Officer-involved shootings: testing the effect of question timing on memory accuracy for stressful events

Journal of Experimental Criminology - This randomised controlled trial tested the effect of immediate versus delayed, as well as repeated, questioning on memory retrieval regarding details of...     

Lay Participation in Danish Crime Trials: On the Interaction between Lay and Professional Judges during Deliberation

While there is abundant research on common law jury systems, we know less about lay participation in civil law crime trials, often called ‘mixed courts’ or alternately ‘mixed tribunals'. Here, a professional judge and a number of lay judges deliberate together on the issues of guilt and sentencing. This joint deliberation has naturally led both public opinion and research to focus on power relations such as lay judges’ dependence on the professional judges. Based on an ethnographic study of deliberation processes, the present article offers a different perspective on lay judges’ contribution and argues that their decision making rests on a hybrid construction of knowledge in the continuous interaction between the professional judge and lay participants during deliberation. The analysis of this decision‐making process contributes to our understanding of how ordinary people selected for this civic duty create knowledge about justice.     

Justice at risk! An evaluation of a pseudoscientific analysis of a witness’ nonverbal behavior in the courtroom

Psychology and law have developed as disciplines through rigorous data collection, exploration and analysis, and the publication of findings through peer-review processes. Such findings are then used to implement evidence-based practices within a variety of settings. However, in parallel to factually and scientifically based knowledge, ‘alternative’ science, or pseudoscience, has gained in popularity. The present case study aims to evaluate the empirical evidence and theoretical underpinnings of a publically accessible analysis of a suspected serial killer’s nonverbal behavior during a bond hearing published online by two ‘synergologists’. The case study emphasizes how a ‘synergological’ analysis to understanding and interpreting human behavior fails to use empirical data, making generalized inferences based on erroneous assumptions. The case study also highlights the detrimental effects such assumptions may have within the justice system and why pseudoscientific analytical approaches should be vigorously challenged by research scientists.     

Effectiveness of a risk–need–responsivity‐based treatment program for violent and sexual offenders: Results of a retrospective,quasi‐experimental study

Purpose

Relapse prevention is an important goal in correctional settings. Although there is strong evidence for the effectiveness of certain treatment programs for juvenile offenders, those for adults lack such evidence. This study evaluated the effectiveness of a risk–need–responsivity (RNR)‐based intervention.

Methods

A quasi‐experimental, observational study design and cox regression analysis were used to compare treated violent and sexual offenders (n = 171) with untreated offenders (n = 241).

Results

Both groups were observed for an average of 7.9 years. Recidivism rates of treated offenders (11.7%, n = 20) were similar to those of control offenders (15.8%, n = 38; p = .25). When controlling for confounding variables, the hazard of recidivism in the treatment group was 5.2% lower than that in the control group. Subdividing the treatment group resulted in lower hazard ratios for offenders still in therapy when released and offenders cancelling therapy. However, none of the group differences was statistically significant.

Conclusion

Our results show that control and RNR‐based treatment groups had comparable recidivism rates with a trend towards a positive treatment effect, especially for people in outpatient treatment. However, criminal history, age at the start of follow‐up, and actuarial risk of recidivism were significantly associated with recidivism. Future research needs to apply elaborate methodological approaches to detect robust treatment effects and consider different criteria of treatment effectiveness. Furthermore, the influence of prison climate, motivational factors, intervention quality, and factors supporting the success of outpatient treatment should be considered in future studies of larger offender samples.     

Correlates of Joining a Sexual Harassment Class Action

Researchers have proposed a variety of factors that influence the decision to seek legal relief in response to sexual harassment, but have generally failed to test these proposals empirically. The present study aims to address this gap by investigating the decision to join a class-action lawsuit. Participants were female professionals at a nationally based financial services firm, who either participated in or opted out of a sexual harassment class-action proceeding against the company. Five variables emerged as significant correlates of joining the class: organizational climate, turnover, financial dependence, PTSD, and primary appraisal. Dominance analysis identified contextual factors as the most important correlate. Theoretical and practical implications for the role of these factors in joining a class action are discussed.

Patterns of Risk and Protective Factors in the Intergenerational Cycle of Maltreatment

This study investigates the continuation and discontinuation of the intergenerational transmission of child maltreatment within the first 13 months of the child’s life. Differences in risk factors and parenting styles between families who initiate (Initiators), maintain (Maintainers) or break (Cycle Breakers) the intergenerational cycle of child maltreatment are explored in comparison to control families (Controls). One hundred and three Health Visitors were trained to assess risk factors and parenting styles of 4,351 families, at both 4–6 weeks and 3–5 months after birth. Maintainers, Initiators and Cycle Breakers had a significantly higher prevalence for the majority of risk factors and poor parenting styles than Controls. Protective factors of financial solvency and social support distinguished Cycle Breakers from Maintainers and Initiators. Therefore, it is the presence of protective factors that distinguish Cycle Breakers from families who were referred to Child Protection professionals in the first year after birth. A conceptual, hierarchical model that considers history of abuse, risk and protective factors, in turn, is proposed to assess families for the potential of child maltreatment.     

Who’s Your Daddy?

This paper provides a brief explanation and illustration of the phenomenon of semiotics. It then describes the conceptual tools of semiotics and how lawyers can use semiotics in law to create compelling arguments. Last, the paper applies the tools of semiotics to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court case Ferguson v. McKiernan, 940 A.2d 1236 (Pa. 2008), to reveal the shift in social context that made the lines of legal reasoning behind the outcome appear “self-evident.”     

Innovation spaces: lessons from the United Nations

This paper explores the notion of ‘innovation spaces’ within the UN system, as physical and virtual laboratories for innovation. Using empirical research in a range of innovation labs the authors explore four key questions: what form UN innovation labs have taken, what has motivated their creation, what their aims and objectives are, and what impact they are having. The answers to these questions promote reflection on the future of innovation spaces, particularly an analysis of whether a model of ‘siloed’ innovation spaces will survive in the humanitarian system. The paper demonstrates the important role that innovation labs play in the UN system, as well as grappling with the challenges they face.     

Leaving home: Irish press debates on female employment,domesticity and emigration to Britain in the 1930s

Although Ireland has had a long history of female emigration, the 1930s saw an important shift in emigration patterns. In the context of southern Irish nation-building, the emigration of tens of thousands of young Irish women to Britain raised serious questions about the opportunities and roles of women in the Irish Free State. This article analyses the Irish print media of the 1930s as discursive spaces within which female emigration was repeatedly highlighted and debated. Discussions of female emigration were usually related to issues of female education, female employment and the duties of women within the home. These issues need to be located within the specific context of Irish Free State economics and politics. The Conditions of Employment Act (1936) and the Constitution of 1937 were legislative measures that attempted to define and regulate the role of Irish women. But that is not to imply a simple ideological hegemony in the Free State; I argue that the media debates reveal the competing discourses surrounding women's roles in the newly established nation state. For example, one view was that young women and girls should be given training and preparation for emigration, another view was that plenty of jobs were available at home, while a third view was that women should be content to remain within the domestic sphere. The much-repeated view that women would be better off (at home) illustrates the overlapping constructions of home – domestic sphere – and home – the nation. The overlapping and interconnecting of these home spaces signified a blurring of boundaries that meant Irish women were expected to carry the responsibility for national as well as domestic well-being.