Political Parties,Australia and the U.S. Alliance: 1976-2016

ABSTRACT

What causes variation in the foreign policies of U.S. allies regarding their desired U.S. military role in their region and their troop commitments to U.S. military interventions? This paper addresses this question through documenting and explaining the sources of variation in Australia’s foreign policies regarding these issues over four decades. Treating the two major political parties in Australia and their respective leaders who self-select into them as endogenous, the paper argues that Australian foreign policy, whilst always supportive of the U.S. alliance, has systematically varied. This variation has correlated with the political party in power while the late Cold War and post-Cold War balances of power remained constant. While the Labor party has only been willing to send combat troops to large U.S. military interventions when the latter have a supporting United Nations Security Council Resolution, the conservative Liberal party has been willing to military intervene without this multilateral support. The Labor party, unlike the Liberal party, has also frequently proposed the formation and consolidation of multilateral regional institutions. These preferences render the U.S. to have been necessary for the Labor Party but sufficient for the Liberal party. Future Sino-U.S. armed conflict would provide a harder test of these hypotheses.     

Personality Pathways to Impulsive Behavior and Their Relations to Deviance: Results from Three Samples

The importance of the relation between impulsivity and deviance is well-acknowledged among criminologists. However, differences in the representations of impulsivity, some merely titular and others substantive, may cloud our understanding of these relations. The current study examines the argument, offered by Whiteside and Lynam Pers. Individuals Diff. (2000) 30: 669–689, that there may be four distinct personality pathways through which impulsive behavior may be manifested. Across three samples (two undergraduate, one community), we examine the validity of a four-factor structure of impulsivity, test whether these four pathways manifest divergent relations with various forms of deviant behavior such as crime and substance use, as well as laboratory manifestations of aggressive and impulsive behavior, and examine the invariance of these results across gender. The results support the existence of a four-factor model of impulsivity, the importance of two specific personality pathways in relation to self-reports of deviance (lack of premeditation and sensation seeking), as well as actual behavior, and suggest that these pathways are important for both men and women.     

Genipin--a novel fingerprint reagent with colorimetric and fluorogenic activity

Genipin, the hydrolytic product of geniposide, which is extracted from gardenia fruit, shows good potential as a fingerprint reagent. It develops latent fingerprints on paper as blue impressions with good contrast and resolution. Even very faint impressions that are barely visible in ambient light will fluoresce brightly upon illumination at ca. 590 nm and are best viewed with a barrier filter above 630 nm. Potential advantages of genipin are the combination of colorimetric and fluorogenic activity in one reagent as well as its being a safe and environmentally friendly natural product.     

Integrating Voting Theory and Roll Call Analysis: A Framework

Scholars of legislative studies typically use ideal point estimatesfrom scaling procedures to test theories of legislative politics.We contend that theory and methods may be better integratedby directly incorporating maintained and to be tested hypothesesin the statistical model used to estimate legislator preferences.In this view of theory and estimation, formal modeling (1) providesauxiliary assumptions that serve as constraints in the estimationprocess, and (2) generates testable predictions. The estimationand hypothesis testing procedure uses roll call data to evaluatethe validity of theoretically derived to be tested hypothesesin a world where maintained hypotheses are presumed true. Wearticulate the approach using the language of statistical inference(both frequentist and Bayesian). The approach is demonstratedin analyses of the well-studied Powell amendment to the federalaid-to-education bill in the 84th House and the Compromise of1790 in the 1st House.     

Toward a contemporary tradition for menarche

A cultural tradition to acknowledge a girl's first menstrual period is proposed in order to overcome the negative connotation of the event. Three basic questions regarding such a tradition are addressed: Who would participate? What would it mean? What type of activity should it be? A research team consisting of a psychologist, a nurse, and a social worker suggests answers based on their interviews with mothers and daughters, as well as their collection of menarche anecdotes from women psychologists.     

A View through the Bubble: Some Insights from Teaching Negotiation Online

The teaching of negotiation in an online context is not only possible, but surprisingly provides a number of opportunities that the traditional face-to-face classroom setting lacks. The author, drawing on his practical experience over the past few years, puts forth suggestions for preparing and teaching negotiation online. After explaining the preparation and structure of the course, the author offers six core insights to consider when teaching negotiation in this context.