Family therapy alone is not enough or the dirty story of Dorian

When serious malfunctioning of an individual occurs in a secondary system (school, hospital, rehabilitation center, dormitory setting), the tendency often is to focus on the family as both the cause of the malfunctioning and the arena of intervention. Many times, family therapy alone is not enough because a parallel destructive constellation has formed around the Identified Patient in the secondary system as well and the symptoms catalyze that system's own maladaptive patterns. Often the IP is caught in the web of rigid pathological patterns of interactions between the two systems. A unique model of conjoined intersystemic intervention for dealing with such resistance to change is presented.     

Rearing practices and impulsivity/hyperactivity symptoms in relation to inflated responsibility and obsessive‐compulsive symptoms

Smári, J., Rúrik Martinsson, D., & Einarsson, H. (2010). Rearing practices and impulsivity/hyperactivity symptoms in relation to inflated responsibility and obsessive‐compulsive symptoms. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 51, 392–397. The aim of the study was to investigate potential precursors of inflated responsibility (responsibility attitudes) and obsessive‐compulsive (OCD) symptoms. It was argued that both parental overprotection and impulsivity, separately and in interaction with each other, contribute to inflated responsibility and OCD symptoms. In a large sample of young adults (N = 570), self‐report measures of OCD symptoms (OCI‐R), responsibility attitudes (RAS), anxiety/depression (HADS), rearing practices (EMBU), present and past impulsivity/hyperactivity symptoms (IMP/HY) were administered. Overprotection as well as IMP/HY were found to predict OCD symptoms as well as inflated responsibility. Finally, a significant interaction was found between IMP/HY and overprotection with regard to both OCD symptoms and inflated responsibility. This effect reflected that IMP/HY was more strongly related to OCD symptoms and responsibility in people who had not been overprotected than in people who had been. Conversely overprotection was related to OCD symptoms and responsibility in people low but not in people high in IMP/HY. The results seem to indicate that the inadequacy between offer and need for parental control may play a role in the development of OCD symptoms.     

Synthesis of studies of co-occurring disorder(s) in criminal justice and a research agenda

The studies reported in this special issue were designed to take advantage of the unique opportunity that the Criminal Justice Drug Abuse Treatment Studies (CJDATS) cooperative provides to the systematic study of several key issues in programming for co-occurring disorder(s) (COD) in the criminal justice system. These papers present findings from CJDATS studies pertaining to co-occurring disorder(s), identify clinical initiatives to strengthen efforts to treat the population with co-occurring disorder(s), and point to a direction for the elaboration of a future research agenda. Four key areas of investigation are presented: Screening and Diagnosis; the Relationship of Co-Occurring Disorder(s) to Violence; Gender Differences; and the Delivery of Services for Co-Occurring Disorder(s). The first section of this article summarizes the studies included in this special issue within the context of the research literature already available. The second section suggests a future research agenda for the study of offender populations with co-occurring disorder(s), and concludes with a broad statement of clinical advancements to date.     

Violent offenses associated with co‐occurring substance use and mental health problems: Evidence from CJDATS

The present study examines the relationship between substance use, mental health problems, and violence in a sample of offenders released from prison and referred to substance abuse treatment programs. Data from 34 sites (n = 1,349) in a federally funded cooperative, the Criminal Justice Drug Abuse Treatment Studies (CJDATS), were analyzed. Among parolees referred to substance abuse treatment, self‐reports for the six‐month period before the arrest resulting in their incarceration revealed frequent problems with both substance use and mental health. For most offenders with substance use problems, the quantity of alcohol consumed and the frequency of drug use were associated with a greater probability of self‐reported violence. Mental health problems were not indicative of increases in violent behavior, with the exception of antisocial personality problems, which were associated with violence. The paper emphasizes the importance of providing substance abuse treatment in relation to violent behavior among offenders with mental health problems being discharged to the community. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Educational effects of interscholastic athletic participation on African-American and Hispanic youth.

This study examined the educational effects of interscholastic athletic participation on a national, stratified, probability sample of African-American and Hispanic boys and girls drawn from the High School and Beyond Study (U.S. Department of Education, 1987). This two-year longitudinal analysis was based on questionnaire data from 3,686 minority youth who were sophomores in 1980 and seniors in 1982. The independent variable was athletic participation, and the dependent variables included senior year popularity, extracurricular involvement, grades, achievement test performance, dropout rates, and educational expectations. The control variables were socioeconomic status, school location, and sophomore measures of the dependent variables. In general, athletic participation enhanced popularity and contributed to greater involvement in extracurricular activities. Sports participation was generally unrelated to grades and standardized test scores. Depending on school location (i.e., urban, suburban, rural), athletic participation was significantly related to lower dropout rates for some minority youth. High school athletic participation was unrelated to educational expectations in the senior year. These findings show that high school athletic participation was a social resource for many minority youth, but only a modest academic resource for others. Equally clear, however, is the fact that not all racial or ethnic groups reap the same benefits from sport. More importantly, these findings strongly suggest that high school sport should only be considered one of many institutional forces converging in the lives of American minority youth. To assign sport more significance than these findings call for is to run the risk of oversimplifying and trivializing the very complex psychosocial processes which attend high school athletic participation.     

Relationship between team assists and win-loss record in The National Basketball Association

Using research methodology for analysis of secondary data, statistical data for five National Basketball Association (NBA) seasons (1993-1994 to 1997-1998) were examined to test for a relationship between team assists (a behavioral measure of teamwork) and win-loss record. Rank-difference correlation indicated a significant relationship between the two variables, the coefficients ranging from .42 to .71. Team assist totals produced higher correlations with win-loss record than assist totals for the five players receiving the most playing time ("the starters"). A comparison of "assisted team points" and "unassisted team points" in relationship to win-loss record favored the former and strongly suggested that how a basketball team scores points is more important than the number of points it scores. These findings provide circumstantial support for the popular dictum in competitive team sports that "Teamwork Means Success-Work Together, Win Together."