Public Policy

Abstract Objectives We provide a critical review of empirical research on the deterrent effect of capital punishment that makes use of state and, in some instances, county-level, panel data. Methods We present the underlying behavioral model that presumably informs the specification of panel data regressions, outline the typical model specification employed, discuss current norms regarding “best-practice” in the analysis of panel data, and engage in a critical review.

Recent innovations in the criminal justice system have linked intensive crimi nal justice system surveillance with substance abuse treatment. The goal of this justice-treatment partnership is to improve outcomes for drug-involved offend ers and to reduce the burden of chronic drug use on private citizens, the police, courts, and corrections. These interventions, labeled therapeutic jurisprudence, are designed to identify and treat drug-involved offenders in the community in lieu of incarceration. The programs take many forms.

BACKGROUND: Although a number of studies have tested ecologic models that postulate relationships among social networks, the built environment, and active living, few neighborhood-based studies have considered the role of crime and violence. This study investigates the degree to which individual-level demographic characteristics and neighborhood-level physical and social characteristics are associated with increased fear of crime.

Analyzing political conservatism as motivated social cognition integrates theories of personality (authoritarianism, dogmatism-intolerance of ambiguity), epistemic and existential needs (for closure, regulatory focus, terror management), and ideological rationalization (social dominance, system justification). A meta-analysis (88 samples, 12 countries, 22,818 cases) confirms that several psychological variables predict political conservatism: death anxiety (weighted mean r ϭ .50); system instability (.47); dogmatism-intolerance of ambiguity (.34); openness to experience (-.32); uncertainty tolerance (-.27); needs for order, structure, and closure (.26); integrative complexity (-.20); fear of threat and loss (.18); and self-esteem (-.09). The core ideology of conservatism stresses resistance to change and justification of inequality and is motivated by needs that vary situationally and dispositionally to manage uncertainty and threat.

We conducted semistructured intervie\vs with 38 participants in White racist Internet chat rooms, examining the extent to which people would, in this unique environment, advocate interracial violence in response to purported economic and cultural threats. Capitalizing on the anonymity and candor of chat room interactions, this study provides an unusual perspective on extremist attitudes. We experimentally manipulated the nature and proximity of the threats. Qualitative and quantitative analyses indicate that the respondents were most threatened by interracial marriage and, to a lesser extent, Blacks moving into White neighbor-

This research examines whether spontaneous, unintentional discriminatory behavior can be moderated by an implicit (nonconscious) motivation to control prejudice. We operationalize implicit motivation to control prejudice (IMCP) in terms of an implicit negative attitude toward prejudice (NAP) and an implicit belief that oneself is prejudiced (BOP). In the present experiment, an implicit stereotypic association of Blacks (vs. Whites) with weapons was positively correlated with the tendency to "shoot" armed Black men faster than armed White men (the "Shooter Bias") in a computer simulation. However, participants relatively high in implicit negative attitude toward prejudice showed no relation between the race-weapons stereotype and the shooter bias. Implicit belief that oneself is prejudiced had no direct eVect on this relation, but the interaction of NAP and BOP did. Participants who had a strong association between self and prejudice (high BOP) but a weak association between prejudice and bad (low NAP) showed the strongest relation between the implicit race-weapons stereotype and the Shooter Bias, suggesting that these individuals freely employed their stereotypes in their behavior.

