Histories of sexual abuse in adolescent male runaways

In this study, data on sexual victimization in the histories of 89 Canadian male runaways as well as information on physical victimization, family structure, family financial stability, delinquent and criminal activities, and reasons for running away from home were evaluated. The population of male runaways evidenced dramatically higher rates of sexual and physical abuse than did randomly sampled populations. Sexually abused and nonsexually abused male runaways shared characteristics noted in the literature as common to runaways: problem families, high rates of delinquency, depression, tension, low self-image, and history of physical abuse. Sexually abused male runaways differed from nonsexually abused runaways in their reactions to their runaway event, with sexually abused male runaways responding in highly avoidant patterns coupled with extreme withdrawal from all types of interpersonal relationships. These differences are explained as consistent with known sequelae of sexual abuse, and the implications for treatment by runaway shelters and for further research are suggested.     

Sexual predator commitment laws: lessons for law and the behavioral sciences

Sex offender commitment laws use a mental health commitment model to lock up the "most dangerous" sex offenders after their prison sentences expire. In Kansas v. Hendricks, the United States Supreme Court rejected the major constitutional challenges to these laws. The Hendricks case clarifies important ambiguities about the use of civil commitment to enforce "police power" interests, as opposed to "parens patriae" interests. Hendricks also clarifies the role of "treatment" in justifying civil commitment. While there remain some important legal issues to be resolved, the future direction of sex offender commitment schemes will turn most significantly on policy decisions. The behavioral sciences can play an important role in shaping these decisions. The most significant questions concern whether expensive commitment programs are the most effective use of scarce treatment and supervision dollars. Additional research should be directed to improving dynamic predictors of recidivism, operationalizing "inability to control" standards, judging the "social meaning" of commitment laws, and assessing the potential treatment disincentives of these laws.     

Colour matching of isoluminant samples and backgrounds: a dimming effect

Sequential asymmetrical colour matching of forty Munsell samples simulated under illuminant C and one of eight test illuminants was carried out. The subjects matched the appearance of each sample under illuminant C with its appearance under the test illuminant. Samples and background (N7) were presented for 1 s under the test illuminant and were isoluminant with each other. Subjects adjusted hue, chroma, and value under illuminant C. The experiments distinguished two groups of subjects; some observers needed to reduce the luminance of the sample to make a match while others did not. This 'dimming' occurred when the matches were close to cardinal axes, especially the tritanopic confusion line. A model of luminance and cone-opponent mechanisms contributing to brightness can account for the dimming effect. Details of analysis in cone-opponent space (L - M, L + M - S, L + M) are presented in the companion paper (Stanikunas et al, 2005 Perception 34 this issue).     

PRESENTISM,PERSISTENCE AND COMPOSITION

Pace Benovsky's ‘Presentism and Persistence,’ presentism is compatible with perdurantism, tropes and bundle‐of‐universals theories of persisting objects. I demonstrate how the resemblance, causation and precedence relations that tie stages together can be accommodated within an ersatzer presentist framework. The presentist account of these relations is then used to delineate a presentist‐friendly account of the inter‐temporal composition required for making worms out of stages. The defense of presentist trope theory shows how properties with indexes other than t may be said to exist at t. This involves an account of how times other than t exist at t, and how times may be multiply located at any given time. Benovsky's objection to bundles of universals is shown to assume that a bundle of properties must have the properties of its element properties.     

Clamped Corticosterone (B) Reveals the Effect of Endogenous B on Both Facilitated Responsivity to Acute Restraint and Metabolic Responses to Chronic Stress

