Initiation of formal death investigation procedures among the Northern Plains Indians: a necessary adjunct in the study of American Indian sudden infant deaths

The high rate of infant mortality among native peoples in the Aberdeen Service Area of the Indian Health Service (primarily North and South Dakota) prompted a multi-institutional study of this problem. The study investigators assumed that local coroners or medical examiners would be able to perform suitable death scene investigations. However, during the design portion of the study it became apparent that, with one exception, none of the participating Indian Nations had a death investigator or even a legal mandate to provide death investigation. To allow the study to go forward, and ultimately to better the community health within its service area, the Aberdeen Area Indian Health Service submitted a draft enabling coroner legislation/resolutions to the area tribes. By November of 1996, 6 of the 19 Indian Nations enacted enabling coroner legislation. To facilitate both the study and general death investigation within the area, the Aberdeen Area Indian Health Service since 1993 has held five 2-day death investigation training programs covering a variety of death investigation topics which were attended by 68 participants. Without further recognition of the need for tribal death investigation and additional funding, these gains in tribal death investigation will probably be transitory.     

Mediators of the Relation Between Beliefs in a Just World and Emotional Responses to Negative Outcomes

Research shows that strong believers in a just world respond with less negative and more positive emotion to their own negative outcomes than do weak believers. The present study investigated mediators of this relation. We proposed that strong believers in a just world (versus weak believers) would make stronger internal and weaker external attributions for their negative outcomes, leading to reduced perceived unfairness, which, in turn, was expected to lead to less negative and more positive emotion. We assessed the just world beliefs of a sample of undergraduates as well as measuring their cognitive and emotional responses to an exam grade. Mediational analyses showed that our data were consistent with the processes proposed above. Various cognitive and motivational interpretations of the present findings are discussed     

Review of Books on Private Law and EU Law

Books reviewed in this article:
H. Kötz, Europäisches Vertragsrecht, Band I: Abschluß, Gültigkeit und Inhalt des Vertrages
H. Kötz, A. Flessner, European Contract Law, vol. 1: Formation, Validity, and Content of Contract; Contract and Third Parties
U. Drobing, Private Law in the European Union     

Intimacy status: Relationship to interpersonal perception

Five modes of reacting to the intimacy-isolation crisis of young adulthood were described, measured, and validated. Criteria for inclusion in one of the five intimacy statuses were (1) presence or absence of peer friendships, (2) presence or absence of an enduring-committed-heterosexual relationship, and (3) depth vs. superficiality of peer relationships. Statuses were compared on a partner-perception task assessing subject's intimate knowledge of his partner (a close male or female friend who accompanied the subject to the experiment). In all, 66 male college students participated in the study, 50 with male partners and 16 with female partners. The results support the hypothesis that subjects high in intimacy status share a greater degree of mutual knowledge and understanding with their partners then medium-or low-level intimacy status subjects.The research was supported by SUNY/Buffalo Institutional Funds Grant No. 050-A081A.This article is based in part on a doctoral dissertation submitted to the State University of New York at Buffalo (Orlofsky, 1974).Received Ph.D. in clinical psychology at the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1974. Primary research interest is in personality development during late adolescence and young adulthood, particularly identity formation and the development of an intimate mode of interpersonal relationships. Also involved in research on sex roles and psychological androgyny.     

A review of major factors contributing to errors in human hair association by microscopy.

Forensic hair examiners using traditional microscopic comparison techniques cannot state with certainty, except in extremely rare cases, that a found hair originated from a particular individual. They also cannot provide a statistical likelihood that a hair came from a certain individual and not another. There is no data available regarding the frequency of a specific microscopic hair characteristic (i.e., microtype) or trait in a particular population. Microtype is a term we use to describe certain internal characteristics and features expressed when observing hairs with unpolarized transmitted light. Courts seem to be sympathetic to lawyer's concerns that there are no accepted probability standards for human hair identification. Under Daubert, microscopic hair analysis testimony (or other scientific testimony) is allowed if the technique can be shown to have testability, peer review, general acceptance, and a known error rate. As with other forensic disciplines, laboratory error rate determination for a specific hair comparison case is not possible. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based typing of hair roots offer hair examiners an opportunity to begin cataloging data with regard to microscopic hair association error rates. This is certainly a realistic manner in which to ascertain which hair microtypes and case circumstances repeatedly cause difficulty in association. Two cases are presented in which PCR typing revealed an incorrect inclusion in one and an incorrect exclusion in another. This paper does not suggest that such limited observations define a rate of occurrence. These cases illustrate evidentiary conditions or case circumstances which may potentially contribute to microscopic hair association errors. Issues discussed in this review paper address the potential questions an expert witness may expect in a Daubert hair analysis admissibility hearing.