Adolescent Co-occurring Disorders Treatment: Clinicians' Attitudes,Values, and Knowledge

This study examined community-based clinicians’ (N = 294) attitudes, background/experiences, values, and knowledge relating to issues of co-occurring disorders, which occur at a high rate among adolescents involved in the juvenile justice system. Study results reveal that clinicians self-rate their clinical values and attitudes at or above the expected level of competency, but they concede that their skill and knowledge levels are not adequate. Comparison measures reveal that employment setting conditions, geographic region, hours worked per week, and strongly held convictions about the importance of integrated mental health and substance use disorders service delivery distinguish clinicians’ co-occurring disorders knowledge levels. Implications are offered.     

Feedback on Forensic Mental Health Assessments in a Juvenile Court Clinic Certification Program

Public-sector mental health systems have set forth specialized practice competencies for forensic mental health clinicians conducting court-ordered examinations. This study examined a sample of feedback letters to clinicians who submitted mid-training and final reports for review as part of the requirements for certification as a juvenile court clinician. The most common feedback points were insufficient/irrelevant historical data, problems with clarity/organization of the report, problems with interview/mental status examination, and problems with competency to stand trial data/opinions. Clinicians had fewer deficiencies in their final report compared to their mid-training report, supporting the perspective that forensic training and supervision is associated with better quality reports.     

‘Flat and fabulous’: women’s breast reconstruction refusals post-mastectomy and the negotiation of normative femininity

The ‘pinkification’ of breast cancer culture in recent years conflates women’s empowerment with the celebration of hyperfemininity. Consistent with this trend, reconstructive surgery post-mastectomy is increasingly normalised: restoring the breasts is to restore ‘lost’ femininity. Contextualised within the pressures of this normalisation, our article explores how women who decide against breast reconstruction negotiate their non-normative ‘flat’ bodies. We examine women’s posts in a breast cancer forum about their refusals of breast reconstruction. Using thematic and feminist post-structuralist analyses, we suggest that although health and body acceptance discourses enable resistance to embodied femininity norms, pressures to conform permeate practices related to appearance. Clothes and prosthetic breasts enabled forum participants to pass as ‘healthy’, ‘whole’, and ‘recovered’. The study’s findings emphasise the limitations to agency and resistance that emanate from the ways constraining gender discourses infiltrate every aspect of a woman’s life. In line with a critical awareness approach to breast cancer education, we discuss the possibilities of resistance afforded by the safe spaces of online communities.     

A Profile of Violent Offenders in Spanish Prisons

In Europe, it is relatively uncommon to find studies that investigate the criminal profiles of violent offenders, especially infrequent are those that pay special attention to offenders’ mental health/substance use disorders and histories of violence during childhood. The current research explores whether inmates who are incarcerated for violent offenses (n = 536) in Spain are different in terms of the aforementioned factors as compared to inmates incarcerated for non-violent offenses (n = 536). Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that violent offenders, as compared to their non-violent counterparts, were more likely to be younger, younger at the time of their first arrest, single, use alcohol, receive treatment in prison for anxiety or schizophrenia, and report physical abuse during childhood.     

Last Thoughts on <Emphasis Type="Italic">The Last Intellectuals</Emphasis>

Over twenty years ago my book The Last Intellectuals put into circulation the phrase “public intellectual.” The term unexpectedly enjoyed great success. It encapsulated a new division between a professional or academic intellectual focused on his or her specialty and an intellectual orientated to a larger public. The former tend to disappear into the university, while they latter write for the educated public. In the twenty years since its publication, my book has been sharply challenged. Moreover the emergence of African-American and women intellectuals, and well as new developments such as Internet, have possibly undermined my thesis. Yet these phenomena amount to revisions, not refutations, of my thesis. Moreover the role of intellectuals in France and Germany suggest that the same process of academization is taking place in other advanced industrial nations. What is called for is not nostalgia or its opposite, a celebration of everything that happens, but a consideration of the real shifts that affect the lives and work of intellectuals.

福建在押未成年犯健康状况及影响因素分析

以福建省未成年管教所14~16周岁在押未成年犯为研究对象,通过文献资料法、访谈法、问卷调查法、统计法等,对其身体健康状况进行分析,家庭教育的缺失是造成他们思想和行为"叛逆"的最主要原因,而家长与孩子之间的平等交流太少,没有给孩子倾诉自己心声的机会,一些孩子沉迷网络游戏、崇尚血腥暴力、甚至感染了"黄色病毒",网络上充斥的"暴力"、"色情"和"为朋友赴汤蹈火,为哥们两肋插刀"的心态在少年犯罪中尤为突出。因此,14~16周岁是一个人健康成长的关键期,如何使他们身体健康、心理健康还能具备良好的社会适应能力应该引起家长、学校、社会的高度重视。     

控审分离原则之法理探析

作为近现代国家刑事诉讼中普遍认同的一项基本原则，控审分离有其丰富内涵，诉讼公正系其核心价值，而分权制衡、人权保障、程序主体性、诉讼经济理论以及相应的心理学原理构成其理论基础。     

试析互联网治理的概念、机制与困境

目前最具影响力的互联网治理机制是互联网名称与数字地址分配机构和它的挑战者——联合国系统下的三个机构：国际电信联盟、信息社会世界峰会和互联网治理论坛。这两套互相竞争的机制各有不足之处，前者合法性不足，后者有效性不够。但这只是互联网治理困境的表象，其深层原因不仅在于网络安全问题本身的复杂性，还和国际体系转型过程中全球治理的困境密切相关，集中反映在三大矛盾上，即霸权国和国际社会的矛盾、中关之间的矛盾以及国家行为体和非国家行为体之间的矛盾。任何国际治理机制的有效性和合法性在很大程度上依赖于新兴大国的参与，互联网治理机制也是如此。基于此，中国如果能在其中扮演更加重要的角色，将对互联网治理起到积极的作用。