Last updated 12:35 02/10/2013
Criminal assessments 'utterly useless'
"Assessment tools used to predict how likely a psychopathic prisoner is to re-offend if freed from jail are "utterly useless" and parole boards might just as well flip a coin when deciding such risks, psychiatrists say.
Publishing a study that found risk score tools were only about 46 per cent accurate on how likely psychopathic convicts were to kill, rape or assault again, they said probation officers and judges should set little or no store by such tests.
They warned that clinicians carrying out such classifications must be aware of their severe limitations, and make sure prisoners undergo comprehensive psychiatric diagnosis before any risks assessment is made.
"If you apply these (tests) to somebody who is a psychopath, they're utterly useless, you might as well toss a coin," said study leader Jeremy Coid, director of the forensic psychiatry research unit at Queen Mary University of London.
"They will not predict accurately at all," he told reporters at a briefing in London about his findings.
Coid and other forensic psychiatrists said the findings - which also showed the tools performed only moderately well in prisoners with disorders like schizophrenia, depression, drug and alcohol dependence - could have major implications for risk assessment in criminal justice systems."
http://www.stuff.co.nz/science/9235045/Criminal-assessments-utterly-useless
http://m.theglobeandmail.com/life/health-and-fitness/health/predicting-violence-in-psychopaths-utterly-useless-psychiatrists-say/article14654568/?service=mobile#!/
Showing posts with label Biopsychology. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Biopsychology. Show all posts
Thursday, 3 October 2013
Tuesday, 24 September 2013
Underlying Neurodevelopmental Basis To Account For The Lack Of Sexual Attraction Characteristic Of Asexuality
Arch Sex Behav. 2013 Sep 18. [Epub ahead of print]
Biological Markers of Asexuality: Handedness, Birth Order, and Finger Length Ratios in Self-identified Asexual Men and Women.
"Human asexuality is defined as a lack of sexual attraction to anyone or anything and it has been suggested that it may be best conceptualized as a sexual orientation."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24045903
Biological Markers of Asexuality: Handedness, Birth Order, and Finger Length Ratios in Self-identified Asexual Men and Women.
"Human asexuality is defined as a lack of sexual attraction to anyone or anything and it has been suggested that it may be best conceptualized as a sexual orientation."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24045903
Monday, 16 September 2013
To Build A Courageous Character
Posted: 09/15/2013 8:19 am EDT
The Science Of Conquering Your Fears -- And Living A More Courageous Life
"Aristotle believed courage to be the most important quality in a man. “Courage is the first of human virtues because it makes all others possible," he wrote. Today, it's one of the more neglected areas of positive psychology, but recent research has begun to move toward an understanding of what courage is and how we might be able to cultivate the ability to face our fear and make decisions with greater fortitude.
Neuroscientists recently determined just how courage works in the brain, finding that a region called the subgenual anterior cingulate cortex (sgACC) is the driving force behind courageous acts -- a conclusion which could one day prove useful in treating anxiety disorders.
So how can we train our minds to act more courageously in everyday life? Other recent research on courage, which has shown that's it's not just about facing fear, but also about coping with risk and uncertainty (as Ernest Hemingway put it, courage is "grace under pressure.") And, it seems, we can make ourselves more courageous with practice and effort."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/15/conquering-fear_n_3909020.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003
The Science Of Conquering Your Fears -- And Living A More Courageous Life
"Aristotle believed courage to be the most important quality in a man. “Courage is the first of human virtues because it makes all others possible," he wrote. Today, it's one of the more neglected areas of positive psychology, but recent research has begun to move toward an understanding of what courage is and how we might be able to cultivate the ability to face our fear and make decisions with greater fortitude.
Neuroscientists recently determined just how courage works in the brain, finding that a region called the subgenual anterior cingulate cortex (sgACC) is the driving force behind courageous acts -- a conclusion which could one day prove useful in treating anxiety disorders.
So how can we train our minds to act more courageously in everyday life? Other recent research on courage, which has shown that's it's not just about facing fear, but also about coping with risk and uncertainty (as Ernest Hemingway put it, courage is "grace under pressure.") And, it seems, we can make ourselves more courageous with practice and effort."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/15/conquering-fear_n_3909020.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003
Tuesday, 7 May 2013
Days Numbered, DSM?
Published: 05/03/2013 03:43 PM EDT
National Institute Of Mental Health To Drop DSM Use
"The National Institute of Mental Health is moving away from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, sometimes known as the psychiatrist's "bible," saying that patients deserve better.
The change won't alter the way patients get diagnosed and treated in the clinic -- at least not for many years. Instead, researchers seeking to study mental disorders with National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) funding will be required to look at patients across traditional diagnoses, rather than limiting their studies to a single DSM diagnosis such as depression, for example.
"Studies of biomarkers for 'depression' might begin by looking across many disorders with anhedonia or emotional appraisal bias or psychomotor retardation to understand the circuitry underlying these symptoms," NIMH director Thomas Insel wrote in a statement.
