Exploratory Investigation On Theoretical Predictors Of The Electronic Leash

As technology has become an ever-present facet in the lives of young people, they have become reliant on it to form and maintain relationships. It has also helped facilitate negative relationship behaviors. The purpose of this study is to investigate theoretical predictors of negative relationships in a sample of university students. Results indicated that low self-control is a significant predictor of the behavior, but deviant peer association was not significant

I'm Watching You: Cyberstalking Behaviors Of University Students In Romantic Relationships

As technology has become an ever-present facet in the lives of young people, they have become reliant on it to form and maintain relationships. It has also helped facilitate negative relationship behaviors, such as the monitoring of romantic partners without their permission (aka cyberstalking). The purpose of this study is to investigate theoretical predictors of cyberstalking in a sample of university students by applying General Theory of Crime and Social Learning Theory. Results indicated that low self-control and deviant peer association are significant predictors of cyberstalking, specifically attempting to log-in to a person’s social media, as well as social media presence and sex

Examining The Effectiveness Of Academic Scholarship On The Fight Against Cyberbullying And Cyberstalking

Online victimization via cyberbullying and cyberstalking are plaguing our young online users. These tormenting and intrusive behaviors have infiltrated relationship formation, online communication and social identity. Friends and romantic partners have become increasingly dependent on the use of technology to initiate relationships. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the current state of these online crimes and the involvement of youth and young adults. We will consider current responses by our criminal justice system, as well as our educational and community groups. Based on what is currently implemented and its success factor, we will make our assertions about the effectiveness of scholastic work and its influence on what we are doing to combat these forms of cybervictimization

Examining the Role of Ambivalent Sexism, Violations of Traditional Feminine Norms, and Provocation in Men\u27s Aggression Toward Women and Female Intimate Partners

The aim of the present study was to investigate the hypotheses that men’s endorsement of hostile sexism (HS), but not benevolent sexism (BS), would be positively associated with their perpetration of laboratory physical aggression toward a female stranger who was perceived as low in her adherence to traditional feminine norms or their self-report of sexual and physical aggression toward a female intimate partner. Though these apriori hypotheses were not supported, exploratory analyses demonstrated that despite initial perceptions of a female as conforming to traditional feminine norms, receiving any provocation from that female elicited a significant increase in intensity of physical aggression following receipt of provocation from that female. These analyses similarly indicated that men’s endorsement of HS was positively associated with their perpetration of laboratory physical aggression and self-report of sexual, but not physical, intimate partner aggression. Clinical theory- and research-based implications are discussed

Needs Assessment for Animal-Assisted Interventions: Factors Influencing Implementation of Dogs as Judiciary Aids in Criminal Justice Processes in CPS Cases

The study presents findings from a needs assessment exploring the critical features or core elements that bear on professionals regarding the inclusion of dogs as judiciary aides in the investigation and prosecution of child maltreatment cases. Specifically, the objectives of the current needs assessment were examined through the following questions: (1) What are the perceived benefits of implementing programs with dogs as judiciary aids throughout criminal justice? (2) What specific roles do professionals identify for dogs within criminal justice, (3) What are potential barriers to the implementation of dogs as judiciary aids programs, and (4) How are the needs and expectations of agencies considering incorporating dogs similar to or different from those agencies that are currently incorporating dogs. The study identified a number of differences in the identified roles, barriers, and important factors reported by survey respondents. Quantitative analysis of responses regarding the role of dogs in the criminal justice setting revealed professionals identified roles for dogs that matched their particular scope of influence. Moreover, qualitative findings provided additional insight into participant’s concerns and convictions and their varying perceptions of factors central to the inclusion of dogs in criminal justice processes for child maltreatment. The study relies heavily on qualitative responses of participants. Implications are discussed with regard to micro and macro levels of social work practice and the field of implementation research

