Criminology Happens

Sunday, April 27, 2014

Criminology & Public Policy 13(1)

Criminology & Public Policy, February 2014: Volume 13, Issue 1

VOLLMER AWARD

Interventions for Juvenile Offenders: A Serendipitous Journey
Mark W. Lipsey

This is a story of a concatenation of largely unplanned and unexpected events that propelled a line of research on the effectiveness of interventions for juvenile offenders along a trajectory that is more coherent in retrospect than at the time of any of those events. In the course of that serendipitous journey, insights were gained on the limitations of individual studies, the value of systematic analysis of a body of research, and the challenges of transporting evidence into evidence-based practice.

VOLLMER AWARD COMMENTARIES

Mark Lipsey's Contribution to Evidence-Based Services for Juvenile Offenders: What Works across Juvenile Justice Systems
James C. Howell

From Research Synthesis to Evidence-Based Policy and Practice: How Mark Lipsey Is Improving Juvenile Offender Treatment
Brandon C. Welsh

JUVENILE ECONOMIC SANCTIONS

EDITORIAL INTRODUCTION
Rehabilitative and Restorative Justice for Juvenile Offenders: How Might Economic Sanctions Help?
John W. Raine

RESEARCH ARTICLE
Juvenile Economic Sanctions: An Analysis of Their Imposition, Payment, and Effect on Recidivism
Stacy Hoskins Haynes, Alison C. Cares and R. Barry Ruback

Research Summary: Economic sanctions, particularly restitution, can help juvenile offenders both learn the extent of the harm they caused and assume responsibility for repairing that harm. If that assumption is true, then restitution should be imposed in every case for which it is appropriate, other factors should not affect imposition, and paying restitution should be negatively related to recidivism. This analysis of 921 juvenile cases in five Pennsylvania counties found that restitution was imposed in only 33% of cases for which it was appropriate, whereas fees were imposed in 66% of cases. Consistent with expectations, restitution was more likely to be imposed for property offenses, but contrary to expectations, restitution was more likely to be imposed for felonies and for males. Judges were less likely to revoke the sentences of juveniles who paid a greater percentage of their total economic sanctions and of juveniles whose violation of sentencing conditions was for nonpayment of economic sanctions.

Policy Implications: Given that support for both punitive and progressive policies exists, policy makers have a unique opportunity to pursue alternatives, like economic sanctions, that appeal to both perspectives. Economic sanctions are particularly important for juveniles because they are less likely to interfere with other financial obligations (in large part because juveniles have fewer financial obligations than do adults) and because they avoid the stigma associated with more punitive sentences, such as incarceration. The negative relationship between payment of economic sanctions and recidivism, found in this study and in other studies, also suggests that, in both the short and the long term, economic sanctions are more cost-effective. Furthermore, the restorative aspect of economic sanctions, particularly restitution, suggests that policy makers should consider how best to impose and collect economic sanctions, as they also are consistent with efforts to improve the treatment of crime victims.

POLICY ESSAYS

The Costs of Delinquency
Mark A. Greenwald, Sherry L. Jackson and Michael T. Baglivio

Juvenile Economic Sanctions: A Logical Alternative?
Tamara Walsh

SERIOUS, VIOLENT, AND CHRONIC JUVENILE OFFENDERS

EDITORIAL INTRODUCTION
Delinquency Referrals; Predictive and Protective Factors for Serious, Violent, and Chronic Offenders; and Juvenile Justice Interventions
Kenneth C. Land

RESEARCH ARTICLE
Serious, Violent, and Chronic Juvenile Offenders: A Statewide Analysis of Prevalence and Prediction of Subsequent Recidivism Using Risk and Protective Factors
Michael T. Baglivio, Katherine Jackowski, Mark A. Greenwald and James C. Howell

Research Summary: The prevalence of serious, violent, and chronic offenders is assessed across 5 years of delinquency referrals to a centralized juvenile justice agency. Differences in prevalence by gender and race/ethnicity and by age at first referral are compared for these youth with the other juveniles referred. Analyses examine whether subsequent official reoffending of these juveniles is predicted by similar risk and protective factors as with other youth. Stability in the proportion of youth meeting the serious, violent, and chronic classification was found. Males were more than twice as likely to be serious, violent, and chronic offenders. Serious, violent, and chronic offenders were almost three times more likely to have been first referred when 12 years old or younger. Predictive risk and protective factors are substantively different for these serious, violent, and chronic youth. Policy implications regarding appropriate delinquency interventions to address significant risk and protective factors for different subgroups of youth are discussed.

Policy Implications: Our study examines the prevalence rates of juvenile offenders classified as serious, violent, and chronic, thereby necessitating an analysis of resource allocation strategies for a juvenile justice agency. In light of this and other empirical findings, agency policies have been adjusted and new policies implemented, including a reduction in the number of residential beds by more than 50% in the last 3 years and reallocation of “deep-end” resources to prevention and community-based programming.

POLICY ESSAYS
What are the Policy Implications of Our Knowledge on Serious, Violent, and Chronic Offenders?
Rolf Loeber and Lia Ahonen

Moving from Description to Implementation of Evidence-Based Research Findings
Alex R. Piquero

SEX OFFENDER RESIDENCE RESTRICTIONS

EDITORIAL INTRODUCTION
Evidence of Ineffectiveness: Advancing the Argument Against Sex Offender Residence Restrictions
Richard Tewksbury

RESEARCH ARTICLE
The Effect and Implications of Sex Offender Residence Restrictions
Beth M. Huebner, Kimberly R. Kras, Jason Rydberg, Timothy S. Bynum, Eric Grommon and Breanne Pleggenkuhle

Research Summary: We evaluated the efficacy of sex offender residence restrictions in Michigan and Missouri using a quasi-experimental design with propensity score matching. First, we examined the implementation of the laws and found that sex offenders in both states were less likely to live in restricted areas after the implementation of the laws than the prerestriction sample, but the differences were not statistically significant. In our outcome analysis, we find little evidence that residence restrictions changed the prevalence of recidivism substantially for sex offenders in the postrelease period. In Michigan, trends indicate that the implementation of the laws led to a slight increase in recidivism among the sex offender groups, whereas in Missouri, this effect resulted in a slight decrease in recidivism. Technical violations also declined for both groups in Missouri. The small effect sizes, inconsistent results across states, and the null results between sex offender and non–sex offender models cast doubt on the potential usefulness of the laws to influence individual patterns of recidivism broadly.

Policy Implications: The results caution against the widespread, homogenous implementation of residence restrictions. Instead, we advocate individualization in sex offender programming and call for the development of risk-centered models of residence restrictions that draw on the established literature. In addition, the research highlights the practical challenges in defining restricted areas, enforcing restrictions, and promoting successful returns to the community. Furthermore, a call for reframing the focus of sex offender reentry to include collaborative treatment groups and enhanced communication and services between key stakeholders is made. Finally, we close with a discussion of several best practice models that provide alternative housing sources for individuals sentenced under residence restrictions without a suitable home plan.

POLICY ESSAYS

Sex Offender Residency Restrictions : Successful Integration or Exclusion?
Elizabeth Ehrhardt Mustaine

Residence Restrictions Are Ineffective, Inefficient, and Inadequate: So Now What?
Kelly M. Socia

The study synthesizes the literature on turnover intentions to assess what domains (e.g., personal characteristics, work environment, and job attitudes) account for the strongest association with turnover intent, what are the characteristics of these relationships, and how do these relationships differ by criminal justice practitioner type. The current study utilizes a systematic review to obtain studies for conducting a meta-analysis. The researchers utilized the r family/correlation coefficient. Studies were weighted by sample size, correlations converted to Fisher’s z, analyses performed, and results converted back to r for interpretation. In terms of the individual predictors for law enforcement, the five strongest variables included alternative job search behavior, job satisfaction, psychological distress, emotional exhaustion, procedural and distributive justice. The five strongest predictors of turnover intent for institutional corrections were normative commitment, emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, affective commitment, and job satisfaction. The five strongest predictors for community corrections included experience, alternative job search behavior, perceptions of coworkers, growth need strength, and job satisfaction. The results of the meta-analysis confirmed the domain of personal characteristics, overall, has the weakest association with turnover intent whereas work environment and job attitude domains consistently display moderate-to-large effects for both law enforcement and corrections.

