Suicide: a ten-year retrospective study

Suicide is a complex phenomenon associated with psychological, biological, and social factors, claiming approximately 30,000 lives each year in the United States. We retrospectively reviewed all cases referred to the Medical Examiners' Office/Forensic Pathology Section at the Medical University of South Carolina from January 1988 to December 1997. The cases of suicide totaled 678. All of the cases were analyzed as to age/race/sex, method of suicide, time of year, and toxicological results. Files were also reviewed to determine if the victim left behind a suicide note. The ages ranged from 12 to 94 years; males comprised 79.5% of the victims, and whites 78.3%. The male to female and white to black ratios were both 3.9:1. The most common methods were gunshot wounds, accounting for 64.6% of the cases. No correlation existed with time of year, and the number of cases was not increased around major holidays. The group of victims 65 years and older and the pediatric group under the age of 18 were also examined separately.     

Effects of face-to-face restorative justice on victims of crime in four randomized,controlled trials

The growing use of restorative justice provides a major opportunity for experimental criminology and evidence-based policy. Face-to-face meetings led by police officers between crime victims and their offenders are predicted to reduce the harm to victims caused by the crime. This prediction is derived not only from the social movement for restorative justice, but also from the microsociology of interaction rituals (Collins, 2004). Four randomized, controlled trials of this hypothesis in London and Canberra, with point estimates disaggregated by gender, tested the prediction with measures of both successful interaction ritual (apologies received and their perceived sincerity) and the hypothesized benefits of the ritual (on forgiveness of, and reduced desire for violent revenge against, offenders, and victim self-blame for the crime). The meta-analyses of the eight point estimates suggest success (as victims define it) of restorative justice as an interaction ritual, and as a policy for reducing harm to victims.     

Pellagra: a rare disease observed in a victim of mental and physical abuse

Lesions of the brain stem and cerebellum due to nutritional deficiencies are mostly seen in chronic alcohol abuse and more rarely in severe malnutrition. We report the case of a 27-year-old woman, found dead in the family flat. She presented cachexia (167 cm, 25 kg) and multiple hematomas of the limbs. Postmortem examination revealed lesions due to peritonitis. Neuropathological examination showed severe atrophy of the corpus callosum and central neuronal chromatolysis, which are observed in pellagra. Inflammatory colitis or celiac disease was not found. Toxicological analysis was negative, in particular no alcohol absorption. Pellagra, which is due to nicotinamide deficiency, is a disease rarely seen in this country. In this case, nutritional deficiency was the consequence of failure to eat in a context of abuse. The woman was born of an incestuous relationship and presented intellectual retardation due to poor affective relations with her mother.     

Emotional Variables in Adolescence,and Their Stability and Contribution to the Mental Health of Adult Men: Implications for Early Intervention Strategies

This longitudinal study documented the stability of the emotional of a sample of males from adolescence (age 14) through young adulthood (age 19) and into middle adulthood (age 48). Using the Offer Self-image Questionnaire (OSIQ), the Hess and Henry Identity Test, and the Symptoms Checklist (SCL-90), distinct emotional traits were found in 67 adolescent males that were important in determining their mental health status in adult life (age 48). The results clearly demonstrated that certain adolescent emotional states tend to remain a problem in adulthood as well. Intervention work that could be done in order to change any adverse trajectories set by these variables was discussed.     

Identifying,explaining, and targeting burglary ‘hot spots’

Conclusion The data-gathering and crime analysis part of the Task Force programme (while not yet completed) has generated some useful information about burglary in Cambridge which might inform a crime prevention strategy. The research has shown that residential burglary is not evenly distributed across Cambridge, but tends to be clustered in the northwest of the City. It has also shown that even in these high-burglary areas there are hot spots and cold spots of crime. These hot spots account for a relatively large proportion of all burglary.One factor contributing to the high burglary counts in the hot spot area is the high number of repeat burglaries, with as many as 35 percent of all burglaries recorded in the area being one of a repeat series of burglaries. Another factor which might have contributed to the high burglary counts was the abundance of access and escape routes of the kind identified in the environmental survey. Perhaps the most important factor which explains the high number of burglaries was the closeness of the area to the place of residence of known offenders. The hot spot site thus provides a local source of easy and rewarding opportunities for offenders who live in these areas.In the second stage of its work, the Cambridge Burglary Task Force will collate the information that has been collected in the first stage and devise appropriate intervention strategies. We aim to continue to monitor crime and criminals in the area and to evaluate the effectiveness the programmes implemented.     

Public transportation policy making in France as an implementation problem

Public transportation policy is analyzed as the output of a complex social system of interdependencies and power relationships linking the central state bodies to various economic and political organizations. The interest groups structure the system by controlling the implementation process. The system works because of cheating—violating the public regulations, but the interest groups need state regulation to protect their privileges.The study of governmental projects is a particularly stimulating form of political analysis. Because it emphasizes both the process and the contents of the activities of public authorities, which is to say the goods and services produced by the State, such a study deals with problems having specific impact on and distinct meaning for individuals. It also allows one to avoid overly abstract speculation on the nature of the State by placing the discussion on a more scientifically fruitful level, that of the effective interactions and exchanges among institutions and groups.Our objective will be to demonstrate the importance of the implementation sequence of public policy, particularly in terms of its effects on the understanding of the definition of alternative solutions. We will concentrate on the way in which an ensemble of systems effects, induced by governmental action conditions both the perception of the problem to which this action is supposedly responding, and the elaboration of decisions to solve the problem. The method employed will be that of suggesting a form of analysis which will discern those fields of force and interaction processes with which decision makers, in this case public authorities, are confronted. The method employed should thus be useful in understanding the process of decision making.     

