Sexual addiction and compulsion: recognition, treatment, and recovery

The management of patients with compulsive sexual behavior requires an understanding of the profile of the sexually compulsive or addicted patient. This article summarizes patient characteristics and their implications for treatment. Data from a study of the recovery of 957 patients who had problematic, sexually excessive behavior are presented. Spanning 5 years, the study shows six distinct stages patients experienced and the clinical activities that were most useful to them. A trajectory of a typical diagnosis and treatment path is provided, as well as important resources for physicians and patients.     

Democratic presumptions

At the Leading Edge: New Visions of Science, Spirituality, and Society. Michael Toms, 4936 State Route 414, Burdett, New York: Larson Publications, 1991. Softcover, 386 pp. U.S. $14.95.

A Dream Deferred: America's Discontent and the Search for a New Democratic Ideal, Philip Slater, Beacon, Boston, $19.95, 1991, ISBN 0–8070–4304–4

The American Replacement of Nature, William Irwin Thompson, Doubleday, New York, $20, 1991, ISBN 0,385–42025–0

Reimagination of the World, A Critique of the New Age, Science, and Popular Culture, David Spangler and William Irwin Thompson, Bear and Company, Santa Fe, New Mexico, $12.95, 1991, ISBN 0–939680–92–0

The New Evolutionary Paradigm, Ervin Laszlo, (Ed.), Gordon &; Breach, New York, $60 (libraries) $36 (individuals), 1991, ISBN 2–88124–375–4

The Evolutionary Approach for Social Scientists, Ignazio Masulli, Gordon &; Breach, New York, $50 (libraries) $30 (individuals), 1991, ISBN 2–88124–376–2

The Fifth Discipline. The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization, Peter M. Senge, Doubleday, New York, $19.95, 1990, ISBN 0–385–26094–6

Symbiosis as a Source of Evolutionary Innovation: Speciation and Innovation, Lynn Margulis and Rene Fester (Eds.), MIT Press, Cambridge, MA, $37.50, 454, Includes Index

One Earth, One Future: Our Changing Global Environment, Cheryl Simon Silver (with Ruth S. Defries for the National Academy of Sciences), National Academy Press, Washington, D.C., $14.95, 196, Includes Index

Toward a Transpersonal Ecology: Developing New Foundations for Environmentalism, Warwick Fox, Shambhala, Boston, MA, $16.95, 380, Includes Index

Gaia, A Way of Knowing: Political Implications of the New Biology, William Irwin Thompson (Ed.), The Lindisfarne Press, Great Barrington, MA, $10.95, 216

Gaia 2: Emergence, The New Science of Becoming, William Erwin Thompson, The Lindisfarne Press, Hudson, NY, $14.95, 272

A Replicative Perspective On Evolutionary Dynamics: The Organizing Process of the US Economy Elaborated Through Biological Metaphor, Mika Pantzar, Labour Institute for Economic Research, Helsinki, Finland, 274

Societal Systems: Planning, Policy and Complexity &; A Science of Generic Design: Managing Complexity through Systems Design, Vol I and II, John N. Warfield, Intersystems Publications, Salinas, CA, 1989 and 1990     

Alcohol as social lubricant.

This study examines how consuming alcohol differentially affects the communicative behavior and perceptions of high and low social self‐esteem (SSE) women as they engage in a brief interaction with a flirtatious male. Alcohol myopia theory proposes that alcohol affects behavior when it blocks a person's normal inhibitions about enacting a behavior. It was predicted that low SSE women would be more inhibited when talking to a flirtatious male than would high SSE women and, therefore administration of a social self‐esteem measure and random assignment to an alcoholic or nonalcoholic beverage condition, participants (N=50) talked with an attractive, flirtatious male confederate. Low SSE women were less anxious and self‐disclosed more when drinking than when sober, whereas high SSE women were not significantly affected by alcohol consumption. The discussion highlights the complex and often contradictory effects of alcohol consumption on social interaction.     

The Efficacy of Child Parent Relationship Therapy for Adopted Children With Attachment Disruptions

This pilot study examined the effectiveness of child parent relationship therapy (CPRT; Landreth & Bratton, 2006 ) with 61 adoptive families. Statistically significant findings and large treatment effects on all measures indicated the effectiveness of CPRT over the wait‐list control condition on reducing child behavior problems and increasing parental empathy. The results provide preliminary support for CPRT as a responsive intervention for adoptive families with children presenting with attachment difficulties.     

The Myth of Closure

Therapies for grief and loss have traditionally focused on the work of grieving. The goal was to reach an endpoint, now popularly called closure. There are, however, many people who, through no fault of their own, find a loss so unclear that there can be no end to grief. They have not failed in the work of grieving, but rather have suffered ambiguous loss, a type of loss that is inherently open ended. Instead of closure, the therapeutic goal is to help people find meaning despite the lack of definitive information and finality. Hope lies in increasing a family's tolerance for ambiguity, but first, professionals must increase their own comfort with unanswered questions. In this article, the authors, one a poet, the other a family therapist and theorist, offer a unique blending of theory, reflection, and poetry to experientially deepen the process of self‐reflection about a kind of loss that defies closure.     

A Reconsideration of Religious Authority in Christian Theology

As Stanley Cavell has critiqued Christianity for displacing authority from the individual to somewhere beyond critical assessment, so several Christian theologians have also turned to Wittgenstein to justify just such displacement. This article suggests that both offer theologically impoverished and historically inattentive accounts of authority. It aims instead to sketch five moments in the Christian tradition to suggest five ways of naming the intimacy of religious authority with individual critical assessment. Such intimacy is then theologically described through the doctrinal loci of creation and incarnation, which generate a picture of authority surprisingly near to one Cavell might want to celebrate.