Youth soccer: an epidemiologic perspective

The youth soccer movement in the United States is developing at a tremendous rate. This article explores the epidemiology of youth soccer including trends in participation, injury data, and injury categories that are of specific concern to the young athlete. Finally, recommendations are made regarding possible future areas of study and research on youth soccer.     

Monitoring and interpreting the ocean uptake of atmospheric CO2

The oceans are an important sink for anthropogenically produced CO(2), and on time scales longer than a century they will be the main repository for the CO(2) that humans are emitting. Our knowledge of how ocean uptake varies (regionally and temporally) and the processes that control it is currently observation-limited. Traditionally, and based on sparse observations and models at coarse resolution, ocean uptake has been thought to be relatively invariant. However, in the few places where we have enough observations to define the uptake over periods of many years or decades, it has been found to change substantially at basin scales, responding to indices of climate variability. We illustrate this for three well-studied regions: the equatorial Pacific, the Indian Ocean sector of the Southern Ocean, and the North Atlantic. A lesson to take from this is that ocean uptake is sensitive to climate (regionally, but presumably also globally). This reinforces the expectation that, as global climate changes in the future owing to human influences, ocean uptake of CO(2) will respond. To evaluate and give early warning of such carbon-climate feedbacks, it is important to track trends in both ocean and land sinks for CO(2). Recent coordinated observational programmes have shown that, by organization of an observing network, the atmosphere-ocean flux of CO(2) can, in principle, be accurately tracked at seasonal or better resolution, over at least the Northern Hemisphere oceans. This would provide a valuable constraint on both the ocean and (by difference) land vegetation sinks for atmospheric CO(2).     

The role of creative thinking in resilience after hurricane Katrina.

This study hypothesized that creative thinking can help predict the process of resilience, manifested as subjective well-being despite exposure to adversity, either directly or with moderation of personality and demographic variables. Eighty survivors of hurricane Katrina who have lost their homes were asked to respond to measures of creative thinking, perception of adversity, well-being, a short personality inventory, and a demographic questionnaire. Supplementary qualitative exploration of 17 participants’ experiences augmented understanding within contextual framework. Findings suggest that originality and flexibility are significant predictors of well-being when personality traits and demographic variables are taken into account. Specifically, originality was found to be a significant predictor for extroversion, which was a significant predictor of life satisfaction measure. In addition, flexibility and originality were significant predictors of clinical stress and life satisfaction for the African American participants but not for the European American participants; originality and flexibility were also significant predictors of resilience for participants reporting greater income disparity. Triangulation of interviews with these findings further supports the notion that manifestations of creative thinking as resilience are likely moderated by SES, culture and social structure, and might be masked under condition of social privilege and prevalence of resources. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Psycotherapy, managed care, and the economy of interaction

This paper examines the disclosure over the value of long-term psychotherapy in a managed-care system. Many managed-care companies define extended psychotherapy as superfluous. Those who defend psychotherapy respond that the restrictions imposed by managed care are misguided and potentially harmful. After briefly discussing the relevant literature, the points of contention between psychotherapy and managed care are examined from the perspective of narrative literary theory. The analysis highlights the contrasting narrative assumptions implied about the importance of the clinical interaction. Pointing out each side's use of point-of-view, narrative structure, and informational exchange, it is posited that beneath arguments that often focus on the commodities of time and money lie larger, conceptual differences. These stealthily serve to undermine the possibility of a rational debate. The paper concludes by asserting that psychotherapy and managed care assume incommensurate narratives of interaction when discussing the value of therapy. The terms of discourse must be expanded in order to account for the philosophical differences described. Several ways this might be accomplished are proposed.