Creating the climate for conflict resolution in communities

Book reviewed in this article:
Roger Fisher and Scott Brown , Getting Together: Building Relationships that Get to YES
Susan L. Carpenter and W.J. D. Kennedy , Managing Public Disputes: A Practical Guide to Handling Conflict and reaching Agreements
Lawrence Susskind and Jeffrey Cruikshank , Breaking the Impasse: Consensual Approaches to Resolving Public Disputes     

The most important things learned about violence and trauma in the past 20 years

In the past 2 decades, important insights have been gained regarding violence and trauma. Complications occur in how violence and trauma, their causes, and their effects on victims should be defined. Violence and abuse to women--physical, sexual, and emotional--are not rare events and are most often perpetrated by partners or acquaintances rather than strangers and occur in nonmarital as well as marital relationships, including same-sex relationships. A promising methodological innovation in the study of violence and trauma is the use of longitudinal designs. Innovations in treatments for victims such as evidence-based interventions have been slow to emerge; they include eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) and the Seeking Safety group intervention for drug-abusing women with trauma histories. Future research should address increased understanding of variation in individual responses to violence and trauma, matching of treatment to different types of male offenders, better understanding of how culture affects violence perpetration and victimization, and evaluation of domestic violence interventions.     

The duty to warn/protect: issues in clinical practice

The duty of therapists to warn or protect third parties when a patient expresses a threat was established by the court in the Tarasoff decision. Confidentiality, disclosure, and prediction of violence are clinical, ethical, and legal issues that the therapist must address in the context of a therapeutic relationship. Clinical case material from the literature, as well as cases from the authors' experiences, indicate that when confidentiality is breached and a potential victim is warned, the therapeutic results may be positive, especially if the patient participated in the process. Other methods of protection, such as commitment, use of medications, police involvement, and confiscation of a weapon, may be necessary. Each case deserves individual consideration as to what appropriate and necessary steps should be taken. Through careful assessment of a patient's threats, concern for the patient and victim, adherence to ethical standards of care, and knowledge of the law, one can often protect a victim as well as engage the patient in an ongoing therapeutic relationship.     

The Evolution and Application of a Screening Instrument to Identify Adolescents with Developmental Disabilities

The evolution and application of this screening instrument, the Adolescent Developmental Disabilities Screening (ADDS), is based on the spectrum model of developmental disabilities. Scale construction is outlined, including the selection and revision of screening criteria and tasks. Results of multiple discriminant, factor, and correlational analyses are reported and suggest the instrument to be a powerfully discriminating measure, and reliable internally as well over time. Development and application of the measure are discussed in the context of an identified need within the juvenile justice system where the prevalence of developmental disabilities far exceeds that of the general population. The screening test appears to be well-suited for a variety of human service and educational settings.     

The family: Where do we go from here?

His graduate work was done at Ohio University, and he has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Scandinavian Foundation. His major works are Family Questions: Reflections on the American Social Crisis and The Swedish Experiment in Family Politics,both published by Transaction.     

The Effect of English Language Learner Reclassification on Student ACT Scores,High School Graduation,and Postsecondary Enrollment: Regression Discontinuity Evidence from Wisconsin

The recent increase in the number of students classified as English language learners (ELLs) has focused significant attention on reclassification policy, which governs the process by which ELLs move toward, and are deemed to reach, full English proficiency. In this paper, we draw on a data set containing annual individual‐level records for every Wisconsin student ever classified as an ELL between the 2006–07 and 2012–13 school years to estimate the effects of being reclassified at the end of 10th grade—a crucial period on the pathway to postsecondary education—on several measures related to students’ postsecondary attainments. We estimate these effects in a regression discontinuity framework, exploiting Wisconsin's policy rule that automatically reclassifies ELLs who score above a specified cutoff on the state's English language proficiency exam. Our analysis indicates that being reclassified as fully English proficient in 10th grade has a positive effect on students’ ACT scores. It also provides some evidence of a positive effect on high school graduation and the probability of enrolling in a postsecondary institution the fall after graduation. Together, our analyses provide evidence on the effects of a policy directly relevant to the country's fastest growing student population, and we close the paper with a discussion of the implications for research and policy.