Sunday, April 30, 2017
Hypnotist entertains for Make-a-Wish Foundation, wants to help veterans - CullmanSense
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CullmanSense |
Hypnotist entertains for Make-a-Wish Foundation, wants to help veterans
CullmanSense Conrad mentioned weight loss, overcoming bed-wetting and breaking nail-biting and tobacco habits as efforts that can be assisted by hypnosis. In addition to entertainment, he has performed therapeutic hypnosis to help people with these issues. During ... |
Using Your Imagination to Increase Your Patience
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After a week of Spring Break with my kids, trying to take care of their needs while also working from home, I’m reaching the outer limits of my patience. What if there was a way to train myself to become more patient?
Past research into this subject by scientists has usually focused on increasing willpower, but a new study suggests that instead, using imagination is a way to becoming more patient.
“Whereas willpower might enable people to override impulses, imagining the consequences of their choices might change the impulses,” wrote study author Adrianna Jenkins, a postdoctoral researcher at UC Berkeley Haas School of Business. “People tend to pay attention to what is in their immediate vicinity, but there are benefits to imagining the possible consequences of their choices.”
To conduct the research, Jenkins and Ming Hsu, an associate professor of marketing and neuroscience, used a monetary award for participants. They were given choices about how to receive this monetary award, which stayed the same, but how it was framed, or expressed, was different. One group was told they could receive $100 tomorrow, or $120 in 30 days — this was the “independent” frame. The other group was told that they could receive $100 tomorrow and no money in 30 days, or no money tomorrow and $120 in 30 days. This was called a “sequence” frame. Same results financially, but different communication.
It turned out that people in the sequence frame group were able to better imagine the consequence of their choices. One participant, for example, wrote, “It would be nice to have the $100 now, but $20 more at the end of the month is probably worth it because this is like one week’s gas money.” Participants who had the independent frame presented to them demonstrated less imagination. One participant commented, “I’d rather have the money tomorrow even if it’s a lesser amount. I can get the things I need instead of waiting. Why wait a month for just $20 more?”
The more participants imagined the consequences of their choices, the more they were able to be patient in order to receive the greater reward. “We know people often have difficulty being patient,” Jenkins wrote. “Our findings suggest that imagination is a possible route for attaining patience that may be more sustainable and practical than exerting willpower.”
Which is good, because willpower, as many of us can attest, won’t always cut it!
This post courtesy of Spirituality & Health.
Anxiety: 3 Dietary Supplements Which Are Most Beneficial
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The three dietary supplements that are most effective for treating anxiety.
Dietary supplements which contain passionflower, kava or combinations of L-lysine and L-arginine can help reduce anxiety, according to a review published in the Nutrition Journal.
The supplements generally had mild to moderate effects without producing any serious side-effects.
The review included results from 24 separate studies with over 2,000 participants.
The researchers also concluded that St John’s Wort and magnesium were not effective in treating anxiety (Lakhan & Vieira, 2010).
→ For more on how to deal with anxiety, find out about PsyBlog’s anxiety ebook, “The Anxiety Plan”.
Dr Shaheen Lakhan, the study’s first author, said:
“Our review and summary of the literature on herbal remedies and dietary supplements for anxiety should aid mental health practitioners in advising their patients and provide insight for future research in this field.
We found mixed results — while passionflower or kava and L-lysine and L-arginine appeared to be effective, St John’s Wort and magnesium supplements were not.”
Of the supplements included, kava has been the most extensively studied.
The kava plant is originally from the western Pacific and its roots have traditionally been used to make a drink with anaesthetic and sedative effects.
The researchers found that taking kava on its own…
“… significantly reduced anxiety symptoms in a variety of patient types.
This provides good evidence for the use of kava in patients with GAD, non-psychotic anxiety and other anxiety-related disorders.” (Lakhan & Vieira, 2010).
Passionflower was originally discovered in Peru in 1569.
Nowadays it is often found in supplements in combination with kava and other ingredients.
On its own, though, the researchers found:
“All three of these studies showed a positive benefit for treatment with passionflower, providing good evidence of its effectiveness as an anxiolytic agent [anti-anxiety].
However, since each of these studies was conducted in a different patient type, more research is needed to prove its efficacy in each indication.”
Finally, L-lysine and L-arginine are essential amino acids which can reduce the hormonal stress response.
“Combination nutritional supplements containing lysine or magnesium also appear to hold promise as treatments for anxiety symptoms and disorders.
Both RCTs of L-lysine and L-arginine combinations demonstrated positive results, providing good but limited evidence of its usefulness as a treatment for anxiety.”
→ For more on how to deal with anxiety, find out about PsyBlog’s anxiety ebook, “The Anxiety Plan”.
[Note: Kava is legal in the US and Canada and many other places, but not in the UK. It is has been linked to liver problems. In some people passionflower can cause drowsiness and confusion. As always, articles on PsyBlog do not constitute medical advice.]
6 Ways Being In Nature Linked To Life Satisfaction
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A well managed natural environment is particularly important to people.
Being in the natural environment is linked to higher satisfaction with life, new research finds.
People were particularly satisfied if they felt their natural environment was being well managed.
Dr Kelly Biedenweg, the study’s first author, said:
“Whether people feel like things are fair and they have a voice in process of making decisions and whether governance is transparent — those are the foundations of why people even can interact with nature.”
