Americans’ Knowledge of Their Local Judges

What do Americans know about their local judges and how do they know it? One of the central arguments in the debate over judicial elections is whether voters know enough about judicial candidates to make an informed democratic choice. The vast majority of criminal and civil matters in the U.S. begin with and filter through the local state courts. But judicial scholars know little about what explains the variance in voters’ knowledge of their courts and judges. This paper draws on survey data from the 2012 Cooperative Congressional Election Study to investigate the origins of voter knowledge of local judges. A central finding of this study is that rural voters are a lot more knowledgeable about their local judges than are urban voters, ceteris paribus. This finding has significant consequences for the debate over the ways in which states structure their elections for local judges.     

Longitudinal Associations between Maternal Involvement,Cultural Orientations,and Prosocial Behaviors Among Recent Immigrant Latino Adolescents

Prosocial behaviors (i.e., actions that benefit others) are important markers of healthy social functioning, and understanding the factors that predict such outcomes among recent immigrant Latino adolescents is important. The current study examines the longitudinal associations between maternal involvement and prosocial behaviors via collectivism values. Data comes from a longitudinal project (Construyendo Oportunidades Para los Adolescentes Latinos) of 302 recently immigrated U.S. Latina/o adolescents (53.3% male, average age?=?14.51 years old). The current study uses data from three times points across 2 years. The results demonstrated that maternal involvement was positively associated with collectivism values. Collectivism was positively associated with changes in prosocial behaviors. There was also partial support for a reverse-causal model. Discussion focuses on the links among parenting, cultural values, and prosocial behaviors among immigrant U.S. Latina/o adolescents.     

The methodological struggles of racial profiling research: a causal question that automobile stop data has yet to answer

Automobile stop research finds that citizen race influences officer decision-making. Researchers, however, report methodological issues inhibiting them from drawing causal inferences about the existence of racial profiling. The purpose of this study is to deconstruct this field of inquiry through a causal lens to inform the next generation of scholarship. Through an analysis of automobile stop data, temporal ordering issues are exposed. Relating to association, most studies find that racial minorities are more likely to be searched, however, spuriousness issues continue to plague racial profiling studies as researchers rarely estimate departmental, passenger, vehicle, and temporal variables. To confront these issues, researchers are encouraged to engage in primary data collection and explore recent statistical innovations in their analytical strategies.     

History of Traumatic Abuse and HIV Risk Behaviorsin Severely Mentally Ill Substance Abusing Adults

Epidemiological studies in the United States estimate HIV seroprevalence rates ranging between 4% and 23% for serious mentally ill adults (SMIA; i.e., schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and other chronic disorders with psychotic features), with substantially greater estimates for risky sexual behaviors. Among the most consistent factors linked to HIV risk in non-SMIA populations is a history of emotional, physical, or sexual abuse. The current study examined the intersection of abuse history and HIV sexual risk behavior in SMIAs with a group of men (n = 64) and women (n = 115) recruited from eight geographically diverse and representative clinical sites around Florida. A cross-sectional interview revealed a high prevalence of alcohol and other drugs problems, as well as a history of emotional, physical, or sexual abuse in 75% of the participants, with 68% of these reporting multiple types of abuse. Compared to nonabused counterparts, those with a history of abuse reported significantly greater: (a) lifetime and current psychiatric symptoms, (b) recent unprotected sexual intercourse, and (c) crack cocaine, heroin, and marijuana use. No gender differences were detected in the associations of abuse history and sexual risk behaviors. These results underscore the need for HIV prevention efforts targeted to SMIAs and the critical importance of addressing abuse history in interventions with this underserved population.     

Evaluation of non-metric variation in the crania of black and white perinates

Reports in the literature suggest that diagnostic differences in craniofacial morphology between blacks and whites arise very early in development. These reports, however, have not been consistent regarding which traits are diagnostic and have failed to provide forensic anthropologists with a reliable method of assessment. In an effort to clarify the situation, 13 non-metric craniofacial traits were scored and analyzed statistically in a sample of 70 black and white perinatal specimens obtained from the Smithsonian's fetal osteology collection. Chi-square analysis revealed significant (p<0.05) differences in the distribution of five of the 13 non-metric traits examined. Compared with black perinates, white perinates more frequently possessed a relatively narrow supraoccipital portion of the occipital bone, a prominent anterior nasal spine, "deep" subnasal margins, an elongated vomer, and semi-circular temporal squamae. When these five traits were entered into a stepwise logistic regression, temporal squamous shape, vomer shape and subnasal margin definition were found to be predictive of race (79.1% overall correct classification). An independent sample of 39 black and white perinates was then used to validate the results; overall, 67.5% of the validation sample could be classified correctly. Reasons for the disparity in correct classification rates between the initial and follow-up sample are provided. Results of the present study may be useful for anthropologists who encounter unidentified cranial material from this age range.     

Televised Exposure to Politics: New Measures for a Fragmented Media Environment

For many research purposes, scholars need reliable and valid survey measures of the extent to which people have been exposed to various kinds of political content in mass media. Nonetheless, good measures of media exposure, and of exposure to political television in particular, have proven elusive. Increasingly fragmented audiences for political television have only made this problem more severe. To address these concerns, we propose a new way of measuring exposure to political television and evaluate its reliability and predictive validity using three waves of nationally representative panel data collected during the 2008 presidential campaign. We find that people can reliably report the specific television programs they watch regularly, and that these measures predict change over time in knowledge of candidate issue positions, a much higher standard of predictive validity than any other measure has met to date.