Responses to Gender Inequality in the Division of Family Work: The Status Quo Effect

This study addresses responses to gender inequality in the division of family work as well as the outcomes of those responses. Ninety-eight husbands and 95 wives responded to stimulus information manipulated by means of scenarios. Participants reported more wife-demand/husband-withdraw interaction than husband-demand/wife-withdraw interaction when the wife was discontent with her spouse's contribution to family work, but the demand/withdraw interaction patterns were reported equally when the husband was discontent. The data showed support for the Status Quo Effect Hypothesis: The likelihood that the spouse's contribution to family work remained unchanged (i.e., status quo maintenance) was rated higher than the likelihood that the spouse would increase his/her contribution to family work. In line with this, when the wife was discontent, wife-demand/husband-withdraw interaction was negatively related to the likelihood that the spouse would do more family work. Finally, participants reported a greater likelihood for discontent spouses than for content spouses to increase their own contribution, but discontent husbands were more likely to do so than discontent wives.     

Unusual Suicide in Italy: Criminological and Medico‐Legal Observations—A Proposed Definition of “Atypical Suicide” Suitable for International Application

This work is the result of a kind of categorization of suicidal conduct based on an empirical–phenomenological approach, with integrated assessment of certain criteria, such as the dynamics, correlation of types of injury and how they were produced, evidence gathered during official inspections in loco, and case history findings about “suicide.” This categorization is an attempt to provide a nosographic definition of atypical suicide, that is, cases in which the parameters of “typical” suicide are missing. Case studies are described, taken from a systematic exploration mainly of the Italian specialized literature of the 20th century, supplemented by earlier references when deemed significant. In‐depth analysis of atypical suicide can supply additional interpretations of the problem of differential diagnosis of suicide, homicide, and accidental death, that is, the real punctum dolens in overall medico‐legal determination of the cause of death in scenarios in which death cannot be definitely traced to a deliberate act.     

HOW AND WHY DOES WORK MATTER? EMPLOYMENT CONDITIONS,ROUTINE ACTIVITIES,AND CRIME AMONG ADULT MALE OFFENDERS*

An inverse relationship between employment and crime is well established, although the mechanisms that account for the correlation remain poorly understood. In the current study, we investigate the role of work quality, measured objectively (hours, income) as well as subjectively (commitment). A routine activities perspective is proposed for the work–crime relationship, and it inspires hypotheses about the way that work reduces crime indirectly, in part, through unstructured leisure and substance‐using behaviors that tend to carry situational inducements to offend. The results derive from within‐person analyses of monthly data provided by adult male offenders recently admitted to state prison in the Second Nebraska Inmate Study (N = 717; NT = 21,965). The findings indicate that employment significantly reduces self‐report crime but only when employed men report strong commitment to their jobs, whereas other work characteristics are unrelated to crime. This indicates that, among serious criminally involved men, the subjective experience of work takes priority over its objective characteristics. The results also indicate that routine activities only partly mediate the relationship among work, job commitment, and crime, whereas the majority of the work–crime relationship remains unmediated.     

THE FEMALE HOMICIDE VICTIM

This study examines the ways that females meet violent death and the role that illegal drug use plays in precipitating such deaths. The sex role hypothesis and the transactional risk thesis are explored to help account for homicide victimization of women. Data were drawn from the records of the Medical Examiner's Office in Philadelphia. Records of all illegal drug using homicide victims were compared with a random sample of non-drug-using victims. Data included interviews with relatives of the deceased, autopsy reports, police and other records. Both hypotheses received support. The importance of these findings can only be assessed, however, when more is known about how sex role constellations work in drug-using groups     

Measuring Neoliberalism: Development and Initial Validation of a Scale of Anti-Neoliberal Attitudes

Critics of neoliberalism argue that so-called meritocratic and identity-neutral social policies and political positions actually reinforce and exacerbate intersecting inequalities, namely racism, sexism, heterosexism, classism, and ethnocentrism/xenophobia. The purpose of these studies was to develop and initially validate a scale of neoliberal attitudes from a wide range of existing instruments that reflect anti-neoliberal theory. A series of three studies resulted in a 25-item instrument—the Anti-Neoliberal Attitudes Scale (ANAS)—that exhibits initial evidence of construct validity, internal consistency, and test–retest reliability. Exploratory factor analysis with students from two universities revealed a four-factor structure of Racism and Sexism Awareness, Communitarian Values, Multicultural Ideology, and Inequality Consciousness. However, a confirmatory factor analysis with an independent sample of undergraduate students suggests a bifactor model in which the general factor explains most of the variance and that the instrument should be treated as a single scale, rather than independent subscales. Significant correlations with measures of right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation suggest convergent validity. Temporal stability was established via a test–retest analysis in an independent sample of undergraduate students. Finally, responses from a sample of MTurk workers provided evidence of the ANAS’s incremental validity when compared to an existing measure of neoliberal beliefs. Implications for future empirical work on the psychological dimensions of neoliberalism are discussed.

