Predictors of Early Engagement in Home Visitation

Predictors of engagement in mothers receiving home visitation in the first year of service was examined. Early engagement was studied in three ways: (1) length of time active in the program during the first year of service (duration), (2) number of visits received (quantity), and (3) gaps in service between visits (consistency). Examined visits received in 515 first-time mothers in a Healthy Families America (HFA) program. Parameters of engagement were investigated, and predictors of engagement were identified using demographics and the Kempe Family Stress Inventory. Inclusive of the Assessment Visit, 31.8% of mothers disengaged prior to the first month of service. Remaining active in the program was associated with being Caucasian, and increased parenting risk (mental health/substance abuse history, low social support, increased stress). Most mothers had fewer home visits than prescribed. Gaps in prescribed service were common, with 89.4% of mothers experiencing gaps between visits of 1 month, and dropping to 16.4% having gaps of 2 months. In contrast to findings from clinic-based interventions, early engagement in home visitation is associated with lower levels of functioning and acute needs. These findings add to a growing body of literature suggesting that increased adversity promotes engagement in prevention programs in general, and home visitation programs in particular. To the extent that mothers who are actively engaged in home visitation are likely to have increased psychosocial needs, curricula may require modification and augmentation to address these needs and optimize program effectiveness.     

Battered women who kill their abusers: an examination of commonsense notions, cognitions, and judgments

It has been argued that battered women who kill their abusers represent a special class of defendants being unfairly treated in the legal system. As a result, commentators have argued for reforms to permit the judicial system to respond more fairly. Researchers have investigated the influences of these prescribed legal modifications and the possible influence of various demographic and psychological factors on legal reforms. However, social scientists have not yet asked some fundamental, psychological questions. Is the law consistent with what society believes is right and just? Is there a commonsense notion of justice in these cases? What factors constitute cognitive decision rules and influence judgments in cases of battered women who kill their abusers? This study uses a basic, psychological method to identify psychological factors that are important in judgments regarding battered women who kill and to better understand commonsense notions of justice in these cases.     

Federal Oversight, Local Control, and the Specter of "Resegregation" in Southern Schools

Analyzing data for the 100 largest districts in the South andBorder states, we ask whether there is evidence of "resegregation"of school districts and whether levels of segregation can belinked to judicial decisions. We distinguish segregation measuresbased on racial isolation from those based on racial imbalance.Only one measure of racial isolation suggests that districtsin these regions experienced resegregation between 1994 and2004, and changes in this measure appear to be driven largelyby the rising nonwhite percentage in the student populationrather than by district policies. Although we find no time trendin racial imbalance over this period, we find that variationsin racial imbalance across districts are nonetheless associatedwith judicial declarations of unitary status, suggesting thatsegregation in schools might have declined had it not been forthe actions of federal courts.     

Community Support and Diversionary Measures for Juvenile Offenders in Hong Kong: Old Legacy, New Age

This paper begins by examining the arguments that led to the change of emphasis from residential training and detention to community-based measures in Hong Kong. Police cautioning and community support services are introduced. An evaluation of the services provided found that the majority of respondents reported high levels of satisfaction with them. It is likely that the services exerted positive influences on the respondents’ deviant behaviour, family values and sense of social responsibility, but one-fifth of them continued to commit deviant acts. Parents’ participation was not high. Young offenders rarely took responsibility for the offence they committed or understood the harm they had done to victims, and victims were not involved in deciding the intervention plan. The conclusions raise issues about the future for Hong Kong. They consider new diversionary strategies for responding to young people and debate the values that should underpin them.

Going, going, gone: the effects of aid policies on graduation at three large public institutions

This paper exploits uniquely detailed data and cross-institution variation in aid for three large public universities to identify the effects of aid on the probability of college graduation. The results indicate that need-based and merit-based aid both increase graduation rates at large public institutions, but primarily through the types of students that ‘select’ these institutions. Merit-based aid facilitates an institution attracting students who have higher observed academic ability that raises the probability of graduation. Need-based aid enables an institution to attract students with non-academic attributes such as social and cultural networks that, while often unobserved, improve graduation success. Broadly, our results suggest that recent aid policy that has moved away from need-based aid for low-income students (reducing their ability to find the best institutional match) and toward merit-based aid (that alters the distribution of high ability students across colleges) could foster stagnant graduation rates even with rising enrollment rates that have been observed over the last three decades.