Pilot study of the effects of a workplace smoking ban on indices of smoking,cigarette craving,stress and other health behaviours

Abstract

Worksite smoking bans provide an ideal opportunity to examine the effects of enforced smoking restrictions on not only smoking behaviour, but also other health behaviours. This pilot study examines the short term effects of a such a ban on self-reported smoking behaviour, carbon monoxide and plasma cotinine levels and a number of other appetitive behaviours. The total number of cigarettes smoked on a working day and the number smoked just during working hours both declined following the introduction of a ban. Although the carbon monoxide levels of smokers during working hours demonstrated a similar trend to self-reported smoking, smokers' cotinine levels tended to increase, following an initial decrease following the ban. These data are suggestive of a compensatory process and a change in smoking topography, probably outside working hours. Measures of stress and craving also appeared to be affected by the introduction of smoking restrictions.     

Introduction

The author argues that Gediman's assertion that self-disclosure does not require a new paradigm fails to recognize some of the fundamental tenets of Relational theory. The author stresses two main points. The first is that our self-disclosures derive their meaning from the relational context(s) in which they occur, meanings which we may not be able to know, discern, or understand. The second point is that analysts are disclosing unintentionally all the time, in a variety of ways of which we are mostly unaware.     

Addressing Mental Health Disparities With Asian American Clients: Examining the Generalizability of the Common Factors Model

Although mental health disparities for Asian Americans are known, reasons for the disparities are not well understood within the counseling process. This study coded Asian American and White clients' reports of helpful counselor actions into empirically supported common factors to determine which within‐session processes might reduce mental health disparities for Asian American clients. Asian American clients' reports of helpful therapist actions did not differ from those of White clients, suggesting that disparities do not originate in differences in the foundational aspects of counseling. Implications for addressing disparities are discussed.     

Toward establishing a qualifying autoclitic repertoire in children with autism spectrum disorder

Autoclitics are secondary verbal operants that are controlled by a feature of the conditions that occasion or evoke a primary verbal operant such as a tact or mand. Qualifying autoclitics extend, negate, or assert a speaker's primary verbal response and modify the intensity or direction of the listener's behavior. Howard and Rice (1988) established autoclitics that indicated weak stimulus control (e.g., “like a [primary tact]”) with four neurotypical preschool children. However, generalization to newly acquired tacts was limited. In Experiment 1, we addressed similar behavior as in Howard and Rice but with autistic children while using simultaneous teaching procedures, and we observed generalization across sets and with newly acquired tacts. In Experiment 2, we evaluated the effects of multiple-exemplar training on generalization of autoclitics across sets of naturalistic stimuli. Across participants, gradual increases in the frequency of autoclitics occurred with untaught stimuli after teaching with one or more sets.     

'No-show': therapist racial/ethnic disparities in client unilateral termination

In the present study, the authors examined the source of racial/ethnic minority (REM) disparities in unilateral termination (i.e., the client ending therapy without informing the therapist)--a form of dropout that is associated with poor alliance and outcome. First, the authors tested whether some therapists were more likely to have clients who reported unilaterally terminating as compared with other therapists. Next, the authors examined 2 competing hypotheses regarding the therapists role in termination disparities: (a) that racial/ethnic disparities in unilateral termination are similar across therapists and thus due to other components of the treatment process or (b) that racial/ethnic disparities in unilateral termination are specific to therapists, where some therapists are more likely, on average, to have higher rates of unilateral termination with REM clients as compared with White clients. The sample included 155 REM clients and 177 White clients who were treated by 44 therapists at a university counseling center. The results showed that therapists accounted for a significant proportion of the variation in clients' unilateral termination, and REM clients were more likely to report they unilaterally terminated from therapy as compared with White clients. Furthermore, racial/ethnic disparities in clients' report of unilateral termination varied across therapists' caseloads. These results suggest that therapists have a central role in their clients' unilateral termination and have implications for understanding racial/ethnic mental health disparities.     

The six most essential questions in psychiatric diagnosis: a pluralogue part 3: issues of utility and alternative approaches in psychiatric diagnosis

In face of the multiple controversies surrounding the DSM process in general and the development of DSM-5 in particular, we have organized a discussion around what we consider six essential questions in further work on the DSM. The six questions involve: 1) the nature of a mental disorder; 2) the definition of mental disorder; 3) the issue of whether, in the current state of psychiatric science, DSM-5 should assume a cautious, conservative posture or an assertive, transformative posture; 4) the role of pragmatic considerations in the construction of DSM-5; 5) the issue of utility of the DSM ?C whether DSM-III and IV have been designed more for clinicians or researchers, and how this conflict should be dealt with in the new manual; and 6) the possibility and advisability, given all the problems with DSM-III and IV, of designing a different diagnostic system. Part 1 of this article took up the first two questions. Part 2 took up the second two questions. Part 3 now deals with Questions 5 & 6. Question 5 confronts the issue of utility, whether the manual design of DSM-III and IV favors clinicians or researchers, and what that means for DSM-5. Our final question, Question 6, takes up a concluding issue, whether the acknowledged problems with the earlier DSMs warrants a significant overhaul of DSM-5 and future manuals. As in Parts 1 & 2 of this article, the general introduction, as well as the introductions and conclusions for the specific questions, are written by James Phillips, and the responses to commentaries are written by Allen Frances.     

The six most essential questions in psychiatric diagnosis: a pluralogue. Part 4: general conclusion

In the conclusion to this multi-part article I first review the discussions carried out around the six essential questions in psychiatric diagnosis – the position taken by Allen Frances on each question, the commentaries on the respective question along with Frances’ responses to the commentaries, and my own view of the multiple discussions. In this review I emphasize that the core question is the first – what is the nature of psychiatric illness – and that in some manner all further questions follow from the first. Following this review I attempt to move the discussion forward, addressing the first question from the perspectives of natural kind analysis and complexity analysis. This reflection leads toward a view of psychiatric disorders – and future nosologies – as far more complex and uncertain than we have imagined.     

What is Sidgwick’s Dualism of Practical Reason?

Sidgwick's 'Dualism of Practical Reason' has attracted the attention of many interpreters, and the Dualism itself seems to be an historically important version of the view, recently defended by Thomas Nagel, Susan Wolf, and others, that there exists a fundamental fragmentation of value – that the 'cosmos of duty is reduced to chaos,' in Sidgwick's words. In this paper, I consider and reject the leading interpretations of Sidgwick's Dualism, and propose an alternative reading. I conclude by offering what I hope is a plausible but Sidgwickian way out of the Dualism.