Voter Confidence and the Election-Day Voting Experience

The scholarly literature provides mixed guidance on the question of whether DREs or optical scan systems inspire greater confidence. We bring new evidence to bear on the debate using a unique exit poll and a nationally representative survey, both of which examine a wide range of voting experiences. Having detailed information about voting experiences enables us to investigate both the direct effects of DRE/optical scan voting and the indirect effects through voting experiences. Doing so reveals new information about the relationships between voting technology, voting experiences, and voter confidence. Indeed, the type of machine one uses has very different direct and indirect effects on voter confidence—a finding that may help explain scholarly disagreement over voters’ reactions to different types of voting machines.     

Woman and home in Australia

Jill Julius Matthews, Good and mad women: the historical construction of femininity in twentieth century Australia (George Allen & Unwin) Sydney, 1984; Kerreen Reiger, The disenchantment of the home: modernising the Australian family 1880–1940 (Oxford University Press) Melbourne, 1985.     

Psychiatric and neurological characteristics of murder defendants referred for pretrial evaluation

After literature review, this paper presents the largest study to date (n = 270) of psychiatric and neurological characteristics of accused murderers in the United States. This retrospective record review of pretrial detainees undergoing competency to stand trial and criminal responsibility evaluations examined demographic characteristics, psychiatric diagnosis, substance use patterns, Intelligence Quotient (IQ), and results of electroencephalogram (EEG), neuroimaging (MRI or CT) and neurological examination. Substance use and mood/adjustment disorders were common. Neuroimaging was abnormal in 18% of subjects and was associated with lower Performance IQ. EEG and neurological exam findings were not associated with measured cognitive impairment. While 16% of subjects had a FS IQ < 70, only 6% were diagnosed with mental retardation. Subjects with a psychotic disorder (p = 0.001) or an anxiety disorder (p = 0.005) were more likely to use a knife than other subjects in the study. Violence risk assessment in these patients must not only involve inquiry about firearm availability.     

Accurate STR allele designations at the FGA and vWA loci despite primer site polymorphisms

Polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based STR DNA typing systems are used extensively in the field of human identification. Under optimal PCR conditions, the amplicon yield from both alleles of an STR locus is expected to be approximately equivalent. However, it is reasonable to expect that rare genomic sequence polymorphisms will co-localize with well-designed primer sets and induce allele imbalance or "dropouts". Two samples were identified in the course of genotyping thousands of individuals with AmpF/STR Profiler Plus that showed strong disparity in amplitude peak height of heterozygous peaks at the loci vWA and FGA. These samples were reamplified at reduced annealing temperature in an attempt to balance the peak heights. Nucleotide sequencing documented polymorphisms at the PCR primer binding sites of the affected alleles. The results indicate that reducing the annealing temperature to improve primer-binding efficiency at the mismatch and employing an alternative multiplex enhanced the data from both samples. Reducing annealing temperatures could provide a simple general solution to improving data quality for samples where polymorphisms are suspected to cause allele imbalance. Finally, we report on additional polymorphisms surrounding the vWA locus in a genetically diverse population.     

Distinguishing Absentee Students from Regular Attenders: The Combined Influence of Personal,Family, and School Factors

In the present study, the relationship between student attendance and personal characteristics of the student, the student's family relations, and school variables were examined in a sample of 54 high school students. Consistent with earlier reports, t-tests revealed statistically significant relationships between school absence and many student, family, and school variables. The data were also analyzed using a stepwise discriminant analysis. The results showed that the absentee and regular attending students could be distinguished based on a combined set of 6 variables representing each of the three domains of student, family, and school characteristics. The results further revealed that several variables that were statistically significant in the univariate analyses failed to be retained in the discriminant analysis, suggesting that these variables did not contribute sufficient unique variance to warrant their inclusion in the discriminant function. The implications of school absence as a multifactored problem is discussed with respect to assessment and treatment effectiveness.     

Technology transfer into capital-intensive industry: I. The paper industry by the year 2000

Traditionally, new technology has been slow to enter the paper industry, which turns over its capital stock in about 40 years. In this paper, we will examine some of the reasons for this long transition period and the implications of such a transition period for government policy. If the turnover time could be cut in half, the potential energy savings could be 4 quadrillion Btu (Quads) in 20 years. Examples of new technologies that will become prominent throughout the paper industry by the year 2000 include vapor recompression evaporation, oxygen bleaching, twin-wire forming and extended nip pressing. We present explicit projections of production shares (based on a computer model) for selected new technologies. New technology blends into an industry over a period of years. This paper examines some of the factors that accelerate or retard this transition in the capital-intensive (“heavy”) industries. For purposes of this article, our example is the paper industry, and so the examples of new innovations are drawn from pulp and paper-making processes. (Incidentally, we use the term “paper” throughout as a shorthand for SIC 26, Pulp, Paper and Paperboard.) The examination of paper-industry technology reported here is based to a great extent on a study of industrial energy use [1] conducted by the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) for the U.S. Congress. The OTA study examined the four most energy-intensive American industries (paper, steel, chemicals and petroleum refining), to identify technologies to improve energy efficiency, to project industrial energy use in each industry between now and the end of the century, and to assess the impact of various policies on energy use and energy efficiency. The study found remarkable similarities between the four industries. One notable commonality is the attitude of management towards introduction of new technology.