The results come from a survey of 4,000 residents of the Puget Sound region of Washington State.
They measured 13 factors that might link to life satisfaction.
Dr Biedenweg said:
“Eleven of the 13 had a positive correlation to overall life satisfaction.
The links between ecological conditions, like drinking water and air quality, and objective well-being have been studied quite a bit, but the connection between various aspects of engaging the natural environment and overall subjective well-being have rarely been looked at.
We wanted to identify the relative importance of diverse, nature-oriented experiences on a person’s overall life satisfaction assessment and statistically prove the relationship between happiness/life satisfaction and engaging with nature in many different ways.”
Nature is beneficial to life satisfaction in six ways, the researchers found:
- Social and cultural events,
- trust in governance,
- access to local wild resources,
- sense of place,
- outdoor recreation,
- and psychological benefits from time outdoors.
Dr Biedenweg said:
“Controlling for demographics, all were significantly related to life satisfaction.
The fact that trust in governance was a significant predictor of life satisfaction — in fact, the most statistically significant predictor of the ones we looked at — it was nice to see that come out of the research.
The way we manage is the gateway to people being able to get livelihoods and satisfaction from nature.”
The study was published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology (Beidenweg et al., 2017).
Lincoln Hypnosis Center - Lincoln Journal Star
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Lincoln Journal Star |
Lincoln Hypnosis Center
Lincoln Journal Star At Lincoln Hypnosis Center, Jeff and Devan work with their clients to develop coping skills and teach them self-hypnosis to assist in the client's ability to achieve success. Each client's concern is approached as an independent issue. The number of ... |
The State of Social and Personality Psychology Research
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Source: ScienceDaily
Two studies have examined the state and quality of social and personality research and how practices have changed, if at all.Testosterone May Make Men Less Likely to Realize When They're Wrong
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Source: ScienceDaily
Testosterone makes men less likely to realize when they're wrong, a new study shows. The researchers found that men given doses of testosterone performed more poorly on a test designed to measure cognitive reflection than a group given a placebo.The Trump Administration's First 100 Days on LGBT Rights
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Now, 100 days into Trump's presidency, advocacy groups say their concerns have been realized through Cabinet appointments and policy decisions that undermine civil rights for LGBT Americans.
Here's a timeline of key actions affecting LGBT Americans from the first 100 days.
After the departments of Education and Justice
issued joint guidance in May 2016directing schools to let transgender students use facilities that correspond with their gender identity, officials in a dozen states
suedto block their implementation.
A federal judge in Texas
granted the states' requestfor a nationwide injunction to halt the guidelines' enforcement. The Obama administration's Justice Department appealed to reduce the injunction's scope to states involved in the lawsuit while the case was alive.
Then, the day after Attorney General Jeff Sessions was sworn in, the Justice Department said it
withdrew its appealso it could decide how to "best proceed" with the lawsuit.
February 22:
A few weeks later, the Trump administration
withdrew the guidelinesentirely, in a joint decision from the departments of Justice and Education.
March 27:
Trump signed an executive order that nullified an
Obama administration initiativeto ensure that federal contractors complied with labor and civil rights laws forbidding discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
March 28: Meanwhile, the Obama administration's efforts to collect data on LGBT Americans had begun to unravel.
Advocates have long pushed for the government to gather data on LGBT Americans, including how numerous they are. There's no official national count of gay, bisexual or transgender Americans. Therefore, advocates welcomed the inclusion of "sexual orientation" and "gender identity" in the Census Bureau's road map for 2020 data collection. But celebrations were premature. The agency later said it found
"no need"to collect the data.
The reversal came days after Secretary Tom Price's Department of Health and Human Services eliminated questions about about sexual orientation and gender identity in proposed versions of two critical health-care surveys addressing the needs of
the elderlyand
the disabled.
Advocates said their inclusion in surveys helps assess needs within the LGBT community and collect data to support policy changes.
April 14:
After North Carolina
repealed and replacedits so-called bathroom bill with another measure that prevents cities from passing anti-discrimination ordinances, the Justice Department
halted its litigationrelated to the laws.
Meanwhile, a handful of state and district courts have sided with transgender students in lawsuits against schools. And, observers are waiting to see what's next for transgender teen Gavin Grimm's lawsuit against the Gloucester County School Board in Virginia. The withdrawal of the guidance led the Supreme Court to return
the case to a lower courtto consider whether anti-discrimination protections extend to gender identity.
Trump's appointments
Presidential appointments speak volumes about what an administration will stand for, said Sharon McGowan, director of strategy at legal aid group Lambda Legal.
LGBT advocacy groups opposed the nominations of then-US Sen. Jeff Sessions and then-US Rep.
Tom Priceto head the Justice Department and Department of Health and Human Services based on their legislative track records on gay rights issues.
As lawmakers, both supported a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage in 2006, though Sessions promised in his
confirmation hearingsthat he would follow the Supreme Court's decision on marriage equality. It didn't come up in Price's hearings, and observers are waiting to see whether he upholds anti-discimination measures in the Affordable Health Care Act that protect LGBT Americans.
When in Congress, Sessions and Price co-sponsored the First Amendment Defense Act, the so-called religious liberty bill preventing the federal government from punishing businesses for denying services to same-sex couples. They voted against expanding federal hate crime statutes to include sexual orientation, gender and disability. They condemned the repeal of "don't ask, don't tell," the policy that forbade gay and lesbian service members from serving openly.
