GC-IRD studies on regioisomeric ring substituted methoxy methyl phenylacetones related to 3,4-methylenedioxyphenylacetone

The methoxy methyl phenylacetones share an isobaric relationship (equivalent mass but different elemental composition) to the controlled precursor substance 3,4-methylenedioxyphenylacetone (3,4-methylenedioxyphenyl-2-propanone; 3,4-MDP-2-P). The ten ring substituted methoxy methyl phenylacetones are resolved by capillary gas chromatography on a modified cyclodextrin stationary phase. All ten regioisomeric ketones eluted before the controlled precursor substance 3,4-methylenedioxyphenylacetone. The vapor phase infrared spectra generated from the capillary column effluent clearly differentiated 3,4-MDP-2-P from the various methoxy methyl phenylacetones. Additionally the methoxy methyl phenylacetones provide unique individual infrared spectra. Infrared absorption frequencies and patterns confirmed the relative position of the methoxy-group and the acetone side-chain for the regioisomeric ketones.     

Five-year accuracy of assessments of high risk for sexual recidivism of adolescents

This study looked at 12 juveniles in Wisconsin who were recommended by experts for commitment under Chapter 980, known as the Sexually Violent Person Commitments Act, but who ultimately were not committed. The purpose was to determine the accuracy of these assessments and risk for sexual reoffending for juvenile sexual offenders. The results found a rate of 42% sexual recidivism among these individuals, with a 5-year at-risk period. This figure is in contrast to the low rates of sexual recidivism reported in the general juvenile sexual research. This provides evidence that the capability to assess the risk in juvenile sexual re-offending may at times be higher than previously estimated. Implications of these unusual results are discussed.     

On Biehl's Defense of Bookchin's Immanent Dialectic

Stephen G. Bunker. Underdeveloping the Amazon: Extraction, Unequal Exchange, and the Failure of the Modern State. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1985.

Susanna Hecht and Alexander Cockburn: The Fate of the Forest: Developers, Destroyers and Defenders of the Amazon. Harper Perennial, New York, 1990.

Chico Mendes: Fight for the Forest: Chico Mendes in His Own Words. (Additional material by Tony Gross). Latin American Bureau, London, 1989; distributed in U.S. by Monthly Review Press.     

Attention to Counter-Attitudinal Messages in a State Election Campaign

Research following the "selective exposure" model has focused on avoidance of political messages with which a person might disagree. But positive attention to such "counter-attitudinal" messages is worthy of study, in part because normative theories of democracy value exposure to information that might disturb citizens' political predispositions. Surveys of youth (N = 417) and parents (N = 430) examine attention to newspaper, television, and Web messages about candidates. While there is somewhat more attention to messages about and for a person's favored political candidate or party, forms of political involvement (knowledge, curiosity, and discussion) that predict this "attitude-consistent" attention also predict counter-attitudinal attention at least as strongly. Parents' education and students' exposure to civics lessons also predict both kinds of attention. These results suggest that attention to counterattitudinal political messages is worthy of further study as an important goal of political socialization and a criterion of citizen performance in democracy.     

Local government in Europe: Retrenchment,restructuring and British exceptionalism

This article compares the strategy of British governments towards elected local government following the onset of fiscal stress in the mid‐1970s with those of two other western European countries with a unitary system of government: France and Sweden. The conclusion reached is that, notwithstanding different national configurations of central‐local government relations and the distinctiveness of the British strategy, there are similar policy and institutional outcomes in each case. In so far as such outcomes are taking place irrespective of the party political or ideological complexion of governments, they are consistent with a neo‐Fordist interpretation of local government restructuring.