Sexual coercion reported by women in three midwestern prisons

The study was an anonymous self-report survey of coercive sexual experiences of women incarcerated in three Midwestern prisons. Inmate populations were 295 (Facility 1), 113 (Facility 2) and 60 (Facility 3). Return rates were over 50%. Some prison staff were also surveyed. The 150 inmates in Facility 1 reported relatively high rates of sexual coercion: 27% had been coerced in the state system and 19% in their present facility. The 80 inmates in Facility 1 and 36 inmates in Facility 3 reported lower rates: 8% to 9% for prisons statewide and 6% to 8% for their present facility. One half of the perpetrators were females. Most incidents involved genital touching. About one fifth of the incidents were classifiable as rape. We concluded that the prison environment potentially fosters female sexual aggression among inmates and sexual exploitation by staff.     

Does Knowledge Mediate the Effect of Context on Performance? Some Initial Evidence

This research examines the links among four firm context variables, knowledge, and financial performance. Adopting a knowledge‐based, contingency view of the firm and assuming that strategy's locus is knowledge creation and application, we hypothesize that knowledge completely mediates the effects of context on performance. The results from analyzing 208 manufacturers found a positive relationship between applied knowledge and financial performance, but none between knowledge creation and performance. As for context, production technology routineness and low demand unpredictability were positively related only to greater applied knowledge; high technological turbulence was positively related to both knowledge creation and knowledge application; and firm size had no effect on either knowledge construct. No direct context‐performance relationships were found (i.e., all effects were indirect): knowledge, in particular applied knowledge, completely mediated the impact of context on performance.     

Contextualizing mistreatment in cognitive impairment in Latin America

Mistreatment is an important social outcome of the growing cognitive impairment epidemic, particularly in developing countries. This study aimed to bring to light what is known about mistreatment in cognitively impaired individuals in Latin American Countries. We identified a gap in the literature on this topic that opens the door for future research.     

Impact of misspecified residual correlation structure on the parameter estimates in a shared spatial frailty model

In practice, survival data are often collected over geographical regions. Shared spatial frailty models have been used to model spatial variation in survival times, which are often implemented using the Bayesian Markov chain Monte Carlo method. However, this method comes at the price of slow mixing rates and heavy computational cost, which may render it impractical for data-intensive application. Alternatively, a frailty model assuming an independent and identically distributed (iid) random effect can be easily and efficiently implemented. Therefore, we used simulations to assess the bias and efficiency loss in the estimated parameters, if residual spatial correlation is present but using an iid random effect. Our simulations indicate that a shared frailty model with an iid random effect can estimate the regression coefficients reasonably well, even with residual spatial correlation present, when the percentage of censoring is not too high and the number of clusters and cluster size are not too low. Therefore, if the primary goal is to assess the covariate effects, one may choose the frailty model with an iid random effect; whereas if the goal is to predict the hazard, additional care needs to be given due to the efficiency loss in the parameter(s) for the baseline hazard.     

Relationship of Religiosity and Spirituality to Hazardous Drinking,Drug Use,and Depression Among Sexual Minority Women

Using data from Wave 3 of the Chicago Health and Life Experiences of Women (CHLEW) study (N = 699), we explored whether religiosity and spirituality were associated with risk of hazardous drinking, drug use, and depression among sexual minority women (SMW; i.e., lesbian, bisexual) and possible differences by race/ethnicity. Participants were more likely to endorse spirituality than religiosity, and endorsement of each was highest among African American SMW. We found no protective effect of religiosity or spirituality for hazardous drinking or drug use. An association initially found between identifying as very spiritual and past-year depression disappeared when controlling for help-seeking. Among SMW with high religiosity, African American SMW were more likely than White SMW to report hazardous drinking. Latina SMW with higher spirituality were more likely than White SMW to report drug use. Results suggest that religiosity and spirituality affect subgroups differently, which should be considered in future research on resiliency among SMW.     

Interparental Violence and Nonverbal Abilities

Nonverbal decoding and encoding abilities of undergraduates were examined as a function of their self-reported history of interparental violence. Students exposed to domestic violence showed decoding and encoding deficits. Results for decoding revealed an emotion-specific deficit for recognizing happiness but no evidence for an advantage in decoding anger and fear. In contrast, students from violent homes showed overall deficits in posed encoding of emotions. There was no evidence for an emotion-specific encoding bias in the pattern of false negatives and no evidence for suppression of general expressiveness. Hence, it appears that the encoding deficit of students from violent homes is a result of inappropriate encoding. Results are discussed in terms of past theoretical explanations for the influence of family environment on nonverbal abilities.     

Gambling behaviors and perceived health among incarcerated older adults

The proliferation of lotteries and casinos has led to increased participation in gambling. Older adults who have opportunities to gamble may be vulnerable to gambling problems, and incarcerated older adults may be the most vulnerable. Furthermore, research has linked decreased health to gambling problems. This study compared perceived health and gambling problems among 43 incarcerated older adults from two county jails in the midwestern United States. Results from the South Oaks Gambling Screen indicated 48.83% of the sample scored in the problem or pathological range. Short Form-36 results were compared with U.S. norms for ages 55 to 64 and showed significantly lower perceived health scores on Role-Physical, Bodily Pain, Mental Health, Social Functioning, and Role-Emotional subscales. The problem and pathological gamblers showed significantly lower social functioning than the recreational gamblers. Assessment of health conditions and gambling behaviors is important for quantifying current and anticipated burdens of these conditions on correctional health care systems and the community.