Social Exclusion: The Interplay of Group Goals and Individual Characteristics

Past research has shown that adolescents justify social exclusion based on concerns for group functioning, and yet, to date, no study has evaluated whether group functioning justifications shift or remain stable across different exclusion contexts. In this study, we systematically manipulated exclusion context (i.e., competitive or noncompetitive soccer groups) and individual characteristics of the target of exclusion to test the nature of the interaction between these factors during exclusion judgments. Adolescents’ (N = 201; 61 % Female) exclusion judgments differed across contexts only when an individual’s ability was under consideration. Intergroup (i.e., gender, nationality) and interpersonal (i.e., aggression, shyness) characteristics overwhelmed contextual considerations. Results indicate the complexity of factors weighed by adolescents when making exclusion judgments, and suggest the need for extension of the present findings to understand more fully the interaction between the context of exclusion and individual characteristics in exclusion judgments.     

‘Quality’, Cinema and the ‘Superior Woman’ Persona: understanding women’s film criticism in post‐war Britain (1945–59)

Criticism was a particularly buoyant area of film culture in Britain during the post‐war period, a regular feature in newspapers, periodicals, magazines, and BBC radio programmes. What has not been widely recognised is the central role that women played as critics of film at this time, and where their interests differed from those of their male peers. This article recovers the contribution made by women film critics, arguing that middle‐class writers such as C. A. Lejeune and E. Arnot Robertson adopted a form of ‘distanced amusement’ with regard to themes of sentimentality and romance (associated with low‐brow female pleasures). This strategy permitted them to engage with the broader cultures of film‐watching, commenting on subjects such as female crying and character identification, and recognising cinema‐going as a pleasurable activity for women, subjects which male critics did not discuss. These findings expand knowledge about film criticism in the post‐war period and reconfigure received understandings of film culture to account for women’s gendered contribution to the critical field.     

Marital Conflict and Early Adolescents’ Self-Evaluation: The Role of Parenting Quality and Early Adolescents’ Appraisals

Cognitive appraisals and family dynamics have been identified as mediators of the relationship between marital conflict and children's adjustment. Surprisingly little research has investigated both meditational processes in the same study. Guided by the cognitive-contextual framework and the spillover hypothesis, the present study integrated factors from both theories early adolescents' appraisals of threat and self-blame, as well as perceived parenting quality as mediators of the link between early adolescents' perception of marital conflict and their self-evaluations (self-esteem and scholastic competence). Analyses were based on the first two waves of an ongoing longitudinal study. Participants were 176 two-parent families, and their early adolescents (50.5% girls) whose mean age was 10.61 years at Time 1 (SD =0.40) and 11.63 years at Time 2 (SD=0.39). Structural equation modeling analyses indicated that parenting quality and early adolescents' perceived threat provided indirect pathways between marital conflict and early adolescents' self-esteem 1 year later when controlling for their initial level of self-esteem. With respect to scholastic competence, only fathers' parenting was an indirect link. Self-blame did not play a role. Implications for understanding the mechanisms by which exposure to marital conflict predicts early adolescents' maladjustment are discussed.     

Fake Claims of Fake News: Political Misinformation,Warnings, and the Tainted Truth Effect

Political Behavior - Fact-checking and warnings of misinformation are increasingly salient and prevalent components of modern news media and political communications. While many warnings about...     

Staring into the abyss: A crisis of the rule of law in the EU

Acceptance of the meaning, operation and enforcement of the rule of law in the EU by its Member States is critical to the Union's legitimacy. Any perceived or real crisis in the rule of law thus merits careful consideration. This article focuses on how a crisis in the rule of law occurred within the EU and how the intended ambiguity of the rule of law has entrenched this crisis. This article argues that the primary cause of the crisis has been the EU's development of a unique ideation of the rule of law ‐ as a constitutional norm, policy instrument and value ‐ that 'hollowed out' the rule of law from a constitutional principle to an expedient policy tool. The EU institutions have entrenched the crisis in the rule of law and then tried to manage the chasm between what it deems as respect for the rule of law and certain Member States' conduct.     

J. Michael Cole,Cross-Strait Relations since 2016: the End of the Illusion (Routledge: London and New York, 2020) 202p. $35.96 Paperback; $124 Hardback; $35.96 Ebook

Journal of Chinese Political Science -     

Hu Bo, (Trans. Zhang Yanpei; Ed. Geoffrey Till) Chinese Maritime Power in the 21st Century; Strategic Planning,Policy and Predictions (Routledge: London and New York, 2019) 274 p. $124.00 hardcover; $46.36 e-book

Journal of Chinese Political Science -     

Impact of deception detection errors on public's trust in the police

Purpose. The present study explored the public's attitude towards errors in police officers’ detection of deception. Based on findings on trust in the police after responses to terrorist threats, we predicted a positive influence of a correct credibility assessment and of a risk‐averse response bias of police officers on public's trust. Methods. A general population sample (N= 151) read a hypothetical scenario concerning a credibility judgment and indicated their trust in the officers making the judgment. Decision outcome was manipulated by varying the four outcomes of a signal‐detection task, namely, Hit, Miss, False Alarm, and Correct Rejection. Results. In line with findings on trust in the police following responses to terrorist threats, people trusted police officers more if they judged the credibility of a suspect correctly. Moreover, officers who disbelieved the suspect's statement were trusted more than officers who believed, independently of outcome correctness. Furthermore, this effect was moderated by individual differences in error weighting. Conclusions. In sum, these findings indicate that lie‐biased credibility judgments made by police officers are supported by the public and increase their trust in the police. In addition, the present findings suggest that an asymmetrical weighting of judgment errors is a relevant factor in explaining the development of and attitude towards lie bias.