“Keeping Children Safe”: the Child Sex Offender Disclosure Scheme in Scotland

Abstract

This article describes the Child Sex Offender Disclosure Scheme in Scotland known as Keeping Children Safe (KCS), and the wider community engagement strategy developed by the charity Stop it Now! Scotland. The author coordinated the disclosure scheme on behalf of Police Scotland from November 2011 to March 2014. He is employed by Stop it Now! Scotland as a project officer. In 2011, Stop it Now! Scotland took over responsibility for the coordination of the KCS scheme from the Police. This work is embedded within a community engagement strategy known as the Upstream Project. The Upstream Project provides information to “community-facing” agencies to use in their interface with groups or individual adults in the community. To achieve this, a prevention toolkit was developed which includes a range of practical information and resources which adults can use to identify potential risk and take steps to prevent sexual abuse from occurring.     

Public opinion during a presidential campaign: Distinguishing the effects of environmental evolution and attitude change

This paper develops a spatial model which distinguishes between different sources of temporal variability in public opinion over the course of an election campaign. Candidates and citizens are shown as points within a space. The candidate points are fixed, but their relative positions can change as a result of change over time in the dimension weights. If this occurs, it represents environmental evolution. The individual citizens' points also can move within the space, independently of the external environment. To the extent this occurs, it represents attitude change. The model is tested with data from the CPS 1980 National Election Study. The empirical results show that much of the variability in public evaluations of the candidates is due to evolutionary changes in the electoral environment, rather than individual-level attitude changes. Furthermore, that attitudinal change which does occur is strongly delimited by factors like partisan strength, interest in the campaign, and political participation.     

从执法警官的视角看警方对患有精神疾病人士的处置方式（三）

2．互动与交流。精神疾病患者、他们的朋友和家庭成员,以及受训警官们之问的直接交流是培训的一个重要内容。想要取得的一个成果是提高警官们在这些互动中的舒适程度,以及他们对精神疾病患者的理解。表七显示了危机干预小组培训在这个领域的成果。有稍高百分比的警官们报告说在培训之后的一个时期与精神疾病患者的互动中感觉舒适。     

Identity Formation in Adolescence: Change or Stability?

The aim of this five-wave longitudinal study of 923 early to middle adolescents (50.7% boys; 49.3% girls) and 390 middle to late adolescents (43.3% boys and 56.7% girls) is to provide a comprehensive view on change and stability in identity formation from ages 12 to 20. Several types of change and stability (i.e., mean-level change, rank-order stability, and profile similarity) were assessed for three dimensions of identity formation (i.e., commitment, in-depth exploration, and reconsideration), using adolescent self-report questionnaires. Results revealed changes in identity dimensions towards maturity, indicated by a decreasing tendency for reconsideration, increasingly more in-depth exploration, and increasingly more stable identity dimension profiles. Mean levels of commitment remained stable, and rank-order stability of commitment, in-depth exploration, and reconsideration did not change with age. Overall, girls were more mature with regard to identity formation in early adolescence, but boys had caught up with them by late adolescence. Taken together, our findings indicate that adolescent identity formation is guided by progressive changes in the way adolescents deal with commitments, rather than by changes in the commitments themselves.     

Coase and Bertrand on lighthouses

Coase (Journal of Low and Economics 17(2):185–213, 1974) failed to appreciate that the construction and maintenance of nineteenth-century lighthouses were in part financed by British taxpayers. Bertrand (Cambridge Journal of Economics 30:389–402, 2006) rightly calls him to account. While agreeing with Bertrand’s conclusion, we dispute her reasoning and argue that lighthouses nevertheless could have been supplied by the private sector.     

Self-Concept Clarity Across Adolescence: Longitudinal Associations With Open Communication With Parents and Internalizing Symptoms

Higher self-concept clarity is related to several adjustment indices and may be promoted by open communication with parents, while problems with self-concept clarity development could enhance internalizing problems (i.e., depressive and anxiety symptoms) in adolescence. This longitudinal study examined linkages between self-concept clarity, adolescents’ open communication with parents, and adolescent depressive and anxiety symptoms. Dutch youths (N = 323; 51.1 % girls; mean age Time 1 = 13.3 years) reported on these constructs over four consecutive annual measurements. Concurrent positive links between open communication and self-concept clarity were found at Time 1. Over time, higher levels of open communication with parents predicted higher self-concept clarity only in middle adolescence (mean age between 14 and 15 years). We also found concurrent associations between self-concept clarity and both depressive and anxiety symptoms. Longitudinally, lower self-concept clarity predicted relatively higher levels of depressive symptoms across all waves, and also higher anxiety levels from Time 1 to Time 2. Conversely, higher levels of anxiety also predicted lower levels of self-concept clarity during the first three waves. Self-concept clarity did not mediate the longitudinal associations between open communication and internalizing symptoms. This study is one of the first to investigate self-concept clarity across adolescence. It highlights the possible importance of both anxiety symptoms and communication with parents in understanding the development of a clear self-concept, and demonstrates an association between lower self-concept clarity and higher levels of later depressive and anxiety symptoms.     

Impact of Early Adolescent Externalizing Problem Behaviors on Identity Development in Middle to Late Adolescence: A Prospective 7-Year Longitudinal Study

Adolescents at-risk for problem behaviors can have more difficulties in developing a firm sense of personal identity. Hence the purpose of this prospective longitudinal study was to scrutinize how externalizing problems in early adolescence impact identity development in middle to late adolescence. Participants were 443 (43.12 % female) Dutch adolescents. Teachers rated their externalizing problem behaviors when participants were 11 or 12 years old and their identity formation was studied during five consecutive years (from 14 to 18 years of age). The sample was divided into four groups: boys and girls with a high versus a low-risk for externalizing problem behaviors. Participants completed a self-report measure of identity commitment, in-depth exploration, and reconsideration of commitment. Multi-group Latent Growth Curve and profile stability analyses were used to evaluate identity development across adolescence. Findings indicated that high-risk boys and girls reported a less structured identity, with lower levels of commitment and higher levels of reconsideration of commitment. Since externalizing problems behaviors and lack of a coherent sense of identity might reinforce each other, early intervention for high-risk adolescents might foster positive youth development.     

Pushing the Boundaries of Education: Evaluating the Impact of Second Step®: A Violence Prevention Curriculum with Psychosocial and Non-Cognitive Measures

The Second Step® violence prevention curriculum was implemented in a large urban school district as part of a comprehensive three-year initiative to impact students at-risk for violence and substance abuse. An outcome evaluation was conducted to assess the intervention's effectiveness on students’ attitudes and on behaviors important for accountability. Results indicated improvements in students’ prosocial attitudes and behaviors that were consistent across two large cohorts of students. Implications for theory and future research are discussed.     

Youth Worker Professional Development Participation,Preferences, and Agency Support

Using a Web-based survey, this study examined youth workers' professional development participation, preferences, and levels of agency support and the relationships between these variables and youth worker characteristics. Results revealed a positive relationship between participation in professional development opportunities and youth workers' self-reported job competency but also indicated low levels of agency support for participation in continuing education. Though perceptions of critical training topics varied among program staff from different geographic areas, most youth workers reported similar training experiences and interests regardless of their individual characteristics. Collaborative approaches to training and professional development may result in increased exposure to a broad range of professional development opportunities and significantly enhance the quality of youth programming.