School Characteristics,Strain, and Adolescent Delinquency: a Test of Macro-Level Strain Theory in China

Despite the important role of schools in influencing juvenile delinquency, limited research has investigated the contextual effects of schools on delinquency. Using the framework of macro-level strain theory, this study investigates the effects of school-level strain on delinquent behavior among Chinese adolescents. The sample comprises 1411 adolescents from 32 middle schools in Guangzhou, a large city in Southern China. Results from multilevel regression models show that school-aggregated level of strain is positively associated with both self-destructive and other-directed delinquent behaviors, after adjusting for individual strain and other sociodemographic variables. Specifically, school-level anticipated educational goal blockage and negative treatment by teachers are positively associated with self-destructive behavior, whereas school mean level of negative treatment by peers is positively related to other-directed behavior. Although individual-level strain is positively associated with both types of delinquency, it only partially mediates the effect of school-level strain on self-destructive delinquent behavior. This study also investigates whether school-level variables may condition the strain-delinquency relationship. The results show a significant interaction between personal strain and overall delinquent schoolmates on both self- and other-directed delinquent behaviors, indicating that school-level delinquent peers significantly exacerbate the effect of strain on delinquent behaviors. These findings suggest that the effort to reduce juvenile delinquency should target practices to alleviate both individual strain and aggregate strain, and provide more resources and support for students, particularly those in schools with substantial disruptive student behaviors, to legitimately cope with strains.

     

Development of a Validity Scale for the Dissociative Experience Scale-Revised: Atypicality,Structure, and Inconsistency

Psychological Injury and Law - The Dissociative Experiences Scale (DES), the most commonly used scale for assessing dissociation across settings, lacks a validity scale. In this study, six methods...     

Ecological Validity of the Inventory of Problems-29 (IOP-29): an Italian Study of Court-Ordered,Psychological Injury Evaluations Using the Structured Inventory of Malingered Symptomatology (SIMS) as Criterion Variable

The Inventory of Problems-29 (IOP-29; Viglione, Giromini, & Landis, Journal of Personality Assessment, 99(5), 534–544, 2017) is a 29-item, recently published, self-administered test aimed at assessing the credibility of various symptom presentations. Although available research strongly supports the use of this symptom validity test in malingering-related contexts, to date, only few studies have analyzed data from real-life forensic evaluations. To fill this gap and explore ecological and convergent validity, the current study analyzed data from 74 court-ordered evaluations aimed at establishing the possible presence of psychological injury. Such evaluations are high-stakes situations in which exaggeration or malingering occur relatively often. We used a research-supported and popular symptom validity test, i.e., the Structured Inventory of Malingered Symptomatology (SIMS; Smith & Burger, Journal of the American Academy on Psychiatry and Law, 25:180–183, 1997), as our criterion variable. The IOP-29 produced excellent area under the curve (AUC) values of .98 with a recommended SIMS total score cutoff (≥ 17) and .99 when eliminating too-close-to-classify cases (Rogers & Bender, 2018) and very large Cohen’s d effect sizes of 2.98 and 3.59, respectively. Crucially, when implementing established cut scores from previous research, the IOP-29 yielded very high specificity and sensitivity rates, and the predictions from the two tests were strikingly similar. Taken together, these findings support the strong convergent validity of the IOP-29 and its utility in applied clinical and forensic settings.     

中国政府原理的集权之维:历史与现代化

所有的政治活动都有集权或分权的因素,当分权或集权具有系统性、结构性的特征时,分权或集权便超越了工具性的含义,具有制度安排的性质,或被称为分权政府,或被称为集权政府.西方的封建主义产生的分权体制,后经资产阶级革命用自由主义和代议制原则改造和创建了现代分权制衡的政府结构,分权的学说和分权政府由此被视为"永恒的规律".中国的...     

无固定期限劳动合同若干问题的法律探讨

我国的<劳动合同法>对无固定期限劳动合同制度做了重大改变,引起许多争议,有必要对其进行法律探讨.无固定期限劳动合同制度符合社会法理念,在强制续签、解雇保护、违约责任等制度设计上应区别固定期限劳动合同,同时在相关法条的可操作性方面仍需要加强.     

关于中国财政分权制度的思考

财政分权是财税体制的关键.随着经济发展,我国分税制财政体制的问题逐渐凸现.这与我国非制度化的中央集权,"职责同构"的行政体制密切相关.财政体制改革应当从创新行政管理体制,实现中央和地方关系的法治化、制度化两方面着手.     

Perceptions of Problem Behavior in Adolescents’ Families: Perceiver,Target, and Family Effects

Considerable research has focused on the reliability and validity of informant reports of family behavior, especially maternal reports of adolescent problem behavior. None of these studies, however, has based their orientation on a theoretical model of interpersonal perception. In this study we used the social relations model (SRM) to examine family members’ reports of each others’ externalizing and internalizing problem behavior. Two parents and two adolescents in 69 families rated each others’ behavior within a round-robin design. SRM analysis showed that within-family perceptions of externalizing and internalizing behaviors are consistently due to three sources of variance; perceiver, target, and family effects. A family/contextual effect on informant reports of problem behavior has not been previously reported.     

Autonomy,Belongingness, and Engagement in School as Contributors to Adolescent Psychological Well-Being

Self-determination theory emphasizes the importance of school-based autonomy and belongingness to academic achievement and psychological adjustment, and the theory posits a model in which engagement in school mediates the influence of autonomy and belongingness on these outcomes. To date, this model has only been evaluated on academic outcomes. Utilizing short-term longitudinal data (5-month timeframe) from a set of secondary schools in the rural Midwest (N = 283, M age = 15.3, 51.9% male, 86.2% White), we extend the model to include a measure of positive adjustment (i.e., hope). We also find a direct link between peer-related belongingness (i.e., peer support) and positive adjustment that is not mediated by engagement in school. A reciprocal relationship between academic autonomy, teacher-related belongingness (i.e., teacher support) and engagement in learning is supported, but this reciprocal relationship does not extend to peer-related belongingness. The implications of these findings for secondary schools are discussed.

Ukraine's ancient matriarch as a topos in constructing a feminine identity

In 1991, Ukrainian independence opened an important theoretical channel for debating the status of its women. The people's collective memory of an ancient matriarchy generated a neo-matriarchal mythology which has been transformed into a delusional ideology that legitimizes female subordination, in the name of her alleged empowerment. Fieldwork in Ukraine – annual visits, including travel from one end of the country to another in official capacities, and many extended stays in Ukraine, as a scholar, researcher, educator and participant in key events, provided opportunities for exchanging views with countless people from many walks of life throughout the country. Participation in a host of programs – television ‘specials’ on gender, seminars, retreats, workshops and conferences, designed to raise the consciousness of women and men alike – provided an array of opportunities to observe at first hand the way that today's women construct individual identity. Extensive research in the press (many runs of daily newspapers, including Den’, in Kyiv, and Vysoky Zamok in Lviv, and women's journals such as the widely read Zhinka, among others) added further insights. Television viewing, popular publications collected habitually during my numerous visits to Ukraine, copies of documents contributed by my Ukrainian friends and colleagues, outdoor advertising, posters and intimate gatherings at the homes of likeminded women, all played a part in the formation of my impressions of Ukrainian women's inferior status. In this paper I use my findings to explore the conflicting discourses on women's alleged empowerment, and the essentialist constraints on their self-realization, together with measures adopted to date on changing gender stereotypes and promoting equal rights and opportunities.