Multiple Forensic Interviews During Investigations of Child Sexual Abuse: A Cost-Effectiveness Analysis

In suspected child sexual abuse some professionals recommend multiple child interviews to increase the likelihood of disclosure or more details to improve decision-making and increase convictions. We modeled the yield of a policy of routinely conducting multiple child interviews and increased convictions. Our decision tree reflected the path of a case through the health care, welfare, and legal systems and estimated the increased probability of conviction with additional interviews. We populated our decision analysis model using literature-based estimates. We simulated the experiences of 1,000 cases at 250 sets of plausible parameter values representing different hypothetical communities. Multiple interviews increase by 6.1% the likelihood that an offender will be convicted in the average community. We estimate that one additional conviction will follow if 17 additional children are multiple interviewed. Implications for the children, costs of care, protection of other children, and the risk of false prosecution are discussed.     

Expected Consequences of Disclosure Revealed in Investigative Interviews with Suspected Victims of Child Sexual Abuse

The current study explored the expected consequences of disclosure discussed by 204 5- to 13-year-old suspected victims of child sexual abuse during the course of investigative interviews conducted using the NICHD Investigative Interview Protocol. Expected consequences were mentioned in nearly half of all interviews, with older children and those alleging multiple incidents more likely to do so. Most consequences were mentioned spontaneously by children and most consequences were expected to befall the children themselves. The most common consequences were physical harm and feeling negative emotions for the child and jail/legal consequences for the suspect. Expecting consequences for the child or another family member were associated with delaying disclosure, but expecting consequences for the suspect was not related to delay. Results provide insight into developmental and socio-motivational influences on children's disclosure of negative events and are of considerable practical interest to legal and clinical professionals who must interview, treat, and evaluate children alleging sexual abuse.     

A Life History Approach to Understanding Youth Time Preference

Following from life history and attachment theory, individuals are predicted to be sensitive to variation in environmental conditions such that risk and uncertainty are internalized by cognitive, affective, and psychobiological mechanisms. In turn, internalizing of environmental uncertainty is expected to be associated with attitudes toward risk behaviors and investments in education. Native American youth aged 10–19 years (n = 89) from reservation communities participated in a study examining this pathway. Measures included family environmental risk and uncertainty, present and future time perspective, adolescent attachment, attitudes toward risk, investments in education, and salivary cortisol. Results support the idea that environmental risk and uncertainty are internalized during development. In addition, internalizing mechanisms significantly predicted attitudes toward risk and education: (1) lower scores on future time perspective and higher cortisol predicted higher scores on risk attitudes, and (2) higher scores on future time perspective and lower scores on problems with attachment predicted higher self-reported school performance. Gender differences were seen, with males anticipating a shorter lifespan than females, which predicted higher scores on risk attitudes and lower school performance. Implications for research on adolescent problem behavior and academic achievement are discussed.     

Understanding Collective Discontents: A Psychological Approach to Measuring Zeitgeist

Over the last decade, several countries around the world developed a collective sense of doom and gloom: Their Zeitgeist could be characterized as one of decline. Paradoxically, in some countries, such as the Netherlands, this collective discontent with society seems to exist despite high levels of individual well-being. Current psychological research informs us about why individuals would feel unduly optimistic, but does not account for a collective sense of decline. The present research develops a novel operationalization of Zeitgeist, referred to as a general factor Z. We conceptualize Zeitgeist as a collective global-level evaluation of the state (and future) of society. Three studies confirm that perceptions of the same societal problems at the personal and collective level differed strongly. Across these studies we found support for a hypothesized latent factor Z, underlying collective-level perceptions of society. This Z-factor predicted people’s interpretation of new information about society that was presented through news stories. These results provide a first step in operationalizing and (ultimately) understanding the concept of Zeitgeist: collectively shared ideas about society. Implications for policy are discussed.     

