David Mcelhattan
Biographic Data
| ID | 315895 |
|---|---|
| NAME | David Mcelhattan |
| GIVEN NAMES | David |
| FAMILY NAME | Mcelhattan |
| SIGNATURE | MCELHATTAN D |
| AFFILIATIONS | Purdue University West Lafayette |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-4178-7175 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 8 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 213 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 8 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2014 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
Life Sentences and Minor Offenses: Benchmarking, Recalibration, and the Culture of Collateral Consequence Reform
The collateral consequences of justice involvement have become the subject of much reform activity in recent years. Drawing from a sample of 284 news articles, the present study uses content analysis methods to identify and examine the dominant frames that characterize collateral consequences in public discourse as a problematic feature of criminal justice policy and practice. The analysis finds that reform discourse draws primarily on a formal p…
Criminal background check laws and labor market inequality in the United States
Research summary A growing literature documents the effect of criminal justice contact on inequalities in the labor market. While ample evidence indicates that a criminal record itself imposes considerable disadvantage, the formal legal mechanisms that may contribute to criminal record‐based exclusion have received less empirical attention. The present study examines how one such mechanism—legal requirements for employers and license boards to pe…
Immobilized: (In)congruent collateral consequences and racialized driver's license restrictions
For Americans convicted of crimes, collateral consequences impose barriers extending long past the completion of official sentences. The present study develops a novel distinction between congruent and incongruent collateral consequences. Congruent consequence laws impose barriers that are closely linked to their triggering offenses, while incongruent measures impose barriers that are only loosely connected to triggering offenses—or are disconnec…
The Proliferation of Criminal Background Check Laws in the United States
Criminal record checks have become a widely used method for governing access to institutional attachments in the United States. State laws that authorize or require the use of background checks serve as one important source of criminal records’ expanded reach. The current study uses novel longitudinal data to examine the proliferation of these laws at the state level between 1982 and 2013. Panel analyses provide the strongest support for a model …
Punitive ambiguity: State-level criminal record data quality in the era of widespread background screening
Prior research documents widespread deficiencies in the quality and completeness of official criminal records in the United States. In an era when the social reach of criminal records has expanded to an unprecedented degree, these deficiencies carry serious consequences for criminal record subjects. The present study develops the concept of punitive ambiguity to characterize the burdens of incomplete criminal records and examines how they vary at…
The Exception as the Rule: Negligent Hiring Liability, Structured Uncertainty, and the Rise of Criminal Background Checks in the United States
The threat of negligent hiring lawsuits is thought to play an important role in the widespread use of criminal background checks among US employers. This article examines the construction of negligent hiring within the trade literature of the human resources (HR) field using a qualitative content analysis. While courts tend to view criminal record checks as unnecessary for occupations that do not carry foreseeable risks, the article finds that th…
Race and Determinations of Discrimination: Vigilance, Cynicism, Skepticism, and Attitudes about Legal Mobilization in Employment Civil Rights
What factors affect whether ordinary citizens believe that workplace decisions involving African-American employees rise to the level of discrimination? When do observers believe targets of possible race discrimination should consider mobilizing the law? We use a factorial design vignette study administered to a nationally representative sample of 2,087 ordinary people to address these questions. The "vigilance hypothesis" predicts that minoritie…
Comparing Data Characteristics and Results of an Online Factorial Survey between a Population-Based and a Crowdsource-Recruited Sample
Compared to older kinds of sample surveys, online platforms provide a fast and low-cost platform for factorial surveys, as well as a more demographically diverse alternative to student samples. Two distinct strategies have emerged for recruitment: using panels based on population-based samples versus recruiting people actively seeking to complete online tasks for money. The latter is much cheaper but prompts various concerns about data quality an…
Comparing Data Characteristics and Results of an Online Factorial Survey between a Population-Based and a Crowdsource-Recruited Sample
Compared to older kinds of sample surveys, online platforms provide a fast and low-cost platform for factorial surveys, as well as a more demographically diverse alternative to student samples. Two distinct strategies have emerged for recruitment: using panels based on population-based samples versus recruiting people actively seeking to complete online tasks for money. The latter is much cheaper but prompts various concerns about data quality an…
Race and Determinations of Discrimination: Vigilance, Cynicism, Skepticism, and Attitudes about Legal Mobilization in Employment Civil Rights
What factors affect whether ordinary citizens believe that workplace decisions involving African-American employees rise to the level of discrimination? When do observers believe targets of possible race discrimination should consider mobilizing the law? We use a factorial design vignette study administered to a nationally representative sample of 2,087 ordinary people to address these questions. The "vigilance hypothesis" predicts that minoritie…
The Exception as the Rule: Negligent Hiring Liability, Structured Uncertainty, and the Rise of Criminal Background Checks in the United States
The threat of negligent hiring lawsuits is thought to play an important role in the widespread use of criminal background checks among US employers. This article examines the construction of negligent hiring within the trade literature of the human resources (HR) field using a qualitative content analysis. While courts tend to view criminal record checks as unnecessary for occupations that do not carry foreseeable risks, the article finds that th…
Punitive ambiguity: State-level criminal record data quality in the era of widespread background screening
Prior research documents widespread deficiencies in the quality and completeness of official criminal records in the United States. In an era when the social reach of criminal records has expanded to an unprecedented degree, these deficiencies carry serious consequences for criminal record subjects. The present study develops the concept of punitive ambiguity to characterize the burdens of incomplete criminal records and examines how they vary at…
