BODY, MOTHER, MIND: ANOREXIA, FEMININITY AND THE INTRUSIVE OBJECT

This paper takes as its starting point the preponderance of female to male patients who suffer from anorexia. The author suggests that there may be something specific about certain experiences of femaleness which predispose towards anxieties of intrusion. Two contemporary theories of the aetiology of anorexia are outlined. Both of these suggest that the problem has its origins in intrusion or invasion of different sorts. The author suggests that many women who suffer from anorexia have an intrusive object instated in their minds, which may not necessarily be the result of actual intrusions in external reality. In the final part of the paper, the author examines the intrusiveness of anorexic patients in the transference and suggests that such patients very often harbour profound phantasies of intruding between the parents, with a wish to regain their special place with mother, untroubled by the presence of father. It is further suggested that the psychopathology underlying certain cases of anorexia leads to a failure in symbolisation. This failure in turn complicates the clinical picture, making such patients particularly difficult to think with about their difficulties.     

The Peer Attitudes Toward Children who Stutter scale: Reliability, known groups validity, and negativity of elementary school-age children's attitudes

Psychometric properties of the Peer Attitudes Toward Children who Stutter (PATCS) scale (Langevin, M., & Hagler, P. (2004). Development of a scale to measure peer attitudes toward children who stutter. In A.K. Bothe (Ed.), Evidence-based treatment of stuttering: empirical bases and clinical applications (pp. 139–171). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.) and the extent to which peer attitudes are negative were re-examined. Results show that internal consistency was .97 and test–retest reliability was .85. In a known groups analysis participants who had contact with someone who stutters had statistically significant higher mean scores (more positive attitudes) than those who had not had contact. Nonsignificant findings for gender and grade call into question the usefulness of these variables as discriminators in future tests of known groups validity of peer attitudes toward children who stutter. Approximately one-fifth of participants had PATCS scores that were somewhat to very negative. These findings support calls for school-based education about stuttering.

Educational objectives

The reader will be able to: (1) summarize the social impacts of stuttering on school-age children who stutter, (2) describe the known groups method to test construct validity, (3) evaluate the psychometric properties of the Peer Attitudes Toward Children who Stutter scale, and (4) provide information about the proportion of students who appear to hold negative attitudes toward children who stutter.     

I TO WE: THE ROLE OF CONSCIOUSNESS TRANSFORMATION IN COMPASSION AND ALTRUISM

It is clear that human consciousness can be transformed through spiritual experiences and practices. Little is known, however, about what the predictors, mediators, and outcomes are of such transformations in consciousness. In‐depth structured interviews were conducted with forty‐seven teachers and scholars from religious and spiritual traditions and modern transformative movements to identify factors common to the transformative process across traditions. Compassion and altruism were almost universally identified as important outcomes of positive consciousness transformation. Results of our analysis suggest that altruism and compassion may arise as natural consequences of experiences of interconnection and oneness. These experiences appear to lead to shifts in perspective and changes in one's sense of self and self in relationship to others. Based on these findings, we suggest several mechanisms by which transformative experiences and practices might influence the development of compassion and altruism.     

'She Herself was the Ultimate Rule': Arabic biographies of missionary teachers and their pupils

Arabic biographies of missionary teachers and their pupils found in magazines published in Cairo and Beirut voice an indigenous perspective on missionary activity by educated women and men. The feelings of the missionaries' target population reveal a tension between local histories and foreign incursions as well as between female domesticity and professional aspirations. This larger imperial discourse informed worldwide missionary agendas for women at the turn of the twentieth century; however, the individual biographies cited within the paper demonstrate the personal interaction and effects on both foreign missionary and local women within their specific context through insightful Arab sources.     

Correlates of Parenting on a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit: Maternal Characteristics and Family Resources

The association of maternal characteristics, family resources, and receipt of prenatal care with parenting behaviors observed in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU; n = 383) was assessed. The parenting behavior of mothers not receiving prenatal care (n = 128) was compared to that of mothers of the preceding and subsequent admissions (n = 256) by retrospective chart review. Parenting variables included frequency of visits to the NICU and evaluative ratings of parents' involvement with their infant. Parenting of the no-prenatal-care group was significantly less favorable than the control on all comparisons. Factor analysis supported a priori grouping of parenting variables. A stepwise multiple regression of maternal and family characteristics to the factor-derived variable, parenting, showed significant contributions for prenatal drug use and father involvement. Pediatric interventions assessing maternal social and behavioral characteristics are proposed.     

Working memory and mental arithmetic: A case for dual central executive resources

The current study was designed to examine the possible existence of two limited-capacity pools of central executive resources: one each for verbal and visuospatial processing. Ninety-one college students (M age = 19.0, SD = 2.2) were administered a verbal working memory task that involved updating numbers in 2-, 3-, and 4-load conditions. The task was administered in both single task (no-interference condition) and dual-task (verbal interference and visuospatial interference conditions) formats. Findings indicated main effects for both memory load and type of interference, as well as, a load × interference interaction. Verbal interference led to a steeper increase in errors on the primary verbal working memory task; whereas, there was a smaller increase in errors across load in both the non-verbal and no-interference conditions. The effect of verbal interference and the lack of a spatial interference effect on a primary task that utilized verbal working memory resources, suggests that the processing of verbal and spatial stimuli in a dual-task paradigm requires separate central executive resources.     

Containment in theory and practice

Abstract

This article selects the term ‘containment’ as a vehicle for an exploration of multi-professional work and communication in the general practice setting. The term was selected because of its widespread use by and relevance to the different professionals who work in general practice. It is sufficiently elastic to be applied to one-to-one work between patients and GPs, counsellors, nurses or complementary therapists, and to a multi-professional teamwork process.

The exploration of the concept in use at Marylebone Health Centre is complicated by the multi-professional nature of the team and then-wide range of belief systems and language groups. In the process of exploring the term, members of the team had to cope with their discovery that it was being used in contradictory ways. They decided that a new and more grounded definition in shared and ordinary (nonprofessional) language was needed, if the term were to become a vehicle for inter-professional collaboration and if unhelpful, anti-task social defences were to be minimised.