A New Approach to Understanding the Calcifuge Habit of Plants

Growth rate of the calcifuge plants Carex pilulifera, Deschampsiaflexuosa, Holcus mollis, Luzula pilosa, Nardus stricta, andVeronica officinalis, transplanted into an Ordovician limestonesoil of pH 8, increased by two to three times on addition of5 mol m^-3 of CaHPO₄ compared to untreated conditions. For Galiumsaxatile, however, P treatment was lethal and growth was possibleonly in soil supplied with Fe(III) citrate, which had littleor no effect on growth of the other six species. Phosphate treatmentof the limestone soil greatly increased plant uptake of P, whereasP concentration of shoots from untreated soil was very low andprobably highly deficient, compared to plants of field siteorigin. From this and two other recent studies it is now possibleto conclude that the calcifuge habit of plants, at least underclimatic conditions prevailing in northern Europe, is most oftendue to an inability of such plants to render the native phosphateof limestone soils available to plant uptake. Out of ten calcifugespecies tested, only one exception to this rule was identified.Copyright1994, 1999 Academic Press Carex pilulifera, Deschampsia flexuosa, Galium saxatile, Holcus mollis, Luzula pilosa, Nardus stricta, Veronica officinalis, calcifuge plants, phosphorus, iron, limestone soil, limiting factors     

A Bioeconomic Approach to Marriage and the Sexual Division of Labor

Children may be viewed as public goods whereby both parents receive equal genetic benefits yet one parent often invests more heavily than the other. We introduce a microeconomic framework for understanding household investment decisions to address questions concerning conflicts of interest over types and amount of work effort among married men and women. Although gains and costs of marriage may not be spread equally among marriage partners, marriage is still a favorable, efficient outcome under a wide range of conditions. This bioeconomic framework subsumes both cooperative and conflictive views on the sexual division of labor. We test hypotheses concerning marriage markets, assortative mating, and men’s labor motivations among Tsimane forager-horticulturalists of Bolivia and find that: (1) men and women both value work effort in marital partners, (2) marital labor contributions are complementary, (3) work effort is correlated between spouses, (4) total production is correlated with total reproduction, and (5) better hunters have higher fitness gains within marital unions.     

The Effects of an Animal-Assisted Intervention on Salivary Alpha-Amylase,Salivary Immunoglobulin A,and Heart Rate during Forensic Interviews in Child Sexual Abuse Cases

Animal-assisted invention (AAI) in gaining attention as a therapeutic modality; however, the effect of it has not been well studied in the child welfare system. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of AAI on stress indicators (as measured by salivary alpha-amylase (sAA), immunoglobulin A (IgA), and heart rate) in children undergoing forensic interviews for alleged sexual abuse. A repeated measures design was used in this study. Upon receiving signed, informed consents and assents, children were enrolled in the study. Children (n = 42), whose ages ranged from 5 to 14 years (M = 8.91, SD = 2.33), were assigned to either the intervention condition (n = 19; AAI during forensic interview) or the control condition (n = 23; standard practice forensic interview). Each child's parent/guardian completed a demographic form, and saliva samples and heart rate measures were obtained from each child before and after the forensic interview. Mixed linear models were tested, with the level of significance set at p ≤ 0.05. There was an interactive effect regarding the duration of the interview and the presence of the dog on sAA after the forensic interview (p = 0.047). There also was a significant interaction between age and length of interview (p = 0.01). Salivary immunoglobulin A tended to be lower (p = 0.055) when the therapy dog was present during the forensic interview. Results further indicated that the drop in heart rate was greater in longer interviews and with older children (p = 0.02) when the dog was present. Individuals working in child welfare systems can use the results of this study to advocate for the use of therapy dogs as a therapeutic intervention. More research is needed to further examine the relationships among AAI, salivary biomarkers, and stress responses in children to improve child welfare.     

