LA ESTRUCTURA DE LA FAMILIA Y LA FERTILIDAD EN PUERTO RICO.

This is a report of the findings from a survey of attitudes and behavior with respect to birth control. The survey was conducted in 1953-54, and involved interviews of approximately one hour with lower class families marriedIess than zo years. Studies prior to this survey had shown 'that rnost Puerto Rican families have more children than they want to have. These earlier studies had also shown that the discrepancy was apparently not due to lack of knokwledge about birth control, unavailability of birth control material s, or religious objections to contraception. Exploratory studies by the authors of this article had suggested further factors which might explain the difference. These were tested by the survey. The dependent variable "family planning" was divided into the following categories: Nevér Users, Quitters, Current Users, and Sterilized. Five blocks of independent variables were included in the interview. They were: 1. General Value System: Fatalism-striving, traditionalism-modernism, aspirations for self and children, and tendencies toward general planning. 2. Family Action Possibilities: Marital happiness, agreement on general issues, sexual satisfaction, communication on general issues, communication on family size ideals and birth control, modesty handicaps, familistic organization types, family readiness of actionon birth control. 3. Specijic Family Size Attitedes: Attitudes towards importance of children, ideal family size, sense of pressure of fertility on family resources, interest in spacing children. 4. Informational and Attitudinal Attributes: Information on methods, attitudes toward birth control, agreement on birth control. 5. Background Factors: Residence, occupation,education, religión, rental value of house, type of marital union, age at marriage. The hypotheses were that successful use of birth control would be associated with (1) modernism-striving-planning; (2) happiness-agreement-communication-readiness; (3) sma11 family mindedness; and ( 4) know'ledge about and favorable attitudes toward birth control methods. In addition, it was hypothesized that each of these four blocks of variableswould be related to each other in the same ways. The hypotheses with respect to background variables were less conventional. It was hypothesized that religious affiliation (catholic-protestant) would fail to differentiate; that economic status and education would not-differentiate (because the sample is limited to lower class); ,that YOllfiger wives are less likely to practice birth control; and that rural, consensually .married families will prefer large families. There are more than 8,000 separate hypotheses which rnight be tested if a11 variables of each "block" are tabulated with a11 variables ofevery other block", Of the 8,000, 81 wereseleeted. Of these 81 -associations,47 were found to be significant at the 5 per cent level, 29 we,:e not significant, and 5 reversed theexpected relationship. The five unexpected findings included: (a)rural.consensual marriages werethe most favorable (rather than the .least favorable) toward small families, · (b) subjects using birth control were likely to be less satisfied (rather than more satisfied) with general life conditions, and (c) in families where birth control had long been used, the wife was likely tú be less satisfied (rather. than more sátisfied) sexuapy. The authors conclude that the foflowing factors are. important for effective planning;: (1) a general "modera" value system; (2) definite views favoring sma11 families, (3) sufficient information on birth control methods and favorable attitudes towards using them; and (4}. effectlve family organization.Resumen en inglés

Multilevel Deconstruction of the In Vivo Behavior of Looped DNA-Protein Complexes

Protein-DNA complexes with loops play a fundamental role in a wide variety of cellular processes, ranging from the regulation of DNA transcription to telomere maintenance. As ubiquitous as they are, their precise in vivo properties and their integration into the cellular function still remain largely unexplored. Here, we present a multilevel approach that efficiently connects in both directions molecular properties with cell physiology and use it to characterize the molecular properties of the looped DNA-lac repressor complex while functioning in vivo. The properties we uncover include the presence of two representative conformations of the complex, the stabilization of one conformation by DNA architectural proteins, and precise values of the underlying twisting elastic constants and bending free energies. Incorporation of all this molecular information into gene-regulation models reveals an unprecedented versatility of looped DNA-protein complexes at shaping the properties of gene expression.Comment: Open Access article available at http://www.plosone.org/article/fetchArticle.action?articleURI=info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.000035

Means to an End: An Assessment of the Status-blind Approach to Protecting Undocumented Worker Rights

