Severity of neurocognitive impairment in women who have experienced intimate partner violence in Spain

This study examines neuropsychological impairment in women who have experienced intimate partner violence using DSM 5 criteria for mild and severe cognitive impairment. A total of 108 females in Spain were included in one of three groups: psychological abuse (n = 24), physical and psychological abuse (n = 45), and no-abuse (n = 39). There were differences between the control and IPV groups in attention and executive functioning. Furthermore, approximately 25% of women experiencing IPV suffer mild neuropsychological alterations and 5% severe, mostly in memory and executive function domains. This evidence supports the growth in research that suggests psychological violence on its own to be as strongly related to poor health outcomes as physical violence in intimate partner relationships.     

The role of teacher quality in retention and hiring: Using applications to transfer to uncover preferences of teachers and schools

Many large urban school districts are rethinking their personnel management strategies, often giving increased control to schools in the hiring of teachers, reducing, for example, the importance of seniority. If school hiring authorities are able to make good decisions about whom to hire, these reforms have the potential to benefit schools and students. Prior research on teacher transfers uses career history data, identifying the school in which a teacher teaches in each year. When such data are used to see which teachers transfer, it is unclear the extent to which the patterns are driven by teacher preferences or school preferences, because the matching of teachers to schools is a two‐sided choice. This study uses applications‐to‐transfer data to examine separately which teachers apply for transfer and which get hired and, in so doing, differentiates teacher from school preferences. Holding all else equal, we find that teachers with better pre‐service qualifications (certification exam scores, college competitiveness) are more likely to apply for transfer, while teachers whose students demonstrate higher achievement growth are less likely. On the other hand, schools prefer to hire “higher quality” teachers across measures that signal quality. The results suggest that not only do more effective teachers prefer to stay in their schools but that schools are able to identify and hire the best candidates when given the opportunity © 2010 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management.     

Mergers and difference-in-difference estimator: Why firms do not increase prices?

Difference-in-difference methods are being increasingly used to analyze the impact of mergers on pricing and other market equilibrium outcomes. Using evidence from an exogenous merger between two retail gasoline companies in a specific market in Spain, this paper shows how concentration did not lead to a price increase. In fact, the conjectural variation model concludes that the existence of a collusive agreement before and after the merger accounts for this result, rather than the existence of efficient gains. This result may explain empirical evidence reported in the literature according to which mergers between firms do not have significant effects on prices.     

Judging the Judiciary: Understanding Public Confidence in Latin American Courts

Although there is a substantial literature examining public confidence in the judiciary in developed nations, scholars have paid scant attention to analyzing judicial confidence in developing countries. Building on extant work regarding developed nations and introducing original hypotheses in the context of developing nations, this research explains influences on public confidence in Latin American judiciaries by developing a theory that focuses on the potential influences of institutional quality, experiences, and individual attitudes. The hypotheses are empirically tested with the rich individual‐level data compiled by the Latin American Public Opinion Project 2006 survey. The results indicate that a variety of factors influence public confidence in Latin American courts; the role of context explains points of consistency and divergence with research on developed nations.     

Becoming widowed

This article discusses the characteristics of widowhood in early 19th-century Austria, focusing on the sources of economic support. Higher proportions of the widowed population were found in inmate than in tenant households, and more women than men were widowed. Widows were more likely to live on their own than adults in general were, indicating that many widows could support their households from their own resources. For 40% of the widows, however, familial support was available in the form of a coresident extended household. Tenant households with greater resources at their disposal were better able to offer this form of support than inmate households. Less than 1% of tenant widows lived alone. Longitudinal data were analyzed to determine the relative frequency with which tenant and inmate widows succeeded their late husbands as household heads, remarried, or retired to become the mothers or mothers-in-law of the new household heads.     

Reflections on the implications of the Vietnam Caucus

Abstract

It is revealing that a Vietnam Caucus held in March 1968 should end its meeting by beginning an evaluation of the professional “conscience” of Asian scholars. That it took this war to raise the latent problems in the profession is itself a depressing commentary on the state of the field. But the desire on the part of some individuals to create a nationwide inter-university student-faculty Committee of Concerned Asian Scholars to pose and then seek to resolve these problems fulfills one of the organizers' hopes.     

Raman Spectroscopy as a Simple,Rapid, Nondestructive Screening Test for Methamphetamine in Clandestine Laboratory Liquids

Raman spectroscopy has found increased use in the forensic controlled substances laboratory in recent years due to its rapid and nondestructive analysis capabilities. Here, Raman spectroscopy as a screening test for methamphetamine in clandestine laboratory liquid samples is discussed as a way to improve the efficiency of a laboratory by identifying the most probative samples for further workup among multiple samples submitted for analysis. Solutions of methamphetamine in ethanol, diethyl ether, and Coleman fuel were prepared in concentrations ranging from 0.5% to 10% w/v, and Raman spectra of each were collected. A concentration‐dependant Raman peak was observed at 1003 per cm in each solution in 4% w/v and greater solutions. Case samples were analyzed and also found to reliably contain this diagnostic peak when methamphetamine was present. The use of this diagnostic indicator can save the forensic controlled substances laboratory time and materials when analyzing clandestine laboratory liquid submissions.