A Non-punitive Paradigm of Probation Practice: Some Sobering Thoughts

Dr L. R. Singer, Assistant Chief Probation Officier, Merseyside Probation Service, Rainford Hall, Crank Road, Crank, St Helens, Merseyside WA11 7RP. Summary The Government White Paper Crime, Justice and Protecting thePublic proposes a radical change for probation practice. Henceforthprobation work will no longer be an alternative to punishmentbut an alternative form of punishment. This article challengesthe conceptual and practical appropriateness of applying thenotion of punishment to the probation context. Probation officers,it is argued, are concerned with establishing rules for probationersand not inflicting pain on them. An alternative non-punitiveparadigm of probation practice is described. The paradigm isbased on the joint supervisory aims of support and surveillancewhich are implemented through the methods of counselling, assisting,directing, and monitoring. To illustrate the paradigm, referenceis made to an alcohol education course developed for offendersin trouble through drink. The efficacy of the alcohol projectand the non-punitive paradigm is demonstrated by the resultsreported from a three year evaluation study covering 152 offenders.The article concludes with an affirmation of the disciplinedbut non-punitive character of current probation work and arguesthat, to successfully protect the public and reintegrate offendersinto the community, the probation officer's employment of establishedsocial work knowledge, skills, and values is a strength nota weakness.     

Minorities and the media: a content analysis of native Canadians in the daily press*

Cette étude examine la question de l'espace consacré aux autochtones canadiens dans la presse ontarienne. Une analyse de contenu est utilisée pour examiner la fréquence des reportages sur les Amérindiens et les Inuits, les classes d'événements, la prédominance des articles, ainsi que les termes utilisés dans les manchettes. Les raportages les plus fréquents concernant les deux groupes touchaient les relations gouvernementales et les revendications territoriales, tandis que pour les Amérindiens en particulier, les reportages des conflits prédominaient. L'analyse des manchettes semble indiquer qu'un rapport existe entre l'identification des Amérindiens et les termes décrivant les conflit ou la contestation. En conclusion, il est suggéré que l'image des peuples autochtones présentée dans la presse ontarienne est liée aux relations gouvernementales et aux revendications territoriales. De futures recherches devraient pouvoir déterminer l'influence de cette image sur les attitudes de lecteurs d'appartenance majoritaire ou minoritaire.
This study is concerned with Ontario newspaper coverage of native Canadians. Content analysis is employed to examine frequency of stories about Indians and Eskimos, event categories, article prominence, and headline wording. Most frequent news categories for both were government relationships and land claims, but for Indians conflict material was most prominently located. Headline analysis indicates some association between Indian identification and conflict/deviance words. The conclusion suggests native Canadian images presented are tied to government relationships and land claim activity. Future research should assess image influence in attitudes of majority and minority readers.     

Attitudes and Behavior: The Impact of Privacy and Confidentiality Concerns on Participation in the 2000 Census

To what extent do concerns about privacy and confidentialityaffect people's participation in surveys, in particular thelargest U.S. survey, the decennial census? This study presentsthree separate estimates of the effect of attitudes on behavior.First, it estimates the effect of privacy and confidentialityconcerns on willingness to provide an address to a Gallup interviewer.Second, based on the Census Bureau's matching of survey responsesto its file of census returns, it estimates the effect of privacyand confidentiality concerns on respondents' return of theircensus form. Finally, it estimates these effects in one-personhouseholds. It concludes that concerns about privacy and confidentialityhave a small but statistically significant effect in all threetests, explaining roughly the same amount of variance in the2000 census as they had in 1990.     

Interviewer Expectation Effects: A Replication and Extension

Interviewers' evaluations of the general difficulty of a surveyhave no effect on the cooperation rate they obtain, but do affectresponses to individual questions. Although these effects arenot large, interviewers who expect more difficulty with a study,or who expect certain parts of it to be difficult to ask, tendto get higher nonresponse rates tosensitive questions and lowerestimates of sensitive behavior. Such expectations affectedone of the experimental manipulations in the informed consentstudy, but not enough to account for the effects of the experimentalvariable. Eleanor Singer is a Senior Research Associate at theColumbia Center for the Social Sciences and Editor of The PublicOpinion Quarterly. Luane Kohnke-Aguirre is Sampling Managerat Yankelovich, Skelly, and White, Inc. Charles F. Cannell,Program Director atthe Survey Research Center of the Institutefor Social Research, University of Michigan, refereed the evaluationof this article.     

