刑事照相常用紫外光源照射对DNA检验的影响研究

目的探究刑事照相常用紫外光源照射不同客体上的血指印和汗潜指印后对DNA检验产生的影响。方法分别使用254nm和365nm紫外光源在不同照射距离,不同照射时间下对不同客体表面制备的原血指印、微量血指印和汗潜指印检材进行照射,随后进行DNA定量分析。结果原血指印经紫外照射后对DNA检验结果无显著影响,微量血指印和汗潜指印经紫外照射对后续DNA检验结果认定影响较大。结论紫外光波长越短、功率越大、照射距离越短、照射时间越长,对DNA检验结果的影响越大。     

Core Consensus,Strategic Variations: Mapping Arts Management Graduate Education in the United States

This study is the first comprehensive curricular comparison of graduate arts management programs in the United States. Its principal finding is that there exists considerable curricular convergence among arts management programs and that their differences may be exploited strategically. Through extensive curricular analysis and in-depth conversations with faculty, this study makes both conceptual and methodological contributions to the field—conceptual because it provides an empirical basis for the definition of arts management as a formal academic discipline in its own right and methodological because it proposes a framework to effect a systematic comparison of arts management program curricula.     

SCAN is largely driven by 12 criteria: results from sexual abuse statements

Scientific Content Analysis (SCAN) is increasingly used by investigative authorities to evaluate the credibility of statements made by witnesses and suspects. SCAN, however, lacks a well-defined list of criteria, and does not involve a standardised scoring system. In the current study, we investigated which SCAN criteria are represented in actual statements. To this end, we analysed 82 sexual abuse cases of the Dutch police in which SCAN had been applied. Two independent coders scored the presence of various SCAN criteria in the: (1) written statements from victims, suspects, and witnesses; and also looked at the (2) recommendations for follow-up investigations that were derived from SCAN. Results showed that SCAN is primarily driven by 12 criteria. Results also indicated a low inter-rater agreement for most SCAN criteria, suggesting SCAN is insufficiently developed as a forensic tool. Still, the 12 criteria can be used as a starting point for future research on their psychometric properties.     

Behind closed doors: the effect of pretrial publicity on jury deliberations

Abstract

Effective treatment of aggressive behaviour and accurate release decision making are necessary components of adequate clinical practice in forensic psychiatric units. Unfortunately, methods to identify treatment targets and ameliorate aggressive behaviour have developed at a slower pace than risk assessment technologies. Recent progress on the identification of offence paralleling or functionally equivalent behaviour offers a framework for individually tailored treatment and idiographic release decision making, although empirical scrutiny of this approach is inadequate. This paper describes an examination of the relationship between aggressive behaviour prior to admission with aggression during inpatient psychiatric treatment, and reconviction for violent offending following discharge. Results showed a relationship between pre- and post-admission aggression but no relationship between aggression during inpatient psychiatric treatment with either pre-admission aggressive behaviour or violent recidivism. These findings indicate the importance of state psychological variables, specifically those states affected by symptoms of psychiatric illness, as well as environmental activators and inhibitors of violence that operate within the hospital. These require inclusion in an adequate functional analysis of aggressive behaviour for forensic psychiatric patients.     

‘Look into my eyes’: can an instruction to maintain eye contact facilitate lie detection?

Abstract

Traditionally, research on offender profiling has investigated the relationships between offender behaviour and offender characteristics. However, evidence about offender behaviour is not the only evidence available at a crime scene. This study extends previous collaborative research between forensic scientists and psychologists (e.g. Bond & Sheridan, Journal of Forensic Science, 52, 1122–1128, 2007) to investigate how forensic science can assist in the psychological process of offender profiling. Specifically, the potential utility of footwear impression evidence in the task of offender profiling is investigated. Using 155 domestic burglaries, the consistency and homology assumptions underlying offender profiling were tested. Evidence supportive of both assumptions is reported. A multiple regression analysis identified significant relationships between cost of footwear and employment status, age of offender, and the relative deprivation of his/her residence.     