The DSM's fifth revision, the DSM-5, is due out in May. The book, published by the American Psychiatric Association, classifies mental disorders, and the revisions have spurred controversy. Particular disorders, such as sexual fetishes, are contested by those who would like to see them removed from the book and those who would like to see those diagnoses remain available.
Compared with the NIMH's shift, however, the DSM changes are minor. The agency is looking to improve the way mental disorders are identified in general.
"Unlike our definitions of ischemic heart disease, lymphoma or AIDS, the DSM diagnoses are based on a consensus about clusters of clinical symptoms, not any objective laboratory measure," Insel wrote.
As an alternative, the NIMH is launching the Research Domain Criteria Project. The goal, according to the agency, is "to transform diagnosis by incorporating genetics, imaging, cognitive science and other levels of information to lay the foundation for a new classification system."
The decade-long project will require researchers to include patients across DSM categories, or to subdivide the categories, when conducting research trials.
"We need to begin collecting the genetic, imaging, physiologic and cognitive data to see how all the data - not just the symptoms - cluster and how these clusters relate to treatment response," Insel wrote."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/03/national-institute-of-mental-health-dsm-use_n_3211440.html
Monday, May 6, 2013 05:06 PM +0100
Beginning of the end of the DSM-IV?
"The National Institute of Mental Health has announced it will reorient its research away from DSM categories
What is mental illness? Schizophrenia? Autism? Bipolar disorder? Depression? Since the 1950s, the profession of psychiatry has attempted to provide definitive answers to these questions in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Often called The Bible of psychiatry, the DSM serves as the ultimate authority for diagnosis, treatment and insurance coverage of mental illness."
http://www.salon.com/2013/05/06/beginning_of_the_end_of_the_dsm_iv_partner/singleton/
Mental Health Researchers Reject Psychiatry’s New Diagnostic ‘Bible’
http://healthland.time.com/2013/05/07/as-psychiatry-introduces-dsm-5-research-abandons-it/
DSM-5: A Manual Run Amok
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324216004578483391664789414.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
*****
New edition of Psychiatric bible
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2013/s3763493.htm
Normal behaviour defined as mental illness
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2013/s3763502.htm
National Institute Of Mental Health To Drop DSM Use
"The National Institute of Mental Health is moving away from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, sometimes known as the psychiatrist's "bible," saying that patients deserve better.
The change won't alter the way patients get diagnosed and treated in the clinic -- at least not for many years. Instead, researchers seeking to study mental disorders with National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) funding will be required to look at patients across traditional diagnoses, rather than limiting their studies to a single DSM diagnosis such as depression, for example.
"Studies of biomarkers for 'depression' might begin by looking across many disorders with anhedonia or emotional appraisal bias or psychomotor retardation to understand the circuitry underlying these symptoms," NIMH director Thomas Insel wrote in a statement.
The DSM's fifth revision, the DSM-5, is due out in May. The book, published by the American Psychiatric Association, classifies mental disorders, and the revisions have spurred controversy. Particular disorders, such as sexual fetishes, are contested by those who would like to see them removed from the book and those who would like to see those diagnoses remain available.
Compared with the NIMH's shift, however, the DSM changes are minor. The agency is looking to improve the way mental disorders are identified in general.
"Unlike our definitions of ischemic heart disease, lymphoma or AIDS, the DSM diagnoses are based on a consensus about clusters of clinical symptoms, not any objective laboratory measure," Insel wrote.
As an alternative, the NIMH is launching the Research Domain Criteria Project. The goal, according to the agency, is "to transform diagnosis by incorporating genetics, imaging, cognitive science and other levels of information to lay the foundation for a new classification system."
The decade-long project will require researchers to include patients across DSM categories, or to subdivide the categories, when conducting research trials.
"We need to begin collecting the genetic, imaging, physiologic and cognitive data to see how all the data - not just the symptoms - cluster and how these clusters relate to treatment response," Insel wrote."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/03/national-institute-of-mental-health-dsm-use_n_3211440.html
Monday, May 6, 2013 05:06 PM +0100
Beginning of the end of the DSM-IV?
"The National Institute of Mental Health has announced it will reorient its research away from DSM categories
What is mental illness? Schizophrenia? Autism? Bipolar disorder? Depression? Since the 1950s, the profession of psychiatry has attempted to provide definitive answers to these questions in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. Often called The Bible of psychiatry, the DSM serves as the ultimate authority for diagnosis, treatment and insurance coverage of mental illness."
http://www.salon.com/2013/05/06/beginning_of_the_end_of_the_dsm_iv_partner/singleton/
Mental Health Researchers Reject Psychiatry’s New Diagnostic ‘Bible’
http://healthland.time.com/2013/05/07/as-psychiatry-introduces-dsm-5-research-abandons-it/
DSM-5: A Manual Run Amok
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324216004578483391664789414.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
*****
New edition of Psychiatric bible
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2013/s3763493.htm
Normal behaviour defined as mental illness
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2013/s3763502.htm
Monday, 6 May 2013
Same As Yours
May 03, 2013
The Evil Brain: What Lurks Inside a Killer’s Mind
"Homicidal madmen don’t have much of a capacity for gratitude, but if they did, they’d offer a word of thanks to Charles Whitman. Whitman was the 25-year-old engineering student and former Marine who, in 1966, killed 17 people and wounded 32 in a mass shooting at the University of Texas, before being shot and killed himself by police.
