A friend in need: the role of friendship quality as a protective factor in peer victimization and bullying

This study examined friendship quality as a possible moderator of risk factors in predicting peer victimization and bullying. Children (50 boys and 49 girls, ages 10 to 13 years) reported on the quality of their best friendship, as well as their bullying and victimization tendencies. Parents reported on their child's internalizing and externalizing behaviors, in addition to bullying and victimization tendencies. Results indicated that externalizing problems were related to bullying behavior; however, friendship quality moderated this relation such that among children with externalizing behaviors, a high-quality friendship significantly attenuated bullying behavior. Internalizing problems and low friendship quality were significantly related to victimization; however, friendship quality did not moderate the relation between internalizing problems and victimization. Implications for interventions based on these findings are discussed.     

GC-MS of ignitable liquids using solvent-desorbed SPME for automated analysis

Solid-phase microextraction (SPME) is well documented with respect to its convenience and applicability to sampling volatiles. Nonetheless, fire debris analysts have yet to widely adopt SPME as a viable extraction technique, although several fire debris studies have demonstrated the utility of SPME coupled with gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) to identify ignitable liquids. This work considers the expansion of SPME sampling from the customary thermal desorption mode to solvent-based analyte desorption for the analysis of ignitable residues. SPME extraction fibers are desorbed in 30 microL of nonaqueous solvent to yield a solution amenable to conventional GC-MS analysis with standard autosampler apparatus. This approach retains the advantages of convenience and sampling time associated with thermal desorption while simultaneously improving the flexibility and throughput of the method. Based on sampling results for three ignitable liquids (gasoline, kerosene, anddiesel fuel) in direct comparisons with the widely used activated charcoal strip (ACS) method this methodology appears to be a viable alternative to the routinely used ACS method.     

Using hydrophilic adhesive tape for collection of evidence for forensic DNA analysis

Known exemplar samples of human DNA have traditionally been body fluids, such as blood, saliva, and semen. In each case, the presence of water is a risk for the bacterial growth, which may degrade the DNA evidence. In this study, the authors have developed a method that employed a hydrophilic adhesive tape (HAT) for collecting DNA evidence. The HAT method was used to remove surface cells from relatively hairless areas on the body. The area examined were ankle, arm, behind the ear, between fingers and back of the neck. The HAT was then dissolved in the extraction buffer. DNA typing was performed at vWA, THo1, F13A1, and FES loci using the short tandem repeat (STR) analysis. Our results show that the samples collected from ear give the best results with a success rate of 100%. All subjects tested by this method had known STR genotypes established from buccal swabs. The authors' results suggest that the HAT method can be used as a less invasive method for collecting biological evidence for forensic DNA analysis. In addition, this collection method should reduce the risk of DNA degradation due to the moisture, which is encountered using conventional collecting methods.     

Panhypopituitarism in a young drug abuser

An intoxicated young man returned home from a drinking party and collapsed and died in his mother's presence. Three weeks earlier, he had been released from prison, having served a sentence for possession and sale of "street drugs". At the time of his release, he and his friends had gathered together for a celebration at which drugs were used. At the autopsy table, there was initial evidence of an intrasellar hemorrhage of recent onset with ablation of the adenohypophysis. At first the prosectors considered the case to be one of drug-induced pituitary "apoplexy". However, there was subsequent autopsy evidence of chronic panhypopituitarism. The intrasellar lesion proved to be a Rathke-cleft cyst of dysontogenetic origin, probably unrelated to drug abuse. This case is presented as an example of the increasing complexities encountered by the forensic pathologist in a world of increasing numbers of available toxic substances.     

Reviews

E. H. Carr, The Russian Revolution from Lenin to Stalin, 1917–1929. London and Basingstoke: The Macmillan Press, Ltd., 1979. x + 200 pp. £6.95.

Paul Dukes, October and the World: Perspectives on the Russian Revolution. London and Basingstoke: The Macmillan Press, Ltd., 1979. viii + 224 pp. £10.00 and £4.95.

Graeme J. Gill, Peasants and Government in the Russian Revolution. (The London School of Economics and Political Science) London and Basingstoke: The Macmillan Press, Ltd., 1979. xiv + 233 pp. £12.00.

John L. H. Keep, The Debate on Soviet Power: Minutes of the All‐Russian Central Executive Committee of Soviets, Second Convocation, October 1917‐January 1918. (British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data) Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979. xiv + 465 pp. £15.00.

Robert Service, The Bolshevik Party in Revolution: A Study in Organisational Change, 1917–1923. London and Basingstoke: The Macmillan Press, Ltd., 1979. 246 pp. £12.00.

