2008 Board, Committees, Sections & Focus Group Meetings - Alphabetical
2008 Board, Committees, Sections & Focus Group Meetings - Chronological
2007 Research and Theory Section Minutes (pdf document)
2006-2007 Research and Theory Section Work Plan (pdf document)
Minutes - Research and Theory Section Meeting
November 7, 2007
Pittsburgh, PA
Attendance: Approximately 45 people were in attendance at the meeting.
Stephen Marks, Chair of the section, opened the meeting at 8:10 p.m.
A sign-up sheet asking people to volunteer to be reviewers, discussants, and/or presiders for next year’s meeting was passed around.
Introductions of the current section officers: Stephen Marks: Chair; Ron Sabatelli: Chair-elect; Valarie King: Secretary/Treasurer; Jennifer Hardesty: Student/New Professional Representative. Nominating Committee members include: Bonnie Barber, Kristine Baber, Kim Updegraff, and Bill Marsiglio.
Approval of Minutes: The 2006 RT section minutes were handed out at tonight’s meeting (along with tonight’s agenda and a copy of the treasurer’s report). Time was allowed to review the minutes. Shelly MacDermid moved that the 2006 section meeting notes be approved. Bonnie Barber seconded the motion. There was unanimous approval from those in attendance. Motion carried.
Treasurer’s Report: Valarie King gave a report on the section’s three accounts. This year’s treasurer’s report covers the 12 month period ending September 30, 2007.
The RT section account posted a net profit, increasing from $6,701.97 to $8,137.28. The main income sources included RT membership income and interest. The main expenses were related to travel and the annual conference.
The Reuben Hill Award account posted a net profit, increasing from $44,160.41 to $45,738.09. Income came from interest paid to the account, and expenses were related to the award.
The Royalty account posted a net profit, increasing from $7,051.68 to $7,302.89, all due to interest income; there were no expenses. John Pepper again confirmed on 10/03/07 that NCFR will reimburse the RT Royalty account once they receive funds from the Sourcebook sales from Sage.
Discussion followed. Marks noted that there will be no section dues collected starting January 1, 2008. Stephen Russell, liaison to the Board for our section, provided information on this change in the dues structure. Our section will receive money from NCFR in place of income from membership dues but we will lose any unspent money left at the end of the year. Any money that our section has in the account as of December 31, 2007 will remain in our account (and will not expire). We can add to our account through fundraising activities.
Susan Herrick moved that the Treasurer’s report be approved. The motion was seconded. Motion carried.
Award Winners. Ani Yazedjian won our section award for outstanding paper submission from a student/new professional for her paper “Predictors of Academic Achievement for White and Hispanic College Students.” Ani is Assistant Professor of Family and Consumer Sciences, Texas State University-San Marcos.
Reuben Hill Award. Frank Fincham explained the process behind this award. It is given annually by our section to the best article combining research and theory around a family issue based on a search of 22 journals within a given year. The award was given to Melissa T. Sturge-Apple, Patrick T. Davies, and E. Mark Cummings (it was given earlier this afternoon) for their 2006 article “Hostility and Withdrawal in Marital Conflict: Effects on Parental Emotional Unavailability and Inconsistent Discipline.” Journal of Family Psychology, 20(2), 227-238.
Todd Goodsell and Elizabeth Sharp (Co-Chairs of the award committee) presented the Anselm Strauss award to Dana Shawn Matta and Carmen Knudson-Martin for their 2006 paper “Father Responsivity: Couple Processes and the Co-construction of Fatherhood.” Family Process, 45(1): 19-37. Stephen Fife also served on the award committee.
JMF report. Dave Demo reported that Alexis Walker left the journal in good shape. Several articles accepted under her leadership will still be forthcoming in the next few issues (February and May). Wiley-Blackwell has instituted a new copyediting process.
Demo reported that he has 4 deputy editors who will also be serving as action editors: David Johnson, Ralph LaRossa, Cheryl Buehler, and Velma McBride Murry. They will receive approximately 35-40 manuscripts per year in their specialty area (substantive and/or methodological) to handle.
Demo has been having discussions regarding increasing the publication of JMF to 6 issues per year (5 issues per year are currently being published). He noted that JMF has been receiving more high quality manuscripts and current manuscripts tend to be longer on average. He reported that the NCFR board was supportive of this idea and he will be discussing it further with the JMF editorial board at their meeting tomorrow. Any change in this regard will likely take place either next year or the year after.
Demo has also been exploring possibilities for web features and interactive features such as having extra tables and appendices from manuscripts posted on the JMF website or posting book reviews and blogs.
Please contact Demo if you would like to review for JMF, want to recommend colleagues to review, or can recommend students for the Reviewer-in-Training Program (jmf.uncg.edu).
FR report. Joyce Arditti reported that FR is doing well. The current acceptance rate of 14.9% is at a historic low but has resulted in high quality manuscripts. She noted that FR’s impact factor is up and that article downloads have increased 27% from 2005, with articles downloaded 582,161 times in the last reporting period. She encourages manuscript submissions and welcomes ideas for special issues. People can serve as guest editors or guest coordinators. Please contact her if you would like to review for the journal or would like to nominate others for the editorial board. Tucker and Crouter are editing a volume on enduring couples (April issue) and another issue will focus on transnational families (October). Arditti has agreed to continue as editor until 2009.
