Communication error management in law enforcement interactions: a receiver’s perspective

Two experiments explore the effect of law enforcement officers’ communication errors and their response strategies on a suspect’s trust in the officer; established rapport and hostility; and, the amount and quality of information shared. Students were questioned online by an exam board member about exam fraud (N_study1 ?=?188) or by a police negotiator after they had stolen money and barricaded themselves (N_study2 ?=?184). Unknown to participants, the online utterances of the law enforcement officer were pre-programmed to randomly assign them to a condition in a 2(Error: factual, judgment)?×?3(Response: contradict, apologize, accept) factorial design, or to control where no error was made. Our findings show that making (judgment) errors seem more detrimental for affective trust and rapport in a suspect interview, while no such effects appeared in a crisis negotiation. Notably, we found a positive effect of errors, as more information was being shared. The ultimate effect of the error was dependent on the response: accept was effective in re-establishing rapport and decreasing hostility, while contradict threatens it. Accept seems more effective for the willingness to provide information in a suspect interview, while apologize seems more effective for affective trust and rapport in a crisis negotiation.     

Introduction: shifting meanings of home

The studies and narratives collected in this special volume acknowledge "home" as a complex, ambiguous notion and reality. The contributors pay tribute to different ways of experiencing home, and to multiple connections to place and time. They illustrate how home is a social edifice, how it embodies different meanings and values, how it demarcates individual and social or national identities, and how a longing for home permeates experiences of homelessness as well as cultural, spatial, linguistic, and economic transitions.     

Incorporating groups into rational choice explanations of turnout: An empirical test

This study examines the problem of voter turnout from a rational choice perspective. It reviews the “paradox of voting” and finds one model, which incorporates the role of intermediary social groups and leaders, to be a promising solution. It tests the hypothesis that leader mobilization increases voter turnout, using an ecological analysis of turnout in five Montreal ethnic communities during three recent elections: the 1993 Canadian federal, the 1994 Quebec provincial, and the 1994 Montreal municipal elections. Data on mobilization are taken from semi-directed interviews with association leaders in each community. The results compare predicted and actual rankings of turnout for each community and election. The overall results are weak, indicating that the model does a poor job of predicting voter turnout.     

Comparison of violence and abuse in juvenile correctional facilities and schools

Peer violence, peer sexual harassment and abuse, and staff abuse experienced by boys and girls in juvenile correctional facilities are compared with those experienced by peers in schools in the community. Responses of 360 youths in 20 gender-separated correctional facilities in Israel to a questionnaire tapping these forms of mistreatment were compared with those of 7,012 students in a representative sample of Israeli junior high and high schools. Victimization was reported more frequently by those in correctional facilities than by those in schools. However, some of the more prevalent forms of violence and abuse were reported with equal frequency in both settings, and some more frequently in schools. Despite being victimized more frequently, those in the correctional facilities tended to view their victimization as a significantly less serious problem than those in the schools and to rate the staff as doing a better job of dealing with the problem.     

An uneven playing field: The impact of strain and coping skills on treatment outcomes for juvenile offenders

Purpose

This study examines the experiences of a group of drug-abusing juvenile offenders following their release from a residential treatment facility in order to determine how pre-existing levels of strain and coping skills affect their ability to benefit from the treatment program and avoid recidivism and relapse.

Methods

During an extensive pre-treatment interview, the youths were asked a variety of questions assessing potential sources of strain (including the experience of physical/emotional abuse and intra-familial violence, parental drug use, and physical/emotional health problems) and a variety of coping (cognitive, emotional, physical, social, and spiritual) skills. We hypothesized that pre-existing strain levels would decrease the likelihood of treatment success just as pre-existing coping skills levels would enhance it, but also predicted that the impact of strain on treatment success would be moderated by existing coping skills and that coping skills would have the greatest capacity to affect treatment outcomes among youths with higher levels of pre-treatment strain.

Results

Our findings offered mixed support for our hypotheses, including evidence that some coping skills mitigated the negative impact of strain whereas others seemed to intensify it. Implications of our findings are discussed and directions for future research are suggested.     

Children with Incarcerated Parents and Developmental Trajectories of Internalizing Problems across Adolescence

American Journal of Criminal Justice - Research over the past several decades has documented the effect of parental incarceration on child development. While many findings point to a negative...     

Farmer resistance to agriculture commercialisation in northern Ghana

Drawing on postcolonial literature and theories of farmer resistance, this article provides an empirically based alternative explanation of African farmer behaviours to narratives that blame them for their lack of technology adoption. Based on six months of ethnographic immersion in one district in the Northern Region of Ghana^a, we identify the ways that farmers defy commercial agriculture investment, government services and non-governmental organisation (NGO) project interventions aimed at intensification, and describe their reasons for doing so. This study interprets farmers’ acts of defiance, such as side-selling or falsely weighting their products, as insights into everyday acts of resistance. We find that throughout Ghana’s postcolonial period, agriculture intensification policy and practice have produced an environment where various development actors and farmers have both a sense of entitlement and mistrust of each other. Farmers’ acts of sabotage may be spaces where they make rational choices based on experiences of historical antecedence, including decades of failed development projects, elite corruption and mismanagement, degrading ecologies and donor hegemony.     

Profiles of Problematic Behaviors Across Adolescence: Covariations with Indicators of Positive Youth Development

Previous analyses of data from the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development (PYD) have examined concurrent trajectories of positive development and risk/problem behaviors among adolescents, finding complex and not necessarily inverse relationships among them. In this article, we expand on prior research by employing a person-centered approach to modeling risk behaviors, assessing development from approximately 6th grade through 12th grade among 4,391 adolescents (59.9 % female). Latent profiles involving the problematic behaviors of delinquency, depressive symptoms, substance use, sexual activity, disordered eating behaviors, and bullying were then assessed for concurrent relationships with the Five Cs of PYD: Competence, Confidence, Character, Caring, and Connection. We found six latent profiles, based primarily on mental health, aggression, and alcohol use, with significant differences in Confidence levels among many of the profiles, as well as some differences in the four other Cs. We discuss directions for future research and implications for application to youth policies and programs.