College of Behavioral & Social Sciences
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The collections in this community comprise faculty research works, as well as graduate theses and dissertations..
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Item Feasibility and initial efficacy of a culturally sensitive women-centered substance use intervention in Georgia: Sex risk outcomes(Springer Nature, 2015-12-08) Jones, Hendrée E.; Kirtadze, Irma; Otiashvili, David; Murphy, Keryn; O’Grady, Kevin E.; Zule, William; Krupitsky, Evgeny; Wechsberg, Wendee M.This paper reports on the feasibility and initial efficacy of a culturally sensitive, comprehensive women-centered substance use intervention for women who inject drugs in Georgia in terms of the primary and secondary sex risk outcomes. The hypothesis under examination was that, relative to case management participants, participants in a culturally sensitive, comprehensive women-specific and -centered intervention would, on average, show significant decreases in past-30-day frequency of unprotected sex, unprotected sex at the last sexual encounter, and increases in condom use and safer sex actions. The study was a two-arm randomized trial, in which 173 potentially eligible women were screened, and those 128 women determined to be eligible were assigned at random to either Reinforcement-based Treatment plus Women’s Co-Op (RBT + WC) or case management (CM). RBT + WC participants received 12 sessions of a structured intervention with the goal of reducing risky sex and substance use and improving physical and mental health. CM participants received 12 sessions of case management and informational brochures that focused on the same issues on which RBT + WC focused. Participants were assessed at baseline, post-treatment, and 3 months following treatment enrollment. Analyses revealed case management having significantly overall higher Safer Sex action scores than RBT + WC, and a significant decrease over time for past 30-day number of unprotected sex acts. Unprotected sex at the last encounter and Condom Use action scores were nonsignificant. Women who inject drugs in Georgia are engaging in risky sexual practices, and are in need of an intervention that addresses these risky behaviors. Reasons for the failure to find differences between a culturally sensitive, comprehensive women-centered intervention and case management tailored to the needs of women who inject drugs in Georgia may have been the result of inadequate power to detect an effect in a sample whose drug use was not as serious as warranted by the intervention. (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT01331460)Item Partition as a Solution to Ethnic Civil War: Statehood, Demography, and the Role of Post-War Balance of Power for Peace(2009) Johnson, Carter Randolph; Lichbach, Mark I; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Partition has been proposed as a way to (i) end ethnic civil wars and to (ii) build a lasting peace after ethnic civil wars end. This dissertation builds on partition theory and the ethnic security dilemma in three ways, demonstrating empirical support for a novel theory of why violence recurs following the end of ethnic civil wars and how partition can be used to prevent such violence. The dissertation begins by introducing the puzzle of ethnic group concentration: the social sciences have demonstrated that concentrated ethnic groups produce both peace and violence. The first case study discredits the notion that ethnic group concentration produced during ethnic civil wars will produce an end to ethnic civil wars. I conducted detailed field research, producing a longitudinal study of ethnic migration and violence in the Georgia-Abkhaz civil war (1992-1993), which acts as a crucial case. I conclude that partitioning groups does not end ethnic war. This is the first accurate empirical test of the ethnic security dilemma. Next, the dissertation looks at partition's ability to build peace by concentrating ethnic groups in new homeland states, and I argue that post-partition violence is caused by weak states and the triadic political space endogenously created by partitions that do not separate ethnic groups completely. I call this the Third Generation Ethnic Security Dilemma, building on previous ethnic security dilemma research. I test this empirically by introducing an index measuring the degree to which partitions separate ethnic groups, and I compare all ethnic civil war terminations between 1945 and 2004, demonstrating that partitions which completely separate ethnic groups provide a better chance for peace. Third, I selected two cases (Moldova and Georgia) to examine the causal processes of post-war recurring violence. Georgia, which experienced post-partition violence, and Moldova, which did not, act as a structured case comparison. I conclude that mixed ethnic demography interacts with state-building to cause or avert renewed violence.Item RACE AND THE DEATH PENALTY IN GEORGIA 1995-2004: HAS ANYTHING CHANGED?(2009) Joseph, Patricia; Paternoster, Ray; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This study examines the relationship between the race of victim and combination of victim and offender races on a prosecutor's decision to seek the death penalty. The objective is to offer an updated look at the Georgia capital sentencing system between 1995 and 2004. In an older Georgia study based on data from the 1970s, race of victim was found to be of critical importance in capital case processing. Given the changes that have occurred in Georgia's death penalty system to address disparate sentencing along with the number of years that have gone by, an argument can be made that a more current investigation may yield new findings. Using data from the Atlanta Constitution Journal, a logistic regression analysis is conducted. Results reveal that although race of victim is still relevant to a prosecutor's decision to seek a death sentence, its influence has diminished.