Erotic and pseudoerotic elements in the treatment of male patients by female therapists

This paper describes some aspects of the clinical encounter between the male patient and the female therapist. Examples are given of transference involving erotic, as compared to pseudoerotic (dependency or aggressive) themes. Countertransference and countertransference problems are discussed.     

Organizational Slack and Corporate Greening: Broadening the Debate

Organizational slack seems to have an ambiguous relationship with corporate greening. On the one hand, excess resources can be used to experiment with new environmental innovations, or potential green market segments. On the other, excess resources can be used to build corporate buffers against pressures for environmental improvement, such as large corporate environmental departments or environmental lobbying activity, and resist changes to the core of the organization. This paper begins to resolve these conflicting arguments by broadening the debate on organizational slack and corporate greening. It builds on recent empirical studies of slack and corporate greening, and recognizes the many potential roles that different types of slack may play in a dynamic decision–making context. Using a theoretical framework suggested by Bourgeois (1981), the paper systematizes and draws lessons from examples of the roles of slack encountered in a recent series of 35 interviews within UK public limited companies. It concludes that future treatments of slack and environmental management should incorporate a more holistic view of slack, which recognizes its dynamic, complex and often contradictory effects on decision–making in organizations.     

Ageism and Ageist Language Across the Life Span: Intimate Relationships and Non-intimate Interactions

The possible effects of ageist language and ageism on the structure and function of intimate and non-intimate relationships have received significant attention from social scientists. Recent research grounded in communication accommodation theory ( Giles, Mulac, Bradac, & Johnson, 1987 ), the communication predicament model of ageing ( Ryan, Giles, Bartolucci, & Henwood, 1986 ), the communication enhancement model of ageing ( Ryan, Meredith, MacLean, & Orange, 1995 ), and ageing and stereotype research by Hummert (1994) and colleagues ( Hummert & Mazloff, 2001 ; Hummert, Shaner, & Garstka, 1995 ) point toward the numerous consequences of both negative and positive attitudes toward ageing. Focusing specifically on health care settings, this article reviews recent theoretical positions and empirical findings that link ageist language and ageism to these positive and negative social consequences, and offers pragmatic suggestions and directions for future research .     

Keep the Tool-Box Open for Social Justice: Comment on Kitzinger and Wilkinson

We argue that psychology is not ill-suited to confronting problems of inequality and injustice, and that psychologists are, in fact, quite capable of activist science. The parameters of psychology need to be considered as being broader than mental health pronouncements regarding various targeted minority groups. At a time when empirical claims are being wielded as tools by both sides of the same-sex marriage debate, activist psychologists should not relinquish their own various strategies for challenging the status quo. The authors provide examples of tactics and tools that have been used and continue to be used by feminist and other progressive psychologists both to transform psychology and to work toward equality and social justice.     

The Limits of Working with Children Cards in Protecting Children

Abstract

In 2006 Western Australia passed legislation that introduced a system to check criminal records and issue permits to those who wish to work with children. In 2007, the legislation was described by the minister responsible as a “powerful system that would prevent harm to children”. This paper explores that system and identifies limits to its effectiveness. The paper concluded that unless the system's limits are fully appreciated there is a possibility of a paradoxical outcome, whereby children's lives will be less safe. It also raises the question of whether in the area of record checking a national approach is not preferable to each state and territory developing its own system.     

Aboriginal Practitioners Speak Out: Contextualising Child Protection Interventions

Abstract

One month before the June 2007 Federal Government Emergency Intervention in the Northern Territory some 55 West Australian Aboriginal child protection workers attended a 3-day summit in Fremantle. Their purpose as front-line practitioners from across the State was to identify how more nurturing and healing communities could be developed and supported in a climate of despair. This paper reports on how the summit was designed and on some of the ideas and concerns that emerged within this dialogical space of cooperative inquiry. The project was a partnership between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal representatives of university, government, and community-service bodies. Aboriginal practitioners identified the complexity of what was happening in their experience and where changes were needed. Integral to this participation and coproduction of knowledge by Aboriginal child protection workers was the provision of a safe space for the articulation of reflected experience. Implications for policy, practice, and curriculum of both process and outcome dimensions to considering Aboriginal views on this contentious issue are discussed.     

The later social adjustment of a group of borderline defective delinquents trained at the oaks school 1

In Part 1 of this article, the author provides an overview of the history of psychoanalytic treatment of those identifying as homosexual. In Part 2, the author interviews “Rob” to more fully demonstrate the corrosive effects over a lifetime of analytic and psychotherapeutic treatment, as it had once been practiced. Rob, a man primarily attracted to men, spent many years in treatment with different therapists and analysts during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s. Now in his early eighties, Rob is married and remains closeted to all but a few close associates. When Rob entered treatment many years ago, he was told that his homosexual attractions were symptoms of an illness and with treatment he could change. Rob's experience is uncannily similar to multiple reports that exist in the professional and lay literature. Rob knows that nothing can undo the damage he suffered, yet it remains his wish that the psychoanalytic community would acknowledge, and even apologize, to all those who were harmed—including the many who took their lives—by theories and practices that were once so central to mainstream psychoanalysis.     

Still connecting the dots: An investigation into infants' attentional bias to threat using an eye-tracking task

An attentional bias toward threat has been theorized to be a normative aspect of infants' threat and safety learning, and an indicator of risk for internalizing psychopathology in older populations. To date, only four studies have examined this bias using the dot-probe task in infancy and the findings are mixed. We extended the literature by examining patterns of attention to threat in a culturally and linguistically diverse sample of infants aged 5–11 months old (N = 151) using all measures previously employed in the infant dot-probe literature. Given that an attentional bias toward threat is associated with higher risk of developing anxiety disorders later in life, we also examined how negative affect—an early correlate of later anxiety disorders—is related to attentional bias toward threat in infancy. This study was the first to use a consistent measure of negative affect across the whole sample. An eye-tracking dot-probe task was used to examine attentional bias toward threat (i.e., angry faces) relative to positive (i.e., happy faces) stimuli. Results showed that an attention bias to threat was not characteristic of infants at this age, and negative affect did not moderate the putative relationship between attention and emotional faces (angry, happy). These findings therefore suggest that attention biases to socio-emotional threat may not have emerged by 11 months old.     

Timing of Immigration Effects Asset Change Among Hispanic Caregivers of Older Family Members

Journal of Family and Economic Issues - Given the cultural value of family in Hispanic culture, older Hispanic immigrants are likely to have family caregivers. This study examined the economic...