A mixed DNA profile controversy revisited

Semaan et al. (J Forensic Res, 2020, 11, 453) discuss a mock case “where eight different individuals [P₁ through P₈] could not be excluded in a mixed DNA analysis. Even though … expert DNA mixture analysis software was used.” Two of these are the true donors. The LRs reported are incorrect due to the incorrect entry of propositions into LRmix Studio. This forced the software to account for most of the alleles as drop-in, resulting in LRs 60–70 orders of magnitude larger than expected. P₁, P₂, P₄, P₅, and P₈ can be manually excluded using peak heights. This has relevance when using LRmix which does not use peak heights. We extend the work using the same two reference genotypes who were the true contributors as Semaan et al. (J Forensic Res, 2020, 11, 453). We simulate three two-donor mixtures with peak heights using these two genotypes and analyze using STRmix?. For the simulated 1:1 mixture, one of the non-donors’ LRs supported him being a contributor when no conditioning was used. When considered in combination with any other potential donors (i.e., with conditioning), this non-donor was correctly eliminated. For the 3:1 mixture, all results correctly supported that the non-donors were not contributors. The low-template 4:1 mixture LRs with no conditioning showed support for all eight profiles as donors. However, the results from pair-wise conditioning showed that only the two ground truth donors had LRs supporting that they were contributors to the mixture. We recommend the use of peak heights and conditioning profiles, as this allows better sensitivity and specificity even when the persons share many alleles.     

Inclusivity in Online Platforms: Recruitment Strategies for Improving Participation of Diverse Sociodemographic Groups

Governments are increasingly implementing smart and digital approaches to promoting citizen participation. However, whether online participation platforms are tools that improve inclusivity in citizen participation remains underexplored. To address this gap, this article focuses on the role of recruitment messages and their effect on participation in an online participation platform by gender and age. A field experiment with a neighborhood census sample (N = 6,066) shows that online participation dips for younger and older citizens and is equal among women and men. For the age groups between 60 and 75, differences in the control and intervention recruitment messages significantly impacted participation. These findings can help public managers tailor recruitment strategies to facilitate inclusive participation and represent a first step toward learning what types of messages are effective for whom.     

Fear of victimization and health

Fear of victimization may have consequences for subjective well-being. I develop and test a model linking fear of victimization to subjective health. I hypothesize that two processes link fear to subjective health-psychological and behavioral. Specifically, I hypothesize that fear of victimization increases psychological distress, and fear decreases outdoor physical activity, especially walking. High levels of psychological distress and low levels of walking, in turn, are associated with poor self-reported health. I find empirical support for the hypothesized processes in a representative national sample of 2031 adults aged 18 to 90 interviewed by telephone in 1990. The negative association between fear and health is explained largely by psychological distress and walking. However, a significant direct effect remains. I conclude with suggestions for future research linking crime and health, focusing on the need for collecting information on community disorganization. Community context is likely the ultimate exogenous variable-the one that sets in motion the destructive cycle of fear, distress, inactivity, and poor health described here.     

September 11th and U.S. Hegemony—Or Will the 21st Century Be American Too?

The tragedy of September 11 highlights the stark contrast between the real and measurable capabilities possessed by one state, and the almost inevitable resentments which the possession of those capabilities engendered in others. The purpose of this article is not to interrogate the strengths and weaknesses of arguments of American decline. Nor is it to speculate at length about September 11th. It is instead to set the scene and try and identify the underlying causes of America's transition from presumed crisis in the 1970s and 1980s to new self-confidence in the 1990s—a self-confidence that some now feel has been shattered by the events of September. While there were important structural reasons why the United States was unlikely to go the way of other powers, it was a peculiar conjuncture of mainly unforeseen developments that combined together after 1989 to improve the U.S. position within the world. We will then move on to discuss the most effective way of characterizing this position. Here, we will mount a defense of the somewhat contentious notion of "hegemony" While recognizing the problems associated with the idea, it will be argued that as a concept it has serious intellectual advantages over its various theoretical competitors. If nothing else, because it focuses on the American role within the world system, rather than just its statically defined position, it is theoretically more suggestive than the less dynamic idea of unipolarity.     

Hispanics and the death penalty: Discriminatory charging practices in San Joaquin County, California

Following reinstatement of the death penalty after the Supreme Court's decision in Gregg v. Georgia (1976), social scientists carefully documented evidence of racial and gender bias against defendants and victims at all stages of the death penalty system, from charging to conviction and sentencing. Despite these consistent findings, questions remained. One crucial unknown was whether or not racial bias uncovered in investigations of African Americans and Whites also negatively impacted members of other minority groups, in particular the largest minority group in the U.S.-Hispanics. Are Hispanics, as both victims and defendants, treated more like non-Hispanic Whites or African Americans? This research examined all death-eligible homicides in San Joaquin County, California from 1977 through 1986. Using logistic regression analysis, the investigation uncovered patterns of racial and gender bias, finding defendants in Hispanic victim cases were less likely to face a death-eligible charge than defendants in White victim cases. Evidence of discrimination may have implications for how Hispanic integration and race and ethnicity are understood and for evaluating the success of statutory reforms designed to insure fairness and constitutionality of the death penalty.     

Parent-adolescent congruence on decision-making and its relation to adolescent adjustment

Much attention has been paid to the nature of parent-adolescent relationships, with a frequent conclusion being that it is a time of marked disagreement between parents and their adolescents. However, other literature suggests that this time is not inherently conflictual. The purpose of this study was to examine agreement and disagreement between mothers, fathers, and adolescents on specific issues. Then, adolescent adjustment was assessed, and the degree to which it was a function of congruence with parents was examined. A modified version of the Issues Checklist was used to measure intrafamily agreement; the Revised Behavior Problem Checklist and the Harter Scale of Child's Actual Competence were completed by adolescents' social studies teachers to assess adolescent functioning. Relative to their parents, adolescents reported that they should make more decisions alone, while both mothers and fathers reported that decisions should be made jointly among all family members. Only father-adolescent congruence was found consistently to be related to adolescent functioning. Possible explanations for the present results and relevant issues pertaining to family agreement are discussed.