Perceptions Of Personal Security Research Articles

Role of Bystanders on Women’s Perception of Personal Security When Using Public Transport

Role of Bystanders on Women’s Perception of Personal Security When Using Public Transport

The Impact of Sex and Gender on the Perception of the Personal Security of Uniformed Public Services

The article presents a psychological approach to sex and gender in uniformed public services, and is based on the author’s own research. The research examines the role of women in the military and the popular perception of women participating in the armed forces, as well as possible differences in this regard between the military and the civilian environment. The paper also presents the results of research on the perception of personal security by uniformed public service members when on duty. In the course of the analysis of the factors significant for the investigated phenomenon, i.e. for the psychological gender, a number of specific research problems has been identified. The identified problems are dependent in nature and relate to the significance of relations between variables. The analysis of the research problem, conducted on the basis of subject literature, indicates that psychological gender is one of the significant factors that determine perceived personal security. This factor is chosen as the primary independent variable in this paper. Psychological gender is understood here as spontaneous readiness to apply the dimension of gender in relation to oneself and the external world.

A literature review of the passenger benefits of real-time transit information

ABSTRACTRecently, it has become common practice for transit operators to provide real-time information (RTI) to passengers about the location or predicted arrival times of transit vehicles. Accompanying this is a growing body of literature that aims to assess the impacts of RTI on transit passenger behaviour and perceptions. The main objective of this research is to compile a literature review of studies that assess the passenger benefits of RTI provision. The results suggest that the primary behavioural changes associated with providing RTI to passengers pertain to decreased wait times, reductions in overall travel time due to changes in path choice, and increased use of transit. RTI may also be associated with increased satisfaction with transit service and increases in the perception of personal security when riding transit. A second objective of this review was to identify areas for future research based on remaining gaps in the literature; two keys areas that were identified are assessing actual behavioural changes of path choice of transit riders and conducting cost–benefit analyses post implementation of RTI systems. The results of this study have immediate implications for public transit operators considering implementation or expansion of RTI systems and researchers seeking topics for future investigation.

Personal Security and Electoral Demobilization: A Comparative Analysis

AbstractThis research examines the link between the encroachment upon personal security and political participation among women in Lebanon and Morocco. Analyses are performed on the Status of Women in the Middle East and North Africa Survey conducted by the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) from August 2009 to June 2010. Results indicate a strong link between perceptions of personal security in both public and private spheres, and the propensity to vote. The results show that not feeling free to leave the home and experiencing regular sexual harassment in the public sphere curtail women's likelihood to vote. These findings have profound implications for shaping policies as they apply to women in the transitioning Middle East.

The games must go on? The influence of terror attacks on hosting sporting events in Israel

The terrorist campaign against Israel, euphemized as the ‘al-Aqsa intifada’, affected Israeli society in terms of perceptions of personal security, economic and political stability and aspects such as tourism and culture. The Israeli sporting scene was affected as well. From 2001 to 2004, international sports organizations adopted policies in stark contrast to one another. While some banned certain sports events from taking place in Israel, others obliged athletes to come to Israel and fined them for refusing to do so. A comparison of how these organizations chose to act in similar cases around the world reveals a striking inconsistency. An examination of the events and information provided in personal interviews indicates that sports associations fail to define terrorism and the conditions under which competitions should be banned.

How Insecurity impacts on school attendance and school drop out among urban slum children in Nairobi

This paper discusses how perceptions of personal security can impact on school enrolment and attendance. It mainly focuses on threats of physical harm, crime, and community and domestic violence. These security fears can include insecurity that children suffer from as they go to school, maybe through the use of unsafe routes; insecurity that children feel at school; and the insecurity they suffer from in their homes. Although poverty can be a source and/or an indicator of insecurity, this paper does not focus solely on poverty as it is well covered elsewhere in the literature. The paper relies on qualitative data col- lected in Korogocho and Viwandani slum areas in Nairobi, Kenya between October and November 2004. The paper analyses data from individual interviews and focus group interviews and focuses on the narrative of slum dwellers on how insecurity impacts on educational attainment. The conclusion in this paper is that insecure neighbourhoods may have a negative impact on schooling. As a result policies that address insecurity in slum neighbourhoods can also improve school attendance and performance.

Assistive navigational devices that incorporate principles of spatial cognition and imagery

We investigate a systems approach to developing a new class of assistive devices for the visually disabled. This systems approach consists of a simultaneous exploration of the content of mental representations of space in both the blind and the sighted, the development of a design method that aims at improving the ability of the visually disabled to elaborate mental representations of the space through which they are moving, and the development of socially anchored evaluation methods that ensure our new class of devices serve the needs of the disabled. This systems approach has led us to investigate a new aspect of the experience of the disabled—their personal safety and their perception of personal security. Safety and security have not been widely studied, except within a narrow definition of physical safety. Hence we use the fundamental research in spatial cognition to probe aspects of mental representations we expect to exploit in the development cycle, we investigate the concepts of safety and security from a social and psychological perspective and focus on the development of new evaluation indicators based on these concepts, and then introduce both these elements into a modified engineering design process and validation cycle. We illustrate the approach in terms of several projects presently under development.

An Empirical Typology of Perfectionism in Gifted Adolescents

We document a typology of perfectionism in a sample of academically talented adolescents and directly examine its relationship to indices of psychiatric symptomatology, adjustment, self-esteem, and coping. Adolescents enrolled in a state-funded residential academy for academically gifted high school students ( N = 141) responded to the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (Frost, Marten, Lahart, & Rosenblate, 1990), the Hopkins Symptom Checklist, the Mastery Coping and Superior Adjustment scales from the Self-Image Questionnaire for Young Adolescents, the Perception of Personal Security and Academic Competence scales from the Self-Esteem Index, and the Coping Inventory (COPE). A 2-step cluster analysis of perfectionism scores revealed four clusters: Mixed-Adaptive ( n = 51), Mixed-Maladaptive ( n = 20), Pervasive ( n = 30), and Self-Assured Nonperfectionist ( n = 39). The Pervasive and Mixed-Maladaptive clusters showed a uniformly poor profile of mental health, adjustment, and coping relative to Mixed-Adaptive and Nonperfectionists. The Mixed-Adaptive cluster reported greater academic competence and superior adjustment than did the Nonperfectionist cluster, although these cluster groups were statistically similar on other dimensions of mental health and adjustment. These results suggest that maladaptive perfectionism takes two forms: pervasive and mixed. Implications for intervention and directions for future research are discussed.

Junior and Senior Faculty Women: Commonalities and Differences in Perceptions of Academic Life

The purpose of this study was to explore the commonalities and differences in the perceptions of senior and junior faculty women regarding the barriers to success experienced early in academic careers. The population consisted of 22 pairs of junior and senior faculty women who participated in a mentoring program at a major public research university. Descriptive data indicate close agreement among junior and senior women faculty regarding the importance of the majority of potential barriers. Nonetheless, important differences exist. An exploratory factor analysis identified four underlying dimensions: personal security, work priorities, sense of belonging, and scholarly accomplishment. There was a significant difference between the two groups in their perceptions of personal security.