Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: During the last several years Russia started more openly to use energy and natural resources related issues as a critical form of leverage in relationships with EU, CIS, and Northeast Asian countries. To get more political and economic maneuver Moscow is trying to become a more diversified seller of its natural resources looking to the East. Resource and environmental issues have became important components of its ties with Northeast Asian giants (China and Japan), as well as with both Korean states.Trying to take more proactive stand in solving Korean Peninsula security issue (in a multilateral format) Moscow is ready to make a real input to satisfy DPRK energy needs, thus giving way to Northeast Asian strategic projects to build pipelines and expand transportation networks through DPRK territory.Considering the security implications of environmental issues, the chemical spill in the Amur River waters in Northern China brought serious socioeconomic damage to the Russian territories in the delta. At the same time joint efforts by the US and Japan to help Russia in dismantling nuclear submarines and processing nuclear waste became a real input to the safety of the Russian Far East and Northeast Asia. This positive experience in the sphere of nuclear safety is a sound manifestation that it is worth trying to use the multilateral model to develop and realize CBMS to solve the Korean Peninsula issue. Overall, the main research questions of the proposed paper would be as follows:- How well calibrated is the Russian NEP, and what may be its tactical and strategic consequences for Russia itself?- How will NEP influence Russian security and economic ties with key EU and CIS countries, USA, China, Japan, and other Northeast Asian countries? - What may be security implications of possible conflicts for access to Russian natural resources among countries of Eurasia and Northeast Asia?- What may be security implications of environmental issues (such as trans-boundary air and water pollution, shortage of water, nuclear waste dissemination, etc.) in Northeast Asia?

Publication Type: Individual Poster
Abstract: Background and Aims:
Previous research suggests that parents� power-assertive discipline (e.g., time-out, withdrawal of privileges) is associated with poorer child adjustment. However, Darling and Steinberg (1993) have proposed that the effects of such discipline may depend on the emotional climate in which such practices occur. Interestingly, this model has been infrequently tested in the literature, despite widespread agreement on the generally salutary effects of emotionally available parenting. The current research explores relations between maternal emotional availability, power-assertive discipline, and child competencies or behavior problems.
Methods:
36 mothers with first-born children from 17 to 52 months-of-age (M=30.89, SD=11.88) were home-visited to obtain semi-structured observations during free play and clean up. Mothers also completed questionnaires regarding discipline practices within the past week (PCRM; Holden, 2001) and their child�s social and emotional adjustment (BITSEA; Briggs-Gowan & Carter, 2002). Mothers� identified themselves as predominantly Caucasian (92%), and ranged in age from 19-41 (M=32.43, SD=4.76). Family annual income ranged from 13,000-132,000 (M=60,545, SD=26,536). Maternal sensitivity, structuring, and non-hostility were coded from observations utilizing the Emotional Availability Scales (Biringen, 1998). Interrater reliability (interclass correlation coefficient) on 15% of the total sample of observations ranged from .68-.85, with an average value of .76.
Key Results:
Separate regressions were run predicting children�s social and emotional competencies and problem behaviors. Predictors included parental emotional availability, current power-assertive discipline practices, and the interaction between the two. In both regressions, the �main effects� of emotional availability and discipline practices were non-significant, but their interaction was significant for predicting child competence, and marginally significant for predicting problem behaviors. Post hoc analysis of these interactions (Aiken & West, 1991) indicated that power-assertive discipline in the context of low emotional availability was associated with significantly fewer child competencies (�=2.38, p<.05) and more behavior problems (�=2.21, p<.05) in comparison with parents with greater emotional availability.
Conclusions:
These findings support Darling and Steinberg�s (1993) model of parenting and indicate that when mothers are emotionally available to their infants and young children, power assertive discipline is associated with higher levels of competence and lower levels of problem behaviors. In contrast, such discipline techniques in the absence of maternal emotional availability are associated with adjustment problems over time. Additional findings will focus on whether specific aspects of mothers� emotional availability are more salient moderators of discipline-child adjustment linkages than others.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper examines Congress's “Out of Iraq” caucus. Weaving together literatures on Congress and its members in foreign policy, we assess a variety of member characteristics to weigh their relative importance on members' choices to join the caucus.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: The paper concerns a specific type of question wording often used in public opinion research : the assertion. This question format requires that the respondent tells whether (s)he agrees or disagrees with an evaluative assertion about a specific topic. The results of a methodological study in which assertions are compared with open questions will be presented.
A field experiment was designed to get more insight in the meaning of answers to assertions. Two hundred respondents were randomly distributed over four groups. The first group was interviewed with a questionnaire about asylum seekers. The questionnaire starts with assertions followed by open questions about the same topic. The second group obtained the same questions but the order of assertions and open questions was reversed. The third group was interviewed about traffic jam. The questionnaire starts with assertions followed by open questions. The last group was also interviewed about traffic jam but the order of assertions and open questions was reversed.
Systematic comparison of these groups is used to answer the following general research question: To what extent are answers to assertions valid representations of the way respondents talk about the question-topic? Especially relevant is the analysis of frames of references used by respondents in talking about a topic. For example, to what extent differ the definitions used by respondents in talking about asylum seekers or traffic jam from the definitions implied by the assertions in the questionnaire? And to what extent differ the criteria used by the respondent in evaluating the policy concerning asylum seekers or traffic jam from the criteria implied by the assertions in the questionnaire?
The choice of two very different question-topics offers the opportunity to detect if differences between answers to assertions and answers to open question are topic dependent.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper examines the interactions between the Anti-War (AW) and the Support Our Troops (SOT) movements, which mobilized in response to the recent Iraq war. Through the strategic use of identity and claims of legitimacy, the AW and SOT movements attempted to bolster the power of and support for their movements while denouncing the activists and goals of the opposing movement. We explore these dynamics through the use of ethnography, including participant observation and interviews. This research was conducted at 3 war protest sites in Southern California over a four-month period from before the war began until after the combat stage was declared over.