Women's legislative underrepresentation has emerged as perhaps the most stable feature of the postcommunist Hungarian political system, resisting Europeanization, changes in the electoral and party systems, and a new constitution. Early research on the decline in women's access to power in postcommunist transitional democracies focused on common legacies of communist rule, but those legacies cannot account for widening disparities in women's representation across the region over time or the persistent underrepresentation of women in Hungary. Using a pathway case analysis of Hungary's 2010 parliamentary elections, this research examines how cultural, structural, and institutional factors interacted to keep Hungary stuck in the basement with respect to women's legislative recruitment.

Across Europe populist radical right (PRR) parties advertise themselves as defenders of Christian identity and values, but they do not seem to strongly attract religious Christian voters. This article tests a general framework for understanding this religion gap in 13 countries. Findings extend earlier research on religiosity and radical right attitudes, provide insight on East-West differences in the PRR phenomenon, and lend conditional support to the notion of a “vaccine effect” suggested by prior research.

For zygosity diagnosis in the absence of genotypic data, or in the recruitment phase of a twin study where only single twins from same-sex pairs are being screened, or to provide a test for sample duplication leading to the false identification of a dizygotic pair as monozygotic, the appropriate analysis of respondents' answers to questions about zygosity is critical. Using data from a young adult Australian twin cohort (N = 2094 complete pairs and 519 singleton twins from same-sex pairs with complete responses to all zygosity items), we show that application of latent class analysis (LCA), fitting a 2-class model, yields results that show good concordance with traditional methods of zygosity diagnosis, but with certain important advantages. These include the ability, in many cases, to assign zygosity with specified probability on the basis of responses of a single informant (advantageous when one zygosity type is being oversampled); and the ability to quantify the probability of misassignment of zygosity, allowing prioritization of cases for genotyping as well as identification of cases of probable laboratory error. Out of 242 twins (from 121 like-sex pairs) where genotypic data were available for zygosity confirmation, only a single case was identified of incorrect zygosity assignment by the latent class algorithm. Zygosity assignment for that single case was identified by the LCA as uncertain (probability of being a monozygotic twin only 76%), and the co-twin's responses clearly identified the pair as dizygotic (probability of being dizygotic 100%). In the absence of genotypic data, or as a safeguard against sample duplication, application of LCA for zygosity assignment or confirmation is strongly recommended.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the patient's experience of transnasal flexible laryngo-oesophagoscopy under local anaesthetic in an out-patient setting. This was a clinical observational study using a patient questionnaire and visual analogue score. Subjects were 50 patients seen in the hospital's ENT outpatient clinic between March and August 2004 in whom transnasal flexible laryngo-oesophagoscopy was performed and who completed pain discomfort questionnaires. Any patient undergoing transnasal flexible laryngo-oesophagoscopy, for either diagnostic or therapeutic purposes, was included in the study. Patients in whom transnasal flexible laryngo-oesophagoscopy was not necessary as part of their investigation or treatment were excluded. Patients completed a questionnaire, providing a simple visual analogue score for discomfort during the procedure. Any operative complications were noted by the surgeon. All patients completed transnasal flexible laryngo-oesophagoscopy, and the upper aerodigestive tract was clearly visualized. The procedure is well tolerated, with mean score of <  1 out of 10 for all forms of discomfort. There was a complication rate of 2 per cent (one patient with epistaxis); no other complications occurred. Transnasal flexible laryngo-oesophagoscopy is a new diagnostic and therapeutic technique which is well tolerated by patients. It compares favourably with other flexible endoscopic techniques. This report documents for the first time a detailed description of patients' experience of this technique.