CONSIDERATION OF THE ROLE OF PSYCHOTHERAPY IN REDUCING THE RISK OF SUICIDE IN AFFECTIVE DISORDERS – A CASE STUDY

In this paper material is presented from a patient with a diagnosis of a recurrent affective disorder and exhibiting resistance to engaging in the work of therapy alongside the emergence of active suicidal intent. Supervision can help in containing intensely disturbing feelings in the therapist and aid in identifying the underlying psychosis. Through exploration of the counter‐transference feelings, the therapist can become attuned to a playing down of the psychosis by the patient and alert other involved professionals. Technically, the challenge remains one of how to make an impact in the sessions through converting a psychotic monologue into a dialogue.     

A Cross‐National Comparison of Suicide Attempts,Drug Use,and Depressed Mood Among Dominican Youth

We compared suicide attempts, depressed mood, and drug use of 1,710 Dominican public high school students in New York City (NYC) and 9,573 in the Dominican Republic (DR) in 2009. Compared to DR Dominicans, NYC Dominicans were more likely to have reported lifetime marijuana use (27.6% vs. 1.5%), lifetime inhalant use (11.0% vs. 7.6%), lifetime other drug use (9.9% vs. 3.0%), depressed mood (31.3% vs. 27.2%), and suicide attempt (13.8% vs. 8.8%). The results of this study supported the hypothesis that substantial increases in illicit drug use, especially cocaine, heroin, ecstasy, and methamphetamines, among NYC Dominican youth account for their increased risk for suicide attempts compared to their DR Dominican counterparts. It also identified suicide attempts as a public health problem among NYC Dominicans, the largest NYC Latino immigrant population.     

Adjacent and Non-Adjacent Word Contexts Both Predict Age of Acquisition of English Words: A Distributional Corpus Analysis of Child-Directed Speech

Children show a remarkable degree of consistency in learning some words earlier than others. What patterns of word usage predict variations among words in age of acquisition? We use distributional analysis of a naturalistic corpus of child-directed speech to create quantitative features representing natural variability in word contexts. We evaluate two sets of features: One set is generated from the distribution of words into frames defined by the two adjacent words. These features primarily encode syntactic aspects of word usage. The other set is generated from non-adjacent co-occurrences between words. These features encode complementary thematic aspects of word usage. Regression models using these distributional features to predict age of acquisition of 656 early-acquired English words indicate that both types of features improve predictions over simpler models based on frequency and appearance in salient or simple utterance contexts. Syntactic features were stronger predictors of children's production than comprehension, whereas thematic features were stronger predictors of comprehension. Overall, earlier acquisition was predicted by features representing frames that select for nouns and verbs, and by thematic content related to food and face-to-face play topics; later acquisition was predicted by features representing frames that select for pronouns and question words, and by content related to narratives and object play.     

Interactive Effects of Chronic Health Conditions And Financial Hardship On Episodic Memory Among Older Blacks: Findings From The Health And Retirement Study

Previous research links chronic health conditions and financial hardship to cognitive outcomes among older Blacks. However, few studies have explored the moderating effect of financial hardship on chronic disease burden and specific cognitive domains. This study examined whether financial hardship (as measured by difficulty paying monthly bills) modifies the impact of self-reported chronic health conditions (e.g., diabetes, stroke) on episodic memory among 871 older Blacks (50+ years) in the 2006 Health and Retirement Study . Financial hardship modified the association between chronic disease burden and episodic memory performance such that individuals who reported very little difficulty paying their monthly bills had significantly lower memory scores at high levels of disease burden compared to those reporting high financial difficulty after controlling for age, gender and education (F 2, 49 = 5.03, p = .010). This cross-sectional study suggests that both financial and physical wellbeing may have joint effects on cognitive health in older Blacks.     

Identifying and Referring Youths at Risk for Suicide Following Participation in School‐Based Gatekeeper Training

Gatekeeper training is a core strategy of the Garrett Lee Smith Memorial Suicide Prevention Act of 2004. Using data gathered from school‐based gatekeeper trainings implemented by GLS grantees, this analysis examines training and gatekeeper factors associated with (1) identification and referral patterns and (2) services at‐risk youths receive. Time spent interacting with youths was positively correlated with the number of gatekeeper identifications and knowledge about service receipt. Gatekeepers who participated in longer trainings identified proportionately more at‐risk youths than participants in shorter trainings. Most gatekeeper trainees referred the identified youths to services regardless of training type.