This article presents the development and results of a study that analyzed the psychosocial determinants of abstaining from sexual intercourse, practicing contraception, and avoiding pregnancy. It was carried out with a representative household and a clinic sample of 12-19-year-old females of lower-middle and lower socioeconomic levels in Mexico City. Among the implications of the results for program design are: (1) the need for clarifying erroneous beliefs and providing detailed, practical knowledge concerning sexuality, pregnancy, use of and access to contraceptives; (2) a broad definition of sex education that emphasizes family communication, values clarification, provision of alternative role options for women other than motherhood, and both the goals and the skills needed to achieve them--for example, independent decision-making. Attention to male attitudes and communication skills as well as ways of improving communication and support networks among peers was also found to be essential.

The aim of this study was to explore the influence on Mexican citizens of several variables that have been reported as being important in the literature on fear of victimization. Sociodemographic variables such as gender, age group and socioeconomic level, together with perceived risk of victimization, perceived seriousness in the face of different acts, experienced victimizations and perception of control of violence and crime are included among these variables. One hundred and eighty-one people were interviewed in a cross-sectional field study. Multiple regression analyses were carried out in three fear of victimization dimensions: personal, property and general situations. On the whole, the findings confirm the influence of the aforesaid variables. Being a woman, feeling at risk of being the object of violent attacks and the seriousness with which moderately violent acts are perceived were some of the major variables considered to predict fear of victimization.

El objetivo de este estudio fue analizar la relación entre la presencia de esquemas desadaptativos tempranos-incluyendo privación emocional, abandono, defectuosidad, aislamiento social, fracaso, vulnerabilidad, insuficiente autocontrol, grandiosidad, búsqueda de aprobación, subyugación, inhibición emocional, negatividad y estándares irreales-y el nivel de ansiedad total, ansiedad de separación, fobia social, pánico-somatización y ansiedad general en la infancia. Los participantes fueron 234 niños entre 8 y 13 años de edad (M = 9.78; DT = 1.20; 59.82% era niñas), pertenecientes a dos centros educativos públicos de la Ciudad de México. Los resultados indicaron que no hubo diferencias significativas por sexo en los niveles de ansiedad, excepto en pánico-somatización; las niñas presentaron mayor nivel que los niños. Todos los esquemas desadaptativos estudiados correlacionaron positiva y significativamente con el nivel de ansiedad total. Los niños que presentaban esquemas como defectuosidad, abandono, vulnerabilidad a catástrofes extremas, inhibición emocional y negatividad tendieron a presentar mayor ansiedad por separación. Además, los niños que presentaban el esquema de vulnerabilidad a catástrofes extremas mostraron mayor fobia social y los que presentaron los esquemas de abandono e inhibición emocional presentaron mayor pánico-somatización. Los niños que presentaban los esquemas de abandono y vulnerabilidad a catástrofes extremas presentaron mayor ansiedad general. Asimismo, el modelo de regresión lineal indicó que los esquemas que predicen el 54.8% de la varianza de la ansiedad total fueron: vulnerabilidad a catástrofes extremas, inhibición emocional, abandono y defectuosidad. Estos resultados aportan información relevante para el desarrollo de programas de prevención e intervención de la ansiedad infantil.

* Este artículo de investigación científica y tecnológica hace parte de los resultados del proyecto denominado «Desarrollo positivo del adolescente como protector de conductas de riesgo. Un estudio comparativo Colombia-México», realizado entre el 1° de febrero del 2014 y el 30 de mayo

Suicide represents a public health issue that requires new preventive strategies. Therefore, this study analyzes differences in language use between a themed posts group (suicide and depression) and a random posts group (non-specific topics) from different social media platforms. In addition, the similarity of the texts of themed posts group with the set of phrases linked to suicide risk factors is analyzed. Texts were processed using the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC) software. A 95% bootstrap confidence interval (CI) was built for the difference in means for the resulting values per word category across groups. Significant differences in the use of language were observed between the themed post group and the random post group, whereas no differences were found between the themed post group and the set of phrases linked to suicide risk factors. These results can contribute to the development of risk-detection tools, which identify users at risk based on the analysis of language use embedded in social media. Such opportune detection would significantly increase the suicide prevention work. However, there is still a latent need for doing more research in this field, especially for the Mexican culture.