Paraprofessionals in parole and probation services: Selection,training, and program evaluation

The use of paraprofessional personnel in parole and probation services has been increasing dramatically. With decreasing budgets and expanded calls for service, parole and probation agencies have been turning to the paraprofessional employee as a solution. Several variables which can be changed through implementation of a paraprofessional program are identified, including the differences between using indigenous and nonindigenous personnel. Through a survey of past hiring practices, qualifications of those hired, and justification of using a certain type of personnel, factors to be used in the selection of paraprofessionals are delineated. Training programs for paraprofessionals, especially indigenous personnel, are reviewed in conjunction with standard industrial training concepts and practices. Comments are made regarding the necessity of evaluating paraprofessional programs in order to document empirically their effectiveness within the parole and probation organization.     

What Is Training All About?

This article compares "training" to "education" generally and, specifically, with respect to the question of how this distinction plays a role in teaching negotiation and the possible emergence of a "second generation" of negotiation theory and practice.     

Predicting police behavior: Ecology,class, and autonomy

Social ecological theories of crime have recently been extended to explain spatial variation in police behavior. Although these theories successfully identify community characteristics affecting local policing, they fail to acknowledge the class-based origins of formal social control and the relative autonomy of the police. This paper addresses the neglected class issue by integrating social ecological and critical theories in a model of police behavior. Cross-sectional data was obtained from twenty-five police agencies’ vice divisions and their corresponding jurisdictions to test the integrated hypothesis. Four social ecological variables and a fiscal measure of relative autonomy are examined as police behavior predictors. Findings reveal that both the autonomy measure and three of the social ecological variables explain significant variance in police behavior, thus supporting the inclusion of structural Marxism in a general theory of police behavior.     

Personality correlates of men who batter and nonviolent men: Some continuities and discontinuities

The present study investigated personality and family-of-origin differences among three groups of domestically violent men and a nonviolent comparison group, matched for age and education. The domestic violence groups consisted of male batterers referred for treatment (agency identified batterers) who were alcoholic (n=38) or nonalcoholic (n=61), and a third group who were identified through community sampling as maritally violent (n=28 community batterers). Multivariate analyses of variance of the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory (MCMI) showed that, compared to nonviolent controls, alcoholic and nonalcoholic batterers showed higher levels of borderline characteristics. Furthermore, alcoholic batterers showed the highest MCMI elevations, followed by nonalcoholic batterers. Community-identified batterers showed no predicted significant differences from the nonviolent controls. On measures of family-of-origin pathology and disruption, only alcoholic batterers differed significantly from nonbatterers on report of both experienced and witnessed abuse victimization.Based on a paper presented in: A. Holtzworth-Monroe (Chair)Research on Marital Violence: What We Know, How We Can Apply It. Symposium presented at the meeting of the Association for the Advancement of Behavior Therapy, New York, November 19, 1988.