Genetic and environmental influences underlying the relationship between low self-control and substance use

Purpose

The current study seeks to examine the relationship between low self-control and cigarette smoking, alcohol use, and marijuana use in adolescence and adulthood using behavioral genetic methodology.

Methods

Using a subsample of twin pairs from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), the current study estimates the genetic and environmental overlap between low self-control and substance use (or problems associated with substance use) across four waves of data collection.

Results

The overall pattern of results suggests that genetic factors explain a moderate proportion of the variance in low self-control and substance use in both adolescence and adulthood. Furthermore, bivariate genetic analyses reveal that the correlation between low self-control and substance use is due, for the most part, to common genetic and nonshared environmental factors.

Conclusions

The current study adds to a growing body of biosocial research on self-control and its relationship to criminal and analogous behaviors. The implications of our findings for the general theory of crime are discussed.     

A Cautionary Tale: Council Amalgamation in Tasmania and the Deloitte Access Economics Report

Contemporary Australian public policy has come to rely increasingly on technical reports produced by commercial consultants in contrast to the traditional approach, which employed disinterested public servants to generate the specialist information required to inform decision makers. This approach is fraught with problems, not least the fact that ‘hired guns’ have strong incentives to create the ‘answers’ sought by their employers. By way of a ‘cautionary tale’, this paper examines the empirical evidence adduced in favour of radical amalgamation of Tasmanian local authorities in Local Government Structural Reform in Tasmania, produced by Deloitte Access Economics (DAE) (2011), and commissioned by the Property Council of Tasmania. In particular, the paper provides a critical analysis of the econometric modelling undertaken in the DAE (2011) Report. We find that if the DAE model is re‐estimated – employing alternative functional forms – then the empirical evidence in support of Tasmania council merges evaporates.     

Business Formalisation in Vietnam

We estimate the impact of business formalisation using nationally representative panel data on businesses in Vietnam. Our data allows us to observe businesses for two surveys prior to obtaining a licence and hence to control for differential trends before formalisation. We find that obtaining a licence is not associated with an increase in profits or other business outcomes such as revenue, expenses, and employment once we control for differential trends. Controlling for trends is crucial, as estimates that ignore trends consistently find a larger positive association between becoming licensed and business performance. Our results suggest that inducing more businesses to register is unlikely to bring about large-scale changes for these businesses.     

Response to Cilluffo and Gergely

Research on the motives of those who engage in small group political violence typically takes a qualitative or quantitative form. I argue that researchers should seek to understand why people engage in small group political violence, and that the best way to achieve such understanding is to employ both. The advantages of this approach are discussed in this paper, as is the importance of recognizing that the activities of all actors in any given violent location, including state actors, should be accounted for in research.     

Do 90 Percent of Terrorist Groups Last Less than a Year? Updating the Conventional Wisdom

ABSTRACT

Prominent scholars criticize terrorism research for lacking sufficient empirical testing of arguments. Interestingly, one of the most widely cited estimates in terrorism studies has not been evaluated using the many data sources now available. Rapoport’s 1992 claim, that perhaps 90 percent of terrorist groups last less than one year, has been described as part of the conventional wisdom. This estimate is frequently used to justify studies of terrorist group longevity, a substantial line of research in recent years. Is the estimate accurate? Scholars increasingly publish data sets of terrorist organizations, but no one has analyzed them collectively to see if the 90 percent claim holds up. This article examines the eight largest global data sets of terrorist group longevity, covering 1968–2013. The samples vary considerably, but the percentage of groups that do not survive beyond their first year in these relevant data sets is between 25–74 percent. Across all data sets, on average about 50 percent of terrorist organizations do not make it past their first year. There is some variation depending on group motivations, consistent with Rapoport’s “wave” theory. However, overall, terrorist organizations appear to be more durable than the conventional wisdom suggests.     

The limits of analogy: comparing Islamophobia and antisemitism

ABSTRACT

The predicament faced by Muslims today, either in the United Kingdom specifically or in the West more generally, is often compared with the predicament faced by Jews at some point in the past. Muslims, it is suggested, are the new Jews. Klug's article homes in on one element in this view, the claim that Islamophobia is the new antisemitism, and considers the analogy between them. An introductory section sketches the political context, after which Klug focuses on logical or conceptual issues. The two middle sections contain the core of the analysis: consideration of the two terms ‘antisemitism’ and ‘Islamophobia’ in relation to the concepts they denote, followed by an examination of the concepts as such. Certain conclusions are drawn about both their general logic and their specific logics. The final section returns to the political context and, via critique of a thesis put forward by Matti Bunzl, discusses the uses of the analogy. Klug argues that the question we need to ask is not ‘Are Islamophobia and antisemitism analogous?’ but ‘What is the analogy worth?’ The value of the analogy lies in the light it sheds on the social and political realities that confront us in the here and now. Does it illuminate more than it obscures? These things are a matter of judgement. Klug leans towards asserting an analogy between antisemitism in the past and Islamophobia in the present, within limits.     

An experimental study of the efficiency of unanimity rule and majority rule

Scholars traditionally claim that unanimity rule is more capable of producing Pareto optimal outcomes than majority rule. Dougherty and Edward (Public Choice 151(3):655–678, 2012) make the opposite claim assuming proposals are either random, sincere, or strategic. We test these competing hypotheses in a two-dimensional framework using laboratory experiments. Our primary results suggest: (1) majority rule enters the Pareto set more quickly than unanimity rule, (2) majority rule leaves the Pareto set at the same rate as unanimity rule, and (3) majority rule is more likely to select a Pareto optimal outcome than unanimity rule at the end of the game.     

Risk Attitudes and the Incumbency Advantage

Explanations for the incumbency advantage in American elections have typically pointed to the institutional advantages that incumbents enjoy over challengers but overlook the role of individual traits that reinforce this bias. The institutional advantages enjoyed by incumbents give voters more certainty about who incumbents are and what they might do when (and if) they assume office. We argue that these institutional advantages make incumbents particularly attractive to risk-averse individuals, who shy away from uncertainty and embrace choices that provide more certainty. Using data from 2008 and 2010 Cooperative Congressional Election Study, we show that citizens who are more risk averse are more likely to support incumbent candidates, while citizens who are more risk accepting are more likely to vote for challengers. The foundations of the incumbency advantage, we find, lie not only in the institutional perks of office but also in the individual minds of voters.     

More on Measuring Two-Party Competition: A Response to Dunleavy

Gaines and Taagepera [(2013) How to operationalize two-partyness. Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties, 23(4), pp. 387–404] propose two indices of two-party competition for district-level data, both of which are alleged to be flawed. The case against them rests mainly on whether or not elections with one dominant party should be regarded as exhibiting one- or two-way competition. For those inclined to see 90–10% and 50–50% outcomes are different in kind, our indices can provide better measures than the popular effective number of parties or the “gap”. We agree that assessment of a set of outcomes, in a given election or over time, requires careful attention to the important distinction between micro-level data and aggregate measures.