Nach beinahe dreißig Jahren Forschung über Automatismus und Aktivierung kann gesagt werden, dass ein Großteil des mentalen, menschlichen Lebens unbewusst und ohne Absicht geschieht. Laut der Kognitiven Psychologie werden durch die Anwesenheit eines einschlägigen Stimulus der Umwelt, automatische Prozesse zwangsläufig, schnell und ohne Aufwand ausgelöst, welche keinerlei Zugang zu einer bewussten Erinnerung besitzen. Das Konzept des Automatismus, welches bereits lange einen wichtigen Platz in der kognitiven Psychologie einnahm, gewann auch in der Sozialpsychologie immer mehr an Bedeutung. Zur selben Zeit gerieten auch einige anerkannte Funktionen des Automatismus in Frage und neuere Untersuchungen ergaben, dass diese automatischen und unbeabsichtigten Reaktionen, unter bestimmten Voraussetzungen, nicht unvermeidlich sind. Es hat den Anschein, dass eine unbewusste Wachsamkeit für Fehler oder eine Voreingenommenheit zu korrigierenden Prozessen führen, die ebenfalls unbewusst und unabsichtlich geschehen. Es wird angenommen, dass das Unbewusste, neben der Funktion des Bewertens, semantischen Bearbeitens und Kategorisierens, auch eigene Ziele der Verarbeitung hat, wie beispielsweise Genauigkeit und Egalitarismus (Gleichmacherei). Des weiteren wird vermutet, dass es wachsam ist für Bedrohungen, welche für die Verwirklichung dieser Ziele hinderlich wären und diese Bedrohungen pro aktiv ausgleichen kann. Dieses könnte man den kompensatorischen Automatismus nennen, welcher ein noch nicht bewusster Ausgleich für unbeabsichtigte Gedanken, Gefühle und Verhaltensweisen ist. Man könnte das nun als Widerspruch sehen, da Automatismus mit einem Mangel an Kontrolle und Absicht postuliert wurde, jedoch wird angenommen, dass diese Intentionen auf multiplen Ebenen des Bewusstseins operieren. Bei unbewussten Intentionen können automatische Ausgleichsprozesse, wenn das Potential für die bevorstehende Frustration erst deutlich wird, eingreifen und schützen. The unconscious and the triarchic mind Die Komplexität und Weite des Unbewussten wurde vielfach mit bezwingender Logik und zunehmender empirischer Stützung dargestellt. Hilgard, der über die Trilogie des Affektes, des Erkennens und der Konation schrieb (Hilgard 1977), meinte, dass das Unbewusste aus mehreren Ebenen des Bewusstseins besteht. Seine PS Sozialpsychologie Social Cognition WS 2007/08 3

This research draws on ideas about emotion-related appraisal tendencies to generate and test novel propositions about intergroup emotions. First, emotion elicited by outgroup category activation can be transferred to an unrelated stimulus (incidental emotion effects). Second, people predisposed toward an emotion are more prejudiced toward groups that are likely to be associated with that emotion. Discussion focuses on the implications of the studies for a more complete understanding of the nature of prejudice, and specifi cally, the different qualities of prejudice for different target groups. of barbarian, enemy, and imperialist .

Policy attitudes relating to group-based inequities are in many cases founded on tenuous legitimizing beliefs which are contradicted by empirical evidence. Policy issues, and their attendant legitimizing beliefs, are considered, including affirmative action, colorblindness/"racial privacy," hate crime legislation, samesex marriage, and, in greater depth, capital punishment and racial profiling. Primary themes underlying the legitimizing beliefs include denials that groupbased biases and inequities exist, overestimations of the societal costs of inequityreducing policies, valuing public safety above civil liberties, and discounting the adverse effects of inequity-reducing policies.

MRI working memory children adolescent executive functions longitudinal a b s t r a c t Prenatal alcohol exposure can cause a wide range of deficits in executive function that persist throughout life, but little is known about how changes in brain structure relate to cognition in affected individuals. In the current study, we predicted that the rate of white matter volumetric development would be atypical in children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD) when compared to typically developing children, and that the rate of change in cognitive function would relate to differential white matter development between groups. Data were available for 103 subjects [49 with FASD, 54 controls, age range 6-17, mean age = 11.83] with 153 total observations. Groups were age-matched. Participants underwent structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and an executive function (EF) battery. Using white matter volumes measured bilaterally for frontal and parietal regions and the corpus callosum, change was predicted by modeling the effects of age, intracranial volume, sex, and interactions with exposure status and EF measures. While both groups showed regional increases in white matter volumes and improvement in cognitive performance over time, there were significant effects of exposure status on age-related relationships between white matter increases and EF measures. Specifically, individuals with FASD consistently showed a positive relationship between improved cognitive function and increased white matter volume over time, while no such relationships were seen in controls. These novel results relating improved cognitive function with increased white matter volume in FASD suggest that better cognitive outcomes could be possible for FASD subjects through interventions that enhance white matter plasticity.

Racial profiling-the use of race, ethnicity, or national origin by law enforcement officials to make judgments of criminal suspicion-is assessed in terms of its effect on targeted populations and on law enforcement efficiency. A mathematical simulation, comparing multiple profiling and non-profiling scenarios, is employed. This analysis indicates that racial profiling exacerbates incarceration disparities between groups whether or not the groups differ in criminality rates, and that the long-term effects of profiling in terms of criminal captures depend on the calibration of profiling rates to criminality rates. The highest long-term criminal capture rates appear to occur when stop rate ratios match, or are slightly below, criminality rate ratios between groups. When the possibility of a deterrent effect is modeled, profiling appears to yield fewer criminal captures and have little or no crime reduction effect, and may even increase overall crime rates.