LGBT advocates are concerned about the White House appointment of former Heritage Foundation employee
Roger Severinoto lead the Health and Human Services civil rights office. He
came outagainst a provision of the Affordable Care Act banning discrimination against transgender patients, saying
the rulewould "threaten the religious liberty, freedom of conscience, and independent medical judgment of health care professionals."
The road ahead
From the President to the attorney general to Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, the administration has said it's trying to balance civil rights with states' right to set their own policies.
But advocacy groups say the administration's actions are efforts to erase them from America narrative.
"One hundred days of Trump translates into 100 days of erasure for the LGBTQ community," said Sarah Kate Ellis, president and CEO of advocacy group GLAAD.
"From the census exclusion, to rescinding Obama's guidance for trans youth in schools, and lack of any LGBTQ mentions on the White House website, he has spent the early days of his administration trying to remove us from the very fabric of this country, and we must resist."
Depression Impacts Twice As Many Females As Males
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A new meta-analysis confirms that depression affects twice as many females as males, and this gap appears as early as age 12. The results, published in the journal Psychological Bulletin, are based on existing studies involving more than 3.5 million people in more than 90 countries.
“We found that twice as many women as men were affected,” said co-author Dr. Janet Hyde, a professor of psychology and gender and women’s studies at the University of Wisconsin (UW)-Madison.
“Although this has been known for a couple of decades, it was based on evidence far less compelling than what we used in this meta-analysis. We want to stress that although twice as many women are affected, we don’t want to stereotype this as a women’s disorder. One-third of those affected are men.”
The gender gap was evident in the earliest data studied by co-authors Hyde; Rachel Salk, now a postdoctoral fellow in psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine; and Dr. Lyn Abramson, a professor of psychology at UW-Madison.
“The gap was already present at age 12, which is earlier than previous studies have found,” Hyde said. “We used to think that the gender difference emerged at 13 to 15 years but the better data we examined has pushed that down to age 12.”
The gender difference tapers off somewhat after adolescence, “which has never been identified, but the depression rate is still close to twice as high for women,” she said.
For the meta-analysis, the researchers looked at both diagnoses of major depression and at symptoms of depression. “Symptoms are based on self-reported measures — for example, ‘I feel blue most of the time’ — that do not necessarily meet the standard for a diagnosis of major depression. To meet the criteria for major depression, the condition must be evaluated much more rigorously.”
The researchers also investigated the link between depression and gender equity in income. Surprisingly, nations with greater gender equity had larger gender differences — meaning women were disproportionately diagnosed with major depression.
“This was something of the opposite of what was expected,” said Hyde. “It may occur because, in more gender-equitable nations, women have more contact with men, and therefore compare themselves to men, who don’t express feelings of depression because it doesn’t fit with the masculine role.”
Puberty, which occurs around age 12 in girls, could explain the early onset.
“Hormonal changes may have something to do with it, but it’s also true that the social environment changes for girls at that age. As they develop in puberty, they face more sexual harassment, but we can’t tell which of these might be responsible,” said Hyde.
Although the data did not cover people younger than 12, “there are processes going on at 11 or 12 that are worth thinking about, and that matters in terms of intervening,” she said.
“We need to start before age 12 if we want to prevent girls from sliding into depression. Depression is often quite treatable. People don’t have to suffer and face increased risk for the many related health problems.”
While the findings covered averages across the world, similar results emerged from the studies focusing on the United States alone. Curiously, no relationship in either direction appeared for depression symptoms.
Despite the prevalence of and growing concern about depression, “this was the first meta-analysis on gender differences in depression,” Hyde said. “For a long while, I wondered why nobody had done this, but once I got into it, I realized it’s because there is too much data, and nobody had the courage to plow through it all. We did, and it took two years.”
Source: University of Wisconsin-Madison
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Dialectical Behavior Therapy: For More Than Borderline Personality Disorder
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Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), developed by Marsha Linehan in the late 1980’s is a specific type of cognitive behavioral therapy that was originally developed to treat chronically suicidal individuals diagnosed with borderline personality disorder (BPD). It is now considered the treatment of choice for individuals with characteristics associated with symptoms of BPD such as impulsivity, interpersonal problems, emotion dysregulation, self-harm, and chronic suicidal behaviors.
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy is a type of cognitive therapy that focuses on the balance between acceptance and change. DBT works with individuals to validate their pain and suffering while developing skills to make the changes needed to have a life worth living. The term “dialectical” refers to the philosophy of synthesizing two opposing perspectives or ideas that can exist simultaneously, such as acceptance and change.
A key component of DBT is skills training. DBT has 4 modules of skills, mindfulness, interpersonal effectiveness, emotional regulation, and distress tolerance. Each module helps individuals develops skills to manage their life more effectively and develop improved quality of life. The skills training and treatment of DBT is applicable to people with a wide range of mental health conditions to improve overall well-being, emotion management, and decrease negative emotions and distress. Therefore, DBT treatment or DBT informed therapy may be beneficial for individuals with depression, anxiety, eating disorders, addiction, and post-traumatic stress disorder.
