non-school employment, but this earnings differential is unrelated to GPA. Economic factors therefore cannot explain why high-GPA graduates more rarely enter and more often leave school employment. (Contains 3 tables, 4 figures and 7 notes.)

Even though female students now make up more than half of all higher education students in many countries, the distribution of women across fields of study is still very uneven. This study examines the gendered nature of recruitment and dropout in higher education. Our results show that students who made gender traditional choices more often had an early preference for the study programme they enrolled in. Moreover, female students reported more often than male students that they had been encouraged by their parents and friends. However, unlike what we expected, there are no differences between students in gender traditional and non-traditional programmes with regard to encouragement from parents and students' confidence that they had made the right choice. While male students' dropout is unrelated to the gender composition of educational programmes, women drop out of female-dominated programmes to a lesser extent.

Despite strong trends in most Western countries towards gender equality in educational attainments, men are still considerably more likely to obtain doctoral degrees. Using data comprising nearly all students graduating from Norwegian universities during 1981-1996, separate event history analyses are carried out of recruitment to and completion of doctoral studies. Multilevel models are used to take both differences among individuals and among educational fields into account. With regard to "recruitment," a moderate gender difference is partly accounted for by men's higher grades. Children have no impact for either gender. The remaining gender difference could be due to discrimination, but the fact that this difference is not larger in predominantly male fields is an argument against this. There is no overall gender difference in completion probabilities. Men, however, seem more likely to drop out of their studies in applied fields, probably due to attractive opportunities in the non-academic labour market.

Analysis of data from 2,910 Norwegian workers indicated that promotions increased job satisfaction and commitment; lateral/downward mobility decreased them. Quitting generally led to higher rewards and satisfaction, but commitment took time to build. Layoffs had no effect on satisfaction but a strong negative effect on commitment. (Contains 51 references.) (SK)

In recent years, multidimensional conceptualizations of social origin have become increasingsly common in social stratification research. We provide evidence on the associations between four origin measures, parents' class, status, earnings and education on the one hand and the corresponding offspring measures on the other. We also extend previous research on differences in origin effects at different levels of the children's educational attainment and compare the predictive power of the social origin measures with regard to children's top and bottom attainments on all outcome variables. We use Norwegian administrative data for nearly 500,000 individuals born between 1961 and 1970. The analyses show that parents' education is a much stronger predictor for all outcomes than are their social class and status positions – both taken separately and together. Parental education also outperforms parents' earnings, except when the offspring variable is also earnings. Thus, parents' premarket characteristics seem to be more important than their labour market achievements for their children's outcomes. A second major finding is that the predictive power of social origins is often quite similar for advantaged and disadvantaged outcomes. However, bottom earnings are much less strongly associated with social origins than are top earnings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Higher psychological well-being among married persons may be because of social selection in marriage or of marriage effects. Findings from approximately 9,000 persons revealed that predictive power of well-being measures remained stable throughout 2- to 4-year period. Concluded that selection may play important part in producing association between marital status and well-being. (Author/NB)

To link to full-text access for this article, visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2010.06.045 Byline: StA[yen]le Asthus, Arne Mastekaasa Abstract: It is generally assumed that organizational downsizing has considerable negative consequences, not only for workers that are laid off, but also for those who remain employed. The empirical evidence with regard to effects on sickness absence is, however, inconsistent. This study employs register data covering a major part of the total workforce in Norway over the period 2000-2003. The number of sickness absence episodes and the number of sickness absence days are analysed by means of Poisson regression. To control for both observed and unobserved stable individual characteristics, we use conditional (fixed effects) estimation. The analyses provide some weak indications that downsizing may lead to slightly less sickness absence, but the overall impression is that downsizing has few if any effects on the sickness absence of the remaining employees. Author Affiliation: Department of Sociology and Human Geography, University of Oslo, Boks 1096 Blindern, 0317 Oslo, Norway