The Proliferation of Criminal Background Check Laws in the United States
Criminal record checks have become a widely used method for governing access to institutional attachments in the United States. State laws that authorize or require the use of background checks serve as one important source of criminal records’ expanded reach. The current study uses novel longitudinal data to examine the proliferation of these laws at the state level between 1982 and 2013. Panel analyses provide the strongest support for a model …
Immobilized: (In)congruent collateral consequences and racialized driver's license restrictions
For Americans convicted of crimes, collateral consequences impose barriers extending long past the completion of official sentences. The present study develops a novel distinction between congruent and incongruent collateral consequences. Congruent consequence laws impose barriers that are closely linked to their triggering offenses, while incongruent measures impose barriers that are only loosely connected to triggering offenses—or are disconnec…
Life Sentences and Minor Offenses: Benchmarking, Recalibration, and the Culture of Collateral Consequence Reform
The collateral consequences of justice involvement have become the subject of much reform activity in recent years. Drawing from a sample of 284 news articles, the present study uses content analysis methods to identify and examine the dominant frames that characterize collateral consequences in public discourse as a problematic feature of criminal justice policy and practice. The analysis finds that reform discourse draws primarily on a formal p…
Criminal background check laws and labor market inequality in the United States
Research summary A growing literature documents the effect of criminal justice contact on inequalities in the labor market. While ample evidence indicates that a criminal record itself imposes considerable disadvantage, the formal legal mechanisms that may contribute to criminal record‐based exclusion have received less empirical attention. The present study examines how one such mechanism—legal requirements for employers and license boards to pe…
Comparing Data Characteristics and Results of an Online Factorial Survey between a Population-Based and a Crowdsource-Recruited Sample
Compared to older kinds of sample surveys, online platforms provide a fast and low-cost platform for factorial surveys, as well as a more demographically diverse alternative to student samples. Two distinct strategies have emerged for recruitment: using panels based on population-based samples versus recruiting people actively seeking to complete online tasks for money. The latter is much cheaper but prompts various concerns about data quality an…
Race and Determinations of Discrimination: Vigilance, Cynicism, Skepticism, and Attitudes about Legal Mobilization in Employment Civil Rights
What factors affect whether ordinary citizens believe that workplace decisions involving African-American employees rise to the level of discrimination? When do observers believe targets of possible race discrimination should consider mobilizing the law? We use a factorial design vignette study administered to a nationally representative sample of 2,087 ordinary people to address these questions. The "vigilance hypothesis" predicts that minoritie…
Punitive ambiguity: State-level criminal record data quality in the era of widespread background screening
Prior research documents widespread deficiencies in the quality and completeness of official criminal records in the United States. In an era when the social reach of criminal records has expanded to an unprecedented degree, these deficiencies carry serious consequences for criminal record subjects. The present study develops the concept of punitive ambiguity to characterize the burdens of incomplete criminal records and examines how they vary at…
The Exception as the Rule: Negligent Hiring Liability, Structured Uncertainty, and the Rise of Criminal Background Checks in the United States
The threat of negligent hiring lawsuits is thought to play an important role in the widespread use of criminal background checks among US employers. This article examines the construction of negligent hiring within the trade literature of the human resources (HR) field using a qualitative content analysis. While courts tend to view criminal record checks as unnecessary for occupations that do not carry foreseeable risks, the article finds that th…
The Proliferation of Criminal Background Check Laws in the United States
Criminal record checks have become a widely used method for governing access to institutional attachments in the United States. State laws that authorize or require the use of background checks serve as one important source of criminal records’ expanded reach. The current study uses novel longitudinal data to examine the proliferation of these laws at the state level between 1982 and 2013. Panel analyses provide the strongest support for a model …
Immobilized: (In)congruent collateral consequences and racialized driver's license restrictions
For Americans convicted of crimes, collateral consequences impose barriers extending long past the completion of official sentences. The present study develops a novel distinction between congruent and incongruent collateral consequences. Congruent consequence laws impose barriers that are closely linked to their triggering offenses, while incongruent measures impose barriers that are only loosely connected to triggering offenses—or are disconnec…
Criminal background check laws and labor market inequality in the United States
Research summary A growing literature documents the effect of criminal justice contact on inequalities in the labor market. While ample evidence indicates that a criminal record itself imposes considerable disadvantage, the formal legal mechanisms that may contribute to criminal record‐based exclusion have received less empirical attention. The present study examines how one such mechanism—legal requirements for employers and license boards to pe…
Life Sentences and Minor Offenses: Benchmarking, Recalibration, and the Culture of Collateral Consequence Reform
The collateral consequences of justice involvement have become the subject of much reform activity in recent years. Drawing from a sample of 284 news articles, the present study uses content analysis methods to identify and examine the dominant frames that characterize collateral consequences in public discourse as a problematic feature of criminal justice policy and practice. The analysis finds that reform discourse draws primarily on a formal p…
Law (7 works) · Political science (7 works) · Law (6 works) · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis (5 works) · Criminology (5 works) · Computer Science (4 works) · Crime Patterns and Interventions (4 works) · Psychology (4 works) · Sociology (4 works) · Business (3 works)