This article applies the tenets of bureaucratic incorporation theory to an investigation of bureaucratic decision making in labor standards enforcement agencies (LSEAs), as they relate to undocumented workers. Drawing on 25 semistructured interviews with high-level officials in San Jose and Houston, I find that bureaucrats in both cities routinely evade the issue of immigration status during the claims-making process, and directly challenge employers’ attempts to use the undocumented status of their workers to deflect liability. Respondents offer three institutionalized narratives for this approach: (1) to deter employer demand for undocumented labor, (2) the conviction that the protection of undocumented workers is essential to the agency’s ability to regulate industry standards for all workers, and (3) to clearly demarcate the agency’s jurisdictional boundaries to preserve institutional autonomy and scarce resources. Within this context, enforcing the rights of undocumented workers becomes simply an institutional means to an end

The Changing of the Guard: The New American Labor Leader

This article analyzes recent changes in the leadership of international unions. There has been a trend toward leaders who are lifetime bureaucrats rather than rank-and-file members with charisma. This change toward more technocratic leadership is due to the different environment and new challenges that labor currently faces. The United Mine Workers is a good example of a union that has had many changes in the type of person who has become president, from the labor giant John L. Lewis to the 33-year-old lawyer Richard Trumka. The United Auto Workers is an example of a union whose leadership has been consistently drawn from the union hierarchy. The AFL-CIO has made a change in leadership from George Meany to the labor bureaucrat Lane Kirkland. There will probably be an increase in the number of women and minorities in top leadership positions in unions, but this will be a gradual increase.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/66627/2/10.1177_000271628447300107.pd

The effects of habitat degradation on metacommunity structure of wood-inhabiting fungi in European beech forests

Intensive forest management creates habitat degradation by reducing the variation of forest stands in general, and by removing old trees and dead wood in particular. Non-intervention forest reserves are commonly believed to be the most efficient tool to counteract the negative effects on biodiversity, but actual knowledge of the conservation efficiency is limited, especially for recent reserves. The structure of ecological communities is often described with measures of nestedness, beta diversity and similarity between communities. We studied whether these measures differ among forest reserves with different management histories. For this purpose, we used a large data set of wood-inhabiting fungi collected from dead beech trees in European beech-dominated forest reserves. The structure of fungal assemblages showed high beta diversity, while nestedness and similarity was low. During the decomposition process of trees beta diversity between the communities occupying different trees increased in natural, but not in previously managed sites. Effects of management and decay process on nestedness were complex. We argue that the detected differences most likely reflect historical effects which have extirpated specialized species from the local species pools in managed sites, and resulted in more homogeneous communities in managed sites. It is alarming that community structure is affected the most in the latest decay stages where the decay process turns the dead wood into litter, and which is thus the interface between the wood decay and the litter-decaying ecosystem. The effects of simplified communities in late decay stages on soil biodiversity should be studied

Measurement of the cosmic ray spectrum above 4×10184{\times}10^{18} eV using inclined events detected with the Pierre Auger Observatory

A measurement of the cosmic-ray spectrum for energies exceeding $4{\times}10^{18}$ eV is presented, which is based on the analysis of showers with zenith angles greater than $60^{\circ}$ detected with the Pierre Auger Observatory between 1 January 2004 and 31 December 2013. The measured spectrum confirms a flux suppression at the highest energies. Above $5.3{\times}10^{18}$ eV, the "ankle", the flux can be described by a power law $E^{-\gamma}$ with index $\gamma=2.70 \pm 0.02 \,\text{(stat)} \pm 0.1\,\text{(sys)}$ followed by a smooth suppression region. For the energy ($E_\text{s}$) at which the spectral flux has fallen to one-half of its extrapolated value in the absence of suppression, we find $E_\text{s}=(5.12\pm0.25\,\text{(stat)}^{+1.0}_{-1.2}\,\text{(sys)}){\times}10^{19}$ eV.Comment: Replaced with published version. Added journal reference and DO

The twilight of the Liberal Social Contract? On the Reception of Rawlsian Political Liberalism

This chapter discusses the Rawlsian project of public reason, or public justification-based 'political' liberalism, and its reception. After a brief philosophical rather than philological reconstruction of the project, the chapter revolves around a distinction between idealist and realist responses to it. Focusing on political liberalism’s critical reception illuminates an overarching question: was Rawls’s revival of a contractualist approach to liberal legitimacy a fruitful move for liberalism and/or the social contract tradition? The last section contains a largely negative answer to that question. Nonetheless the chapter's conclusion shows that the research programme of political liberalism provided and continues to provide illuminating insights into the limitations of liberal contractualism, especially under conditions of persistent and radical diversity. The programme is, however, less receptive to challenges to do with the relative decline of the power of modern states