Susan McVie

Abstract: This article assesses the effectiveness of the Scottish model of youth justice in the context of a growing body of international research that is challenging the `evidence base' of policy in many w...

Abstract: This article explores children's experience of policing. Drawing on findings from the Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime, it argues that the police may be unfairly targeting certain cat...

Abstract: Based on findings from the Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime, this article challenges the evidence-base which policy-makers have drawn on to justify the evolving models of youth justic...

Abstract: This paper summarizes the purposes and methods of the Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime, a longitudinal study of 4,300 young people in the City of Edinburgh and the neighbourhoods where they live. The study is not concerned with early childhood influences, but with transitions and personal transformations during adolescence and early adulthood. It aims to explain why some, among all those with criminal inclinations, become offenders, and why some stop offending much sooner than others. Unlike previous studies, it focuses in particular on explaining gender differences, and on the mechanisms leading to serious, long-term, and frequent offending. It aims to assess the influence of contacts with the official systems on subsequent criminal careers. Finally, it integrates explanations at the levels of the individual and local community. The rationale for the basic design of the study is set out, and some early findings are presented and discussed.

Abstract: This meta-analysis of 161 published and unpublished manuscripts was conducted to determine whether the association between parenting and delinquency exists and what the magnitude of this linkage is. The strongest links were found for parental monitoring, psychological control, and negative aspects of support such as rejection and hostility, accounting for up to 11% of the variance in delinquency. Several effect sizes were moderated by parent and child gender, child age, informant on parenting, and delinquency type, indicating that some parenting behaviors are more important for particular contexts or subsamples. Although both dimensions of warmth and support seem to be important, surprisingly very few studies focused on parenting styles. Furthermore, fewer than 20% of the studies focused on parenting behavior of fathers, despite the fact that the effect of poor support by fathers was larger than poor maternal support, particularly for sons. Implications for theory and parenting are discussed.

Abstract: We have come a long way from the heady days of the Great Society, when most people seemed to believe that education would solve all of our problems, both intellectual and social The Coleman Report in 1966 cast the first doubts, and Jencks ( Inequality ) and Averch ( How Effective is Schooling? ) in 1972 seemed to make it official: nothing that schools do really makes any difference Considering that we spend more on schools than most other state and local governmental functions combined, this is indeed a dreary state of affairs Fifteen Thousand Hours has the temerity to question our present conventional wisdom It is a study of what things do make a difference in pupil outputs in 12 London inner-city secondary schools In many ways, it is a substantial improvement, methodologically, over previous studies First, it studies not just one output (which has usually been the score on some standardized test),

Abstract: Public confidence in policing has become an important issue in the UK. The police rely on legitimacy and public support, and initiatives to improve levels of confidence are currently underway. The point of contact between citizens and officers is vital in any such endeavour. But how are encounters judged and how important for public confidence are assessments of the quality of contacts? We draw upon data from the 2005/2006 Metropolitan Police Public Attitudes Survey to answer these questions. We test Skogan's (2006) finding that personal contact has a largely negative impact on confidence; we demonstrate that unsatisfactory contacts are indeed associated with less favourable opinions about police effectiveness, fairness and engagement with the community. Yet consistent with the procedural justice model we also show that positively received contacts can improve perceptions of fairness and community engagement. Moreover, seeing regular police patrols and feeling informed about police activities are associat...

Abstract: 1. The recent rise and fall of American violence 2. Some recent trends in US violence 3. Guns and gun violence 4. The limited importance of prison expansion 5. Patterns in adult homicide 6. The rise and decline of hard drugs, drug markets, and violence in inner-city New York 7. Have changes in policing reduced violent crime 8. An economic model of recent trends in violence 9. Demographics and US Homicide.