SOUTH AFRICA'S PRESS RESTRICTIONS EFFECTS ON PRESS COVERAGE AND PUBLIC OPINION TOWARD SOUTH AFRICA

The 2 November 1985 ban on photographic and sound recordingsby the South African government provided an opportunity to investigatehypotheses concerning the effect of the ban on U.S. media coverageof South Africa and on public opinion toward South Africa. Wehypothesized that the ban would result in (1) a decrease incoverage of protest-related stories, (2) a tapering off of thevolume of coverage, and (3) a decline in the prominence of theSouth Africa story. We further hypothesized that (4) all ofthese effects would be stronger for broadcast than for printmedia, that (5) if the press ban reduced coverage of eventsin South Africa, there would be less attentiveness to the SouthAfrican problem among the general public in the United States,and that (6) sympathy for the black population would decreaseas a result of the press restrictions. We found that the press restrictions did not have the effectspredicted, either on press coverage or on United States publicopinion. Relative to levels of political violence in South Africa,coverage levels did decline. However, the decline did not occurabruptly in November, but appeared as a continuation of decreasesthat had already begun in September, prior to the press restrictions.     

The Effect of Interviewer Characteristics and Expectations on Response

This study reports on two sets of findings related to interviewereffects, derived from a national RDD sample of the adult population.The first of these concerns the effect of interviewer characteristicsand expectations on overall cooperation rates; the second, theeffect of interviewer characteristics and expectations on itemnonresponse and response quality. We found that interviewers'age, the size of the interviewing assignment, and interviewers'expectations all had a strong effect on overall cooperationrates; the relation of experience to response rate was curvilinearin this sample. Age and education have consistent but statisticallyinsignificant effects on item nonresponse. The effect of interviewers'expectations on responses within the interview resembles thatin earlier studies, but is less pronounced and less consistent.     

批判医学人类学的历史与理论框架

回顾20世纪70年代以来逐步形成,并在现实社会问题研究中越来越彰显重要性的批判医学人类学的产生和发展,并解释了在批判医学人类学理论体系下的其核心概念,指出:在人类学的框架内,用批判的眼光解决医疗体制中所存在的问题是非常有意义的;在政治经济发展全球化的今天,致力于建立一个多元文化批判的完整体系可以促使人们更深刻地了解医疗和医疗护理.     

EFFECTS OF BENEFITS APPEALS, MANDATORY APPEALS, AND VARIATIONS IN STATEMENTS OF CONFIDENTIALITY ON COMPLETION RATES FOR CENSUS QUESTIONNAIRES

This study examines the effects of two different prominentlydisplayed appeals in combination with two different prominentlydisplayed confidentiality assurances on mail-back completionrates for census questionnaires. The experiment was carriedout on a national probability sample of 30,000 household units,using occupant-addressed questionnaires that contained the contentof the 1990 decennial census short form. Neither the benefitsappeal nor the variation between two confidentiality assuranceshad a significant effect on completion rates. The mandatoryappeal, however, significantly improved completion rates, evenwhen it appeared on the envelope only.     

CONFIDENTIALITY ASSURANCES AND RESPONSE: A QUANTITATIVE REVIEW OF THE EXPERIMENTAL LITERATURE

This article tests the general hypothesis that a stronger assuranceof confidentiality improves survey response by means of a meta-analysisof the experimental literature. No support is found for thegeneral hypothesis, but the subsidiary hypothesis, that confidentialityassurances improve response when the data asked about are sensitive,is supported. Under those circumstances, the effect of confidentialityassurances is small but statistically significant and is robustin the presence of a variety of control variables.