Are Your Disputants Insecure and Does It Matter? Attachment and Disputants' Speech during Mediation

An exploratory qualitative study explored the effect of attachment styles on disputants' speech during real‐life mediations. Drawing on attachment theory, we classified disputants as secure or insecure individuals using a self‐report attachment‐style questionnaire. Subsequently, they entered their mediation sessions, where their entire speech was recorded. Qualitative analysis of their speech yielded consistent and sometimes striking differences that portrayed secure speech as remarkably more useful and enhancing toward resolution compared with insecure speech. The findings, presented with many examples, strongly indicate the relevance of attachment to the research of communication during mediation sessions. In this report, we also consider the practical implications of the association between attachment and disputants' behavior, emphasizing the role of mediators.     

Forensic applications of chemical imaging: latent fingerprint detection using visible absorption and luminescence

Chemical imaging technology is a rapid examination technique that combines molecular spectroscopy and digital imaging, providing information on morphology, composition, structure, and concentration of a material. Among many other applications, chemical imaging offers an array of novel analytical testing methods, which limits sample preparation and provides high-quality imaging data essential in the detection of latent fingerprints. Luminescence chemical imaging and visible absorbance chemical imaging have been successfully applied to ninhydrin, DFO, cyanoacrylate, and luminescent dye-treated latent fingerprints, demonstrating the potential of this technology to aid forensic investigations. In addition, visible absorption chemical imaging has been applied successfully to visualize untreated latent fingerprints.     

Diagnosis of sudden unexplained death in epilepsy by immunohistochemical staining for prolactin in cerebral vessels

Sudden unexplained death in epilepsy occurs when epilepsy patients die suddenly and unexpectedly in the absence of recent tonic-clonic seizure activity. There is currently no known reliable indicator of acutely lethal seizure activity. Clinical studies record a relationship between recent (within 10-40 minutes) seizure activity and elevated serum prolactin levels, and postictal elevation of prolactin within peripheral vessels has proved clinically useful in determining recent seizure activity. The authors hypothesized that elevated prolactin could be detected in cerebral vessels by immunohistochemical stains, serving as a marker for sudden unexplained death in epilepsy. They conducted a retrospective study of individuals who died in their jurisdiction during the 14 years from 1986 through 1999. The study contained one group of individuals who died of sudden unexplained death in epilepsy, a group with epilepsy who died of some other cause, and a control group whose members died rapidly of a gunshot wound of the torso. Sections of hippocampus and neocortex were obtained and stained with a polyclonal prolactin antibody. No significant difference in the level of immunostaining for prolactin in cerebral vessels was found between the experimental and control groups. A review of the protocols used indicates that revision of certain aspects may provide better immunostaining and more conclusive results.