     

Everyone Knows the Game: Legal Consciousness in the Hawaiian Cockfight

Past legal consciousness research has revealed a great deal about what individuals think and do with regard to law, but less attention has been paid to the social processes that underpin these attitudes, beliefs, and actions. This article focuses particularly on a “second‐order” layer of legal consciousness: people's perceptions about how others understand the law. Ethnographic observations and in‐depth interviews with cockfighters in rural Hawaii reveal how law enforcement practices not only affect cockfighting rituals, but are embedded within them. Police practices and informal rules work in concert to shape fighters' second‐order beliefs. These beliefs have implications for participants' understanding of central concepts, including order, disorder, and illegality. Examining legal consciousness from a second‐order perspective also underscores that notions of legitimacy are constantly created and recreated. Recognizing legitimacy's inherently relational nature helps us understand how experiences of law are synthesized into beliefs—for example, when an unusual police action directed toward a subgroup of fighters compromised the law's legitimacy for them. Foregrounding the relational nature of legal consciousness offers scholars a means to better understand and operationalize the dynamic nature of human relationships to law.     

Surveillance deputies: When ordinary people surveil for the state

The state has long relied on ordinary civilians to do surveillance work, but recent advances in networked technologies are expanding mechanisms for surveillance and social control. In this article, we analyze the phenomenon in which private individuals conduct surveillance on behalf of the state, often using private sector technologies to do so. We develop the concept of surveillance deputies to describe when ordinary people, rather than state actors, use their labor and economic resources to engage in such activity. Although surveillance deputies themselves are not new, their participation in everyday surveillance deputy work has rapidly increased under unique economic and technological conditions of our digital age. Drawing upon contemporary empirical examples, we hypothesize four conditions that contribute to surveillance deputization and strengthen its effects: (1) when interests between the state and civilians converge; (2) when law institutionalizes surveillance deputization or fails to clarify its boundaries; (3) when technological offerings expand personal surveillance capabilities; and (4) when unequal groups use surveillance to gain power or leverage resistance. In developing these hypotheses, we bridge research in law and society, sociology, surveillance studies, and science and technology studies and suggest avenues for future empirical investigation.     

SOCIAL WORK AND CORRECTIONS Comments on an Uneasy Partnership

This paper offers a summary of social work contributions to correctional treatment and provides a refutation to charges that social work in corrections is ineffective and adds a therapeutic veneer that prolongs the life of an outmoded, deficient system. Fundamental theories and practices of social work are consistent with the shifting emphasis from punishment to rehabilitation and community integration through focusing on the client within a social framework, attempting to influence the functioning of the social system, and coordinating new resources to met emerging needs. Postponing access to social services until after discharge from prison prevents the most rootless and disorganized among the prison population, with the highest probability of recidivism, from receiving necessary services, which might help to break the vicious cycle.     

CONTINGENCY CONTRACTING WITH JUVENILE OFFENDERS

This study was designed to test whether or not juvenile subjects who were on probation and were under a court order to pay fines would show an increased rate of work when positive contingencies of reinforcement were used in the form of contingency contracts.     

Social ties and short‐term self‐reported delinquent behaviour of personality disordered forensic outpatients

Purpose. In community‐based forensic psychiatry, patients' social ties are considered as protective factor in a risk management strategy. However, it is unknown whether these ties actually assist patients to refrain from re‐offending. We hypothesised a protective role for social ties in re‐offending behaviour. Methods. In a sample of forensic outpatients with a personality disorder (N = 55), the relationship between social ties (social contacts and participation in social institutions) and short‐term self‐reported re‐offences was studied within a prospective study design with a 6‐month follow‐up period. Results. Our results provide evidence for a protective function of club participation. For violent re‐offences, social institutions were protective and this protective function remained, even when a patient had network members with a criminal background. Except for work‐related contacts, social contacts did not provide protection. Conclusions. The protective effect of social ties, especially club participation, on desistance from re‐offending in forensic psychiatric patients merits further attention from researchers and clinicians.     

Value of DNA tests: a decision perspective

ABSTRACT: Before a Court of Law testifying in DNA‐evidence cases, scientists are often challenged with the idea that the more markers (loci) the better, i.e., why does the scientist not use 16 or more markers? This paper introduces a new perspective, decision analysis, to deal with the problem of the number of markers to type in a criminal context. The decision‐making process, which plays a key role in the routine work of a forensic scientist, consists of the rational choice, given personal objectives, between two or more possible outcomes when the consequences of the choice are uncertain. Simulated results support the hypothesis that analytical added value does not increase with the number of markers.     

