A Developmental-Ecological Model of the Relation of Family Functioning to Patterns of Delinquency

Person-centered approaches to understanding delinquent and criminal careershave identified several distinct pathways or patterns of delinquent behavior(Gorman-Smith et al., 1998; LeBlanc and Kaspy, in press; Loeber et al.,1991; Loeber et al., 1993). In addition, research suggests that there maybe etiological variations that correspond to these different pathways(Gorman-Smith et al., 1998). That is, there may be different configurationsof risk factors associated with different types of delinquent and criminaloffending. If this is so, understanding these relations can have importantimplications for intervention and prevention. However, there have been fewstudies that examine how the configuration of risk factors may vary inrelation to different delinquency pathways. The current study brings aperson-centered analysis to examine how patterns of family functioningrelate to patterns of offending. In addition, this study contextualizesthese relations by examining how these relations vary as a function ofcommunity setting. This study expands upon previous research that hasidentified four basic patterns of delinquent behavior among a sample ofminority male adolescents living in poor urban neighborhoods (Gorman-Smithet al., 1998).     

Expectations of government’s response to disaster

Citizens’ expectations about what government is capable of doing and what policies government officials intend to pursue can influence their decisions. After a disaster, for instance, expectations of government’s intent and capacity to assist in the rebuilding process will influence the rebuilding strategies that affected citizens adopt. This article develops a typology that categorizes citizens’ expectations of government response to disaster. We then deploy this typology to identify expectation patterns among residents and other private actors in New Orleans’ Ninth Ward communities who have returned following Katrina and explain how these expectations shape their preferred rebuilding strategy.     

Collaborative Institutions in an Ecology of Games

This article seeks to improve our understanding of policy institutions and cooperation by adapting Long's (1958) analysis of the ecology of games to the context of collaborative land use and transportation planning in California. The traditional institutional rational choice analysis argues that collaborative institutions reduce the transaction costs of cooperation among multiple policy actors. The ecology of games framework extends IRC by emphasizing the consequences of multiple institutions and identifies several reasons why collaborative institutions may actually reduce the amount of cooperation in existing policy venues. Analyses of survey data from policy actors in five California regions demonstrate that higher levels of cooperation in collaborative institutions are associated with lower levels of cooperation in other land‐use and transportation planning institutions.     

How to think about the U.S. budget challenge

The long‐term budget prospects of the United States are grim. Projected spending greatly exceeds projected revenue over the next few decades. Projected growth of health care spending accounts for more than all of the anticipated gap. Without action to narrow the gap, accumulating deficits will drive up the ratio of debt to GDP. Interest payments will rise correspondingly. At some point, domestic and foreign holders of U.S. debt will come to doubt the capacity of the government to service this debt. At that point, they will demand sharply higher interest rates. The combination of increasing debt and rising interest rates will cause debt service costs to explode. What follows would be some combination of collapsing investment, declining production, debt default, and inflation—in brief, a calamitous mess. That such a mess will occur is certain if budget deficits as large as those currently anticipated are realized. Precisely when is impossible to forecast accurately.     

School Disengagement as a Predictor of Dropout, Delinquency, and Problem Substance Use During Adolescence and Early Adulthood

Over the past 5 years, a great deal of attention has been paid to the development of early warning systems for dropout prevention. These warning systems use a set of indicators based on official school records to identify youth at risk for dropout and then appropriately target intervention. The current study builds on this work by assessing the extent to which a school disengagement warning index predicts not only dropout but also other problem behaviors during middle adolescence, late adolescence, and early adulthood. Data from the Rochester Youth Development Study (N = 911, 73% male, 68% African American, and 17% Latino) were used to examine the effects of a school disengagement warning index based on official 8th and 9th grade school records on subsequent dropout, as well as serious delinquency, official offending, and problem substance use during middle adolescence, late adolescence, and early adulthood. Results indicate that the school disengagement warning index is robustly related to dropout as well as serious problem behaviors across the three developmental stages, even after controlling for important potential confounders. High school dropout mediates the effect of the warning index on serious problem behaviors in early adulthood.     

Book Review

Understanding criminal behaviour, psychosocial approaches to criminality D. W. Jones Devon: Willan Publishing, 2008.     

证据与推论——兼论概率与似真性(英文)

今天的讲座和前四讲有一些不同。在前四讲中,我所分析的都是证据法的公认领域,试图说明我们何以能够通过运用各种分析工具来更深刻地理解它们。今天我不想讨论证据法的传统领域,而要讨论在美国和其他几个国家正在进行的一项重要研究工作,这涉及我们所称的司法证明的性质。该研究领域并不论及像传闻规则那样的证据法特定领域,而是关于证据法根基的探讨。