The dynamics of party voting in congress, 1955–78: A cohort model

This paper discusses the individual dynamics of Congressional party voting in terms of a cohort model. Like previous studies, which have used a different terminology (Asher and Weisberg, 1978), stability and replacement are major factors. Smaller, yet significant conversions were also found in regard to the impact of the seniority system and the committee system in allowing independence from the parties. Lastly, major period effects were also revealed. While period effects are more a chance occurrence than conversion associated with accumulating seniority, they may prove significant in understanding the dynamics of congressional voting as stability processes pick up and structure the period effects. In other words, the effects of period disturbances may persist long after the period has ended, as stabilizing processes capture the period changes and make these period changes a part of the congress's future.     

Giving and Getting Respect: Prestige and Stratification in a legal Elite

This article focuses on the corporate actor elite of Chicago's legal community—those attorneys who practice law with and for the major business, social, civic, and cultural organizations in the city. A continuation of a previous article, this article focuses on the differential allocation of professional respect made within that elite. Specifically, the discussion centers on the "second-class citizenship" in the legal community to which elite house counsel are relegated by elite partners in private law firms.
The first half of the article probes the social bases for that stigma. Examining a number of alternative explanations, it offers most support to one based on differences in the educational preparations of the respondents, to the effect that house counsel attended less prestigious law schools and performed less outstandingly at these schools than did firm partners at theirs. In the concluding half of the article, the effects of the stigma on elite social cohesion and commonality of purpose are examined. What emerges from this analysis is the finding that the house counsel stigma—strongly felt as it may be by all concerned—nevertheless generates no lasting lines of social cleavage within the corporate actor legal elite.     

Cognitive and interpersonal factors in woman abuse

As part of a larger ecological analysis of woman battering in Israel, this study examined the combined ability of selected cognitive and interpersonal measures to differentiate among couples in which women were battered and those in which they were not. The ability of these variables to predict men's physical violence and verbal abuse and women's verbal abuse was also executed. Results indicate that a combination of low marital adjustment, high levels of conflict over children, and more perceived self-control over one's life characterized violent men; low marital adjustment and high conflict over child rearing characterized battered women. Both men's and women's verbal abuse was moderately predicted by lower marital adjustment while men's physical violence was predicted by increased levels of conflicts with his partner over child rearing. These findings suggest the importance of marital relationship factors in domestic violence and highlight the need for further study of the interaction between perceived control and marital relationship problems in relationships where men physically abuse women.     

Juvenile probation officer cynicism

This article addresses the question of cynicism among juvenile probation officers in Alabama. The findings reveal that Alabama juvenile probation officers are not as cynical as police and correctional officers have been found to be. It also reports that Alabama juvenile probation officer cynicism cannot be explained by the demographic variables of sex, length of service, and age.     

Drugs and free will

He is a doctoral candidate in human development at the University of Maryland. He lectures on drugs, alcoholism, and society in the department of justice, law, and society at American University, Washington, D.C.