A turning point in the survivors' benefits schemes has been reached in many developed countries because a typical family for which these schemes were designed for has undergone a lot of changes. The survivors' benefits schemes were established when a typical family meant a family headed by a male working full time and a wife who took care of children and the household on a full time basis, a family whose ties were stable and devorce were rare. However, at present all these have changed. This papaer will present a detailed account of the historical development and similar background of the Japanese survivors' benefits schemes. Acounts of historical development will also tackle the changing concept of "widowhood". It will also include a discussion of major current issues involving the derivative rights of surviovors, particularly the changing concept of a typical family. With all these changes happening and having an impact on the current survivors' benefits schemes, the author would like to strongly believe that a closer and deeper study of the said schemes is necessary and timely.

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This study analyzed the occurrence rate of the burn-out syndrome of 433 staff in 32 rehabilitation centers for mentally retarded persons in Hokkaido, and its relationships with the characteristics of individuals and employment settings, subjective symptom of fatigue, stress, and coping factors. The results showed the burn-out existed more than 14% among the staff, although its occurrence rate was relatively low compared to other studies for nurses or public health nurses. Multiple regression analysis found the 14 predicting variables for the staff burn-out which accounted for 57 % of the variance for the sample (R=.75). The result indicated the significant relationship between the burn-out and the stress-related factors for staff members of rehabilitation center for mentally retarded persons.

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In this paper, social support intervention is defined as social worker activities to help solve clients' problems by promoting their receipt of social support which meets their needs. Social support intervention, which focuses on a client's immediate environment and links informal and formal helping services, has a rich potential. However, social worker intervention strategies are still unclear, and some have pointed out the limitations of social support. To establish intervention strategies, it is important to pay attention to the change process of a client situation, that is, the social support process. A practice model of the social support process (Richman et al.) is presented. Tasks and procedures in each helping process (namely, assessment, planning, intervention, and evaluation) are examined. It is necessary that both strengthening of the theoretical framework of social support intervention and the development of effective programs are achieved concurrently.

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