An investigation into the empirical relationship between time with peers, friendship, and delinquency
Bob Edward Vásquez, Gregory M. Zimmerman

Much of the research on peer influence has examined the relationship between peer associations and delinquency. Relatively little empirical research has addressed the effects of delinquent behavior on peer intimacy and time spent with peers. Our research attempts to fill these gaps in the literature as we hypothesize that, net of peer delinquency, delinquents spend more time with their peers but are less closely attached to their peers. Using data from two waves of the National Youth Survey (NYS), we present two sets of regression models to account for selection bias resulting from whether respondents reported having friends. To assess the stability of our findings, we supplement our presented findings with extensive use of alternate estimation strategies. Conclusions regarding our hypotheses do not vary by estimation strategy. Delinquents spend more time with their peers, but delinquents and non-delinquents do not report differences in closeness to their peers. Given our control variables, our finding introduces complexity in the causal priority between time spent with peers and delinquency. Prior delinquency may be a predictor of more time with peers, but partly as an avenue for opportunities for crime, not for the sake of friendship.

Prior problem behavior accounts for the racial gap in school suspensions
John Paul Wright, Mark Alden Morgan, Michelle A. Coyne, Kevin M. Beaver, J.C. Barnes

A large body of empirical research finds a significant racial gap in the use of exclusionary school discipline with black students punished at rates disproportionate to whites. Furthermore, no variable or set of variables have yet to account for this discrepancy, inviting speculation that this association is caused by racial bias or racial antipathy. We investigate this link and the possibility that differential behavior may play a role. Using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class (ECLS-K), the largest sample of school-aged children in the United States, we first replicate the results of prior studies. We then estimate a second model controlling for prior problem behavior. Replicating prior studies, we first show a clear racial gap between black and white students in suspensions. However, in subsequent analyses the racial gap in suspensions was completely accounted for by a measure of the prior problem behavior of the student – a finding never before reported in the literature. These findings highlight the importance of early problem behaviors and suggest that the use of suspensions by teachers and administrators may not have been as racially biased as some scholars have argued.

The effect of prison gang membership on recidivism
Brendan D. Dooley, Alan Seals, David Skarbek

How does prison gang membership affect recidivism? In this paper, we use a unique dataset of all releasees from prisons operated by the Illinois Department of Corrections during the month of November 2000, which includes demographic information and data on gang participation. We attempt to control for confounding factors that are traditionally associated with both prison gang membership and rearrest. We develop a potential-outcomes framework and describe the conditions under which a counterfactual can be estimated when gang membership is not randomly assigned. We combine regression analysis with Coarsened Exact Matching, which has several advantages over the more popular propensity score matching, to estimate the effect of gang membership on recidivism. Prison gang membership results in a six percentage point increase in recidivism. Despite the strengths of the data, unobserved heterogeneity among inmates could still bias estimates. However, there are probably important subtleties to the gang participation decision such that experimental or quasi-experimental data are unlikely to increase our understanding of the relationship between gang-membership and post-release outcomes. We recommend incorporating ethnography with survey data collection, because ethnographers are able to document otherwise unobservable contextual information concerning the selection process which could be used to identify causal relationships.

Social Control Across Immigrant Generations: Adolescent Violence at School and Examining the Immigrant Paradox
Anthony A. Peguero, Xin Jiang

Social control predicts adolescent violence; however, there is limited research about the extent to which social control explains adolescent violence across immigrant generations. Because it is estimated that one out of four children in the United States has at least one immigrant parent, understanding the correlates of violence for adolescents in immigrant families warrants investigation. This study explores whether and how the adolescent associations between social control (i.e., attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief) and school-based misconduct and victimization vary across immigrant generations. Data are drawn from the Educational Longitudinal Study of 2002. Findings indicate important nuances related to immigrant generation in the conceptual links between social control and adolescent violence. For instance, attachment to school is linked to decreased misconduct for third-plus generation adolescents but a potential factor toward misconduct for first generation adolescents. The implications of the relationships between social control and adolescent violence across immigrant generations are discussed more generally.

The Relationship between Self-Control in Adolescence and Social Consequences in Adulthood: Assessing the Influence of Genetic Confounds
Joseph L. Nedelec, Kevin M. Beaver

Assess the relationship between levels of self-control in adolescence and a variety of later-life outcomes and evaluate the confounding effects of genetic factors. The current study employed data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) and examined whether levels of self-control in adolescence are related to economic, educational, employment, health, relationship and family, and behavioral outcomes in adulthood using DeFries-Fulker regression-based analyses. Analyses employing non-genetically sensitive methods indicated robust associations between self-control and various social consequences. After estimating genetically-sensitive analyses, however, many associations were no longer significant. Those associations which remained significant were in the reversed direction relative to the non-genetically sensitive models. Additionally, further analyses indicated that some of the remaining significant associations were influenced by nonshared genetic effects. The findings indicate that even after controlling for the effect of genetic factors, levels of self-control are associated with differences in a variety of social outcomes. However, given the reduction in the number of significant associations and reversal of associations in the genetically sensitive models, analyses of the social consequences of low self-control which do not account for the effect of genetic factors are likely misspecified.

Sex as a moderator and perceived peer pressure as a mediator of the externalizing-delinquency relationship: A test of gendered pathways theory
Glenn D. Walters

The current study sought to determine whether sex moderated peer mediation of the externalizing-delinquency relationship as part of a larger test of the gendered pathways theory of crime. Data gathered from 4,144 (2,079 males and 2,065 females) members of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth-Child sample were subjected to simple correlational and moderated mediation analysis. Externalizing behavior and delinquency correlated equally in boys and girls but in testing a full moderated mediation model it was discovered that sex moderated the mediating effect of perceived peer pressure on the externalizing–delinquency relationship. Whereas externalizing behavior predicted delinquency in both boys and girls, perceived peer pressure only mediated the externalizing-delinquency relationship in boys. These results support the gendered pathways to delinquency model to the extent that the relationship between childhood externalizing behavior and delinquency was mediated by perceived peer pressure in males but not females. The implications of these results for theoretical refinement of the gendered pathways approach and crime prevention and intervention are discussed.

Sunday, April 20, 2014

American Journal of Sociology 119(3)

American Journal of Sociology, November 2013: Volume 119, Issue 3

Special Contributions

Causal Thinking and Ethnographic Research
Mario Luis Small

Styles of Causal Thought: An Empirical Investigation
Gabriel Abend, Caitlin Petre, and Michael Sauder

While most work on causation in ethnography addresses the normative question of what ethnographers should do, this article addresses the empirical question of what ethnographers actually do. Specifically, it investigates whether ethnographic articles make causal arguments and how these arguments are made. The authors draw on a content analysis of 48 ethnographic articles sampled from four groups of sociological journals: contemporary generalist journals, contemporary specialist journals, mid-20th-century generalist journals—all in the United States—and contemporary generalist journals in Mexico. They find that ethnographies in U.S. contemporary generalist journals are most likely to advance strong and central causal claims and to use logical and rhetorical devices comparable to those used in quantitative articles. They also find that most Mexican ethnographic articles undertake a different kind of project, which they call “shedding light” on social phenomena. In addition to offering one methodological and one substantive suggestion to account for these findings, the authors highlight their implications for the sociology of social science.

How Options Disappear: Causality and Emergence in Grassroots Activist Groups
Kathleen Blee

This study advances recent theorizing on causality and emergence by analyzing how new activist groups create a collective sense of plausible tactics. A comparative ethnographic approach is used to observe shifts in the discussions of four fledgling activist groups. In each group, implicit discursive rules, often set off by minor comments and events, authorize some options and silence others. Although such rules emerge without deliberation or explicit decision making, they shape the group’s sense of possibility into the future. This study contributes both a new understanding of the role of contingency in collective activism and a method for using ethnographic observation to locate subtle causal mechanisms in social life.

A Pragmatist Approach to Causality in Ethnography
Iddo Tavory and Stefan Timmermans

Drawing on early pragmatist theorizing, the authors propose three interrelated methodological activities for the construction of robust causal claims in ethnographic research. First, Charles S. Peirce’s semiotic approach offers ethnographers a useful foundation for a mechanism-based approach to causality by tracing iterations of meaning-making-in-action. Second, taking advantage of the structure of Peirce’s semiotics ethnographers can examine three forms of observed variation to distinguish regularly occurring causal sequences and temporally and spatially remote causal processes. Third, the authors emphasize that the standards to evaluate causal arguments—their plausibility and assessments of explanatory fit—are always made in relation to challenges provided within a disciplinary community of inquiry. The use-value of the pragmatic approach to causality is demonstrated with an explanation of the different reactions of parents and clinicians to positive newborn screening results.