A. Reviews: general

THE CIVILIZATIONS OF ASIA AND THE MIDDLE EAST BEFORE THE EUROPEAN CHALLENGE. By JAROSLAV KREJCI. Basingstoke, Macmillan, 1990. 348 pp. .£37.50 (hb).

THE ORIGINS OF ARAB NATIONALISM. Edited by RASHID KHALIDI, LISA ANDERSON, MUHAMMAD MUSLIH, and REEVA S. SIMON. 288 pp. + glossary, bibliography, index. New York, Columbia University Press, 1991.

THE ARAB STATE. Edited by GIACOMO LUCIANI. London, Routledge, 1990. 454 pp., bibliography, index, tables.

STATE, POWER, AND POLITICS IN THE MAKING OF THE MODERN MIDDLE EAST. By ROGER OWEN. London, Routledge, 1992. xiv, 302 pp. £40.00 (hb), £12.99 (pb).

L'ÉCHEC DE L'ISLAM POLITIQUE. By OLIVIER ROY. Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1992. 247pp.

MOSCOW AND THE MIDDLE EAST. By ROBERT O. FREEDMAN. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1991. xii, 426 pp. $59.50 (hb), $16.95 (pb).

EURO‐ARAB RELATIONS: A STUDY IN COLLECTIVE DIPLOMACY. By HAIFAA A. JAWAD. Reading, Garnet Publishing, 1992. viii, 302 pp. £25.00

OIL ON TROUBLED WATERS: GULF WARS 1980–91. By JOHN CREIGHTON. London, Echoes, 1992. viii, 156 pp. £35.00.

ALL THAT REMAINS: THE PALESTINIAN VILLAGES OCCUPIED AND DEPOPULATED BY ISRAEL IN 1948. Edited by WALID KHALIDI. Washington, D.C., The Institute for Palestine Studies, 1992. li, 636 pp. Illustrations, maps, bibliography, index. $59.00 (hb).

PALESTINE REBORN. By WALID KHALIDI. London, I.B. Tauris, 1992. xxi, 234pp. £35.00(hb), £14.95 (pb).

WILDFIRE: GRASSROOTS REVOLT IN ISRAEL IN THE POST‐SOCIALIST ERA. By SAM N. LEHMAN‐WILZIG. New York, State University of New York Press, 1992. x, 198 pp. $12.95 (pb).

MODERN ALGERIA. By CHARLES‐ROBERT AGERON. London, Hurst, 1991. x, 166 pp. £16.50 (hb).

L'ALGERIE PAR SES ISLAMISTES. By M. AL‐AHNAF, BERNARD BOTIVEAU and FRANCK FREGOSI. Paris, Karthala, 1991. 328 pp.

TUNISIA: RURAL LABOUR AND STRUCTURAL TRANSFORMATION. By SAMIR RADWAN, JAMAL VALI and AJIT GHOSE. London, Routledge, 1991. xii, 122 pp, £30.00 (hb).

SUDAN AFTER NIMEIRI. Edited by PETER WOODWARD. (Routledge/ SOAS Contemporary Politics and Culture in the Middle East series.) London, Routledge, 1991, xii, 223pp. £35(hb).

TRADE AND EMPIRE IN MUSCAT AND ZANZIBAR: ROOTS OF BRITISH DOMINATION. By M[OHMED] REDA BHACKER. (Exeter Arabic & Islamic series.) London & New York, Routledge, 1992. 278pp. £40.00

THE KURDS: A CONTEMPORARY OVERVIEW. Edited by PHILIP K. KREYENBROEK AND STEFAN SPERL. London, Routledge, 1991. xii, 250 pp. £35.00 (hb).

ARABIC ADENI TEXTBOOK. By HABAKA J. FEGHALI. Edited by ALAN S. KAYE. (Arabic dialect series (Yemen).) Wheaton, MD, Dunwoody, 1991. xx, 233 pp.

MOROCCAN ARABIC READER. By HABAKA J. FEGHALI. Notes by Alan S. Kaye. Wheaton, MD, Dunwoody, 1989. xi, 143 pp.     

Intensity and Breadth of Participation in Organized Activities During the Adolescent Years: Multiple Associations with Youth Outcomes

The goal of this study was to examine initial levels and rates of change in the intensity and breadth of participation in organized activities during the adolescent years, and how these participation practices were related to youth outcomes in later adolescence. The main objectives were (a) to examine growth curves of intensity and breadth of participation from Grades 7 through 11 and their interrelations, and (b) to test the associations between these dimensions of participation and academic orientation, risky behaviors, internalizing problems, and civic development in Grade 11. A homogenous sample of 299 youth (mean age = 13.37, SD = .41; 62% girls) were surveyed annually using questionnaires and phone interviews. The main results revealed that (a) even though both intensity and breadth of participation decreased over time, intensity of participation showed steeper declines by later grades, and (b) initial levels of participation were better predictors of later outcomes than rates of change over time. Regardless of the levels of change taking place over time, results revealed that youth with high initial levels of participation (both intensity and breadth) were more committed to school and developed more positive values towards society by Grade 11 than those who participated less. This might suggest that a high level of participation during early-to-mid-adolescence is particularly important when it comes to later outcomes.