CONTEXTUAL DISPARITIES IN GUIDELINES DEPARTURES: COURTROOM SOCIAL CONTEXTS,GUIDELINES COMPLIANCE,AND EXTRALEGAL DISPARITIES IN CRIMINAL SENTENCING1

This study examines the theoretical and empirical linkages between criminal court social contexts and the judicial use of sentences that deviate from the recommendations of sentencing guidelines. Individual sentencing data from the Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing (PCS) are combined with county‐level measures of social context to examine predictions about the role courtroom characteristics play in judicial departures. Results from hierarchical analyses suggest that the likelihood of departure varies significantly across courts, even after accounting for variations in individual case characteristics. Several measures of courtroom social context—including the size of the court, its caseload pressure and the overall guidelines compliance rate—are significantly related to the individual likelihood of receiving a departure sentence. Moreover, the social context of the court also conditions the influence of various individual‐level sentencing considerations. Findings are discussed in relation to contemporary theoretical perspectives on courtroom decision making and future directions for research on contextual disparities in criminal sentencing are suggested.     

领导决策风格量表的修订与应用研究

领导者的决策风格是领导班子配置的重要依据。罗的决策风格量表是目前国际上使用较为广泛的决策风格量表之一。本项研究依据心理测量学的有关原理和罗的决策风格量表编制的有关理论 ,从我国国情出发 ,对罗的决策风格量表进行了修订 ,并根据各类决策风格与人的个性因素之间的关系 ,对修订后的领导决策风格量表进行信度和效度的检验 ,为领导人才的开发提供了有用的工具     

THE ELUSIVE PURSUIT OF SOLOMON: FALTERING STEPS TOWARD THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD

This article provides a brief critique of presumptions about parenting and children seen through the lens of family law. It argues that, historically, decisions largely followed gender‐based and/or moral presumptions of the day and that sometimes these were in tension with each other. Sometimes, too, as in the biblical story of Solomon's judgment, biological parenthood was contested and/or gender did not provide a ready answer. The article argues that, as children's rights and the best interests of the child increasingly came to dominate the decision‐making rhetoric, a Solomon‐like belief has nonetheless persisted, that judicial ingenuity and sophisticated investigative resources can determine the underlying truth of a dispute and lead to the correct outcome. The evidence, however, points in the direction of significant predictive limitations to the legal, social, and psychological knowledge bases supporting most postseparation parenting decisions. It is argued that what is needed is a formal shift in emphasis from a somewhat idealized commitment to discovering the truth in most contested cases to a focus on good decision‐making processes. It is suggested that most transitional families are best served by an emphasis on good, respectful processes associated with good‐enough decisions that formally acknowledge the limitations of our capacity to predict. Good processes and good‐enough decisions are in turn best supported by a clear emphasis on children as individual agents, who, though dependent on adults, are entitled to the full panoply of human rights.     

Theoretical criteria for online consumer behaviour: web-based communication exposure and internal psychological behavioural processes approaches

Various theories, theoretical viewpoints and models on consumer behaviour stipulate consumers’ offline and online behaviour when purchasing a product or using a service. This article deviates from the purchasing perspective and instead proposes an information and web-based communication message ‘seeking and consumption¹ perspective. This new perspective is theoretically grounded in two new approaches to online consumer behaviour: the web-based communication exposure and internal psychological behavioural processes approaches; as well as the integration of various theoretical perspectives, approaches, theories and models that address fragments of offline and online consumer behaviour. The research problem is to address the existing limited and fragmented approaches, because existing purchasing perspectives arguably do not provide adequate theoretical criteria to explain online consumer behaviour during interactive information-seeking and consumption activities. Hence, the main aim of this article is to propose new theoretical criteria for online consumer behaviour to address these shortcomings.     