Other Articles

The Transformation of Prison Regimes in Late Capitalist Societies
John R. Sutton

Recent studies argue that cultural and political-economic shifts have led to a sea change in penal regimes among modern Western societies, resulting in more punitive social policies in general and a trend toward higher incarceration rates in particular. This is a special case of a wider argument that globalization has led to a decline in state autonomy and convergence on a market-based model of economic and social policy. This thesis has been challenged by the empirical literature on welfare states, which finds persistent cross-national diversity in institutional structures, policies, and patterns of inequality. Focusing on incarceration rates as the outcome of interest, this study evaluates these arguments by applying a Bayesian change-point model to four decades of data from 15 countries. Results show that a regime shift did occur but that incarceration rates increased mainly among countries with unregulated labor markets, decentralized polities, or weak labor unions. Profound institutional differences persist and are fateful for incarceration trajectories.

The Self-Expressive Edge of Occupational Sex Segregation
Erin A. Cech

Recent gender scholarship speculates that occupational sex segregation is reproduced in large part through the gendered, self-expressive career decisions of men and women. This article examines the effects of college students’ expression of their self-conceptions on their likelihood of entering occupations with a high or low proportion of women and theorizes the consequences of this mechanism for gender inequality. The author uses unique longitudinal data on students from four U.S. colleges to examine how the gender composition of students’ field at career launch is influenced by their earlier self-conceptions. Students with emotional, unsystematic, or people-oriented self-conceptions enter fields that are more “female,” even net of their cultural gender beliefs. Results suggest that cultural ideals of self-expression reinforce occupational sex segregation by converting gender-stereotypical self-conceptions into self-expressive career choices. The discussion section broadens this theoretical framework for understanding the role of self-expression in occupational sex segregation and notes the difficulty of addressing this mechanism through social or policy actions.

Challenger Groups, Commercial Organizations, and Policy Enactment: Local Lesbian/Gay Rights Ordinances in the United States from 1972 to 2008
Giacomo Negro, Fabrizio Perretti, and Glenn R. Carroll

Drawing on theories of social movements and organizations, the authors examine how the expanding presence of commercial organizations and the growing diversity of their forms foster policy change securing rights for a group of challengers. In particular, they suggest that these organizations can operate as bridges and can signal the legitimacy of the group in a community. Empirically, they analyze organizations linked to lesbians/gays and the promulgation of local ordinances banning discrimination, using a data set covering American counties from 1972 to 2008. Using hazard models, they find that the rate of policy enactment increases (1) with greater presence of lesbian/gay commercial organizations, particularly of those linking toward the larger community, and (2) with greater diversity of their organizational forms. Finally, they find evidence that commercial and political organizations are linked in a complex way.

Sunday, April 6, 2014

American Sociological Review 79(2)

American Sociological Review, April 2014: Volume 79, Issue 2

Cross-Field Effects and Ethnic Classification: The Institutionalization of Hispanic Panethnicity, 1965 to 1990
G. Cristina Mora

Research on racial/ethnic categorization provides insight on how broad processes, such as migration trends or political shifts, precede the establishment of new categories, but does not detail the struggles and compromises that emerge between state and non-state actors. As a result, we know little about why new census categories are defined in certain ways or how they become legitimated. This article addresses this gap by using an organizational lens to reconstruct how the Hispanic category emerged in the United States. I demonstrate that categories can become institutionalized through a two-stage process as state actors and ethnic entrepreneurs (1) negotiate a classification’s definition and (2) work together to popularize the category. I argue that cross-field effects undergird these stages—movements toward developing a new category within state agencies are reinforced by similar classification efforts occurring among social movement groups and media firms, and vice versa. I identify three organizational mechanisms that sustained these effects in the Hispanic case: the development of boundary-spanning networks between state and non-state actors, the transposition of resources across fields, and the use of analogy and ambiguity as cognitive tools to describe and legitimate the new category. I discuss the theoretical merits of incorporating organizational analysis, especially the concept of cross-field effects, into the study of racial/ethnic classification.

Are Suicidal Behaviors Contagious in Adolescence? Using Longitudinal Data to Examine Suicide Suggestion
Seth Abrutyn and Anna S. Mueller

Durkheim argued that strong social relationships protect individuals from suicide. We posit, however, that strong social relationships also have the potential to increase individuals’ vulnerability when they expose people to suicidality. Using three waves of data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, we evaluate whether new suicidal thoughts and attempts are in part responses to exposure to role models’ suicide attempts, specifically friends and family. We find that role models’ suicide attempts do in fact trigger new suicidal thoughts, and in some cases attempts, even after significant controls are introduced. Moreover, we find these effects fade with time, girls are more vulnerable to them than boys, and the relationship to the role model—for teenagers at least—matters. Friends appear to be more salient role models for both boys and girls. Our findings suggest that exposure to suicidal behaviors in significant others may teach individuals new ways to deal with emotional distress, namely by becoming suicidal. This reinforces the idea that the structure—and content—of social networks conditions their role in preventing suicidality. Social ties can be conduits of not just social support, but also antisocial behaviors, like suicidality.

Casualties of Social Combat: School Networks of Peer Victimization and Their Consequences
Robert Faris and Diane Felmlee

We point to group processes of status conflict and norm enforcement as fundamental elements in the development of school-based victimization. Socially vulnerable youth are frequently harassed for violating norms, but the logic of status competition implies they are not the only victims: to the extent that aggression is instrumental for social climbing, increases in status should increase risk—at least until the pinnacle of the hierarchy is reached. Victimization causes serious harm, and, we argue, at the margin these consequences will be magnified by status. We test these ideas using longitudinal network data on friendship and victimization from 19 schools. For most students, status increases the risk of victimization. However, youth at the uppermost extremes of the school hierarchy—students in the top 5 percent of centrality and those with cross-gender friendships where such friendships are rare—sit just above the fray, unlikely to fall victim to their peers. As expected, females and physically or socially vulnerable youth are victimized at particularly high rates. Victims experience psychological distress and social marginalization, and these adverse effects are magnified by status. For most students, gains in status increase the likelihood of victimization and the severity of its consequences.

Insiders, Outsiders, and the Struggle for Consecration in Cultural Fields: A Core-Periphery Perspective
Gino Cattani, Simone Ferriani, and Paul D. Allison

Building on recent research emphasizing how legitimacy depends on consensus among audiences about candidates’ characteristics and activities, we examine the relationship between cultural producers’ (candidates) position in the social structure and the consecration of their creative work by relevant audiences. We argue that the outcome of this process of evaluation in any cultural field, whether in art or science, is a function of (1) candidates’ embeddedness within the field, and (2) the type of audience—that is, peers versus critics—evaluating candidates’ work. Specifically, we hypothesize that peers are more likely to favor candidates who are highly embedded in the field, whereas critics will not show such favoritism. We find support for these hypotheses in the context of the Hollywood motion picture industry.

“Notable” or “Not Able”: When Are Acts of Inconsistency Rewarded?
Stoyan V. Sgourev and Niek Althuizen

Atypical practices of crossing categories or genres are generally discouraged in the market, but the ideal of the Renaissance mind1 persists. Building on recent work elaborating the need to reward the greater risk associated with atypicality for it to survive, this article provides the first systematic, direct evidence for such a reward. We focus on stylistic inconsistency—mixing distinct artistic styles. In a between-subject experimental design, 183 subjects estimated the aesthetic and market value of consistent and inconsistent sets of artworks by Pablo Picasso in three status conditions. Controlling for cognitive difficulties posed by inconsistency, we show that inconsistency is rewarded (i.e., evaluated higher than consistency on aesthetic value) only at high status. Status cues guide perception so that inconsistent works by a prominent artist are given the benefit of the doubt and interpreted as a sign of creativity. The association with creativity leads to a reward for atypicality in the absence of tangible proof that it performs better than typicality.

Who’s the Boss? Explaining Gender Inequality in Entrepreneurial Teams
Tiantian Yang and Howard E. Aldrich

Sociologists have examined gender inequalities across a wide array of social contexts. Yet, questions remain regarding how inequalities arise among autonomous groups pursuing economic goals. In this article, we investigate mixed-sex entrepreneurial teams to unpack the mechanisms by which gender inequality in leadership emerges, despite strong pressures toward merit-based organizing principles. We theorize the potentially competing relationships between merit and gender and explore the contingencies moderating their effects. Drawing on a unique, nationally representative dataset of entrepreneurial teams sampled from the U.S. population in 2005, we use conditional logistic regression to test our hypotheses. We demonstrate that merit’s effect becomes much larger when multiple merit-based criteria provide consistent predictions for which team member is superior to others, and when entrepreneurial founders adopt bureaucratic templates to construct new ventures. However, gender stereotypes of leaders pervasively constrain women’s access to power positions, and gender’s effect intensifies when spousal relationships are involved. Women have reduced chances to be in charge if they co-found new businesses with their husbands, and some family conditions further modify women’s chances, such as husbands’ employment and the presence of children.

