Can technology change the existing culture? Case study on Bangladesh’s public sector

This article highlights the challenges development aid donors can face in Bangladesh’s post-colonial culture, as well as substantiating how lack of quality control in an aid project can influence local values, beliefs, and subjective experiences. The article also suggests that improving quality control, such as through monitoring and evaluation (M&E), can generate greater impact of development aid resources.     

The Developmental Unfolding of Sibling Influences on Alcohol Use over Time

Research has long demonstrated that siblings are similar in their alcohol use, however much of this work relies on cross-sectional samples or samples of adolescents alone and/or exclusive focus on older siblings’ impact on younger siblings. Using a three time-point design from early adolescence to early adulthood (M ages?=?14.9, 18.3, and 22.4 years, respectively; 55% female; 54% European ancestry, 38% Asian ancestry), we evaluated the prospective older and younger sibling influences on alcohol use across time (N?=?613 sibling pairs; 35% sisters, 26% brothers, 39% mixed-gender; average age difference?=?2.34 years; 34% full-biological siblings, 46% genetically-unrelated adopted siblings, 20% pairs where one child was the biological offspring of parents and the other was adopted). The results from both the traditional and random-intercept cross-lagged panel analyses showed that older siblings’ alcohol use predicted younger siblings’ alcohol use across each developmental transition and across a variety of sibling contexts (e.g., gender composition, age difference, genetic relatedness). On the other hand, younger siblings’ alcohol use only predicted older siblings’ alcohol use when siblings were close in age (1.5 years or less) and under conditions of high sibling companionship. These results add to a body of literature illustrating how both older and younger siblings are important socializing agents of adolescent and early adult alcohol use. Assessing or co-treating siblings for alcohol problems may be an important add-on to existing adolescent and early adult alcohol prevention and intervention programs.     

Pop Goes IR? Researching the Popular Culture–World Politics Continuum

In this article we offer a potential research agenda for the study of popular culture in IR and outline how this research agenda could be advanced. If the incorporation of popular culture into IR is going to be fruitful, there must be a willingness to go beyond an engagement with illustrations of world politics. Doing so will get us closer to what is at stake in the mutual implication of popular culture and world politics.     

A comparison of three shoe sole impression lifting methods at high substrate temperatures

Footwear impressions are a common form of evidence found at crime scenes, and the accurate recovery and recording of such impressions is critical for shoe sole comparison and identification. The lifting of shoe sole impressions from hot surfaces (>30°C/86°F) and in hot environments has received little attention in the literature, particularly in relation to the recovery of class and randomly acquired characteristics (RACs) required for accurate comparisons. This study addressed this knowledge gap by comparing the performance of three common impression lifters (gelatin, adhesive, and vinyl static cling film) at recovering shoe sole impressions in dust from hot flooring substrates. Dry origin dust shoe sole impressions were made on ceramic tile, galvanized metal, and laminated wood flooring using a shoe that possessed two RACs and five class characteristics present on the sole. Substrates were left in direct full sun for five hours during a summer day prior to lifting. Performance was measured by the proportion of RACs and class characteristics visible in each lifted impression. Results demonstrated that the vinyl static cling film tested performed poorly across all substrates, particularly for metal (23.8% marks recovered), including notable shrinkage of the lifted impression. In contrast, adhesive (~96% marks recovered over all substrates), and to a lesser extent gelatin (~85%), lifts were highly successful on hot substrates. These data suggest that adhesive lifts can consistently and accurately recover shoe sole impressions from hot substrates. This study contributes critical information for crime scene examiners to improve and expand evidence recovery in hot environments.     

Assessing child-safe culture and practices in organisational settings: a validation and refinement of Kaufman's Organisational Safety Climate Survey

ABSTRACT

Using an Australian sample of employees (n?=?1068) we assessed the psychometric properties of Kaufman’s Organisational Safety Climate Survey and its practical utility for measuring child-safe culture within organisations. The 60-item survey was found to have adequate psychometric properties. Initial factor analyses indicated a unidimensional factor structure, despite the survey being originally conceptualised into four subscales. Cronbach’s α coefficients were .95 for the full survey, with subscales ranging from .65–.94. However, qualitative feedback from respondents indicated that the survey was somewhat laborious and repetitive, with some item ambiguity noted. Refinements to the survey resulted in a 24-item short-form survey. The psychometric properties of the short-form survey were re-assessed. Factor analyses indicated a three-factor solution. Despite a significant reduction in items, internal consistency of the scale was not compromised; reliability of subscales also improved. Validation of this short-form survey as an alternative, time-efficient measure to maximise employee participation and contribution, is recommended.     

America’s Exceptionalist Tradition: From the Law of Nations to the International Criminal Court

How might we explain the reticence that the United States has towards the International Criminal Court, especially when one considers that the Rome Statute, the Court’s governing treaty, contains many of the legal protections afforded under the US legal system? This article will argue that the US’ relationship with the ICC is part of a longer pattern of US behaviour that can be best explained through the lens of exceptionalism. In making this argument, the article has two interrelated objectives: first, to provide an historical overview of how the US has behaved vis-à-vis treaty-based international legal institutions designed to moderate warfare; and second, to provide a critique of arguments that present the United States’ relationship with said legal institutions as nothing more than an expression of narrowly informed national interests.     

Moral Concerns and Policy Attitudes: Investigating the Influence of Elite Rhetoric

A growing body of research documents the crucial role played by moral concerns in the formation of attitudes and a wide range of political behaviors. Yet extant models of moral judgment portray a direct linkage between moral intuitions and policy attitudes, leaving little room for the influence of political context. In this article, we argue that political rhetoric plays an important role in facilitating the connection between moral intuitions and political attitudes. Using a unique combination of media content analysis of the stem cell debate and individual-level measures of the public’s moral foundations, we examine the role of rhetoric in linking a person’s moral foundations to his or her attitudes. Our results show that individuals who are the most likely to have been exposed to political rhetoric have the strongest connection between their moral foundations and their attitudes on the issue. We also find that rhetoric was persuasive on this moralized issue and present suggestive evidence that it was most persuasive among those who endorsed the relevant moral foundation.     

Who “Wins”? Determining the Party of the Prime Minister

The prime ministership is the preeminent political post in parliamentary democracies. Yet few studies examine PM party choice, perhaps under the assumption that the choice is a simple function of party size. In this article, we argue that key strategic actors and the context in which government negotiations take place can play a critical role in PM party choice. We test our hypotheses using a mixed logit with random coefficients on an original data set comprising PM selection opportunities in 28 European countries. Our methodological approach allows us to incorporate qualitative concerns about heterogeneity and causal complexity into our analysis. Contrary to conventional wisdom, we find that the largest party is often disadvantaged when it comes to PM party choice, that some presidents play an influential role in choosing the PM, and that the value of being the incumbent depends on one’s performance in office and how the previous government ended.     

Hate groups and hate crime

This paper is the first to investigate the relationship between hate groups and hate crime empirically. We do so using panel data for the U.S. states between 2002 and 2008. Contrary to conventional wisdom, we find little evidence that hate groups are associated with hate crime in the United States. We find somewhat stronger evidence that economic hardship may be related to hate crime. However, evidence for the potential importance of economic factors remains weak. Further, we find that demographic variables are not significantly related to hate crime in the United States. Our results leave the question of what factors may drive hate crime in America unresolved. But they cast doubt on the popular perception that hate groups are among them.