Perceived Quality of Life and Health Complaints in Children Exposed to Intimate Partner Violence

Children 9 to 13 years old exposed to intimate partner violence (IPV) reported on their violence exposure, attachment to both parents, temperament (negative emotionality and emotion regulation), perceived quality of life, and health complaints. Half of the children perceived their quality of life as good and did not have recurrent health complaints. When controlling for socioeconomic status, health complaints were associated with higher IPV exposure and negative emotionality, whereas quality of life was associated with attachment security, higher capacity for emotion regulation, and lower negative emotionality. These results underscore the importance of increasing and supporting the capacity of children exposed to IPV to handle and express their emotions, as well as making school nurses and other primary care practitioners more attentive to IPV as a possible background factor in children’s health complaints.     

Training in the Strategic Use of Evidence technique: Improving deception detection accuracy of American law enforcement officers

The Strategic Use of Evidence (SUE) approach is a framework for planning and executing suspect interviews with the aim of facilitating judgments of truth and deception. US law enforcement officers (N = 59) either received training in the SUE approach or did not. Each officer interviewed a mock suspect (N = 59) who had either committed a simulated security breach or had completed a benign task. The officers who received SUE training interviewed in line with the training: They questioned the suspect systematically, withheld the evidence and critical case information until after questioning, and relied on statement-evidence inconsistency to detect deceit. Consequently, SUE-trained interviewers achieved a higher deception detection accuracy rate (65%) compared to untrained interviewers (43%).     

Ratification of the 1992 Climate Change Convention: What Determines Legislative Delay?

The authors use a proportional hazards framework toinvestigate the impact of various countrycharacteristics on the duration of time taken toratify the United Nations Framework Convention onClimate Change (FCCC). The most significant findingsare that the conditional probability of ratificationis positively related to total CO₂ emissions andthe presence of civil liberties. The finding foremissions indicates that large, polluting countrieswere under great political pressure to ratify theFCCC. The latter finding is consistent with earlierresearch that found that democratic freedoms raisedthe probability of signing the Montreal Protocol.     

Coalitions in European Union Negotiations

Coalitions will probably become an increasingly important theme in European Union (EU) politics. The spread of decision making by majority voting promotes coalition‐building behaviour. The impending enlargement is predicted to differentiate and polarize policy standpoints within the EU. Increasing levels of policy conflict imply increased propensities for coalition building. Still, the role and nature of coalitions in EU negotiations are obscure. This article raises important research questions: What characterizes coalition building in the EU? How important are coalitions? What coalition patterns are discernible?Using data from a questionnaire to Swedish participants on EU committees, it is shown that coalitions are more frequent when majority voting occurs than when unanimity rules. Coalition behaviour is, however, important also under unanimity. The existence of consensus norms diminishes the propensity to form coalitions. As regards coalition patterns, there is a prevalence of coalitions based on policy interests and/or on cultural affinity. Contrary to conventional wisdom, consistent and durable coalition patterns seem to exist. The north–south divide is one such persistent pattern. The Swedish respondents thus reveal a close cooperation between the Nordic member states and Great Britain, whereas France and Spain are seldom approached for coalition‐building purposes. As to future research, evidence from other member states and from case studies is needed in order to learn more about the bases for coalition building in EU negotiations.     

The Structure and Culture of Post-Communist Civil Society in Latvia

This article provides an account of post-communist civil society in Latvia. Based on original survey data, the structure of civil society is analysed on both individual and organisational levels and cultural aspects are examined. The weakness of post-communist civil society found in much previous research is confirmed when measured on the individual level and in relation to some organisational aspects. The political culture of civil society in Latvia is relatively trusting, tolerant and pro-democratic, but elitist. The specific weaknesses of post-communist civil society can be attributed to the historical heritage of the communist regime as well as the context in which new foreign-funded civil society organisations emerged.     

