Using Interactive Theater to Create Socioculturally Relevant Community‐Based Intimate Partner Violence Prevention

This article describes the use of interactive theater, audience response assessment, and peer educators to create community‐generated approaches for bystander interventions (i.e., actions taken by people who become aware of controlling, abusive and violent behavior of others) to prevent intimate partner violence (IPV) and to foster change in community norms. We include a case example of an ongoing university–community partnership, which mobilizes community members to develop and implement socioculturally relevant IPV prevention programs in multiple Asian communities. We used interactive theater at a community event—a walk to raise awareness about IPV in South Asian communities—and examined how the enacted bystander interventions reflect specific community contexts. We detail the challenges and limitations we have encountered in our attempts to implement this approach in collaboration with our community partners.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/116302/1/ajcp9700.pd

Enculturation and Attitudes Toward Intimate Partner Violence and Gender Roles in an Asian Indian Population: Implications for Community‐Based Prevention

This study examined the relationships among enculturation, attitudes supporting intimate partner violence (IPV‐supporting attitudes), and gender role attitudes among one of the largest Asian Indian population groups in the US. Data were collected via computer‐assisted telephone interviews with a random sample of Gujarati men and women aged 18–64 in Metropolitan Detroit. Using structural equation modeling, we modeled the effects of three components of enculturation (behavior, values, and community participation) on gender role attitudes and IPV‐supporting attitudes among married respondents (N = 373). Analyses also accounted for the effects of respondent age, education, religious service attendance, perceived financial difficulty, and lengths of residence in the US. The second‐order, overall construct of enculturation was the strongest predictor of IPV‐supporting attitudes (standardized B = 0.61), but not gender role attitudes. Patriarchal gender role attitudes were positively associated with IPV‐supporting attitudes (B = 0.49). In addition to the overall effect of the enculturation construct, two of the components of enculturation had specific effects. “Enculturation‐values” had a specific positive indirect association with IPV‐supporting attitudes, through its relationship with patriarchal gender role attitudes. However, “enculturation‐community participation” was negatively associated with IPV‐supporting attitudes, suggesting the importance of community‐based prevention of IPV among this immigrant population group.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/117013/1/ajcp9627.pd

Measuring the Lifetime Experience of Domestic Violence: Application of the Life History Calendar Method

In the absence of a gold standard, research on domestic violence relies primarily on self-report, the quality of which is known to decline as the length of the recall period increases. Eliciting valid and reliable self-report data is crucial to the development of prevention and intervention policies and services. Nevertheless, existing measures typically do not incorporate devices to facilitate respondents\u27 recall of the lifetime experience of domestic violence. This article describes the application of the Life History Calendar (LHC) method (Freedman, Thornton, Camburn, Alwin, & Young-DeMarco, 1988) to increase a respondent\u27s recall of domestic violence victimization over the lifecourse. The LHC method elicits memorable information of a personal nature (e.g., children\u27s birth dates) and uses this information to facilitate the recall of less memorable events. A recent field test of this LHC measure indicates its utility in assessing domestic violence victimization, which takes place in a complex sequence of episodes and often involves multiple perpetrators over the lifecourse

Battered Women's Coping Strategies and Psychological Distress: Differences by Immigration Status

People are rarely passive, and battered women are no exception. This study investigated the types of coping strategies women of Japanese descent (both Japan-born and U.S.-born) chose and their perceived effectiveness in dealing with their partners' violence. Japan-born respondents were significantly less likely to use “active” strategies and perceived them to be less effective than did U.S.-born respondents. For the Japan-born, the more effective they perceived “active” strategies, the higher their psychological distress, whereas the more effective they perceived “passive” strategies, the lower their psychological distress. In contrast, for the U.S.-born, the higher the perceived effectiveness of “active” strategies, the lower their psychological distress, and the perceived effectiveness of “passive” strategies had little effect on their psychological distress. The complex relationship between individuals' country of birth, the choice and perceived effectiveness of coping strategies, and psychological distress calls for increased attention to the role of culture in studies of coping and domestic violence.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/44062/1/10464_2004_Article_371215.pd

