Perceptions of Intragroup Rejection and Coping Strategies: Malleable Factors Affecting Hispanic Adolescents’ Emotional and Academic Outcomes

Understanding psychosocial factors that affect the academic achievement of Hispanic adolescents remains a nationwide priority in the United States. Extending previous studies of the stressful effects of perceived discrimination, this year-long longitudinal study examined the correlates of perceived ethnic in-group rejection, coping strategies and fatalistic beliefs, on depressive symptoms, grades, and college aspirations of 2,214 Hispanic adolescents (54 % female) in Southern California. Based on the transactional model of stress and coping and on self-perception theory, structural equation models revealed that high perceived intragroup rejection (10th grade) and low levels of active coping (11th grade) were associated with depressive symptoms in 11th grade. Also, depressive symptoms partially mediated the link between intragroup rejection and both academic outcomes. Avoidant coping strategies (e.g., watching TV) also predicted depressive symptoms and were positively related to fatalism. In addition, fatalism was negatively related to grades and aspiration to attend college. The findings suggest the need to help adolescents find adequate outlets for communication and to create awareness about the potential effects of intragroup rejection.     

Creating the Financial Stability Forum: What Role for Existing Institutions?

The Financial Stability Forum (FSF)—now rebranded as the Financial Stability Board (FSB)—has become a focal point for financial regulatory initiatives in the aftermath of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. Despite its central status, the body has received little attention from scholars. This is particularly striking both in light of the increasing centrality of the FSF/FSB within the realm of financial regulatory governance and the body's unusual structure and composition. Indeed, the creation and design of the FSF pose an empirical puzzle: what explains the creation of a new, informal and loosely structured institution and the centre of a financial regulatory governance regime? At the time of the Forum's creation, the broader financial architecture was marked by significant institutional density, with a large number of international organisations engaged in governance activities. This paper argues that it is precisely the structure and activities of these existing institutions, particularly the International Monetary Fund, the Bank for International Settlements and the Joint Forum on Financial Conglomerates, which account for the creation and design of the FSF, and points to the need for scholars to take seriously the role of organisations operating within institutionally dense spaces.     

The European Commission and fiscal governance reform: a strategic actor?

The intensification of the financial and economic crisis in Europe has added a new impetus to the debate over the possibilities for securing supranational fiscal integration within the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). Since the literature on the European Union’s response to the crisis is dominated by the study of intergovernmental politics, this article considers the previously neglected role of the Commission. A framing analysis of the Commission’s crisis discourse is operationalised here, which is supplemented by interviews with senior officials located in the Directorate General for Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN) during key phases of the crisis. It is found that a supranational reform agenda was never internalised by the Commission. Instead, the Commission acted strategically by framing the crisis around intergovernmental fiscal discipline. These findings suggest that, in line with the ‘new intergovernmentalist’ thesis, supranational institutions themselves may not be as ‘hard-wired’ towards supranationalism as is often assumed.     

A Variable-Centered and Person-Centered Evaluation of Emotion Regulation and Distress Tolerance: Links to Emotional and Behavioral Concerns

Distress tolerance and emotion regulation deficits are associated with many emotional and behavioral concerns and may be important deficit areas for college students especially during the transition to college. However, little is known about how distress tolerance and emotion regulation relate to each other or what typical profiles of these deficit areas might be. We took a variable-centered (i.e., exploratory factor analysis) and a person-centered approach (i.e., latent profile analysis) to identify the overlap and distinctiveness of distress tolerance and emotion regulation deficits and then evaluated how the profiles related to several emotional and behavioral concerns. Participants were undergraduates (N = 627; age M = 20.23, SD = 1.40; 60 % female; 47 % European-American) who completed an online assessment. The exploratory factor analysis of distress tolerance and emotion regulation subscales demonstrated three factors with one factor corresponding to distress tolerance and two factors defined by emotion regulation. Subscales demonstrated significant multidimensionality across the factors. The latent profile analysis with distress tolerance and emotion regulation subscales produced three profiles corresponding to “Functional”, “At Risk”, and “Challenged” levels of distress tolerance and emotion regulation abilities. Internalizing symptoms (i.e., depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and suicidal ideation) had significantly higher symptom severity in the “At Risk”, and “Challenged” profiles than in the “Functional” profile. ADHD symptoms and hostility showed a similar pattern. Conduct problems and substance use were much less related to the deficit profiles. Implications for the etiology of mental health, for prevention and treatment of college students are discussed.     

A Community‐Based Model for Remediating Juveniles Adjudicated Incompetent to Stand Trial: Feedback from Youth,Attorneys, and Judges

This study examined client satisfaction with a community‐based restoration services program for youth adjudicated incompetent to stand trial in Virginia. The sample consisted of 130 youth (ages 8‐21 years), 80 attorneys, and 43 juvenile court judges. Youth overwhelming found restoration services helpful to them, although some concepts were harder to learn than others. Both judges and attorneys were generally knowledgeable about juvenile competency law, although both were less knowledgeable about competency evaluators and the services provided to youth. Results will be used to improve teaching tools, training of Restoration Counselors, and communication between program providers and the legal community.     

Elemental analysis of bone: proton-induced X-ray emission testing in forensic cases

Proton-induced X-ray emission (PIXE) is a spectroscopic technique that provides the researcher with the elemental composition of a given target material. In this paper, we illustrate the utility of PIXE analysis in two forensic contexts: (1) case of cremation in which the nature of the remains is questioned and (2) cases of death by gunshot wound. In the first case, elemental analysis by PIXE reveals that the purported cremated remains are not bone. The last two cases show that radiopaque metallic residue embedded in bone is composed of lead from a projectile.     

The Participedia Project: An Introduction

ABSTRACT

Participedia is an open-source, participatory knowledge tool that responds to a new global phenomenon: the rapid development of experiments in new forms of participatory politics and governance around the world. The experiments are diverse and widespread, from the British Columbia Citizens' Assembly in Canada and the Oregon Citizens' Initiative in the United States to Participatory Budgeting in Brazil, deliberative forums in China, Panchayati Raj reforms in India, and citizen technology assessment in Denmark. Our knowledge of this rapidly expanding universe is shallow. The authors of this article, together with several others, have created the Participedia to respond to this deficit in knowledge. This article documents the development of the Participedia project to date. Participedia aims to be useful to scholars (and practitioners) as an open-source, real-time, cumulative qualitative and quantitative data repository about participatory and deliberative governance experiences. We believe that Participedia is the first effort in the social sciences to build a large data set through a method that is both crowd-sourced and structured to produce good quality, comparable information.

[Editor's Note: The authors of this article are two of the co-founders of Participedia.]