A Comparison of Acculturation Measures Among Hispanic/Latino Adolescents

Acculturation has been associated with numerous health and social outcomes among Hispanic/Latino adolescents. Various self-report scales have been used to measure acculturation, making comparisons of results across studies difficult. This study administered several commonly-used acculturation scales to 221 Hispanic/Latino 9th grade students in Los Angeles. Although all of these scales purport to measure acculturation, the correlations among the scales, and their correlations with language usage measures, were modest. As expected, higher scores on Hispanic/Latino orientation scales (or lower scores on U.S./White orientation scales) were associated with higher levels of ethnic identity formation. Results indicate that these acculturation scales may measure different aspects of the complex phenomenon of acculturation. For example, purely language-based measures shared only small amounts of variance with more comprehensive measures. Additional research is needed to create and validate acculturation measures for adolescents. Jennifer B. Unger, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine. She is the principal investigator of Project RED, which is examining parent-child acculturation patterns and substance use among Hispanic adolescents. Anamara Ritt-Olson, Ph.D. is a Research Associate in Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine. Karla Wagner, MA is a predoctoral student and research assistant in Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine. Daniel Soto, BA is the project manager on Project RED. Lourdes Baezconde-Garbanati, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California Keck School of Medicine and a co-investigator on Project RED.     

A Growth Curve Analysis of the Joint Influences of Parenting Affect,Child Characteristics and Deviant Peers on Adolescent Illicit Drug Use

This study purports that parental rejection and warmth are critical to the development of adolescent drug use, and investigates a model that also considers children's vulnerability and deviant peer affiliations. It tests mediation through the proximal risk factor of deviant peers. Poisson growth curve modeling was used to examine participants from the Canadian National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (NLSCY; N=2194) over 4 waves. Results indicated that parental rejection was positively related to drug use, whereas parental warmth was negatively related to it. Both effects were significant when child ADHD symptoms were taken into account. Parental rejection and warmth had differential effects over time. Deviant peer affiliations were positively associated with drug use, did not have a differential influence over time, and did not mediate the other effects. There was significant between-individual (level 2) variability in drug use. Results are discussed in light of adolescent perceptions of parent-child relationships. Research Interests: social and emotional development; family processes; adolescent problem behaviours; main area of work is about understanding risk and protective factors in typical and atypical adolescent development Department of Human Development and Applied Psychology, University of Toronto, 252 Bloor Street West, Toronto, Ontario, M5S 1V6, Canada Research Interests: social and emotional development; family interaction; child psychopathology; main area of work is about understanding emotion processes in children and in family life that help us to understand psychopathology in childrenDepartment of Human Development and Applied Psychology, University of Toronto, 252 Bloor Street West, Toronto, Ontario, M5S 1V6, Canada     

Structural determination of the principal byproduct of the lithium-ammonia reduction method of methamphetamine manufacture

One common method of illicit methamphetamine manufacture utilizes an alkali metal, typically lithium, and liquid ammonia to chemically reduce ephedrine or pseudoephedrine to form methamphetamine. This method is often referred to as the lithium-ammonia reduction method or the Birch reduction method. While the hydroxyl group of ephedrine is more reactive than the aromatic ring, excess alkali metal and the presence of a proton source allow the formation of a cyclohexadiene byproduct not found in samples of methamphetamine produced from other manufacturing methods. A sample enriched in this byproduct was generated and characterized using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS), infrared (IR) spectrophotometry, and ultraviolet (UV) spectrophotometry. The chemical structure of this byproduct was determined to be 1-(1',4'-cyclohexadienyl)-2-methylaminopropane (CMP).     

The Role of Victim-Related Factors in Victim Restitution: A Multi-Method Analysis of Restitution in Pennsylvania

Mandatory statutes do not always produce change, but a 1995 Pennsylvania statutory change making restitution mandatory dramatically increased the proportion of cases in which restitution was imposed. There are three possible reasons for this generally successful implementation: (a) judges agreed with the victim-centered goals of the statute, (b) there were mechanisms in place to implement the goals of assisting victims, and (c) there was a context supportive of victims that made it easier to follow the law. Two studies investigated these possible explanations. First, a statewide survey of trial court judges suggested that they agreed with the statute's goals of compensating victims. Second, hierarchical logistic models of 55,119 statewide restitution-eligible decisions indicated that a victim-related contextual factor, the nature and location of the victim/witness assistance office, was significantly related to the imposition of restitution, although a more general contextual factor relating to funding for victim programs had only small effects.     