The Development and Validation of the Emotion Knowledge and Awareness Test

The purpose of this study was to develop, test, and pilot a general outcome measurement tool that will allow educators to test young children’s knowledge of factors of emotional development: emotional identification and fluency, understanding situations where multiple emotions are present, understanding that others may feel differently in situations, and emotional regulation (CASEL, 2014). There are few assessments that reliably measure emotion knowledge in early elementary grades. The Emotion Knowledge and Awareness Test (EKAT) has been developed for kindergarten through second grade students to measure emotion awareness across two domains: knowledge and management. It was developed as a pre/posttest assessment to measure levels of emotion knowledge and strategy gains associated with social-emotional learning curricula. Practitioners will learn about the content validation processes and initial piloting of the EKAT. The EKAT development took place over four distinct phases. Phase One included item development and informal content validation with practitioners. In order to develop the items, the principal investigator trained her research team on the steps for item generation. Phase Two included content validation of the EKAT from a panel of experts in the fields of child development, psychology and education as well feedback from practitioners. The third phase included a pilot study of the EKAT with a diverse population of students throughout Western Massachusetts. The final analysis phase of the EKAT included a classical test theory analysis to eliminate items with poor discrimination and an exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis to measure how the items fit into the knowledge and management domains

Monitoring, Creeping, or Surveillance? A Synthesis of Online Social Information Seeking Concepts

Affordances of Internet sites and Internet-based applications make personal information about romantic partners, friends, family members, and strangers easy to obtain. People use various techniques to find information about others, capitalizing on online affordances by using search engines to find relevant websites and databases; scouring the target’s social media or social networking site presence; accessing information about the target via their links or network association with others on social media; or asking questions or crowdsourcing information through online channels. Researchers have coined an assortment of terms to describe online social information seeking behaviors, such as interpersonal electronic surveillance, social surveillance, monitoring, patient-targeted Googling, cybervetting, websleuthing, human flesh search, lateral surveillance, Facebook surveillance, and Facebook stalking. Although considerable research has examined these behaviors, there has been little effort to clarify the concepts themselves. As a result, the literature is currently full of inconsistent and overlapping conceptualizations. To synthesize these concepts for future research, this review examines 73 online social information seeking concepts extracted from 186 articles. Specifically, the concepts are reviewed in light of their scope; the information seeker or target of information seeking (e.g., romantic partners, parents, children, employees, criminals); motives for information seeking (e.g., uncertainty, threat, curiosity); and the intensity of the behavior. Recommendations are provided for future research, such as employing clear conceptualizations and incorporating affordances. Finally, we offer a decision tree that researchers can use to help select appropriate terms to use in their work moving forward

Investigating the Utility of the Film War Zone as a Component of a Street Harassment Prevention Program

Street harassment, the sexual harassment by strangers in public places, is a common experience shared by many women and has been linked with other forms of sexual victimization. The negative impact of street harassment, such as fear and behavior to avoid being harassed, points to the need for preventing the behavior. This study sought to determine whether the documentary-style film War Zone may be effective in impacting men’s attitudes toward street harassment, and whether the effectiveness of the film would depend on men’s hostility toward women and level of peer acceptance for street harassment. Findings do not support the effectiveness of War Zone as a component of street harassment prevention. However, the data does suggest that endorsement of hostile attitudes toward women predicts a lack of empathy, and that endorsement of hostile attitudes toward women, a lack of empathy, and peer acceptance of street harassment predict acceptance of street harassment

Cognitive bias, personality and arousal in the domestic dog

The domestic dog has lived alongside humankind for many thousands of years, and in that time has undergone extensive selective breeding that has altered both morphology and behaviour. Our close relationship with dogs may to some extent be characterised by inter-specific communication, but this communication may lead to both understandings and misunderstandings. This thesis looks in part at how inter-specific misunderstandings may arise in the dog-human dyad, and how we may be able to both minimise misunderstandings and maximise understandings through our behaviour, the choices we make in training and husbandry practices, and the associations we expose dogs to. Also explored is dog personality, how this can be measured, and what measures of dog personality may mean for the health and welfare of individual dogs as well as patterns in behavioural tendencies. This is explored by way of a personality survey as well as with a cognitive bias task. Cognitive bias in animals has been investigated in recent years as a possible objective measure of positive and negative welfare by measuring the direction (positive or negative) of judgement bias – which refers to whether ambiguous signals are interpreted as predicting a positive or a negative outcome. Interpretation of cognitive bias results was explored and an index of judgement bias developed. The possible applications of a judgement bias index in conjunction with arousal to look at the role of emotional state on operant training procedures is also discussed