Poverty in the Social World of the Wise

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/68560/2/10.1177_030908928701203704.pd

Supermassive Binaries and Extragalactic Jets

Some quasars show Doppler shifted broad emission line peaks. I give new statistics of the occurrence of these peaks and show that, while the most spectacular cases are in quasars with strong radio jets inclined to the line of sight, they are also almost as common in radio-quiet quasars. Theories of the origin of the peaks are reviewed and it is argued that the displaced peaks are most likely produced by the supermassive binary model. The separations of the peaks in the 3C 390.3-type objects are consistent with orientation-dependent "unified models" of quasar activity. If the supermassive binary model is correct, all members of "the jet set" (astrophysical objects showing jets) could be binaries.Comment: 31 pages, PostScript, missing figure is in ApJ 464, L105 (see http://www.aas.org/ApJ/v464n2/5736/5736.html

Racial discrimination, the superwoman schema, and allostatic load: exploring an integrative stress-coping model among African American women

Racial discrimination has been linked to allostatic load (i.e., cumulative biological stress) among African American women. However, limited attention has been given to psychosocial processes involved in the stress response—critical for understanding biological pathways to health—in studies examining racial discrimination as a social determinant of health. We examined whether the superwoman schema (SWS), a multidimensional culture-specific framework characterizing psychosocial responses to stress among African American women, modifies the association between racial discrimination and allostatic load. We used purposive sampling to recruit a community sample of African American women ages 30–50 from five San Francisco Bay Area counties (n = 208). Path analysis was used to test for interactions while accounting for the covariance among SWS subscales using both linear and quadratic models. Significant interactions were observed between racial discrimination and four of the five SWS subscales. Feeling obligated to present an image of strength and an obligation to suppress emotions were each protective whereas feeling an intense motivation to succeed and feeling an obligation to help others exacerbated the independent health risk associated with experiencing racial discrimination. Our findings affirm the need to consider individual variability in coping and potentially other psychosocial processes involved in the stress response process, and offer several insights that may help elucidate the mechanisms by which racial discrimination gets “under the skin.

The Political Consequences of Perceived Threat and Felt Insecurity

We draw on data from a national RDD telephone sample of 1549 adult Americans conducted between October 15, 2001 and March 2, 2002 to explore the impact of a need for security on support for national security policies in the aftermath of the 911 terrorist attacks. In past research, an external threat has been assumed to have uniform impact on an affected population, a claim that has met with growing research scrutiny. We advance research on threat through an examination of the political effects of individual differences in one’s ability to feel secure in the aftermath of terrorism, exploring the interaction between perceived threat and felt security. Most Americans reported a sense of security after the 911 attacks. But a sense of insecurity among a minority of Americans coupled with a perceived threat of future terrorism increased support for both domestic and international security policy-- the curtailment of domestic civil liberties, tougher visa checks, and support for the war in Afghanistan. Our findings underscore the diverse ways in which individuals react politically to a common external threat. We draw on attachment (Bowlby 1982/1969) and terror management theory (Pyzszcynski et al 2002) to understand the origins of individual differences in felt security