Dental identification by comparison of antemortem and postmortem dental radiographs: influence of operator qualifications and cognitive bias

Dental forensic identifications based on comparison of antemortem and postmortem radiographs provide effective and reliable evidence. There are no standardized procedures for assessing similarities between different types of dental radiographs (e.g. orthopantomograms, bitewings, and periapical radiographs), and the operator's subjective judgment can considerably affect identification. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the potential influence of experts' qualifications, training, and cognitive bias on the accuracy of identification. Seventy-eight differently qualified and experienced experts underwent an identification test. The expert sample was composed of 10 specialists in emergency care (ER), 10 specialists in legal medicine (ML), 20 pregraduate dental students (STU), 12 dentists (DENT), 20 dentists educated in forensic odontology (DENT-TRA), and 6 experienced forensic odontologists (FOR). The simulated cases required participants to assess the possible matching of 42 postmortem intraoral radiographs with 16 antemortem panoramic radiographs. Accuracy and specificity for the different operator groups were as follows: ER, 0.76-0.70; ML, 0.76-0.88; STU, 0.89-0.82; DENT, 0.87-0.97; DENT-TRA, 0.88-0.92; and FOR, 0.97-1. As evidenced by high rates of accuracy and repeatability, the most experienced forensic odontologist consistently outperformed operators less or differently educated and trained, especially for difficult cases. In our sample, the dentists who received additional education in forensic odontology did not necessarily perform better than dentists who had not received this additional education. Some cognitive bias, mainly the so-called observer effect, emerged as a possible source of outcome variability among the operator groups.     

The democratic legitimation of European institutions

Italy is firmly in the grip of an austerity programme mandated by the European Union institutions, and executed by an unelected technocrat. This state of affairs is at once the result of the acute and unexpected crisis of the financial and economic integration of the eurozone, and an expression of the failures of the Italian political class. Although the euro crisis has been mishandled by European elites, Italy's long-term economic decline, and the inability of Italian party politicians to generate a sustainable coalition to address Italy's economic problems, hinders an exit from the crisis.     

Institutions come before markets

The Theory of Institutional Design. Edited by Robert E. Goodin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Pp.x + 288, name and subject indexes. £16.95 (paper); £35/$49.95 (cloth). ISBN 0–521–63643–4 and 47119–2.

The Political Economy of Public Administration. Institutional Choice in the Public Sector. By Murray J. Horn. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. Pp.ix + 263, biblio., name and subject indexes. £14.95/$21.95 (paper); £35/$59.95 (cloth) ISBN 0–521–48436–7 and 48201–1.

The Future of Governing : Four Emerging Models. By B. Guy Peters. Lawrence, KS: The University Press of Kansas, 1996. Pp.ix + 179, biblio., index. £11.95 (paper); £27.95 (cloth). ISBN 0–7006–0794–3 and 0793–5.

Public Management and Administrative Reform in Western Europe. Edited by Walter J. M.Kickert. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 1997. Pp.xv + 278, 6 figures, 19 tables, biblio., index. £49.95 (cloth). ISBN 1–85898–553–6.     

Italian Politics in an Era of Recession: The End of Bipolarism?

Abstract

Italian politics have undergone momentous change in the 2007–2017 decade under the impact of the eurozone crisis, whose peak in 2011–2013 could be equated to the earlier watershed years of 1992–1994. The lasting impact of the upheaval in Italian politics in the early 1990s could still be felt in the decade of economic recession, but there were also new challenges prompted by a crisis that had its roots in international financial contagion and which unravelled under the shadow of both recession and austerity. The changes were of an economic, social, cultural, institutional, policy-oriented and political nature. If one central quintessentially political theme stands out by the end of this decade it is the apparent exhaustion of the quest for bipolarisation that was initiated in the early 1990s.