A Metabolomic Approach to Understanding the Metabolic Link between Obesity and Diabetes

Obesity and diabetes arise from an intricate interplay between both genetic and environmental factors. It is well recognized that obesity plays an important role in the development of insulin resistance and diabetes. Yet, the exact mechanism of the connection between obesity and diabetes is still not completely understood. Metabolomics is an analytical approach that aims to detect and quantify small metabolites. Recently, there has been an increased interest in the application of metabolomics to the identification of disease biomarkers, with a number of well-known biomarkers identified. Metabolomics is a potent approach to unravel the intricate relationships between metabolism, obesity and progression to diabetes and, at the same time, has potential as a clinical tool for risk evaluation and monitoring of disease. Moreover, metabolomics applications have revealed alterations in the levels of metabolites related to obesity-associated diabetes. This review focuses on the part that metabolomics has played in elucidating the roles of metabolites in the regulation of systemic metabolism relevant to obesity and diabetes. It also explains the possible metabolic relation and association between the two diseases. The metabolites with altered profiles in individual disorders and those that are specifically and similarly altered in both disorders are classified, categorized and summarized.     

A Child's Speech Responses and the Social Environment

Modern psychology has come to the firm view that human personality is shaped by its concrete sociohistorical circumstances. We can think of no form of behavior that can be studied in isolation from this historical context, by itself, independent of the specific sociohistorical conditions determining it.     

The Long-Term Health Consequences of Child Physical Abuse,Emotional Abuse,and Neglect: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Background

Child sexual abuse is considered a modifiable risk factor for mental disorders across the life course. However the long-term consequences of other forms of child maltreatment have not yet been systematically examined. The aim of this study was to summarise the evidence relating to the possible relationship between child physical abuse, emotional abuse, and neglect, and subsequent mental and physical health outcomes.

Methods and Findings

A systematic review was conducted using the Medline, EMBASE, and PsycINFO electronic databases up to 26 June 2012. Published cohort, cross-sectional, and case-control studies that examined non-sexual child maltreatment as a risk factor for loss of health were included. All meta-analyses were based on quality-effects models. Out of 285 articles assessed for eligibility, 124 studies satisfied the pre-determined inclusion criteria for meta-analysis. Statistically significant associations were observed between physical abuse, emotional abuse, and neglect and depressive disorders (physical abuse [odds ratio (OR) = 1.54; 95% CI 1.16–2.04], emotional abuse [OR = 3.06; 95% CI 2.43–3.85], and neglect [OR = 2.11; 95% CI 1.61–2.77]); drug use (physical abuse [OR = 1.92; 95% CI 1.67–2.20], emotional abuse [OR = 1.41; 95% CI 1.11–1.79], and neglect [OR = 1.36; 95% CI 1.21–1.54]); suicide attempts (physical abuse [OR = 3.40; 95% CI 2.17–5.32], emotional abuse [OR = 3.37; 95% CI 2.44–4.67], and neglect [OR = 1.95; 95% CI 1.13–3.37]); and sexually transmitted infections and risky sexual behaviour (physical abuse [OR = 1.78; 95% CI 1.50–2.10], emotional abuse [OR = 1.75; 95% CI 1.49–2.04], and neglect [OR = 1.57; 95% CI 1.39–1.78]). Evidence for causality was assessed using Bradford Hill criteria. While suggestive evidence exists for a relationship between maltreatment and chronic diseases and lifestyle risk factors, more research is required to confirm these relationships.

Conclusions

This overview of the evidence suggests a causal relationship between non-sexual child maltreatment and a range of mental disorders, drug use, suicide attempts, sexually transmitted infections, and risky sexual behaviour. All forms of child maltreatment should be considered important risks to health with a sizeable impact on major contributors to the burden of disease in all parts of the world. The awareness of the serious long-term consequences of child maltreatment should encourage better identification of those at risk and the development of effective interventions to protect children from violence. Please see later in the article for the Editors'' Summary     

Different Responses of Sexual and Asexual Reproduction of Arundinella hirta to Flooding

The sexual and asexual reproductive features of the graminoid species Arundinella hirta growing at riversides of the Jialing River were analyzed.It was found that the total seed mass,seed number per plant,and sexual reproductive allocation of A.hirta decreased with decreasing bank elevation,and plants growing at the lowest elevations of banks subjected to intense flooding did not show sexual reproduction.The total plant biomass and the number of ramifications per plant increased with flooding intensity,which implies that,contrary to sexual reproduction,asexual reproduction of A.hirta was enhanced by flooding.