Motor Vehicle Collisions and Their Consequences—Part II: Predictors of Impairment and Disability

A significant number of persons involved in motor vehicle collisions (MVCs) evidence persistent changes in physical, psychosocial, and cognitive functioning consequent to physical injury. While post-injury impairment and disability can sometimes be predicted with knowledge of injury type and injury severity, post-injury experiences of pain, psychological distress, cognitive dysfunction, and role disruption have been determined to contribute to injury-related impairment and disability. This article represents the second part of a two-part review of MVCs and their consequences. In part I of the review, research findings related to physical, psychosocial, and cognitive changes that occur consequent to injury-causing MVCs are described. In this article, measures used to document the severity of physical injuries are reviewed, along with the most widely accepted definitions of impairment and disability. Models that have been proposed to explain the progression from injury to impairment and disability are reviewed, including a more recently proposed model created specifically to guide the assessment and management of MVC-related outcomes. The greater part of this article is devoted to the review of findings related to physical, psychological, and cognitive predictors of post-MVC impairment and disability. The relation of these predictors to post-MVC impairment and disability is described across three specific injury contexts: (1) whiplash-associated disorders, (2) traumatic brain injury, and (3) polytrauma. In each context, findings related to recovery of function in the form of return to work are summarized, along with findings related to the contribution of compensation to injury-related symptoms and impairments. Although not characterized as a physical injury, chronic pain serves frequently as the post-injury symptom that persists beyond all injury management and rehabilitation efforts and that contributes significantly to MVC-related functional impairment, disability, and emotional distress. It is appropriate, therefore, to include in this review a discussion of those MVC studies that specifically address impairment and disability occurring in relation to chronic pain. The article ends with the identification of ongoing research challenges and future directions for both the study of MVCs and their associated sequelae and clinical practice with persons who are experiencing the consequences of MVC-related injuries.     

Role of Nanomaterials for Forensic Investigation and Latent Fingerprinting—A Review

The imminent nanotechnology and progressive instrumentations together have vast applications in the field of forensic science. Few prominent examples are gold nanoparticles for improvising the efficiency of polymerase chain reaction and atomic force microscopy for examining ink and bloodstains. Characteristics like distinct ridge details of fingerprints could be obtained by applying different nanoparticles such as silver, zinc oxide, silicon dioxide, aluminum oxide, gold (with silver physical developer), europium, fluorescent carbon, and amphiphilic silica on a range of object surfaces, and among all, gold is most commonly used. Fingerprint is considered noteworthy evidence in any crime scene, and nano-based techniques hold immense future potential in fingerprint investigations. Therefore, this paper focuses on the applications of nanoparticles in developing and detecting the latent fingerprints.     

Motor Vehicle Collisions and Their Consequences—Part 1: Common Physical,Psychosocial, and Cognitive Outcomes

Motor vehicle collisions (MVCs) have a significant impact on injured persons and society. MVCs generally result in property damage, but more serious MVCs often result in physical injuries that have significant physical, psychosocial, and cognitive consequences, all of which may result in long-standing functional impairment and disability as well as marked changes in quality of life. This article represents the first part of a two-part review of MVCs; the complex and interactive array of physical, psychosocial, and cognitive changes that occur consequent to injury-causing MVCs; and the person and environmental factors that best predict functional impairment and disability following an MVC. The current article provides an overview of the scope and significance of MVCs and summarizes the literature related to the physical injuries and the physical, psychosocial, and cognitive impairments that are most commonly experienced consequent to MVCs. Physical injuries reviewed in the current article include fractures, whiplash-associated disorders (WADs), traumatic brain injury (TBI), multiple traumatic injuries or polytrauma, and chronic pain conditions. These injuries and conditions are reviewed because of the relative quantity and quality of existing research related to these injuries and conditions. This article also provides a review of those psychological disorders that more commonly begin, recur, or are exacerbated in the aftermath of an MVC. The following psychological disorders are reviewed: posttraumatic stress disorder, complex posttraumatic stress disorder, major depressive disorder, somatic symptom disorder, and major neurocognitive disorder and mild neurocognitive disorder. Finally, this article ends with a brief discussion of changes in quality of life that can occur in relation to the physical injuries and psychological and neurocognitive disorders that are common consequences of MVCs. The final section of this article will serve to introduce part II of this review of MVCs and their consequences, in which predictors of MVC-related impairment and disability are discussed.     

