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Archive for January, 2011

 

Wed, 6 Oct 2010

Victoria University researchers are investigating whether iPads – or other electronic devices capable of converting words or pictures to speech – can be used to help autistic children communicate.

Autism is a developmental disorder that affects the brain, with one in every 150 children afflicted. Most of them have difficulty communicating and about half fail to develop speech at all.

Professor Jeff Sigafoos, of Victoria University, and Dr Dean Sutherland, of Canterbury University, have been given $885,000 in taxpayer funding over the next three years to identify the best communication tools for those without speech.

Prof Sigafoos and Dr Sutherland will study 40 children aged between four and seven and hope to find enough families willing to take part in the project in Wellington and Christchurch, where the two researchers are based.

They will test responses to the three most common alternatives to speech for autistic children: electronic speech-generating devices, which include an iPad or iPod Touch with special applications installed and a range of text-to-speech machines; sign language; and pointing to or exchanging pictures.

Read in Full:  http://www.odt.co.nz/news/technology/130224/ipads-ipod-touch-may-help-autistic-children-speak



 

By Steve Silberman

October 6, 2010  

When Ari Ne’eman walked onstage at a college campus in Pennsylvania in June, he looked like a handsome young rabbi presiding over the bar mitzvah of a young Talmudic scholar.

In truth, Ne’eman was facilitating a different kind of coming-of-age ceremony. Beckoning a group of teenagers to walk through a gateway symbolizing their transition into adult life, he said, “I welcome you as members of the autistic community.” The setting was an annual gathering called Autreat, organized by an autistic self-help group called Autism Network International.

Ne’eman’s deliberate use of the phrase “the autistic community” was more subversive than it sounds. The notion that autistic people — often portrayed in the media as pitiable loners — would not only wear their diagnosis proudly, but want to make common cause with other autistic people, is still a radical one. Imagine a world in which most public discussion of homosexuality was devoted to finding a cure for it, rather than on the need to address the social injustices that prevent gay people from living happier lives. Though the metaphor is far from exact (for example, gay people obviously don’t face the impairments that many autistic people do), that’s the kind of world that autistic people live in.

Now, as the first openly autistic White House appointee in history — and one of the youngest at age 22 — Ne’eman is determined to change that.

Read in Full:  http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/10/exclusive-ari-neeman-qa/all/1



 

Article Date: 05 Oct 2010 – 6:00 PDT

During October, vote online to fund the development of the Mojo Project, an online intervention program for musicians with bipolar disorder.

Growing out of the expertise of the National e-Therapy Centre (NeTC) based at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia, the Mojo Project is a proposed online program for sleep management that musicians with bipolar disorder can access at their convenience.

Bipolar disorder is often associated with creativity, with several celebrated musicians including Sting, Tom Waits and Macy Gray revealing that they’ve been diagnosed with the condition.

“The lifestyle that most musos lead is not conducive to the regular sleep that their body needs,” said Swinburne Associate Professor and Director of Clinical Psychology Programs, Dr Greg Murray, who studies circadian rhythms in mood disorders. 

“This regular sleep is even more critical for people with bipolar disorder as disturbed sleep patterns can trigger relapses into mania.”

To kick-start the Mojo project, the Sean Costello Memorial Fund has submitted a $50,000 grant request to the Pepsi Refresh Everything project.

If successful, the project will fund the tailoring of a program by Murray for musicians with bipolar disorder.

If you are a US resident aged over 13 and would like to support the Mojo project, visit here during October 2010 to register and vote.

The Pepsi Refresh Everything project hosts a popularity poll to give away millions to fund ideas that can ‘change the world’. Each month project proposals are listed at the refresheverything.org website. Visitors to the site can vote for their favourite ideas, with the most popular projects ‘winning’ funding from Pepsi.

Source:  http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/203569.php



 

Sexism still prevails in the Internet social world of “The Social Network”



 

By John M Grohol PsyD

So this is the 20th anniversary since Congress first established Mental Health Awareness Week as the first week in October.

The effort to increase awareness about mental health is based in the history of numerous government reports and well-meaning workgroups and such that have found that stigma still exists surrounding the diagnosis of mental disorders. Surprise, surprise. Of course it still exists. People who’ve never encountered someone living with a mental illness still believe it’s the kind of thing that “happens to other people.”

But it happens to a lot more “other people” than anyone realizes. In our lifetime, 1 in 5 Americans will have a diagnosable mental disorder. And the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention just announced last week that the 12 month prevalence rate for depression stands at 9 percent. That means in any given year, 1 in 10 Americans suffer from the most common mental disorder, depression.

That’s a lot of depressed people.

