Explanations for child sexual abuse given by convicted offenders in Malawi: no evidence for "HIV cleansing"

Objective

A commonly cited, but unproven reason given for the rise in reported cases of child sexual abuse in Sub-Saharan Africa is the “HIV cleansing myth”—the belief that an HIV infected individual can be cured by having sex with a child virgin. The purpose of this study was to explore in Malawi the reasons given by convicted sex offenders for child sexual abuse and to determine if a desire to cure HIV infection motivated their offence.

Methods

Offenders convicted of sexual crimes against victims under the age of 18 were interviewed in confidence in Malawi's two largest prisons. During the interview the circumstances of the crime were explored and the offenders were asked what had influenced them to commit it. Each participant was asked the closed question “Did you think that having sex with your victim would cure or cleanse you from HIV?”

Results

58 offenders agreed to participate. The median (range) age of offenders and victims was 30 (16-66) years and 14 (2-17) years, respectively. Twenty one respondents (36.2%) denied that an offence had occurred. Twenty seven (46.6%) admitted that they were motivated by a desire to satisfy their sexual desires. Six (10.3%) stated they committed the crime only because they were under the influence of drugs or alcohol. None of the participants said that a desire to cure or avoid HIV infection motivated the abuse.

Conclusion

This study suggests that offenders convicted of a sexual crime against children in Malawi were not motivated by a desire to be cured or “cleansed” from HIV infection. A need to fulfil their sexual urges or the disinhibiting effect of drugs or alcohol was offered by the majority of participants as excuses for their behaviour.     

Conceptualizing Magnification and Scale: The Roles of Spatial Visualization and Logical Thinking

This study explored factors that contribute to students’ concepts of magnification and scale. Spatial visualization, logical thinking, and concepts of magnification and scale were measured for 46 middle school students. Scores on the Zoom Assessment (an assessment of knowledge of magnification and scale) were correlated with the Test of Logical Thinking (TOLT) and a series of four spatial visualization tests. Results showed that the TOLT was significantly correlated with the Zoom Assessment. There was also a significant correlation between the TOLT and spatial visualization assessments MV1 (Shape Memory), MV2 (Building Memory), the Storage Test, and the Surface Development Test. The implications of this study for further research are discussed.     

Estimating the relation between health and education: What do we know and what do we need to know?

The empirical link between education and health is firmly established. Numerous studies document that higher levels of education are positively associated with longer life and better health throughout the lifespan.But measuring the causal links between education and health is a more challenging task. Aside from the typical econometric concerns about measurement error, functional form, and sampling properties, measuring the causal impact of education on health is confounded by the likely causal effect of health on education, and vice versa. Concerns about ‘missing’ variables that affect both the accumulation of human capital and the health capital - such as measures of individual discount rates - also make causality difficult to measure.Despite the difficulties, there has been a marked surge over the last decade in the number of empirical studies attempting to estimate the causal links between education and health. This survey reviews recent empirical evidence on the topic. Following the bifurcation in the literature, we split the survey into two pieces. First, we review the evidence of the effect of education on health. The vast majority of work in this area focuses on schooling up through college and its effect on adult health, including longevity. Second, we review the evidence of the effect of health on education, including health shocks in the womb and their effects on educational attainment. Rather than attempting a comprehensive review, our focus is to highlight relatively recent research.     

Preparing Teachers for Anti‐oppressive Education: International movements

While theories and recommendations continue to proliferate in the educational research literature on what it means to teach towards social justice and to prepare teachers for such teaching, so do concerns that these theories and recommendations fail to account for the ways that the contexts of teaching—cultural contexts, national contexts, political contexts—always affect teaching in idiosyncratic, unpredictable and even contradictory ways. Given that much educational research fails to trouble the US‐centric nature of prevailing conceptions of social justice and teacher education, it is important to learn about the unique as well as shared challenges facing teacher educators around the globe. In this article, teacher educators from Asia, Africa, North America and South America offer a sampling of initiatives in anti‐oppressive teacher education; that is, initiatives to prepare teachers to teach various subject matters to various age groups, addressing various forms of oppression in various cultural and community contexts.     