Entrepreneurship as a Mobility Process
Jesper B. Sørensen and Amanda J. Sharkey

We advance a theory of how organizational characteristics, in particular the structure of opportunity within organizations, shape the decision to become an entrepreneur. Established organizations play an important yet understudied role in the entrepreneurial process, because they shape the environment within which individuals may choose to enter self-employment. Yet, despite the fact that sociologists have long recognized that inequality within organizations plays an important role in career attainment and mobility, we lack an understanding of how it shapes the pursuit of entrepreneurial opportunities. We develop a formal model in which entrepreneurial choice is driven by differences in the arrival rate of various types of advancement opportunities. Entrepreneurship then arises as a result of matching processes between workers and employers, as well as the features of opportunity structures in paid employment. Analyses using Danish census data provide support for empirical implications derived from the model.

Comment and Reply

Is the Motherhood Penalty Larger for Low-Wage Women? A Comment on Quantile Regression
Alexandra Killewald and Jonathan Bearak

Statistical Models and Empirical Evidence for Differences in the Motherhood Penalty across the Earnings Distribution
Michelle J. Budig and Melissa J. Hodges

Critical Criminology 22(2)

Critical Criminology, May 2014: Volume 22, Issue 2

Toys for the Boys? Drones, Pleasure and Popular Culture in the Militarisation of Policing
Michael Salter

This paper argues that the various and contradictory rationales offered for law enforcement drones are symptomatic of a ‘weapons fetish’ evident in popular culture. This fetishisation imbues military technology such as the drone with masculine fantasies of control and domination that obscure the practical limitations and ethical implications of drones for crime control and prevention. By linking the pleasures of militarism to crucial shifts in the social and economic order, the paper argues that counter-terrorism discourse functions to legitimate the militarised masculine subject positions of paramilitary policing specifically and the neoliberal state generally. In such a context, the drone features as a regressive ‘weapon-toy’ that fuses state control with technological transcendence.

Mad Men in Bib Overalls: Media’s Horrification and Pornification of Rural Culture
Walter S. DeKeseredy, Stephen L. Muzzatti, Joseph F. Donnermeyer

The media play a key role in stereotyping as “ignorant and uncouth hillbillies” people who live in rural US communities. As well, since the early 1970s, popular films frequently portray rural areas as dangerous locations, places where urban people are at high risk of being savagely killed and tortured by demented, in-bred locals without conscience or constraint. Further, with the advent of the Internet, rural women continue to be depicted in a degrading, highly sexualized manner and “gonzo” pornographic videos of them are widely and freely accessible. Informed by feminist and cultural criminological modes of inquiry, this paper presents some exploratory research on rural horror films and pornographic videos. A key argument is that with the help of new information technologies, these media are normalized, mainstreamed, and contribute to the horrification/pornification of rural culture, and by doing so, mask the real issues about crime, violence, and gender relations in the rural context.

“Because That’s What Justice Is to Us”: Exploring the Racialized Collateral Consequences of New Parochialism
Sarah Becker

Renewed interest in communities as spaces for criminal opportunity has generated numerous studies of neighborhood social dynamics and crime. Most of this research is rooted in social disorganization theory, which examines neighborhood structural characteristics that facilitate effective social control. While many studies tout the benefits of community-based controls, the potential externalities of these efforts remain underexplored. In the modern neoliberal context, where policing strategies stress community involvement and often focus on vaguely-defined problems like “quality of life” or “incivilities” and where police have considerable enforcement discretion, the unintended consequences of community-based controls are important to document. I use the ethnographic case study of Gardner Village to explore the potential collateral consequences of one form of collective social control: new parochialism. Applying a critical lens to the social disorganization literature, I argue that when embedded in particular structural contexts, new parochialism contributes to the reproduction of inequality and undermines community-building processes.

Seeking Asylum and Residence Permits in Sweden: Denial, Acknowledgement, and Bureaucratic Legitimacy
Isabel Schoultz

Sweden’s reputation as one of the most encompassing welfare states in the world is maintained by means of a good self-image, not least in relation to refugee policies. At the same time, external authorities have been critical of Sweden’s handling of the process of seeking asylum. Drawing on Stanley Cohen’s concepts of denial and partial acknowledgment, the article explores how Swedish state officials respond to complaints regarding the process of seeking asylum and other forms of residence permit. The study analyzes judgments from the Parliamentary Ombudsman, the Chancellor of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights. The analysis suggests that even within the well-developed democratic state, denials constitute a form of account that may be utilized to maintain bureaucratic legitimacy. In addition, partial acknowledgments serve to present state actors as decent and self-correcting. At the same time these acknowledgements could be understood as constituting a means of avoiding moral censure.

The Coverage of American Indians and Alaskan Natives in Criminal Justice and Criminology Introductory Textbooks
Favian Alejandro Martín

This paper examines the coverage of American Indians and Alaskan Natives (AI/AN) in the most widely read introductory criminal justice and criminology books published between 2004 and 2010. The current research extends upon Young’s (J Crim Justice Educ 1:111–116, 1990) assessment of AI/ANs in criminal justice and criminology introductory textbooks, where he found no mention of AI/ANs. The replication of Young (J Crim Justice Educ 1:111–116, 1990) is especially important because AI/ANs continue to face a wide array of social issues (i.e. substance abuse and poverty), which leads to an overrepresentation of AI/ANs in the criminal justice system. To accomplish this, a content analysis was conducted on thirty-one introductory criminal justice and criminology textbooks to determine whether AI/ANs have received more academic coverage in current textbooks. The findings reveal that introductory criminal justice and criminology textbooks still under represent AI/ANs despite experiencing crime, victimization, and justice related problems.

Risky Reports: Crime Risk Assessments and Spatial Governance
Murray Lee, Garner Clancey, Daren Fisher

The identification, assessment, and minimization of crime risk has permeated practices that extend well beyond traditional criminal justice responses. This article analyses crime risk assessment reports and the guidelines and processes through which they are produced for large-scale commercial and residential developments and redevelopments, taking New South Wales Australia as a case study. The article suggests that although the crime risk assessment guidelines and reports deploy a language of risk, there is a messiness and inconsistency to the crime risk assessment process that raises significant questions its normative utility. The article concludes that the language and promise of risk minimisation can silence or ‘black box’ what appear to be coherent regulatory process making them little more than symbolic gestures.

A Prescription for Violence: The Legacy of Colonization in Contemporary Forensic Mental Health and the Production of Difference
Ameil J. Joseph

In this paper I will argue, through the example of the “treatment” of racialized minorities diagnosed with mental illness, that the mental health system (including its unique laws, production of different identity categories and ruling disciplines), with its dogmatic adherence to and reliance on alleged expert opinion and internal inquiry, allows for the erasure of subaltern voices. Often we hear about a tragic incident as reported by the media about someone diagnosed with a mental illness who has committed a crime. These representations routinely present the person as violent, aggressive, uncontrollable, and unpredictable. Repeatedly the voice of the accused is not represented; his or her social, historical, and political contexts are not considered relevant. The technologies of the criminal justice and mental health system’s use of physical or chemical restraint, coercive treatment, or practices such as deportation are also not reported, thus reproducing systems of harm. We don’t get to look inside the asylum. Patients’ voices are excluded from the discursive practices, disciplinary hegemony or dominant regimes of truth within the mental health system. This creates a system impermeable to criticism, where violence continues to prevail. Through a discussion of the disproportionate criminalization and deportation of the mentally ill, the false associations between mental illness and violence, the colonial ancestry of internal inquiry, and example cases from the media, this paper reviews how these particular technologies of violence owe their inheritance to the orientalising, discursive practices and disciplinary hegemony developed during colonization that when ignored, reproduce the dehumanizing outcomes upon which they were built.

‘Cultural Criminology, Governmentality and the Liquidity of the Failing State: The View from Ireland’ for Critical Criminology
Liam Leonard

A number of incidents and community movements in the post-economic growth era have come to shape understandings of the Republic of Ireland’s marginalised groupings. These groups exist in both urban streetscapes and rural communities; all have come to represent a new culture of transgressive resistance in a state that has never completely dealt with issues of political legitimacy or extensive poverty, creating a deviant form of ‘liquid modernity’ which provides the space for such groupings to exist. The article demonstrates that the prevailing ideology in contemporary, post-downturn Ireland have created the conditions for incidents of ‘cultural criminology’ that at times erupt into episodes of counter hegemonic governmentality. The article further argues that these groups which have emerged may represent the type of transgressive Foucaultian governmentality envisaged by Kevin Stenson, while they are indicative of subcultures of discontent and nascent racism which belie the contented findings of various affluence and contentment surveys conducted during the years of rapid growth. The paper develops this theme of counter-hegemonic ‘governmentality’, or the regional attempts to challenge authorities by local groups of transgressors. The paper finally argues that, in many ways, the emergence of a culture of criminality in the Irish case, and media depictions of the same, can be said to stem from the corruption of that country’s elites as much as from any agenda for resistance from its beleaguered subcultures.

