Building and Sustaining Academic Researcher and Criminal Justice Practitioner Partnerships: A Corrections Example

Bringing researchers and practitioners together in partnerships has substantial benefits. Partnerships can inform research questions and provide researchers with data to further their academic dialogues. Collaborative research provides practitioners with a better appreciation for research, and its integration into the provision of service. Published examples of successful partnerships in the criminological field offer insight into navigating the relationship building and maintenance process. The current paper discusses a partnership between researchers and practitioners at a corrections institution. The benefits and challenges to partnerships and recommendations for building and sustaining researcher-practitioner partnerships are discussed.     

The Patterns of Syrian Uprising: Comparing Hama in 1980–1982 and Homs in 2011

Economic grievances that marginalized rural citizens and eroded the Syrian government’s political base are widely considered to have sparked the 2011 uprising. Although the country’s 1980–1982 protests were also blamed on economic factors, commentators to date have largely resisted comparing the events. This article draws parallels between Hama in the lead-up to 1980–1982 and Homs pre-2011, arguing that while there are differences between the uprisings—including the socioeconomic group involved—the root causes of grievance were remarkably similar. Both uprisings followed a redrawing of Syria’s social contract that marginalized a group that had previously had a stake in the Syrian state. In both cases, a new underclass was formed that became the backbone of the political unrest. Although economic factors cannot explain the 2011 uprising in its entirety, this article argues that some of the seed dynamics in 2011 were remarkably similar to 1980–1982.     

Fathers’ Perspectives Regarding Their Children’s Exposure to Intimate Partner Violence

Children exposed to intimate partner violence are at high risk for mental health and behavioral problems. Numerous studies have examined mothers’ perceptions about the influence of exposure to violence on their children; few studies have examined the views of violent fathers. This study sought to identify how fathers, participating in batterer intervention programs (BIP), perceive consequences of their violence on their children and how they protect and mitigate the destructive effects of their violence on their children. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 21 fathers, with a qualitative approach for analysis. The findings highlight the need for specific intervention for fathers.     

(Sex) Crime and Punishment in the #MeToo Era: How the Public Views Rape

One of the core tasks of a well-functioning state is providing fair and adequate criminal justice. Recent events have raised concerns that the US exhibits a “culture of rape,” wherein victims are often disbelieved and blamed. Scholars have not yet examined how the public understands rape and how it should be punished, despite the important role that public pressure has played in the #MeToo era. We present an empirical conceptualization of rape culture to generate predictions for how various attributes of rape incidents affect the likelihood that they are perceived as punishable crimes. In a series of conjoint experiments, we demonstrate that details relating to the victim’s consent and credibility significantly decrease participants’ propensities to support reporting to police or to recommend a severe punishment for the perpetrator. The results show that emphasizing certain legally irrelevant features of rape strongly affect whether the public views an incident as severe or worthy of punishment.

     

Do Traffic Tickets Reduce Motor Vehicle Accidents? Evidence from a Natural Experiment

This paper analyzes the effect of traffic tickets on motor vehicle accidents. Ordinary least squares (OLS) estimate may be upward biased because police officers tend to focus on areas where and periods when there is heavy traffic and thus higher rates of accidents. This paper exploits the dramatic increase in tickets during the Click‐it‐or‐Ticket campaign to identify the causal impact of tickets on accidents using data from Massachusetts. I find that tickets significantly reduce accidents and nonfatal injuries. I provide suggestive evidence that tickets have a larger impact at night and on female drivers.     

Genetic Data and the Data Protection Regulation: Anonymity,multiple subjects,sensitivity and a prohibitionary logic regarding genetic data?

Owing to the unique qualities of genetic data, there have been numerous criticisms of the current data protection framework's ability to protect genetic data. It has been suggested that the Directive did not recognise the sensitivity of genetic data and that it ignored a number of legitimate interests in this data (in particular interests which multiple data subjects may have and those which may remain in anonymous data). In 2012, the first results of a reform process of EU data protection law were released. These results included a draft Regulation (to replace the Directive) which introduced a new framework for the protection of genetic data. This Article considers whether the innovative approach to genetic data in the Regulation will provide a more adequate framework for the protection of genetic data. It concludes that the Regulation has rectified the lack of recognition of sensitivity, but still stutters in recognising a number of legitimate interests.     

Citizens' perceptions of data protection and privacy in Europe

Data protection and privacy gain social importance as technology and data flows play an ever greater role in shaping social structure. Despite this, understanding of public opinion on these issues is conspicuously lacking. This article is a meta-analysis of public opinion surveys on data protection and privacy focussed on EU citizens. The article firstly considers the understanding and awareness of the legal framework for protection as a solid manifestation of the complex concepts of data protection and privacy. This is followed by a consideration of perceptions of privacy and data protection in relation to other social goals, focussing on the most visible of these contexts–the debate surrounding privacy, data protection and security. The article then considers how citizens perceive the ‘real world’ environment in which data processing takes place, before finally considering the public's perception and evaluation of the operation of framework against environment.     

The Dangers of Co-witness Familiarity: Investigating the Effects of Co-witness Relationships on Blame Conformity

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of pre-existing relationships between co-witnesses on statement similarity, after a post-event discussion. Although research studies have attempted to observe the effect of a pre-existing relationship on eyewitness pairs, few have investigated these effects on larger groups of co-witnesses. Four hundred and twenty participants took part in an eyewitness simulation experiment. Participants were placed into groups of five, and viewed video footage of a bar fight. After witnessing the event, participants discussed the event with group members before giving individual statements privately. The study employed a one-way between subjects design with three conditions: (1) participants discussed the event with familiar co-witnesses, (2) participants discussed the event with unfamiliar co-witnesses and (3) participants were not permitted to discuss the event with their co-witnesses (control). It was found that post-event discussion between co-witnesses increased the level of similarity in blame attribution within the eyewitness groups; however, this difference was only significant in groups where eyewitnesses shared a pre-existing relationship. In addition, the level of uncertainty was reduced when eyewitnesses took part in post-event discussions. It is suggested that this might be attributed to an increased level of informational influence between familiar co-witnesses. However, there was no evidence suggesting that post-event discussions led to an increase in false eyewitness statements.