Gerrymandering and the Voting Rights Act of 1982: A public choice analysis of turnover in the U.S. House of Representatives

The present paper uses various data sets and statistical techniques to examine the outcome of gerrymandering under the Voting Rights Act of 1982 on turnover rates in the U.S. House of Representatives, as well as the competitiveness in Party primaries for House seats. Evidence presented here suggests that political redistricting at the federal level (namely for U.S. House seats) has tended to favor incumbents in both the Party primaries and general elections. In fact, some results suggest that turnover rates (for 1988) are between 8.9 and 10.3 percentage points lower within states that engaged in such redistricting efforts. Our findings generally support the main tenets of the public choice view of legislator behavior.     

Fission and Federalism: The Disaggregation of Canadian Party Activists

This article focuses on the Progressive Conservative (PC) partyof Canada and contrasts the orientations of four different setsof PC party workers: those who are active in the provincialarena in Nova Scotia and in Alberta, as well as those who areactive in the national arena from the same two provinces. Thedata reveal that federalism has had a disaggregative effecton Canadian political party ideology. Not only is the cleavagebetween activists in different orders of government consistentlylarge; it also generally exceeds that which exists between activistsin different provinces.     

The Coming of Parliamentary Television: The Lords and the Senate Compared

Subscribing to a Burkean view of representation, legislators have long tended to resist constant public scrutiny. In recent years, however, they have overcome this reluctance in a large number of countries and voted to allow the televising of their proceedings. But why they did so remains a mystery. Some media theorists argue that television exposure is a 'great democratizer'. It demystifies public authority figures and obliges them to become more accountable for their actions. The experience of the British House of Lords and the United States Senate suggests instead that television was invited in by rational political actors as a means of achieving their goals in a time of change. In this view, television is best seen not as a force in its own right, but as a medium of communication that can be strategically deployed by goal-oriented political élites responding to different political circumstances and institutional incentive structures.     

Disordered Eating Precursors in Pre- and Early Adolescent Girls and Boys

First- and second-year findings from a study of the development of disordered eating in pre- and early adolescents are presented. Fifth- and sixth-grade girls (n = 80) and boys (n = 85) were assessed on depression, body image, self-esteem, and eating behaviors and attitudes in Year 1 and again one year later. Weight, height, and pubertal development were also evaluated in Year 1 and Year 2. Gender differences existed on all measures in Year 2 and indicated consistently poorer scores for girls compared to boys. For girls, Year 1 Body Mass Index and pubertal development predicted Year 2 disordered eating. For boys, poor body image in Year 1 predicted Year 2 disordered eating. The importance of identifying early risk factors for eating disorders is discussed.     

The impact of puberty and dating on eating problems among middle school girls

Puberty has been related to the onset of a variety of weight concerns and eating problems among middle school girls, including body dissatisfaction, dieting, and eating disorders. At least two models can be used to explain these relationships. The first emphasizes the timing of puberty, arguing that girls who face early puberty are particularly stressed because of the off-time nature of the event. The second focuses on synchronous events. For girls more than boys, puberty is likely to coincide with the change from elementary to middle school and/or beginning to date. Such synchronous events may create greater stress for girls. Seventy-nine girls were tested during the spring of their sixth- and eighth-grade years. Pubertal and dating status, body dissatisfaction, weight management, and eating disordered attitudes (using the Children's EAT:ChEAT) were assessed. The simple timing model (early vs. on time vs. late) was not supported. The simple synchronous model received some support in that girls with synchronous onset of menstruation and dating had higher ChEAT scores as well as greater body dissatisfaction. However, the data indicated that girls for whom puberty was early and coincidental with dating might be at unusual risk. These girls showed the highest levels of body dissatisfaction and the highest ChEAT scores.Ph.D. from Temple University. Research interest is in developmental psychology.Ph.D. from the University of California at Santa BarbaraThese authors have a joint research program in the developmental psychopathology of eating problems.The first wave of data for this report was collected as part of her undergraduate honors thesis.Earlier versions of these data were presented at the 1991 meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development, Seattle, Washington and the 1992 Conference on Human Development, Atlanta, Georgia.     

Dimensions of self-esteem and psychological symptoms among chinese adolescents in Hong Kong

Self-esteem and psychological symptoms were assessed in a sample of 1082 Chinese adolescents who responded to the Chinese versions of Coopersmith's Self-Esteem Inventory and the General Health Questionnaire. Three dimensions of self-esteem, interpreted as Family Acceptance/Rejection, Self-Depreciation, and Peer Affirmation/Disaffirmation, were found to relate substantially to general psychological symptoms and particularly to specific symptoms of anxiety, social dysfunction, and depression as reported by these adolescents. The implications of the relative importance of appraisal from internal feedback as sources of self-esteem as opposed to the external feedback from family and peers were discussed in relation to self-esteem enhancement in adolescents.Received his Ph.D. from the University of Western Ontario in 1978. His research interests include self-esteem, stress, coping, health and psychopathology.Received her Ph.D. from the University of South Dakota in 1983. Her research interests include stress, coping and health, and geriatric psychology.     

Dealignment, spatial polarisation and economic voting

Abstract. Estimates of voting by occupational class are provided for each of 22 regions in the UK for every general election since 1964. These are analysed, using a log-linear modelling strategy, to identify the changing degree of class dealignment and spatial polarisation within the British electorate over the period. The growing regional variability is consistent with expectations regarding the increasing volume of economic voting and the pattern of uneven development in the country: the north-south and urban-rural divides have both widened.