Private Law Exceptionalism? Part I: A Basic Difficulty with the Structural Arguments from Bipolarity and Civil Recourse

Contemporary discussions of private law theory have sought to divine the deep structure and content of private law by reference to two key distinctions. First, the distinction between private and criminal law has been utilized to flesh out the distinctively bipolar structure of private law (and its various departments, namely, property, contract, torts, and unjust enrichment). Second, the distinction between formal and distributive equality has served to highlight the special terms of interaction established in private law. In these pages, I take up the former distinction, arguing that its theoretical significance is overdrawn. I argue that it does not succeed in identifying private law’s precise nature.     

Prevalence of Spousal Violence and Associated Risk Factors: Facts from Pakistan Demographics and Health Survey 2012–13

The current study aims to investigate the risk factors associated with the prevalence of spousal violence among the women from 15 to 49 years of age in Pakistan in their marital relationship. Secondary data collected in Pakistan Demographic and Health Survey (PDHS) 2012–2013 is used. In the survey, respondents were selected using probability sampling technique from all the four provinces of Pakistan. Modified and shortened version of Conflict Tactics Scale is used to measure physical and psychological spousal violence among the women perpetuated by their ever husbands. Prevalence of physical, psychological, any type of spousal violence and associated risk factors were analyzed by unadjusted odd ratios (OR) and adjusted odd ratios (aOR). Education, profession, ethnicity and wealth index are found significant risk factors associated with spousal violence. Odds of experiencing spousal violence were higher among the poorer (aOR 1.700 CI 1.272–2.271) as compared to their richer counterparts. Moreover, the prevalence of spousal violence was found the highest (aOR 2.730 CI 2.162–3.447) in Pushton ethnic group. The study recommends improving the literacy rate and economic well-being of the poorer to address the problem of spousal violence in Pakistan.     

Disentangling the Disability Quagmire in Psychological Injury: Part 1—Disability and Return to Work: Theories, Methods, and Applications

This paper critically reviews and integrates multidisciplinary literature informing conceptualization and determination of disability and return to work from a psychological injury perspective. It focuses on dissecting and disentangling the ambiguities and complexities of theories and definitions of disability, impairment, and return to work, highlighting the conceptual quagmires that affect both research and clinical methodology in the field. The paper discusses the strengths and limitations of the main theoretical perspectives on disability and return to work—social, medical, and biopsychosocial—and the associated applied perspectives, including the legal/administrative, clinical, and research oriented. It provides a special focus on the Americans with Disabilities Act and the American Medical Association’s Guides for the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment as leading applied perspectives. The paper also highlights the features and methodological implications of the integrative framework of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (World Health Organization, International classification of functioning, disabilities and health, WHO, Geneva, Switzerland, 2001). Finally, it draws implications for the field of psychological injury in a legal context.     

Psychiatrists,criminals, and the law: Forensic psychiatry in Switzerland 1850–1950

Between 1880 and 1950, Swiss psychiatrists established themselves as experts in criminal courts. In this period, the judicial authorities required psychiatric testimonies in a rising number of cases. As a result, more offenders than ever before were declared mentally deficient and, eventually, sent to psychiatric asylums. Psychiatrists also enhanced their authority as experts at the political level. From the very beginning, they got involved in the preparatory works for a nationwide criminal code. In this article, I argue that these trends toward medicalization of crime were due to incremental processes, rather than spectacular institutional changes. In fact, Swiss psychiatrists gained recognition as experts due to their daily interactions with judges, public prosecutors, and legal counsels. At the same time, the spread of medical expertise had serious repercussions on psychiatric institutions. From 1942 onwards, asylums had to deal with a growing number of “criminal psychopaths,” which affected ward discipline and put psychiatry's therapeutic efficiency into question. The defensive way in which Swiss psychiatrists reacted to this predicament was crucial to the further development of forensic psychiatry. For the most part, it accounts for the subdiscipline's remarkable lack of specialization until the 1990s.     