DBT for Depression
Dialectical Behavior Therapy has skills to address specifically for people struggling with depression. DBT teaches mindfulness helping individuals learning to live in the moment rather than the past. DBT teaches increasing pleasurable activities to empower people to add more joyous experiences to their lives. DBT also teaches behavior activation and opposite to emotion action. These are evidence based tools for depression and it helps to know what works.
DBT for Anxiety
Dialectical Behavior Therapy gives individuals concrete ways to live in the present moment. It teaches people to observe, describe, and participate in the moment. For individuals with anxiety this can be particularly challenging. DBT focuses on mindfulness and how to use these skills to decrease the intensity of negative emotions so feelings become manageable.
DBT for Eating Disorders
Dialectical Behavior Therapy has been adapted for treating individuals with eating disorders and focuses on skills that increase mindfulness, appropriately regulate emotion, and safely tolerate distress. DBT helps individuals identify the trigger and utilize skills to avoid the eating disorder behavior.
DBT for Addiction
Dialectical Behavior Therapy has an adaptation for individuals with substance use disorders. The skills can be applied to understanding “dialectical abstinence,” which encourages abstinence (change) but acknowledges that should a relapse occur that recovery is still possible and progress was still made (acceptance). DBT-SUD focused on mindfulness (one day at a time and non-judgmental stance), distress tolerance, and emotion regulation skills to help individuals develop long term recovery skills. The skills can also be applied to other types of addiction than just substances such as gambling.
DBT for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Dialectical Behavior Therapy is shown to help clients with PTSD decrease the frequency and intensity of symptoms. DBT teaches distress tolerance skills to manage crisis, such as grounding skills, and mindfulness skills to bring individuals to the present. DBT can address and decrease dangerous behaviors common among survivors or trauma; DBT helps individuals develop effective interpersonal skills for setting boundaries and learning trust the self; and DBT teaches skill to regulate emotions or other symptoms of PTSD on a daily basis.
DBT is a skills focused treatment based on CBT and learning theory and it is not diagnosis specific. DBT is currently used and a highly effective treatment for an array of mental health issues. If you think DBT could be for you don’t hesitate in seeking a therapist trained to offer Dialectical Behavior Therapy.
Tomorrow Edition - A Journey Round My Brain
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A community for those who are interested in the mind, brain, language and artificial intelligence.
Want to know more? Take a look at our reading list here. If you have any suggestions for further inclusions, post them here.
Stacey lost 43 pounds
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Transformation of the Day: Stacey lost 43 pounds. After 11 years of college and achieving multiple degrees, she realized that she’d neglected her health. Her doctor advised that she was headed towards a diabetes diagnosis. She used Beachbody workouts and meal plans to get fit and healthy. Check out her journey. I decided about 6 years […]
April 30, 2017 at 02:52AM
Transformation of the Day: Stacey lost 43 pounds. After 11 years of college and achieving multiple degrees, she realized that she’d neglected her health. Her doctor advised that she was headed towards a diabetes diagnosis. She used Beachbody workouts and meal plans to get fit and healthy. Check out her journey. I decided about 6 years […]
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April 30, 2017 at 02:52AM
Overweight Type 2 Diabetics at Greater Risk for Brain Abnormalities
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Overweight and obese individuals with early stage type II diabetes (T2D) tend to have more severe and progressive abnormalities in brain structure and cognition than do normal-weight people, according to new research published in the journal Diabetologia.
For the study, researchers in Korea and the US examined how being overweight or obese could impact the brain and the cognitive function of people with early stage type II diabetes
It is well-known that when T2D is chronic, patients are more susceptible to a wide range of health problems in multiple organs throughout the body. The disease may also lead to complications in the brain that accelerate cognitive dysfunction or increase the risk of dementia.
Although the exact mechanism underlying how T2D alters the brain is not fully understood, several metabolic side effects including insulin resistance, poor blood sugar control, and inflammation have been suggested as playing a role.
In addition, obesity is associated with a greater risk for T2D and can often precede its onset. Being overweight has also been linked to metabolic dysfunction, which is independently associated with brain alterations. Still, little is known about the impact on the brain of excess weight or obesity in the presence of T2D.
Researchers from the Ewha Brain Institute and the Ewha Womans University in South Korea and the Brain Institute at the University of Utah recruited 150 Koreans aged 30 to 60 to participate in the study. A total of 50 participants were overweight/obese with T2D, 50 were normal-weight with T2D, and 50 non-diabetic, normal-weight individuals acted as a control group.
Those with diabetes had been diagnosed within the previous five years and had not received stable insulin therapy. Individuals with chronic diabetic complications or major medical, neurological, or psychiatric disorders were excluded from the study.
Data about the structure of participants’ brains were acquired using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), which allowed the mean thickness of the cerebral cortex to be measured across its entirety. Subjects also completed tests of memory, psychomotor speed, and executive function, as these are known to be affected in people with T2D.
The findings show that grey matter was significantly thinner in clusters in the temporal, prefrontoparietal, motor and occipital cortices of the brains of diabetic study participants when compared to the non-diabetic control group.
The researchers also found more extensive thinning of the temporal and motor cortices in the overweight/obese diabetic group, compared to normal-weight diabetics. There were also region-specific changes, suggesting that the temporal lobe has a particular vulnerability to the combined effects of having T2D and being overweight or obese.