Student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilia

Abstract

This research investigates student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilia and their explanations for the current crisis of paedophilia. The research methodology is based on a previous research design (Sternberg, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 49, 607–627, 1985), and consists of two interrelated studies. Study 1 (n=60) develops scales for student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilia and Study 2 (n=188) uses these scales in conjunction with other scales to define the student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilia and to measure the potential explanations for the current crisis of paedophilia. The findings indicate that student/trainee-professional implicit theories of paedophilic personalities (pathology, abusive and mentally disordered old offender) and behaviours (devious, child focused, cognitive distortions, secretive, child lovers, sexual abusers, socially inept and grooming) seem to reflect both previous research and expert opinion. These tentative findings suggest that student/trainee-professionals' implicit theories of paedophilia, and as such the current crisis of paedophilia in modern society, seem to have developed in part from the transfer of expert knowledge (explicit theories), the impact of the media, and social constructionalism; and not from the student/trainee-professionals' individual personality and coping traits.     

Offenders' lies and truths: an evaluation of the Supreme Court of Sweden's criteria for credibility assessment

Abstract

The criteria used by Swedish courts for assessing credibility of plaintiffs' accounts were for the first time scientifically evaluated. Furthermore, unlike much previous deception detection research, we used offenders as participants instead of college students. False and truthful confessions by 30 offenders were analysed, and few significant effects were obtained. Truthful confessions were rated as having a higher degree of clarity than false confessions. Women's truthful confessions were rated as more credible than their false confessions. The offenders who were most experienced in being interviewed by the police gave a stronger impression of talking about something self-experienced in their false than in their truthful confessions; hence, it seems that offenders with more police interview experience have developed a kind of expertise in telling a convincing lie about crime. Overall, the criteria for credibility assessment used by Swedish courts had very limited usefulness in discriminating truthful and false confessions. A critique of the current status of evaluating statements in Swedish courts is provided.     

Non-sex offenders display distorted thinking and have empathy deficits too: A thematic analysis of cognitions and the application of empathy

Abstract

It is generally assumed that empathy acts to disinhibit behaviour that could be perceived as detrimental to others, and as a result is a common feature of offender treatment programmes. The present research hypothesised that empathy in all populations is both a situational and a selective process that is ultimately governed by self-interest, and further, that it is the nature of the self-interest that distinguishes individuals rather than a general empathy deficit per se. Empathic processes were observed in a non-offending population in a personal situation normally regarded as evocative of empathy: infidelity. Thematic analysis of data from individuals who reported being faithful or unfaithful to their partners revealed five dominant themes: vulnerable predisposition, emotional motivators, rational emotive decision making, avoiding cognitive dissonance and lack of remorse. The themes all revealed how individuals employed cognitive strategies, which were managed by self-interest that functioned to create cognitive states devoid of empathy.     

The Time Path of Legislative Party Switching and the Dynamics of Political Competition: The Italian Case (1996–2011)

Political competition is more realistically described as a dynamic process rather than as a series of static stages in which parties compete over policy and government formation. This paper focuses on legislative party switching as the main manifestation of this endogenously evolving process, linking individual switching behaviour to policy and office incentives that are assumed to evolve throughout the life of the entire legislature. Using a new data set tracking the timing of MPs’ changes in party affiliations between 1996 and 2011 in Italy, it is found that switching is mainly motivated by policy reasons and that it is more likely during government formation periods and budget negotiations. These results are a consequence of the interplay between MPs’ ambition and the alternation of key phases in the legislative cycle.     

Fear of Crime in the Swedish Daily Press—Descriptions of an Increasingly Unsafe Society

Fear of crime is a subject that is described increasingly often in the daily press. In spite of this, very few studies have examined how the press describes fear of crime. This article focuses on how fear of crime is presented, in what context, and who is labelled as fearful in the Swedish daily press. The theoretical frameworks are theories about the risk society and how fear of crime can be understood in a society characterized by risk, uncertainty, and worry. The current study analyses articles from four national daily newspapers employing a qualitative, thematic content analysis. In the analysis, four principal themes were distinguished: fear of crime defined, fear of crime personified, fear of crime situationalized, and fear of crime contextualized. The articles examined describe an increasingly unsafe society characterized by rising crime, particularly in the suburbs, which is producing fear among women and children. Male police officers are also described as being afraid and as no longer being able to protect the public. The daily press establishes clearly who should be afraid of crime, which crimes produce fear, and where and why people are afraid. The articles formulate special ways of describing fear of crime, in which fear appears as a natural and expected reaction to life in an increasingly unsafe and violent society.