Rethinking the Mechanisms of Gang Desistance in a Developing Country

ABSTRACT

Most academic literature is based on experiences of gang members in developed countries. This article explores the mechanisms of desistance among street gangs in El Salvador. Gangs in this Central American nation, which include MS-13 and the 18^th Street gang, are known for complex structures and their transnational reach. Based on a survey with nearly 1,200 gang members and former gang members in El Salvador and 24 in-depth interviews with former gang members in rehabilitation programs, this study finds that the characteristics of the gang organization play a more significant role in the ways individuals exit the gangs in extremely violent contexts. It also shows that a religious experience is the most frequent mechanism to leave the group because it provides a safer alternative in those contexts.     

Entrevista a Dan I. Slobin

RESUMEN

El autor comienza explicando los factores que motivaron su interés por la psicolingüística evolutiva a principios de los sesenta. Tras exponer brevemente cuál es la significación del estudio del lenguje en la comprensión global del sujeto humano y justificar su atención a la adquisición de lenguas altamente inflexionales como el ruso o el turco, Slobin nos habla extensamente del Berkeley Crosslinguistic Acquisition Project (“Proyecto translingüístico sobre adquisición de Berkeley”), del cual fue uno de los máximos inspiradores. El autor aborda, además, cuestiones relativas a su teoría de la Gramática Básica Infantil, la síntesis de sus Principios Operativos para la adquisición del lenguaje o la posibilidad de aproximar las concepciones de Piaget y Chomsky. La última parte se reserva para las tendencias teóricas y de investigación que considera prometedoras en este campo, finalizando con algunas reflexiones en torno a la situación multilingüe de España y el estudio de la adquisición del lenguaje. Los comentarios de Miguel Pérez Pereira acerca de este importante investigador de la psicolingüística evolutiva introducen la entrevista.     

Problemas epistemológicos del concepto y definición de la psicología

RESUMEN

Todavía es reciente, en Psicología, el predominio de una actitud “epistemolófoba”, que rechazaba como acientífico cualquier intento de reflexión metacientífico sobre el objeto de la psicología y las formulaciones explicativas que define. En los últimos años, esta actitud ha cambiado y los psicólogos vuelven a considerar pertinente y necesaria la reflexión. En este trabajo se analizan los diversos modos de explicación de la conducta, sin exclusiones y a partir de la premisa de la “sobredeterminación” de la propia conducta. Se define la psicología científica como la ciencia de los principios, estructuras y funciones de la formalización conductual de la interrelación respectiva del hombre y su medio natural y social.     

Lepore and Ludwig on ‘explicit meaning theories’

The fundamental problem proponents of truth conditional semantics must face is to specify what role a truth theory is supposed to play within a meaning theory. The most detailed proposal for tackling this problem is the account developed by Ernest Lepore and Kirk Ludwig. However, as I will show in this paper, theories along the lines of Lepore and Ludwig do not suffice to put someone into the position to understand the objectlanguage. The fundamental problem of truth conditional semantics thus remains unsolved.     

Minority goals for interaction with the majority: Seeking distance from the majority and the effect of rejection on identification

Four studies investigated the conditions under which minority group members respond to group‐based discrimination with increased identification with their group. We propose that minorities' interaction goals should serve as a moderator: seeking distance from the majority might keep minority identification alive in the face of perceived discrimination. These predictions were tested correlationally in Study 1 among Chinese immigrants in Australia (sample 1a) and children of rural migrant workers in a Chinese city (sample 1b). In Studies 2 and 3, perceived discrimination was manipulated among Romanian immigrants in France and Polish immigrants in Scotland. In Study 4, both minority goals and perceived discrimination were manipulated among a sample of international students in Australia. Results showed that only for those who were inclined to seek distance from the majority, minority group identification increased when discrimination was high compared with low. Discussion focuses on the way that seeking distance might be an important strategy for coping with discrimination. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The role of outcome inhibition in interference between outcomes: A contingency‐learning analogue of retrieval‐induced forgetting

Current associative theories of contingency learning assume that inhibitory learning plays a part in the interference between outcomes. However, it is unclear whether this inhibitory learning results in the inhibition of the outcome representation or whether it simply counteracts previous excitatory learning so that the outcome representation is neither activated nor inhibited. Additionally, these models tend to conceptualize inhibition as a relatively transient and cue‐dependent state. However, research on retrieval‐induced forgetting suggests that the inhibition of representations is a real process that can be relatively independent of the retrieval cue used to access the inhibited information. Consistent with this alternative view, we found that interference between outcomes reduces the retrievability of the target outcome even when the outcome is associated with a novel (non‐inhibitory) cue. This result has important theoretical implications for associative models of interference and shows that the empirical facts and theories developed in studies of retrieval‐induced forgetting might be relevant in contingency learning and vice versa.     

The Catholic Church,moral doctrine,and HIV prevention in Recife,Brazil: Negotiating the contradictions between religious belief and the realities of everyday life

Religious beliefs have had a key role in shaping local responses to HIV and AIDS. As the world's largest Catholic country, Brazil is no exception. Yet little research has been conducted to document how religious doctrine is enacted in practice among its lay leaders and followers. In this article, we present ethnographic research from Recife, Brazil, conducted to understand the way in which religious doctrines are interpreted at a local level. Contextualised within the sociology of contemporary Brazilian Catholicism, we draw on interviews with clergy members, lay leaders, and parishioners to discuss how the Catholic Church's vision of sexuality translates into everyday lives of its followers. We explore the disjuncture between the Catholic ideals of fidelity and delaying sex until marriage with the everyday reality of the Church's followers, highlighting the role that gender plays in defining sexual roles and expectations. We conclude by posing questions for future research and HIV prevention strategies considering the formal institutional response of the Brazilian Catholic Church to AIDS on the one hand, and the social and cultural contexts in which Catholics live their daily lives on the other.     

Parental Acceptance and Children’s Psychological Adjustment in the Context of Power and Prestige

On a sample of 313 nine- through 16-year-old Spanish children this study explored the question: Is the relation between paternal versus maternal acceptance and the psychological adjustment of offspring significantly affected by the level of interpersonal power and/or prestige of each parent within the family? The relationship between perceived parental acceptance and children’s psychological adjustment depends on which parent was perceived by children to have higher interpersonal power or prestige than the other. This trend was especially strong in families when mothers were perceived to have both higher power and higher prestige than fathers. The strongest overall contribution to children’s adjustment, however, was made in families where fathers were perceived to have both the highest power and the highest prestige.