CAN RATIONAL CHOICE BE CONSIDERED A GENERAL THEORY OF CRIME? EVIDENCE FROM INDIVIDUAL‐LEVEL PANEL DATA

In the last few decades, rational choice theory has emerged as a bedrock theory in the fields of economics, sociology, psychology, and political science. Although rational choice theory has been available to criminologists for many years now, the field has not embraced it as other disciplines have. Moreover, rational choice scholars have fueled this skepticism of the theory's generality by modeling offender decision making that is one‐sided—large on the costs of crime (sanction threats), short on the benefits of crime. In this article, we directly assess the generality of rational choice theory by examining a fully specified model in a population that is often presumed to be less rational—adolescents from lower socioeconomic families who commit both instrumental (property) and expressive crimes (violence/drugs). By using a panel of N = 1,354 individuals, we find that offending behavior is consistent with rational responses to changes in the perceived costs and benefits of crime even after eliminating fixed unobserved heterogeneity and other time‐varying confounders, and these results are robust across different subgroups. The findings support our argument that rational choice theory is a general theory of crime.     

再制造影响因素研究现状评析

闭环供应链下,复杂的再制造系统受到企业内外部多种因素的影响。通过对国内外大量有关再制造生产研究文献的梳理,考虑时间、偏好、质量与技术四个维度,可以系统探析出再制造企业外部需求与内部控制对再制造生产决策的影响。与新产品生产不同,再制造活动需要考虑更多不确定性因素,并且很多是不可控的,诸如由于废旧产品来源不稳定,再制造商要根据回收品磨损程度进行不同的处理;无法控制处理后能够用于新产品生产的零部件数量,生产稳定性可能会受到影响;需求市场中,消费者对再制品的偏好也存在某种差异。因此,再制造系统的因素分析为再制造理论提供了清晰的研究脉络,使再制造决策理论更有效地应用于再制造实践,也有利于推动经济发展方式的转变。     

论风险型侦查决策

从决策形态诠释和决策优选方法上看,风险型决策是最接近现实侦查决策的决策模型。风险型侦查决策以期望值准则为价值标准,科学分析和定位侦查经验、损益和效用,通过决策树分析法、贝叶斯分析法、灵敏度分析法和效用值分析法进行侦查方案优选。风险型侦查决策研究的重要意义在于将决策科学引入侦查学,为侦查工作提供科学方法论基础。     

Intimate Partner Violence: The Role of Suspect Gender in Prosecutorial Decision‐Making

Utilizing a sample of 8,461 cases involving heterosexual intimate partner violence, this paper examines the role of suspect gender in prosecutorial decision‐making. Four decision points are assessed: the decision to file charges (versus rejection for insufficient evidence); to file as a felony (versus a misdemeanor or probation violation); to dismiss for insufficient evidence (versus full prosecution); and to reduce felony charges to a misdemeanor or violation of probation. Suspect gender was found to be statistically significant in relation to all four outcomes in favoring female over male suspects. Numerous interaction effects were observed between gender and measures of prior arrest and offense severity in particular, suggesting that prosecutors distinguish between male and female suspects across these variables. We suggest that these data provide some support for recent qualitative research suggesting that court personnel are responsive to the gendered asymmetry of intimate partner violence, and may view female intimate violence perpetrators more as victims than offenders.     

深化文化体制改革开放的行动纲领

深化国有文化单位改革,健全现代文化市场体系,创新文化管理体制,完善政策保障机制,推动中华文化走向世界,积极吸收借鉴国外优秀文化成果,是党的十七届六中全会提出的深化文化体制改革的行动纲领。按照这一纲领深化文化体制改革,对于推动社会主义文化大发展大繁荣、把我国建设成为社会主义文化强国具有决定性意义。     

The role of economic and psychological variables in parking violations

Abstract

This study explored some of the factors involved in parking violations, using as a framework the model of tax evasion developed by Weigel, et al. (1987). Two groups of parkers were observed, offenders (N = 121) and non-offenders (N =128). Two questionnaires were employed. An initial questionnaire was used at the time of the observed behaviour to ascertain situation-specific factors followed by the main questionnaire which measured attitudes, moral beliefs, social norms and controls, perceived risk and severity of punishment and personal characteristics. Results revealed that the Weigel et al. model was a good predictor of parking violation with both economic and psychological factors being important determinants. There was also a significant correlation between observed and self-reported behaviour. Implications for understanding rule-breaking behaviour in general are also discussed.