The characteristics of un-apprehended firesetters living in the UK community

The prevalence and characteristics of un-apprehended, self-reported deliberate firesetters living in the community were examined. Ten percent of Thanet households in Kent, UK (n = 5568) were randomly invited to participate in an online study investigating deliberate firesetting. Participants answered demographic questions, questions relating to any deliberate fires ignited and five questionnaires: The Fire Setting and Fire Proclivity Scales [Gannon & Barrowcliffe (2012). Firesetting in the general population: The development and validation of the Fire Setting and Fire Proclivity Scales. Legal and Criminological Psychology, 17(1), 105–122], The BIDR [version 6; Paulhus (1984). Two-component models of socially desirable responding. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 46, 598–609; Paulhus (1988). Assessing self-deception and impression management in self reports: The balanced inventory of desirable responding. Unpublished manual, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada], The Identification with Fire Scale [Gannon, Ó Ciardha, & Barnoux (2011). The identification with fire questionnaire. Unpublished manuscript. CORE-FP, School of Psychology, University of Kent, UK] and The Fire Attitude Scale [Muckley (1997). Firesetting: Addressing offending behaviour. A resource and training manual. Redcar and Cleveland Psychological Service]. A question relating to deliberate firesetting was answered by 157 participants. Eighteen (11.5%) participants were classified as deliberate firesetters. Firesetters and non-firesetters were similar, but significantly more firesetters self-reported a history of self-harm, having a family member who ignited a deliberate fire, and a father with a psychiatric illness. Interestingly, significantly more non-firesetters reported experimenting with fire before the age of 10 compared to the firesetters. Firesetters also scored significantly higher compared to the non-firesetters on The Fire Setting Scale, The Fire Proclivity Scale, The Identification with Fire Scale and The Fire Attitude Scale. This new information shows promise in identifying community individuals who may require education or preventative work

Measuring the cognition of firesetting individuals using explicit and implicit measures

This study examined un-apprehended deliberate firesetters’ cognition. Relative to non-firesetters, un-apprehended firesetters reported higher explicitly measured fire interest. However, their reaction times (RTs) on a fire interest implicit LDT were inconsistent with these findings. They did, however, display a pattern of LDT RTs consistent with Dangerous World and Fire is Powerful beliefs

Clinical use of biomarkers of survival in pulmonary fibrosis

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Biologic predictors or biomarkers of survival in pulmonary fibrosis with a worse prognosis, more specifically in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis would help the clinician in deciding whether or not to treat since treatment carries a potential risk for adverse events. These decisions are made easier if accurate and objective measurements of the patients' clinical status can predict the risk of progression to death.</p> <p>Method</p> <p>A literature review is given on different biomarkers of survival in interstitial lung disease, mainly in IPF, since this disease has the worst prognosis.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Serum biomarkers, and markers measured by medical imaging as HRCT, pertechnegas, DTPA en FDG-PET are not ready for clinical use to predict mortality in different forms of ILD. A baseline FVC, a change of FVC of more than 10%, and change in 6MWD are clinically helpful predictors of survival.</p

Analysis and characterization of heparin impurities

This review discusses recent developments in analytical methods available for the sensitive separation, detection and structural characterization of heparin contaminants. The adulteration of raw heparin with oversulfated chondroitin sulfate (OSCS) in 2007–2008 spawned a global crisis resulting in extensive revisions to the pharmacopeia monographs on heparin and prompting the FDA to recommend the development of additional physicochemical methods for the analysis of heparin purity. The analytical chemistry community quickly responded to this challenge, developing a wide variety of innovative approaches, several of which are reported in this special issue. This review provides an overview of methods of heparin isolation and digestion, discusses known heparin contaminants, including OSCS, and summarizes recent publications on heparin impurity analysis using sensors, near-IR, Raman, and NMR spectroscopy, as well as electrophoretic and chromatographic separations

Firesetting among 18-23 year old un-apprehended adults: A UK community study

This study assesses the prevalence of firesetting in a sample of young UK adults age 18 to 23 years and compares their characteristics with non-firesetting individuals. Two-hundred and forty male (n = 119, 49.6%) and female (n = 121, 50.4%) participants were recruited through Prolific Academic. Comparisons were made between self-reported firesetting and non-firesetting participants on a range of demographic, fire-related, and personality measures. Factors predictive of firesetting status were examined using hierarchical logistic regression. Twenty-five percent of participants (n = 60) reported igniting a deliberate fire. Logistic regression was used to examine the ability of parental supervision and behavioural issues (e.g., witnessing domestic violence, experimenting with fire before age 10, and family history of firesetting), antisocial behaviours (e.g., having criminal friends, impulsivity, teenage access to fire paraphernalia, skipping class more than once per week, taken any illegal drugs, participation in criminal behaviour), and fire-related interests, attitudes, and propensities in predicting firesetting status. Factors found to distinguish firesetting and non-firesetting participants included: experimented with fire before 10 years of age, family history of firesetting, impulsivity, teenage access to fire paraphernalia, participation in criminal behaviour, and the Fire Setting Scale. The results provide key information about potential risk factors relating to un-apprehended firesetting in the general population. This research adds to the small body of literature examining firesetting in the general population. It refines previously used methodologies, presents the first research study to examine the prevalence of firesetting behaviour in emerging adults, and enhances our understanding of un-apprehended firesetting

Firesetting in the general population: The development and validation of the Fire Setting and Fire Proclivity Scales

Purpose. The main aims of the present study were to examine the prevalence of self-reported deliberate firesetting in the community, and to develop two separate measures – the Fire Setting Scale and the Fire Proclivity Scale – to assess, respectively, the antisocial and fire interest factors associated with firesetters and the propensity of firesetters to be attracted to, aroused by, behaviourally inclined, and antisocially motivated to light fires. Method. At Time 1, 158 participants were asked to indicate – confidentially – whether they had ever intentionally set a fire. Participants also completed the newly developed Fire Setting Scale and Fire Proclivity Scale. Around 2 weeks later, 150 of the 158 participants returned at Time 2 to complete the Fire Setting Scale and Fire Proclivity Scale again. Participants' responses at Time 1 were used to gather basic descriptive information on the newly developed measures. Participants' repeated testing at Time 2 was used to measure the reliability of the measures over time. Results. Of participants, 11 per cent (n= 18) self-reported setting a deliberate fire. These participants were similar to non-firesetters on basic demographics although firesetters reported more behavioural problems and previous convictions for vandalism-associated offences. Both the Fire Setting Scale and Fire Proclivity Scale showed good psychometric properties and discriminated clearly between self-reported firesetters and non-firesetters. However, only one subscale from the Fire Proclivity Scale – the behavioural propensity index – entered significantly into a Discriminant Function Analysis which correctly classified participants at an overall rate of 91%. Conclusions. The two new scales developed show promise for detecting factors associated with firesetting and may be useful for (1) detecting individuals in the community who require preventative firesetting work, and (2) measuring clinical need and intervention impact associated with firesetters in secure settings