Substance abuse is an important risk factor for offending, but is mostly studied in males. The aim of this multicentre study is to gain insight into possible gender differences in substance abuse history and offending behavior in forensic psychiatric patients. Files were analyzed of 275 women and 275 matched men who have been admitted between 1984 and 2014 to one of four Dutch gender-mixed forensic hospitals. Risk assessment ratings were related to registered violent incidents during treatment for both women and men and to official recidivism data after discharge for a subgroup of 78 women. Substance abuse history was coded as a risk factor for more than half of the women (56.7%), but significantly more often for men (68.4%). Men were more often diagnosed with substance dependence and more frequently committed the index-offense whilst intoxicated. Prediction of violent incidents during treatment was more accurate for men. A history of substance abuse was not a significant predictor for recidivism after discharge in the subgroup women. It is concluded that there are gender differences in substance abuse history and that the relationship with offending behavior seems stronger for men. These differences have implications for substance use treatment in forensic mental health services.
Affective teacher–child relationships have frequently been investigated in school settings, but less attention has been devoted to these relationships in after-school care. This study explored caregiver- (N = 90) and child-informed reports (N = 90) of the affective caregiver–child relationship (N = 180 dyads) in Dutch after-school care, exploring gender differences at caregiver and child level and the relationship with a gender match between children and caregivers. The caregivers and children reported relatively high levels of closeness and relatively low level of conflict and dependency/autonomy support, irrespective of gender. Multilevel regression analyses revealed that a gender match between child and caregiver was associated with teacher-reported closeness: levels were highest in female-girl dyads and lowest in male-boy dyads. Further, boys indicated the highest levels of autonomy in male-boy dyads, whereas girls indicated the lowest levels in female-girl dyads. Masculinity of staff was associated with more child-reported autonomy support, whereas femininity predicted caregiver-reported closeness in the relationship.
The aim of the study is to investigate the influence of gender and gender pairing on students’ learning performances and knowledge elaboration processes in Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL). A sample of ninety-six secondary school students, participated in a two-week experiment.Students were randomly paired and asked to solve several moderately structured problems concerning Newtonian mechanics. Students’ pretest and posttest performances were analyzed to see whether students’ gender and the gender pairing (mixed or single-gender) were significant factors in their problem solving learning in CSCL. Students’ online interactions were also analyzed to unravel the dynamic process of individual knowledge elaboration. The multilevel analyses revealed that a divergent pattern of knowledge elaboration was a significant predictor for students’ learning achievement, and in mixed-gender dyads students’ knowledge elaboration processes were more inclined to diverge from each other. Moreover, females in single-gender dyads significantly outperformed females in mixed-gender dyads. But this was not the case for male students.
