Compensation,retraining and respiratory diseases: British coal miners, 1918–1939

By 1918, the British coal industry, like all industries, was facing the pressures of transitioning from a wartime to a peacetime economy. The pressures brought by a slowing economy would leave many coal miners, who possessed limited transferrable skills, harbouring deep concerns about their future employment. For those still in employment, concerns were increasing for workers’ health. Sharp increases in respiratory illnesses across the nation’s coalfields were now a major cause of disablement. Accompanying this was the almost inevitable possibility of unemployment, prompting major concerns among workers and trade unions. This article will explore how the nature of industrial relations across Britain’s coalfields changed during the interwar years in response to these challenges, and reveals how the government developed schemes to train disabled coal miners for work in other industries. The relationship between trade unions and the Ministry of Labour, and the incremental passage of legislation to address issues concerning workers’ occupational health in Britain’s coal mines will be examined. The onset of the Second World War ensured the coal industry was now central to the war effort. Recruitment was intensified accordingly. The improvement to working conditions underground, negotiated by trade unions, helped ensure that the workforce and the coal industry more generally were well-prepared for the challenges of the post-First World War economy, and the difficulties the Second World War would bring.     

Violence in young adolescents' relationships: a path model

A structural equation model based on social cognitive theory was used to predict relationship violence from young adolescents' knowledge, self-efficacy, attitudes, and alternative conflict strategies (n = 143 male and 147 female grade 7-9 students). A direct causal effect was supported for violence-tolerant attitudes and psychologically aggressive (escalation/blame) strategies on physical violence against dating partners and friends. Knowledge and self-efficacy contributed to using reasoning-based strategies, but this reduced violence only in boys' friendships. Knowledge reduced violence-tolerant attitudes, thus reducing escalation/ blame and physical violence. Attitudes toward male and female dating violence (ATMDV and ATFDV) were indicators of general attitudes toward violence among non-dating students but ATFDV affected physical violence and ATMDV affected psychological aggression for both dating boys and girls.     

Can Genetics Predict Response to Complex Behavioral Interventions? Evidence from a Genetic Analysis of the Fast Track Randomized Control Trial

Early interventions are a preferred method for addressing behavioral problems in high‐risk children, but often have only modest effects. Identifying sources of variation in intervention effects can suggest means to improve efficiency. One potential source of such variation is the genome. We conducted a genetic analysis of the Fast Track randomized control trial, a 10‐year‐long intervention to prevent high‐risk kindergarteners from developing adult externalizing problems including substance abuse and antisocial behavior. We tested whether variants of the glucocorticoid receptor gene NR3C1 were associated with differences in response to the Fast Track intervention. We found that in European‐American children, a variant of NR3C1 identified by the single‐nucleotide polymorphism rs10482672 was associated with increased risk for externalizing psychopathology in control group children and decreased risk for externalizing psychopathology in intervention group children. Variation in NR3C1 measured in this study was not associated with differential intervention response in African‐American children. We discuss implications for efforts to prevent externalizing problems in high‐risk children and for public policy in the genomic era.     

State Social Services Contracting: Exploring the Determinants of Effective Contract Accountability

This article examines the effectiveness of contract accountability in social service contracts. The analysis is based on five case studies of Kansas contracts for selected welfare, Medicaid, and foster care and adoption services. Results indicate the state has achieved moderate to high levels of accountability effectiveness, especially in terms of specifying social service contracts and selecting appropriate accountability strategies. However, accountability is undermined by the use of risk shifting, reliance on a system of multiple competing providers, and the adoption of new information technologies. These conclusions contradict the conventional wisdom, theory, and existing research on contracting.     

Beyond the census. Reconstructing Dutch women's labour market participation in agriculture in the Netherlands,ca. 1830–1910

Many historians have pointed out for various countries that nineteenth-century national censuses do not accurately reflect women's economic activity. This was no different for the Dutch national censuses. In this article, we argue that under-recording was especially severe in agriculture, and that this problem increased towards the end of the century. The rise in under-recording was partly due to an increased irregularity of women's work on farms, but it also reflected changing living standards and ideologies, in which work was increasingly defined as undesirable for women. In relative terms, agriculture did become less important to men and women alike because of mechanization and industrialization. Nevertheless, agriculture continued to employ many women, especially married women and daughters working on their husbands' and fathers' farms. By offering additional source material and methods for estimating women's labour force participation in agriculture on a regional level, such as relating their occupational status to their husbands', and estimating the number of days worked, we aim to offer an enhanced methodology for gauging the work of women in agriculture, which may be applied to future research.     

Arts and Cultural Engagement,Reportedly Antisocial or Criminalized Behaviors,and Potential Mediators in Two Longitudinal Cohorts of Adolescents

Journal of Youth and Adolescence - Arts and cultural engagement is a potential strategy for reducing or preventing reportedly antisocial or criminalized behaviors (those previously and...     

Internal Report Submitted to the Jerusalem Institute for Israel Studies

Dissident Irish Republicans have increased their violent activities in recent years. These “spoilers” reject the 1998 Good Friday Agreement power-sharing deal between Unionist and Nationalist traditions in Northern Ireland. Instead dissident IRAs vow to maintain an armed campaign against Britain's sovereign claim to Northern Ireland and have killed British soldiers, police officers, and civilians in recent years. These groups have small political organisations with which they are associated. The assumption across the political spectrum is that, whereas Sinn Fein enjoyed significant electoral backing when linked to the now vanished Provisional IRA, contemporary violent Republican ultras and their political associates are utterly bereft of sympathy. Drawing upon new data from the Economic and Social Research Council 2010 Northern Ireland election survey, the first academic study to ask the electorate its views of dissident Republicans, this article examines whether there are any clusters of sympathy for these irreconcilables and their modus operandi. The piece assesses whether there are any demographic, structural, ideological, religious, or party trends indicating Republican dissident sympathies. It also assesses the extent to which dissidents are seen as a threat and examines whether this perception is shared evenly across Northern Ireland's two main communities.