New Maximum Likelihood Estimators for Eukaryotic Intron Evolution

The evolution of spliceosomal introns remains poorly understood. Although many approaches have been used to infer intron evolution from the patterns of intron position conservation, the results to date have been contradictory. In this paper, we address the problem using a novel maximum likelihood method, which allows estimation of the frequency of intron insertion target sites, together with the rates of intron gain and loss. We analyzed the pattern of 10,044 introns (7,221 intron positions) in the conserved regions of 684 sets of orthologs from seven eukaryotes. We determined that there is an average of one target site per 11.86 base pairs (bp) (95% confidence interval, 9.27 to 14.39 bp). In addition, our results showed that: (i) overall intron gains are ~25% greater than intron losses, although specific patterns vary with time and lineage; (ii) parallel gains account for ~18.5% of shared intron positions; and (iii) reacquisition following loss accounts for ~0.5% of all intron positions. Our results should assist in resolving the long-standing problem of inferring the evolution of spliceosomal introns

The relationship between intimate partner violence and PTSD: An application of Cox regression with time-varying covariates

This study uses Cox regression with time-varying covariates to examine the relationship between intimate partner violence and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in a random sample of Japanese American women and immigrant women from Japan ( N = 211). Because applications of survival analysis in trauma research are scarce, this paper presents the utility of this analytical approach by contrasting it with other common methods of analysis (chi-square tests and Cox regression with covariates that do not change over time).Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/35039/1/345_ftp.pd

Characteristics and clustering of human ribosomal protein genes

BACKGROUND: The ribosome is a central player in the translation system, which in mammals consists of four RNA species and 79 ribosomal proteins (RPs). The control mechanisms of gene expression and the functions of RPs are believed to be identical. Most RP genes have common promoters and were therefore assumed to have a unified gene expression control mechanism. RESULTS: We systematically analyzed the homogeneity and heterogeneity of RP genes on the basis of their expression profiles, promoter structures, encoded amino acid compositions, and codon compositions. The results revealed that (1) most RP genes are coordinately expressed at the mRNA level, with higher signals in the spleen, lymph node dissection (LND), and fetal brain. However, 17 genes, including the P protein genes (RPLP0, RPLP1, RPLP2), are expressed in a tissue-specific manner. (2) Most promoters have GC boxes and possible binding sites for nuclear respiratory factor 2, Yin and Yang 1, and/or activator protein 1. However, they do not have canonical TATA boxes. (3) Analysis of the amino acid composition of the encoded proteins indicated a high lysine and arginine content. (4) The major RP genes exhibit a characteristic synonymous codon composition with high rates of G or C in the third-codon position and a high content of AAG, CAG, ATC, GAG, CAC, and CTG. CONCLUSION: Eleven of the RP genes are still identified as being unique and did not exhibit at least some of the above characteristics, indicating that they may have unknown functions not present in other RP genes. Furthermore, we found sequences conserved between human and mouse genes around the transcription start sites and in the intronic regions. This study suggests certain overall trends and characteristic features of human RP genes

Long-term trends in depression among women separated from abusive partners

This study tested a cumulative adversity hypothesis, where differences in postseparation stressors among battered women were expected to lead to a widening gap in levels of women’s depression over time. Ninety-four women separated fromtheir abusive partners were interviewed six times over a 2-year period. Consistent with the hypothesis, inequalities grew over time.Women who were exposed to the greatest amount of violence and secondary stressors shortly after shelter exit experienced relatively higher levels of depression that either did not improve or significantly increased with time. Social support was the only resource to have the hypothesized decreasing effect on depression.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/90508/1/Anderson-Saunders-Yoshihama-Bybee-Sullivan _2003 Long term trends in depression among survivors VAW.pd

SafeWeb: A Middleware for Securing Ruby-Based Web Applications

Web applications in many domains such as healthcare and finance must process sensitive data, while complying with legal policies regarding the release of different classes of data to different parties. Currently, software bugs may lead to irreversible disclosure of confidential data in multi-tier web applications. An open challenge is how developers can guarantee these web applications only ever release sensitive data to authorised users without costly, recurring security audits. Our solution is to provide a trusted middleware that acts as a “safety net” to event-based enterprise web applications by preventing harmful data disclosure before it happens. We describe the design and implementation of SafeWeb, a Ruby-based middleware that associates data with security labels and transparently tracks their propagation at different granularities across a multi-tier web architecture with storage and complex event processing. For efficiency, maintainability and ease-of-use, SafeWeb exploits the dynamic features of the Ruby programming language to achieve label propagation and data flow enforcement. We evaluate SafeWeb by reporting our experience of implementing a web-based cancer treatment application and deploying it as part of the UK National Health Service (NHS)