Study Provides Insights on Habits and Motivations of Burglars

From the Press Release:

The researchers delved into the decision-making processes and methods of 422 incarcerated male and female burglars selected at random from state prison systems in North Carolina, Kentucky and Ohio. This investigation explored offender motivation; target selection considerations; deterrence factors; burglars’ techniques; and gender differences in motivations, target selection and techniques.'

 Source: The University of North Carolina at Charlotte
 Read more of the findings: “Understanding Decisions to Burglarize from the Offender’s Perspective”

OpenSecrets.org launches Anomaly Tracker tool for researching government funding.

From the OpenSecrets blog:

For years, our researchers have analyzed and crunched numbers looking for outliers -- instances where a politician relies to an unusual degree on one group of donors, for instance, or contributors from one geographic area dominate a candidate's fundraising. Earlier this week we introduced a new tool so users of our site can join us in this search: the Anomaly Tracker.

The tracker will look for four different types of anomalies:

1. Lawmakers sponsoring legislation that was lobbied by only one company or other organization whose employees or PAC also donated to the sponsoring lawmakers.
2. Lawmakers receiving twice as much in contributions from their top donors as their next highest donors.
3. Lawmakers receiving twice as much in contributions from their top donor industries as their next highest donor industries.
4. Lawmakers receiving more than 50 percent of their itemized contributions from out of state.

Explore the  Anomaly Tracker.

Game-based learning: latest evidence and future directions

From the Press Release:

The role of video games in teaching and learning is a source of debate among many educators, researchers and in the popular press. Detractors and advocates have been discussing the influences and the potentials of video games for quite some time, and we feel that sound evidence and informed advice on these topics is still very much needed. Against this background, Futurelab at NFER felt that it was timely to provide practitioners, industry and researchers with an up-to-date account of what the evidence tells us about game-based learning and its potential impact on learning and teaching. The review aims to bridge academic and non academic domains, to provide insights that will be of interest to educators, educational researchers, industry and others seeking to engage in a more thoughtful debate about the types of educational values that can be attached to gaming. In particular, we provide accessible advice for practitioners, in the belief that innovation in education is always underpinned by informed and critical teaching.

Source: The National Foundation for Educational Research in England and Wales
Download pdf publication: Game-based learning: latest evidence and future directions

Evaluation of Internet Child Safety Materials Used by ICAC Task Forces in School and Community Settings

Abstract:

This project involves content and process evaluations of current internet safety education (ISE) program materials and their use by law enforcement presenters and schools. Despite a proliferation of internet safety programs over the last decade, there is little information that can guide law enforcement, policy makers or the public in determining which materials or delivery methods are most likely to increase children’s online safety.

 ISE content and process evaluation results indicated that the educational approach and messages of current ISE fail to incorporate critical elements of effective prevention education, including: 1) research-based messages; 2) skill-based learning objectives; 3) opportunities for youth to practice new skills; and 4) sufficient time for learning. Our analyses indicate that the ISE field has been slow to include research-based information on internet predators and online harassment and there is no research to support the assumption that many of the popular educational slogans/messages around privacy and digital reputation concerns (e.g., “Think Before You Click”) will lead to improved youth online behavior.

 The failure to define research-supported program logic means that most ISE is a highly speculative and experimental undertaking, whose success cannot be assumed. Recommendations are made for re-conceptualizing ISE and developing a more effective approach to helping protect youth.

Source: National Institute of Justice (U.S.)
For Download:

• Executive Summary (pdf, 16 pages)

• Final Report (pdf, 114 pages)

Children with sleep apnea have higher risk of behavioral, adaptive and learning problems

"This study provides some helpful information for medical professionals consulting with parents about treatment options for children with SDB that, although it may remit, there are considerable behavioral risks associated with continued SDB," said Michelle Perfect, PhD, the study's lead author and assistant professor in the school psychology program in the department of disability and psychoeducational studies at the University of Arizona in Tucson. "School personnel should also consider the possibility that SDB contributes to difficulties with hyperactivity, learning and behavioral and emotional dysregulation in the classroom."

The five-year study, which appears in the April issue of the journal SLEEP, utilized data from a longitudinal cohort, the Tucson Children's Assessment of Sleep Apnea Study (TuCASA). The TuCASA study prospectively examined Hispanic and Caucasian children between 6 and 11 years of age to determine the prevalence and incidence of SDB and its effects on neurobehavioral functioning. The study involved 263 children who completed an overnight sleep study and a neurobehavioral battery of assessments that included parent and youth reported rating scales.

Source: American Academy of Sleep Medicine

 Read: Children with sleep apnea have higher risk of behavioral, adaptive and learning problems.

