American Journal of Orthopsychiatry (AM J ORTHOPSYCHIAT)

Publications in this journal

• Article: Clinical studies in benign and malignant cases of childhood psychosis (schizophrenialike.).

  Margaret S. Mahler, John R. Ross Jr, Zira Defries
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  ABSTRACT: 16 cases of children who showed evidence of psychotic reactions in their behavior before the age of 10 were studied. Disturbance could be traced to 2 critical periods of development; that period in which normally primary object relationship with the mother or a mother substitute is formed and the period later in infancy in which this specific object relationship becomes mutual and consolidated. From the psychoanalytic point of view, symptomology was classified into primary, secondary, and tertiary. Cases are grouped according to time of onset of psychosis, differentiation of symptomology and clinical course and prognosis is considered. 32 references. Discussion by Leo Kanner. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Runaway children.

  M. D. Riemer
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  ABSTRACT: Children who repeatedly run away from home show certain characterological abnormalities including antagonism, impulsiveness, distrustfulness, and, paradoxically enough, an occassional attitude of sheepish docility which often has a trigger-like-swing to full negativism. Detailed studies of such children often reveal similar early, extremely traumatic, experiences. Cruel treatment in the first year of childhood, severe physical trauma, poverty or death of one or both parents are prominent in the milieu of these children. Running away is a defense attitude hiding a helpless, begging type of personality. The runway with his extreme negativism and his compulsive running away from reality displays a severe narcissistic disorder. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Attitudes, emotional and physical symptoms commonly associated with menstruation in 100 women.

  A. L. Brush
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  ABSTRACT: This is a study of mental and emotional changes as reported by college women, professional women, and physicians' wives. Material was gathered by the questionnaire method. The questions were related to age of menstrual onset, regularity, frequency, and duration of periods. "Yes" and "No" answers are reported in terms of percentages and discussions are given in full. The results "indicate that the women showed variations which are probably within normal limits." It is felt that future studies on this phase of the problem will reveal a close relationship between constitutional make-up of women and "their attitude toward menstruation and its physical, mental and emotional effect on them." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Active play therapy.

  J. C. Solomon
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  ABSTRACT: The author proposes a modified methodology for the diagnosis and treatment of personality disturbances in children. In this procedure the therapist takes an active part in revealing unconscious conflicts by means of re-enacting life situations with the aid of dolls and other toys. "The author believes that active play therapy offers rapid diagnostic and therapeutic assistance in the emotional problems of childhood." Six photographs, a bibliography, and a brief discussion by P. Blanchard are included. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: The application of psychoanalytic methods to the study of mental retardation.

  L. Chidester, K. A. Menninger
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  ABSTRACT: A psychoanalytic study of a retarded boy. Clinical examinations revelaed little organic pathology. Psychosexual development was considered arrested in the anal stage, so that there was "inhibition of his emotional and consequently his intellectual development, and hence an incomplete and distorted sense of reality." Talking, writing, drawing, even thinking were equated by him with his excretory processes, and reading to eating. In revenge against traumata he was retaliatory and stubborn. When conflicts were interpreted to him and love was given him in the form and degree he could accept, his inhibitions decreased markedly. The IO changed from 62 to 90. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: The use of puppet shows as a psychotherapeutic method for behavior problems in children.

  L. Bender, A. G. Woltman
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  ABSTRACT: These writers describe the use of puppet shows for determining the psychological mechanisms in the emotional problems of children and for psychotherapeutic purposes. Hand puppets are employed because they are more direct in action, more convincing in movement, and capable of more aggressiveness than string marionettes. In retelling a play a child makes known his identifications. Because children do identify themselves and their siblings and parents with the puppet characters, the technique enables one to understand better (1) the problems of the child's love relationship with its parents and siblings, and (2) the problems of aggression by the child with anxiety, or aggression against the child with apprehension. For therapeutic purposes the technique is economical because it treats a group at one time; and it is superior to individual treatment because anxiety and guilt are more thoroughly released in the group and because children discuss more freely in groups than they will alone. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Panic in school phobia.

  Mira Talbot
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  ABSTRACT: The Social Work Staff of the Queens Center of the Bureau of Child Guidance studied 24 children suffering from anxiety neurosis-school phobia. Some of the dynamic patterns discovered were inbred family constellation, neurotic involvement of mother with own family, neurotic involvement of father with own family, immature marital adjustment, neurotic involvement with death, neurotic involvement of mother and child. After social casework treatment of mother and child, twenty of these emotionally disturbed children were able to attend school regularly and a majority of them showed no signs of personality disturbance in other reality areas of their lives. A follow-up is needed to learn whether or not they will be able to meet the next steps in development, namely marriage and employment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Structured play therapy.

