Are You My Mother? A Critique of the Requirements for De Facto Parenthood in Maine Following the Law Court\u27s Decision in Pitts v. Moore

Are you my mother? The answer to this question may not have been very difficult to ascertain years ago, however it is not so easily answered today. With advancements in technology, shifts in family structures, and changes in social norms, new legal issues pertaining to parental rights have materialized. The right to raise a child as one sees fit is one of the oldest fundamental rights recognized and protected by the United States Constitution. However, courts are now being asked to consider the rights of “legal strangers” at the expense of the biological or legal parent. One method that a “legal stranger” can use to attain parental rights over the objection of the biological parent is the doctrine of the de facto parenthood. In Maine, there is relatively new, and was first recognized by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, sitting as the Law Court, in Rideout v. Riendeau. There, the court addressed de facto parenthood as applied to grandparents seeking parental rights, but acknowledged that other jurisdictions have opened the door to non-biological adults who have become de facto parents of a child. One year later, in Stitham v. Henderson, the court acknowledge granting parental rights to third parties by noting that a court may give such an award to “ a person with significant bonds to the child” where that person has more than a limited relationship with that child. Although the law court has recognized that de facto parenthood does exist in Maine, it has only addressed the issue on four occasions since Stitham. In each of these cases the court was asked to determine whether a “legal stranger” was entitled to parental rights under the de facto parenthood doctrine, but the court never established a precise test for making this determination. Due to the lack of necessarily infringes on the fundamental rights of the biological parent, the Law Court in Pitts v. Moore sought to offer clarity and provide guidance by establishing a clear standard in Maine. While well intentioned, the new standard, ultimately, has muddied the waters for deciding de facto parenthood and fails to adequately account for the constitutionally protected rights of the biological or legal parent

Are You My Mother? A Critique of the Requirements for De Facto Parenthood in Maine Following the Law Court\u27s Decision in Pitts v. Moore

Are you my mother? The answer to this question may not have been very difficult to ascertain years ago, however it is not so easily answered today. With advancements in technology, shifts in family structures, and changes in social norms, new legal issues pertaining to parental rights have materialized. The right to raise a child as one sees fit is one of the oldest fundamental rights recognized and protected by the United States Constitution. However, courts are now being asked to consider the rights of “legal strangers” at the expense of the biological or legal parent. One method that a “legal stranger” can use to attain parental rights over the objection of the biological parent is the doctrine of the de facto parenthood. In Maine, there is relatively new, and was first recognized by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, sitting as the Law Court, in Rideout v. Riendeau. There, the court addressed de facto parenthood as applied to grandparents seeking parental rights, but acknowledged that other jurisdictions have opened the door to non-biological adults who have become de facto parents of a child. One year later, in Stitham v. Henderson, the court acknowledge granting parental rights to third parties by noting that a court may give such an award to “ a person with significant bonds to the child” where that person has more than a limited relationship with that child. Although the law court has recognized that de facto parenthood does exist in Maine, it has only addressed the issue on four occasions since Stitham. In each of these cases the court was asked to determine whether a “legal stranger” was entitled to parental rights under the de facto parenthood doctrine, but the court never established a precise test for making this determination. Due to the lack of necessarily infringes on the fundamental rights of the biological parent, the Law Court in Pitts v. Moore sought to offer clarity and provide guidance by establishing a clear standard in Maine. While well intentioned, the new standard, ultimately, has muddied the waters for deciding de facto parenthood and fails to adequately account for the constitutionally protected rights of the biological or legal parent

Meta-Analysis of the Relationship Between Ethnicity, Obesity, and Type 2 Diabetes of Adults in Urban Populations of Central America

The purpose of this meta-analysis was to examine the impact of ethnicity and obesity as it relates to Type-2 Diabetes (T2D) in specific Central American countries. A meta-analysis was conducted to determine the association of ethnicity, obesity, and T2D. Four studies that qualified for inclusion were identified by searching MEDLINE and PubMed databases. The studies on the association of ethnicity and T2D had a combined population resulted in 265,858 study participants. Two studies on the association of obesity and T2D had 197,899 participants. An analysis of the data was conducted utilizing the relative risk ration, odds ratio, and forest plots. The comparison of the relative risk of T2D across ethnic categories by studies range for Blacks was 1.59 to 2.74, Asians was 1.43 to 2.08, and Hispanics .92 to 2.91. The ethnic difference in the prevalence of diabetes was almost two-fold higher in all ethnic groups than among the Caucasians with a significance level of 95%. A comparison of relative risk of T2D across weight categories was significantly higher among those with a diagnosed of diabetes in all reported areas. The odds ratio was very close to the risk ratio in both ethnicity and obesity to the development of T2D. The meta-analysis findings documented that an association does exist between ethnicity and obesity to the development of type 2 diabetes