‘Demonstrative Evidence’: A Genealogy of the Racial Iconography of Forensic Art and Illustration

This essay stages a critique of the unacknowledged racialising visual regimes that inform forensic pathologys typical body charts. In order to disclose these unacknowledged regimes, I stage a genealogy of the racialising iconography that continues to shape forensic pathologys visual texts. In drawing attention to the racialising visual conventions that constitute the contemporary production of caucacentric forensic body charts, I attempt to disrupt the scientifico-objective status of these visual artefacts in order to underscore their ideological effects. By focusing on the ontological/epistemological split between the corporeality of native informants and white knowledge workers, I underscore the white medico-legal professions historical transmuting of other bodies into objects of knowledge. I conclude by outlining the discursive effects of presenting forensic pathologys caucacentric body charts as demonstrative evidence within the court of law.This is an extended version of an essay first presented at the Association for the Study of Law, Culture, and the Humanities Conference, Cardozo Law School, New York University, New York, USA, March 2003. My thanks to Peter Goodrich and Penelope Pether for their generous enthusiasm and support.     

Investigating Investigators: How Presentation Order Influences Participant–Investigators’ Interpretations of Eyewitness Identification and Alibi Evidence

Presentation order of ID and Alibi evidence was manipulated for undergraduate participants who conducted a simulated police investigation. Experiment 1 found a recency effect when an eyewitness rejected the investigator’s suspect. Experiment 2 also examined order effects, exploring how participant–investigators evaluated alibi information in addition to eyewitness ID information. When investigators saw the witness identify the suspect but also received a strong alibi for that suspect a recency effect occurred, such that whichever piece of information occurred at the end of the procedure had the strongest impact on investigators. Thus, type of evidence and evidence order both had a dramatic influence on participant–investigators’ decisions.     

Computers in criminal justice — Realising the potential: Part II: The future

A number of trends are apparent from the current development of existing Criminal Justice computer systems (CJS). Apart from in probation, the first systems in each criminal justice agency in this country have been designed to assist with routine clerical and administrative tasks — book-keeping in the magistrates' courts, wordprocessing and finance in prisons, etc, which although effective at easing the clerical and administrative tasks have made little overall impact on the operation of criminal justice. They have not, for example, reduced the delays in the criminal justice process, or reduced the overcrowding in prisons. This is in contrast to the US, where computerisation in some courts, for example, has significantly reduced delay and has helped with the operation of sentencing guidelines to bring about a great consistency of sentencing. In Part II of his article A D Maclean looks at what the future holds as far as computers in criminal justice and concerned.     

How Chinese e-public feel and think about corruption: A case study of Audit Storm (Shenji fengbao – – Part I)

Corruption is pervasive, rampant, enduring, and above all else a tolerated and taken for granted social problem in China. Still, corruption is a major concern for the political leaders, general public and foreign observers. Foreigners complained about the corruption cost of doing business in China. Students took to the street and peasants staged violent protest against government corruption. The consensus is that corruption challenges CPC's legitimacy and threatens China's stability.A systematic review of literature uncovers no investigation on the Chinese people's reception and reaction to the corruption, in the net. This is a first attempt to do so.This is a research into the “feelings” and “thinking” of Chinese internet users (e-public) on (anti)corruption in China. Specially, it tries to document and analyze the comments – reaction of the e-public to news articles on various aspects of “Audit Storm” in June–July of 2004.     

The kinetics of colour change in textiles and fibres treated with detergent solutions: Part II — Spectrophotometric measurements

The aim of this study was to assess colour variations that occur in several types of textiles and their constituent fibres, resulting from the long-term influence of various laundry detergents. A 14-day experiment was conducted using blue, red and grey/black cotton, wool, acrylic and polyester textiles. The spectrophotometric measurement of colour changes in fabric samples and test solutions, as well as the microspectrophotometric analysis of colour changes in single fibres were described. An evaluation of the observed colour changes from a forensic fibre analysis expert's point of view, as well as that of an average user/consumer of the textiles and laundry detergents is also provided.