The association between psychopathic personality traits and health-related outcomes

Purpose

Psychopathy and psychopathic personality traits (PPT) have been linked to a long list of negative life outcomes. To date, however, few studies have provided a systematic analysis of whether psychopathic personality traits contribute to increased health burden. The current study was designed to address this gap in the literature.

Method

This study analyzed data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health and employed a measure of PPT derived from the five-factor model of personality. Analyses were conducted using OLS, logistic, and Poisson regression techniques.

Results

The results revealed that relatively higher scores on psychopathic personality traits were associated with a slight increase in a wide range of negative health outcomes. These significant associations were detected for both males and females.

Conclusions

We speak to the importance of these findings for the potential to reduce health burden among psychopaths and those who score relatively high on measures of psychopathic personality traits.     

German and Italian Municipalities’ Internal Control Systems: Convergence to a Neo-Weberian Reform Pattern?

This article contributes to the debate on convergence/divergence of public management reforms toward the new public management (NPM) paradigm by analyzing the internal control systems (ICSs) in Germany and Italy. Specifically, the study describes the ICS established at the normative level in German and Italian municipalities and evaluates the extent of the decisional convergence to NPM, using the INTOSAI guidelines. Although similarities between the two ICSs and the INTOSAI guidelines emerged, decisional convergence is not demonstrated. Instead, these countries seem to converge to a Neo-Weberian reform pattern since they are cautious in the introduction of new managerial tools and they maintain their domestic original ICS.     

Planning and Control System With a Network Approach： Evidence From the Italian Regional Governments

The focus on networks in public administration has grown rapidly in recent years and prompts modifications of traditional planning and control systems of public entities. Public networks have been defined as a response to the criticalities of New Public Management and they represent a recurring approach for policy implementation and service provision in the theoretical framework known as New Public Governance. This article addresses the question whether public entities are aware of being part of a network and whether they have actually changed, as such, their planning and control system. Focus is made on the case of Italian regional governments which are particularly significant for different reasons. First of all, the recent process of administrative devolution and federalism in Italy has reinforced regional governments＇ powers and responsibilities as well as their importance as actors in the political and economic scenario, where they can influence the behaviours of many public and private organizations. Furthermore, Italian regional governments have extensive autonomy and so they can actually modify and integrate traditional documents of their planning and control system. The article proposes a framework for mapping different approaches toward being part of a public network. This framework can support the interpretation of the behaviour of public entities involved in networks and take the initiatives to develop them.     

Impaling Dracula: How EU Accession Empowered Civil Society in Romania

Europeanisation scholars increasingly debate when and in what ways the European Union influences domestic politics. This article adopts a ‘bottom-up’ design and the process-tracing method to examine the influence of the EU enlargement context over the political power of the new social movements in Romania between 2000 and 2004 when the EU acquis was being negotiated. It finds that domestic civil society empowerment resulted from the nexus of three interacting causal pathways: the Executive's desire to accede to the EU; a transnational advocacy network, which included domestic NGOs, reinforcing the Executive's anticipatory self-constraint; and to a somewhat lesser extent, the Executive's self-identification with certain elements of the advocacy network, reinforced by a general concern for their external reputation.     

Democratic transition and social spending: the case of Pakistan in the 1990s

The article assesses the social consequences of the democratic transition that began in Pakistan in 1988 and ended in 1999 by analysing public spending for health and education and changes in human development indicators. Available information indicates that the return to democracy did not lead to greater spending in these two sectors. It is argued that the key internal factors that hampered government commitment to social welfare were the pre-eminence among elected representatives of social groups unwilling to invest in the human capital of the majority and the dominance of the armed forces in the country's power politics.     

