A Meta‐Analysis of Campaign Contributions' Impact on Roll Call Voting*

Objectives. Conventional wisdom about the link between campaign contributions and roll call votes is that contributions rarely matter because groups tend to give to like‐minded legislators. This meta‐analysis examines the conventional wisdom by analyzing published research on this topic. Methods. More than 30 studies are pooled to produce more than 350 individual tests of the contributions‐roll call link. Extending meta‐regression ( Stanley and Jarrell, 1989 ), a logit meta‐analysis is conducted to summarize the literature and assess the importance of various modeling choices. Results. We find that some, but not all, model specifications have an impact on whether significant results are present. Models that control for friendly giving by including a measure of legislators' ideology and that include more than one contributions variable are less likely to produce significant results. Conclusions. After considering the impact of model choice on study results, we conclude that one‐third of roll call votes exhibit the impact of campaign contributions.     

Reports of Conferences,Institutes, and Seminars

In the span of four weeks, from late March to early April 2008, three important technical services conferences were held: the Electronic Resources & Libraries Conference, the New England Technical Services Librarians Conference, and the North Carolina Serials Conference.     

Neural Correlates of Human and Monkey Face Processing in 9‐Month‐Old Infants

Behavioral and electrophysiological evidence suggests a gradual, experience‐dependent specialization of cortical face processing systems that takes place largely in the 1st year of life. To further investigate these findings, event‐related potentials (ERPs) were collected from typically developing 9‐month‐old infants presented with pictures of familiar and unfamiliar monkey or human faces in 2 different orientations. Analyses revealed differential processing across changes in monkey and human faces. The N290 was greater for familiar compared to unfamiliar faces, regardless of species or orientation. In contrast, the P400 to unfamiliar faces was greater than to familiar faces, but only for the monkey condition. The P400 to human faces differentiated the orientation of both familiar and unfamiliar faces. These results suggest more specific processing of human compared to monkey faces in 9‐month‐olds.     

The Social Construction of Romantic Relationships in Adolescence: Examining the Role of Peer Networks,Gender, and Race*

Romantic activity is a social psychological phenomenon. Gender, race, and peer networks are key contexts for understanding the social construction of this behavior as gender‐ and race‐based norms structure feelings and behaviors that define “appropriate” romantic activity and peer networks serve as incubators of this activity. With a nationally representative sample of adolescents (N= 8510) drawn from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, this study explored the linkages among peer networks, conceptions of idealized romantic relationships and actual romantic relationships, and the ways in which gender and race moderate these associations. Several characteristics of peer networks predicted adolescent attitudes about romantic behaviors as well as actual romantic behavior. Moreover, the linkages among peer networks, romantic attitudes, and romantic behaviors varied by race.     

Separating batterers and guns: a review and analysis of gun removal laws in 50 States

Firearms play an important role in lethal domestic violence incidents. The authors review state laws regarding two policies to separate batterers from firearms: laws authorizing police to remove firearms when responding to a domestic violence complaint ("police gun removal laws") and laws authorizing courts to order guns removed from batterers through a protective order ("court-ordered removal laws"). As of April 2004, 18 states had police gun removal laws; 16 states had court-ordered removal laws. The authors examine relevant characteristics of the laws and recommend that these laws be mandatory, apply to all guns and ammunition possessed by an abuser, and include clear procedures to enhance implementation.     

A Note on the Poisson Likelihood Ratio Test Statistic for Kulldorff's Scan Methods

Methods based on scan statistics are widely used in health-related applications to detect clusters of disease. The most common methods are based on the Bernoulli and Poisson models. Kulldorff (1997 Kulldorff , M. ( 1997 ). A spatial scan statistic . Communications in Statistics—Theory and Methods 26 : 1481 – 1496 .[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) derived the likelihood ratio test statistic for his scan method for both of these models. His scan statistic is widely used with freely available software, SaTScan^? (see Kulldorff, 2005 Kulldorff , M. ( 2005 ). SaTScan: software for the spatial, temporal, and space-time scan statistics , version 5.1 [computer program]. Information Management Services 2005; Available: http://www.satscan.org/. Accessed July 2007 . [Google Scholar]). We provide an alternative derivation of the likelihood ratio test statistic in the Poisson case. Our derivation is simpler and more general in the sense that it applies when the incidences are not aggregated into subregional counts.     

Notes on likelihood intervals and profiling

In many applications, decisions are made on the basis of function of parameters g(θ). When the value of g(theta;) is calculated using estimated values for te parameters, its is important to have a measure of the uncertainty associated with that value of g(theta;). Likelihood ratio approaches to finding likelihood intervals for functions of parameters have been shown to be more reliable, in terms of coverage probability, than the linearization approach. Two approaches to the generalization of the profiling algorithm have been proposed in the literature to enable construction of likelihood intervals for a function of parameters (Chen and Jennrich, 1996; Bates and Watts, 1988). In this paper we show the equivalence of these two methods. We also provide and analysis of cases in which neither profiling algorithm is appropriate. For one of these cases an alternate approach is suggested Whereas generalized profiling is based on maximizing the likelihood function given a constraint on the value of g(θ), the alternative algorithm is based on optimizing g(θ) given a constraint on the value of the likelihood function.     

Cultural Anthropology and Open Access—Interview With Dominic Boyer,Cymene Howe,and Marcel LaFlamme

Abstract

In this installment of “Conversations,” Dominic Boyer, Cymene Howe, and Marcel LaFlamme, of the Cultural Anthropology editorial team, discuss the ins and outs of publishing a gold open access journal in the field of anthropology. Highlights of the discussion include Cultural Anthropology’s move to open access, the ethics of open access, the growth of international readership, ongoing publishing challenges in open access, and the role libraries can play with open access publishing.