Agentic or Communal? Associations between Interpersonal Goals,Popularity, and Bullying in Middle Childhood and Early Adolescence

This study investigated whether perceived popularity mediates and/or moderates the association between agentic goals and bullying, and whether sociometric popularity mediates and/or moderates the association between communal goals and bullying. Age and gender differences were also examined. Participants were 276 fourth and fifth graders (middle childhood sample) and 196 seventh and eighth graders (early adolescence sample). Peer status and bullying were assessed with sociometric measures, interpersonal goals with self‐reports. The theoretical model included both mediation and moderation effects. An age‐related reversal was found in how status mediated the associations between goals and bullying. Sociometric popularity mediated the association of agentic goals with bullying in middle childhood but of communal goals with bullying in early adolescence. Perceived popularity mediated the association of communal goals with bullying in middle childhood but of agentic goals with bullying in early adolescence. In middle childhood, perceived popularity also moderated the effect of agentic goals on bullying. The results were discussed in terms of the role of bullying as a means to enhance status in early adolescence.     

‘If the Facts Don't Fit the Theory … ’: The Security Design Puzzle in Venture Finance

When confronting theory with evidence, divergent results surface with reference to the optimal securities that should be adopted in venture capital (VC) finance. The vast majority of the theoretical models on VC consistently predict that convertible securities, especially in the form of convertible preferred stocks, represent the optimal form of finance. While the theoretical literature seems to be supported by empirical studies in the US, the evidence outside the US shows the opposite results. Puzzling patterns emerge, especially when comparing the evidence from the US, Canada and Europe, and an intensive academic debate is under way. The evidence becomes even more challenging when considering the contrasting financing behaviour of US venture capitalists (VCs) investing in Canada. It has been documented that US VCs investing in Canada adopt a wide range of securities other than convertible stocks. If convertible securities truly represent the optimal form of VC finance, why would US VCs use different types of securities when investing in Canada? At present, researchers are still arguing about which factors would have the most significant impact on explaining the different financing behaviour of VCs around the world. The purpose of this paper is to shed some light on the ongoing international debate on the optimal security design and contracting behaviour in venture finance. With this review, the authors intend to contribute to the VC literature by identifying current trends, explanations and determinants underlying the puzzling empirical evidence on the financing structure adopted by VCs around the world.     

Education and the Non-financial Employment Commitment in Times of Economic Recession Among the Youth

In this paper, we study the non-financial employment commitment using the so-called “lottery question”, which asks if you would continue working if you won the lottery. This is the first study that reports results using data from a Southern-European country and this is done both before and 3 years into the recession following the financial crisis of 2008. We find that the willingness to continue working in Spain is shockingly lower than in previous research done in other countries. Additionally, we find two important moderators of the non-financial employment commitment at the individual level. The willingness to work increases by education level and it is negatively correlated with the time spent searching for jobs. We find some regional effects, but in general, we do not find that the non-financial employment commitment is higher during the financial recession.     

An alternative assessment of global climate policies

This paper analyzes alternative pricing schemes for funding investment in climate policies. This paper proposes a new policy scenario, explicitly disentangling the issue of burden sharing of financing new investments from the issue of taxation energy consumption and therefor emissions. We compare traditional allocation schemes with an optimal Ramsey pricing by applying demand elasticity values, derived from empirical estimations of household behavior for the 106 leading countries in the world, representing around 90% of total world energy consumption and carbon emissions in 2014. We calculate country-specific alternative taxation options: uniform, equitable and Ramsey pricing schemes, applied to households, assessing the related welfare effects. Our results show that the optimal pricing scheme, for a given investment need, can improve world welfare at the expenses of equitable considerations. In addition, the aggregate societal benefit outweighs the losses associated with specific group of countries, paving the way for easier political agreement, using compensation schemes to redistribute the proceeds.     