British Journal of Criminology 54(3)

British Journal of Criminology, May 2014: Volume 54, Issue 3

Recognizing the 2011 United Kingdom Riots as Political Protest: A Theoretical Framework Based on Agency, Habitus and the Preconscious
Sadiya Akram

Drawing on the 2011 United Kingdom riots, this article explores contestation over the meaning of riots. Is rioting criminality and looting, or are there political aspects to the act? For those advocating a political element, there is difficulty in reconciling how an apparently spontaneous act can have political motivations. This article argues that rioting is a distinctly political action, and in order to understand it we must theorize the characteristics of agency that underpin the act. Drawing on Bourdieu’s habitus, but developing it to include a preconscious component, the article develops a novel theoretical framework for understanding the rioter. Habitus is presented as a mechanism that can help better understand how experiences in the past affect the rioter’s present, thereby leading to a coming to the surface of underlying political grievances.

The Life Course of Young Male and Female Offenders: Stability or Change between Different Birth Cohorts?
Olof Bäckman, Felipe Estrada, Anders Nilsson, and David Shannon

Individuals’ life chances are shaped by the times and events that they experience. This emphasizes the need for studies that focus on staggered birth cohorts. The article presents a new longitudinal data set that includes three complete Swedish birth cohorts, born in 1965, 1975 and 1985. Comparisons between the different birth cohorts show how offending distributions among young offenders, as well as their socio-demographic backgrounds and life chances, have developed over time. The analyses of stability and change presented in the study may serve as a point of departure for more informed discussions of the significance of societal changes for the criminality and life chances of male and female offenders.

Crime and the Transition to Marriage: The Role of the Spouse’s Criminal Involvement
Torbjørn Skardhamar, Christian W. Monsbakken, and Torkild H. Lyngstad

Influential perspectives in life course criminology maintain that marriage leads to desistance from crime, and the mechanisms are largely related to spousal social control. Whether and to what degree marriage represents a break from a criminal past might depend on the spouse’s criminal attitude. We study how changes in offending are related to marriage, and how the patterns vary by the wife’s criminal record. We use data from Norwegian administrative registers that cover the total population of all persons who married in Norway between 1997 and 2001 (N = 80,064). We use information on these persons’ criminal records in two five-year periods before and after marriage as well as information on their wives’ criminal records in the same period, to estimate the probability of offending across an 11-year period around the time of marriage. We do so in a way that takes premarital changes in criminal behaviour into account. We find that the desistance process tend to start up to several years before marriage, and that the decline is greater for those who marry a wife with a criminal record.

Exposing ‘Sex’ Offenders: Precarity, Abjection and Violence in the Canadian Federal Prison System
Rosemary Ricciardelli and Dale Spencer

Imprisoned sex offenders face abjection because of their criminality and are the most victimized group of adult male prisoners. Drawing on Judith Butler’s work on gender, abjection and precarity, and scholarship focused on prison masculinities, we examine the experiences of sex offenders while incarcerated and the role of various agents in exposing their convictions to other prisoners and, ultimately, to victimization. Given each prisoner’s convictions are not immediately known when they enter the penitentiary and recognizing that prison is unsafe for sex offenders, we sought to understand how sex offenders attempt to pass among the general prisoner population and the methods through which their convictions become known. Utilizing interviews with 59 formerly incarcerated men, we analyse the modalities that sex offenders employ to ‘pass’ as non-sex offenders and the anxieties associated with awaiting their inevitable exposure. Former prisoners reveal the methods used by staff and prisoners to expose those with sex-related convictions.

Self-efficacy Beliefs and Preferred Gender Role in Policing: An Examination of Policewomen’s Perceptions in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates
Doris C. Chu and Mohammed Murad Abdulla

In Dubai, one of the fastest-growing cities in the world, women are encouraged to pursue higher education and careers in different spheres. Since the first group of 17 women joined the Dubai police force in 1977, the number of women choosing the police profession has risen. Today, more than 1,400 female officers work in Dubai. Using data from surveys conducted with 278 female police officers in Dubai, this study assesses female officers’ attitudes towards women in policing and their preferred gender role at police work. In general, female officers believed that they are effective as patrol officers on the street, and a majority of the sampled policewomen believed that women can be as good as male officers in doing police work. The findings reveal that professional role confidence is significantly associated with positive self-appraisal. In addition, policewomen who are confident about their work and those with longer tenure in the police force are more likely to favour the same assignment as policemen. Female officers with higher education attainment are less likely to endorse gender-restrictive assignments. Suggestions for future research are addressed.

Police Understanding of the Foundations of Their Legitimacy in the Eyes of the Public: The Case of Commanding Officers in the Israel National Police
Tal Jonathan-Zamir and Amikam Harpaz

The dialogic approach to legitimacy postulates that a complete picture of police legitimacy requires considering not only citizens’ views, but also police understanding of their legitimacy and the interaction between the two. This article addresses a particular aspect of police perceptions of their legitimacy in the eyes of the public: the foundations of their external legitimacy. The analysis reveals that, in contrast to the priorities of citizens as reflected in community surveys, Israeli commanding police officers associate their external legitimacy more with their accomplishments in fighting crime than with procedural justice. We consider the implications of these findings for Israeli policing, as well as in relation to the ‘legitimacy as a dialogue’ approach and legitimacy research more generally.

Sunday, March 30, 2014

Journal of Research on Crime and Delinquency 51(3)

Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, May 2014: Volume 51, Issue 3

Can the FIFA World Cup Football (Soccer) Tournament Be Associated with an Increase in Domestic Abuse?
Stuart Kirby, Brian Francis, and Rosalie O’Flaherty

Objectives: This study aims to establish whether empirical evidence exists to support the anecdotal view that the Fédération Internationale de Football Association world cup football (soccer) tournament can be associated with a rise in reported domestic abuse incidents, when viewed remotely via television. Method: A quantitative analysis, using Poisson and negative binomial regression models looked at monthly and daily domestic abuse incidents reported to a police force in the North West of England across three separate tournaments (2002, 2006, and 2010). Results: The study found two statistically significant trends. First, a match day trend showed the risk of domestic abuse rose by 26 percent when the English national team won or drew, and a 38 percent increase when the national team lost. Second, a tournament trend was apparent, as reported domestic abuse incidents increased in frequency with each new tournament. Conclusion: Although this is a relatively small study, it has significant ramifications due to the global nature of televised football (soccer) tournaments. If replicated, it presents significant opportunities to identify and reduce incidents of domestic abuse associated with televised soccer games.

Criminogenic Facilities and Crime across Street Segments in Philadelphia: Uncovering Evidence about the Spatial Extent of Facility Influence
Elizabeth R. Groff and Brian Lockwood

Objectives: Test whether the exposure of street segments to five different potentially criminogenic facilities is positively related to violent, property, or disorder crime counts controlling for sociodemographic context. The geographic extent of the relationship is also explored. Method: Facility exposure is operationalized as total inverse distance from each street segment in Philadelphia, PA, to surrounding facilities within three threshold distances of 400, 800, and 1,200 feet. All distances are measured using shortest path street distance. Census block group data representing ethnic heterogeneity, concentrated disadvantage, and stability are proportionally allocated to each street block. Negative binomial regression is used to model the relationships. Results: Exposure to bars and subway stations was positively associated with violent, property, and disorder crime at all distance thresholds from street segments. Schools were associated with disorder offenses at all distance thresholds. The effects of exposure to halfway houses and drug treatment centers varied by distance and by crime type. Conclusions: Facilities have a significant effect on crime at nearby places even controlling for sociodemographic variables. The geographic extent of a facility’s criminogenic influence varies by type of facility and type of crime. Future research should examine additional types of facilities and include information about place management.

