The boomerang effect of psychological interventions

Research has found that teaching people about psychological biases can help counteract biased behavior. On the other hand, due to the innate need for preservation of a positive self-image, it is likely that teaching people about biases they hold, may cause a boomerang effect in cases where being associated with a specific bias implies negative social connotations. In the three studies below we examine situations in which psychological bias implies negatively associated behavior, and show that teaching people about bias in those contexts can be counterproductive.     

Generating Dynamic Democratic Discussions: An Analysis of Teaching With U.S. Presidential Debates

Researchers have found that when young people participate in discussions of controversial political issues, they often become more politically engaged and informed (Hess, 2009 Hess, Diana E. (2009). Controversy in the classroom: The democratic power of discussion. New York, NY: Routledge.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). Nonetheless, some educators avoid fostering such discussions because they can become heated and distract from academic learning (Hess, 2002 Hess, Diana E. (2002). Discussing controversial public issues in secondary social studies classrooms: Learning from skilled teachers. Theory &; Research in Social Education, 30(1), 10–41.[Taylor &; Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]). Presidential elections, including the highly publicized debates, provide substantial material for discussions of major national and international issues, but no published research has examined how educators can leverage these events to generate productive civic learning experiences. In this article, we analyze data collected in seven high school classrooms during the 2012 presidential election to examine the challenges and opportunities associated with generating substantive, dynamic discussions of presidential debates. Our findings indicate that students enjoyed learning about candidates' different perspectives and that certain strategies were especially helpful for fostering substantive discussions: (a) scaffolding students' preparation for discussion; (b) providing opportunities for students to address open-ended questions; (c) redirecting students' engagement in competitive, interpersonal dynamics to learning about public issues; and (d) countering students' partisan tendencies. We discuss implications for practice and research and present a conceptual framework for generating dynamic, substantive democratic discussions.     

Disability,personalisation and community arts: exploring the spatial dynamics of children with disabilities participating in inclusive music classes*

This paper uses personalisation and the capabilities approach to explore inclusive music classes for children with disabilities in Scotland. It provides a unique insight into the impact of participation through the voices of the disabled young musicians, their parents and tutors. The study highlights the power of inclusive spaces to transform lives, to build confidence and contest disabled identities. It engages in the spatial dynamic of opening up inclusive spaces, as well as exposing emerging tensions in the liminal space that is created through movement between safe and supported spaces and the antithesis, spaces that disempower and marginalise. The findings suggest good practice around personalisation, when conceived of from a social justice perspective, as a template for working with other marginalised groups and in other professional settings.     

Short run responses to foreign exchange crises

This paper constructs a short-run general equilibrium model for an LDC-type economy. Some key features are the possibility of excess capacity and the presence of quantitative restrictions on exports and imports. A rich variety of pricing possibilities for tradeable goods is allowed for, including “water in the tariff” as well as domestic prices exceeding world prices with binding import quotas.The model is used to analyze alternative responses to a foreign-exchange crisis. Import controls, devaluation and cuts in government expenditures are compared. We find that: i) import quotas can worsen the balance of trade, ii) rationing foreign exchange for noncompetitive imports is stagflationary, increasing prices even under excess capacity, iii) a devaluation has strong effects on income distribution, although output and employment expand, and iv) cuts in government spending are deflationary but the income distribution effects are neutral.     

Residential Building Codes,Affordability, and Health Protection: A Risk-Tradeoff Approach

Residential building codes intended to promote health and safety may produce unintended countervailing risks by adding to the cost of construction. Higher construction costs increase the price of new homes and may increase health and safety risks through income and stock effects. The income effect arises because households that purchase a new home have less income remaining for spending on other goods that contribute to health and safety. The stock effect arises because suppression of new-home construction leads to slower replacement of less safe housing units. These countervailing risks are not presently considered in code debates. We demonstrate the feasibility of estimating the approximate magnitude of countervailing risks by combining the income effect with three relatively well understood and significant home-health risks. We estimate that a code change that increases the nationwide cost of constructing and maintaining homes by $150 (0.1% of the average cost to build a single-family home) would induce offsetting risks yielding between 2 and 60 premature fatalities or, including morbidity effects, between 20 and 800 lost quality-adjusted life years (both discounted at 3%) each year the code provision remains in effect. To provide a net health benefit, the code change would need to reduce risk by at least this amount. Future research should refine these estimates, incorporate quantitative uncertainty analysis, and apply a full risk-tradeoff approach to real-world case studies of proposed code changes.     

Treatment of noncustodial fathers: Gender issues and clinical dilemmas

This article addresses issues involved in the treatment of fathers who do not have custody of their children. It reviews literature on demographic trends and discusses fathers' reactions to loss of child custody. Assessment and treatment guidelines are offered so that clinical practice may become more responsive to the needs of the population. Gender concerns, particularly as they relate to transference and countertransference, are also discussed.     

On the multivariate structure of wellbeing

A mapping sentence is provided for defining the universe of observations of wellbeing. According to this, assessment of wellbeing is attitudinal. Data from several studies verify that the First Law of Attitude holds for wellbeing. These data also show the structure of the interrelationships among the variables to be that of intermeshing cylindrexes, in an SSA space of four dimensions. Areas of life play the role of polarizing facets, while self-versus-community and situation-versus-treatment serve as axial facets. Modulating facets include primary-to-secondary interaction, and generality-to-specificity.     

Testing for lack of fit in linear multiresponse models based on exact or near replicates

Three procedures for testing the adequacy of a proposed linear multiresponse regression model against unspecified general alternatives are considered. The model has an error structure with a matrix normal distribution which allows the vector of responses for a particular run to have an unknown covariance matrix while the responses for different runs are uncorrelated. Furthermore, each response variable may be modeled by a separate design matrix. Multivariate statistics corresponding to the classical univariate lack of fit and pure error sums of squares are defined and used to determine the multivariate lack of fit tests. A simulation study was performed to compare the power functions of the test procedures in the case of replication. Generalizations of the tests for the case in which there are no independent replicates on all responses are also presented.