When Prejudice Is Popular: Implications for Discriminatory Behavior

Prejudice and popularity represent two major areas of research. Yet studies have not considered whether prejudiced adolescents actually can be popular. Among 572 high school students (M_age = 15.80 years), the current study tested the association between popularity (based on sociometric peer nominations) and sexual prejudice against gay and lesbian individuals, moderated by gender and perspective taking. As hypothesized, the association was significant for males but not females, and it was significant for adolescents lower on perspective taking but not those higher on perspective taking. Moreover, adolescents who were popular and expressed strong sexual prejudice were more likely to engage in homophobic behavior than prejudiced adolescents who were less popular. Popular adolescents with strong sexual prejudice beliefs may be more prone to use homophobic behavior as a way to maintain their dominant position. Similarly, prejudiced adolescents who are popular may face less pushback for their engagement in homophobic behavior. Continued attention to the connection between sexual prejudice and popularity is important because of the high status, influence, and visibility of popular adolescents.     

Educational imposters and fake degrees

We develop a sociological context for understanding the phenomenon of falsely claimed educational credentials and analyze national data that cast light on the incidence of false degrees. We find that about 6% of Bachelor's degrees and 35% of Associate's degrees are falsely claimed. Most individuals who falsely claim degrees have attended the college in question. Many have nearly completed the required credits, but claim a degree without having finished. The socio-demographic profile of persons falsely claiming credentials is consistent with Merton's theory of innovative deviance, but not with the theory of status inconsistency.     

Evaluating the impact of conditional cash transfer programs on fertility: the case of the Red de Protección Social in Nicaragua

Evaluating the impact of poverty-reduction programs on fertility is complicated given that changes in incentives to have children take time to be incorporated into decision making and evaluation periods are usually quite brief. We explore the use of birth spacing as a short-run indicator of the impact of poverty-reduction programs on fertility. The data come from a Nicaraguan conditional cash transfer program that offers incentives for poor households to invest in children’s health, nutrition, and education. We estimate a stratified Cox proportional hazard model and find that the program decreased the hazard of a birth, indicating an increase in birth spacing.     

Abusive supervision and the entitled employee

We present two studies that examine the effects of psychological entitlement on employees' ratings of abusive supervision and their behavioral reactions to these perceptions. Study 1 indicated that entitlement was positively associated with ratings of abusive supervision. Perceived abuse was, in turn, associated with upward undermining behaviors and organizational deviance. In Study 2, we re-examined the hypothesized relationships using paired data from employees and their coworkers. The results replicated those from the first study and showed that entitled employees rated supervisors as more abusive than coworkers who shared the same supervisors. Although this variance is likely driven by a combination of perceptual distortion and actual abusive behaviors, the ultimate implication is that psychologically entitled employees are prone to feel that they are victims of abuse and to react in undesirable ways.     

Extending mixtures of multivariate <Emphasis Type="Italic">t</Emphasis>-factor analyzers

Model-based clustering typically involves the development of a family of mixture models and the imposition of these models upon data. The best member of the family is then chosen using some criterion and the associated parameter estimates lead to predicted group memberships, or clusterings. This paper describes the extension of the mixtures of multivariate t-factor analyzers model to include constraints on the degrees of freedom, the factor loadings, and the error variance matrices. The result is a family of six mixture models, including parsimonious models. Parameter estimates for this family of models are derived using an alternating expectation-conditional maximization algorithm and convergence is determined based on Aitken’s acceleration. Model selection is carried out using the Bayesian information criterion (BIC) and the integrated completed likelihood (ICL). This novel family of mixture models is then applied to simulated and real data where clustering performance meets or exceeds that of established model-based clustering methods. The simulation studies include a comparison of the BIC and the ICL as model selection techniques for this novel family of models. Application to simulated data with larger dimensionality is also explored.     

Technology selection in the absence of standardised materials and processes: a survey in the UK composite materials supply chain

Composite materials is an industry where technology selection has major consequences as there is not a standard manufacturing process, nor are there standardised materials with defined or proscribed properties for companies to select as multiple solutions are technically viable. This research aims to identify key factors for manufacturing technology selection in the UK composite materials supply chain. Literature review and managers’ opinions were used to identify 18 factors affecting manufacturing technology selection. This was followed by a survey comprising the multi-tier supply chain of the composite materials industry. The results of the survey show ‘on time deliveries/service level to customers’, ‘improve quality’ and ‘reduce cycle time’ received the highest average ratings. In this study a correlation analysis was performed to identify the underlying dependencies between the factors investigated. The identification and use of underlying dependencies rather than highest average provided a more comprehensive picture of the factors that affect technology selection in the composite materials industry. For this study, experts in composite materials were asked to comment on the findings of the survey and their value to the industry. The results presented may assist companies in the composite materials industry with technology selection decision-making processes.     

Naming,blaming and claiming ablism: the lived experiences of lawyers and advocates with disabilities

The social model explains that different abilities are not the true cause of disablement. Ablist institutions and practices construct a certain level of ability as disability. How do people respond when they are being disabled by society? This study analyses how 28 advocates and lawyers with disabilities respond when they confront ablism. This study employs the naming, blaming and claiming model to map the conduct of 28 lawyers and advocates with disabilities from Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. Despite their empowered position, participants often did not claim for every act of ablism. This study analyses why participants did not claim. One of the primary issues raised by participants was a gap between the range of parties who caused disablement in society and the way in which anti-discrimination laws attributed duties.     

Sad and Lonely? Sad Mood Suppresses Facial Mimicry

The aim of the current study was to investigate the influence of happy and sad mood on facial muscular reactions to emotional facial expressions. Following film clips intended to induce happy and sad mood states, participants observed faces with happy, sad, angry, and neutral expressions while their facial muscular reactions were recorded electromyografically. Results revealed that after watching the happy clip participants showed congruent facial reactions to all emotional expressions, whereas watching the sad clip led to a general reduction of facial muscular reactions. Results are discussed with respect to the information processing style underlying the lack of mimicry in a sad mood state and also with respect to the consequences for social interactions and for embodiment theories.     

Psychologists’ roles in ending homelessness

Homelessness in the U.S. remains a pernicious social problem despite national coordinated efforts to end it. Psychologists are well positioned to address homelessness through direct service, advocacy, research, and policy work. Results of a survey of psychologist members (n?=?197) and student members (n?=?209) of the American Psychological Association highlighted activities they engaged in related to helping people who experience housing instability and showed psychologists are more compassionate toward those who experience homelessness than is the general public. Respondents suggested a number of factors that would encourage their greater involvement with homelessness issues including receiving more focused training, increased funding for services, and simply being asked by someone to help. Given the continued problem of homelessness, psychologists can play an important role in supporting those who are in this situation. Suggestions for increasing training and engagement of psychologists are discussed.