The Contribution of Gang Membership to the Victim–Offender Overlap
David C. Pyrooz, Richard K. Moule, Jr, and Scott H. Decker

Objective: Although a vast literature has investigated the consequences of gang membership for offending and victimization, little is known about the contribution of gang membership to the victim–offender overlap. We advance a group process theoretical model and provide an empirical extension of the victim–offender overlap to gang membership. Method: Using data gathered from 621 respondents in five cities, the contribution of gang membership to the victim–offender overlap is determined by examining (1) a typology of four victim–offender arrangements using multinomial logistic regression modeling and (2) the latent propensity for violent offending and victimization using multilevel item response theory modeling. Results: Gang members were over twice as likely as nongang members to be both victims and offenders, even after adjusting for low self-control, adherence to street codes, and routine activities. Neither contemporary theoretical perspectives on the overlap nor the reciprocal relationship between violent outcomes eliminated the association of gang membership with violent victimization and violent offending. Conclusion: By theoretically and empirically integrating gang membership into current knowledge on the victim–offender overlap, the results suggest that there is much to be gained for research and practice by unpacking the features of criminal and deviant networks.

The Relative Impact of Gang Status Transitions: Identifying the Mechanisms of Change in Delinquency
Chris Melde and Finn-Aage Esbensen

Objectives: Explore the relative impact of transitions into and out of gangs on adolescent involvement in delinquency and determine the mechanisms associated with these changes in deviant behavior. Method: Hierarchical discontinuous regression models are utilized to examine changes in elevation and slope in outcomes associated with gang membership status transitions using six waves of panel data from a school-based sample of 512 gang-involved youth. Result: Results reveal the potential for gang membership to have an enduring impact on involvement in delinquent activity, but also on attitudes, emotions, and unstructured activities associated with a higher risk of offending. Heightened elevation in proximate postgang membership observations of offending was mediated by the mechanisms associated with a turning point. Conclusions: Gang membership, however brief, can have an impact on adolescent development after self-reported membership ends. While desistance from gang membership is a good first step in promoting better outcomes, youth remain more at risk of antisocial behavior after leaving the gang than they were prior to joining such groups. Research on the enduring impact of gang membership is needed, as well as programs and policies that might lessen the severity of the impact of gang membership on later life outcomes.

Boundary Adherence during Place-based Policing Evaluations: A Research Note
Evan T. Sorg, Jennifer D. Wood, Elizabeth R. Groff, and Jerry H. Ratcliffe

Objectives: This note explores complications with standard methods to evaluate place-based policing interventions. It identifies and explains issues of boundary misspecification during evaluation as a result of boundary adjustment by police during an intervention. Method: Using geographic data gathered during post-experiment focus groups with officers involved in the Philadelphia Foot Patrol Experiment, we highlight the practice of boundary adjustment on the part of officers and we explain why such adjustments occurred. Results: Officers involved in the focus groups who identified the active boundaries of their hot spot assignments (n = 124) all reported policing outside of their delineated beats. On average, their active beats were 0.13 square miles larger than the originally delineated treatment beats. Some active beats overlapped catchment and control locations. Conclusion: Boundary misspecification could cause researchers to (1) incorrectly label a direct benefit of receiving treatment as a diffusion of crime control benefits; (2) underestimate immediate spatial crime displacement; and (3) underestimate treatment effects. Future place-based experiments should take into account the various pressures on officers to adjust the boundaries of their assignments by incorporating measures that track boundary adherence over time (and reporting them) in order to optimize assessments of net effects, diffusion and displacement.

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 653

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, May 2014: Volume 653

Human Trafficking: Recent Empirical Research

New Directions in Research on Human Trafficking
Ronald Weitzer

The Celebritization of Human Trafficking
Dina Francesca Haynes

Policing Human Trafficking: Cultural Blinders and Organizational Barriers
Amy Farrell and Rebecca Pfeffer

Estimating Labor Trafficking among Unauthorized Migrant Workers in San Diego
Sheldon X. Zhang, Michael W. Spiller, Brian Karl Finch, and Yang Qin

Labor Migration and Trafficking among Vietnamese Migrants in Asia
Danièle Bélanger

Trafficking, Scandal, and Abuse of Migrant Workers in Argentina and the United States
Denise Brennan

Teenage Labor Migration and Antitrafficking Policy in West Africa
Neil Howard

The Experiences of Migrants Trafficked from Bangladesh
Mohammad Abdul Munim Joarder and Paul W. Miller

Human Trafficking in Eastern Europe: The Case of Bulgaria
Georgi Petrunov

Sex Trafficking and Prostitution in South Africa
Chandré Gould

Human Trafficking and Moral Panic in Cambodia
Chenda Keo, Thierry Bouhours, Roderic Broadhurst, and Brigitte Bouhours

Conflict and Agency among Sex Workers and Pimps: A Closer Look at Domestic Minor Sex Trafficking
Anthony Marcus, Amber Horning, Ric Curtis, Jo Sanson, and Efram Thompson

Coercion, Control, and Cooperation in a Prostitution Ring
Carlo Morselli and Isa Savoie-Gargiso

Sunday, March 23, 2014

Crime & Delinquency 60(3)

Crime & Delinquency, April 2014: Volume 60, Issue 3

Modeling Isomorphism on Policing Innovation: The Role of Institutional Pressures in Adopting Community-Oriented Policing
George W. Burruss and Matthew J. Giblin

Recent research on innovation diffusion points to a number of key factors that stimulate the need for change or facilitate the adoption of innovations. Empirical studies examining the process of innovation—that is, how ideas are spread—are less common and often lack a theoretical foundation. The present study uses institutional theory to develop a model of community-policing adoption in municipal law enforcement agencies. The fit of the institutional model is assessed using secondary data and structural equation modeling. The results show that centrist forces—including publications, the professionalization of law enforcement, and other law enforcement agencies—shape the organizational adoption of community-policing reforms. The implications of the research for communicating innovations are addressed.

The Lost Cause? Examining the Southern Culture of Honor Through Defensive Gun Use
Heith Copes, Tomislav V. Kovandzic, J. Mitchell Miller, and Luke Williamson

This article reconsiders the “Southern culture of honor” thesis, which has enjoyed prevalence in the social sciences since the first half of the 20th century. The bulk of researchers investigating the link among Southern residence, culture of honor, and violence have focused on attitudinal measures of violence through surveys and ethnographic experiments indicating preferences and opinions toward engaging in hypothesized violence. The current research measures respondents’ actual violent behaviors in a national survey of defensive gun use (DGU). Although the results failed to support a relationship between Southern residence and defensive gun use, respondents’ age and victimization were significant. This finding is dissonant with the historical literature that suggests that the rural Southern White male is prone to a violent defense of honor; as such, the article orients discussion around the further theoretical advancement of the culture-of-honor perspective.

Shelter During the Storm: A Search for Factors That Protect At-Risk Adolescents From Violence
Marvin D. Krohn, Alan J. Lizotte, Shawn D. Bushway, Nicole M. Schmidt, and Matthew D. Phillips

Using data from the Rochester Youth Development Study, the authors show that trajectories of past violence predict future violence better than other more traditional measures of risk. The authors then evaluate whether factors that can be manipulated during this time can both promote less violence for all individuals as well as protect against violence among those who are most at risk for more violence. This article finds that several factors protect youth from violent behavior but not from gun or weapon carrying. Implications of these findings for future research on risk and protective factors of youth violence and for strategies for preventing such behavior are discussed.

Do State Policies Matter in Prosecutor-Reported Juvenile Marijuana Case Disposition?
Yvonne M. Terry-McElrath, Jamie F. Chriqui, Hannalori Bates, and Duane C. McBride

This article examines outcomes for first-time juvenile marijuana possession offenders based on relationships between state policy and local prosecutor self-reported decision making. Specifically, relationships between state statutory penalty data for low-level marijuana possession offenses and prosecutor-reported case outcomes for first-offender juvenile marijuana possession cases are examined. A national sample of prosecutors was interviewed in 2000. Analyses included state statutory policy data in effect as of January 1, 1999, as well as community sociodemographic controls. Results indicated that state statutory policy significantly related to prosecutor-reported juvenile court processing as well as diversion and transfer to criminal court. State statutory policy appears to play a significant role among the legal, resource, and extralegal factors that affect prosecutorial discretion regarding juvenile substance offenders.

Policing Juveniles: Domestic Violence Arrest Policies, Gender, and Police Response to Child–Parent Violence
Kevin J. Strom, Tara D. Warner, Lisa Tichavsky, and Margaret A. Zahn

This study analyzed the National Incident Based Reporting System data from 2000 to 2004 to determine how domestic violence arrest policies, along with incident, offender, and victim characteristics, influence arrest outcomes in violent incidents committed by juveniles against their parents. The authors’ primary interest was to assess whether the enforcement of domestic violence arrest laws, coupled with increased police involvement in familial disputes, has contributed to the decreasing gender gap in juvenile arrests for violent offenses. Results indicated that domestic violence arrest policies had positive effects on arrest outcomes both for juvenile females and males accused of assaulting a parent, as juveniles were more likely to be arrested in states with mandatory or pro-arrest policies than in states with discretionary arrest policies. However, there was also evidence that, beyond the effects of the domestic arrest laws, girls became increasingly more likely to be arrested for assaults against parents over the 5-year study period relative to boys. The implications for these findings are discussed, including the importance of a better understanding of how police respond to domestic violence incidents involving juveniles.

