Are “superdelegates” super?

Political Behavior - Post-1968 changes in the Democratic party's nomination process resulted, by some accounts, in the selection of delegates who knew little about politics, cared little about...     

Psychopathy and Recidivism Among Female Inmates

Despite a plethora of studies investigating psychopathy among male offenders, little is known about the applicability of this construct to female populations. Research has shown that prevalence rate, symptom presentation, and diagnostic comorbidity differ for females as compared to males. The current study is the first to examine the relationship between psychopathy and recidivism among women. Recidivism data on a sample of 78 female inmates were examined at a 1-year interval in relation to the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R), inclusion criteria for the Antisocial Personality Disorder Diagnosis from the Personality Disorder Examination (PDE), and selected scales from the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI; Antisocial and Aggression scales). The egocentricity subscale of the PAI, Factor 1 of the PCL-R, and the verbal aggression subscale of the PAI were the best predictors of future recidivism. Specific differences emerged between male and female offenders when comparing the present data with previous studies of male psychopaths.     

Police prejudice as a function of training and outgroup contact

A longitudinal study investigated prejudice among 412 New South Wales (Australia) police recruits. Recruits were tested on Beswick and Hills' (1972) Australian E scale and Ray's (1972) Balanced F scale at recruitment, after 6 months' full-time academy training, and after 12 months' police experimence. It was found that over the period of academy training recruits became less authoritarian but did not vary on ethnocentrism. Over the field experience stage recruits became both more ethnocentric and authoritarian. Further, recruits sent to districts with large Aboriginal populations became significantly more ethnocentric but no more authoritarian than other recruits. At a theoretical level, results suggest that police attributes may develop as a function of particular policing experiences. At an applied level, results suggest that training alone is unlikely to overcome the problem of police prejudice.