THE USE OF PSYCHOLOGICAL TESTING IN CHILD CUSTODY EVALUATIONS

Evaluation of families for purposes of assisting the court in making decisions about custody is perhaps the most complicated forensic evaluation. Mental health professionals conducting such evaluations must ensure that their evaluations validly assess areas of concern deemed relevant by the judiciary and legislature. Evaluators sometimes use psychological measures in the evaluation process, and in recent years, a number of tests designed specifically for use in child custody evaluation contexts have been developed. Because some published tests do not meet basic professional standards, child custody evaluators should carefully review any test and its supporting documentation before including it in their examination procedures. In this article, the authors discuss the rationale for using psychological tests in child custody evaluations, describe current testing practices, review and critique contemporary custody evaluation instruments, and offer a template for mental health professionals to use when considering use of a particular test.     

The Psychology of Foreign Fighters

The recent influx of foreign fighters into Syria, particularly those aligning with the Islamic State, has brought renewed attention to the security threat posed by people who cross borders to participate in armed conflict. Although foreign fighters have rarely, if ever, constituted the majority of combatants in a war or insurgency, understanding their role is critical for conflict analysis and prevention. This review focuses on behavioral aspects of the foreign fighter phenomenon. Although other books and articles have focused wholly, or in part, on historical dimensions, the behavioral and social science literature on foreign fighters is much more limited. This review first explores the definitions of “foreign fighter” terminology, then analyzes what is known about their motivations and their pathways toward engaging in armed conflict on foreign soil. It examines recruitment strategies and the role of “radicalization” in feeding the transnational insurgent supply, and finally describes more specifically, the nature of foreign fighter involvement in more recent armed conflicts (e.g., Syria, Chechnya, Iraq, and Afghanistan), and speculates about the prospects for their future involvement.     

A study of business letter features

As part of their work, forensic document examiners examine word processed letters. The purpose of this study, the first of its kind, was to determine how common or rare certain features are in word-processed business letters and if any of these features could determine the author or source. Initially, 114 original business letters were obtained that were dated from 1999 through 2003. Specific features of the letters were selected for examination. These features were letter format, type style, the point size of the font, margin spacing to ascertain the use or nonuse of the default margins for Word (1.25 in. nonjustified) and the default margins for WordPerfect (1 in. nonjustified). In addition, the research involved the examination of the right margins to determine if they were justified or not and the use of the comma or colon in the salutation of the letter. The features of each letter were independently examined by the authors and the findings documented. As expected, several features were found to be very common. For example,full block format was used on 48% of the letters followed by the semi-block with 39%. The Times Family of fonts was used on 67% of the letters. Font point size 12 was the most popular with 70%. The nonjustified default margins were widespread with 67% and the colon was the overwhelming favorite in the salutation with 79%. There were some unexpected findings that could possibly lead to the identification of a source or typist.     

Scrutiny Land: Scrutiny Land is the place where government needs to justify to a court its restrictions on the liberties of the people

Scrutiny Land is the place where government needs to justify to a court its restrictions on the liberties of the people. In the 1930s, the Supreme Court began limiting access to Scrutiny Land. While the New Deal Court merely shifted the burden to those challenging a law to show that a restriction of liberty is irrational, the Warren Court made the presumption of constitutionality effectively irrebuttable. After this, only one road to Scrutiny Land remained: showing that the liberty being restricted was a fundamental right. The Glucksberg Two-Step, however, limited the doctrine of fundamental rights to those (1) narrowly defined liberties that are (2) deeply rooted in tradition and history. In this Article, I explain how the ability to define accurately almost any liberty as broad or narrow improperly gives courts complete discretion to protect liberty or not as it chooses. I then describe an alternative that is suggested by the approach taken by the Court in Lawrence v. Texas: a general presumption of liberty. Not only is such an approach practical, it is also more consistent with the text and original meaning of the Constitution than is the Glucksburg Two-Step.     

Property and markets in Elmer Kelton novels

Literature is not for clear answers. Literature is for complicated questions. There is vital empirical data in literary texts—not data about economic fact, though there is some of that as well, but data about how people felt and thought and wrote about economic and market issues. If we care about that, if that is as important as Deirdre McCloskey has argued, we have a responsibility to find that data, to write about it, to share it, and to teach it (Skwire in Cato Unbound, 2012. http://www.cato-unbound.org/2012/07/02/sarah-skwire/bonfire-cliches).     

The conversion of coroner systems to medical examiner systems in the United States: a lull in the action

Coroner and medical examiner systems in the United States conduct death investigations for most deaths that are sudden and unexplained, or which involve external causes such as injury and poisoning. They play a very important role in the criminal justice, public health, public safety, and medical communities, and they also contribute a substantial portion of autopsy-based mortality data to the state and federal mortality statistics systems. Death investigations often involve complex medical issues and necessarily require the involvement of appropriately trained physicians. Over the years, there has been a trend to replace the elected lay coroner systems with systems run by appointed, physician medical examiners. Presently, about 31% of counties in the United States are served by a medical examiners at the county, district, or state level. Between 1960 and 1989, there was considerable conversion to medical examiner systems, but this trend slowed in the 1990s. Since 2000, only 6 counties in the United States have converted to a medical examiner system, no states have converted since 1996, and 1 county has reverted to a sheriff-coroner system. Possible reasons for this decline are discussed, including legislative, political, geographical, financial, population-based, and physician manpower distribution factors. It is important to ensure that all death investigation systems have appropriate access to medically educated and trained physicians such as forensic pathologists.