Acculturation

The health (self-reported health conditions) and nutritional status (food and nutrient intake, nutritional biochemistry, anthropometry) of 189 elderly Greeks living in Melbourne, Australia were described and compared with 104 elderly Greeks living in a rural town in Greece (Spata) using a validated health and food frequency questionnaire. Spata was chosen because the traditional diet is maintained by the community and may act as a 'surrogate' measure of diets prevalent in Greece prior to the Melbourne sample's migration to Australia in the 1960s.

A higher rate of psychosis has been observed in immigrant populations as compared to the indigenous populations of the UK. Specifically, second generation immigrants (born in the UK) have been noted to have the highest risk. This phenomenon has been attributed to a number of genetic and social factors such as problems with acculturation. Previous studies in Luton, Bedfordshire have shown that the Bangladeshi community experience the highest rate of psychosis above all other ethnic minorities in this area.

OBJECTIVES: To explore differences in contraceptive use among women of Mexican origin across generations of migration. METHODS: Logit models were used to assess contraceptive use among 1,830 women of Mexican origin in Cycles 5 (1995) and 6 (2002) of the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG). Analyses were stratified by age. Initial models controlled for survey year and underlying differences across generations of migration in age and parity; subsequent models added a range of potential mediating variables.

Three types of close relationships have received attention from theorists and researchers interested in self-monitoring: friendships, romantic relationships, and marriage. Our review of this literature was organized around three phases of relationships: initiation, maintenance, and dissolution. Across the three types of relationships, consistent differences between high self-monitors and low self-monitors emerged concerning the structure of their social relationships (segmented vs. integrated), the basis for choosing friends and romantic partners (activity-based vs.

Lullabies and laments promote new awareness, enculturation, adaptation, and grief expression. These concepts' relevance to palliative care, however, has not been examined. In this study, a music therapist used a grounded theory-informed design to reflexively analyze lullaby and lament qualities, evident in more than 20 years of personal palliative care practice. Thus, the construct "lullament" emerged, which signified helpful moments when patients' and families' personal and sociohistorical relationship with lullabies and laments were actualized.

Adoption is an act of kindness and an expression of the most exalted of human morality. It fulfills the needs of both the adoptive parents and the adopted child. Muslim religious law has rejected the concept of adoption as it exists in the western world and presents several alternatives including personal liability, declaration of guardianship, bestowing a gift and leaving a last will and testament.

The old polynesian custom of giving a child persits. One child in three or four is asked for and adopted (Fa'a'amu). It was not officially recognized, which had no disadvantage as it was between Maoris and inside enlarged polynesian families. But quick acculturation and urbanization, social and economical changes of the past ten years have changed all that. The contradiction between french law and tahitian traditional customs exposes these fa'a'amu children, with no legal statute and without judicial protection, to many drawbacks.

Health and mental health practitioners in rural and regional Australia are increasingly being presented with the challenge of working cross-culturally. Due to a diversity of cultures, generic approaches are needed that take account of culture without requiring the practitioner to have detailed knowledge of each person's background. However, there are many practitioners from diverse backgrounds now working in Australia at various stages of enculturation into Western practice.

Professionals starting on a rehabilitation unit must join the unit culture, learning to work side by side with addiction counselors who are often "in recovery." They then face the task of integrating self-help and psychological models of treatment. Patients undergo their own induction, first accepting the attribution of "addict," and then joining a subculture of recovery that provides ego support and a sense of higher purpose. Group therapy is the primary avenue of acculturation for both patients and professionals.

Nurses of American Indian heritage address unique challenges in their professional and personal lives. A qualitative study is described that investigates how such nurses bring unique qualities to nursing based on their spiritual beliefs, which stem from tradition and ritual, belief in the family, and harmony and oneness with the earth and with all creatures. The imperative to do cross-cultural research as well as the difficulties encountered in doing such research are discussed.