Book Review

Book reviewed in this article:
OTHER: Paths of Loneliness: The Individual Isolated in Modern Society. Margaret Mary Wood
Solitude and Privacy: A Study of Social Isolation, Its Causes and Therapy. Paul Halmos     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article:
OTHER: People of Coal Town . H erman R. L antz
OTHER: Small Town in Mass Society: Class, Power and Religion in a Rural Community . A rthur J. V idich and J oseph B ensman     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article:
OTHER: The Two Major Works of Charles H. Cooley: Social Organisation. Human Nature and the Social Order. (Introduction by Robert Cooley Angell.)
Sociological Theory: Present-day Sociology from the Past. Edited by Edgar F. Borgatta and Henry J. Meyer     

Books Received

Violence Against Women: Philosophical Perspectives Stanley G. French, Wanda Teays and Laura M. Purdy
Taking Animals Seriously: Mental Life and Moral Status David DeGrazia
Who Goes First: the Story of Self-Experimentation in Medicine Lawrence K. Altman
A Chosen Death: the Dying Confront Assisted Suicide Lonny Shavelson
Clones, Genes, and Immortality: Ethics and the Genetic Revolution John Harris
Death of Life: the legacy of Molecular Biology Stanley Shostak
Microwave Engineering with Wireless Applications S.R. Pennock and P.R. Shepherd     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book Reviws in this Article Meta-Medical Ethics: The Philosophical Foundations of Bioethics, edited by Michael A. Grodin. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1995 Autonoaty and Intervention: Parentalism in the Caring Life, by Job Kultgen. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995 Long-Term Care Decisions, Ethical and Conceptual Dimensions, edited by Laurence McCullough and Nancy Wilson. Baltimore; The John Hopkins University Press, 1995 Contemplating Suicide: The Language and Ethics of Self Harm by Gavin Fairbairn. Landon and New York: Routledge, 1995     

Epidemiology of suicide pacts in England and Wales, 1988-92.

OBJECTIVE: To describe the epidemiology of suicide pacts in England and Wales DESIGN: Analysis of the death certificates and coroners'' records of all people who died in pacts between 1 January 1988 and 31 December 1992. SUBJECTS: 124 people who committed suicide in 62 pacts. RESULTS: Suicide in a pact accounted for 0.6% of all suicides (124/19721), a rate of 0.6 per million people aged 15 and over. Forty eight pacts were between married couples and five were between family members. The mean age was 56 years. 99 of the 124 subjects were of occupational social classes I-III. Poisoning by car exhaust fumes and drugs accounted for 116 deaths, with both members of each pair using the same method. CONCLUSIONS: Suicide pacts are rare and less common than they were 35 years ago, although the epidemiological profile is similar. People who commit suicide in a pact are more likely than those who commit suicide alone to be female, older, married, and of a high social class.     

180 例自杀死亡者自杀方式及其自杀环境的法医学回顾性研究

目的:调查自杀死亡者对自杀方式和自杀环境的选择是否因性别、年龄和社会经济阶层的不同而存在差异性。方法:运用自编调查表,调查了昆明市公安局及其四个分区(五华区、西山区、盘龙区、官渡区)公安局2008年1月至2010年10月备案登记的180例自杀案例,将这些案例分为三组:性别组、年龄组和社会经济阶层组,分组后采用SPSS11.5统计学软件进行检验分析。结果:不同性别和不同社会经济阶层对自杀方式的选择不存在显著性差异;不同年龄段对自杀方式的选择存在显著性差异;不同性别和不同年龄段对自杀环境的选择存在显著性差异,不同社会经济阶层对自杀环境的选择不存在显著性差异。结论:自杀事件是一种复杂的社会现象,虽然它的发生受到众多复杂因素的影响,但不同的自杀人群对自杀方式和自杀环境的选择存在一定的特殊性,法医学工作者在实际工作中,对自杀死亡事件的鉴定需要扎实的理论知识和丰富的工作经验。     

