Psychological Assessment of Chief of Police Candidates: Scientific and Practice Issues

This report examines issues associated with the selection of a Chief of Police. A review of the literature indicates minimal progress in specifying appropriate objective selection procedures for the Police Chief. This is attributable to a research focus on broad leadership styles, rather than specific competencies, and an inattention to the unique needs of individual jurisdictions. As a potential alternative, a hiring process model is offered that includes a systematic job analysis within the given jurisdiction, and the use of a reliable and well-validated instrument to assess job candidates’ leadership potential and skills. This approach is illustrated by a case study of a medium-size city that followed the recommended procedures to make a hiring decision that has been sustained across more than a year’s time, and which appears to be working out. The uses of testing results to help the Chief of Police to enhance personal capabilities within the new position also are discussed.     

PIs as boundary spanners,science and market shapers

The research program organization has been generalized to implement research policies in OECD countries. Principal investigators are the linchpin of the program based organization as they are developing research project to fit within programs. However, principal investigators are not only project managers but they also enact their environment, shape organization, heterogenous networks, research avenues, research communities and transepistemic arenas. Principal investigators are not only researchers they are also boundary spanners amongst academic and private sectors and amongst subfields and disciplines. Principal investigators, especially serial Principal investigators act as scientific entrepreneurs who enact their environment. It questions the relationship between principal investigators and their organization. It also questions the efficiency and effectiveness of program based research policy.     

Community violence to prison assault: A test of the behavioral continuity hypothesis

This large-scale study (N = 23,277) investigated the relationship between criminal history in the community and serious or assaultive prison misconduct, while controlling for the effects of inmate characteristics, general criminality, and custody level. Community violence variables included the rate of prior violent crime arrests and the types of prior violent crime, as well as a range of specific violent crimes of conviction. Behavioral continuity from community to prison was neither simple nor intuitively discernible, depending on the type, recency, and pattern of community criminality. Application of logistic regression models revealed that the omnibus measure of the rate of prior violent arrests was not related to either serious or assaultive prison misconduct. Prior arrests for assault and current convictions for robbery and/or assault, but not prior or current homicides, were associated with an increased risk for prison violence. Current conviction for a sexual assault had the strongest inverse relationship to prison violence, while prior arrests for sexual assault showed no relationship to prison violence. A more "nuanced" approach in assigning risk ratings based on prior criminal history and seriousness of offense is recommended. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

The human factor in technology transfer

Over the past thirty years developing countries have imported product and information technologies. Despite receiving billions of dollars in products and information, many third world countries are now poorer than 30 years ago. One possible explanation for the failure of technology to transfer effectively is the human dimension--the threat of that technology to the receiving organization's internal status structure. To increase the likelihood of successful technology transfer the following suggestions are offered: seek alternative problem definitions; allow decisionmaking latitude at the most problematic point using appropriate technology; restructure the system prior to introducing the technology.