JFTR report. Bob Milardo reported that the JFTR office officially opened on October 15 and they are currently accepting manuscripts. Four manuscripts have already been submitted. An advisory committee has been appointed. Milardo has arranged focus group meetings here at the annual meeting to provide an opportunity for feedback on how the board should be arranged. He welcomes suggestions regarding ideas for articles and for guest authors. The first issue is due in October and he will need 8 articles for it. A call for papers and reviewers has already gone out through Zippy News and other organizations (e.g., ASA, APA). Milardo is hopeful that the website for the journal will be up and running within a few weeks on the NCFR website. The journal will be accepting both theory pieces and integrative reviews. Milardo is also looking for a book review editor.
Theory Construction and Research Methodology report by Kay Pasley (chair). There were 146 registrants this year. A new web based submission system was in place this year. There were only a few glitches with the new system and these are expected to be worked out by next year. Hillary Rose will be the chair next year. There are plans for all papers and discussant comments to be made available to the membership. Sessions were increased from 1 hour and 20 minutes to 1 hour and 30 minutes, with positive results. Please volunteer as a presider or discussant for next year. The 2009 chair will be Dan Pearlman, who was just elected.
Report by Stephen Russell, liaison to the Board for our section. Russell noted that one of the biggest changes has been the addition of Diane Cushman as executive director. He views this as a very positive change and noted that Cushman has a strong vision for the staff and is making positive changes. Jason Samuels is involved in virtual social networking of the membership. Take a look at http://community.ncfr.org. Russell reports that all of the journals are in good shape. Since Joyce Arditti will only be serving as editor of FR for two more years, a new editor for FR will be announced very soon. Russell noted that the financial situation of NCFR is good. A vision for financial policies and investments is being considered. Russell will serve as treasurer next year. Please nominate people for offices in NCFR. There will be a meeting on Friday regarding identity issues and a member survey will be conducted at a later date.
Anisa Zvonkovic is our incoming program chair. She has chosen “lenses on family” as the theme for next year. Please contact her with any ideas that you have. She would like to bring in great speakers, and have invited symposia (like research groups), and plenaries. She would like to draw in people from other disciplines.
Discussion of RT’s Policy Representative. Stephen Marks reported on the recent history of our policy representative. During his term he implemented a new procedure of self-nomination for this position, with selection by the section officers. Claire Forest was chosen as our policy representative for a two year term. Her main duties were to attend the policy meeting in Washington D.C and report back to the section. Forest was unable to attend the business meeting last year and so we did not get a report from her. The policy meeting in D.C. was cancelled this year so Forest prepared a report on conference calls that were made with regard to these policy issues. A discussion ensued regarding the future of the policy representative position and whether we should elect a new representative given that it was unclear what the future of this role would be or whether the meetings in D.C. would be resumed. Stephen Russell noted that this will still be an important committee and that the RT section should elect someone to serve on it as our policy representative. It is unclear whether the D.C. meetings will be resumed, but regardless, Diane Cushman will still rely on this committee in the future. It was agreed that we would proceed with the election of a new policy representative for our section and Ron Sabatelli will solicit nominations via our list serve. Susan Herrick volunteered to serve as our representative at the policy meeting being held here at the conference until we could elect a new policy representative.
Updates on RT activities by Stephen Marks. Marks noted that our sessions at the meeting were going well. He saw two section sessions today and both were well attended. Cindy Winters had previously contacted him regarding concerns expressed by some members regarding the quality of sessions. She asked Marks to create some special sessions for this year’s conference and he created 3 of them. He noted that the first session with Mike Johnson was very well attended; the other 2 sessions were yet to come. Marks reported that we received 105 submissions for the conference this year, which was 20 more than our nearest competitor. He discussed the advantages of having more submissions in that they result in getting more slots for sessions. We had 7 symposia this year and Marks noted that we had many excellent proposals. In addition to this, we had 7 paper sessions and 43 posters.
Marks presented awards to the outgoing section members: Ron Sabatelli as Chair-Elect, Valarie King as Secretary/Treasurer, and Jennifer Hardesty as student/new professional representative. He then turned over the meeting to our new Chair, Ron Sabatelli.
Ron Sabatelli presented Marks with an award for his service as Chair of our section. He then introduced our new section officers: Shelly MacDermid, Chair-Elect; Kevin Roy, Secretary/Treasurer; and Paula Goodwin, Student/New Professional representative.
Update from the Nominations Committee by Bonnie Barber. Barber noted that the committee was charged with finding nominations this year for two positions on the Nominations Committee and one position as the Chair of the Reuben Hill Award Committee. The current slate of candidates for the Nominations Committee includes four candidates (for two positions). They currently have one candidate on the slate for Chair of the Reuben Hill Award Committee and they will be seeking one additional nomination.
Bob Milardo moved that the current slate of candidates be approved. Lee Leslie seconded the motion. Unanimous approval from those in attendance. Motion carried.
Comments from the floor. Ron Sabatelli solicited comments from the floor. A discussion ensued around the topic of increasing the quality of presentations at NCFR and keeping researchers engaged in NCFR including the following:
- some members observed that some researchers are not attending NCFR anymore and would like to see our section reaffirm our commitment to representing research and theory. Some members felt that the meetings were holding less and less for scholars.
- we need more members of RT on the NCFR board so that our input is represented there.
- we need to have more dynamic speakers.
- we need to invite senior scholars that we know to participate in the meetings.
- how can we take responsibility to improve the quality of our sessions? We can nominate people as officers and have researchers serve on the board.
Members brainstormed for names for speakers for next year’s meeting.
Ron Sabatelli adjourned the meeting at 9:45 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Valarie King
Secretary/Treasurer
Research and Theory Section
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