Paradoxes of late-modern autonomy imperatives: Reconciling individual claims and institutional demands in everyday practice

Governmentality studies and social theories agree that in contemporary societies the idea of autonomy is no longer simply an ideal or an individual aspiration but a social obligation. In an attempt to clarify the meaning of autonomy in this day and age, this paper asks how individuals perceive and negotiate the various dimensions of autonomy and how this affects the functioning of late-modern institutions. The empirical insights derived from a qualitative study provide a differentiated picture of how individuals pursue their claims to autonomy and comply with institutional demands for autonomy in everyday practice. By presenting seven types of late-modern “autonomy managers,” the analysis evinces a usurpation of autonomous agency that renders individuals the institutional editors of the contemporary contradictions, deficits, and tensions that occur in their everyday interactions. This comes at the price of notionally free but exhausted actors running short of all kinds of resources.     

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Understanding Condom Use Decision Making Among Homeless Youth Using Event-Level Data

This is one of the first qualitative event-based studies to understand the various mechanisms through which multiple factors influence condom use decision making among homeless youth. Event-level interviews that explore characteristics of the environment surrounding sexual events were conducted with 29 youth who were asked to describe two recent sexual encounters. In thematic analyses of data across events, reasons that youth gave for engaging in unprotected sex included the expectation of having sex and use of alternative methods of protection against pregnancy. Other nonevent factors that influenced condom use decision making were related to attributes of the partnership (e.g., testing, trust and love, and assessments of risk) and attributes of the youth (e.g., perceptions of diseases, concerns over pregnancy, and discomfort using condoms). Additional event analyses conducted within the same individuals found that decision making was influenced by multiple interacting factors, with different pathways operating for event and nonevent factors. Future interventions should consider taking a multilevel and individualized approach that focuses on event-based determinants of risky sex in this population.     

Supreme Court Auditing of the US Courts of Appeals: An Organizational Perspective

Using an aggregate-level model of Supreme Court–circuitcourt interactions, this study assesses the extent to whichthe Court's auditing process of circuit court outputs is shapedby organizational dynamics such as structural capacity, institutionalization,and demographic characteristics. Principals in organizationalhierarchies must audit the behavior of their agents to ensurethat the agents are faithfully complying with the principals'preferences. In the case of the Supreme Court, such auditingactivities must take place in the face of very limited institutionalcapacity on the Court's part. We propose that the Court considerscertain broad organizational and institutional characteristicsat the circuit level when performing this task. In particular,we find that the Court strategically allocates its limited institutionalresources to audit decisions to respond to its recent interactionswith individual circuits in past terms, the circuits' internaldecision-making dynamics (including dissent and reversal rates),and goal conflict between the circuit and the Supreme Court.     

Intergenerational mobility in Sweden: a regional perspective

I employ high quality register data to present new facts about income mobility in Sweden. The focus of the paper is on regional differences in mobility, using a novel approach based on a multilevel model. This method is well suited when regions differ greatly in population size, as is the case in Sweden. The maximum likelihood estimates are substantially more precise than those obtained by running separate OLS regressions. I find that few regions are statistically significantly different from the Swedish average when measuring mobility in relative terms, while a greater number of regional differences emerge when focusing on absolute outcomes. Compared to growing up in the least favorable region, children from the most favorable region with parents located at the 25th percentile in the income distribution reach higher income ranks corresponding to approximately one monthly salary for an average Swedish worker per year.     

Testing the Interaction Effects of Task Complexity in Computer Training Using the Social Cognitive Model

Using a Modified Social Cognitive Theory framework, this study examines the behavior modeling and lecture‐based training approaches to computer training. It extends the existing Social Cognitive Model for computer training by adding the task complexity construct to training method, prior performance, computer self‐efficacy, outcome expectations, and performance. A sample of 249 students from a large state university served as participants in a laboratory experiment that was conducted to determine the task complexity*training method and task complexity* self‐efficacy interaction effects on performance. Structural equation modeling with interaction effects was used to analyze the data. The results show that behavior modeling outperforms lecture‐based training in a measure of final performance when task complexity is high. Further, it is found that computer self‐efficacy has a greater positive effect on performance when task complexity is high than when task complexity is low. Prior performance is also found to be an important variable in the model.