Use of pepper spray in policing: retrospective study of situational characteristics and implications for violent situations

Pepper spray (OC) is a policing tool aimed to prevent or stop aggressive behavior by quickly and temporarily incapacitate without injuring. To date, few studies have investigated OC’s operational usefulness and limitations. OC reduced violent behavior in 93% of the 936 incidents investigated. However, the operative range was often <2 m and it took between 3 and 5 s of spraying before obtaining effect, partly owing to the difficulties of hitting a small, sometimes erratically moving target. Collateral hits were noted in 24% of the incidents, whereof 90% were other officers. Noteworthy, in 21% of incidents officers put themselves at large personal risk by using OC at close range against people armed with lethal weapons. Hence, OC emerges as a suitable tool for handling low threat situations but lacks key traits to ensure safe and efficient policing of high threat situations, e.g., handling armed assailants.     

Injuries of the female genitalia in cases of sexual assault

Sexual violence is a global problem that particularly affects women and children. A retrospective analysis of 390 clinical-forensic examinations and 120 autopsies regarding injuries of the female genitalia in cases of sexual violence was performed. In the majority of cases no injuries of the female genitalia were found. Autopsy cases showed significantly more (and more serious) injuries of the genitalia than clinical forensic examinations (43 % vs. 25 %; p = 0.0004). Predominantly found were injuries of the external anogenital area, mostly tears or soft tissue lesions. In the current literature, data regarding the rate of injuries in victims of sexual violence vary strongly and their comparability is limited. Regarding the reconstruction of an offence, a forensic examination with an appropriate documentation of the injuries is evidently crucial.     

Naming the Unmentionable: How Children Exposed to Intimate Partner Violence Articulate Their Experiences

Witnessing intimate partner violence (IPV) is a frightening experience that affects children’s development and well-being. This study examines experiences of IPV from the perspective of children. Interviews with 14 children between 8 and 12 years of age were analyzed using a thematic method. Three main themes were identified: how children talked about abuse of their mother, described their own actions, and related to or handled memories of violence. Most children confirmed that their mother had been the victim of abuse, but had difficulties describing these experiences. Narratives were often incoherent and difficult to fully understand. In contrast, most of the children seemed to find it easier to describe their own actions during violence and conflicts. Not thinking about IPV was a strategy that aimed at reducing unwanted memories; it is also a strategy that may obstruct creating a narrative.     

Elasticity in evaluations of criminal evidence: Exploring the role of cognitive dissonance

Purpose. Previous experiments have demonstrated asymmetrical scepticism in investigators' judgments of criminal evidence – evidence inconsistent (vs. consistent) with the dominant hypothesis about a case is judged as less reliable. In addition, some types of evidence (e.g., witness testimony) are more susceptible to asymmetrical scepticism than others (e.g., DNA evidence), indicating varying degrees of elasticity. This article proposes that inconsistent evidence arouses cognitive dissonance, and that the dissonance can be reduced through either asymmetrical scepticism (for high‐elasticity evidence) or belief change (for low‐elasticity evidence). The hypotheses are tested in two experiments. Methods. In both experiments, law students made a preliminary judgment about the guilt of a suspect in a homicide case, and subsequently received a piece of DNA or witness evidence which was either consistent or inconsistent with the preliminary judgment. The extent to which participants changed their guilt judgments, judged the additional evidence as reliable, and felt dissonance served as the main dependent variables. Results. Inconsistent (vs. consistent) evidence did arouse stronger dissonance, but only for witness (and not DNA) evidence. Experienced dissonance (Experiment 1) and dissonance reduction (Experiment 2) accounted for the effect of the evidence on changes in guilt judgments, but not for the effect on reliability judgments. The greatest dissonance reduction was observed among participants who received inconsistent witness evidence but did not change their guilt judgments accordingly. Conclusions. It appears that dissonance plays a significant, although complex, role in investigative judgments of guilt and reliability. Alternative dissonance‐reducing mechanisms that can account for the findings and practical implications are discussed.