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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™

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Social Control, Law, Crime, and Deviance

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University of Nebraska - Lincoln

2013

Articles 1 - 7 of 7

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Juvenile Court Officers’ Perceptions Of Innovation Adoption; What Personal And Contextual Factors Make A Difference In Levels Of Adoption? An Exploratory Mixed-Method Study., Brenda Jean Moran Dec 2013

Juvenile Court Officers’ Perceptions Of Innovation Adoption; What Personal And Contextual Factors Make A Difference In Levels Of Adoption? An Exploratory Mixed-Method Study., Brenda Jean Moran

College of Education and Human Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This exploratory research examined levels of innovation adoption among Juvenile Court Officers (JCOs) in a Midwestern state. The researcher applied Dr. Everett M. Rogers’ Diffusion of Innovation model as the study’s framework. According to Rogers (2003), innovation is “an idea, practice or object that is perceived as new by an individual or other unit of adoption” (p. 475). The study sought to determine the extent that demographic and work-life variables such as gender, office location, caseload, years of service, personality/temperament and employee engagement contributed to levels of innovation adoption by JCOs. This study examined the characteristics of individuals and contexts …

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Reflections On The Metamorphosis At Robben Island: The Role Of Institutional Work And Positive Psychological Capital, Wayne F. Cascio, Fred Luthans Dec 2013

Reflections On The Metamorphosis At Robben Island: The Role Of Institutional Work And Positive Psychological Capital, Wayne F. Cascio, Fred Luthans

Department of Management: Faculty Publications

Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners from South Africa were imprisoned on notorious Robben Island from the mid-1960s until the end of the apartheid regime in 1991. The stark conditions and abusive treatment of these prisoners has been widely publicized. However, upon reflection and in retrospect, over the years, a type of metamorphosis occurred. Primarily drawing from firsthand accounts of the former prisoners and guards, it seems that Robben Island morphed from the traditional oppressive prison paradigm to one where the positively oriented prisoners disrupted the institution with a resulting climate of learning and transformation that eventually led to freedom …

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Family Histories And Multiple Transitions Among Homeless Young Adults: Pathways To Homelessness, Kimberly A. Tyler, Rachel M. Schmitz Oct 2013

Family Histories And Multiple Transitions Among Homeless Young Adults: Pathways To Homelessness, Kimberly A. Tyler, Rachel M. Schmitz

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

This study explored the early family histories of homeless young adults, the types and number of transitions they experienced, and their pathways to the street. Intensive qualitative interviews were audio taped and transcribed with 40 homeless young adults 19 to 21 years of age in the Midwest. Findings show that family backgrounds were generally characterized by substance use, child maltreatment, and witnessing violence, all of which provide social context for understanding why so many of these young people opted to leave home in search of an alternative living situation. The current findings also reveal that while some young adults ran …

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Homeless Youths’ Hiv Risk Behaviors With Strangers: Investigating The Importance Of Social Networks, Kimberly A. Tyler Jun 2013

Homeless Youths’ Hiv Risk Behaviors With Strangers: Investigating The Importance Of Social Networks, Kimberly A. Tyler

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between homeless youths’ HIV risk behaviors with strangers and risk and protective characteristics of their social networks. Data were from the Social Network and Homeless Youth Project. A total of 249 youth aged 14 to 21 years were interviewed over 15 months in three Midwestern cities in the United States using a systematic sampling strategy. Multivariate results revealed that homeless youth with a greater average number of network members who engaged in more drug risk behaviors and who pressured them into precarious behaviors at least once were more likely to …

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Adolescent Depressive Symptoms And Substance Use: The Mediating Influence Of Health Service Utilization, Sarah E. Malone May 2013

Adolescent Depressive Symptoms And Substance Use: The Mediating Influence Of Health Service Utilization, Sarah E. Malone

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

A large number of American adolescents suffer from depression and the consequences have been shown to be detrimental to their well-being. Adolescent substance use is also an increasing social problem due to the high usage rates and negative lifelong consequences for users. This paper explores the relationships between victimization, substance use, psychological health service utilization, and depressive symptoms in a sample of 4,757 adolescents. Using two waves of data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), the results revealed a positive relationship between victimization and adolescent depressive symptoms, even after controlling for several demographic variables and previous …

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Sins Of Our Fathers (And Mothers): Impact Of Parental Incarceration Upon Education Outcomes, Patrick Habecker Apr 2013

Sins Of Our Fathers (And Mothers): Impact Of Parental Incarceration Upon Education Outcomes, Patrick Habecker

Department of Sociology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

In 2007, it was estimated that 2.3% of all children in the U.S. under the age of 18 had a parent currently in prison or jail (Glaze and Maruschak 2008). A growing body of research on the experiences of children who have had a parent to go prison or jail has exposed a number of detrimental outcomes associated with parental incarceration, including lower education outcomes (Foster and Hagan 2007), higher risk of mental health problems (Farrington et al. 2001), and increased contact with the criminal justice system later in life (Huebner and Gustafson 2007). This study used data from the …

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Justice League? Depictions Of Justice In Children’S Superhero Cartoons, Lisa A. Kort-Butler Jan 2013

Justice League? Depictions Of Justice In Children’S Superhero Cartoons, Lisa A. Kort-Butler

Department of Sociology: Faculty Publications

The literature argues that media depictions of criminal justice present messages that conform to and promote the dominant ideology about the crime problem and how to solve it. Research has focused on television news and adult programs, but little research has examined messages about justice present in children’s shows. To fill this gap, an ethnographic content analysis of children’s cartoons was conducted, using a sample of episodes from Batman: The Animated Series, Spider-Man, and Justice League Unlimited. Several themes emerged. First, the justice system is often depicted as ill equipped to handle serious crime. Second, story lines suggested that the …

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