Specifically, people of Asian ethnicity tend to be more vulnerable to slight increases in BMI and are at higher risk of T2D than other ethnicities. This vulnerability may be linked to differences at the cellular level as well as a tendency toward insulin resistance, even in lean individuals. The authors note that the potential for ethnic differences in brain vulnerability to T2D and/or obesity may need to be taken into account when interpreting their results.
“Our findings also highlight the need for early intervention aimed to reduce risk factors for overweight or obesity in type II diabetic individuals to preserve their brain structure and cognitive function,” said the authors. They stress that the importance of managing insulin resistance during early stage T2D may be greater than previously thought.
Source: Diabetologia
Support from Online Friends Eases Students’ Test Anxiety
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Reading supportive comments, “likes” and private messages from social media friends before taking a test may help college students who have high levels of test anxiety significantly reduce their nervousness and improve their scores, according to a new study.
Researchers at the University of Illinois found that college students with high levels of test anxiety who sought social support from their online friends and read the messages before a simulated exam reduced their anxiety levels by 21 percent.
These students were able to perform as well on a set of computer programming exercises as students who had low levels of test anxiety, said lead author Robert Deloatch, a graduate student in computer science.
Up to 41 percent of students are estimated to suffer from test anxiety, which is a combination of physiological and emotional responses that occur while preparing for and taking tests, the researcher explained.
Test anxiety is associated with lower test scores and grade-point averages, as well as poorer performance on memory and problem-solving tasks. Test anxiety can be particularly acute when students face exams involving open-ended problems, such as those commonly used on computer science exams that require students to write and run code, according to the researchers.
When students’ test anxiety is reduced, their test scores, GPAs, and task performance improve accordingly, the study discovered.
Students with high test anxiety strongly fear negative evaluation, have lower self-esteem, and tend to experience increased numbers of distracting and irrelevant thoughts in testing situations, according to the study’s findings.
For the simulated exam, students had to solve two programming problems by writing and running code. Most of the participants were computer science majors or computer engineering students who passed a pretest that ensured they had basic programming knowledge.
The researchers measured the students’ levels of test anxiety using the Cognitive Test Anxiety scale, which assesses the cognitive problems associated with test-taking, such as task-irrelevant thinking and attention lapses.
The students also completed two other questionnaires that measured their levels of state anxiety — or “state-of-the-moment” unease — and their trait anxiety, which is anxiety that is considered to be a longstanding characteristic or personality trait, the researchers noted.
The day before the experiment, students in the social support group posted messages on their personal social media pages requesting encouragement — in the form of likes, comments, or private messages — about an upcoming computer programming challenge they planned to participate in.
For seven minutes immediately prior to taking the simulated test, students in the social support group read the responses associated with their online request.
Another group of students wrote about their thoughts and feelings, while a third group of students — the control group — crammed for the exam by reading information on computer programming data structures and answering questions about the text.
Prior to taking the exam, all the students completed a questionnaire to assess their levels of state anxiety. Students were then given 40 minutes to solve two programming problems that had many viable solutions.
“We found that only the students who received supportive messages from their Facebook network showed a significant decrease in anxiety and an increase in their performance on our simulated exam,” Deloatch said.
While prior researchers have found expressive writing to be helpful to some students with test anxiety, Deloatch said he and his team of researchers were surprised to find that the expressive-writing exercise instead increased the pretest jitters of low test-anxious students by 61 percent.
“We hypothesized that might have occurred because focusing on their anxiety as they wrote caused their apprehensiveness to increase rather than decrease,” Deloatch said.
Using social support to alleviate state-of-the-moment anxiety may have implications beyond education, such as helping job applicants quell their nervousness prior to interviews with potential employers, Deloatch said.
While the students who sought social support online felt that reading the supportive messages was helpful, “all of them were uncomfortable with soliciting support from their online friends, perceiving such posts as ‘attention seeking’ and ‘out of place,'” Deloatch said.
“As the majority of the participants in our study were computer science students, the competitive environment of the curriculum may have led to concerns about how others would perceive them. They may have felt that such statuses could harm their relations in group project settings.”
Source: University of Illinois
ER Intervention Shown to Reduce New Suicide Attempts
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A clinical trial involving nearly 1,400 suicidal patients in the emergency departments of eight hospitals found that a multifaceted intervention lowered the risk of new suicide attempts by 20 percent.
In a study published in JAMA Psychiatry, emergency department (ED) patients who received the intervention, which was composed of specialized screening, safety planning guidance, and periodic follow-up phone check-ins, made 30 percent fewer total suicide attempts compared to people who received standard ED care.
“We were happy that we were able to find these results,” said Brown University and Butler Hospital psychologist Dr. Ivan Miller, the study’s lead and corresponding author. “We would like to have had an even stronger effect, but the fact that we were able to impact attempts with this population and with a relatively limited intervention is encouraging.”
While suicide prevention efforts such as hotlines are well-known, published controlled trials of specific interventions have been much rarer, according to Miller.
The new report is one of several from the Emergency Department Safety Assessment and Follow-up Evaluation (ED-SAFE) study led by Miller and Drs. Edwin Boudreaux of the University of Massachusetts, and Carlos Camargo of Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard University.
According to Miller, the study focused on an especially high-risk group: patients who said they had engaged in suicidal ideation or had made an attempt within a week before their ED visit.
