A six-year analysis of sex traffickers of minors: exploring characteristics and sex trafficking patterns

ABSTRACT

Few studies have explored the characteristics and arrest patterns of sex traffickers, particularly sex traffickers of persons under the age of 18 (minors) in the U.S. The purpose of this study is to understand the behavior and characteristics of a national cross sectional sample of sex traffickers of minors during a six-year period. This study explored cases involving the arrest of sex traffickers of minors or persons under the age of 18 in the United States from 2010 to 2015. Sex traffickers of minors was defined as a person who facilitates and/or benefits by receiving something of value for the commercial sexual exploitation of a minor (person under the age of 18) or attempts to do so. During a systematic online search, 1,416 sex traffickers of minors were identified. The arrests were found in 46 states in the United States, two U.S. territories, and Washington D.C. The sex traffickers of minors were mostly males (n = 1067, 75.4%), and of those with race identified (only 51.6%), 71.7% were African American. Their ages ranged from 15 to 70 years old (M = 28.5, SD = 8.54). Characteristics of the sex trafficker and the sex trafficking situation are analyzed and implications discussed.     

Improving an exact approach for solving separable integer quadratic knapsack problems

We consider the specially structured (pure) integer Quadratic Multi-Knapsack Problem (QMKP) tackled in the paper “Exact solution methods to solve large scale integer quadratic knapsack problems” by D. Quadri, E. Soutif and P. Tolla (2009), recently appeared on this journal, where the problem is solved by transforming it into an equivalent 0–1 linearized Multi-Knapsack Problem (MKP). We show that, by taking advantage of the structure of the transformed (MKP), it is possible to derive an effective variable fixing procedure leading to an improved branch-and-bound approach. This procedure reduces dramatically the resulting linear problem size inducing an impressive improvement in the performances of the related branch and bound approach when compared to the results of the approach proposed by D. Quadri, E. Soutif and P. Tolla.     

WebStress: a web interface to explore a multidatabase bibliographic corpus on occupational stress

A bibliographic study on a multidisciplinary subject, such as occupational stress, requires a multidatabase query facility. Given this, we searched eight databases belonging to different fields (medicine, psychology, etc.) and from different countries. Thus, more than 26000 references on occupational stress were gathered. A bibliographic corpus of this sort is unusable because of the heterogeneous format of the records and the number of duplicate entries. Considering the limitations of commercial programs, we have developed a system, called WebStress, for reformatting the data and removing duplicates. The huge number of references and the research needs of updating and searching have necessitated the addition of several other functions to WebStress. Therefore WebStress comprises a web interface that makes it possible to search the corpus with advanced features (using clustering, a specialized thesaurus on stress and Boolean queries). In addition to the usual bibliographic queries on a specific database such as Medline, WebStress provides bibliometric analysis of the corpus, which might contribute to a detailed analysis on occupational stress in order to highlight the networks of researchers and to find the main topics studied in this area. WebStress is not yet available to researchers in general. It is being further developed, and also permission needs to be obtained from the eight commercial bibliographic databases that it consults.     

Disentangling the Influence of Value Predispositions and Risk/Benefit Perceptions on Support for Nanotechnology Among the American Public

Using nanotechnology as a case study, this article explores (1) how people's perceptions of benefits and risks are related to their approval of nanotechnology, (2) which information‐processing factors contribute to public risk/benefit perceptions, and (3) whether individuals’ predispositions (i.e., deference to scientific authority and ideology) may moderate the relationship between cognitive processing and risk perceptions of the technology. Results indicate that benefit perceptions positively affect public support for nanotechnology; perceptions of risk tend to be more influenced by systematic processing than by heuristic cues, whereas both heuristic and systematic processing influence benefit perceptions. People who are more liberal‐minded tend to be more affected by systematic processing when thinking about the benefits of nanotechnology than those who are more conservative. Compared to less deferent individuals, those who are more deferent to scientific authority tend to be less influenced by systematic processing when making judgments about the benefits and risks of nanotechnology. Implications are discussed.     

Improving quality at the point of service

The authors provide a research-based construct of youth program quality that differentiates safety, support, interaction, and engagement, four important issues for practitioners working with youth in the middle years. They describe two tools that have helped direct staff to be intentional about creating offerings that are appropriate for early adolescents: the focusing idea of point-of-service quality and the technology of observational assessment. They describe how these tools can be used to create cultures of accountability and intentionality that extend across program levels.     

Scales of observation A micro‐sociological epistemology of social science practice∗

Often what is presented as conflict between schools of thought is more often based on a difference of scale of observation. Visual sociology is viewed as a way to understand the “scale issue” because the visual sociologist knows it is impossible to simultaneously photograph a macro and a micro phenomenon. We thus offer a critique of a prevalent fantasy in social science; that of catching at once all data coming from all scales.     

Are simple tests of son preference useful? An evaluation using data from Vietnam

Son preference is widespread although not universal. Where it occurs it may lead to higher fertility rates. Ideally son preference should be measured in the context of a hazards or parity progression model of fertility, or a logistic model of contraceptive use. Such models require large amounts of survey data, particularly to measure the covariates. Can son preference be discerned reliably using tests which rely on more limited information? The answer is yes, based on applying eight simple tests to data from the Vietnam Living Standards Survey of 1992–93 and comparing the outcomes with the benchmark results from fuller models. Some, but not all, of the simpler tests accurately measure son preference, including estimating a simple hazards or progression parity model, the unisex sibship test, and the sibling differentials test. Received: 28 September 1995 / Accepted: 2 January 1997     

Immigrant Children: Their Experience of Violence at School and Community in Host Country

This article describes our qualitative sociological study of immigrant children's life experiences of violence. We conducted interviews with 42 first‐generation immigrant children from any country, aged 9–13 years old, living in the Quebec City region (Canada). Results from three main themes are presented: representations of violence and concrete violent acts experienced; perceived effects of violence on children health and well‐being; and reactions and coping strategies. Overall, the narratives show that they may experience racist peer violence in school that leads to suffering situations, and they consequently have to develop strategies to maintain their well‐being. Social implications are discussed.