  Gove Hambidge Jr
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  ABSTRACT: Structured play therapy is the name given by the author to the series of specific play forms worked out by David Levy. These include sibling rivalry play, balloon bursting, genital differences, invisible child in bedroom of parents, birth of a baby, and re-enactment of specific threats. Cases are presented to illustrate how structured play therapy enables patient and therapist to bring energy to bear where it will count. 51 references. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Psychological privation in infancy and subsequent adjustment.

  W. Goldfarb
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  ABSTRACT: Following earlier experimental studies comparing institution and foster-home children (see 17: 3268; 18: 2307, 2637, 3915), the author has made intensive investigations of the life histories of 15 adolescent institution children. These life histories tend to confirm the previous conclusion that infant deprivation results in a basic defect of total personality manifest especially as a defect in concept formation and as an attitude of passivity and emotional apathy. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Effects of early institutional care on adolescent personality: Rorschach data.

  W. Goldfarb
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  ABSTRACT: Rorschach data confirm the results of previous studies (see 17: 3268; 18: 2307, 2636) which show that institutional rearing of infants has a deep and permanent effect. The tendency to extremely loose perceptions is the most distinctive trait of the institution group on the Rorschach. In contrast to the foster-home group, the institution child may be described as less controlled and less capable of developing logical constructs. The Rorschach agrees with other experimental and clinical findings in showing that, in contrast to the foster-home children, the institutional children tend to be (1) less mature, less controlled, less differentiated, and more impoverished, and (2) more passive and apathetic, less ambitious, and less capable of adjustment related to conscious intention or goal. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Group psychological elements in discipline problems.

  F. Redl
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  ABSTRACT: Even those discipline problems which are clearly centered in the conspicuous problem behavior of one individual cannot be sufficiently understood and handled through an individual study. Even they require some group psychological analysis and handling. On the other hand, given a certain amount of readiness on the side of individuals, a group of normal children may suddenly produce problems whenever disturbances of the existing group climate occur. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Complaint of nervousness and the psychoneurosis.

  P. Lemkau, C. Tietze, M. Cooper
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  ABSTRACT: Part of the data from a survey enumerating all known cases of mental disease, deficiency, or maladjustment in the eastern health district of Baltimore was used to form the basis for an examination of the complaint of nervousness. The group of people who reported themselves or were reported by members of their families as being nervous with no other qualifying data available was, in certain important respects, similar to the group of adult psychoneurotics and adults with neurotic traits. The complaint of nervousness as used by the lay person, after gross disorders such as psychosis, mental deficiency, and epilepsy are subtracted, may indicate something closely related to what the psychiatrist thinks of as psychoneurosis and neurotic traits. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Imaginary companions of children.

  L. Bender, F. Vogel
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  ABSTRACT: Many American psychologists seem to hold the view that the child's use of his capacity to phantasy is unwise and that his creation of imaginary companions is unhealthy. The authors studied a group of 14 cases in which imaginary companions played an important part in the psychological life of the child. They found that the creation of imaginary companions is a positive and healthful mechanism, used by the child to supplement deficient environmental experiences and emotional inadequacies. Two particular factors contribute most to the creation of these phantasies: (1) unsatisfactory parent-child relationship (weak superego), and (2) unsatisfactory real experiences, due to unfavorable social or economic situations. The imaginary companion is the representation of varied psychological mechanisms. When the psychological need no longer exists and the environmental stresses are not so overwhelming, the imaginary companion is given up and seems to pass into the unconscious. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: The treatment of fearful children.

  J. H. Conn
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  ABSTRACT: The method of play interview is described as it has been worked out and used on more than 500 children at the Harriet Lane Home of Johns Hopkins Hospital. This method serves to supplement other methods of investigation and contributes material which deals with the personal, emotional, and imaginative aspects of the children's behavior. No attempt is made to arouse hostile tendencies; i.e., guns, knives, soldiers are not among the play materials. The play interview offers the child an opportunity for an objectification and immediate re-shuffling of perspectives. This usually occurs within one or two interviews, during which the child not only learns and accepts what he has contributed to the total situation, but for the first time finds himself secure in a personal relationship. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: The sex offender; a psychiatric study.