Previous research suggests that both men's and women's level of sickness absence may be systematically related to the gender composition of their workplace as well as of their occupational category. The number of studies is, however, low and the composition of the occupational category has often been used as a proxy for the composition of the workplace. This paper employs a large data set broadly representative of the employed population of Norway. The data make it possible to take workplace and occupation simultaneously into account. Thus, the relationship between the gender composition of the workplace and sickness absence is estimated with detailed control for differences between occupational categories. Likewise, the importance of the gender composition of the occupation is assessed with control for between workplace variation. Men's sickness absence turns out to be largely unrelated to the gender composition of the workplace. For women the level of sickness absence tends to be higher in female-dominated workplaces, but the relationship is weak. These findings provide evidence against theories suggesting that the minority sex in the workplace faces special problems and is therefore more absent. They are to some extent consistent with the idea that female-dominated workplaces develop norms that are more tolerant towards sickness absence. The relationship of sickness absence to the gender composition of the occupational category is similar to the U-shaped pattern found in several previous studies (highest sickness absence both in strongly male-dominated and strongly female-dominated occupations), but again the relationship is weak. Keywords: Workplace health; Gender segregation; Sickness absence; Norway

It is well documented that women have generally higher morbidity rates than men. In line with this women are also more absent from work due to sickness. This paper considers one popular explanation of the morbidity difference in general and of the difference in sickness absence in particular, viz. that women to a greater extent than men are exposed to the 'double burden' of combining paid work with family obligations. We discuss theories of role overload and role conflict, which both assume that the combination of multiple roles may have negative health effects, as well theories of role enhancement, which assume positive health effects of multiple roles. Using two large Norwegian data sets, the relationship between the number of and the age of children on the one hand and sickness absence on the other is examined separately for men and women and for a number of theoretically interesting subpopulations of women defined in terms of marital status (also taking account of unmarried cohabitation), level of education, and working hours. Generally speaking the association between children and sickness absence is weak, particularly for married people of both genders. To the extent that married persons with children are more absent than married persons without children, this is largely due to respiratory conditions. The relationship between children and sickness absence is somewhat stronger for single, never married mothers, but not for single mothers who have been previously married or for women living in unmarried cohabitation. The findings thus provide little support for either role overload/conflict or role enhancement theories. The possibility that these effects are both present and counterbalancing each other or that they are confounded with uncontrolled selection effects can not, however, be ruled out.

An analysis of marital dissolution cases in Norway confirmed the hypothesis that divorce is a highly stressful process that leads to a decline in the well-being of those involved while simultaneously increasing loneliness, distress and alcoholism. These effects are also manifested in the form of weight loss. However, there was no substantial evidence supporting the hypothesis that men are more negatively affected by the process of separation than women.

Marital dissolution, particularly during the pre-separation period, is a highly stressful event. The individual's well-being diminishes remarkably, while loneliness, distress and alcohol use increase. Weight loss is a physical manifestation of these changes. These were concluded in a study of more than 1,000 men and women separating during a two- to four-year period and the changes in their marital status during the process, especially as the time of formal separation approaches.

A relationship between marital status on the one hand and various indicators of well-being and mental health on the other has been found in a large number of studies. Typically, that the currently married have been shown to enjoy the mos favorable position, the divorced and widowed are generally worst off, and the never married in an intermediate position. This paper provides an analysis of the consistency and generality of this relationship: To what extent are there national differences? Is the relationship stronger for men than for women, as has been suggested by several authors? And is there evidence for such a relationship whatever measure of psychological well-being we use? Comparable interview data from 19 countries, including a few non-western ones, are used. The data are analyzed by ordinary linear recession methods, representing marita status by means of dummy variables and controlling for age and parenthood. At least some evidence of differences in psychological well-being between the currently married on the one hand and the previously married and the never married on the other are found in practically all countries. On average the relationship between marital status and well-being is quite similar for men and women. More striking differences are found between well-being measures. The relationship with marital status is weakest for positive affect and strongest for self-reported happiness, with the results for negative affect and overall life satisfaction falling in between., At least since Durkheim's study of suicide, the relationship between marital status and psychological well-being has been an important field of sociological inquiry. A quite strong relationship has often been […]