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The chapter considers the change of position of the Home Office on the value of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) in England and Wales which took place around 2003 after the end of the Crime Reduction Programme (CRP). Before the CRP Home Office researchers had shown little interest in RCTs; after it, they came close to arguing that no other kinds of evaluation research were worth doing. This represented a reversal of a position that had dominated Home Office thinking on the issue for almost 30 years – that RCTs were in general impractical and unlikely to produce clear-cut results. This view was based in part on the experience of RCTs in the 1970s, which led influential researchers to conclude that the method could not be transferred from medicine to criminal justice. But, disappointed with the lack of definite results from the CRP, the Home Office turned back to RCTs as a potential source of certainty about what works. The chapter considers two recent scholarly exchanges on the question, in relation to an evaluation of a community crime reduction programme, for which an experimental design was attempted but not achieved, and to Lawrence Sherman's recent advocacy of RCTs and his use of research on restorative justice as an example of the successful use of the method. The chapter argues that the restorative justice research, while of very high quality, does not provide as clear an example of the use of an RCT as Sherman claims, and concludes with some reflections on the inherent difficulties of criminal justice evaluation, and on the lack of a predictable, rational relationship between research quality and policy influence.

Rural theology is explained here as a form of practical theology that seeks to interpret the rural context in the light of the central themes of Christian theology and vice versa. If Christian theology can be understood as concerning belief in God and the understanding of human relationships with God, the created order, and each other in the light of that belief, rural theology expresses that in the light of the lived experience in a rural context, which for these purposes is the daily bulletin from Ambridge. The author draws on his experience of teaching in the Cambridge Theological Federation to reflect on three recent examples: the recent changes at Brookfield in response to the perennial issue of the milk price lead us to ask who benefits from the production of higher quality food; the care for the land and Adam Macy’s reforms at Home Farm point us to issues about sustainability and responsibility; and the cohesion of a community with shared values and its treatment of Rob Titchener asks questions about the limits of inclusion. As with much practical theology, the outcome of the reflection is in ethical action and some further ethical questions, which, as the example of Jim Lloyd’s philosophical conversations with Alan Franks illustrate, are not the monopoly of the Church.

This chapter explores social media and athlete mental health and well-being from a sociological perspective. The chapter provides an overview of current literature and encourages future research to address the mental health and well-being impacts of social media use among athletes.

The chapter synthesizes existing literature focusing on sociological approaches to mental health, social media's impact on mental health, and athlete mental health and well-being. Focus is given to the ways social media can impact athlete mental health and well-being through virtual maltreatment and using the platforms for social change and challenging stigmatization.

Virtual maltreatment typically manifests in the intersectionality between gender, race, and sexual orientation adding to mental health challenges of vulnerable groups. Conversely, athletes could help challenge stigmatization of mental health and use their status to create social change among social groups experiencing higher rates of mental health challenges.

The chapter reveals that sociological perspectives around athlete mental health and well-being related to social media are growing, yet predominately concentrate on publicly available social media content. Therefore, more concentrated efforts are needed to fully understand these impacts in the short and long-term.

The chapter provides one of the first insights on social media and athlete mental health and well-being from a sociological perspective and argues that athletes contend with unique stressors compared to the general population which can exacerbate mental health challenges. The chapter advances that more research is needed to inform practice and help safeguard vulnerable populations of athletes.

Of the many serious challenges confronting schools today, bullying and harassment perhaps pose the most deleterious and persistent long-term outcomes for students. The effects of bullying are not limited to the students targeted by these behaviors, but also negatively affect the bullies and bystanders who witness the events. An array of factors influence, or even perpetuate, school bullying. The factors are related to individual characteristics of the students, social relationships in school, family support, neighborhood influences, and community systems. In this chapter, we describe the effects of bullying and harassment and, provide a current perspective of the magnitude of the problem. We also discuss effective responses to bullying and harassment in schools and approaches for prevention. School-wide implementation of programs is highlighted.

This study delves into the factors that influence the practice of female genital mutilation in West Africa, as well as the health implications. An online cross-sectional study was conducted with the use of electronic questionnaire. The study was targeted at adult females who were between the age of 18 and 50 years old. The Uniform Resource Locator (URL) of the electronic questionnaire was administered on social media platforms (Facebook and WhatsApp) only through convenience and snowball sampling techniques. A sample size of 3,119 adult females participated in the study. Spearman rank correlation (r) was employed to test the hypotheses. Responses were gathered from adult females whom originates from nine West African countries which are Nigeria, Ghana, Mali, Liberia, Benin, Cameroon, Chad, Gambia and Guinea. The study found a strong and positive relationship between culture and the practice of female genital mutilation in West Africa, and there was a weak and positive relationship between religion and education, and the practice of female genital mutilation in West Africa. Despite the health risks, it was revealed that female genital mutilation remained uninterrupted in West Africa. The findings of this study imply that the culture of the people, religious belief system and education are critical factors in efforts to be considered when discouraging the practice of female genital mutilation. Therefore, for healthy living, the practice of female genital mutilation should be discouraged in the study area. Based on the study outcome, recommendations were suggested.

This paper uses the case of the English East India Company to consider the impact of colonialization on patterns of trade. The East India Company went through a commercial and a colonial period in Asia and therefore provides a rare case in which fixed national effects are held constant while the degree of colonialism varies. We use this variation to consider the impact of colonial institutions on the degree of concentration in overseas trade. We find that the onset of colonialism is linked to increasing inequality in the distribution of traffic across ports. This finding is significant because of the relationship between overseas trade and the potential for long-term economic development: the development trajectories of the individual ports were likely to have been affected by these different rates of trade. Our findings also highlight how the negotiation between political and commercial goals in early modern trade and imperialism produced different macro-structural outcomes for global trade patterns.