Assessing multiple object tracking in young children using a game

Visual tracking of multiple objects in a complex scene is a critical survival skill. When we attempt to safely cross a busy street, follow a ball’s position during a sporting event, or monitor children in a busy playground, we rely on our brain’s capacity to selectively attend to and track the position of specific objects in a dynamic scene. This ability to visually track simultaneously moving objects in a continuously changing and multisensory environment is a critical component of nearly all forms of visual-motor coordination. While methods for assessing Multiple Object Tracking (MOT) in adults are well established, due to challenges associated with designing a MOT task suitable for young children, we have little understanding of MOT abilities under the age of 5 years. To better understand how and when young children learn to track multiple objects, we designed, implemented and evaluated TrackFX, the first game-based MOT task running on a touch tablet designed for children as young as 30 months old. We present findings from an empirical study of 31 children between the age of 30 and 58 months and implications for game-based learning.     

经济学视角下的国际学生学业差距分析

在国际范围内,最有影响力的学业成就测试项目主要由IEA和OECD两大组织举办,截至2007年共有96个国家参加过该类测试,在世界范围内产生了广泛影响.利用此类数据进行跨国比较研究成为教育经济学的最新热点,以汉纳谢克为代表的学者对此进行了持续探索.国际数据分析表明,与资源投入、学校制度等因素相比,教师质量对学生学业成就的影响更加重要.不仅如此,学业成就对于一国宏观经济增长具有巨大的促进,如果正确而适时地推动教育改革,一国经济将呈现稳定的增长态势.因此,对于中国来说,促进基础教育优质均衡发展是整个社会平稳发展的重要保障.     

Dual Credit/Dual Enrollment and Data Driven Policy Implementation

The use of dual credit has been expanding rapidly. Dual credit is a college course taken by a high school student for which both college and high school credit is given. Previous studies provided limited quantitative evidence that dual credit/dual enrollment is directly connected to positive student outcomes. In this study, predictive statistics were calculated using the generalized linear mixed model function in SPSS. For the final analysis, a two-level, propensity score weighted, multinomial logistic regression model was developed. Findings of this study are that even after controlling for selection bias, variation across high schools, and several education and socioeconomic status variables, dual credit/dual enrollment was significantly related to increased odds of enrolling at both four-year institutions and community colleges upon high school graduation. The opportunity presented by dual credit expansion and related policy recommendations are explored within the state and federal completion agenda context.     

Preparing schools to accommodate the challenge of Web 2.0 technologies

With laptops, mobile phones, tablets and broadband wireless access becoming more widely available, Web 2.0 is now entering schools. This changes the way students work and communicate, altering their relationship with knowledge, and generating new objectives for media literacy in the digital society. Thus, schools face new challenges and this paper aims at highlighting four of them. A first challenge relates to trust. Web 2.0 opens the classroom to the world and educators have to face new dangers and irrelevant uses, while bringing their students to gain better access to information and culture. The second challenge relates to teachers’ professional identities. The role of teachers is changing as Web 2.0 tools are being used by students, and policymakers should take this into account. A third challenge relates to a growing need to control working time, timetable organization and rhythm in schools. The fourth challenge that we underline is the need for common rules that allow students to benefit from the opportunities offered by Web 2.0 to develop their autonomy and to foster ethical practices.     

Culture and Survival: the role of symbol in improving the quality of a comprehensive school

The relationship between organisational culture and effectiveness is one of the dominant themes in current organisational and management theory. The major problem in the field is to establish a clear link between cultural change and increased effectiveness. The article illustrates one aspect of this relationship. Data for a comprehensive school in a London borough illustrate a steady decline in its intake and in the 11 + component of that intake. It then describes the steps taken by the head and staff collectively to strengthen the culture of the school. The data shows the consequent rise in both the overall intake and its 11 + component.