The Strategic Uses of Gender in Household Negotiations: Women Workers on Mexico's Northern Border

The study illustrates the potential of the 'doing gender' perspective to explain why employment does not always improve women's household–power. Eighteen in–depth interviews with women maquiladora workers in Mexico suggest that, depending on the gendered meanings of household negotiations, employment may help women gain new rights and extend the limits of respect accorded them by male companions and parents. Nevertheless, women were more successful when they used negotiating strategies that conformed to their gender identity, such as making offers , than when they used negotiating strategies that challenged traditional gender norms, such as withdrawing services or making threats .     

Sexually violent predators and civil commitment: is selection evidence based?

Sexual offenses represent an alarming proportion of crimes committed yearly. To address these concerns, several states, including South Carolina (SC), have enacted laws requiring sexually violent predators (SVPs) to be civilly committed to treatment. To date, no published study has examined sexual offenders recommended for treatment in SC. This study used a specially designed statewide database (SC-SVP research database) to determine which offender and offense characteristics were associated with increased likelihood of being recommended for civil commitment. Factors correlated with being more likely to be recommended included: being of a younger age at time of evaluation, prior sex convictions, having related and unrelated victims, a higher number of victims, frequent substance use, and a history of suicide attempts. Prior sex convictions, having both related and non-related victims, and a higher total number of victims align with characteristics associated with sexual recidivism. Frequent substance abuse and a history of suicide attempts do not mirror previous findings regarding sexual recidivism. These findings present new information regarding the civil commitment process of offenders being committed to the SC-SVP treatment program, characterize types of offenders committed to SC-SVP treatment program, and provide a foundation for using a computerized database in conducting sex offender research.     

Economic and Strategic Position Of the Soviet Far East

The role of the Soviet Far East in the Soviet regional system is conditioned by its remoteness from the country's commanding center, its harsh physical environment, and strategic importance. The region is weakly integrated into the mainstream of the Soviet economy. At the same time, its most powerful economic links are with the distant metropolis—a strongly dependent, parasitic relationship made more dominant by the cost of the massive military build-up. Huge Soviet efforts to accelerate the growth of the Far East are proving largely unsuccessful, despite the construction of the BAM. Economic priorities are shifting to West Siberia, while Far Eastern resource projects are proving increasingly unattractive to Japan. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: 052, 124, 731.     

The impact of litigants' baby-facedness and attractiveness on adjudications in small claims courts

The effects of litigants' facial appearance on judicial decisions were investigated in 506 cases heard in small claims courts. Replicating previous laboratory studies, both baby-facedness and attractiveness exerted a significant impact on adjudications. As plaintiffs increased in attractiveness, defendants were more likely to lose the case. Also, as defendants increased in baby-facedness, they were more likely to win cases involving intentional actions and less likely to win cases involving negligent actions, although the latter simple effect was not significant. Finally, as defendants increased in facial maturity, they were required to pay larger monetary awards to baby-faced plaintiffs, albeit not to average or mature-faced plaintiffs. This pattern of decisions was interpreted as reflecting assumptions about the psychological attributes of baby-faced versus mature-faced individuals. The effects of the extralegal variables of litigant attractiveness and baby-facedness were sufficiently large to have practical as well as statistical significance, and they were independent of each other and the age of the litigants as well as of legal variables predicting adjudications.This research was supported by NIMH grant No. BSR 5 R01 MH42684 to the first author. Thanks are extended to Philip Shapiro for his help with legal terminology, to Steven Samuels for his help in the data collecton, and to Michael Berbaum and Avron Spiro III for their statistical assistance in the data analysis.     

Assessing mothers' and fathers' violence toward children as a function of their involuntary participation in family work

This study examines the association between parents' violence toward children and their involuntary participation in family work. Involuntary participation in family work is conceptualized as a form of role strain measured by the disparity between the amount of responsibility husbands and wives would prefer to assume in the home and the amount of family work they actually perform. The prediction guiding this research is that differences of this kind are more associated with mothers' violence than fathers'. Regression analysis with a national sample of parents supports this hypothesis. Nonetheless, the association between such role strain and violence is quite weak, suggesting that additional research is required in formulating and measuring this relationship.