Cardiac Inhibitory Reflex as a Cause/Mechanism of Death

The role of cardiac inhibitory reflex as a potential cause of death is still a matter of debate. This study reports two cases of death under unusual circumstances. Case 1 corresponds to a man found hanging where the role of ligature compression of the carotid sinus became relevant as a possible explanation of death. In Case 2, the participation of a vasovagal syncope was clearly triggered by the laryngoscopic procedure. It is proposed that cardiac inhibitory reflex should be taken into account in those cases of unexpected death, which fulfills the following three criteria: (i) The investigation of the circumstances of the death is consistent with a hypothesis of cardiac arrest. (ii) A typical triggering peripheral stimulus is present. (iii) The performance of a complete autopsy cannot rule out the participation of a cardiac inhibitory reflex in the cause of death.     

A 27‐Locus STR Assay to Meet All United States and European Law Enforcement Agency Standards,

Different national and international agencies have selected specific STR sets for forensic database use. To enhance database comparison across national and international borders, a 27‐locus multiplex system was developed comprising all 15 STR loci of the European standard set, the current 13 STR loci of the CODIS core, the proposed 22 STR loci of the expanded CODIS core, 4 additional commonly used STR loci, and the amelogenin locus. Development required iterative primer design to resolve primer‐related artifacts, amplicon sizing, and locus‐to‐locus balance issues. The 19.5‐min assay incorporated newly developed six‐dye chemistry analyzed using a novel microfluidic electrophoresis instrument capable of simultaneous detection and discrimination of 8 or more fluorescent dyes. The 27‐locus multiplex offers the potential for a new international STR standard permitting laboratories in any jurisdiction to use a single reaction to determine profiles for loci they typically generate plus an expanded common STR profiling set of global interest.     

Carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes as indicative of geographical origin of marijuana samples seized in the city of São Paulo (Brazil)

The drug trafficking is one of the most serious problems related to the Public Safety in Brazil, especially in the most populous areas of the country, as is the case of the city of São Paulo. In this work, it was developed a methodology that can help tracking the traffic routes of marijuana samples seized in the city of São Paulo, based on stable carbon and nitrogen isotopes, which are related to the climate and plant growth conditions. A model to classify the origin of unknown samples was built using linear discriminant analysis based on about 150 samples apprehended in the main producing regions of the country. Results for 76 samples seized in the city of São Paulo showed that most of them were cultivated in a humid region with the same origin as those from Mato Grosso do Sul. The provenance of 13 outliers samples from Northeast region (an important producing region) also were evaluated and some of them presented same profile of those from Mato Grosso do Sul, pointing to the existence of the traffic routes between the Northeast and Midwest region, probably as a consequence of the intensive field raids by Brazilian Federal Government since 1999.     

Facing the Boundaries of Epistemology: Kumārila on Error and Negative Cognition

Kumārila’s commitment to the explanation of cognitive experiences not confined to valid cognition alone, allows a detailed discussion of border-line cases (such as doubt and error) and the admittance of absent entities as separate instances of cognitive objects. Are such absent entities only the negative side of positive entities? Are they, hence, fully relative (since a cow could be said to be the absent side of a horse and vice versa)? Through the analysis of a debated passage of the ?lokavārttika, the present article proposes a reconstruction of Kumārila’s view of the relation between erroneous cognitions and cognitions of absence (abhāva), and considers the philosophical problem of the ontological status of absence.     

Comparison of Different Swabs for Sampling Inorganic Gunshot Residue from Gunshot Wounds: Applicability and Reliability for the Determination of Firing Distance

This study concentrates on samples of bare pork skin, with and without bristles, and dried bovine ribs shot with a semi‐automatic pistol to find the best methodology and sampling surface in the search for inorganic gunshot residues (IGSR). Four quadrants of known surface areas were sampled at different distances from the bullet's hole with different swabs: tapes in graphite, Leukosilk® white tape, 3M® transparent tape, and a cotton swab to assess the technique able to collect the highest amounts of IGSR with the lowest contribution of the blank. The cotton swab wet in 10% HNO₃ gave the best results. The highest amounts of IGSR, measured by ICP‐OES and MS, were detected on a surface of 3‐cm radius from the bullet's edge. The amount of metals collected decreased with the firing distance between 20 and 60 cm. The procedure was efficient for sampling different tissues like skin and bones.