How Housing Matters Survey Finds American Attitudes Transformed by Housing Crisis, Changes in Lifestyle

From the introduction:

The How Housing Matters Survey, a new national survey conducted by Hart Research Associates and commissioned by the MacArthur Foundation, found while financial markets, as well as homebuilding and home sales data, may suggest the prolonged housing crisis is over, the American public is not ready to agree, with nearly 8 in 10 (77%) believing we are still in the middle of the crisis, or that the worst is yet to come. When it comes to remedying the housing crisis, two-thirds of adults (65%) now believe the focus of national housing policy should be split fairly equally between rental and ownership, as opposed to promoting one over the other. Three in five adults (61%) now believe that renters can be just as successful as owners in achieving the American Dream.

Source: MacArthur Foundation 
Read the survey report (pdf) or complete survey data.

New Report on First Premarital Cohabitation in the United States

From the Report Description:

This report provides an updated description of trends and patterns in first premarital cohabitations among women aged 15–44 in the United States using the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG). Trends in pregnancies within first premarital cohabiting unions and differences by Hispanic origin and race, and education are also presented.

About the survey:

The National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) gathers information on family life, marriage and divorce, pregnancy, infertility, use of contraception, and men's and women's health. The survey results are used by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and others to plan health services and health education programs, and to do statistical studies of families, fertility, and health.

Source: Centers for Disease and Control Prevention National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG)

Download pdf Report on First Premarital Cohabitation in the United States

Self-Image and Strategic Ignorance in Moral Dilemmas

Abstract: 

Avoiding information about adverse welfare consequences of self-interested decisions, orstrategic ignorance, is an important source of corruption, anti-social behavior and even atrocities. We model an agent who cares about self-image and has the opportunity to learn the social benefits of a personally costly action.  The trade-off between self-image concerns and material payoffs can lead the agent to use ignorance as an excuse, even if it is deliberately chosen. Two experiments, modeled after Dana, Weber, and Kuang (2007), show that a) many people will reveal relevant information about others' payoffs after making an ethical decision, but not before, and b)  some people are willing to pay for ignorance. These results corroborate the idea that Bayesian self-signaling drives people to avoid inconvenient facts in moral decisions.

Source:  Departmental Working Papers, Department of Economics, UCSB, UC Santa Barbara [via eScholarship Repository]

Download full pdf publication: Self-Image and Strategic Ignorance in Moral Dilemmas

After the Withdrawal: A Way Forward in Afghanistan and Pakistan

From RAND Corpoation:

Testimony presented before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Joint Subcommittee on Middle East and North Africa and Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific on March 19, 2013.

 Download full pdf publication

Research Report: 2012 Catalyst Census: Fortune 500 Women Executive Officers and Top Earners

The 2012 Catalyst Census: Fortune 500 Women Executive Officers and Top Earners provides critical statistics to gauge women’s advancement into leadership and highlights the gender diversity gap. Each year Catalyst tracks:

•  Women’s share of all Executive Officer and top earner positions. 
•  Companies with 0 percent, 25 percent or more, and 40 percent or more women Executive Officers. 

The appendices provide additional points of comparison by region and industry, as well as list companies with the highest and lowest representation of women Executive Officers.

• In 2012, women held 14.3 percent of Executive Officer positions at Fortune 500 companies and 8.1 percent of Executive Officer top earner positions. 
• In both 2011 and 2012, one-fifth of companies had 25 percent or more women Executive Officers, yet more than one-quarter had no women. 

Source: Catalyst 

Download full pdf research report | Go directly to Catalyst site for multiple downloads

Digitized: The Historic Mexican and Mexican American Press collection

About the collection:

The Historic Mexican and Mexican American Press collection documents and showcases historic Mexican and Mexican American publications published in Tucson, El Paso, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Sonora, Mexico from the mid-1800s to the 1970s. The collection covers important periods in Mexican-American history, from the Mexican Revolution to the Bracero Program to the Chicano Movement. There are about 1,900,000 Latino and Hispanic population in Arizona and more than 50 million in the United States. Having this collection available to the public through digitization of these materials, will raise awareness to issues that advance the image and identity of Latinos in American politics and media and their contributions to the United States.

Source: University of Arizona Libraries

 Link to The Historic Mexican and Mexican American Press collection

Wilson Center Digital Archive: Declassified Historical Documents available to the Public

About:

The Digital Archive is a resource where students, researchers and specialists can access once-secret documents from governments and organizations all over the world.
Constructed and maintained by the Wilson Center’s History and Public Policy Program, the Digital Archive contains newly declassified historical materials from archives around the world—much of it in translation and including diplomatic cables, high level correspondence, meeting minutes and more. The historical documents presented in the ever-expanding Digital Archive provide fresh, unprecedented insights into recent international history. By making new sources available and easily accessible, the Digital Archive serves to deepen and enrich international scholarship, history education, and public policy debate on important global issues and challenges.