  J. Frosch, W. Bromberg
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  ABSTRACT: This is a statistical and psychological study of 709 sex offenders passing through the psychiatric court clinic of the Court of General Sessions in New York City. The significant findings are: (1) high rate of whites, (2) low rate of recidivism, (3) large number of men over 40 in the pedophile group, (4) high rate of reported strong religious affiliation, (5) alcoholism a minor factor, (6) American-born offenders outrank foreign-born, (7) mental deficiency a minor factor, (8) maladjusted sex life in more cases among pedophiles and homosexuals than other groups, (9) psychopathic personalities and neurotics among pedophiles and homosexuals. The authors stress the importance of individualized treatment for sex offenders. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Middle-class fathers' occupational role and attitudes toward children.

  David F. Aberle, Kaspar D. Naegele
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  ABSTRACT: The relationship is considered between the occupational role of the middle-class male and his aims and concerns in the socialization of his children. It was hoped that a connection could be established between the particular satisfaction and strains of each father's occupational setting and his behavior toward his wife and children. At best, fathers could see only trivial relationships between their job situation and their behavior in the home. Traits in sons which were of special concern to father, were those which the fathers considered as prognosticators of behavior which would interfere with success in middle-class occupational life. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: School phobia.

  A. M. Johnson, E. I. Falstein, S. A. Szurek, M. Svendsen
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  ABSTRACT: This is a report of a fairly intensive clinical experience with 8 children treated at the Institute for Juvenile Research for the problem of school phobia,—a deep-seated psychoneurotic disorder recognizable by the intense terror associated with being at school. The outstanding common factors in the initiation of school phobia are an acute anxiety in the child, an increase of anxiety in the mother, and a strikingly poorly resolved early dependency relationship of these children to their mothers. The case material shows how these 3 cardinal factors become interrelated in the production of the school phobia. In a discussion of this paper O. B. Markey reports somewhat less encouraging results than those of the authors. He believes that school phobia is not fundamentally a sign of disorder in the school-child relationship, but has its roots in a characterologic level long before the beginning of school life. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Factors affecting the success of child guidance clinic treatment.

  R. M. Hubbard, C. F. Adams
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  ABSTRACT: An analysis of 100 cases handled in the child guidance clinic in Strong Memorial Hospital to evaluate procedures and estimate achievements. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 10/2012;
• Article: Speaking up about the unspeakable.

  Wanda K Mohr
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  ABSTRACT: Torture, an ugly word for an ugly act, evokes in most of us unpleasant visceral reactions. It would be comforting to relegate torture to a less enlightened past and believe that it is a phenomenon that civilized humans have moved past. However, although we may escape to comfortable corners of our mind to avoid the topic, torture does not go away. It has never gone away and until it does, it is a topic that demands our attention. This editorial introduces the article in this issue by Metin Başoğlu on torture, as well as a commentary by Steven Miles. Başoğlu has devoted his professional career to shedding light on, and scrutinizing, the acts and consequences of torture. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2009 APA, all rights reserved).
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 05/2009; 79(2):133-4.
• Article: A multivariate contextual analysis of torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatments: implications for an evidence-based definition of torture.

  Metin Başoğlu
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  ABSTRACT: Current thinking on what constitutes torture in a detention/interrogation setting focuses solely on particular procedures, without regard for contextual factors that mediate traumatic stress. The present study examined stressor interactions that determined severity and psychological impact of captivity stressors in 432 torture survivors in former Yugoslavia countries and Turkey. A principal components analysis of 46 captivity stressors measured by an Exposure to Torture Scale identified meaningful stressor clusters, which suggested that multiple detention procedures were used in combination to maximize their impact. Perceived torture severity related to 'cruel, inhuman, and degrading' treatments (CIDT) but not to physical torture. Posttraumatic stress disorder related to war-related captivity, deprivation of basic needs, sexual torture, and exposure to extreme temperatures, isolation, and forced stress positions but not to physical torture. CIDT increased posttraumatic stress disorder risk by 71%. Fear- and helplessness-inducing effects of captivity and CIDT appear to be the major determinants of perceived severity of torture and psychological damage in detainees. Considerations on what constitutes torture need to take into account the contextual processes in a captivity setting that mediate these effects.
  American Journal of Orthopsychiatry 05/2009; 79(2):135-45.