No abstract

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.This study examined the relationship between aging and religious participation, focusing on changes in older people's formal participation in church life, informal or private religious practices, and attitudes towards participation in the church. Survey data from a random sample of older persons in a medium-sized northeastern city included both objective and subjective measures of health. Contrary to earlier studies which relied on subjective health as the sole indicator of health status, multiple regression analyses showed that health, especially as measured by health-related, functional limitations, serves an important mediating role. Older people experience greater functional limitations and, in turn, are less likely to engage in various church activities. These findings have important implications for the activity-disengagement debate within social gerontology and also for the concern in the sociology of religion with the role of religion in older people's lives.

Research on differential justice suggests the need for analyses of the independent and interactive effects of offender and victim social characteristics on judicial decisions. The article that follows addresses this issue through an application of analysis of variance to data on the adjudication of cases in homicide (N = 444 defendants and 432 victims). The findings of the study suggest that male defendants, white, female, and higher-status victims, and lower-status persons held in the death of those of higher status elicit the more severe legal response. We argue that this pattern may be a product of an interpretive process wherein authorities come to rely on the social attributes of actors in arriving at determinations of culpability in an offense characterized by complex social relationships. That the analysis reveals no differences in the adjudication of inter- and intraracial and inter- and intragender offenses, or independent effects of the defendant's race or occupational prestige on adjudication also has implications for the findings of prior research in these areas.

A study of the legal treatment of inter‐group and intra‐group homicides reveals that dispositional decisions are made on the basis of the sex and occupational prestige combinations of offender‐victim pairs. Discriminant analysis of data concerning 444 defendants and 432 victims indicates that males accused of slaying females receive the most severe dispositions, while females held in the death of males are noticeably underpenalized. Final convictions are most severe for low status defendants alleged to have murdered high status victims. Contrary to earlier studies, there are no significant differences in legal treatment in terms of the racial combinations of the offender‐victim pair. An interpretive approach to the legal process may explain these results: differential processing of homicides depends on the extent to which defendants and victims conform to the popular conception of violent criminality.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.