Judicial use of social science research

American courts use social science research in three distinct ways: to make law, to determine facts, and to provide context. In this article, we review and critique the approaches that courts have traditionally taken to dealing with each form of social research. We also summarize and integrate a body of work offering a different perspective that treats law-making research associal authority, fact-finding research associal fact, and context-providing research associal framework. We end by proposing a coherent sequence of steps that courts should take when confronted with an empirical question about human behavior.This article was prepared under the auspices of the Task Force on Judicial and Regulatory Decisionmaking of the Carnegie Commission on Science, Technology, and Government. The views expressed are those of the authors rather than of the Task Force or the Commission. We are grateful to David Z. Beckler, Associate Director, for his comments. Requests for reprints should be sent to either author at the School of Law, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22901.     

The legal profession's beautiful myth: surveying the justifications for the lawyer's obligation to perform pro bono work

This article considers some of the substantive and normative claims underlying the performance of pro bono work by lawyers – that lawyers have always done pro bono work and that it is an essential element of what it means to be a lawyer. Following a brief survey of global pro bono activity, the article considers some of the drivers for pro bono work. It identifies three main streams of thought regarding the obligation to perform pro bono work, characterised as the historical arguments, the public service argument, and the ‘lawyer as gatekeeper’ or monopoly argument. Following an analysis of each position, the article concludes that while the historical evidence for a pro bono tradition is not strong, and that the public service and monopoly arguments are open to dispute, there is nonetheless a very strong ‘mythical’ force associated with pro bono work. Its power may thus lie as much in its ability to motivate altruism among lawyers, as it does in any historical or theoretical basis.     

Dimensions of professional listening competence in the legal context

When examining listening competence researchers have been interested primarily in the listening that takes place in personal relationships. This qualitative study (N?=?113), focusing on courtroom communication and drawing on social cognitive theory (SCT), approaches listening from both theoretical and practical perspectives by examining the dimensions of professional listening competence, analyzing it from a taxonomic perspective, and examining the manner in which personal agency is used when applying professional listening competence. In addition, the role of professional listening competence in promoting well-being at work is discussed. The findings suggest that the emphasis placed on the dimensions of listening competence differs depending on whether general or professional listening competence is being examined. In the latter, the contextual dimension forms a strong basis that the other dimensions build on, whereas for general listening competence all dimensions are equally important. The agentic perspective that attorneys apply to listening functions on all taxonomic levels of listening, indicating that there is a profession-based requirement for active, self-regulated listening. The findings also indicate that attorneys’ use of personal agency and the self-regulatory mechanisms of listening lead to an elevated sense of self-efficacy, which increases their subjective sense of well-being at work.     

A mixed DNA profile controversy revisited

Semaan et al. (J Forensic Res, 2020, 11, 453) discuss a mock case “where eight different individuals [P₁ through P₈] could not be excluded in a mixed DNA analysis. Even though … expert DNA mixture analysis software was used.” Two of these are the true donors. The LRs reported are incorrect due to the incorrect entry of propositions into LRmix Studio. This forced the software to account for most of the alleles as drop-in, resulting in LRs 60–70 orders of magnitude larger than expected. P₁, P₂, P₄, P₅, and P₈ can be manually excluded using peak heights. This has relevance when using LRmix which does not use peak heights. We extend the work using the same two reference genotypes who were the true contributors as Semaan et al. (J Forensic Res, 2020, 11, 453). We simulate three two-donor mixtures with peak heights using these two genotypes and analyze using STRmix?. For the simulated 1:1 mixture, one of the non-donors’ LRs supported him being a contributor when no conditioning was used. When considered in combination with any other potential donors (i.e., with conditioning), this non-donor was correctly eliminated. For the 3:1 mixture, all results correctly supported that the non-donors were not contributors. The low-template 4:1 mixture LRs with no conditioning showed support for all eight profiles as donors. However, the results from pair-wise conditioning showed that only the two ground truth donors had LRs supporting that they were contributors to the mixture. We recommend the use of peak heights and conditioning profiles, as this allows better sensitivity and specificity even when the persons share many alleles.     

DIFFERENTIAL SUSCEPTIBILITY? IMMIGRANT YOUTH AND PEER INFLUENCE*

There is reason to suspect that lower levels of exposure to criminogenic peer‐based risks help explain why immigrant youth are less involved in crime and violence. However, it also is possible that if and when they do encounter these risks, immigrant youth are more vulnerable to them than are native‐born youth. Drawing from literature on the adaptation experiences of immigrant adolescents, we hypothesize that immigrant youth will be relatively more susceptible to the effects of both 1) exposure to deviant peers and 2) unstructured and unsupervised socializing with peers when compared with their nonimmigrant counterparts. Using a sample of approximately 1,800 adolescents from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN) study, we find support for our first hypothesis but not the second. Specifically, in both cross‐sectional and longitudinal models, we find that exposure to deviant peers has a greater impact on violence among immigrant youth than it does for native‐born youth. Furthermore, this pattern of results is supported with supplemental, sensitivity analysis using the AddHealth data. In contrast, there are no statistically significant differences across immigrant generation status with regard to the effect of informal socializing with peers on violence.     

