Social connections in the community ("social capital") represent an important source of resilience in the aftermath of major disasters. However, little is known about how residential relocation due to housing destruction affects survivors' social capital. We examined changes in social capital among survivors of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami. People who lost their homes were r...

This article examines the participation of Spanish older people in formal, non-formal and informal learning activities and presents a profile of participants in each kind of learning activity. Method: We used data from a nationally representative sample of Spanish people between 60 and 75 years old (n = 4703). The data were extracted from the 2007 Encuesta sobre la Participación de la Población...

Information on personality, on anxiety and depression and on several aspects of religion was collected in 1974 Dutch families consisting of adolescent and young adult twins and their parents. Analyses of these data showed that differences between individuals in religious upbringing, in religious affiliation and in participation in church activities are not influenced by genetic factors. The fam...

Using the secularization theory and the Marxist notion of religion as masking class conscience one would expect the importance of religion and religious involvement today to wane and be limited to lower class members. To challenge this expectation, using a representative national telephone survey of 2004 youth (ages 11–18) and their parents, we attempt to answer the following two questions: How...

Formalised public participation in project approval procedures is rarely addressed in technology assessment. Empirical data about public participation processes are taken into account even more rarely. This article explores the practice of public participation in infrastructure projects in the Federal Republic of Germany on the basis of empirical data from the period of 1990 to 2010. The author...

In Germany, informal home care is preferred to professional care services in the public discussion as well as in legal care regulations. However, they ascribe only minor importance to the opportunity costs care givers have to face. Therefore, this paper explores the infl uence home care has on the labor supply of carers who live together with their care recipient. I am using the German Socio-Ec...

Greater participation in religious activities is associated with better health outcomes. In the US, most inpatients have religious needs, but physicians address them only occasionally and infrequently refer patients to clergy. US medical students are learning to do spiritual assessments and integrate the findings into patient management, which may reverse this. Religion does not play a central ...