The trial took place in three phases to create three comparison groups.
In the first phase, August 2010 to December 2011, 497 patients received each ED’s usual treatment as a control group.
In the second phase, September 2011 to December 2012, 377 patients received additional suicide screening.
In the third phase, from July 2012 to November 2013, 502 patients received the experimental intervention. Those patients received additional suicide screening from ED physicians, suicide prevention information from nurses, and a personal safety plan that they could opt to fill out to be better prepared for times when they might begin to harbor suicidal thoughts again.
Over the next year they also received brief, periodic phone calls from trained providers at Butler Hospital who would discuss suicide risk factors, personal values and goals, safety and future planning, treatment engagement, and problem solving.
The intervention was designed to directly involve a designated loved one whenever feasible, as well, according to the researcher.
In all three phases, patients were briefly screened for suicidality at the ED and were also followed for a year with periodic assessment phone calls. Regardless of phase, patients who demonstrated a specific suicide risk during assessments were connected with the Boys Town suicide prevention hotline.
The number of suicide attempts and the proportion of people attempting suicide declined significantly in the intervention group compared to treatment as usual, according to the study’s findings. The middle group, which received only additional screening, did not show a significant drop compared to the treatment as usual group.
Suicide attempts were not the only measure the researchers employed to understand the potential impact of the intervention.
Fortunately, there were so few deaths by suicide among patients — only five total — that there could be no statistically valid conclusions drawn from that data point.
But the researchers also created a broader suicide composite score that included not only attempts and deaths, but also interrupted or aborted attempts, and acts to prepare an attempt.
Across the three groups, 46.3 percent of the patients reported one or more of these behaviors, but the relative risk declined significantly among people in the intervention compared to the usual care group (by 15 percent), but not among people who received screening alone.
While other interventions have also been found to reduce suicide risk, some of the most effective ones have involved providing patients with many hours of psychotherapy.
“This intervention was significantly less costly than most other interventions,” Miller said.
He added that the intervention was associated with significant declines in suicide attempts, even though not every patient engaged in the full intervention (e.g. only 37.4 percent reported receiving a safety plan and nearly 40 percent did not complete a follow-up phone call).
The intervention’s apparent efficacy also persisted despite the study’s ethical design, in which even people in the control phases received suicide prevention counseling that could have prevented an attempt if they presented an urgent need.
In further studies, the ED-SAFE team is looking at whether more intensive safety planning while patients are in the ED could help further. Miller and his colleagues are also conducting further tests of the phone follow-ups with patients from Butler Hospital and the Providence Veterans Affairs Medical Center.
Source: Brown University
Depression Impacts Twice as Many Females as Males
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A new meta-analysis confirms that depression affects twice as many females as males, and this gap appears as early as age 12. The results, published in the journal Psychological Bulletin, are based on existing studies involving more than 3.5 million people in more than 90 countries.
“We found that twice as many women as men were affected,” says co-author Janet Hyde, a professor of psychology and gender and women’s studies at the University of Wisconsin (UW)-Madison.
“Although this has been known for a couple of decades, it was based on evidence far less compelling than what we used in this meta-analysis. We want to stress that although twice as many women are affected, we don’t want to stereotype this as a women’s disorder. One-third of those affected are men.”
The gender gap was evident in the earliest data studied by co-authors Hyde; Rachel Salk, now a postdoctoral fellow in psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine; and Lyn Abramson, a professor of psychology at UW-Madison.
“The gap was already present at age 12, which is earlier than previous studies have found,” says Hyde. “We used to think that the gender difference emerged at 13 to 15 years but the better data we examined has pushed that down to age 12.”
The gender difference tapers off somewhat after adolescence, “which has never been identified, but the depression rate is still close to twice as high for women,” Hyde says.
For the meta-analysis, the researchers looked at both diagnoses of major depression and at symptoms of depression. “Symptoms are based on self-reported measures — for example, ‘I feel blue most of the time’ — that do not necessarily meet the standard for a diagnosis of major depression. To meet the criteria for major depression, the condition must be evaluated much more rigorously.”
The researchers also investigated the link between depression and gender equity in income. Surprisingly, nations with greater gender equity had larger gender differences — meaning women were disproportionately diagnosed with major depression.
“This was something of the opposite of what was expected,” says Hyde. “It may occur because, in more gender-equitable nations, women have more contact with men, and therefore compare themselves to men, who don’t express feelings of depression because it doesn’t fit with the masculine role.”
Puberty, which occurs around age 12 in girls, could explain the early onset.
“Hormonal changes may have something to do with it, but it’s also true that the social environment changes for girls at that age. As they develop in puberty, they face more sexual harassment, but we can’t tell which of these might be responsible,” says Hyde.
Although the data did not cover people younger than 12, “there are processes going on at 11 or 12 that are worth thinking about, and that matters in terms of intervening,” Hyde says.
“We need to start before age 12 if we want to prevent girls from sliding into depression. Depression is often quite treatable. People don’t have to suffer and face increased risk for the many related health problems.”
While the findings covered averages across the world, similar results emerged from the studies focusing on the United States alone, says Hyde.
Curiously, no relationship in either direction appeared for depression symptoms.
