The Target-to-Foils Shift in Simultaneous and Sequential Lineups

A theoretical cornerstone in eyewitness identification research is the proposition that witnesses, in making decisions from standard simultaneous lineups, make relative judgments. The present research considers two sources of support for this proposal. An experiment by G. L. Wells (1993) showed that if the target is removed from a lineup, witnesses shift their responses to pick foils, rather than rejecting the lineups, a result we will term a target-to-foils shift. Additional empirical support is provided by results from sequential lineups which typically show higher accuracy than simultaneous lineups, presumably because of a decrease in the use of relative judgments in making identification decisions. The combination of these two lines of research suggests that the target-to-foils shift should be reduced in sequential lineups relative to simultaneous lineups. Results of two experiments showed an overall advantage for sequential lineups, but also showed a target-to-foils shift equal in size for simultaneous and sequential lineups. Additional analyses indicated that the target-to-foils shift in sequential lineups was moderated in part by an order effect and was produced with (Experiment 2) or without (Experiment 1) a shift in decision criterion. This complex pattern of results suggests that more work is needed to understand the processes which underlie decisions in simultaneous and sequential lineups.     

Competence to Waive Interrogation Rights and Adjudicative Competence in Adolescent Defendants: Cognitive Development,Attorney Contact,and Psychological Symptoms

Although there is growing evidence of developmental differences in competency to waive interrogation rights and adjudicative competence, the correlates of adolescents' legal capacities remain unclear. This study examined the relationship of legal capacities to cognitive development, legal learning opportunities, and psychological symptoms. Participants were 152 male and female defendants aged 11–17, who completed Grisso's Instruments for Assessing Understanding and Appreciation of Miranda Rights, the Fitness Interview Test (Revised Edition), the Woodcock-Johnson III Cognitive Assessment Battery, and the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale for Children. Legal capacities relevant to interrogation and adjudication increased with age. These developmental differences were partially mediated or explained by cognitive development. Of the specific cognitive ilities examined (general intellectual ability, verbal ability, reasoning, long-term retrieval, attention, and executive functioning), verbal ability was a particularly strong predictor of performance on competency measures. Also, defendants obtained lower scores on competency measures if they showed evidence of attention deficits or hyperactivity, had spent limited time with their attorneys, and/or were from low socioeconomic backgrounds.     

Does the Statutory Regulation of Advance Decision-Making Provide Adequate Respect for Patient Autonomy?

This paper considers advance decision-making in the context of healthcare. The common law recognition of advance decisions is contrasted with new statutory provision. This paper will examine the Mental Capacity Act 2005 framework for advance decisions and lasting powers of attorney. The ‚best interests’ test and substituted judgment as criteria for proxy decision-making are compared by application to a case example. The paper examines the statutory safeguards in respect of refusals of ‚life-sustaining treatment’ and postulates that these safeguards may render respect for autonomous advance decision-making difficult to achieve in practice.     

Justice in Health Care Decision-Making: Patients’ Appraisals of Health Care Providers and Health Plan Representatives

This study describes the development of two versions of a Health Care Justice Inventory (HCJI). One version focuses on patients interactions with their providers (HCJI-P) and the other focuses on patients interactions with the representatives of their health plans (HCJI-HP). Each version of the HCJI assesses patients appraisals of their interactions (with either their Provider or representatives of their Health Plan) along three common dimensions of procedural justice: Trust, Impartiality, and Participation. Both the Provider and Health Plan scales assess indices that are relatively independent of patients demographic characteristics. In addition, patients appraisals of their interactions with their provider were only moderately related to their appraisals of their interactions with representatives of their health plan, indicating that the Provider and Health Plan scales tap distinct aspects of patients overall experience with the health care system. Overall, procedural justice dimensions were significantly related to patient satisfaction in both the Provider and the Health Plan contexts. As predicted, procedural justice factors were more strongly tied to patient satisfaction in the Provider than in the Health Plan context, and health care decisions based on distributive justice principles of Need (rather than Equity or Equality) were most closely tied to patient satisfaction in both contexts.     