But for many reasons, most of these people never seek treatment for their depression. Or any other mental disorder, too. They believe it’s too costly. Or it’ll take too long. Or it’s too much effort. Or they don’t want any psychiatric drugs, because of fears surrounding them. There are a whole host of reasons people suffer in silence with their depression or other mental health concern.

Read in Full:  http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2010/10/04/mental-health-awareness-week/



 

Article Date: 05 Oct 2010 – 3:00 PDT

New research from Rhode Island Hospital found that reduced levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), a protein in the brain that encourages growth of neurons, may be a trait marker for individuals with psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES) (seizures that are psychological in origin). The findings are published in the October 4, 2010, issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

Read in Full:  http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/203478.php



 

By Rick Nauert PhD Senior News Editor
Reviewed by John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on October 5, 2010

As women become more ingrained in the workforce and take leadership positions, a new study discovers women leave their jobs more frequently than men.

In fact, researchers determined female executives are more than twice as likely to leave their jobs — voluntarily and involuntarily — as men.

However, despite systemic evidence that women are more likely to depart from their positions, the researchers did not find strong patterns of discrimination.

Lead author John Becker-Blease, an assistant professor of finance at Oregon State University, and his co-authors analyzed data from Standard & Poor’s 1,500 firms.

They classified departures as voluntary or involuntary based on careful examination of public news accounts accompanying an executive’s departure.

“Departures of powerful female executives, as we saw with Carly Fiorina and Patricia Dunn at Hewlett-Packard, are often high-profile news events,” Becker-Blease said.

“Despite these very public departures, relatively little is really known about women executives, whether they are more likely to depart or be fired than men, and the reasons for their departures.”

Read in Full:  http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/10/05/high-turnover-among-women-executives/19179.html

 



 

Ig Nobel Prize Winning Research

Read in Full: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/work-matters/201010/if-the-peter-principle-is-right-organizations-should-randomly-promote-peopl



 Edvard Munch's Separation

Edvard Munch’s Separation

This month’s British Journal of Psychiatry has the latest in their ’100 words’ series on the Norwegian artist Edvard Munch, famous for his iconic painting ‘The Scream’ and his own struggles with mental illness.

The Norwegian Expressionist Edvard Munch caused outrage when his paintings were first shown in Berlin but became one of the most prolific artists of his time. Often described as having had bipolar affective disorder, his low moods and sense of isolation are evident in works such as The Scream, Separation,and Evening on Karl Johan. Yet the evidence of his diaries and his many biographies suggest more plausible diagnoses of depressive disorder and comorbid alcohol dependence.

Read in Full:  http://mindhacks.com/2010/10/05/edvard-munch-in-100-words/

Edvard Munch: Evening on Karl Johan. 1889.

Edvard Munch: The Scream. 1893

 



Posted on: Monday, 4 October 2010, 19:38 CDT


When girls with symptoms of autism or ADHD seek professional medical help, their problems are often played down or misinterpreted, and there is a real risk that they will not get the help or support they need. As such, more training is needed in this area, particularly in the public sector, reveals a thesis from the University of Gothenburg.


The thesis focuses primarily on 100 girls who, before reaching adulthood, went to the doctor on account of difficulties with social interaction and/or concentration at school or elsewhere. They were then referred to the paediatric neuropsychiatric clinic at Sahlgrenska University Hospital between 1999 and 2001.


“We could see that their parents had been concerned about the girls’ behaviour or development during their first few years of life,” says Svenny Kopp, a doctoral student at the Institute of Neuroscience and Physiology at the Sahlgrenska Academy, and consultant paediatric psychiatrist at the Queen Silvia Children’s Hospital. “They had also asked for help at an early stage, but hadn’t been given a proper diagnosis.”


When subsequently given a thorough psychiatric and psychological examination, nearly half of the girls proved to have autism or other autism spectrum disorders, and just as many had ADHD as their main diagnosis. Compared with the control group of 60 girls without any known serious problems, the 100 girls’ performance was severely impaired in all areas studied, including psychological, motor and social function.


It also emerged that the girls with autism and ADHD had additional psychiatric and developmental neurological disorders. For example, anxiety, depression, social behaviour disorders and difficulties reading and writing were common in both groups. Half of the girls with autism spectrum disorders or ADHD had been bullied, were frequently truant and avoided sport at school. The study also showed that girls with ADHD smoked more frequently and more overall than the control group.


“The results are particularly disturbing given that these girls did not generally have a disadvantaged social background and were mostly of normal intelligence,” says Kopp.


She concludes that the healthcare system does not take girls with symptoms of autism or ADHD seriously enough.”It’s a shame as we now have effective treatments for both autism and ADHD. We therefore need more training across the public sector on girls with mental problems, social interaction difficulties and/or attention problems,” she stresses.


Source: http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1926718/girls_with_autism_or_adhd_symptoms_not_taken_seriously/index.html