Included collections:

The Cold War International History Project (CWIHP)

The Cold War International History Project (CWIHP) supports the full and prompt release of historical materials by governments on all sides of the Cold War. It seeks to accelerate the process of integrating new sources, materials and perspectives from the former "Communist bloc" with the historiography of the Cold War which has been written over the past few decades largely by Western scholars reliant on Western archival sources.

The North Korea International Documentation Project (NKIDP)

The North Korea International Documentation Project (NKIDP) serves as an informational clearinghouse on North Korea for both the scholarly and policymaking communities by widely disseminating newly declassified documents on the DPRK from its former communist allies as well as other resources that provide valuable insight into the actions and nature of the North Korean state.

The Nuclear Proliferation International History Project (NPIHP)

The Nuclear Proliferation International History Project (NPIHP) is a global network of individuals and institutions engaged in the study of international nuclear history through archival documents, oral history interviews and other empirical sources. Recognizing that today’s toughest nuclear challenges have deep roots in the past, NPIHP seeks to transcend the East vs. West paradigm to work towards an integrated international history of nuclear weapon proliferation.

Browsing and Search options available: Wilson Center Digital Archive: International History Declassified.

Library of Congress Publication: Perspectives on Personal Digital Archiving

From the description:

In addition to the challenges institutions face with preserving their large collections of digital material, individuals are also facing the same challenges.  The challenge is – how to preserve these valuable materials for the long term, more and more of which are in digital format?  The ease involved in creating all this personal digital “content” – whether it’s email, digital photographs, scanned documents, etc. – belies the fact that all digital material, whether in large amounts or small, is fragile.  This fragility can be due to software/hardware obsolescence, not being able to find the files, or even just physical damage.

 Source Library of Congress

Download Library of Congress Publication: Perspectives on Personal Digital Archiving

Difference Among Latina/o, Asian American, and White Online [voter] Registrants in California

From the Introduction: 

On 19 September 2012, the state of California launched its online voter registration system. During the just under five-week window available for eligible voters to register online, 839,297 took advantage of this option.1 This large take-up by voters is especially notable given the state did not advertise its availability, nor did it launch a media campaign to inform voters about this option. Given that, it is reasonable to assume that voters heard about online voter registration from their social networks or from visits to the secretary of state’s website.

 22.6% percent of online registrants were Latina/o (N=189,502); 11.1% were of Asian origin (N=92,923); and 59.8% were white (N=501,614).2 These numbers are similar to the ethnoracial distribution of November 2012 registrants overall, of whom 22% were Latina/o, 9.1% were Asian American, and 61.4% were white. Our analysis of these voters shows that young Latinas/os were most likely to register online, Latina/o and Asian American online registrants were strongly Democratic in their party identification, and Latina and Asian American women registered online and turned out at higher rates than Latino and Asian American men. We also find that majorities of Latina/o and white online registrants were low or middle income, rather than affluent. Our analysis makes clear that studies of the California voting population need to look comparatively across ethnoracial3 groups and to consider gender, class, and age differences within those groups.

Source: Policy Reports and Research Briefs, Center for Latino Policy Research, Institute for the Study of Societal Issues, UC Berkeley [via eScholarship Repository]

Download full pdf publication: Difference Among Latina/o, Asian American, and White Online [voter] Registrants in California
 

NIJ Report: Predicting and Preventing Wrongful Convictions

From the overview:

Why are innocent people wrongfully convicted in certain cases yet acquitted in others? Could policy interventions prevent future erroneous convictions? NIJ-funded researchers at American University studied 460 violent felonies that occurred between 1980 and 2012 to find the answers.
The researchers did not study the factors that lead to the factually innocent people entering the criminal justice system in the first place. They focused instead on why some innocent people are convicted while others are released.

The researchers used a case comparison method — with a control group and logistic regression analysis — instead of the "case study" method researchers have used in the past. A group of 260 cases were identified from across the country where an innocent defendant was exonerated after conviction. These were matched with 200 "near miss" cases in which an innocent defendant was acquitted or the charges were dismissed before trial.

