COMMENTARY ON TIPPINS AND WITTMANN'S "EMPIRICAL AND ETHICAL PROBLEMS WITH CUSTODY RECOMMENDATIONS:

Although in substantial agreement with Tippins and Wittmann's analysis, their call for a moratorium on the practice of custody evaluators making recommendations to the court does not solve the many problems that they have raised, and may have unintended consequences which place families at even greater risk. This commentary reflects our agreement with some of the authors' major points of contention, focuses on several points of disagreement, and suggests alternative remedies for the shortcomings and ethical problems described in child custody evaluations.     

Aggregation effects on male-to-female arrest rate ratios in New York State, 1972 to 1984

The purpose of this paper is to assess the effects of data aggregation on a specification of the relationship between sex and arrest rate trends. The analysis focuses on the empirical implications when arrest data are aggregated across dimensions that are likely to affect the sex-crime relationship. The data for the analysis consist of 4,119,358 male and female adult arrests in New York State for the 13-year period ending in 1984. Results indicate that race, regional differences, and the legal seriousness of the arrest charge produce significantly different patterns of sex convergence across time. On the basis of these results, we suggest serious limitations in past analyses of female crime rates and in the value of Uniform Crime Report (UCR) data for addressing theoretically relevant questions concerning the social correlates of official crime.     

The use of multiple informants to assess children's maltreatment experiences

Most researchers rely exclusively on the reports of protective service workers to determine children's abuse history. In this report, information about children's maltreatment experiences is obtained from protective service workers and three supplementary sources of data: parents, medical records, and clinical observations. Fifty-six children from 34 families receiving protective services for verified reports of physical abuse, neglect, sexual abuse, and/or emotional maltreatment participated in the study, with most children known to have experienced more than one type of abuse. The supplementary data provided important information about the range and severity of children's maltreatment experiences. Review of the parent and medical record data led to identification of 28 children who had additional types of maltreatment experiences that were not reported by their protective services workers—nine cases of physical abuse, two cases of neglect, five cases of sexual abuse, and 12 cases of emotional maltreatment. Supplementary data also revealed information about incidents of specific types of abuse that were more severe than those reported by the children's protective service workers in an additional 24 cases. A method was devised to synthesize information provided from the different sources of data examined in this report to derive 0–4 point ratings of four categories of maltreatment experiences: (1) physical abuse, (3) neglect, (3) sexual abuse, and (4) emotional maltreatment. The Kappa reliability coefficients for each of these scales were .88, .73, .83, and .90, respectively. Data demonstrating the relationship between these maltreatment ratings and various indices of the children's socioemotional and cognitive functioning were also presented to provide preliminary support for the validity of these scales. The findings from this study suggest that multiple sources of data should be examined in order to obtain accurate assessments of children's maltreatment experiences, and that independent raters can synthesize discrepant data to obtain reliable and valid estimates of children's abuse history. Clinical and methodological issues relevant to the improved assessment of children's maltreatment experiences are also discussed.     

Creating a learning culture in rural schools via educational satellite television broadcasts

Abstract

Globalisation is increasingly placing greater pressure on economies of countries to become competitive and to develop higher levels of skills. In order to compete effectively on a global level, education and development must be based on a good foundation. Although formal education in South Africa is presently reaching the majority of children between the ages of seven and fifteen years, actual educational attainment is low. According to the Third International Mathematics and Science Study, South African pupils performed poorly in Mathematics and Physical Science compared to other participating countries.

This low attainment could be addressed by stimulating a learning culture through the medium of telematics. There have been a number of such nationwide initiatives aimed at transforming the country into a 'knowledge-based society' through the use of ICTs. One such initiative is the University of Pretoria's 'TeleTuks' educational satellite broadcasts to schools.

This article concentrates on the benefits of tele-education for schools participating in TeleTuks as perceived by teachers and by learners. This study was also done to determine to what extent schools are able to participate in the various ICT-related options available; and what problems participating schools are experiencing. It was found that satellite TV is effective in supplementing classroom education by fostering an interactive learning culture, although it has not been utilised and implemented widely enough.     

A New US-Sino Space Relationship: Moving Toward Cooperation 1

Since the late 1990's the United States has maintained a strict policy of no cooperation with China on space activities. The reasons for that are several, including the desire to inhibit the development of dual-use technology considered potentially threatening to the United States and political reluctance to work with a communist country. Increasingly, however, it has become clear that policy is not constraining China from dual-use technology development and that the policy overall may be detrimental to U.S. security interests. Therefore a policy change, from a realistic consideration of circumstances, must be considered.