Social media video analysis methodology for sarin exposure

As social media becomes increasingly ubiquitous, many events are recorded and released on social media platforms, including chemical weapon attacks. We develop an objective tool in order to evaluate brief and unstructured social media videos for analysing sarin exposure from a civilian medical pathology perspective. We developed and validated this new questionnaire using a standardized procedure that includes content domain specification, item pool generation, content validity evaluation, a pilot study, and assessment of reliability and validity. In total, 51 sarin attacks and 48 matched videos were analysed. Cronbach’s α for all 20 items was 0.75, which indicates adequate internal reliability. The test–retest reliability was 0.96, which indicates good internal reliability. The inter-observer intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.97. After verifying sampling adequacy with the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin measure and the factorability of the items with Barlett’s test of sphericity, a factor analysis was performed. According to the principal axis factoring, a six-factor solution explained 51.86% of the total variance. The receiver-operating characteristic curve analysis showed that the Video Score Questionnaire has a sensitivity of 0.817, a specificity of 0.478, and an efficiency of 65.3. Therefore, the Video Score Questionnaire is reliable and valid for evaluating sarin attacks from brief and unstructured social media videos.

Key points

• Chemical weapons are still used as a method of warfare.
• Social media videos are an important source of information.
• We developed a validated scale which can analyse sarin exposure in short and unstructured videos.

     

Y-chromosome and autosomal STR diversity in four proximate settlements in Central Anatolia

Due to the longstanding human presence in the region and the influence of social traditions, the genetic make-up of populations currently inhabiting Turkey (Anatolia) is quite complex. To characterize the patterns of genetic diversity in rural Central Anatolian villages, we analyzed samples collected at four local settlements for variation at 17 Y-chromosome STR and 15 autosomal STR loci. The resulting data reveal considerable diversity within these settlements, as well as some structure in the paternal genetic variation, with a limited number of haplotypes being shared between the communities. These findings have important implications for forensic studies of Turkish populations.     

Sexual Behavioral Disinhibition Associated with Nucleus Lentiformis Lesion: A Forensic Neuroscience Perspective Through a Case

Organic brain disturbances particularly related to frontal cortex structures and subcortical areas including the basal ganglia may play a role in behavioral disinhibition disorders. Kluver–Bucy syndrome (KBS), which is one of the better knowns of these syndromes, includes hyperorality, visual agnosia, and hypersexuality, has been reported to occur after temporal lobe and amygdala lesions; however, several patients who had focal lesions in areas other than the temporal cortex and amygdala have been reported to present partial KBS symptoms. Nucleus lentiformis refers to a large portion of the basal ganglia including the putamen and globus pallidus, and specific structures within this broad area are known to be important for reward and value-based decision making. To date, KBS symptoms including hypersexual behavior associated with nucleus lentiformis lesions have never been reported. Here, we present a 38-year-old male patient who developed increased sexual interest and hyperorality after infarctions in the right lenticular nucleus and right occipitotemporal region and committed a first-degree sexual assault. He was sent to our institution for the assessment of criminal responsibility to the index sexual crime. According to a comprehensive and thorough forensic psychiatric evaluation, he was diagnosed as having an organic personality disorder with partial KBS symptoms. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first reported case of deviant sexual behavior and hyperorality developing after nucleus lentiformis infarction. We aimed to discuss possible neurobiologic explanations of late-onset deviant sexual behavior, which resulted in sexual criminal behavior following a cerebrovascular infarction.     

Erosion of confidence in advanced democracies

The data from a host of cross-national surveys document the sociological finding that citizens increasingly mistrust the principal institutions and organizations of pluralist democracies. Paradoxically, this coincides with the exportation and spread of democratic regimes. Available documentation shows four major characteristics of distrust, which are manifest in many European nations. Many sociological features cross national frontiers and permeate all social strata. These lead to further consideration of legitimacy. Analysis also supports the lesson that electoral procedures alone are no longer sufficient for building confidence in representative democracy, for decisions must be continually taken, and cannot insure the harmonious and full legitimacy of democratic regimes in the most developed countries. Mattei Dogan is Senior Research Director at the French National Centre of Scientific Research, Paris. The author of numerous books and articles, he is also Chair of the Research Committee on Comparative Sociology, International Sociological Association.     

Fragmentation and recombination of the social sciences

Studies in Comparative International Development -     

Analyzing Global Governance Failure: A Philosophical Framework

This article seeks to make a contribution to theory development by explicating the competing approaches (explanatory frameworks and research methods) that can be used in the analysis of episodes of global governance failures—undesirable events (such as war, or incidents of international terrorism) and behaviors (such as rogue political leaders accumulating weapons of mass destruction or supporting international terrorist groups) that are a consequence of the ineffectiveness of a global governance process. It does so by constructing a methodological taxonomy, which enables the identification of the competing philosophical methodologies that underpin contending perspectives on the causation of, and solutions to, episodes of global governance failures, by reference to contesting understandings of what knowledge is (an epistemological issue) and what exists that is capable of giving rise to consequences (an ontological issue). It then identifies the epistemological and ontological challenges facing policy analysts seeking to analyze and address global governance failure. Meeting these challenges requires the adoption of a methodology that draws insights from the epistemological and ontological syntheses that have emerged within contemporary social theory.     

Psychiatric morbidity in murder and attempted murder crime convicts: a Turkey study

In the present, the morbidity of psychiatric disorders of homicide/attempted homicide crime convicts imprisoned in Turkey, Sivas maximum security prison was investigated. Seventy imprisoned homicide/attempted homicide crime convicts included in this study. Sociodemographic information form, structured clinical interview for DSM-IV Axis-I disorders and structured clinical interview for DSM-III-R personality disorders applied to the participants. Most commonly diagnosed disorders among those convicts were current Axis-I disorders, depressive disorders (7.1%) and anxiety disorders (5.7%). Among Axis-I disorders, the most diagnosed one was the substance use disorders (45.7%). The most diagnosed Axis-II disorder was found as to be antisocial personality disorder (48.6%). The rate of convicts who were diagnosed as having both Axis-I and Axis-II disorders was 51.4%. The most prevalently accompanying lifetime Axis-I disorders to antisocial personality disorder with respect to Axis-I, and Axis-II comorbidity was substance use disorders. As a result, it was thought that the substance use disorders and antisocial personality disorder among the homicide/attempted homicide crime convicts were the most prevalent lifetime psychiatric disorders.     

Decapitation and Dismemberment of the Corpse: A Matricide Case*

Abstract: Dismemberment of a corpse has always been viewed by society to be a more hideous crime than the homicide itself. In this study, we present a case of a 57‐year‐old woman who was decapitated and her right arm and both hands were dismembered. It was determined that the victim was murdered and dismembered by her 33‐year‐old daughter, who had been receiving treatment for schizophrenia for 15 years. On the victim’s head and back there were 71 incised and stab wounds in total. They were superficial, except the five stab wounds which were connected to the right chest cavity and which incapacitated the victim. Although there is not a regulation for the act of dismembering the corpse in the Turkish Penal Code, since this type of case is rare, the crime scene and the autopsy findings were evaluated together with other pertinent data available in the literature.