Ethnicity, Obesity, and Type 2 Diabetes of Adults in Urban Populations of Central America

The purpose of this meta-analysis was to examine the impact of ethnicity and obesity as it relates to Type-2 Diabetes (T2D) in specific Central American countries. A meta-analysis was conducted to determine the association of ethnicity, obesity, and T2D. Four studies that qualified for inclusion were identified by searching MEDLINE and PubMed databases. The studies on the association of ethnicity and T2D had a combined population resulted in 265,858 study participants. Two studies on the association of obesity and T2D had 197,899 participants. An analysis of the data was conducted utilizing the relative risk ration, odds ratio, and forest plots. The comparison of the relative risk of T2D across ethnic categories by studies range for Blacks was 1.59 to 2.74, Asians was 1.43 to 2.08, and Hispanics .92 to 2.91. The ethnic difference in the prevalence of diabetes was almost two-fold higher in all ethnic groups than among the Caucasians with a significance level of 95%. A comparison of relative risk of T2D across weight categories was significantly higher among those with a diagnosed of diabetes in all reported areas. The odds ratio was very close to the risk ratio in both ethnicity and obesity to the development of T2D.The meta-analysis findings documented that an association does exist between ethnicity and obesity to the development of type 2 diabetes

Good decisions, good causes: Optimality as a constraint on attribution of causal responsibility

How do we assign causal responsibility for others’ decisions? The present experiments examine the possibility that an optimality constraint is used in these attributions, with agents considered less responsible for outcomes when the decisions that led to those outcomes were suboptimal. Our first two experiments investigate scenarios in which agents are choosing among multiple options, varying the efficacy of the forsaken alternatives to examine the role of optimality in attributing responsibility. Experiment 3 tests whether optimality considerations also play a role in attribution of causality more generally. Taken together, these studies indicate that optimality constraints are used in lay decision theory and in causal judgment

Optimality bias in moral judgment

We often make decisions with incomplete knowledge of their consequences. Might people nonetheless expect others to make optimal choices, despite this ignorance? Here, we show that people are sensitive to moral op- timality: that people hold moral agents accountable depending on whether they make optimal choices, even when there is no way that the agent could know which choice was optimal. This result held up whether the outcome was positive, negative, inevitable, or unknown, and across within-subjects and between-subjects de- signs. Participants consistently distinguished between optimal and suboptimal choices, but not between sub- optimal choices of varying quality — a signature pattern of the Efficiency Principle found in other areas of cognition. A mediation analysis revealed that the optimality effect occurs because people find suboptimal choices more difficult to explain and assign harsher blame accordingly, while moderation analyses found that the effect does not depend on tacit inferences about the agent's knowledge or negligence. We argue that this moral optimality bias operates largely out of awareness, reflects broader tendencies in how humans understand one another's behavior, and has real-world implications

Causal mechanisms

This chapter reviews empirical and theoretical results concerning knowledge of causal mechanisms— beliefs about how and why events are causally linked. First, it reviews the effects of mechanism knowledge, showing that mechanism knowledge can trump other cues to causality (including covariation evidence and temporal cues) and structural constraints (the Markov condition), and that mechanisms play a key role in various forms of inductive inference. Second, it examines several theories of how mechanisms are mentally represented— as associations, forces or powers, icons, abstract placeholders, networks, or schemas— and the empirical evidence bearing on each theory. Finally, it describes ways that people acquire mechanism knowledge, discussing the contributions from statistical induction, testimony, reasoning, and perception. For each of these topics, it highlights key open questions for future research

Ethnicity, Obesity, and Type 2 Diabetes of Adults in Urban Populations of Central America

The purpose of this meta-analysis was to examine the impact of ethnicity and obesity as it relates to Type-2 Diabetes (T2D) in specific Central American countries. A meta-analysis was conducted to determine the association of ethnicity, obesity, and T2D.  Four studies that qualified for inclusion were identified by searching MEDLINE and PubMed databases. The studies on the association of ethnicity and T2D had a combined population resulted in 265,858 study participants.  Two studies on the association of obesity and T2D had 197,899 participants. An analysis of the data was conducted utilizing the relative risk ration, odds ratio, and forest plots. The comparison of the relative risk of T2D across ethnic categories by studies range for Blacks was 1.59 to 2.74, Asians was 1.43 to 2.08, and Hispanics .92 to 2.91. The ethnic difference in the prevalence of diabetes was almost two-fold higher in all ethnic groups than among the Caucasians with a significance level of 95%. A comparison of relative risk of T2D across weight categories was significantly higher among those with a diagnosed of diabetes in all reported areas. The odds ratio was very close to the risk ratio in both ethnicity and obesity to the development of T2D.The meta-analysis findings documented that an association does exist between ethnicity and obesity to the development of type 2 diabetes