Editor's comment.

The winter issue of the Journal addresses a number of professional and consumer concerns. The first article relates to violence and abuse, and describes a study of 200 women with a variety of disabilities. Powers, Curry, Oschwald, Maley, Sexton and Eckels found that women with disabilities experiences a higher rate of abuse compared to women without disabilities, and discussed strategies for improving this situation. Moore, Feist-Price and Alston investigated factors related to successful employment for individuals with mental retardation. While a number of factors were studied, job placement services were significantly related to success in placement in competitive employment. The third article in this issue is a theory driven investigation of Hershenson's theory of work adjustment. Strauser, Keim, and Ketz found that higher levels of work personality predicted self-efficacy in job related areas as well as an internal locus of control. Another interesting, but perhaps not surprising, finding was that persistence is correlated with education. The results supported Hershenson's premise that school related activities develop work competence.

Career thoughts have been considered important in how an individual perceives career options and career choices. In a comparison of individuals with a disability and a convenience sample of individuals in a university setting, Strauser, Lustig, Keim, Ketz and Malesky found no difference in any of the four scales of the Career Thoughts Inventory. Apparently, individuals with disabilities think about careers very much like those without disabilities, a rather reassuring finding.

The last two articles address professional knowledge issues. Bat-Chava, Deignan, and Martin investigated the amount of knowledge related to assistive technology and accommodation available from rehabilitation counselors for individuals with hearing impairment. After studying employed counselors and rehabilitation counselor training programs, the authors concluded that many graduate programs do not include needed information in this area. In the last article, Hagner, Noll, and Donovan describe a pilot study in which they used professional responses to 44 scenarios to develop a list of competencies needed by rehabilitation program staff. This somewhat novel approach identified 12 areas of (and 87 specific) competencies needed by professional rehabilitation staff if they are to appropriately respond to client needs.

I want to thank the authors for their contributions to the issue.