Latent groups and latent traits of participation in bullying via factor mixture analysis: An exploratory study

In this study, we drew on a person-centred approach to explore forms of involvement and roles in bullying. More specifically, we applied Factor Mixture Analysis (FMA) to an in-depth measure of bullying roles, with a view to identifying latent dimensions of participation in bullying and latent groups characterised by differential behavioural patterns. Participants were 899 high school students (51% females) attending the 9th (49%) and 11th grades (51%). The data analysis revealed six latent behavioural dispositions. Four of these overlapped with behavioural patterns typical of previously identified forms of participation in bullying, while two factors shed new light on bullying behaviours. We also identified four latent groups, whose profiles were only partially aligned with the roles previously theorised in the literature.     

International Migration: Trends,Determinants, and Policy Effects

This paper synthesizes insights from new global data on the effectiveness of migration policies. It investigates the complex links between migration policies and migration trends to disentangle policy effects from structural migration determinants. The analysis challenges two central assumptions underpinning the popular idea that migration restrictions have failed to curb migration. First, post‐WWII global migration levels have not accelerated, but remained relatively stable while most shifts in migration patterns have been directional. Second, post‐WWII migration policies have generally liberalized despite political rhetoric suggesting the contrary. While migration policies are generally effective, “substitution effects” can limit their effectiveness, or even make them counterproductive, by geographically diverting migration, interrupting circulation, encouraging unauthorized migration, or prompting “now or never” migration surges. These effects expose fundamental policy dilemmas and highlight the importance of understanding the economic, social, and political trends that shape migration in sometimes counterintuitive, but powerful, ways that largely lie beyond the reach of migration policies.     

The Insidious Effects of Sexual Stereotypes in Clinical Practice

The present study investigated the influence of sexual stereotyping on the diagnostic impressions and treatment expectations of gay and straight male patients. Italian male, straight, licensed psychotherapists (N = 152) were presented with clinical vignettes that described a gay (versus straight) male patient reporting either a straight-stereotypical disorder (i.e., rage dyscontrol) or a gay-stereotypical disorder (i.e., sexual compulsivity). Results revealed that treatment efficacy expectations were influenced by the patient’s sexual orientation and the stereotypicality of the disorder. Specifically, psychotherapists anticipated fewer benefits from psychotherapy when gay patients reported a sexual disorder rather than a rage disorder. Furthermore, explicit and implicit levels of sexual prejudice did not play any role in driving such results. Taken together, these findings reveal that sexual stereotyping might exert its subtle effects among clinicians by influencing their clinical evaluations.     

The Forms and Structure of International Voluntary Service

International voluntary service (IVS) has a significant and growing presence worldwide. IVS is a policy and program tool used for international development aid, humanitarian relief, and promotion of international understanding. In the last century, forms of IVS have proliferated, while research on scope, effectiveness, and impacts has lagged behind. We propose a typology that addresses duration, nature of service, and degree of “internationality.” Further, we identify IVS networks and support organizations that bolster the capacity of IVS sending and hosting organizations, and in this process create large and little recognized international institutions of cooperation. Building on the typology, we suggest program, policy, and research implications to advance knowledge of the role of IVS, its role in global civil society, and impacts it may have on human conditions and cross-cultural understanding.

A Poisson-Based Framework for Setting Poverty Thresholds Using Indicator Lists

Poverty is one of the most important concepts in the social sciences, yet commonly-used thresholds for the operationalization of poverty have little or no conceptual basis. This is especially true of the “relative deprivation” poverty concept, where the arbitrary threshold of missing k ≥ 3 items from a list of socially defined necessities is the accepted operationalization. This paper presents a conceptual framework for meaningfully setting k based on the properties of the Poisson distribution. Data from the 2011 Swiss Household Panel are used to illustrate this approach for three poverty concepts: conventional relative deprivation based on non-affordability of items (“afford-deprivation”), simplified relative deprivation based on non-possession of items (“possess-deprivation”), and a novel approach based on the status syndrome concept (“high life burden”). Proof-of-concept analyses suggest thresholds of k ≥ 2 for conventional afford-deprivation, k ≥ 5 for possess-deprivation, and k ≥ 6 for high life burden. In addition to providing a rationale for k, the Poisson-based approach allows for the systematic variation of k in different empirical contexts. It also supports the estimation of “adjusted” poverty rates that account for the chance probability that non-poverty households are accidentally miscategorized as being in poverty.