Sibship and Inequality Beliefs: Do Siblings Have a Liberalizing or Conservatizing Effect?

How do individuals come to hold certain beliefs about meritocracy, individualism, and redistribution? Several sociodemographic factors are regularly used to understand variation in these beliefs, but other predictors remain untested. Meanwhile, scholars studying family dynamics are increasingly turning their attention toward the long-term social effects of distinct family features. One facet of this work focuses on the social role of siblings. We investigate the relationship at the intersection of these literatures. How does growing up with (more) siblings influence one's inequality beliefs? Do siblings promote collectivism or might these same relationships foster competition and individualism? Could trust be the mechanism connecting sibship size with inequality beliefs? Or, do sibling effects reflect a broader promotion of conservative thinking in larger families? We investigate these questions using data from the General Social Survey from 1984 to 2018. Our results indicate that siblings are associated with more conservative meritocracy beliefs. On the other hand, we find limited evidence of siblings influencing attitudes toward redistribution.     

On three and four vicious walkers

We establish a reflection principle for three lattice walkers and use this principle to reduce the enumeration of configurations of three vicious walkers to the enumeration of configurations of two vicious walkers. More precisely, the reflection principle leads to a bijection between three walks (L₁, L₂, L₃) such that L₂ intersects both L₁ and L₃ and three walks (L₁, L₂, L₃) such that L₁ intersects L₃. Hence we find a combinatorial interpretation of the formula for the generating function for the number of configurations of three vicious walkers, originally derived by Bousquet-Mélou by using the kernel method, and independently by Gessel by using tableaux and symmetric functions. This answers a question posed by Gessel and Bousquet-Mélou. We also find a reflection principle for four vicious walks that leads to a combinatorial interpretation of a formula derived from Gessel's theorem.     

The impact of place? A reassessment of the importance of the South in affecting beliefs about racial inequality

Research shows that individuals living in the southern part of the United States express more negative racial attitudes than those living outside the South. Using data from The American National Election Study (NES), the purpose of this paper is to assess whether key factors often associated with the Southern attitude distinction are indeed more potent in the South than elsewhere. Drawing data from the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, we further assess whether the impact of the South has increased or decreased over time. Results indicate that the impact of the South is negligible at best. Findings do show that place does matter for conservatives. However, in this case, non-South location matters more than the South. Relative to their liberal counterparts, conservatives in the non-South espouse more individualistic beliefs than do their Southern counterparts. These findings are discussed within the dominant theoretical framework in this area.     

Cost Allocation in Manufacturing–Remanufacturing Operations

For firms remanufacturing their products, the total life‐cycle costs and revenues from new and remanufactured products determine their profitability. In many firms, manufacturing/sales and remanufacturing/remarketing operations are carried out in different divisions. Each division is responsible for only part of the product's life cycle. Practices regarding transfer pricing across divisions vary significantly among companies, affecting the life‐cycle profit performance of the product. In this research, we identify characteristics of transfer prices that achieve the firm‐wide optimal solution. To this end, we consider a manufacturer who also undertakes remanufacturing operations and we focus on price (quantity) decisions. We determine that a cost allocation mechanism that allocates a portion of the initial production cost to each of the two stages of the product life cycle should be used. We also conclude that cost allocation should be implemented as a fixed cost allocation, where charges to the remanufacturing division should be determined independently of the actual quantity of units remanufactured.     

Extrapolative simulation of neighborhood networks based on population spatial distribution: Do they predict crime?

Objectives

Previous criminological scholarship has posited that network ties among neighborhood residents may impact crime rates, but has done little to consider the specific ways in which network structure may enhance or inhibit criminal activity. A lack of data on social ties has arguably led to this state of affairs. We propose to avoid this limitation by demonstrating a novel approach of extrapolatively simulating network ties and constructing structural network measures to assess their effect on neighborhood crime rates.

Methods

We first spatially locate the households of a city into their constituent blocks. Then, we employ spatial interaction functions based on prior empirical work and simulate a network of social ties among these residents. From this simulated network, we compute network statistics that more appropriately capture the notions of cohesion and information diffusion that underlie theories of networks and crime.

Results

We show that these network statistics are robust predictors of the levels of crime in five separate cities (above standard controls) at the very micro geographic level of blocks and block groups.

Conclusions

We conclude by considering extensions of the approach that account for homophily in the formation of network ties.     

The Social Vulnerability Scale for Older Adults: An Exploratory and Confirmatory Factor Analytic Study

The Social Vulnerability Scale (SVS), a 22-item informant report of vulnerability to exploitation and, in particular, financial exploitation of older adults, was administered to 266 respondents who assessed the social vulnerability of a significant other aged 50 years or over, either a person with dementia or other neurological condition (n?=?116), or a healthy adult (n?=?150). Exploratory factor analysis in the combined sample revealed a 15-item two-factor solution labeled gullibility and credulity. Stability in factor structure was established in an independent sample (n?=?123) using confirmatory factor analysis, and sound reliability (internal consistency) and validity (known-groups) were demonstrated. The SVS15 is a potentially useful instrument for assessing older adults' vulnerability to exploitation.     

“Do They Think I Am a Pack Rat?”

This case study presents details of the life of one older man who lived in seclusion and squalor, surrounded by hoarded possessions. This man was one participant of a focused ethnography of eight older adults who received home care. All participants in the original ethnography were identified by their community care coordinators as exhibiting hoarding behaviors. The case study presented here provides rich narrative and photographic detail in order to add strength to what has already been presented in previous research articles about compulsive acquisition. The narratives reveal examples of debilitating dysfunction, distress associated with decision making, broad acquisition of free things, compulsive buying, and ritualistic discarding. Quotes included in the case study stem from the original ethnography.     

A Day at the Zoo Through the Lens of Jessica Benjamin's Bonds of Love

In this photo-based essay I bring Jessica Benjamin's project of transforming relationships of domination to a day at the zoo. The interrogation of the human/animal dualism illuminates relational moments of mutuality across species. Managing the tension between sameness and difference without collapse into hierarchical configuration, the human-animal connection may take its place in the project of transforming relationships of domination and extending the circle of ethical care.     

Social Workers’ Attitudes Toward Older Adults: A Review of the Literature

Ageist attitudes toward older adults have been recognized as barriers to recruiting and training competent social workers. This article provides a systematic review of the literature that focused on social workers’ and social work students’ attitudes toward older adults and working with older adults. The authors sought empirical studies that used an attitudinal measure of ageism with a social work sample, and a total of 20 articles met the criteria. Characteristics of the studies’ participants, methodology, instruments, and results were evaluated. This article discusses the findings and offers implications for future research.