Despite the prevalence of and growing concern about depression, “this was the first meta-analysis on gender differences in depression,” Hyde says. “For a long while, I wondered why nobody had done this, but once I got into it, I realized it’s because there is too much data, and nobody had the courage to plow through it all. We did, and it took two years.”
Source: University of Wisconsin-Madison
The Patients We Do Not See
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The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research.
In medicine, we speak of “seeing patients” when we are rounding in the hospital or caring for those who come to our clinics. But what about those people who may be sick but do not seek care? What is our responsibility to the patients we do not see?
This question takes on greater urgency in the current political climate, as patients face the threat of losing health insurance. Renewed efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act leave millions wondering whether they will be covered.
For me, as a physician practicing in the safety net, abstract numbers evoke the very real stories of my uninsured patients. One of my patients, whom I’ll call Elsa, had not seen a doctor since immigrating to the United States 15 years ago. That abruptly changed one morning: She awoke to find the room spinning around her and, terrifyingly, she could not articulate the words to explain to her husband what was going on. She was having a stroke.
There are many reasons that patients like Elsa may not seek care – until they have no choice. Although she felt no symptoms before her stroke, Elsa was one of about 13 million U.S. adults with undiagnosed high blood pressure. I wondered if making her aware of her blood pressure would have been enough to avoid her suffering.
But even if high blood pressure may sit atop the list of problems I write out, from his or her perspective it may not crack the top five. Food security, job stability, child care and affordable housing understandably feel more urgent. Time and again, I have learned that taking care of my patients starts by trying to walk a mile in their shoes.
Why patients may not seek care
Sometimes, forgoing care is a symptom of social isolation. I asked another patient of mine – whom I had recently diagnosed with uncontrolled, likely longstanding diabetes – about his eating habits. I learned that in his routine, he would go for days at a time without interacting with another person; he did not have any family nearby and worked from his home computer.
Aside from deterring access to care, loneliness and social isolation have direct effects on health. One review of 148 studies showed that the influence of social relationships on the risk of death was comparable with risk factors such as obesity and alcohol use.
In other cases, the health care system must take responsibility for barriers to patients that we ourselves erect. Beyond costs, structural barriers include inadequate language interpretation services and the assumption of health literacy when conveying information. Meanwhile, historical inequities often underlie wary attitudes toward health care.
Dr. Mary Bassett, the health commissioner of New York City, has spoken plainly about this: “We must explicitly and unapologetically name racism in our work to protect and promote health…We must deepen our analysis of racial oppression, which means remembering some uncomfortable truths about our shared history.”
In the same vein, new immigration policies may have a chilling effect on the willingness of people like Elsa to see a doctor, if they perceive negative repercussions for themselves or their families.
Many patients with the greatest unmet needs are therefore marginalized, with only glancing interactions with the health system – or none at all, in the most wrenching cases of suicide, drug overdose and other chronic illnesses that end in catastrophe.
When they do seek care, it is sporadic. They may show up in the ER, but not to a primary care follow-up appointment. If an ensuing phone call goes unanswered, or their phone is out of service, we label them as “lost to follow-up” and move on to the next patient on the list.
What needs to change
Doing better by these patients will require moving the locus of accountability for health further into communities. It means bringing more of a public health mindset to health care; that is, not reflexively restricting our purview to those who happen to cross our clinic’s threshold.
Hospitals and health systems must have the humility to reach across boundaries and partner with local institutions that are sometimes more trusted, and often more relevant, in people’s daily lives, including churches, schools, food pantries and parks.
In one recent example, the 54 branches of the Free Library of Philadelphia were shown to be vital community nodes for health-related services like literacy programs, healthy eating initiatives, job fairs and food preparation courses. Public libraries are particular safe havens for those experiencing mental illness, substance use disorders and homelessness – as well as youth and recent immigrants. We should consider how the these locations are therefore already a part of our health ecosystem.
Doctors and other clinicians may balk at trying to take care of the patients we do not see. After all, with the harried pace set by the 15-minute office visit, it is hard enough to keep up with the patients we do see. But the goal is not to schedule doctor’s appointments for all library-goers, but rather to equip them to be better stewards of their own health, which sometimes involves health care providers, sometimes not. While physicians can’t do it alone, we can lend our voices to those calling for greater outreach, less stigma and protection of the most vulnerable.
Prevention, not regression
In Elsa’s case, when she had her stroke, she was rushed to the ER and received excellent care from the hospital team. Neurologists treated the blocked vessels in her brain and diagnosed her with a narrowed heart valve and high blood pressure.
As a doctor in a system that accepts all patients, regardless of ability to pay, I was proud to be a part of her follow-up care. She underwent heart valve surgery, and we put her on blood thinners and blood pressure medicines to reduce her risk of another stroke. Her rehabilitation, all things considered, was going well. The health care system had reacted to Elsa’s crisis with swift competence.
At our last clinic visit, my mind turned to what could have been done to prevent her stroke. But the chances to intervene were too few. She and her husband made a living as bottle-pickers; they spent hours every day sifting through trash for bottles to recycle. Elsa told me they made enough money to get by, since they lived with her nephew. But visiting me in clinic, not to mention a cardiologist, neurologist and physical therapist, cost her time and thus cash.
And so for every Elsa who walks into our clinic I know there is another patient we do not see.
With health coverage for millions of Americans in limbo, we must speak out and organize just to keep seeing the many patients who have been newly brought into care. And at the same time, we must develop better ways to find and support people like Elsa – even before we see them as patients.
