The Home-Based Occupational Therapy Intervention in the Alzheimer's Disease Multiple Intervention Trial (ADMIT)

There is no way to prevent functional declines related to Alzheimer's Disease (AD). The use of occupational therapy (OT) has been shown to be successful in managing some aspects of AD. We added home-based OT to evidence-based best practice for AD with the aim of delaying functional decline in people with AD. OT was delivered in the home to a caregiver dyad including the person with AD and her/his caregiver. This article describes the OT intervention for the AD Multiple Intervention Trial, a parallel randomized controlled trial. We include baseline data on the 180 caregiver dyads.     

In conversation with J. Philippe Rushton

The interview covers Rushton’s background in England, South Africa, and Canada, his education at the University of London (B.Sc., 1970; Ph.D., 1973), and his early research (1970–1980) on the social learning of generosity in 7- to 11-year olds. In his first book, Altruism, socialization, and society (1980), Rushton solved two “anomalies” for his social learning perspective—altruism in animals and traits in people—causing a “paradigm shift” for him toward sociobiology. He spent January to June 1981 at the University of California, Berkeley, to study the longitudinal stability of personality traits like altruism. There, he was influenced by Jensen’s work on g and race differences in rate of maturation and two-egg twinning. Subsequently, Rushton found that across 60 variables, Europeans fall between East Asians and Africans, closer to East Asians. He extrapolated Wilson’s (fast–slow) r-K life history theory to explain the pattern. Also covered is Rushton’s research on the heritability of altruism, and Genetic Similarity Theory explaining assortative mating and ethnic nepotism. Spouses and best friends are as similar as half-siblings and people randomly chosen from the same ethnic group are as related as first cousins. Altruism follows lines of similarity to replicate genes effectively. Rushton’s research on creativity is described.     

Creencias de los profesores y estrés docente en función de la experiencia profesional

Resumen

Se investigó la relación entre las creencias de los profesores, el burnout y las diferencias de edad. Participaron 165 profesores de educación secundaria. Se evaluó: actitud hacia la profesión, fuentes de estrés; burnout; eficacia docente, competencia personal, y afrontamiento. Los resultados indicaron que en el grupo de maestros entre 46 y 60 años difirieron del resto en su actitud hacia la profesión, estrategia de afrontamiento y valor de las fuentes de estrés. El burnout fue relacionado con la creencia en la eficacia de la docencia, con una percepción pobre de la propia competencia personal y con ver las condiciones laborales como una fuente importante de estrés. La conclusión fue que el burnout docente depende de una alta expectativa y motivación para enseñar, combinada con una baja percepción de la competencia personal para resolver problemas en general.     

La naturaleza y medida de la ansiedad

RESUMEN

En este artículo se presenta una caracterización general de la naturaleza y medida de la ansiedad, a través de un enfoque factorial. Gracias a éste se consigue separar la ansiedad de dos cosas con las que se confunde constantemente: La reacción a la tensión y la inadaptación de la personalidad neurótica. Las medidas más precisas de la ansiedad que ahora son posibles aclaran también la relación entre la ansiedad y un factor tal como la inteligencia, y deben ayudar a contestar muchas preguntas similares sobre la relación entre la ansiedad y varias situaciones y actuaciones.     

Relación entre “despersonalización” (burnout), trastornos psicofisiológicos,clima laboral y tácticas de afrontamiento en una muestra de docents

Resumen

El artículo presenta una valoración de la dimensión “despersonalización” de la Escala M.B.I. de Maslach y Jackson (1981), relacionando el burnout con estrategias de afrontamiento asumidas para reducir el estrés, desórdenes psicofisiológicos asociados al síndrome, y percepción del clima laboral.

La muestra está constituida por 191 profesores de Enseñanza Secundaria (F.P., B.U.P. y C.O.U.) de la ciudad y provincia de Salamanca.

Los resultados confirmaron la hipótesis de que los profesores manifiestan más frecuencia de despersonalización en Septiembre que en Junio. En cuanto a las variables asociadas que fueron evaluadas, se comprobó que esta fase del burnout, se manifiesta más mediante cambios cognitivos que a través de desórdenes psicofisiológicos, viéndose menos afectados los profesores (en esta fase del proceso) por las influencias del clima laboral percibido.

Finalmente, resaltar que fue significativo en el grupo de los docentes más frecuentemente Despersonalizados, el uso de estrategias de afrontamiento de carácter activo.     

GAIA,OCKHAM'S RAZOR,THE SCIENCE OF COMPLEXITY

In this article, the author describes his sense of synchronicity with Edgar Morin's concepts of complexity. Although Morin only briefly addresses Gaia per se, the implications of Morin's work may reveal the Gaia concept as an element of the general breakthroughs of complexity science. Morin demonstrates a phase transition that is gaining momentum right now, whereby the new, more benign science is overwhelming the old Cartesian world.     

The aim of psychoanalysis

The changing aims of psychoanalysis are discussed with reference to Money-Kyrle's paper on the subject. The theory of dammed-up libido, the theory of moral conflict and the theory of misrepresentations and perversion of reality which he described, all imply different aims. It is argued that, in addition, the theory of projective identification leads to a radical change in the aim of treatment which can now be formulated in terms of helping the patient regain lost parts of the self.     

“Hidden Treasures” from Israeli Women's Writing Groups: Exploring an Integrative,Feminist Therapy

This article presents the work of mental health practitioners and laywomen who have developed and applied a new model of working with women in groups, a model founded on feminist principles that uses women's writing as the vehicle for group work. The model maintains a delicate balance between the needs of the group, the needs of the women in their social environment, and the women's ability to be the broker of their time, place, and mode of expression. This article presents the theoretical roots of the model and the qualitative evaluation of the writing groups that have been held over seven years, and it discusses how and why this model works for women of all ages and from all walks of life.     

A controversy between Freud and Ferenczi and beyond

Abstract

With the aid of passages of Ferenczi's paper on elasticity, and of the correspondence between Freud and Ferenczi, the author points out the conceptual difference between Freud and Ferenczi, evokes the historical roots of this difference, and highlights its continuing importance in present-day psychoanalysis.     

Clinical Commentary

This paper describes a lengthy period of psychotherapy with a child. This treatment began only after a prolonged contact with other child and adolescent mental health services during which the child's difficulties, which had initially seemed to be ordinary behavioural problems, had proved puzzlingly intractable to a variety of interventions. Subsequent psychotherapy revealed a profound disorder of development which lay bath the Surface presentation. In a climate where Asperger's syndrome is often felt to be untreatable, this paper argues that some children, at least, can benefit from psychotherapy and can be helped towards real mental growth. Asperger's syndrome in children bears some striking similarities to narcissistic personality disorder as described in the adult psychoanalytic literature and this paper discusses some of the theoretical and clinical implications of the innate origins of Asperger's syndrome.