Sheltered care residence: ten-year personal outcomes.

A ten-year follow-up study of 393 seriously mentally ill sheltered-care residents examined the type and degree of handicap characterizing the sample and estimated effects of ten-year residence. Results showed higher levels of helper-supported social functioning and of physical and mental health, accompanied by significant reductions in independent social functioning.

A framework for marketing image management.

Managers know that the customer's impression of an organization is important. And sometimes companies attempt to determine just what that impression is. They conduct ad hoc surveys and focus groups. But too often the data is insubstantial, or difficult to analyze, or even inaccurate. Barich and Kotler introduce the concept of "marketing image" and describe a system of image management: designing a study, collecting data, analyzing image problems, modifying the image, and tracking responses to that image. They argue that only a systematic approach will yield useful and accurate information that a company can translate into action.

Attitudes of sheltered care residents toward others with mental illness.

The social acceptance expressed by 234 former mental patients and by the general public toward persons with serious mental illness was compared. Factors that may affect social acceptance of such persons, including personal characteristics and experiences that promote identification with mentally ill persons and the subject's level of psychological distress, were examined. Former patients expressed attitudes that were much more accepting than those of the general public. As hypothesized, individual characteristics and experiences likely to increase former patients' identification with their peers (that is, visible deviant appearance, a high level of involvement within the sheltered care community, and the experience of negative community reactions to a resident's facility) were related to a higher score on a Guttman scale of social acceptance. An increased level of self-reported psychological distress tended to moderate such supportive attitudes.

Turbo marketing through time compression.

A host of advantages will flow to companies that learn to make and deliver goods and services faster than their competitors. However, four key questions must be answered to determine if a turbo marketing approach is suitable for your company.

A ten-year perspective of mortality risk among mentally ill patients in sheltered care.

The ten-year risk of mortality was assessed for a sample of 393 former psychiatric patients who were living in sheltered care settings in California in 1973. Compared with the general state population, residents of sheltered care facilities were 2.85 times more likely to die than would be expected if age-specific rates for the state applied to them. Excess mortality was due to heart disease, cerebrovascular diseases, and all other natural and unnatural causes except malignant neoplasms. The mortality rate of the subjects was closer to that of a low-income subsample of the California population, suggesting that the high mortality rates of patients in sheltered care settings may be due to their low-income status.

Characteristics of sheltered care facility operators in California in 1973 and 1985.

During the past 20 years, sheltered care homes have become the primary supervised community residence for mentally ill patients outside of licensed hospitals. To determine factors associated with sheltered care operators' remaining in business, follow-up interviews were conducted in 1985 with operators of 151 sheltered care facilities in California whose operators had been surveyed in 1973. Fifty-five of the original operators continued to operate the facility at 12-year follow-up, and 96 were new to the facilities since 1973. Compared with the original operators, the new operators were younger and better educated, were more likely to be men, and were more likely to be totally dependent on the business for their income. Operators who were members of local associations for sheltered care operators were more likely to have remained in business over the 12-year period, as were those who owned facilities with more than six beds.

The effect of occupational, marital and parental roles on mortality: the Alameda County Study.

This study investigated the impact of combining marital, parental, and occupational roles upon 18-year risk of mortality from all causes. The respondents were 3,700 participants in the Human Population Laboratory cohort ages 35-64 who completed a comprehensive health and psychosocial questionnaire in 1965 and were followed for mortality status through 1982. Employment status and type of employment were not found to predict mortality risk among women. Contrary to the multiple roles hypothesis, there was virtually no impact upon mortality of increasing numbers of children among employed women, except possibly among single working parents. The major impact of children was felt by housewives who had significantly elevated risks when a child was present in the home or when they had four or more children. Neither the number of children nor the presence of a child in the home affected mortality risk of men. Controlling for a variety of factors thought to be related to mortality in a logistic regression analysis did not change the foregoing relation.

Self-reports predictive of mortality from ischemic heart disease: a nine-year follow-up of the Human Population Laboratory cohort.

In order to assess the validity of self-reports of physical conditions, symptoms, and ailments, the nine-year mortality experience of a random population sample of 4590 adults, aged 35-94, in Alameda County, California, was examined. Consistently, increased risks of death from any cause and from ischemic heart disease were found for several self-reports. Multiple logistic analyses of deaths from ischemic heart disease showed that the best predictors for men were reports of "high blood pressure," "heart trouble," and "shortness of breath" and for women were "heart trouble," "swollen ankles," and "chest pain." The strength and consistency of the relationships between these self-reports and risk of death from all causes and from ischemic heart disease argues for the validity of such reports as measures of underlying disease state.

The marketing of social causes: the first 10 years.

PIP: Social marketing, the application of marketing thinking and tools to the promotion of social causes, has proved successful in effectively promoting beneficial social change, and is expected to grow in scope, scale, and effectiveness. It has evolved through social advertising and social communication, and is increasingly employed by a growing number or organizations and government agencies. Increasingly, social communication and marketing are being added to social advertising. Family planning, heart disease prevention, and other health cases are cited as examples of the range and impact of social marketing applications. As advances in conceptualizing social marketing problems and evaluating the impacts of social marketing programs make them more effective, social marketing specialists should be expected to work on a wider range of social causes with increasing sophistication. The evaluation of social marketing is discussed. Situations calling for social marketing are also explored, program accomplishments outlined, and criticisms and obstacles examined.^ieng

Social marketing: an approach to planned social change.

PIP: This article examines the applicability of marketing concepts to social causes and social change. Social marketing is defined as the design, implementation, and control of programs calculated to influence the acceptability of social ideas and involving considerations of product planning, pricing, communication, distribution and marketing research. Wiebe examined four social advertising campaigns and concluded that their effectiveness depended on the presence of adequate force, direction, adequate and compatible social mechanism, and distance (the "cost" of the new attitude as seen by message's message"s recepient). A marketing planning approach is not a guarantee for the achievement of social objectives; yet, it represents a bridging mechanism linking the knowledge of the behavioral scientist with the socially useful implementation of that knowledge.^ieng

Broadening the concept of marketing.

PIP: Marketing in business is the task of finding and stimulating buyers for a firms's output. Product development, pricing, distribution, and communication are the mainstays of marketing, while progressive firms also develop new products and chart the trends and changes in people's needs and desires. Marketing can either apply its knowledge to social problems and organizations or remain in a narrowly defined business activity. Every organization has basically the same functions: personnel management, production, income, and promotion, which are using modern marketing skills in commercial sectors. Suppliers and consumers are needed by all organizations. In Canada a group wished to promote an antismoking campaign but they had little money compared to the tobacco companies. This group used modern marketing techniques to combat their lack of funds and found many ways, e.g., books, articles. A business firm uses a multitude of marketing tools to sell its product. Nonbusiness organizations frequently do not integrate their programs the way the businesses place all activities under one marketing vice president and department. Astute marketing depends on continuous feedback from consumers and suppliers. They are dependent upon up-to-the-minute research that tells them about changes in the environment and moves of competitors. Nonbusiness organizations are often casual about the research upon which they base their vital decisions.^ieng