The purpose of this study was to test the cross-lagged association between peer delinquency and antisocial cognition in a group of early to middle adolescent respondents assessed once a year for a period of 5 years. Peer delinquency was operationalized as the proportion of friends participants believed engaged in various forms of criminality within the past year after controlling for their own level of delinquent behavior. Applying a random intercept cross-lagged panel model (RI-CLPM) to data obtained from a sample of 1,635 youth (758 males, 877 females) revealed the presence of bidirectional associations between peer delinquency and moral neutralization and between peer delinquency and cognitive impulsivity in three out of four instances each and a unidirectional association in the fourth. These findings support the notion that peer delinquency not only contributes to antisocial cognition but is shaped by it as well.
The use of social media screening in police recruitment has grown rapidly since the early 2010s, yet its adoption varies across law enforcement agencies. Drawing on contingency, institutional, and resource dependency theories, this study is the first to use 2020 Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics data to examine whether agency size and complexity, formalization, resources, and community policing orientation are associated with the adoption of social media screening. The findings show that agencies with greater organizational complexity, formalization, and technological resources are more likely to use social media in background checks. In contrast, adoption among very small agencies (serving fewer than 10,000 residents) is negatively associated with higher minority representation and stronger community engagement. In addition, a stark gap in policy formalization emerges, as only 1.67% of very small departments publish screening policies online, whereas 30.9% of large agencies publish theirs. Interestingly, the few available small-agency policies are highly comprehensive because they utilize the standardized Lexipol template. Theoretically, these findings support a paradox of capacity versus context, demonstrating that technology adoption is bounded by local contexts rather than a uniform standard of administrative progress. Policymakers should therefore avoid one-size-fits-all mandates. While providing standardized templates can ease the resource burden of formalization, written rules do not inherently eliminate discretion, which remains a double-edged sword for equitable implementation.
Many individuals enter correctional facilities with untreated oral health needs, and their conditions often worsen after release due to a lack of ongoing preventive and comprehensive dental services at some facilities. Given the heightened vulnerability of this population and the broader public health implications, there is a pressing need to understand the current state of oral health service utilization and interventions that support formerly incarcerated individuals. This scoping review aims to map the existing literature on access to oral healthcare, service use, and intervention models for formerly incarcerated individuals. The review adapted the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR). The systematic search yielded 515 studies, of which 18 met the inclusion criteria and were reviewed. The most frequently reported oral health outcomes included self-reported oral health status, periodontal disease, dental caries, and tooth loss. Across studies, the most commonly addressed social determinants of health were economic stability, healthcare access, and quality. While the studies varied in design, a consistent pattern emerged across the literature linking incarceration history to poorer oral health outcomes and reduced access to dental care. Taken together, these findings underscore significant gaps in continuity of care and highlight structural barriers to oral health for formerly incarcerated individuals, pointing to the need for more comprehensive, multi-level interventions.
