Therapy with siblings in reorganizing families

The loss of parenting figures through death, divorce, or other kinds of separation often leaves children without consistent parental support and with increased fears of abandonment. In the natural cycle, siblings can maintain almost lifelong relationships and therefore are in a position to offer each other a significant support system over an extended period of time. We have found that work with sibling subgroups can help children to resolve their individual and shared conflicts as well as to remove interferences to mutually supportive relationships. Illustrative cases are presented and treatment guidelines offered.An earlier version of this paper was presented at the National Conference of the American Association of Psychiatric Services for Children, November 1977, in Washington, D.C. Ms. Rosenberg is grateful to Harvey Falit, M.D., and Fady Hajal, M.D., for their encouragement and support of this work.     

'Mid-Life crisis' and its implications in counselling

The term 'mid-life crisis' is increasingly used both in everyday speech and in the professional literature as an explanation of certain disturbing psychological symptoms and uncharacteristic behaviour in middle age. This paper outlines the symptoms and the causes presumed by a wide range o f literature (mainly American) to underlie them. It then examines empirical research for evidence of the existence and nature of the phenomenon labelled 'mid-life crisis' and, finding little, proposes alternative explanations for its symptoms and for the emergence and use of the concept in recent years. It concludes with an examination of implications for guidance and counselling.     

Issues in the comparison of techniques for eliciting source material in computerized content analysis

Zeldow and McAdams (1993) recently presented artifactual explanations for our data showing dissimilarity between the content of speech elicited by the Thematic Apperception Test (Murray, 1943) and free speech tasks (Schnurr, Rosenberg, & Oxman, 1992). In particular, they alleged that our findings resulted from a lack of psychological meaning in our content categories and in the free speech task. We cite empirical and theoretical support to refute this allegation and provide additional analyses of our data that are consistent with our earlier suggestion that text samples elicited under different conditions may not be interchangeable.     

Ethical Issues in Mentoring Doctoral Students in Clinical Psychology

Ethical issues abound in any relationship that is defined by differences between the parties in rank, status, and power. Such is the case in the relationship between a doctoral student in clinical psychology and his or her mentor. In this article, we examine several potential areas of ethical concern within the mentor-student relationship. We present a series of vignettes and our analyses of the issues that arise within them as we examine romantic dual relationships, nonromantic dual relationships, and other ways in which the mentor's power may be intentionally or unintentionally misused for personal gain. We also look at several examples of unhelpful mentoring. Problematic situations often arise when there is the potential for loss of objectivity by either party or exploitation of the student by the mentor. Although the relationship with one's mentor may be one of the most important and gratifying aspects of the graduate school experience, both mentors and students should keep in mind that behavioral choices within this relationship are often complex ones that require forethought, self-monitoring, and discussion between the parties.