Exploring the Relationship Between Childhood Sexual Abuse and Adult Sexual Perpetration

Empirical findings indicate that many adult sexual offenders experienced sexual abuse during childhood. It has been suggested that characteristics of offenders' sexual perpetrating behaviors may resemble their own victimization experiences, although there has been minimal empirical investigation in this area. The purpose of the present study was to provide preliminary data on the relationship between childhood sexual abuse and characteristics of sexual offending behavior. A sample of adult male sexual offenders with histories of sexual abuse completed the Sexual Victimization Survey as well as a measure on their sexual offenses. Such characteristics as the nature of sexual activities, duration and frequency of experiences, and age and relationship of participants were examined. Results showed trends in the hypothesized direction and revealed a variety of similarities between childhood sexual abuse and adult sexual perpetration. Findings of this exploratory study suggest the importance of addressing the nature of victimization in the treatment of sexually abused boys and offenders with histories of sexual abuse.     

MI Implementation in Juvenile Justice: A Case Report

Motivational interviewing (MI) is a communication style focused on enhancing clients’ own motivation towards change. In the justice system MI has evidence to support that it enhances communication and change behaviors in youth. As most MI training is designed for healthcare settings training and implementation of MI must be adapted to fit the juvenile justice model. This includes both rehabilitation and restorative justice. Here we describe the details that allowed one county small county in Pennsylvania to roll out MI training and initial skills review in less than 6 months. The case reviews the details of planning, trainings, and timing of activities. We then discuss what elements of those details fit into a greater implementation plan that may be applied elsewhere. Four key elements were instrumental to implementation: 1) appreciation of JPO time constraints, 2) cost containment 3) using blending to enhance JPO flexibility with MI use, and 4) policies that normalize use of MI. This outline may assist other courts in their own implementation efforts.     

Factors Associated with Physician Discussion of Health Behaviors with Adolescents

Behaviors developed in adolescence influence health later in life. The purpose of this study was to investigate the frequency of health care provider's discussion of health behaviors with overweight and non-overweight adolescents and identify demographic and health behaviors related to exercise, hours of television viewing, and weight issues associated with these discussions. A Cross sectional survey of urban adolescents was conducted. Trained interviewers administered surveys over a three month period in 2001 at an urban academic pediatric and adolescent clinic. The 252 adolescents surveyed had a mean age of 15 with 49% categorized as being at risk for overweight/overweight and 51% as normal weight using the CDC percentiles for BMI. While 16% of the adolescents reported that their physician or nurse discussed the amount of television they watched, rates of discussion related to exercise (58%), and weight (54%) were much higher. In multivariate analyses, health care provider discussions with adolescents regarding exercise were more common for overweight (O.R.=2.42, 95% C.I. [1.28–4.57]) and at risk for overweight (O.R.=1.98, 95% C.I. [1.03–3.81]) adolescents, whereas physician discussion of television viewing was not associated with weight. Discussions of weight were more common for female (O.R.=2.18, 95% C.I. [1.21–3.95]), African-American (O.R.=2.53, 95% C.I. [1.40–4.57]), and overweight (O.R.=3.92, 95% C.I. [1.97–7.81]) adolescents. Even after adjusting for weight, race and gender strongly influenced the frequency of discussions about weight in physician offices. Although health care providers frequently address weight and exercise with adolescents, more discussions related to sedentary behaviors such as television viewing may be warranted to address adolescent obesity.Received PhD in Epidemiology from University of California, San Diego. Research interests include smoking prevention and cessation among adolescents and health promotion interventions.Received MD from University of Missouri-Kansas City and MPH from Johns Hopkins University. Research interests include health services research and research in support of measurable, systematic improvements in the quality of medical care.Received medical degree from Christian Medical College, Punjab, India and Master of Public Health from University of Kansas School of Medicine. Research interests include diet and physical activity behaviors, role of the environment in obesity and obesity prevention, especially among children and adolescents.Received MBBS from Allama Iqbal Medical College, Punjab University, Lahore, Pakistan and MPH from University of Kansas Medical Center. Research interests include smoking cessation, database design, implementation, data management and analysis, and use of information technology in health care settings.Director, Cancer Prevention, Control, and Population Sciences, Kansas Cancer Institute. Received MD/MPH from Tulane University and MS from Harvard School of Public Health. Research interests include disparities in healthcare; smoking cessation among underserved populations, specifically African Americans; diet, nutrition, obesity, and physical activity.     

