Piloting different approaches to personalised offender management in the English criminal justice system

Various approaches to personalisation are well-established in the UK social care sector and are now starting to ‘travel’ to other sectors. In this paper we report findings from an evaluation of a pilot to test elements of personalisation in the management of offenders in probation services within the English criminal justice system. Following a review of evidence from social care, three different approaches to personalised-practice were developed and tested on a small-scale in three separate sites. The evaluation finds that all three approaches were implemented reasonably successfully, but challenges were identified including that personalised approaches are more time-consuming, that staff need support to exercise professional discretion and that balancing greater choice with managing criminogenic risk requires new ways of conceptualising the relationship between case manager and service user. Overall, ‘deeper’ approaches to personalisation, such as co-production, will take time to emerge. This paper makes two important contributions to the debate on personalisation in public services. First, it addresses the question of how transferable the concept of personalisation is from the social care sector to other sectors in the UK, in this case the criminal justice system. Secondly, it outlines a methodology for developing and evaluating personalisation pilots, prior to a wider roll-out.     

Assistive technology for disabled visual artists: exploring the impact of digital technologies on artistic practice

Abstract

Disabled artists with physical impairments can experience significant barriers in producing creative work. Digital technologies offer alternative opportunities to support artistic practice, but there has been a lack of research investigating the impact of assistive digital tools in this context. This article explores the current practice of physically impaired visual artists and their experiences around the use of digital technologies. An online survey was conducted with professional disabled artists and followed up by face-to-face interviews with 10 invited artists. The findings illustrate the issues disabled artists experience in their practice and highlight how they are commonly using mainstream digital technologies as part of their practice. However, there is little awareness around novel forms of technology (e.g. eye gaze tracking) that present new creative opportunities. The importance of digital tools for supporting wider practice (i.e. administrative and business tasks) was also highlighted as a key area where further work is required.     

Ethnic segregation in context: Social discrimination among native Dutch pupils and their ethnic minority classmates

Social discrimination, defined as the relative preference for intra-ethnic over inter-ethnic relationships, was studied in pupils’ networks in Dutch secondary school classes. While native Dutch pupils (ethnic majority members) mainly named fellow majority members, ethnic minority members reported ties with as many majority as minority members. Considering the ethnic composition of the classroom, however, majority members discriminated less than minorities. No strong effect of classroom ethnic composition on social discrimination was found, whereas neighborhood composition was shown to clearly influence social discrimination: ethnic minority members were more, and majority members less inclined to discriminate in neighborhoods with more ethnic presence.     

Impact of low fertility and early age at sterilisation on women’s formal education and skill development in South India

This paper examines the impact of low fertility and early age at sterilisation on women’s formal education and skill development in South India. Multilevel ordered-logit modelling of pseudo-cohort data re-organised from the three rounds of National Family Health Survey, and thematic analysis of qualitative data collected from Tamil Nadu and Kerala states showed no evidence of women’s resumption of formal education or uptake of skill development training in the post-sterilisation and post-childcare period. While resuming formal education in the post-sterilisation and post-childcare period is harder to achieve for various individual, household, community and policy reasons, there is greater preparedness and support for women to undertake skill development training. As low fertility and early age at sterilisation are widely regarded as the emerging reproductive norm in India, post-sterilisation and -childcare women will be a significant population group both in number and in proportional terms. No government policies or programs have so far recognised this group. India’s new government should consider targeted skill development programs for post-sterilisation and -childcare women appropriate to their social, economic and educational levels. An important contribution of the family planning program, particularly female sterilisation, for the economic and social development of the family and the wider society will otherwise be lost.     

Signal extraction goodness-of-fit diagnostic tests under model parameter uncertainty: Formulations and empirical evaluation

We present a time-domain goodness-of-fit (gof) diagnostic test that is based on signal-extraction variances for nonstationary time series. This diagnostic test extends the time-domain gof statistic of Maravall (2003 Maravall, A. (2003). A class of diagnostics in the ARIMA-model-based decomposition of a time series. Memorandum, Bank of Spain. Available at http://www.bde.es/servicio/software/tramo/diagnosticsamb.pdf [Google Scholar]) by taking into account the effects of model parameter uncertainty, utilizing theoretical results of McElroy and Holan (2009 McElroy, T., Holan, S. (2009). A local spectral approach for assessing time series model misspeci?cation. Journal of Multivariate Analysis 100:604–621.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). We demonstrate that omitting this correction results in a severely undersized statistic. Adequate size and power are obtained in Monte Carlo studies for fairly short time series (10 to 15 years of monthly data). Our Monte Carlo studies of finite sample size and power consider different combinations of both signal and noise components using seasonal, trend, and irregular component models obtained via canonical decomposition. Details of the implementation appropriate for SARIMA models are given. We apply the gof diagnostic test statistics to several U.S. Census Bureau time series. The results generally corroborate the output of the automatic model selection procedure of the X-12-ARIMA software, which in contrast to our diagnostic test statistic does not involve hypothesis testing. We conclude that these diagnostic test statistics are a useful supplementary model-checking tool for practitioners engaged in the task of model-based seasonal adjustment.     

The Conversational Model and Child and Family Counselling: Treating Chronic Complex Trauma in a Systemic Framework

Child and Family Counselling Teams in NSW Community Health Services are expected to provide therapeutic services to children who have experienced complex trauma. However, parental trauma is often overlooked or referred elsewhere. A systemic perspective informed by attachment theory and trauma theory provides the basis for addressing parental trauma in Child and Family Counselling Teams, thereby improving parenting. The Conversational Model is an evidence‐based intervention for chronic complex trauma. The foundations of the Conversational Model and its brief component, Short Term Intensive Psychodynamic Psychotherapy, are outlined and a case study is given to illustrate the usefulness of the intervention in Child and Family Counselling. Highlighted is the importance of addressing systemic trauma through parenting to improve attachment quality, family relationships, and children's function.     

Gendered experiences of physical restraint on locked wards for women

Physical restraint is used in inpatient services for people with intellectual disabilities as a way of holding a person to avoid injury. This article uses data from an ethnographic study in a locked unit in the north of England to explore women’s experiences of physical restraint using a feminist disability studies analysis. Data consists of field notes as well as interviews with 16 of the women who had experienced restraint, and 10 staff who worked with them. The women gave insights into the gendered phenomenon of restraint in light of their past experiences of violence. The authors argue that restraint is used with women to encourage passivity at times when more relational and therapeutic methods could be used. The article offers recommendations for alternative strategies that services can encourage.     

Toddlers Involve Their Caregiver to Help Another Person in Need

Three experiments with 18‐ to 35‐month‐old children (n = 169) studied toddler–caregiver interactions when being confronted with another person in need. In particular, we explored whether toddlers would request their caregiver to help a needy other when they are not able to help themselves. Children observed another person who needed help to accomplish a task, but were either not able to provide help as the object was out of reach (Experiment 1) or because an obstacle prevented children from interacting with the other person (Experiments 2, 2b). The experiments revealed the same developmental trend with 2.5‐year‐olds selectively involving their caregiver to help the needy other. The results are interpreted in terms of toddlers’ motivation to see others helped and with respect to their developing ability to actively involve others to regulate their emotions.