South African Serial Homicide: Offender and Victim Demographics and Crime Scene Actions

There is an abundance of literature on serial homicide from a Western perspective that outlines operational definitions, types of offenders and how they prey upon their victims. However, currently, there is a lack of studies that compare serial homicide in different countries. The current study aims to give an overview of the demographics of serial homicide offenders and victims in South Africa and compare these to the demographics of offenders and victims from other currently available empirical studies of other countries. The sample consisted of 33 out of the total 54 solved series in South Africa between 1936–2007, which includes a total of 33 offenders, 302 victims, and 254 crime scenes. Results of the sample as a whole showed that South African serial homicide offenders are similar to offenders in other countries in terms of their actions at the crime scene and victim choice, with some notable exceptions. Additional analysis looked at the offender's consistency of targeting certain types of victims across their homicide series in comparison with the patterns of serial homicide offenders in other countries. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Effect of Knowledge Accumulation on Support for Workplace Accommodation

We investigated the relationship between knowledge about the demonstrated benefits of breastfeeding and individual support for breastfeeding accommodation in the workplace. We tested our hypotheses by asking participants to respond to vignettes that described the factors a Director of Human Resources had to consider in responding to the needs of a breastfeeding employee. We found that participants had a low level of knowledge about the benefits of breastfeeding for child, mother, and organization. Participants with children reported stronger support for accommodation, and the level of knowledge about the benefits of breastfeeding mediated this effect. The results showed that participants in executive level positions, and who had no children, were the least supportive of accommodation. There were no occupational differences in responses to the support measure.     

Clinicians' Experiences of Shared Trauma After the Shootings at Virginia Tech

This phenomenological study was designed to describe the shared trauma perspectives of 8 counselors who experienced the shootings at Virginia Tech and responded to community mental health needs. Shared trauma, vicarious traumatization, compassion fatigue, vicarious resilience, and posttraumatic growth were examined. Themes derived from interviews included changed perceptions of those who experienced shared trauma and the influence of the experiences on clinicians' work. Implications for practitioners and for counselor training are presented.     

A psychology of the human brain–gut–microbiome axis

In recent years, we have seen increasing research within neuroscience and biopsychology on the interactions between the brain, the gastrointestinal tract, the bacteria within the gastrointestinal tract, and the bidirectional relationship between these systems: the brain–gut–microbiome axis. Although research has demonstrated that the gut microbiota can impact upon cognition and a variety of stress‐related behaviours, including those relevant to anxiety and depression, we still do not know how this occurs. A deeper understanding of how psychological development as well as social and cultural factors impact upon the brain–gut–microbiome axis will contextualise the role of the axis in humans and inform psychological interventions that improve health within the brain–gut–microbiome axis. Interventions ostensibly aimed at ameliorating disorders in one part of the brain–gut–microbiome axis (e.g., psychotherapy for depression) may nonetheless impact upon other parts of the axis (e.g., microbiome composition and function), and functional gastrointestinal disorders such as irritable bowel syndrome represent a disorder of the axis, rather than an isolated problem either of psychology or of gastrointestinal function. The discipline of psychology needs to be cognisant of these interactions and can help to inform the future research agenda in this emerging field of research. In this review, we outline the role psychology has to play in understanding the brain–gut–microbiome axis, with a focus on human psychology and the use of research in laboratory animals to model human psychology.     

Belief Revision and Verisimilitude Based on Preference and Truth Orderings

In this rather technical paper we establish a useful combination of belief revision and verisimilitude according to which better theories provide better predictions, and revising with more verisimilar data results in theories that are closer to the truth. Moreover, this paper presents two alternative definitions of refined verisimilitude, which are more perspicuous than the algebraic version used in previous publications.     

Profiles of everyday executive function in acquired and developmental disorders.

Executive function profiles were examined within and between several clinical disorders via the multi-domain Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF; Gioia, Isquith, Guy, & Kenworthy, 2000). Parent ratings of children with Inattentive and Combined types of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD-I, ADHD-C), Autistic Spectrum Disorders (ASD), moderate and severe Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), and Reading Disabilities (RD) were compared with controls. Profile analysis revealed significant (p<.01) and substantial (eta2>.10) differences in global elevations and in profile of scale elevations between diagnostic groups. ASD, ADHD-I and ADHD-C groups exhibited greater elevations across the BRIEF scales than did RD and Severe TBI groups, who were in turn more elevated than Moderate TBI and Control groups. The ADHD-C group was unique in its frequency and severity of inhibitory deficits, while the ASD group was distinguishable by its deficits in flexibility. Within diagnostic groups, relative risk for executive dysfunction was calculated with variability present in the frequency of clinically elevated scales. While the BRIEF captures executive profiles characteristic of specific disorders in the clinical setting, it is not diagnostic in its own right and is best used within the context of a broad based evaluation.