Source: National Institute of Justice (NIJ)

Download full pdf publication (433 pgs) | Download segments of report on the website

Individual Creativity, Ex-ante Goals and Financial Incentives

Abstract:

Creativity is a complex and multi-dimensional phenomenon that has hardly been considered by economists, despite a great deal of economic importance. This paper presents a series of experiments where subjects face creativity tasks where, in one case, ex-ante goals and constraints are imposed on their answers, and in the other case no restrictions apply. The effects of financial incentives in stimulating creativity in both types of tasks is then tested, together with the impact of personal features like risk and ambiguity aversion. Our findings show that, in general,financial incentives affect “in-box” (constrained) creativity, but do not facilitate “blue sky”(unconstrained) creativity. However, in the latter case incentives do play a role for ambiguity averse agents, who tend to be significantly less creative and seem to need extrinsic motivation to exert effort in a task whose odds of success they don’t know. We do find that measures of creative style, sensation-seeking preferences, and past involvement in artistic endeavors are related to our creativity score, but do not find any difference across gender for either form of creativity.

Source: Departmental Working Papers, Department of Economics, UCSB, UC Santa Barbara

Download full pdf publication:  Individual Creativity, Ex-ante Goals and Financial Incentives

Student Survey on Financial Literacy Shows Early Debt Correlates with Risky Behavior

About the Report:

Money Matters on Campus is a new report detailing the findings from a survey of 40,000 first-year college students from across the U.S. and demonstrating to colleges and universities how student financial problems not only impact individual student outcomes but also the institutional mission.

 The study—conducted by EverFi and sponsored by Higher One—surveyed students on banking, savings, credit cards and school loans. The majority of participants (91.2 percent) were first-year college students (mean age = 18.2 years). One of the many survey findings revealed a strong correlation between incurring early debt and not being affiliated with a banking institution. Further, an increased risk of negative financially related outcomes, as students and later in life, was correlated with current risky financial attitudes/behaviors.

Download pdf Report: Money Matters on Campus

Food Hardship in America Report

From the Press Release:

Millions of Americans continued in 2012 to struggle to afford enough food, according to new, up-to-date food hardship data from the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC). More than one in six Americans (18.2 percent) said in 2012 that there had been times over the past 12 months that they didn’t have enough money to buy food that they or their families needed.

 FRAC’s food hardship report – Food Hardship in America 2012 (pdf) – analyzes data that were collected by Gallup and provided to FRAC. The data were gathered as part of the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index project, which has been interviewing almost 1,000 households daily since January 2008. FRAC has analyzed responses to the question: “Have there been times in the past twelve months when you did not have enough money to buy food that you or your family needed?” The report contains data throughout 2012 for every state, region, congressional district, and 100 of the country’s largest metropolitan areas (MSA).

Source:  Food Research and Action Center (FRAC)

Download FRAC’s food hardship pdf report – Food Hardship in America 2012

Recent college graduates in the U.S. labor force: data from the Current Population Survey

From the press release:

Data collected each October in the School Enrollment Supplement to the Current Population Survey provide an annual snapshot of the demographic characteristics, labor force activity, and school enrollment status of each year's cohort of recent college graduates 

Every year, thousands of recent graduates of colleges and universities across the United States enter the labor force with newly minted degrees and high hopes about their employment prospects.1 In October 2011, 74.5 percent of the 1.3 million 2011 recent college graduates were employed, according to data from the Current Population Survey (CPS). The unemployment rate for the 2011 cohort of recent college graduates was 12.6 percent. CPS data also show variation in the labor force status of bachelor's and advanced degree recipients.

Download full pdf publication

Pew Research: Twitter Reaction to Events Often at Odds with Overall Public Opinion

Online Report:

The reaction on Twitter to major political events and policy decisions often differs a great deal from public opinion as measured by surveys. This is the conclusion of a year-long Pew Research Center study that compared the results of national polls to the tone of tweets in response to eight major news events, including the outcome of the presidential election, the first presidential debate and major speeches by Barack Obama.

At times the Twitter conversation is more liberal than survey responses, while at other times it is more conservative. Often it is the overall negativity that stands out. Much of the difference may have to do with both the narrow sliver of the public represented on Twitter as well as who among that slice chose to take part in any one conversation.

Source: Pew Research Center

Read online report: Twitter Reaction to Events Often at Odds with Overall Public Opinion

How Teachers Are Using Technology at Home and in Their Classrooms

From the overview:

A survey of teachers who instruct American middle and secondary school students finds that digital technologies have become central to their teaching and professionalization. At the same time, the internet, mobile phones, and social media have brought new challenges to teachers, and they report striking differences in access to the latest digital technologies between lower and higher income students and school districts.

Source: Pew Internet and American Life Project

Download full pdf report: How Teachers Are Using Technology at Home and in Their Classrooms

Download Survey Questions