The present study aims to investigate the perspective relations between HIV/AIDS and condom-related knowledge, condom use, history of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and predictive factors of condom use by female sex workers (FSW) who were sent to the Women Re-education Center (WRC) in Shenzhen, People's Republic of China. Seven hundred and one FSW were interviewed. Whereas respondents had attained certain accurate knowledge about the HIV transmission routes, misconceptions were still commonly reported. Level of condom related knowledge was not high. The prevalence of using condoms with clients was relatively low-15%- 22% reported not using condoms consistently. One of the major obstacles was 'Refusal by clients'. Significant predictive factors associated with consistency of condom use with clients were age, educational background, average number of client intakes per day, capacity in determining the use of condoms and past STD history. The respondents may have developed a false sense of safety by subjectively assessing whether their clients had a STD but they were unaware that HIV carriers may show no obvious symptoms at all. The data has confirmed the worries regarding the potential 'bridging effect' of HIV transmission as resulted by cross-border commercial sex-networking activities.

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The objective of the study was to establish a behavioural surveillance system (BSS) for sexually-related risk behaviours of the Hong Kong adult male general population. Benchmark data were obtained by interviewing 1,020 male respondents, age 18 to 60. The results showed that: (1) 14% of the respondents had engaged in commercial sex in the past six months, (2) 27% of the male commercial sex clients did not always use condoms when having sexual intercourse with commercial sex workers (CSWs), (3) 1.5% of the respondents had contracted sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) in the past six months, (4) 6.1% of respondents had only ever had sex with a man, (5) 0.8% of the respondents had practised unprotected anal intercourse with a man in a six-month period, (6) 4.4% of respondents practised sexually-related high risk behaviours, defined as unprotected sex with a CSW or unprotected anal intercourse with a man, and (7) 36.4% of those who engaged in commercial sex had not used condoms with their regular sex partners. Commercial sex was often practised outside Hong Kong, very commonly in Mainland China or Macau, and was often practised at multiple locations by the same client. Effective programmes have to be able to reduce the size of the at-risk population. This study together with future ones, will form the first BSS in Hong Kong for the general male population and will provide a relevant yardstick for programme evaluation.

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Purpose: This study aimed to examine the relationships between Sense of Coherence (SoC), Coping Strategies and Quality of Life (QoL) of parents of children with autism in Malaysia.Method: Purposive sampling was used to recruit parents of children with autism from 3 Autism Centres run by NGOs. The parents were asked to complete a questionnaire.Results: The results of the study show that SoC and cognitive reframing are important factors that are associated with QoL.Conclusions: It is recommended that policy-makers and programmers at the Autism Centres conduct more training workshops for parents of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), so that their overall QoL can be improved.Limitations: Future studies could recruit more participants, especially parents at government centr

a b s t r a c tThis study aims to examine whether different educational systems will impose students with different perception on Chinese values. Cluster sampling method was used and 599 Chinese students from three national secondary schools (NSS) and two Chinese independent schools (CIS) in Malaysia were recruited. A questionnaire containing two sections namely background information and Chinese value scale developed by Chinese Culture Connection (1987) was distributed. The findings showed that the practice of Chinese cultural values indicated through the use of Chinese language in everyday life between respondents from NSS and CIS is about the same, but more respondents from CIS read or watch Chinese materials than those from NSS. Respondents from CIS and NSS viewed integrity and tolerance as the most important Chinese value. Respondents from NSS perceived Confucians ethos or human relationship as more important, whereas respondents from CIS chose loyalty to ideals and humanity. The findings suggested that the role of parents in the perseverance of Chinese culture and the influence of different school environment are equally important in determining the perception of Chinese values among secondary school students.

The high attrition rate among Malaysian tertiary students have drawn the attention of educators and policy makers, and poor academic adjustment is regarded as one of the factors. Therefore, it is important to find out factors that are relevant to their poor academic adjustment so that intervention programs can be designed to improve their adjustment. Social media addiction and the grit personality have found to be significant factors that affect academic performance. However, it is not clear how the three variables interact with each other. Accordingly, this study adopts the essentialist and contextual perspectives to examine the relationships among these three variables, especially whether grit is a mediator or moderate for the relationship. 210 undergraduates were recruited by using the purposive sampling method and were asked to fill in a questionnaire. Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling was used to analyze the data. The results showed that social media addiction is negatively associated with grit personality and academic adjustment, and grit is positively associated with academic adjustment. In addition, grit is a statistical mediator rather than a statistical moderator for the effect of social media addiction on academic lifestyle. The findings support the contextual perspective on personality that grit personality is a state that can be changed by certain social context. The findings reveal the importance of providing a positive social context for tertiary students who are undergoing a transition period, so that their grit personality can be developed and thus enhance their academic adjustment.