Department Section of Legal Medicine, University of Firenze, Firenze, Italy.
Forensic Sci Int. 2012 Oct 10;222(1-3):252-5. doi: 10.1016/j.forsciint.2012.06.015. Epub 2012 Jul 5.
Dental forensic identifications based on comparison of antemortem and postmortem radiographs provide effective and reliable evidence. There are no standardized procedures for assessing similarities between different types of dental radiographs (e.g. orthopantomograms, bitewings, and periapical radiographs), and the operator's subjective judgment can considerably affect identification. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the potential influence of experts' qualifications, training, and cognitive bias on the accuracy of identification. Seventy-eight differently qualified and experienced experts underwent an identification test. The expert sample was composed of 10 specialists in emergency care (ER), 10 specialists in legal medicine (ML), 20 pregraduate dental students (STU), 12 dentists (DENT), 20 dentists educated in forensic odontology (DENT-TRA), and 6 experienced forensic odontologists (FOR). The simulated cases required participants to assess the possible matching of 42 postmortem intraoral radiographs with 16 antemortem panoramic radiographs. Accuracy and specificity for the different operator groups were as follows: ER, 0.76-0.70; ML, 0.76-0.88; STU, 0.89-0.82; DENT, 0.87-0.97; DENT-TRA, 0.88-0.92; and FOR, 0.97-1. As evidenced by high rates of accuracy and repeatability, the most experienced forensic odontologist consistently outperformed operators less or differently educated and trained, especially for difficult cases. In our sample, the dentists who received additional education in forensic odontology did not necessarily perform better than dentists who had not received this additional education. Some cognitive bias, mainly the so-called observer effect, emerged as a possible source of outcome variability among the operator groups.
基于前后影像学比较的法医牙科学鉴定提供了有效且可靠的证据。目前，尚没有评估不同类型牙科影像学（如全景片、咬片和根尖片）之间相似性的标准化程序，操作人员的主观判断可能会对鉴定结果产生重大影响。本研究旨在评估专家资质、培训和认知偏差对鉴定准确性的潜在影响。78 名不同资质和经验的专家参加了一项鉴定测试。专家样本由 10 名急救专家（ER）、10 名法医专家（ML）、20 名预牙科学生（STU）、12 名牙医（DENT）、20 名法医牙科学专家（DENT-TRA）和 6 名经验丰富的法医牙科学专家（FOR）组成。模拟病例要求参与者评估 42 例死后口腔内影像学与 16 例生前全景影像学之间可能的匹配情况。不同操作人员组的准确性和特异性如下：ER，0.76-0.70；ML，0.76-0.88；STU，0.89-0.82；DENT，0.87-0.97；DENT-TRA，0.88-0.92；FOR，0.97-1.0。高准确性和可重复性表明，最有经验的法医牙科学专家始终优于资质和培训水平较低或不同的操作人员，尤其是在处理困难案例时。在我们的样本中，接受法医牙科学额外教育的牙医并不一定比未接受过此类额外教育的牙医表现更好。一些认知偏差，主要是所谓的观察者效应，可能是操作人员组之间结果变异性的一个来源。
