Faculty Reported Among Top 2% in Scholarly Citations

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Eighteen faculty members affiliated with UCLA Luskin are included in a listing of the top 2% for scholarly citations worldwide in their respective fields as determined by an annual study co-produced by Stanford University researchers. The 2021 report is a publicly available database that identifies more than 100,000 top researchers and includes updates through citation year 2020. The lists and explanations of study methodology can be found on Elsevier BV, and an article about the study was published by PLOS Biology. Separate data sets are available for career-long and single-year impact. The researchers are classified into 22 scientific fields and 176 subfields, with field- and subfield-specific percentiles provided for all researchers who have published at least five papers. The following current and past scholars with a UCLA Luskin connection met the study’s criteria to be included among the most-cited scholars:

Laura Abrams

Ron Avi Astor

Evelyn Blumenberg

Randall Crane

Dana Cuff

Yeheskel Hasenfeld (deceased)

Aurora P. Jackson

Duncan Lindsey

Susanne Lohmann

Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris

Thomas Rice

Ananya Roy

Robert Schilling

Donald Shoup

Michael Storper

Brian Taylor

John Villasenor

Martin Wachs (deceased)

 

Jackson Selected as American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare Fellow

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Professor Emerita of Social Welfare Aurora Jackson was elected as a 2022 fellow by the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare. The academy is a prestigious society of distinguished scholars and practitioners dedicated to achieving excellence in the field of social work and social welfare through high-impact work that advances social good. The fellowship program recognizes and celebrates outstanding social work and social welfare research, scholarship and practice. Jackson’s scholarship examines the interrelationships among economic hardship, parental psychological well-being, parenting in the home environment, and child developmental outcomes in families headed by low-income, single-parent mothers with young children. When she is formally inducted with 15 other fellows in January 2022, Jackson will become the second woman from UCLA to join the academy, following the induction of Social Welfare Chair Laura Abrams in 2020. Academy fellows are nominated confidentially, then confirmed by a supermajority of current academy members. “Being a member of the academy is the highest honor the profession can bestow on a scholar,” said Social Welfare Professor Ron Avi Astor, who was inducted into the academy in 2017. Jackson will contribute to the growing list of UCLA Luskin Social Welfare scholars who have been inducted as academy fellows. In addition to Abrams and Astor, they include Distinguished Professor Emeritus Stuart A. Kirk (2010), Professor Emeritus James Lubben (2011), Professor Emeritus Robert Schilling (2011) and the late Professor Yeheskel “Zeke” Hasenfeld (2013). — Zoe Day

Abrams Book Compiles Global Research on Child Imprisonment

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A new book co-edited by Professor Laura Abrams, chair of UCLA Luskin Social Welfare, seeks to educate students, scholars and policymakers about the role of incarceration in young people’s lives. “The Palgrave International Handbook of Youth Imprisonment” compiles research from dozens of scholars from around the world on cross-cutting themes including the conditions of confinement, gender/sexuality and identity, juvenile facility staff, young people’s experiences in adult prisons, and new models and perspectives on juvenile imprisonment. “Numerous children are imprisoned across the globe in deplorable conditions, despite international legal conventions which suggest that children should be detained only as a last resort,” write Abrams and co-editor Alexandra Cox of the University of Essex. In addition to facing lengthy terms of imprisonment, a substantial number of children are exposed to abuse and violence in custody, poor health and mental health care, and a lack of access to educational, vocational and training opportunities. Some nations, however, have instituted reforms that have greatly decreased the number of children held in confinement. The handbook offers far-flung criminal justice systems the opportunity to learn from one another: “In this volume, we bring together views from a wide variety of countries and contexts to present the most recent cutting-edge research on youth imprisonment that has the potential to shape how the field can create better systems of care for all young people in conflict with the law.”

 

Social Welfare Issues Update About Anti-Racism Efforts

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The UCLA Luskin Social Welfare faculty, students and alumni who joined forces in summer 2020 to craft an Action Plan to Address Anti-Blackness and Racism recently issued a progress report and accompanying video explaining their efforts. The team came together following the killing of George Floyd to examine the curriculum and culture, developing a set of action items to address racial disparities within the department and across the education of social workers. Their new report details progress that has been made so far, including a series of virtual events during the 2020-21 academic year that focused on racial justice and the history of how white supremacy has impacted the practice of social work. The progress report also discusses areas where further progress is needed at UCLA Luskin, such as recruiting more Black faculty members and providing additional funding opportunities to students of color. Read more about the team and their efforts.

VIEW PROGRESS REPORT

Watch the video

Abrams on Harsh Effects of Entangling Children in the Justice System

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Social Welfare Chair Laura Abrams co-authored two commentaries aimed at galvanizing support for establishing a national minimum age of juvenile justice jurisdiction — an age below which a child cannot be prosecuted in juvenile court. Writing in JAMA Pediatrics and the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Abrams argued that “entangling children in the justice system is harsh and developmentally incongruent with children’s needs.” With co-authors Destiny G. Tolliver of the Yale School of Medicine, Eraka Bath of UCLA Psychiatry and Elizabeth S. Barnert of the UCLA Geffen School of Medicine, Abrams called for the establishment of a federal statute establishing a national minimum age of 12 years or higher for juvenile justice jurisdiction. “Child and adolescent psychiatrists should educate others on the psychosocial risks of early juvenile justice involvement, condemn its racist impact and drivers, and bolster family and community supports for youths with behavioral health and social needs,” the authors wrote.