Earlier that day, he also murdered his wife and mother. Criminal investigators looking for a reason for the rampage got what seemed to be their answer quickly, in the form of a suicide note Whitman left at his home ..."
http://science.time.com/2013/05/03/evil-brain/
What Makes a Psychopath? Answers Remain Elusive
http://www.livescience.com/7859-psychopath-answers-remain-elusive.html
What Makes Us Moral
http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1685055_1685076_1686619,00.html
Free will is an illusion, biologist says
http://phys.org/news186830615.html
Where evil lurks: Neurologist discovers 'dark patch' inside the brains of killers and rapists
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2273857/Neurologist-discovers-dark-patch-inside-brains-killers-rapists.html
Date: 06 February 2013 Time: 05:37 PM ET
Brain Area 'Where Evil Lurks' Doesn't Exist: Neurologist
"Is there really a part of the brain "where evil lurks"?
Evil is alive and is lurking in the brains of certain individuals, if you believe news reports linked to a respected German neurologist. The news of the scientist's discovery, however, has attracted some naysayers — including the neurologist himself.
According to The Independent, Dr. Gerhard Roth of the University of Bremen's Brain Research Institute reportedly discovered "the region of the brain where evil is formed and where it lurks" by performing brain scans on violent convicted felons ..."
http://www.livescience.com/26918-gerhard-roth-brain-area-evil.html
The Evil Brain: What Lurks Inside a Killer’s Mind
"Homicidal madmen don’t have much of a capacity for gratitude, but if they did, they’d offer a word of thanks to Charles Whitman. Whitman was the 25-year-old engineering student and former Marine who, in 1966, killed 17 people and wounded 32 in a mass shooting at the University of Texas, before being shot and killed himself by police.
Earlier that day, he also murdered his wife and mother. Criminal investigators looking for a reason for the rampage got what seemed to be their answer quickly, in the form of a suicide note Whitman left at his home ..."
http://science.time.com/2013/05/03/evil-brain/
What Makes a Psychopath? Answers Remain Elusive
http://www.livescience.com/7859-psychopath-answers-remain-elusive.html
What Makes Us Moral
http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1685055_1685076_1686619,00.html
Free will is an illusion, biologist says
http://phys.org/news186830615.html
Where evil lurks: Neurologist discovers 'dark patch' inside the brains of killers and rapists
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2273857/Neurologist-discovers-dark-patch-inside-brains-killers-rapists.html
Date: 06 February 2013 Time: 05:37 PM ET
Brain Area 'Where Evil Lurks' Doesn't Exist: Neurologist
"Is there really a part of the brain "where evil lurks"?
Evil is alive and is lurking in the brains of certain individuals, if you believe news reports linked to a respected German neurologist. The news of the scientist's discovery, however, has attracted some naysayers — including the neurologist himself.
According to The Independent, Dr. Gerhard Roth of the University of Bremen's Brain Research Institute reportedly discovered "the region of the brain where evil is formed and where it lurks" by performing brain scans on violent convicted felons ..."
http://www.livescience.com/26918-gerhard-roth-brain-area-evil.html
Monday, 4 March 2013
Pornography Doesn't So Much Give Men Bad [sic] Ideas ...
Last updated 11:51 04/03/2013
Porn identity: the science of sex
"Many strangers give Dr William Struthers a quizzical look when he tells them what he does for a living. Some women even turn their eyes away in embarrassment.
The American biopsychologist studies sexual arousal, but specifically what parts of the human brain light up, and what chemicals are unleashed, when people watch porn.
Neuroscience has not only confirmed the old adage that 90 per cent of sex is in the mind - the brain being the control switch for arousal and orgasm - but its research results have become ammunition in the combat zone that is the pornography debate."
""Twenty years ago most men would never have even thought of ejaculating on their partner's face: now it's almost a sexual norm ..." [hahahahahahahaha]
http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/8378364/
Porn identity: the science of sex
"Many strangers give Dr William Struthers a quizzical look when he tells them what he does for a living. Some women even turn their eyes away in embarrassment.
The American biopsychologist studies sexual arousal, but specifically what parts of the human brain light up, and what chemicals are unleashed, when people watch porn.
Neuroscience has not only confirmed the old adage that 90 per cent of sex is in the mind - the brain being the control switch for arousal and orgasm - but its research results have become ammunition in the combat zone that is the pornography debate."
""Twenty years ago most men would never have even thought of ejaculating on their partner's face: now it's almost a sexual norm ..." [hahahahahahahaha]
http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/8378364/
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