Uncertainty and Turnout

This article develops a model that simultaneously considersindividual turnout and vote choice while also accounting foruncertainty about candidates. The theoretical development ofthis model implies that the effects of uncertainty on turnoutvary with the strength of individual preferences. Applicationof the model to individual choice in the 1996 American presidentialelection confirms that decreasing uncertainty about the charactertraits of the candidates decreases the probability of abstentionfor individuals with strong preferences but increases the probabilityof abstention for individuals with weak preferences.     

Multifactorial analysis of firearm wounds to the head with attention to anatomic location.

Firearm wounds to the head are often fatal and are routinely encountered in the practice of forensic pathology in the United States. Often, the anatomic site of the entrance wound is used to support or refute the manner of death indicated by the scene investigation and/or circumstances of the case. The present retrospective study of 120 fatalities resulting from 140 firearm wounds to the head correlates the anatomic region of the entrance wound and range of fire with the manner of death. Other demographic data analyzed include age, race, and gender of the decedents, as well as evidence of drug and/or ethanol use. It is hoped that this study will provide concrete data to support the largely anecdotal associations between the specific site of entry of firearm injuries to the head and the manner of death.     

Narrating genetic disabilities: social constructs, medical treatment, and public policy

The article compares three memoirs of genetically based disability: Lisa Roney's sweet, invisible body, Georgina Kleege's Sight Unseen, and Alice Wexler's Mapping Fate. The essay explores the tension between the narrow and the broad construction of disability, as demonstrated by the 1999 Supreme Court rulings on the ADA and as experienced by these three memoirists. It concludes that the approach of narrative bioethics, as exemplified by such a study of disability and illness narratives, can offer the medical and public policy community a valuable alternative perspective on genetic disability not as an incapacity, but as a set of social relations and practices.