Are the interpersonal and identity disturbances in the borderline personality disorder criteria linked to the traits of affective instability and impulsivity?

This study examines the degree to which two putative biologically influenced personality traits, affective instability and impulsive aggression, are associated with some of the interpersonal and intrapsychic disturbances of borderline personality disorder (BPD) and with choice of defense mechanism. In a sample of 152 personality disorder patients, affective instability and impulsive aggression were measured. Defense mechanisms were assessed in 140 of these patients using the Defensive Style Questionnaire (DSQ). The correlations between the traits of affective instability and impulsive aggression and the eight DSM-III-R criteria for borderline personality disorder and 20 DSQ defenses were examined. Affective instability was significantly correlated with the DSM-III-R criteria of identity disturbance, chronic emptiness or boredom, inappropriate anger, suicidality, and the affective instability criteria. It also was associated with the defenses of splitting, projection, acting out, passive aggression, undoing, and autistic fantasy. Impulsive aggression was related to unstable interpersonal relationships, inappropriate anger and impulsiveness and with the defense of acting out. It was negatively correlated with the defenses of suppression and reaction formation. A number of the interpersonal and experiential disturbances and defense mechanisms that are features of BPD are associated with the traits of affective instability and impulsive aggression among patients with personality disorders.     

Down syndrome: cognitive phenotype

Down syndrome is the most prevalent cause of intellectual impairment associated with a genetic anomaly, in this case, trisomy of chromosome 21. It affects both physical and cognitive development and produces a characteristic phenotype, although affected individuals vary considerably with respect to severity of specific impairments. Studies focusing on the cognitive characteristics of Down syndrome were reviewed, and while performance in most areas could be predicted based upon overall intellectual disability, relative weaknesses were consistently found to be associated with expressive language, syntactic/morphosyntactic processing, and verbal working memory. This profile of uneven deficits could result from a failure to develop typically automatic processing for speech perception and production, and this possibility is discussed along with its implications for intervention.     

Rebuilding the tower of Babel: a revised nomenclature for the study of suicide and suicidal behaviors. Part 2: Suicide-related ideations, communications, and behaviors

A revised and refined version of the O'Carroll et al. (1996) nomenclature for suicidology is presented, with a focus on suicide‐related ideations, communications, and behaviors. The hope is that this refinement will result in the development of operational definitions and field testing of this nomenclature in clinical and research settings. This revision would not have been possible without the international collaboration and dialogue addressing the nomenclature of suicidology since the O'Carroll et al. nomenclature appeared in 1996. Although it is doubtful that we will ever be able to construct universally unambiguous criteria to comprehensively characterize suicidal behaviors (and, overall, firmly establish the intention behind them), for scientific clarity it would be highly desirable that the set of definitions and the associated terminology be explicit and generalizable. De Leo, Burgis, Bertolote, Kerkhof, & Bille‐Brahe, 2006 , p. 5)     

Evidence-based practices project for suicide prevention

Suicide continues to be a serious public health problem. In response to this problem, a myriad of suicide prevention programs have been developed and employed across the United States. Unfortunately, the effectiveness of many of these programs is unknown because they have not been evaluated using rigorous methods. The Evidence-Based Practices Project (EBPP) for suicide prevention was created in 2002 to identify and promote evidence-based suicide prevention programs. In this paper the process and outcomes of the initial EBPP project within the context of the broader evidence-based movement are described, and the EBPPs creation of a best practice registry for suicide prevention is previewed.     

进化心理学概览

该文认为处于萌芽状态的进化心理学作为一个新的心理学分支学科对人类心理运行机制提出了一些基本的解释与预测。该文也讨论了进化心理学研究遭受到的两种批评,其一是文化的重要性没有得到重视;其二是进化历史是“假想的故事”。同时作者认为完整地理解心理学研究课题需要进行最终水平的因果分析,只有掌握与运用自然选择理论才能从最终水平上理解研究课题     

Beyond the Tower of Babel: A Nomenclature for Suicidology

Suicidology finds itself confused and stagnated for lack of a standard nomenclature. This paper proposes a nomenclature for suicide-related behavior in the hope of improving the clarity and precision of communications, advancing suicidological research and knowledge, and improving the efficacy of clinical interventions.     

Multiple Judaisms and mosaic selves: an ethnographic exploration of liberal American Jews

Debates about religion and secularism have called attention to the multiplicities of religions and secularisms that exist in modern societies. In this article, I draw on an ethnographic study of prayer, healing and identity among liberal American Jews, to demonstrate that studying Judaism as a religion obscures our understanding of multiply situated and continually evolving Jewish selves. These selves are best viewed as mosaics integrating diverse elements from Jewish religion, culture, ethnicity, history and peoplehood, as well as modern secular society. This Judaism is the product of individual agency and also embedded in communal frameworks, generated through a reflexive process of bricolage and an active engagement with multiple sources of authority, including imagined ones. It does not fit comfortably within existing analytical categories of religion and secularism, demonstrating that these categories, based on European Protestantism, are only partially appropriate to the study of modern Jewish life.     

Death as the Ultimate Castration

ABSTRACT

Psychoanalysts, beginning with Sigmund Freud, have been scanting, denying, minimizing, and obfuscating the significance of fear of death in their patients and in themselves. Starting with Freud, they have tended to interpret fear of death as a displacement from other sources of anxiety, especially from castration anxiety. Conversely, some psychoanalysts and psychotherapists have denied the presence or significance of castration anxiety in their patients and in themselves. In this communication, the prevalence and significance of each of these forms of terror are examined, individually and as to their connection with one another. Considerable clinical, child observational, and literary evidence is presented that illustrates the significance and meaning of these two sources of terror within the human psyche, as well as the relationship which they have with one another.