A Test of Two Methods of Recall for Violent Events

This project took advantage of an opportunity to test the comparability of two different methods for collecting self-reports of violent incidents. Using a life events calendar (LEC) approach, we collected data from individuals about violent incidents that occurred within a 1–3-year prior time period. These individuals had been research participants in a previous study that collected information about violent incidents using prospective, weekly interviews. Results using the LEC method were compared with the weekly self-reports of violence for an overlapping recall period. This allowed us to see how well the recall of violent incidents at a later date mapped onto reports obtained within seven days of any incidents. Overall results show a significant amount of under-reporting using the life-event calendar methodology compared to the weekly interview approach, but some higher concordance of reporting was found for serious rather than minor violence.     

In Play: A Commentary on Strategies in the 2004 U.S. Presidential Election

“A lot of military battle plans going back to the Civil War say ‘whoever controls the Mississippi controls America.’ And Bush is marching straight up the Mississippi,” the Democratic strategist said. “We’ve just retreated from Louisiana, Arkansas and Missouri. They already control Mississippi, Tennessee and Kentucky. Bush is now moving in on Iowa and Wisconsin. And except for Illinois, which isn’t in play, there’s only one state left: Minnesota, the mouth of the river. And it’s dead even [i.e., a tie] there.” From CNN.com, ALLPOLITICS, September 23, 2004: Mercurio, John and Molly Levinson. “CNN Survey: Bush widens lead in Electoral College.” CNN Political Unit. 27 Sept. 2004 <http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/ 09/23/electoral.map> “All total, 21 states are in play. Some will bounce between “lean [toward a candidate]” to “tossup” throughout the campaign.” USA Today, July 25, 2004: “AP: Bush leads Kerry in electoral votes.” A.P. 25 July 2004, <whttp://www.usatoday.com/news/Politicselections/nation/President/2004-07-25-bush-kerry-electoral-votes_x.htm>     

The impact of litigation on nursing home quality

Government reports indicate that regulations have been ineffective in improving quality of care in many nursing homes. Some analysts feel that litigation against nursing homes may be the result of quality problems that are monitored during the inspection process, some contend litigation merely causes quality problems by diverting financial resources away from patient care, and some argue that litigation is duplicating the efforts of the inspection process. Given that the relationship between litigation and inspection-oriented measures of quality is not clear, this article explores the relationship empirically. When a significant relationship is found, the empirical results suggest that litigation is associated with a decline in inspection-oriented measured quality in the nursing home facing the legal claim. In contrast, litigation against a chain has a very different relationship to firm-level quality, where firms within a chain that is being sued have higher levels of inspection-oriented quality. Our results suggest that legal claims may result from quality problems that go unmeasured during the inspection process. However, more research in this area is warranted.     

The Relationship Behavior Networks of Young Adults: A Test of the Intergenerational Transmission of Violence Hypothesis

The purpose of this study was to determine how negative relationship behaviors are structured in the semantic networks of young adults from violent versus nonviolent homes. Participants included 110 students (72 females and 38 males) from a large Midwestern university who were enrolled in an introductory psychology class. They completed a sorting task that involved relationship behavior stimuli. As hypothesized, differences were found in the composite sorting patterns, as represented by multidimensional scaling (MDS) solutions, for three different groups categorized by their family-of-origin violence history (i.e., nonvictimized by/did not witness parental violence, None; victimized only, Victim; and both witnessed/victimized, Both). Interpretations of the MDS solutions revealed different associations between violent and nonviolent conflict behaviors for victimized versus nonvictimized individuals, suggesting different semantic associations for conflict for individuals in the two groups. In a second set of analyses, separate solutions were generated for perpetrating and nonperpetrating individuals from violent families. Perpetrator and nonperpetrator solutions were also found to differ significantly. These findings suggest that relationship-specific semantic networks are associated with both past and current experiences with violence. One interpretation of these findings is that cognitive differences, generated in the family of origin, may serve to perpetuate a cycle of violence in subsequent romantic relationships.