Whose House is this Anyway? IDP and Refugee Return in Post-Saddam Iraq

Although many people displaced by Saddam's regime over the yearslooked forward to returning as soon as the 2003 war ended, anumber of problems emerged which continued to bedevil the returnprocess as late as one year after the war. These problems includedan unclear political future for the country, competing politicaland sectarian forces that often view IDPs and refugees as strategictools or weapons, a hesitant and initially undecided Coalitionpolicy on the return issue, unclear mandates for the variousactors that could assist with returns, lack of funding, andmost importantly of all, an extremely poor security situationwhich has impeded or even blocked all progress on the returnissue. Nonetheless, because Iraq's Ba'athist dictatorship wasthe overwhelming cause of displacement in the country to beginwith, the future does hold some hope for Iraqi displaced persons.This paper examines the causes of return problems in Iraq andhow various authorities in post-Ba'athist Iraq are addressingthe return issue. Particularly around the contested city ofKirkuk, problems relating to the return issue risk ignitingethnic conflict and possibly even civil war in Iraq as a whole.The article examines the return issue for the period from March2003 to June 2004, focusing especially on northern Iraq andKirkuk. The research presented here is based on fieldwork conductedin Iraq by the author between September 2003 and May 2004. Theauthor went to Iraq independently, with the assistance of aCanadian Department of National Defence post-doctoral researchgrant. Interviews were conducted with US and Coalition ProvisionalAuthority officials, Iraqi Interim Government officials, KurdistanRegional Government officials, NGO workers, and IDPs themselvesduring visits to camps around Kirkuk and Baghdad.     

Suicides by fall from height in Geneva,Switzerland, from 1991 to 2000

Suicides due to fall from height in Geneva from 1991 to 2000 were reviewed. Scene investigations, autopsy findings, psychiatric histories, and toxicology results were examined. There were 197 of these suicides, an incidence of five cases per 100,000 inhabitants per year or one fourth of all suicides in Geneva per year. Autopsies were performed on 33%, the rest had external examinations. Of the victims, 56% were female and 44% were male. The age distribution peaked at 20-29 years in men and 60-69 years in women. Most of the victims jumped from their home, the range of 2 to 7 stories being the most frequent height. Major injury sites, in decreasing frequency, were the thorax, abdomen, skull, vertebrae, pelvis and limbs. Psychiatric illness was reported in 38% of the cases. Toxicological analysis was performed in 25% of the cases and showed that the main drugs present were benzodiazepines, cannabis and antidepressant.     

Detection of deception with fMRI: Are we there yet?

A decade of spectacular progress in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology and systems neuroscience research has so far yielded few changes in our daily lives. The dearth of clinical applications of this prolific and academically promising research tool began raising the eyebrows of the public and the research funding agencies. This may be one of the reasons for the enthusiasm and interest paid to the growing body of literature suggesting that blood oxygenation level‐dependent (BOLD) fMRI of the brain could be sensitive to the differences between lie and truth. The word ‘differences’ is critical here since it refers to the often‐ignored core concept of BOLD fMRI: it is only sensitive to differences between two brain states. Thus, available studies report using fMRI to discriminate between lie and truth or some other comparative state rather than to positively identify deception. This nuance is an example of the extent to which applied neuroscience research does not lend itself to the type of over‐simplification that has plagued the interpretation of fMRI‐based lie detection by the popular press and the increasingly vocal academic critics. As an early contributor to the modest stream of data on fMRI‐based lie detection, I was asked by Dr Aldert Vrij to write a piece in favour of fMRI‐based lie detection, to be contrasted with a piece by Dr Sean Spence presenting an opposite point of view ( Spence, 2008 ). This seemingly straightforward task presented two hurdles: having to respond to the popular as well as scientific view of what lie detection with fMRI is and present a wholly positive view of evolving experimental data.     

Event Studies and the Law: Part II: Empirical Studies of Corporate Law

This article is the second part of a review of the event studymethodology, which has proved to be one of the most successfuluses of econometrics in policy analysis. In this part we focuson the methodology's application to corporate law and corporategovernance issues. Event studies have played an important rolein the making of corporate law and in corporate law scholarship.The reason for this input is twofold. First, there is a matchbetween the methodology and subject matter: the goal of corporatelaw is to increase shareholder wealth, and event studies providea metric for measurement of the impact upon stock prices ofpolicy decisions. Second, because the participants in corporatelaw debates share the objective of corporate law, to adopt policiesthat enhance shareholder wealth, their disagreements are overthe means to achieve that end. Hence, the discourse can be empiricallyinformed. The article concludes by sketching the methodology'suse in evaluating the economic effects of regulation. Whileevent studies' usefulness for policy analysis is by now familiarin the corporate law setting, we hope that our two-part reviewwill suggest appropriate applications to other fields of law.     

Hostage-Taking in the Context of Domestic Violence: Some Case Examples

Initial reports of domestic violence are generally made to law enforcement officers who must respond and intervene. A subset of these episodes involves cases in which the victim, and, in many instances her child(ren), have been taken hostage by her husband or partner. Moreover, there are indications that the number of such incidents is growing. The purpose of this project was twofold: (1) to provide one of the first reports on the prevalence and characteristics of these events, and (2) to more closely analyze domestic crisis (hostage) situations using actual case examples. All information was obtained from the Hostage Barricade Database System (HOBAS) of the FBIs Crisis Negotiation Unit. HOBAS is a postincident information collection tool which stores historical data from law enforcement agencies across the nation on hostage/barricade incidents. An examination of this database yielded different types of domestic hostage-taking acts and outcomes (e.g., tactical vs. negotiated resolutions, survival vs. death/injury of perpetrator and/or victim[s]). Implications of the findings, for future crisis negotiation efforts directed toward nonviolent resolution of these high-risk critical incidents, are discussed.