自杀行为的生物遗传因素研究

自杀是我国15-34岁人群首位重要的死亡原因。自杀行为的发生与生物学、心理学、社会学等多种因素有关。研究表明自杀行为确有一定的遗传学基础,近年来自杀行为的生物遗传因素研究发现5-HT系统相关基因、儿茶酚胺氧位甲基转移酶基因、精胺/精脒乙酰转移酶基因等候选基因单核甘酸多态性与自杀行为有明显关联。有学者认为,自杀行为的遗传学基础可能是附加于精神疾病的遗传或家庭环境诱导所致。本文就近年来国内外有关自杀的主要相关基因研究发现作一综述。     

From Turbans to Inverted Triangles: South Asian Social Anthropology

Human Fertility in India: Social Components and Policy Perspectives. David G. Mandelbaum .
Robber Noblement: A Study of the Political System of the Sikh Jats. Joyce Pettigrew .
Girl Students in Jaipur: A Study in Attitudes Towards Family Life, Marriage, and Career. Cora Vreede-de Stuers .
Kinship and Urbanization: White Collar Migrants in North India. Sylvia Vatuk .
The Transformation of Sikh Society. Ethne K. Marenco .     

Murder by Suicide: Episodes from Muslim History

Suicide terrorism and other operations that consume the killer's life employ beliefs and practices intended to reconcile the killer with his or her own death. This article reviews three episodes from Muslim history: the Assassins of Syria and Persia, juramentado in the Philippines, and Husayn's martyrdom at Karbala. Each of these episodes manifests a different symbolic stratagem: the neutralization of transition anxiety, the sacrificial fusion of murder and suicide, and the justifying projection of the past onto the present. [Keywords: suicide terrorism, Islam, Middle East, Iran, Philippines]     

Do ambient electromagnetic fields affect behaviour? A demonstration of the relationship between geomagnetic storm activity and suicide

The relationship between ambient electromagnetic fields and human mood and behaviour is of great public health interest. The relationship between Ap indices of geomagnetic storm activity and national suicide statistics for Australia from 1968 to 2002 was studied. Ap index data was normalised so as to be globally uniform and gave a measure of storm activity for each day. A geomagnetic storm event was defined as a day in which the Ap index was equal to or exceeded 100 nT. Suicide data was a national tally of daily male and female death figures where suicide had been documented as the cause of death. A total of 51 845 males and 16 327 females were included. The average number of suicides was greatest in spring for males and females, and lowest in autumn for males and summer for females. Suicide amongst females increased significantly in autumn during concurrent periods of geomagnetic storm activity (P = .01). This pattern was not observed in males (P = .16). This suggests that perturbations in ambient electromagnetic field activity impact behaviour in a clinically meaningful manner. The study furthermore raises issues regarding other sources of stray electromagnetic fields and their effect on mental health.     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article:
Ethnology:Archaeology:The Bowen Site: An Archaeological Study of Culture Process in the Late Prehistory of Central Indiana . JOHN T. DORWIN.
Ethnology:The Late Prehistoric Occupation of Northwestern Indiana: A Study of the Upper Mississippi Cultures of the Kankakee Valley . CHARLES H. FAULKNER.
Indiana's Prehistoric Past . B. K. SWARTZ, JR. Muncie     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book Reviws in this Article Shaping Genes: Ethics, Law and Science Using Genetic Technology in Medicine and Agriculture, DarrylR.J. Macer. Christchurch, N.Z. Eubios Ethics Institute, 1990 Suicide and Euthanasia: Historical and Contemporary Themes (Philosophy and Medicine 35), Baruch A. Brody (ed.) Dordrecht and Boston: Kluwer Academic Publishers (1989) Who Lives? Who Dies? Ethical Criteria in Patient Selection by John Kilner. New Haven: Yale U.P., 1990 Beyond BabyM: Ethical Issues in New Reproductive Techniques edited by Dianne M. Bartels, Reinhard Priester, Dorothy E. Vawter and Arthur L. Caplan. Clifton, N.J: Humana Press, 1989 Surrogate Motherhood The Legal and Human Issues by Martha A. Field. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard Univ. Press Medico-Legal Aspects of Parenthood and Reproduction, by J.K. Mason. Aldershot, U.K: Dartmouth Pub. Co., 1990 Philosophical Ethics in Reproductive Medicine: Proceedings of the First International Conference on Philosophical Ethics in Reproductive Medicine, University of Leeds, 18-22 April, 1988. Ed. by David R. Bromham, Maureen E. Dalton and Jennifer Jackson. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1990     

