Factors Mediating the Link Between Witnessing Interparental Violence and Dating Violence

The present study examined several protective and vulnerability factors in a subsample of adolescents who witnessed high levels of interparental violence to determine what factors differentiated adolescents who inflicted (and received) violence in their dating relationship and those who had violence-free dating relationships. Findings revealed that males who witnessed high levels of interparental violence, who inflicted violence in their dating relationships, were differentiated from those who had violence-free relationships by the following variables: low socioeconomic status, exposure to community and school violence, acceptance of violence in dating relationships, and low self-esteem. Low socioeconomic status and acceptance of violence in dating relationships differentiated males who experienced dating violence and those who had not. With regard to females, exposure to community and school violence, poor school performance, and experiencing child abuse differentiated those who inflicted dating violence from those who had not, while poor school performance and experiencing child abuse differentiated females who experienced dating violence and those who had not. Implications of the findings are discussed.     

Incarcerated Battered Women: A Comparison of Battered Women Who Killed Their Abusers and Those Incarcerated for Other Offenses

The present study compared battered women incarcerated for killing/seriously assaulting their abusers with battered women incarcerated for other offenses to explore possible similarities and differences in the characteristics and experiences of the two groups as well as to determine what factors may lead some battered women to use lethal force against their partners. Comparisons were made on a number of variables including sociodemographic factors, characteristics of the battering relationship, alcohol/drug use of battered women and their abusers, perceived social support, actions taken to end the violence, prior criminal behaviors, and childhood trauma factors. Findings revealed that women in the homicide/assault group were older, in the relationship longer and experienced a longer duration of violence in this relationship. They also experienced more frequent and severe battering, including sex assaults and sustained more injuries than those in the comparison group. Further, battered women who killed/seriously assaulted their partners were more likely to believe that their lives were in danger, were less likely to use violence against their partners, and were less likely to have a prior criminal record or to have served time previously. The implications of the findings are discussed.     

Locke and the Politics and Theology of Toleration

Locke's theory of toleration has been understood to rest on the claim that persecution was insufficient to instil either (i) true or (ii) sincere belief in people. Although Locke did indeed make both these claims, neither was fundamental to his theory. Locke was principally concerned to deny that persecution was necessary to instil true or sincere belief; its insufficiency to those ends he, and his contemporaries, took for granted. His denial of the necessity of persecution presupposed that human beings were, in principle, naturally adequate to the discovery of God's wants for them. The same presupposition, which derives from natural theology, underwrote the views in politics and revealed theology that complete his theory and supplied its moral content. Contemporary theories of toleration purposing to proceed on Lockean assumptions are morally and philosophically impoverished by their failure to see the requirements laid on an adequate theory of toleration by genuinely Lockean terms.     

Unusual suicidal smothering by means of multiple loops of adhesive gummed tape

In suicidal asphyxia smothering is very rare, especially when caused by winding strips of adhesive tape around the head to cover the nose and mouth. The authors report a very unusual case in which the deceased, a 66-year-old man, was found with two strips of tape wound around his head: the first, more superficial tape was wrapped six times and the second was wrapped nine times. Only integration of the crime scene data with those of the autopsy and the patient's psychological profile enabled identification of the event as suicide.