“A garden had been left to grow wild there”: considering nature in Ivan Vladislavić’s Johannesburg

Johannesburg has frequently been subjected to critical examinations that conceive the city as a metropolis dominated by late capitalist excess and gold mining hyperbole. Along these particular lines, much of the literary scholarship that considers Vladislavi?’s city texts have focussed on his conception of the built environment that critiques its exploitative extractive history and its simulacral tendencies. However, sustained critical attention of his treatment of nature in the urban space has largely been neglected or underplayed. The natural Highveld environment, for Vladislavi?, occupies a fraught and liminal space in the city, pushed to the margins of a brutalizing modernity. Nature in Johannesburg, he opines, is a construction, an imposition and inheritance that belies the city’s colonial and European settler history. However, there are moments in which, when human attention is turned away, nature in its untended and generative capacity works to unmake the structural obduracy of the settled city. This manifests in episodes that embrace the quiet potency of wild gardens that disrupt the urban status quo.     

Y-chromosome haplotypes in Italy: the GEFI collaborative database.

A sample of 1176 males from 10 Italian regions have been typed for DYS19, DYS389-I, DYS389-II, DYS390, DYS391, DYS392, DYS393, and DYS385. Individual haplotype data are available on line. A low degree of variation is present among regions. Use of this database is specifically recommended for forensic applications in Italy.     

Simulations of child sexual abuse interviews using avatars paired with feedback improves interview quality

We tested whether simulated child sexual abuse (CSA) interviews with computer-generated child avatars could improve interview quality. Feedback was provided not only on question types, as in previous research, but also on whether the conclusions drawn by the interviewers were correct. Twenty-one psychology students (average age M = 24.5) interviewed four different avatars which had a simulated story of either abuse or non-abuse. The participants were randomly divided into two groups: one received feedback on question types and conclusions after each simulated interview and the other one did not receive any feedback. Avatars revealed pre-defined ‘memories’ as a function of algorithms formulated based on previous empirical research on children's suggestibility. The feedback group used more open-ended and fewer closed questions. They also made more correct conclusions and found more correct details in the last two interviews compared to the no-feedback group. Feedback on both the question types and conclusions in simulated CSA interviews with avatars can improve the quality of investigative interviews in only one hour. The implications for training practice were discussed.     

Liberia: security challenges,development fundamentals

This research article argues that security challenges in post-conflict Liberia cannot be addressed effectively without synchronising current stabilisation policies with the implementation of development fundamentals. The article explores key strategic sectors of the Liberian economy and their impact on the security and development dimensions of peace building. The political economy of post-conflict Liberia has not structurally modified an economic model which relies on the concessionary system and the extraction of raw materials at the expense of developing productive sectors which could be used to secure sustainable livelihoods. It is suggested that a shift in the political economy pursued by national and international actors is needed to link current peacebuilding efforts to sustainable development processes; one policy measure recommended to achieve such a goal is enhanced support for land reform and small farmers' rights.     

Detecting Domestic Violence: Spanish External Validation of the Index of Spouse Abuse

The aims of the study were to assess the psychometric properties of the Spanish version of the Index of Spouse Abuse (ISA), and to validate it against external criteria of intimate partner violence. The Spanish version of the ISA was administered to 223 non-abused women and 182 victims of intimate partner violence. Internal consistency coefficients oscillated between 0.88 and 0.98. The Confirmatory Factor Analysis failed to replicate the original two-factor structure. Using Exploratory Factor Analysis, a two-factor solution was found: physical (ISA-P) and non-physical (ISA-NP), but the items included in each factor were slightly different from the original two subscales. Receiver operating characteristic curve analysis revealed an AUC value for the ISA global score of 0.99 (95% CI: 0.98–0.99), with the optimal cut-off of 12 for detecting intimate partner violence. The Spanish version of the ISA is a valid instrument for detecting intimate partner violence in a female population.     

The size of the underground economy in Germany: a correction of the record and new evidence from the modified-cash-deposit-ratio approach

Based on the Ahumada et al. (Rev Income Wealth 53(2):363–371, 2007) critique we revise existing estimates of the size of the German underground economy. Among other things, it turns out that most of these estimates are untenable and that the tax pressure induced size of the German underground economy may be much lower than previously thought. To this extent, German policy and law makers have been misguided during the last three decades. Therefore, we introduce the Modified-Cash-Deposit-Ratio approach, which is not subject to the recent critique and apply it to Germany for the period 1960–2008.     

Underage abortion and beyond: developments of Spanish law in competent minor's autonomy

This paper examines the recent developments in underage abortion and related questions in Spanish law. Despite the prevalence of the language of autonomy, like in Britain, children's interests are not defined in Spain by relying exclusively on the competent child's views. Parental opinion and societal expectations are given due weight, although sometimes only implicitly. Calculated ambiguity in legal practice and in the relevant legal texts provides evidence of the pervasive influence of deeply rooted distrust as against clear-cut rules favouring a young person's autonomy.     

The murderer is the bed: an unusual case of death by traumatic asphyxia in a hotel folding bunk bed

This paper presents the first referenced case on a death by traumatic asphyxia in a folding bunk bed. A middle-aged man was found dead in a hotel room trapped into a lower folding bunk bed where he had been sleeping after a party. The autopsy showed signs of asphyxia and excluded signs of struggle and sexual intercourse. Toxicological analyses revealed alcohol intoxication. A differential diagnosis of the manner of death including a technical study of the bed which contributed to understand the circumstances of death was made. The medico-legal investigation of the case strongly supported the hypothesis of an accidental death by traumatic asphyxia.     

Differentiating Factitious from Malingered Symptomatology: the Development of a Psychometric Approach

Psychometric symptom validity assessment is becoming increasingly part and parcel of psychological and neuropsychological assessments. An unresolved and rarely addressed issue concerns the differentiation between factitious and malingered symptom presentations: present-day symptom validity tests can assess whether an examinee presents with noncredible symptomatology, but not why an examinee does so. We explored this issue by developing the Symptom and Disposition Interview (SDI); a symptom validity test that incorporates strategies intended to gauge internal incentives associated with factitious disorder. The merits of the SDI were explored and compared to a traditional symptom validity test (the Structured Inventory of Malingered Symptomatology) in two analogue studies, each with factitious and malingering conditions (n = 24–30 per condition) and a clinical control group (n = 34, n = 40). Overall, the results were positive: The SDI was as effective in detecting feigned symptom presentations as a traditional symptom validity test and superior in differentiating factitious from malingered symptom presentations. We conclude that the SDI is not ready for clinical use, but that psychometric approaches to the assessment of factitious symptomatology, such as the SDI, appear sufficiently promising to warrant future research.