Rationing ‘Rights’: Supplementary Welfare Benefits and Lone Moms

Previous research has illuminated the effects of the welfare reform in Canada post-1995. However, very little research has focused upon the ways welfare is delivered. Using four supplementary benefits available to social assistance recipients as the backdrop, this paper explores the discretionary practices employed in determining eligibility. Based on interviews with lone mothers and a focus group with social assistance case workers the data illuminates that a lone mother’s ability to access supplementary benefits is based upon rationing practices which may have little to do with her legitimate need and formal eligibility, such that practice, in the hands of caseworkers, contravenes the policy intention

Changing the Game: The Continuous Adaptation of Resilient Single Mothers

This paper explores theoretical and conceptual developments in our understanding of resilience as these apply to single mother-led families. Rather than the earlier and simpler notion that resilience implied \u27bouncing back\u27 we suggest, consistent with work by other resilience scholars, that the varied demonstrations of resilience are a ‘changing of the game’. By this we mean that resilience involves the creation of new outcomes, or, new ways of being through constant adaptation. Further, we argue this transformation to resilient ways of being occurs across all categories of resilience. This is a significant contribution of this work as we submit that even for those single mothers who appear to be just coping, their behaviours manifest significant and strategic adaptation. This important finding suggests critically new and important ways in which the life experiences and adaptive responses of single mothers should be perceived. The findings and analyses offered here derive from feminist, participatory research with 18 single mothers in focus groups and 20 in semi-structured interviews. Following the requisite ethics review processes and ensuring the confidentiality of all data, we utilized this extensive data set to examine these mothers’ responses to their experiences of adversity. These included the transitions associated with family break up, solo parenting, the stigma associated with being a single mom, loss of financial security (which often necessitated social assistance receipt) and for some, coping with abuse-induced trauma. Based on these findings, we offer policy and practice implications in relation to lone mothers and their families. Among others are suggestions that social workers and other frontline practitioners better recognize and appreciate the achievements that might be demonstrated by ‘just coping’ and policy changes that support families through family break up

The Lone Mother Resilience Project: A Qualitative Secondary Analysis

Although qualitative secondary analyses are conducted across the social sciences, supra-assorted analyses that involve both the re-use of existing data and the collection of new, primary data are relatively uncommon. Additionally, discussions regarding qualitative secondary analysis have tended to ignore the re-use of researchers\u27 own data (i.e., auto-data). Thus, with this article, we aim to contribute to this discussion by providing an example of a supra-assorted analysis in which we re-used data from one of our previous studies, Lone Mothers: Building Social Inclusion. This earlier, longitudinal study was conducted with 104 poor lone mothers across Canada. We supplemented this dataset with data from three focus groups and 20 semi-structured interviews engaging a total of 38 lone mothers. Both studies were informed by a feminist and social inclusion lens, and recruited a diverse sample of women in three cities across the country: Vancouver, British Columbia; Toronto, Ontario; and St. John\u27s, Newfoundland. In addition, most of the lone mothers who participated in the secondary analysis had also been involved in the original study as interviewees and/or research assistants. We conclude the article by discussing the strengths and limitations of, and lessons learned from, the secondary study\u27s design

Infection with a Virulent Strain of Wolbachia Disrupts Genome Wide-Patterns of Cytosine Methylation in the Mosquito Aedes aegypti

BACKGROUND Cytosine methylation is one of several reversible epigenetic modifications of DNA that allow a greater flexibility in the relationship between genotype and phenotype. Methylation in the simplest models dampens gene expression by modifying regions of DNA critical for transcription factor binding. The capacity to methylate DNA is variable in the insects due to diverse histories of gene loss and duplication of DNA methylases. Mosquitoes like Drosophila melanogaster possess only a single methylase, DNMT2. DESCRIPTION Here we characterise the methylome of the mosquito Aedes aegypti and examine its relationship to transcription and test the effects of infection with a virulent strain of the endosymbiont Wolbachia on the stability of methylation patterns. CONCLUSION We see that methylation in the A. aegypti genome is associated with reduced transcription and is most common in the promoters of genes relating to regulation of transcription and metabolism. Similar gene classes are also methylated in aphids and honeybees, suggesting either conservation or convergence of methylation patterns. In addition to this evidence of evolutionary stability, we also show that infection with the virulent wMelPop Wolbachia strain induces additional methylation and demethylation events in the genome. While most of these changes seem random with respect to gene function and have no detected effect on transcription, there does appear to be enrichment of genes associated with membrane function. Given that Wolbachia lives within a membrane-bound vacuole of host origin and retains a large number of genes for transporting host amino acids, inorganic ions and ATP despite a severely reduced genome, these changes might represent an evolved strategy for manipulating the host environments for its own gain. Testing for a direct link between these methylation changes and expression, however, will require study across a broader range of developmental stages and tissues with methods that detect splice variants.This research was supported by The National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript

Fragile Watermarking using Chaotic Sequences *

Abstract I

Students' perceptions of international social work: A comparative study in the USA, UK, and Georgia

The field of social work worldwide has been increasingly influenced by globalization, migration, and other conditions that require professionals to be responsive and knowledgeable in addressing them. This collaborative project examined students’ perceptions of international social work at three universities in the United States, United Kingdom, and Georgia. Students’ responses indicated an overall strong interest and widespread agreement that there is a link between local and global social issues. The findings suggest that social work education needs to be globalized and tailored to students’ needs, which will help them identify social work strongly as part of a profession and affect change across the globe

Students' perceptions of international social work: A comparative study in the USA, UK, and Georgia

The field of social work worldwide has been increasingly influenced by globalization, migration, and other conditions that require professionals to be responsive and knowledgeable in addressing them. This collaborative project examined students’ perceptions of international social work at three universities in the United States, United Kingdom, and Georgia. Students’ responses indicated an overall strong interest and widespread agreement that there is a link between local and global social issues. The findings suggest that social work education needs to be globalized and tailored to students’ needs, which will help them identify social work strongly as part of a profession and affect change across the globe