Theda Skocpol, States and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analysis of France, Russia, and China. Cambridge, London, New York and Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 1979. xvii + 406 pp. £19.50 and £5.50.

Marc Ferro, October 1917: a social history of the Russian Revolution. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1980. xiv + 345 pp. £13.50.

Arcadius Kahan and Blair A. Ruble (eds.), Industrial Labor in the U.S.S.R. (Pergamon policy studies), New York and Oxford: Pergamon Press, 1979. xv+ 421 pp. $9.95

Murray Yanowitch (ed.), Soviet Work Attitudes—The issue of Participation in Management, Oxford: Martin Robertson, 1979. xiv+ 133 pp. £12.00.

Nicholas Lampert, The Technical Intelligentsia and the Soviet State. A Study of Soviet Managers and Technicians 1928–1935. London and Basingstoke: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1979. x + 191 pp. £12.00.

Neils Erik Rosenfeldt, Knowledge and Power: The Role of Stalin's Secret Chancellery in the Soviet System of Government. Copenhagen University, Institute of Slavonic Studies, no. 5. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde and Bagger, 1978. 219 pp. 80 D. kr., paper.

Ljubo Sirc, The Yugoslav Economy Under Self‐Management. London: The Macmillan Press, 1979. xx + 270 pp. Index. £15.00.

Marshall I. Goldman, The Enigma of Soviet Petroleum—Half Empty or Half Full. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1980. 214 pp. £10.95.

Jonathan P. Stern, Soviet Natural Gas Development to 1990. London: D. C. Heath, 1980. xiii + 190 pp. £13.50.

Jozef M. van Brabant, Socialist Economic Integration: Aspects of Contemporary Economic Problems in Eastern Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980. xiii + 362 pp. £15.00.

David E. Albright (ed.), Africa and International Communism. London and Basingstoke: Macmillan in association with Indiana University Press, 1980. viii + 277 pp. £12.50 and £4.95.

Michael J. Deane, Strategic Defense In Soviet Strategy. Coral Gables, Fla: Advanced International Studies Institute, University of Miami, 1980. 119 pp.

David W. Paul, The Cultural Limits of Revolutionary Politics: Change and Continuity in Socialist Czechoslovakia. Boulder: East European Quarterly, 1979. x + 361 pp. $23.10.

Christian Rakovsky, Selected Writings on Opposition in the USSR, 1923–30 (edited with an introduction by Gus Fagan). London: Allison & Busby, 1980. 185 pp. £13.95 (cloth), £4.95 (paper).

Alan W. Fisher, The Crimean Tatars, Stanford, California: Hoover Institution Press, 1978. xii + 264 pp. $14.95.     

Do economic conditions influence how theorists view adolescents?

Eighty-nine articles in thePedagogical Seminary and theJournal of Genetic Psychology appearing during two economic depressions and the two world wars were analyzed for their adolescent ideologies. A systematic, ideological bias in the content of these articles was found to be statistically significant. In times of economic depression theories of adolescence emerge that portray teenagers as immature, psychologically unstable, and in need of prolonged participation in the educational system. During wartime, the psychological competence of youth is emphasized and the duration of education is recommended to be more retracted than in depression. The objective, scientific nature of theory building is questioned and discussed.Received Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Minnesota. Research interests: adolescent social development, moral development.Received M.S. in Educational Psychology, University of Wisconsin-Madison. Research interests: adolescent development, cognitive development.Received Ph.D. in Educational Psychology, from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Research interests: quantitative methods.Research interests: adolescent social development, cognitive development.     

WHO'S REGISTERED AND WHO'S NOT: TARGETING VOTER REGISTRATION IN CHICAGO

Racial minorities, the poor, the less educated and the young are the groups least likely to be registered and most likely to be under-represented in voting. The potential payoff from participation in local elections is great: voting is their only real avenue of influence and municipal office holders are more directly responsive to voters than are federal officials. The success enjoyed by blacks in Chicago during the 1980s demonstrates what can be accomplished with high levels of registration and turnout. Yet the barriers to a continuingly high turnout are formidable. An analysis prepared for the Chicago Urban League by social scientists specifies the areas in need of expanded registration efforts, the type of problems likely to be en- countered, and the mobilizing tactics most likely to be successful. The problem of turnout and the differential impact of race and class has real-life consequences. The power of the political party to facilitate, or by not engag- ing in registration activities, to depress involvement is indicated in the various wards of the city where the local party has a commanding presence.