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This study provides new evidence on how historical patterns of household formation shape the present-day level of trust. We test two distinct features of historical family arrangements that might be harmful to trust towards out-groups: (a) family extendedness in terms of the number of household members, and (b) generational hierarchy and gender relations within the household. To conduct our study, we compiled a historical database that reflects family structure and socio-economic development, mostly in the 19th century. The analysis was performed on a sample of 94 historical subnational units within eight contemporary Western and Eastern European countries that participated in the Life in Transition Survey in 2010. We find that cohabitation of several generations within the historical family and power of older generations over the younger are detrimental for out-group trust today. By contrast, family extendedness per se was revealed to have no impact on trust. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article suggests a new method to expand a family of life distributions by adding a parameter to the family, increasing its flexibility. It is called the extended Modi-G family of distributions. We derived the general statistical properties of the proposed family. Different methods of estimation were presented to estimate the parameters for the proposed family, such as maximum likelihood, ordinary least square, weighted least square, Anderson Darling, right-tailed Anderson-Darling, Cramér-von Mises, and maximum product of spacing methods. A special sub-model with three parameters called extended Modi exponential distribution was derived along with different shapes of its density and hazard functions. Randomly generated data sets and different estimation methods were used to illustrate the behavior of parameters of the proposal sub-model. To illustrate the importance of the proposed family over the other well-known methods, applications to medicine and geology data sets were analyzed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Family group conferences (FGCs) in child welfare bring immediate and wider family members together to decide on the best way to meet a child's needs. Unlike professionally led meetings, the aim is for decisions to be made by or with family members. Qualitative and mixed-method research with FGC participants tends to show positive experiences: most participants feel their voices are heard; FGCs facilitate family-driven solutions and closer relationships—within families and with social workers. Although there is existing literature on FGCs, there is a paucity of robust comparative UK evaluations, i.e., randomised controlled trials or quasi-experimental studies. Comparative studies internationally have focused on a narrow range of outcomes, not recognised the importance of context, and paid little attention to the quality of delivery. Some qualitative studies have considered process and context but there is scant measurement of these. The aims of this study are, firstly, to establish how FGCs improve outcomes for families and what factors vary their quality, and, secondly, to assess longer-term outcomes in terms of service use and associated costs. Methods: Given the importance of process and context, evaluation informed by realist and complex systems approaches is needed. This multi-method evaluation includes a survey of FGC services in all UK local authorities (n = 212) to map service provision; co-design of programme theory and evaluation measures with family members who have experienced an FGC (n = 16–24) and practitioners (n = 16–24) in two sites; a prospective single-arm study of FGC variability and outcomes after six months; and comparison of service use and costs in FGC participants (n≥300 families) and a control group (n≥1000) after two years using a quasi-experiment. Discussion: This is a pragmatic evaluation of an existing intervention, to identify what mechanisms and contexts influence effective process and longer-term outcomes. The study is registered with Research Registry (ref. 7432). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy (DDP) is a family-based therapy for adopted children aiming to achieve secure attachment between the child and parent. Due to restrictions under the COVID-19 pandemic, delivery of DDP transitioned from face-to-face to online methods. This study aimed to explore families experience of online DDP compared to face-to-face DDP, looking at the advantages and disadvantages of remote delivery methods and the implications this has on future service delivery for clinicians. Semi-structured interviews with 6 families were conducted online. Analysis of transcripts using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) revealed four superordinate themes: environment and child engagement, non-verbal communication, travel and familiarity with remote interactions. Parents recognised the influence the physical and online environment had on their child's engagement levels, however, varied in their experience and hence preference of delivery method. All families emphasised the importance of non-verbal communication within DDP sessions and majority highlighted this may be lost online. For families who travelled to face-to-face DDP, car journeys provided a unique opportunity to decompress and reflect after sessions. For families where travel is unfeasible, online DDP was a lifeline, demonstrating the ability of remote therapy to widen access to specialist healthcare. Familiarity with online work emerged as a strong indicator of positive attitudes towards remote DDP, especially if the previous experience is positive and the child is confident using technology. Overall, families differed greatly in their experience of remote and face-to-face DDP indicating a new approach must be undertaken with each family beginning therapy, ensuring it is unique and individual to their needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]