Preaching to the Choir: Americans Prefer Communicating to Copartisan Elected Officials

Past work suggests that partisan attachments isolate citizens from encountering elite messages contrary to their points of view. Here, we present evidence that partisan attachments not only serve to filter the information citizens receive from political elites; they also work in the other direction, isolating politicians from encountering potentially contrary perspectives from citizens. In particular, we hypothesized that Americans prefer expressing their opinions to politicians who share their party identification and avoid contacting outpartisan politicians. Three studies—drawing on a mixture of observational, field experimental, and natural experimental approaches—support this hypothesis: Citizens prefer to “preach to the choir,” contacting legislators of the same partisan stripe. In light of evidence that contact from citizens powerfully affects politicians’ stances and priorities, these findings suggest a feedback loop that might aggravate political polarization and help explain how politicians of different parties could develop different perceptions of the same constituencies.     

A policy mix experiment to promote start-up success: exploratory evaluation of the NSF Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR)/Industry University Cooperative Research Center (IUCRC) membership supplement

The Journal of Technology Transfer - This paper investigates the outcomes of a policy experiment, the NSF SBIR/IUCRC Membership Supplement, designed to promote the success of small high-tech...     

Contextualizing sentencing disparities: using conjunctive analysis of case configurations to identify patterns of variability

Using national data from felony cases processed in state courts (n = 48,006), the current study investigates the nature and magnitude of contextual variability associated with sentencing outcomes. Multivariate models are first estimated to identify the main effects of various offender and offense variables on sentencing decisions. Conjunctive analysis is then used to evaluate the contextual variability of each of these main effects across all observed combinations of offender and offense attributes. Separate analyses are also conducted among states with and without mandatory sentencing guidelines to explore whether these guidelines reduce this variability across different contexts. Findings from this study and its comparative methods are discussed in terms of implications for future research on criminal sentencing and assessing the contextual variability of the main effects of particular legal and extralegal factors.     

Party Voting Cohesion in Mixed Member Legislative Systems: Evidence from Korea and Taiwan

How do mixed‐member legislative systems influence legislator voting? While the literature remains inconclusive, this article suggests party influence as an intervening variable. Through an analysis of roll‐call data from Taiwan and Korea, no deviation is evident between district legislators and legislators elected by proportional representation. Further disaggregation of what it means to vote against one's party again finds little evidence of a tier distinction, while party variables remain significant. The findings are suggestive of a contamination effect between tiers, consistent with the influence of parties.     

The impact of nonprogrammatic factors on criminal‐justice interventions

Purpose. Palmer (1995) drew attention to a distinction between ‘programmatic’ and ‘non‐programmatic’ aspects of criminal justice interventions. While a considerable amount of research has accumulated on the former, the latter by comparison remains under‐researched. Nevertheless some advances have been made and the present article identifies the key components of this. Methods. Following analysis of the concepts forwarded by Palmer, a methodical comparison is made between his findings on programmatic elements and those of two other major groups of meta‐analytic findings from this area. This provides further opportunity for testing of the Risk‐Needs‐Responsivity (RNR) model and an evaluation is offered of its current status in synthesizing relevant knowledge. A parallel set of comparisons is then drawn with respect to non‐programmatic factors and the paper considers the level of agreement between separate reviews of that knowledge base. This directs attention to a number of instances of intervention ‘failure’ which can be explained by insufficient attention to non‐programmatic issues. Results. There is a generally high level of agreement between the three sets of data surveyed. There is not a complete consensus however, caused not by disagreement between data sets but by gaps in the types and range of evidence assembled. There are larger gaps remaining on non‐programmatic factors and the nature and extent of those is described. There is also discussion of some objections and proposed alternatives to RNR, and to some conceptual confusions arising from them. Conclusions. The present state of knowledge on criminal justice interventions is a ‘work in progress’ but nevertheless can provide firm guidance on the design of such interventions, highlighting areas in which much further work is needed.