‘Their life in your hands’: the experiences of prison-based psychologists conducting risk assessments with indeterminate sentenced prisoners in the United Kingdom

ABSTRACT

Assessing prisoners’ risk of recidivism and making risk-management recommendations is central to the work of prison-based psychologists. Risk assessment is particularly crucial when it involves indeterminate sentenced prisoners: psychologists’ recommendations have potentially significant consequences both for prisoners and the public. However, little is known about psychologists’ experiences of conducting such high stakes risk assessments. This paper reports the results of an exploration of psychologists’ experiences, via interviews and discussions with qualified, prison-based psychologists. Analysis using Grounded Theory methods identified one super-ordinate category of meaning, namely The Challenging Context of Risk Assessment, which comprised two sub-categories: (1) pressure of limited resources and (2) pressure of the environment. An additional major category, Risk Assessment as a Weighty Task, comprised three sub-categories: psychologists described (1) a weight of responsibility relating to the magnitude and range of their responsibilities; (2) a weight of expectation from colleagues to provide solutions, and (3) the trainee dilemma associated with the need to balance development of trainee psychologists’ competence in risk assessment with being held accountable for their work. Understanding qualified psychologists’ experiences of undertaking risk assessments with indeterminate sentenced prisoners can facilitate improvements and build on areas of existing good practice.     

An Evaluation of Statistical Methods for the Determination of Age of Death Using Dental Root Translucency and Periodontosis

Abstract: Lamendin and colleagues (1992) proposed to assess age‐at‐death from root translucency and periodontosis. Several teeth from the same individual were included in their study. In our work, we evaluate the reliability of their formulas without introducing this bias. Our sample was constituted of 214 individuals (114 males and 100 women) selected from the Terry collection (U.S.A.). The R² between age and both indicators is equal to 0.33 and 0.08 (p < 0.001). Based on linear regression, the mean of standard error for individual age prediction was equal to 13.67 years, and the mean interval length is equal to 53.89 years. Multinomial logistic regression and Bayesian approach failed to give satisfactory results when classifying the individuals in age categories. Therefore, the use of root translucency and periodontosis may lead to incorrect age‐at‐death assessment, and it is thus necessary to complement this approach with other techniques to assess age‐at‐death.     

The COLLECTORS ranking scale for ‘at‐scene’ digital device triage

As digital evidence now features prominently in many criminal investigations, such large volumes of requests for the forensic examination of devices has led to well publicized backlogs and delays. In an effort to cope, triage policies are frequently implemented in order to reduce the number of digital devices which are seized unnecessarily. Often first responders are tasked with performing triage at scene in order to decide whether any identified devices should be seized and submitted for forensic examination. In some cases, this is done with the assistance of software which allows device content to be “previewed”; however, in some cases, a first responder will triage devices using their judgment and experience alone, absent of knowledge of the devices content, referred to as “decision‐based device triage” (DBDT). This work provides a discussion of the challenges first responders face when carrying out DBDT at scene. In response, the COLLECTORS ranking scale is proposed to help first responders carry out DBDT and to formalize this process in an effort to support quality control of this practice. The COLLECTORS ranking scale consists of 10 categories which first responders should rank a given device against. Each devices cumulative score should be queried against the defined “seizure thresholds” which offer support to first responders in assessing when to seize a device. To offer clarify, an example use‐case involving the COLLECTORS ranking scale is included, highlighting its application when faced with multiple digital devices at scene.     

EU Enlargement and the Emboldening of Institutional Integrity in Central and Eastern Europe: The ‘Tough Test’ of Public Procurement

EU enlargement and the incorporation of the acquis communautaire are widely seen as successful and emboldening the integrity of political, administrative and legal institutions in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). The analysis reported here describes the specific problems associated with affirming institutional integrity in the field of public procurement, which constitutes a ‘tough test’. Public procurement is namely an area where the acquis swiftly gained pre‐eminence in accession states, but whose complex regulations depend on a well‐functioning judiciary, effective administrative supervision and limited corruption. The experience in Poland and Bulgaria, countries that represent different stages of institution building in this area, is compared. The results suggest that an EU‐compatible public procurement regime is being consolidated throughout the CEE region. At the same time, that regime may only work well when boundaries between institutional subjects, as well as between the spheres of law, politics and economics, are upheld in post‐communist countries.