Andrew D. Martin

Understanding Health Disparities: The Role of Race and Socioeconomic Status in Children’s Health

OBJECTIVES We sought to determine whether childhood health disparities are best understood as effects of race, socioeconomic status (SES), or synergistic effects of the two. METHODS Data from the National Health Interview Survey 1994 of US children aged 0 to 18 years (n=33911) were used. SES was measured as parental education. Child health measures included overall health, limitations, and chronic and acute childhood conditions. RESULTS For overall health, activity and school limitations, and chronic circulatory conditions, the likelihood of poor outcomes increased as parental education decreased. These relationships were stronger among White and Black children, and weaker or nonexistent among Hispanic and Asian children. However, Hispanic and Asian children exhibited an opposite relationship for acute respiratory illness, whereby children with more educated parents had higher rates of illness. CONCLUSIONS The traditional finding of fewer years of parent education being associated with poorer health in offspring is most prominent among White and Black children and least evident among Hispanic and Asian children. These findings suggest that lifestyle characteristics (e.g., cultural norms for health behaviors) of low-SES Hispanic and Asian children may buffer them from health problems. Future interventions that seek to bolster these characteristics among other low-SES children may be important for reducing childhood health disparities.

Multiparty electoral competition in the Netherlands and Germany: A model based on multinomial probit

A typical assumption of electoral models of party competition is that parties adopt policy positions so as to maximize expected vote share. Here we use Euro-barometer survey data and European elite-study data from 1979 for the Netherlands and Germany to construct a stochastic model of voter response, based on multinomial probit estimation. For each of these countries, we estimate a pure spatial electoral voting model and a joint spatial model. The latter model also includes individual voter and demographic characteristics. The pure spatial models for the two countries quite accurately described the electoral response as a stochastic function of party positions. We use these models to perform a thought experiment so as to estimate the expected vote maximizing party positions. We go on to propose a model of internal party decision-making based both on pre-election electoral estimation and post-election coalition bargaining. This model suggests why the various parties in the period in question did not adopt vote maximizing positions. We argue that maximizing expected vote will not, in general, be a rational party strategy in multiparty political systems which are based on proportional representation.

Automating tactile graphics translation

Access to graphical images (bar charts, diagrams, line graphs, etc.) that are in a tactile form (representation through which content can be accessed by touch) is inadequate for students who are blind and take mathematics, science, and engineering courses. We describe our analysis of the current work practices of tactile graphics specialists who create tactile forms of graphical images. We propose automated means by which to improve the efficiency of current work practices.We describe the implementation of various components of this new automated process, which includes image classification, segmentation, simplification, and layout. We summarize our development of the tactile graphics assistant, which will enable tactile graphics specialists to be more efficient in creating tactile graphics both in batches and individually. We describe our unique team of researchers, practitioners, and student consultants who are blind, all of whom are needed to successfully develop this new way of translating tactile graphics.

Trajectories of Socioeconomic Status Across Children's Lifetime Predict Health

OBJECTIVE. Socioeconomic status is one of the most robust social factors associated with health, but the dynamics of how socioeconomic status over time affects childrens health remains unclear. This study tested how various models of childhood socioeconomic status (accumulation, change, variability, and critical periods of family income) would predict health outcomes at a final time point in childhood. METHODS. This was a prospective, longitudinal study of 6306 children who were aged 10 to 11 years and whose families were interviewed every other year from birth onward. The sample came from the US National Longitudinal Survey of Youth–Children. In the same data set, a replication sample of 4305 14- to 15-year-old children was also examined. Primary outcomes included parent report of asthma and conditions that limited activity and school and required physician treatment. RESULTS. Lower cumulative family income was associated with higher odds for having a condition that limited childhood activities, as well as a condition that required treatment by a physician at ages 10 to 11. Cumulative family income was a stronger predictor than change in income or variability in income. Lower family income early in life (ages 0–5 years) was associated with higher odds for having a condition that limited activities and a condition that required treatment by a physician at ages 10 to 11, independent of current socioeconomic status. Findings were replicated in the 14- to 15-year-old sample. CONCLUSIONS. These findings suggest that the accumulation of socioeconomic status in terms of family income across childhood is more important than social mobility or variability in socioeconomic status, although there may be certain periods of time (early life) that have stronger effects on health. These findings suggest the importance of childhood interventions for reducing health disparities.

