Recontact with the analyst following termination: a survey of seventy-one cases

A questionnaire was sent to graduate members of the Denver Psychoanalytic Society asking for their experience with patients making contact with them after the analysis. They reported that within three years after termination two thirds of "successfully analyzed" patients had recontacted them. Seventy-one cases were surveyed. Most contacts were brief and did not seem to be the result of incomplete analysis. Rather, they aimed to satisfy ongoing needs for: the continuing deidealization of the analyst, the reactivation of the self-analytic function, and the restructuring of self- and object representations by reporting developmentally significant accomplishments to the former analyst. The analyst's acknowledgement appears to be an integral part of the restructuring. This is work which either cannot be done before termination or the need for which has not been recognized during the analysis.     

SOME DIRECT AND GENERALIZED EFFECTS OF REPLACING AN AUTISTIC MAN'S ECHOLALIA WITH CORRECT RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS

We extended the use of operant procedures to decrease immediate echolalia and increase the appropriate responding to questions of a 21-year-old autistic man. Three experiments were conducted in which the overall plan was to (a) encourage the subject to remain quiet before, during, and after the presentation of questions and (b) teach him to use environmental cues (i.e., word cards or a model's responses) to increase the likelihood of responding correctly. Multiple baseline designs demonstrated that echolalia was rapidly replaced with correct stimulus-specific responses. In addition, there were a variety of generalized improvements in the subject's verbal responses to questions. The procedures and results are contrasted to previous research in an attempt to explain the encouraging findings.     

Tailoring computerised interventions to client needs

The results are reported of an experimental study in which 91 subjects rated the perceived helpfulness of three computerised interventions - a work values inventory (WAPS), a job-bank (JOB), and a decisions exercise (DECISIONS) - for hypothetical clients with identity, self-awareness, opportunity-awareness, decision-making and implementation problems. As predicted, WAPS was perceived as most helpful for clients with a self-awareness problem, JOB for clients with an opportunity-awareness problem, and DECISIONS for clients with a decision-making problem. Potential applications of the model implicit in the study to counsellor training, to the assessment of client problems and to careers education programmes are discussed.     

Context,voice and choice: A curricular framework for the medical humanities

Although the humanities' place in the medical school curriculum has been established, how we can best approach our teaching remains unanswered. A curricular framework which addresses process, as well as subject matter and structure is needed. A process-oriented framework demands that we enhance our student's ability to contextualize experience through multiple realms of meaning; encourage our students in the struggle to find a voice; and once a voice is found, to endow our students with the courage to let it be heard.