The suicide assessment scale: Psychometric properties of a Norwegian language version

ABSTRACT: BACKGROUND: Rating scales are valuable tools in suicide research and can also be useful supplements to the clinical interview in suicide risk assessments. This study describes the psychometric properties of a Norwegian language version of the Suicide Assessment Scale Self-report version (SUAS-S). METHODS: Participants were fifty-two patients (mean age = 39.3 years, SD = 10.7) with major depression (53.8%), bipolar disorder (25.0%) and/or a personality disorder (63.5%) referred to a psychiatric outpatient clinic. The SUAS-S, the screening section of the Beck Scale for Suicidal Ideation (BSS-5), the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), Beck's Hopelessness Scale (BHS), the Symptom Check-List-90 R (SCL-90R) and the Clinical Global Impression for Severity of Suicidality (CGI-SS) were administered. One week later, the patients completed the SUAS-S a second time. RESULTS: Cronbach's alpha for SUAS-S was 0.88 and the test-retest reliability was 0.95 (95% CI: 0.93- 0.97). SUAS-S was positively correlated with the BSS-5 (r = 0.66; 95% CI: 0.47-0.85) for the study sample as a whole and for the suicidal (r = 0.52) and non-suicidal groups (r = 0.50) respectively. There was no difference between the SUAS-S and the BSS-5 in the ability to identify suicidality. This ability was more pronounced when the suicide risk was high. There was a substantial intercorrelation between the score on the SUAS-S and the BDI (0.81) and the BHS (0.76). The sensitivity and specificity of the SUAS-S was explored and an appropriate clinical cut-off value was assessed. CONCLUSIONS: The study revealed good internal consistency, test-retest reliability and concurrent validity for the Suicide Assessment Scale Self-report version. The discriminatory ability for suicidality was comparable to that of the BSS-5.     

BOOK REVIEW

Book reviewed in this article:
The Origin of Animal Body Plans: A Study in Evolutionary Developmental Biology. By W. Arthur.     

Epidemiological study of suicide in Croatia (1993-2003)--comparison of Mediterranean and continental areas

The aim of this study is to analyze eventual differences in characteristic of suicide between two areas of the Republic of Croatia, mediterranean and continental, according to the following variables: suicidal rates, season, month, day, method, places, socioeconomic variables such as gender, ages, marital status, employment, education, and psychiatric or medical characteristic. Data were collected from the Suicide register of the Ministry of Interior, and Croatian Bureau of Statistic. Analysis was done on all suicide cases committed in the period 1993-2003. According to the Suicide Register of Ministry of Interior, 11,359 suicides were reported in period between 1993 and 2003. The average suicide rate in the Mediterranean area was lower (16.44 suicides per year) than in continental area of Croatia (26.34 suicides per year). Suicide committers in the Mediterranean area was statistically significant younger than suicide committers in the continental area of Croatia. In the continental area male suicide committers were more often than in the Mediterranean area of Croatia. In the Mediterranean area suicide committers were in most cases with high school education while in continental area of Croatia most cases of suicide committers were with elementary school education. Alcohol dependence, family conflicts, and medical disorders were more often present as suicidal motive in suicide committers in continental area of Croatia than in the Mediterranean area where undefined and unknown reason of suicide is present in majority of suicide cases. Cold steel, drowning, and jumping from height were more often present as suicidal method in the Mediterranean area of Croatia opposite to continental area of Croatia where jumping in front of car or train and suicide with firearms and explosive were more often. Also, in the Mediterranean area of Croatia suicides was mostly committed on open spaces and public places while in continental area of Croatia suicides was mostly committed in private plot.     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article:
Archaeology: Cherokee Archaeology: A Study of the Appalachian Summit. Bennie C. Keel
Archaeology: Cherokee Prehistory: The Pisgah Phase in the Appalachian Summit Region. Roy S. Dickens, Jr     

Destruction and Creative Integration of Linguistic Theory

The Said and the Unsaid: Mind, Meaning, and Culture . Stephen A. Tyler . Language, Thought, and Culture: Advances in the Study of Cognition.     

The Space of Encounter

Book reviewed in this article: Gillian Cowlishaw . Rednecks, Eggheads and Blackfellas: A Study of Racial Power and Intimacy in Australia.