“Where You Lead,I Will Follow”: Partisan Cueing on High-Salience Issues in a Turbulent Multiparty System

The ability of parties to not only reflect, but actually shape, citizens' preferences on policy issues has been long debated, as it corresponds to a fundamental prediction of classic party identification theory. While most research draws on data from the United States or studies of low-salience issues, we exploit the unique opportunity presented by the 2013 Italian election, with the four major parties of a clear multiparty setting holding distinct positions on crucial issues of the campaign. Based on an experimental design, we test the impact of party cues on citizens' preferences on high-salience issues. The results are surprising: Despite a party system in flux (with relevant new parties) and a weakening of traditional party identities, we find large, significant partisan-cueing effects in all the three experimental issues, and for voters of all the major Italian parties—both old and new, governmental and opposition, ideologically clear or ambiguous.     

“If They Notice I’m Mexican”: Narratives of Perceived Discrimination from Individuals Who Crossed the U.S.-Mexico Border at Ports of Entry

ABSTRACT

Understanding individuals’ encounters with Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the largest law enforcement agency in the United States, is an important theoretical and policy-relevant issue. Travelers entering the U.S. through ports of entry may generalize their experiences with border officials to local law enforcement, and thus, negative experiences at ports of entry may reduce travelers’ willingness to cooperate with police and report victimization. Existing studies, however, have primarily examined unauthorized border crossings rather than travelers’ port of entry experiences. This study uses grounded theory and qualitative data to explore the perceptions and experiences of 191 young adults who discussed how individuals are treated when crossing the U.S.-Mexico border at land ports of entry. Findings show that participants reported perceptions and experiences of discrimination based on physical appearances, language differences, and nationality. Participants also described border officials engaging in routine law enforcement behaviors, including poor policing practices.     

When is the Wilcoxon–Mann–Whitney procedure a test of location? Implications for effect-size measures

The Wilcoxon–Mann–Whitney procedure is invariant under monotone transformations but its use as a test of location or shift is said not to be so. It tests location only under the shift model, the assumption of parallel cumulative distribution functions (cdfs). We show that infinitely many monotone transformations of the measured variable produce parallel cdfs, so long as the original cdfs intersect nowhere or everywhere. Thus there are infinitely many effect sizes measured as shifts of medians, invalidating the notion that there is one true shift parameter and thereby rendering any single estimate dubious. Measuring effect size using the probability of superiority alleviates this difficulty.     

From “4Rs and 2Ss” to “Amaka Amasanyufu” (Happy Families): Adapting a U.S.-based Evidence-Based Intervention to the Uganda Context

In Uganda, one in five children presents mental health challenges, including disruptive behavior disorders (DBDs). DBDs can persist through adulthood and result in negative outcomes. Effective interventions for DBDs have been developed and tested in high-poverty communities in developed countries. Yet, most African countries, such as Uganda, lack such interventions. This paper describes the adaptation process of an evidence-based intervention of U.S. origin to optimize fit to context with intervention fidelity, as part of a randomized trial conducted with youth that exhibit behavioral challenges and their caregivers in 30 schools in Uganda. The process involved: initial meetings with headteachers and teachers to introduce the study and the main concepts of the intervention; initial manual review focusing on 4Rs and 2Ss content by the Uganda team; engagement of community stakeholders for additional feedback on content and cultural relevance; final revision of the manual; and collection of children’s drawings for the illustration of the manual. This paper describes both similarities and differences between the original and adapted intervention content and methods of delivery. The findings also highlight the importance of involving community stakeholders in the adaptation process.