Pain Management and Work Capacity: Evidence From Workers’ Compensation and Marijuana Legalization

We study whether the work capacity of the older working population responds to improved pain management therapy access. We use the adoption of state recreational marijuana laws (RMLs) as a large policy shock to access to a non-pharmaceutical pain management option. We focus on workers’ compensation cash benefit receipt as a measure of work capacity, finding that receipt declines in response to RML adoption. Workers’ compensation cash benefits are awarded to workers who require time away from work to recover from an injury, which arguably captures a policy-relevant aspect of work capacity. We observe similar shifts in complementary proxies for work capacity, including work-limiting disability rates. After considering a range of alternative mechanisms, the evidence suggests that the primary driver of the reductions in workers’ compensation benefits is improvements in work capacity.     

Recent human sexual dimorphism study using cephalometric plots on lateral teleradiography and discriminant function analysis

Abstract:  The examination of skull sexual dimorphism has been the subject of numerous morphologic and craniometric studies, but the disadvantage of these studies is that they are dependent on the experience of the operator and involve subjectivity. In 1996, a team from Taiwan refined the methods enabling the sex of an individual to be determined using cephalometric plots made from lateral teleradiography. To validate their work using a European population, 114 dry skulls (59 men and 55 women) were examined. Cephalometric plots were made on lateral teleradiography with an orthodontic software and 18 cephalometric variables were analyzed. Sex was determined with 95.6% accuracy using the 18 variables discriminant function. A subset of eight variables was selected and could predict sex with the same accuracy. In conclusion, it can be said that skull-sexing methods using lateral teleradiography seem always suitable but the most indicative variables could differ relative to the ethnic population concerned.     

George Armstrong Custer and the Battle of the Little Bighorn: homicide or mass suicide?

On 25 June 1876, Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer perished along with 224 men under his immediate command in a battle historically referred to as the Battle of the Little Bighorn. There is some evidence that this was not a battle at all, but a mass suicide. The theory of mass suicide could be substantiated by examination of the skeletal remains.     

A deficit of democratic authenticity: Political linkage and the public in Andean polities

The article argues that Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela are political systems suffering from an acute deficit of democratic authenticity, that is, a loss of substance in democratic processes. The deficit in democratic authenticity is a product of malfunctions in the mechanisms of political linkage and multiple barriers that inhibit effective citizen participation in public life. Rather than acceding to minimalist interpretations of democracy that deemphasize the importance, of active citizen participation, the author stresses the importance of maintaining a rigorous normative definition of democracy as the standard by which to assess the state of democractic political development. Catherine M. Conaghan is a Queen’s National Scholar and professor of political studies at Queen’s University. She is the author ofRestructuring Domination: Industrialists and the State in Ecuador (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1988) and co-author ofUnsettling Scatecraft: Democracy and Neoliberalism in the Central Andes (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1994).     

The Psychology of Political Extremism

Any attempt to analyse the phenomenon of political extremism must seek to explain why choices are sometimes made to articulate such views through violence. It is proposed that such a choice may have little to do with the specific ideology through which extremism is expressed but instead may reflect deeper psychological considerations. Investigations of persons who grew up in totalitarian systems suggest that the state may invade the psyche, interfering with the normal interplay of ego, superego and id. An explanation depending on the construction of a tripartite model of personal, non-personal and impersonal self was developed to explain the consequences of this process. It is proposed that such models may have a wider relevance and can be applied to the phenomenon of violence arising from contemporary political extremism. The advantage of such models is that they can be subjected to empirical investigation.     

Women Arrested for IPV Offenses: Abuse Experiences Yet Low Trauma Pathology

The purpose of this study is to explore how abuse experienced from a current partner and history of childhood abuse perpetrated by a parent are related to trauma symptomalogy in a sample of 82 women adjudicated for Intimate Partner Violence related offenses. Findings are mixed. Although a majority of the participants report some abuse from their partner and/or parent, both the degree of this violence and the presence of trauma pathology are lower than expected. Additionally, correlations between the three scales of partner abuse and the degree of posttraumatic sequelae are either low or did not meet significance. However, level of childhood abuse perpetrated by a mother is highly correlated with traumatic sequelae while childhood abuse from father is not. A number of reasons for these findings, which have implications for practice and future research, are discussed.