Advances

Advances gives a glimpse of the many significant research projects at the university. Tell us about your discoveries. E-mail: wisweek@news.wisc.edu.

Study: Whites link crime, African Americans
Perceptions of crime in a particular neighborhood may be due to the presence of young African-American men, according to a new study by two UW–Madison researchers.

The study, by sociology assistant professor Lincoln Quillian and graduate student Devah Pager, found residents in Chicago, Baltimore and Seattle to be influenced strongly by the racial composition of their neighborhood in judging its level of crime.

The study indicates that even in neighborhoods with low crime rates, residents perceive crime to be a big problem when young black men live in the area.

In fact, the percentage of young black men in a neighborhood more closely matched perceptions of crime than the actual neighborhood crime rates as reported in police department and victimization surveys. The authors found that the higher the percentage of young black men in a neighborhood, the greater the residents’ perceptions of crime.

“These results demonstrate the strong stereotypes people have about blacks and crime. People automatically assume that if there are young black men around, they must be engaged in crime. It’s just not true,” Pager says.

The study appears in the American Journal of Sociology, http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/AJS/journal/home.html.

Researchers to study new snap-bean disease
A new disease threatens Wisconsin’s position as the nation’s leading snap-bean producer and has UW–Madison researchers scrambling for answers.

The viral epidemic hit growers in August and September the past two years, says Walt Stevenson, a UW-Extension vegetable disease specialist at UW–Madison. As a result, Wisconsin snap-bean production has decreased 14 percent.

College of Agricultural and Life Sciences researchers are trying to unravel the mystery behind the disease and to learn how snap beans become infected. The researchers have been meeting with farmers and the canning industry, which needs a steady supply of the crop.

The team includes Stevenson, virologist Tom German, vegetable entomologist Jeff Wyman, plant pathologist Craig Grau, vegetable production specialist A.J. Bussan and vegetable geneticist James Nienhuis.

Growth masks inequality
Wisconsin could lose its standing as one of the most economically equal states in the nation, says the Center on Wisconsin Strategy. The analysis, based on a report released April 23 by the Economic Policy Institute, and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, notes that despite Wisconsin’s strong economic growth and tight labor markets in the late 1990s, income disparity is greater than it was two decades ago.

During the 1990s, inequality grew rapidly in the state. The income of Wisconsin’s poorest families grew only 2 percent while the income of the state’s highest income families grew 30 percent. Wisconsin’s recent growth in inequality far outstrips the national trend. “These figures should really shake us up,” says COWS director Joel Rogers. “What’s in question now are not just individual differences in income, but a way of life in this state.”

Rogers says that to prevent a deepening divide between rich and poor in Wisconsin, Wisconsin should raise and index the minimum wage; improve access to educational opportunities and training for low-wage parents; and ensure that the tax system does not require low-income families to pay a higher percentage of their income for taxes than other families.