Read the JAMA Pediatrics commentary
Read the JAACAP commentary

 

‘Halfway Home’ Book Talk Explores the Afterlife of Mass Incarceration

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Sociologist Reuben J. Miller shared highlights from his new book on the inequities of the U.S. criminal justice system during a virtual dialogue on March 11, part of the Transdisciplinary Speaker Series at UCLA Luskin. “Halfway Home: Race, Punishment and the Afterlife of Mass Incarceration” is the culmination of Miller’s years of research in Chicago and Detroit, including over 250 interviews with prisoners, former prisoners, and their friends and families. “It takes more than a few hours and a few cups of coffee to learn about a person,” said Miller, explaining that he wanted to move past the caricatures we have learned to embrace. In the second half of the event, Social Welfare Chair Laura Abrams moderated a discussion about the repercussions of mass incarceration. Michael Mendoza, director of national advocacy for the Anti-Recidivism Coalition, said prison is like a ghost that follows you throughout your life. “The prison-industrial complex doesn’t just punish people physically but emotionally and mentally as people try to get their footing on the ground,” he said. Amada Armenta Ph.D. sociology ’11, associate professor of urban planning, noted the importance of producing research on criminal justice that is accessible for readers in order to facilitate a dialogue. Isaac Bryan MPP ’18, director of the Black Policy Project at UCLA, spoke about making a radical commitment to recognizing the full humanity of people and the role that policy can play in mitigating systems of harm. “This book uplifts voices that need to be heard,” Bryan said. “This book can propel us forward and was made for a moment like this.” — Zoe Day

Watch the book talk
More on the Transdisciplinary Speaker Series

Abrams Calls for End to Criminalizing Children

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Social Welfare Chair Laura Abrams co-authored a Washington Post opinion piece on the consequences of criminalizing childhood misbehavior and mental health problems. “Arresting children is counterproductive and unethical,” wrote Abrams and co-author Elizabeth S. Barnert of the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. Appearing after the release of video footage showing police in Rochester, N.Y., using pepper spray and handcuffs on a 9-year-old girl, the op-ed called on the United States to set a national minimum age of juvenile court jurisdiction of at least 12. Currently, they wrote, “47 states have the power to forcibly arrest elementary-school-age children and do so regularly.” Abrams and Barnert cited their research showing that child incarceration elevates the risk of trauma and abuse, behavioral and mental health problems, and future involvement in the criminal justice system. They also pointed to systemic racism, noting that, compared with white children, Black youths under 12 are 2.5 times more likely to be referred to juvenile court.

Read the op-ed

Images of Pepper-Sprayed Girl Underscore Urgency of Minimum-Age Laws

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Video footage of a 9-year-old girl being handcuffed and pepper-sprayed by police in Rochester, N.Y., has put a spotlight on a key question for policymakers: At what age should a child be shielded from detention, prosecution and incarceration in the criminal justice system? That question is the focus of scholarship by Social Welfare Chair Laura Abrams and Elizabeth Barnert, assistant professor of pediatrics at UCLA’s David Geffen School of Medicine. Their collaborative research at the intersection of child health and juvenile justice has led to data-driven recommendations about the minimum age of criminal responsibility, factoring in brain development, competency and childhood experiences. Abrams and Barnert recently worked with the National Juvenile Justice Network (NJJN) to form a broad coalition of advocates and health professionals working to raise the age at which children can be processed on criminal charges. Internationally, that age is most commonly set at 14; in the United States, more than half of states have no minimum age at all. “Processing and confining children in the juvenile justice system is traumatic and exposes them to damaging collateral consequences,” including disruptions to education, employment, and mental and physical development, argues NJJN, which released a policy platform and other resources on the issue in January. The incident in Rochester, captured on police body cameras and viewed widely, illustrates the urgency of this advocacy, Abrams said. “No child should ever be cuffed or arrested. Period,” she said. “Our work on minimum age laws shows that criminalizing childhood is racist and has adverse outcomes on children’s health.”

 

Abrams Leads Dialogue on Racism, Mental Health

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Social Welfare Chair Laura Abrams led a dialogue about the links between structural racism and mental health in the inaugural installment of a new webinar series launched by the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare. “When we talk about poverty and homelessness and mental health and race, it’s all a larger conversation about what our profession can do at this juncture to move forward,” said Abrams, who was inducted into the national honor society this year. The webinar featured insights from scholars Sean Joe of Washington University in St. Louis, an authority on Black Americans and mental health, and David Takeuchi of the University of Washington, whose research focuses on health disparities among racial, ethnic and immigrant populations. The conversation was particularly valuable, Abrams said, because “sometimes we come into social work and people want to help and they want to change society, but they don’t always understand our history.”

Watch the webinar