‘I live off this land:’ Tahltan women and activism in northern British Columbia

Tahltan territory of northern British Columbia has been flooded with some of the largest industrial extractive projects in the world. One critical point of conflict is centered on how Canada legislates and regulates access to lands without regard to Indigenous sovereignty. This article illustrates the centrality of gender to such struggles. It argues that historic forms of dispossession paved the way for these contemporary threats to Indigenous territories. It offers a case study on how an aspect of colonial policy—the trapline registration system established in early twentieth-century Canada—prioritized white trappers and registered Indian traplines in ways that were at odds with Tahltan matriarchal systems of governance and land management. Despite colonial attempts to undermine the Tahltan’s relationship to their land and to reorder it according to gender norms, Tahltan women have adamantly revitalized and exercised their matriarchal authority to fulfill their role as protectors of lands and water.     

But what do they really think? Identifying consumers' values relevant to adopting biotechnologically produced foods

• Much has been written about the media's importance in the formation of attitudes toward new technologies such as biotechnology. However, little has been published regarding consumer‐held values that play such an important role in forming these attitudes and which ultimately play a role in whether a product is adopted. Understanding how the product will complement, or clash, with, the publics' values is crucial in developing strategic communication plans. Developing Means‐End Chains via Laddering Theory to document users' values has been a useful research method in understanding the attributes and consequences associated with a product that may lead to acceptance by the general public. The purpose of this exploratory research was to identify the values consumers held toward foods created through biotechnological methods and the supporting attributes and consequences that supported those values. The findings indicate that, in this study, consumers felt no differently toward products developed using traditional agricultural methods versus biotechnological methods because the participants overwhelmingly relied on government agencies to ensure that their food was safe. The values identified in this study may provide a common ground for communicating about biotechnologically produced foods.

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Investigating genetic discrimination in the Australian life insurance sector: the use of genetic test results in underwriting, 1999-2003

A major component of the Genetic Discrimination Project (GDP), an Australia-wide study to examine the advantages and disadvantages for individuals of having genetic information and cases of alleged genetic discrimination, is the analysis of insurers' use of genetic test results. The peak life insurance body, IFSA, had collected data through the Australian Institute of Actuaries (AIA) for the period June 1999-May 2003 from life insurance companies in Australia regarding their use of genetic test results in insurance underwriting. The GDP negotiated with IFSA and the AIA for access to this data for independent analysis. Applications from 288 individuals who had disclosed a genetic test result included products for cover for death, trauma/crisis, income protection/disability and total and permanent disablement. A total of 81% (234/288) contained usable data for analysis. These cases involved the genetic conditions haemochromatosis (71%), Huntington disease (12%) and breast/ovarian cancer (6%). In 49% of cases, the genetic test result was described as the only influencing factor and of these, 32% involved a "positive" genetic test result. Whilst underwriting in most cases appeared to be reasonable, the article highlights several cases involving disclosure of a positive predictive test result for breast/ovarian cancer that required further investigation.     

Interpersonal Relationships and Stalking: Identifying When to Intervene

One of the issues arising out of the introduction of stalking legislation is how to distinguish between the kinds of courting behaviours, reconciliations, termination of relationships and other social interactions that are within the ‘normal range’ and those behaviours that are perceived by the wider community as stalking. This study examined the impact of intent, persistence, perspective and gender on perceptions of behaviours following the dissolution of a relationship. Responses of 868 community members indicated that behaviour was only perceived as illegal when explicit evidence of intent was present rather than when it was absent. Ratings for foreseeability of arousing fear were higher when explicit evidence of intent was present rather than absent and when behaviour constituted a repeated rather than single episode. Participants were more likely to determine that the behaviour of the actor would be repeated when the scenario depicted a repeat episode rather than a single episode. Suggested target responses differed according to whether or not the scenario depicted explicit evidence of intent to arouse fear. Results are discussed in relation to previous studies on community perceptions of stalking as well as the capacity of the research to inform interpretations of stalking legislation.     

Police Witness Identification Images: A Geometric Morphometric Analysis*

Abstract: Research into witness identification images typically occurs within the laboratory and involves subjective likeness and recognizability judgments. This study analyzed whether actual witness identification images systematically alter the facial shapes of the suspects described. The shape analysis tool, geometric morphometrics, was applied to 46 homologous facial landmarks displayed on 50 witness identification images and their corresponding arrest photographs, using principal component analysis and multivariate regressions. The results indicate that compared with arrest photographs, witness identification images systematically depict suspects with lowered and medially located eyebrows (p = <0.000001). This was found to occur independently of the Police Artist, and did not occur with composites produced under laboratory conditions. There are several possible explanations for this finding, including any, or all, of the following: The suspect was frowning at the time of the incident, the witness had negative feelings toward the suspect, this is an effect of unfamiliar face processing, the suspect displayed fear at the time of their arrest photograph.     

Consideration of the probative value of single donor 15-plex STR profiles in UK populations and its presentation in UK courts

The adoption of new 15 locus STR multiplex systems into UK forensic science would be facilitated by agreed guidelines for reporting the strength of DNA evidence using likelihood ratios. To facilitate such an agreement, we present an analysis of previously published UK allele frequencies for white Caucasian, Afro-Caribbean and Indo-Pakistani populations and investigate their effect on likelihood ratios for single donor profiles. We consider the implication of the five additional loci and suggest a procedure for reporting likelihood ratios for 15-plex STR profiles.