Effects of Parental Differential Treatment on Relationship Quality with Siblings and Parents: Justice Evaluations as Mediators

Based on equity theory, the present study analyzes to what extent justice evaluations mediate the effects of perceived parental differential treatment (PDT) on relationship quality with siblings and parents as experienced in middle adulthood. Middle-aged adult offspring (N = 709) rated how often they and a sibling received parental recognition, nurturance, and demands for assuming filial responsibility. In addition, they indicated their justice evaluations of PDT and completed measures of relationship quality to sibling and parents. Justice evaluations emerged as either partial or complete mediators between PDT and relationship quality. Moreover, justice evaluations turned out to be more powerful predictors of relationship quality to parents than PDT per se. Implications are discussed concerning factors contributing to justice evaluations and the role of PDT within the context of other justice issues in families.     

Fairness of Allocations among Groups of Unknown Others

The aim of three experiments was to examine the idea that when judging the fairness of allocations people are influenced both by differences in relative payoffs and the number of comparisons among payoffs. The hypothesis tested was that judged fairness would be inversely related to the average difference between payoffs; average difference was defined as the sum of absolute differences between outcomes to groups divided by the number of pairwise comparisons between the groups. In Experiment 1, 24 undergraduates rated fairness and goodness (desirability) of allocations to one privileged and one underprivileged group consisting of fellow students. The participants were not themselves members of the groups and their ratings did not depend on evaluations by the groups members. Results showed, as expected, that differences in payoff determined judgments of fairness but also that larger sums were to some extent rated as more fair than smaller sums. However, as the sum increased, the effect of difference was shown to decrease. Fairness ratings partially mediated ratings of goodness. In Experiment 2, 72 undergraduates rated fairness and goodness of combinations of payoffs to two or four groups consisting of fellow students. Results confirmed that rated fairness was inversely related to the average difference between payoffs. The total sum of the groups payoffs was again found to somewhat increase rated fairness, whereas the number of members in the groups did not have any clear effect. In Experiment 3, 24 undergraduates rated the goodness of allocations to two, three, and four groups. The results showed similar effects as in the preceding experiments.     

Global and Neighborhood Attitudes Toward the Police: Differentiation by Race,Ethnicity and Type of Contact

This study focused on a series of hypotheses regarding residents’ attitudes toward the police: (1) residents’ attitudes toward the police are better represented by a two-dimensional model that differentiates global perceptions of the police from assessments of the police in the respondents’ neighborhood; (2) the structure of residents’ attitudes toward the police is different for Whites, African Americans, and Latinos; (3) direct experiences with the police in the respondents’ neighborhood will be more strongly associated with the respondents’ assessment of police in their neighborhood than global perceptions of the police; and (4) the influence of direct experiences with the police will be stronger for African Americans and Latinos than for Whites. Results based on structural equation modeling offer strong support for the need to differentiate between global and neighborhood perceptions of the police. The underlining measurement structure of attitudes toward the police was similar for Whites, African Americans, and Latinos. However, the relationship between global and neighborhood attitudes was stronger for African Americans and Latinos. Negative contact with the police was associated with both negative global and neighborhood assessments of the police. Non-negative contact was associated with positive neighborhood perceptions of the police; however, only when it occurred within the neighborhood. The influence of direct experiences with the police (both inside and outside the neighborhood) was similar for Whites, African Americans, and Latinos.     

On the Complexity and Accuracy of Geographic Profiling Strategies

Geographic profilers have access to a repertoire of strategies for predicting a serial offenders home location. These strategies range in complexity—some involve more calculations to implement than others—and the assumption often made is that more complex strategies will outperform simpler strategies. In the present study, we tested the relationship between the complexity and accuracy of 11 strategies. Data were crime site and home locations of 16 UK residential burglars who had committed 10 or more crimes each. The results indicated that strategy complexity was not positively related to accuracy. This was also found to be the case across tasks that ranged in complexity (where complexity was determined by the number of crimes used to make a prediction). Implications for police policies and procedures, as well as our understanding of human decision-making, are discussed.To whom correspondence should be addressed. Phone: +1-709-737-3101; E-mail: bsnook@play.psych.mun.ca     

Social and Scientific Influences on the Measurement of Criminal Victimization

The National Crime Victimization Survey has been informed by decades of methodological research on the measurement of victimization. Yet most criminologists have little knowledge of the process or outcomes of this research or its effects on the characteristics of the survey. Using in-house reports, conference papers, agency memoranda, and other documents, this paper describes some of the important methodological research that has taken place since the 1992 redesign of the survey. Much of the more recent research is the consequence of new initiatives for the survey, such as the measurement of hate crime victimization and victimization among the developmentally disabled, as well as periodic supplements. This research finds that the current characteristics of the NCVS reflect decisions made on the basis of methodological research, broader social and political factors, and budgetary constraints.