Social Capital and Prosocial Behavior among German Children

Peer Victimization and Psychosocial Adjustment among Children of Parents with Physical Disabilities in China: A Comparative Study

This study investigated whether the children of parents with physical disabilities endured higher levels of peer victimization. Particularly, this study focused on the mediating effects of peer victimization in the relationships between parental disability and both the emotional symptoms and prosocial behaviors exhibited by their children. Data were obtained from a survey on health and mental health among children and adolescents from disadvantaged families. The survey was conducted by Renmin University of China from August to September 2018 using multistage probability sampling method. The sample in this study included 716 adolescents, of whom 390 had at least one parent with physical disabilities and reported more severe peer victimization. In contrast to respondents who did not have parents with physical disabilities, these adolescents experienced more emotional symptoms and engaged in fewer prosocial behaviors. Furthermore, the analysis showed that 15.16% of the total effect of parental disability on emotional symptoms was mediated by peer victimization, which had a nonsignificant mediating effect in the relationship between parental disability and prosocial behaviors. These findings can inform practitioners who aim to help children of parents with physical disabilities improve their coping strategies and social skills to manage peer relationships. Moreover, these results highlight the importance of establishing an inclusive school and community environment to reduce social stigma and peer victimization toward children from disadvantaged families.

Methodology and Statistical Modeling of Social Capital Influence on Employees’ Individual Innovativeness in a Company

The research deals with the problem of identification and substantiation of mechanisms of social capital influence on individual innovativeness of employees, which increases the positive innovation effect in companies. The study proposes a new methodological approach and technology for assessing the social capital of employees, taking into account the factors of interpersonal and institutional trust, involvement in social networks, social norms, and its impact on the employee’s innovativeness. The methodology uses methods of system analysis and synthesis, expert assessments, statistical modeling, and survey. Numerical experiments are carried out using collected data from special surveys of employees of a machine-building company. An assessment of social capital and its impact on the employee’s innovativeness is determined and a statistically significant influence of the factors of “trust” and “social networks and connections” on social capital is set. It is revealed that the main determinant of innovativeness is the risk appetite. It is proved that the innovativeness model includes factors of “trust” and “social networks and connections”. The cumulative effect of social capital on innovativeness is positive and statistically significant.

The Impact of Civic and Religious Social Capital on the Antisocial Attitudes of the Youth: A Multi-Level Cross-National Study

The main goal of this paper is to investigate whether some dimensions of civic and religious social capital are connected to antisocial attitudes of the youth. Based on the social capital theory and previous research, the author assumed that membership of voluntary associations as a dimension of civic social capital and attendance at religious services as a dimension of religious social capital, will be negatively correlated with antisocial attitudes of the youth. The integrated dataset of the last European Values Study and the World Values Survey waves were used as the sources of the research data. The dataset was comprised of 11,411 respondents who were younger than 25 years old from 79 countries. As hypothesized, at the individual level, attendance at religious services was negatively correlated with antisocial attitudes, whereas membership of voluntary associations was positively correlated with antisocial attitudes. At the country level, none of the hypothesized correlations were confirmed. A cross-level interaction between GDP and associational membership was found. The author explains the findings by evoking the special characteristics of religious social capital and its strength in building moral obligations and by suggesting possible differences in incentives for joining voluntary associations in the countries with different levels of economic wealth.