To determine the effects of both corticosterone (B) and chronic stressors on acute ACTH responses to restraint, young male rats were exposed to streptozotocin-induced diabetes, cold (5-7 degreesC) or intracerebroventricular (icv) neuropeptide Y (NPY) for 5 d and then exposed to restraint within 2 h after lights on. Two groups of rats were studied: intact and adrenalectomized replaced with B pellets that maintained plasma B in the normal mean 24-h range of intact rats. In addition to ACTH and B responses to restraint on d 5, body weight, food intake, fat depots, glucose and other hormones were measured to determine the role of stress-induced elevations in B on energy balance. ACTH responses to restraint were normal in intact rats subjected to diabetes or cold. By contrast, there was no ACTH or B response to restraint in NPY-infused intact rats. All 3 groups of chronically stimulated adrenalectomized rats with clamped B had facilitated ACTH responses to restraint compared to their treatment controls. Overall food intake increased in all groups of stressed rats; however, augmented intake occurred only during the light in intact rats and equally in the light and dark in B-clamped rats. White adipose depot weights were decreased by both diabetes and cold and increased by NPY in intact rats; the decreases with cold and increases with NPY were both blunted and changes in fat stores were not significant in adrenalectomized, B-clamped rats. We conclude that: 1. diabetes- and cold-induced facilitation of restraint-induced afferent input to hypothalamic control of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis is opposed in intact rats by the elevated feedback signal of B secretion; 2. NPY does not induce facilitation of afferent stress pathways; 3. chronic stimulation of the HPA axis induces acute hyperresponsiveness of hypothalamic neurons to restraint provided that the afferent input of this acute stimulus is not prevented by B feedback; 4. stimulus-induced elevations in B secretion result in day-time feeding; 5. insensitivity of both caloric efficiency and white fat stores to chronic stress in adrenalectomized, B-clamped rats results from loss of normally variable B levels.     

Processing of metaphoric language: An investigation of the three-stage model of metaphor comprehension

Recent experiments that have compared processing of metaphoric and literal language in light of the three-stage model have methodological weaknesses. The study reported in this paper was designed to circumvent these weaknesses. Findings of this study demonstrated longer reading times for metaphors when compared to literals. This result lends support to the three-stage model and to the possibility that serial processing occurs during metaphor comprehension.We would like to thank Dr. Andrew Ortony for kindly providing us with the paragraphs used as stimulus materials in this study. We would also like to thank Dr. Herbert Roitblat for his many helpful comments on earlier versions of this paper.     

Die „Technik der Psychoanalyse“ von Otto Rank

In the 1920s, Otto Rank broadened the psychoanalytic treatment space by the prelingual relational and self-experience in the time before, during and after birth. This meant that early prelingual experiences at the level of emotions and sensations is always covertly present in the analytic situation. The special emphasis on the earliest relationship to the mother was perceived in the patriarchal society of the time as inadequate and unjustifiable. But the last decades provided perceptions in different therapeutic settings which seem to confirm the observations of Rank. Just as important are the findings of the empirical research in early brain development and in after effects of early traumatic stress which show the shaping role of early development in a completely new light. There are also new insights into particularities of early human development due to evolution, especially about the psychological consequences of the “physiological premature birth”. From this knowledge a new framework arises for the understanding of early development and for the assessment of the observations and conclusions of Rank. From a contemporary viewpoint this provides valuable contributions to the psychoanalytic research of the last decades into early after birth mother-child relationships. They bear the potential for a deeper understanding of the prelingual level of the psychoanalytic treatment situation.     

Perceptual stability--going with the flow

Historically, inflow and outflow hypotheses have been formulated as the primary explanations for perceptual stability. Central to these hypotheses is the postulation that, following an intended eye movement, knowledge of eye position cancels the consequences of the retinal image motion. Here, we reconsider the evidence for the extra-retinal signal and discuss whether this cancellation approach is compatible with the available empirical evidence. In particular, we propose that visual-oculomotor processing is a distributed process and that population-coding models of sensorimotor transformations are critical elements that need to be incorporated in any comprehensive explanation of spatial constancy.     

Freud und die pränatale und perinatale Dimension des seelischen Erlebens

The tradition of psychoanalysis is burdened with fractures and splitting, the consequences of which have not yet, in my opinion, been adequately reflected. This concerns in particular the time-relatedness of some psychoanalytical concepts and the experiential importance of earliest experiences with the mother before and during birth. A fundamental reason for the incomplete apprehension of the reality of prenatal and perinatal experiences lies in the era-dependent and personally related limitations of Freud’s possibilities of insight, which were not adequately reflected in consideration of his great discoveries and from loyalty. The fractures mentioned were often compromise-like “solutions” relating to differing perceptions but also meant, more than had been realized, a loss of substantial insights. The consequence of this situation is that nowadays we have a variety of schools and groups with partial insights, which are, however, often arbitrarily generalized for the sake of group identity. This article is an attempt at a reflection of this situation and its background.