The Supreme Court Forecasting Project: Legal and Political Science Approaches to Predicting Supreme Court Decisionmaking

This Essay reports the results of an interdisciplinary project comparing political science and legal approaches to forecasting Supreme Court decisions. For every argued case during the 2002 Term, we obtained predictions of the outcome prior to oral argument using two methods—one a statistical model that relies on general case characteristics, and the other a set of independent predictions by legal specialists. The basic result is that the statistical model did better than the legal experts in forecasting the outcomes of the Term’s cases: The model predicted 75% of the Court’s affirm/reverse results correctly, while the experts collectively got 59.1% right. These results are notable, given that the statistical model disregards information about the specific law or facts of the cases. The model’s relative success was due in large part to its ability to predict more accurately the important votes of the moderate Justices (Kennedy and O’Connor) at the center of the current Court. The legal experts, by contrast, did best at predicting the votes of the more ideologically extreme Justices, but had difficulty predicting the centrist Justices. The relative success of the two methods also varied by issue area, with the statistical model doing particularly well in forecasting “economic activity” cases, while the experts did comparatively better in the “judicial power” cases. In addition to reporting the results in detail, the Essay explains the differing methods

Critical Elections and Political Realignments in the USA: 1860–2000

The sequence of US presidential elections from 1964 to 1972 is generally regarded as heralding a fundamental political realignment, during which time civil rights became as important a cleavage as economic rights. In certain respects, this realignment mirrored the transformation of politics that occurred in the period before the Civil War. Formal models of voting (based on assumptions of rational voters, and plurality-maximizing candidates) have typically been unable to provide an account of such realignments. In this paper, we propose that US politics necessarily involves two dimensions of policy. Whatever positions US presidential candidates adopt, there will always be two groups of disaffected voters. Such voters may be mobilized by third party candidates, and may eventually be absorbed into one or other of the two dominant party coalitions. The policy compromise, or change, required of the successful presidential candidate then triggers the political realignment. A formal activist-voter model is presented, as a first step in understanding such a dynamic equilibrium between parties and voters.

Congressional Decision Making and the Separation of Powers

To what extent does the separation of powers affect congressional roll call voting behavior? To answer this question, I offer a strategic model of congressional decision making that asserts members of Congress pursue public policy goals when casting roll call votes. From the equilibrium predictions of a formal model, I generate testable hypotheses by computing the expected net amount of sophisticated (nonsincere) congressional behavior given changes in decision context. I test the predictions of the theoretical model with data from all civil rights roll call votes from the 83d to the 102d Congress. The results demonstrate that both the other legislative chamber and the Supreme Court profoundly constrain House members and senators when casting roll call votes. This is strong evidence of the importance of policy outcomes to members of Congress when voting on the floor.

Competing Approaches to Predicting Supreme Court Decision Making

Political scientists and legal academics have long scrutinized the U.S. Supreme Courts work to understand what motivates the justices. Despite significant differences in methodology, both disciplines seek to explain the Courts decisions by focusing on examining past cases. This retrospective orientation is surprising. In other areas of government, for example, presidential elections and congressional decision making, political scientists engage in systematic efforts to predict outcomes, yet few have done this for court decisions. Legal academics, too, possess expertise that should enable them to forecast legal events with some accuracy. After all, the everyday practice of law requires lawyers to predict court decisions in order to advise clients or determine litigation strategies. The authors thank Michael Cherba, Nancy Cummings, David Dailey, Alison Garvey, Nick Hershman, and Robin Rimmer for their assistance. Their project is supported in part by National Science Foundation grants SES-0135855 and SES 0136679. The foundation bears no responsibility for the results or conclusions.

The norm of prior judicial experience and its consequences for career diversity on the U.S. Supreme Court

Introduction 906 I. The Norm of Prior Judicial Experience 909 A. Evidence for the Existence of the Norm 909 B. Career Homogeneity Resulting from the Norm 917 1. Occupation at Time of Appointment 918 2. Homogeneity of Career Paths 927 C . D iscussion 937 II. The Importance of Diversity in Institutions 941 A. A General Argument for Diversity 942 1. Diversity in Collective Decision-Making Bodies 944

Partisanship and Pre-Floor Behavior: The Equal Rights and School Prayer Amendments

We examine the effect of issue preferences and partisanship on prefloor behavior by explaining cosponsorship and discharge petition activity over two proposed constitutional amendments, the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) in 1970 and the School Prayer Amendment (SPA) in 1971. Previous research has largely focused on the ability of the majority party leadership in the post-Reform House to employ party as a solution to the collective action problem inherent to policy making. We extend the conception of the role of party, arguing that non-leadership issue entrepreneurs are also capable of utilizing party to bring about collective policy outcomes even during the less party-centered pre-Reform era. Our results show that when entrepreneurs have access to institutional resources, both issue preferences and partisanship explain discharge petition activity; when they do not, discharge petition behavior is almost exclusively preference-based with inconsistent party effects. This research thus highlights the conditions under which party can be employed to build legislative coalitions.