A Systematic Review of the Juvenile Justice Intervention Literature: What It Can (and Cannot) Tell Us About What Works With Delinquent Youth
Michelle Evans-Chase and Huiquan Zhou

A pool of 141 juvenile justice intervention studies conducted in the United States, utilizing a control group, reporting quantitative outcomes and spanning the years 1996 to 2009 were identified via electronic searches. Study inclusion into the summary of best practices was based on the demonstrated equivalence of study groups (treatment and control) at the start of the study, the equivalence of the study groups at posttest, and the degree to which fidelity to treatment procedures was demonstrated. Of the 141 studies, 120 failed quality review, mostly due to fidelity issues. Of the 21 articles that passed, 76% used a therapeutic approach (vs. behavioral control) to behavioral change, with the treatment group outperforming the control group in 88% of the therapeutic intervention studies.

Demographic Patterns of Cumulative Arrest Prevalence by Ages 18 and 23
Robert Brame, Shawn D. Bushway, Ray Paternoster, and Michael G. Turner

In this study, we examine race, sex, and self-reported arrest histories (excluding arrests for minor traffic violations) from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (NLSY97; N = 7,335) for the period 1997 through 2008 covering cumulative arrest histories through ages 18 and 23. The analysis produces three key findings: (a) males have higher cumulative prevalence of arrest than females and (b) there are important race differences in the probability of arrest for males but not for females. Assuming that the missing cases are missing at random (MAR), about 30% of Black males have experienced at least one arrest by age 18 (vs. about 22% for White males); by age 23 about 49% of Black males have been arrested (vs. about 38% for White males). Earlier research using the NLSY97 showed that the risk of arrest by age 23 was 30%, with nonresponse bounds [25.3%, 41.4%]. This study indicates that the risk of arrest is not evenly distributed across the population. Future research should focus on the identification and management of collateral risks that often accompany arrest experiences.

Sociological Theory 32(1)

Sociological Theory, March 2014: Volume 32, Issue 1

The Problem of Excess
Andrew Abbott

This article argues for a new branch of theory based not on presumptions of scarcity—which are the foundational presumptions of most existing social theory—but on those of excess. The article first discusses the emergence of scarcity’s dominance in social theory. It then considers and rejects the idea that excess of one thing is simply scarcity of another. It discusses the mechanisms by which excess creates problems, noting three such mechanisms at the individual level (paralysis, habituation, and value contextuality) and two further mechanisms (disruption and misinheritance) at the social level. The article then considers four types of strategies with which we address excess: two reduction strategies (defensive and reactive) and two rescaling strategies (adaptive and creative). It closes with some brief illustrations of how familiar questions can be recast from terms of scarcity into terms of excess.

Harrison White as (Not Quite) Poststructuralist
J. Lotus Seeley

This paper explores the overlaps and divergences between network sociologist Harrison White’s second edition of Identity and Control: How Social Formations Emerge (2008) and poststructuralist theories from the past three decades. Although poststructuralist thought is barely discussed in White’s work, comparing the approaches reveals significant convergence. I detail two major overlaps: White’s ideas of control compared to Foucault’s concept of discipline, and White’s conception of identity compared to that of feminist poststructuralists. Differences are apparent also, especially as regards treatment of categorical identities such as gender and race. Then, I turn to two ways poststructuralism and White can be put into productive conversation: how focusing on gender as discursive rather than attributional can help network analysts develop theories that better explain the gendered dimensions of social life, and how using blockmodeling methods can aid feminist poststructuralism in understanding what gender looks like without men’s and women’s bodies present.

Obfuscatory Relational Work and Disreputable Exchange
Gabriel Rossman

This article develops a model of how the structure of exchange can manage such disreputable exchanges as the commensuration of sacred for profane. Whereas existing research discusses the rhetorical reframing of exchange, I highlight structures that obfuscate whether an exchange is occurring and thereby mitigate exchange taboos. I identify three such exchange structures: bundling, brokerage, and gift exchange. Bundling uses cross-subsidization across multiple innocuous exchanges to synthesize a taboo exchange. Brokerage finds a third party to accept responsibility for exchange. Gift exchange delays reciprocity and reframes exchanges as expressions of friendship. All three strategies have alternative meanings and so provide plausible deniability to taboo commensuration. The article concludes by arguing that these sorts of exchange structures represent a synthesis of “nothing but” reductionism and “hostile worlds” moralism, rather than an alternative to them as Viviana Zelizer suggests.

Molds and Totems: Nonhumans and the Constitution of the Social Self
Colin Jerolmack and Iddo Tavory

The role of nonhumans in social life has recently generated significant scholarly interest. The two main paradigms for explaining the sociological significance of nonhumans are constructivism and actor-network theory. We propose a pragmatist synthesis inspired by George Herbert Mead, demonstrating how interactions with nonhumans help constitute the social self—that is, the identity one constructs by imaginatively looking upon oneself as others would. Drawing upon observations of humans interacting with objects, animals, and nature, we identify two complementary ways that nonhumans organize the social self and enable people to experience group membership in absentia: (1) by molding how one is perceived by others and constraining alternative presentations of self and (2) by acting as a totem that conjures up awareness of, and feelings of attachment to, a particular social group. This formulation moves beyond constructivist claims that nonhumans reflect people’s self-definitions, and it offers a corrective to actor-network theory’s neglect of sociality.

Sunday, March 9, 2014

Journal of Marriage and Family 76(2)

Journal of Marriage and Family, April 2014: Volume 76, Issue 2

Brief Reports

Two Decades of Stability and Change in Age at First Union Formation
Wendy D. Manning, Susan L. Brown and Krista K. Payne

Intergenerational Exchange and Expected Support Among the Young-Old
I-Fen Lin and Hsueh-Sheng Wu

Intergenerational Relationships

Ambivalence in Older Parent–Adult Child Relationships: Mixed Feelings, Mixed Measures
Jessica P. Lendon, Merril Silverstein and Roseann Giarrusso

Perceptions of Equity, Balance of Support Exchange, and Mother–Adult Child Relations
Jori Sechrist, J. Jill Suitor, Abigail R. Howard and Karl Pillemer

Caregiving

The Transition to Parent Care: Costs, Commitments, and Caregiver Selection Among Children
Thomas Leopold, Marcel Raab and Henriette Engelhardt

Parenthood and Life Satisfaction: Why Don't Children Make People Happy?
Matthias Pollmann-Schult

Does Grandparenting Pay Off? The Effect of Child Care on Grandparents' Cognitive Functioning
Bruno Arpino and Valeria Bordone

Of General Interest

Age at Coresidence, Premarital Cohabitation, and Marriage Dissolution: 1985–2009
Arielle Kuperberg

Estimating the Effects of Parental Divorce and Death With Fixed Effects Models
Paul R. Amato and Christopher J. Anthony

“Where Have All the Good Men Gone?” Gendered Interactions in Online Dating
Derek A. Kreager, Shannon E. Cavanagh, John Yen and Mo Yu

Paternal Incarceration and the Housing Security of Urban Mothers
Amanda Geller and Allyson Walker Franklin

Family Policy and Fertility Intentions in 21 European Countries
Sunnee Billingsley and Tommy Ferrarini

The Long-Term Effects of Building Strong Families: A Program for Unmarried Parents
Robert G. Wood, Quinn Moore, Andrew Clarkwest and Alexandra Killewald

Journal of Quantitative Criminology 30(1)

Journal of Quantitative Criminology, March 2014: Volume 30, Issue 1

Rational Misbehavior? Evaluating an Integrated Dual-Process Model of Criminal Decision Making
Jean-Louis van Gelder & Reinout E. de Vries

Objectives: Test the hypothesis that dispositional self-control and morality relate to criminal decision making via different mental processing modes, a ‘hot’ affective mode and a ‘cool’ cognitive one. Methods: Structural equation modeling in two studies under separate samples of undergraduate students using scenarios describing two different types of crime, illegal downloading and insurance fraud. Both self-control and morality are operationalized through the HEXACO model of personality (Lee and Ashton in Multivariate Behav Res 39(2):329–358, 2004). Results: In Study 1, negative state affect, i.e., feelings of fear and worry evoked by a criminal prospect, and perceived risk of sanction were found to mediate the relations between both dispositions and criminal choice. In Study 2, processing mode was manipulated by having participants rely on either their thinking or on their feelings prior to deciding on whether or not to make a criminal choice. Activating a cognitive mode strengthened the relation between perceived risk and criminal choice, whereas activating an affective mode strengthened the relation between negative affect and criminal choice. Conclusion: In conjunction, these results extend research that links stable individual dispositions to proximal states that operate in the moment of decision making. The results also add to dispositional perspectives of crime by using a structure of personality that incorporates both self-control and morality. Contributions to the proximal, state, perspectives reside in the use of a new hot/cool perspective of criminal decision making that extends rational choice frameworks.

“Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop”: Self-Control, Risky Lifestyles, and Repeat Victimization
Jillian J. Turanovic & Travis C. Pratt

Objectives: Drawing from lifestyle-routine activity and self-control perspectives, the causal mechanisms responsible for repeat victimization are explored. Specifically, the present study investigates: (1) the extent to which self-control influences the changes victims make to their risky lifestyles following victimization, and (2) whether the failure to make such changes predicts repeat victimization. Methods: Two waves of panel data from the Gang Resistance Education and Training program are used (N = 1,370) and direct measures of change to various risky lifestyles are included. Two-stage maximum likelihood models are estimated to explore the effects of self-control and changes in risky lifestyles on repeat victimization for a subsample of victims (n = 521). Results: Self-control significantly influences whether victims make changes to their risky lifestyles post-victimization, and these changes in risky lifestyles determine whether victims are repeatedly victimized. These changes in risky lifestyles are also found to fully mediate the effects of self-control on repeat victimization. Conclusions: Findings suggest that future research should continue to measure directly the intervening mechanisms between self-control and negative life outcomes, and to conceptualize lifestyles-routine activities as dynamic processes.

Bayesian Spatio-Temporal Modeling for Analysing Local Patterns of Crime Over Time at the Small-Area Level
Jane Law, Matthew Quick & Ping Chan

Objectives: Explore Bayesian spatio-temporal methods to analyse local patterns of crime change over time at the small-area level through an application to property crime data in the Regional Municipality of York, Ontario, Canada. Methods: This research represents the first application of Bayesian spatio-temporal modeling to crime trend analysis at a large map scale. The Bayesian model, fitted by Markov chain Monte Carlo simulation using WinBUGS, stabilized risk estimates in small (census dissemination) areas and controlled for spatial autocorrelation (through spatial random effects modeling), deprivation, and scarce data. It estimated (1) (linear) mean trend; (2) area-specific differential trends; and (3) (posterior) probabilities of area-specific differential trends differing from zero (i.e. away from the mean trend) for revealing locations of hot and cold spots. Results: Property crime exhibited a declining mean trend across the study region from 2006 to 2007. Variation of area-specific trends was statistically significant, which was apparent from the map of (95 % credible interval) differential trends. Hot spots in the north and south west, and cold spots in the middle and east of the region were identified. Conclusions: Bayesian spatio-temporal analysis contributes to a detailed understanding of small-area crime trends and risks. It estimates crime trend for each area as well as an overall mean trend. The new approach of identifying hot/cold spots through analysing and mapping probabilities of area-specific crime trends differing from the mean trend highlights specific locations where crime situation is deteriorating or improving over time. Future research should analyse trends over three or more periods (allowing for non-linear time trends) and associated (changing) local risk factors.

Forecasts of Violence to Inform Sentencing Decisions
Richard Berk & Justin Bleich

Objectives: Recent legislation in Pennsylvania mandates that forecasts of "future dangerousness" be provided to judges when sentences are given. Similar requirements already exist in other jurisdictions. Research has shown that machine learning can lead to usefully accurate forecasts of criminal behavior in such setting. But there are settings in which there is insufficient IT infrastructure to support machine learning. The intent of this paper is provide a prototype procedure for making forecasts of future dangerousness that could be used to inform sentencing decisions when machine learning is not practical. We consider how classification trees can be improved so that they may provide an acceptable second choice. Methods: We apply an version of classifications trees available in R, with some technical enhancements to improve tree stability. Our approach is illustrated with real data that could be used to inform sentencing decisions. Results: Modest sized trees grown from large samples can forecast well and in a stable fashion, especially if the small fraction of indecisive classifications are found and accounted for in a systematic manner. But machine learning is still to be preferred when practical. Conclusions: Our enhanced version of classifications trees may well provide a viable alternative to machine learning when machine learning is beyond local IT capabilities.

Block Randomized Trials at Places: Rethinking the Limitations of Small N Experiments
David Weisburd & Charlotte Gill

Objectives: Place-based policing experiments have led to encouraging findings regarding the ability of the police to prevent crime, but sample sizes in many of the key studies in this area are small. Farrington and colleagues argue that experiments with fewer than 50 cases per group are not likely to achieve realistic pre-test balance and have excluded such studies from their influential systematic reviews of experimental research. A related criticism of such studies is that their statistical power under traditional assumptions is also likely to be low. In this paper, we show that block randomization can overcome these design limitations. Methods: Using data from the Jersey City Drug Market Analysis Experiment (N = 28 per group) we conduct simulations on three key outcome measures. Simulations of simple randomization with 28 and 50 cases per group are compared to simulations of block randomization with 28 cases. We illustrate the statistical modeling benefits of the block randomization approach through examination of sums of squares in GLM models and by estimating minimum detectable effects in a power analysis. Results: The block randomization simulation is found to produce many fewer significantly unbalanced samples than the naïve randomization approaches both with 28 and 50 cases per group. Block randomization also produced similar or smaller absolute mean differences across the simulations. Illustrations using sums of squares show that error variance in the block randomization model is reduced for each of the three outcomes. Power estimates are comparable or higher using block randomization with 28 cases per group as opposed to naïve randomization with 50 cases per group. Conclusions: Block randomization provides a solution to the small N problem in place-based experiments that addresses concerns about both equivalence and statistical power. The authors also argue that a 50 case rule should not be applied to block randomized place-based trials for inclusion in key reviews.

Deterring Gang-Involved Gun Violence: Measuring the Impact of Boston’s Operation Ceasefire on Street Gang Behavior
Anthony A. Braga, David M. Hureau & Andrew V. Papachristos

Objectives: The relatively weak quasi-experimental evaluation design of the original Boston Operation Ceasefire left some uncertainty about the size of the program’s effect on Boston gang violence in the 1990s and did not provide any direct evidence that Boston gangs subjected to the Ceasefire intervention actually changed their offending behaviors. Given the policy influence of the Boston Ceasefire experience, a closer examination of the intervention’s direct effects on street gang violence is needed. Methods: A more rigorous quasi-experimental evaluation of a reconstituted Boston Ceasefire program used propensity score matching techniques to develop matched treatment gangs and comparison gangs. Growth-curve regression models were then used to estimate the impact of Ceasefire on gun violence trends for the treatment gangs relative to comparisons gangs. Results: This quasi-experimental evaluation revealed that total shootings involving Boston gangs subjected to the Operation Ceasefire treatment were reduced by a statistically-significant 31 % when compared to total shootings involving matched comparison Boston gangs. Supplementary analyses found that the timing of gun violence reductions for treatment gangs followed the application of the Ceasefire treatment. Conclusions: This evaluation provides some much needed evidence on street gang behavioral change that was lacking in the original Ceasefire evaluation. A growing body of scientific evidence suggests that jurisdictions should adopt focused deterrence strategies to control street gang violence problems.

A Bi-level Framework for Understanding Prisoner Victimization
John Wooldredge & Benjamin Steiner

Objectives: To present and test an opportunity perspective on prison inmate victimization. Methods: Stratified random samples of inmates (n 1 = 5,640) were selected from Ohio and Kentucky prisons (n 2 = 46). Bi-level models of the prevalence of assaults and thefts were estimated. Predictors included indicators of inmate routines/guardianship, target antagonism, and target vulnerability at the individual level, and several indicators of guardianship at the facility level. Results: Assaults were more common among inmates with certain routines and characteristics that might have increased their odds of being victimized (e.g., less time spent in recreation; committed violence themselves during incarceration), and higher levels of assaults characterized environments with lower levels of guardianship (e.g., architectural designs with more “blind spots”, larger populations, and less rigorous rule enforcement as perceived by correctional officers). Similar findings emerged for thefts in addition to stronger individual level effects in prisons with weaker guardianship (e.g., ethnic group differences in the risk of theft were greater in facilities with larger populations and less rigorous rule enforcement). Conclusions: The study produced evidence favoring a bi-level opportunity perspective of inmate victimization, with some unique differences in the relevance of particular concepts between prison and non-prison contexts.