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.
How to Let Go of the Thoughts that Cause Depression
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Depression is different from other illnesses in that, in addition to the physiological symptoms (loss of appetite, nervousness, sleeplessness, fatigue), there are the accompanying thoughts that can be so incredibly painful. For example, when my Raynaud’s flares up, the numbness in my fingers can be uncomfortable, but it doesn’t tell me that I am worthless, pathetic, and that things will never ever get better. During severe depressive episodes, however, these thoughts can be life-threatening: They insist that the only way out of the pain is to leave this world.
Being able to manage our thought stream will direct us toward health, as our thoughts are constantly communicating with the various systems of our body, either sending certain glands or organs an SOS in distress, or a note that everything is fine, resulting in calm. But being able to harness this craziness in the midst of depression and anxiety is so very difficult.
Here are some of the ways I try to let go of the thoughts that cause depression and anxiety. Some days I am much more successful than others.
Identify the Distortions
I have benefited immensely from David Burns’ book Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy — from doing the cognitive behavioral therapy exercises he prescribes to identifying the various distortions in my own thinking that he presents in his book and his workbook. They include:
- All-or-nothing thinking – I look at things in absolute, black-and-white categories.
- Overgeneralization – I view a negative event as a never-ending pattern of defeat.
- Mental filter – Dwelling on the negatives and ignore the positives.
- Discounting the positives – Insisting that my accomplishments or positive qualities don’t count (my college diploma was a stroke of luck … really, it was).
- Jumping to conclusions – I conclude things are bad without any definite evidence. These include mind reading (assuming that people are reacting negatively to you) and fortune telling (predicting that things will turn out badly).
- Magnification or minimization – I blow things way out of proportion or shrink their importance.
- Emotional reasoning – Reasoning from how I feel: “I feel like an idiot, so I must be one.”
- “Should” statements – I criticize myself or other people with “shoulds,” “shouldn’ts,” “musts,” “oughts,” and “have-tos.”
- Labeling – Instead of saying, “I made a mistake,” I tell myself, “I’m a jerk” or “I’m a loser.”
- Blame – Blaming myself for something I wasn’t entirely responsible for, or blaming other people and overlook ways that I contributed to a problem.
It doesn’t take long to identify one or more of these in your thinking. Just recognizing these traps can be helpful. You might then try one of the methods listed in Burns’ 15 Ways to Untwist Your Thinking. A warning, though: I’d wait until you have emerged from a severe depressive episode before you attempt some of these exercises. I’ve made the mistake of trying too hard to “fix” my thinking during severe depression, which has made it worse. It’s better to focus on the other ways listed below.
Focus on the Present
Although every self-help book I read touches on this, I am just beginning to really learn what it means to focus on the present and to appreciate the healing power of mindfulness, which, according to meditation teacher and bestselling author Jon Kabat-Zinn, is “paying attention in a particular way: on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgmentally.” If we continue to practice this, he explains, “this kind of attention nurtures greater awareness, clarity, and acceptance of the present-moment reality.” It’s not that we don’t feel the hurt, rage, and sadness that lives at the surface of our minds. It’s not an attempt to escape all the suffering that is there. But if we can observe all of our projections into the past and future — and all of the judgments that are part of our thought stream — and simply get back to what is happening right now, right here, we can allow a little room between our thoughts and our reality. With some awareness, we can begin to detach from the stories that we spin and from the commentaries that are so often feeding our pain.
One of the best ways we stay present is by keeping our attention on our breath. Vietnamese Zen Buddhist Thich Nhat Hanh instructs us that with each in-breath, we might say, “Breathing in, I know that I am breathing in.” And with each out-breath, “Breathing out, I know I am breathing out.” In his book You Are Here, he explains that mindful breathing is a kind of bridge that brings the body and the mind together. We start by this simple gesture of watching our breath, and then by this mindfulness of breath we begin to stich the body and mind together and generate a calm that will penetrate both.
Apply Self-Compassion
“Self-compassion doesn’t eradicate pain or negative experiences,” Kristin Neff, PhD, explains in her book Self-Compassion. “It just embraces them with kindness and gives them space to transform on their own.” It gives us the “calm courage needed to face our unwanted emotions head-on.” When I’m in the most pain — especially during a severe depressive episode — it is self-compassion more than anything else (cognitive behavioral therapy techniques, mindful breathing, etc.) that saves me and restores me to sanity. Nhat Hanh says that we should treat our depression tenderly, as we would treat a child. He writes:
If you feel irritation or depression or despair, recognize their presence and practice this mantra: “Dear one, I am here for you.” You should talk to your depression or your anger just as you would to a child. You embrace it tenderly with the energy of mindfulness and say, “Dear one, I know you are there, and I am going to take care of you,” just as you would with your crying baby.
It is so easy to be so cruel to ourselves without even realizing it. The ruminations that are part of depression beat us down and shred us until there is practically nothing there. That’s why it is so critical to apply self-compassion from the start, and treat ourselves, as well as our depression, as the scared little child that needs comforting, not scorn.
Acknowledge the Transience of Things
One of my favorite prayers is St. Teresa of Avila’s “Bookmark” that says:
Let nothing disturb you,
Let nothing frighten you,
All things are passing;
God only is changeless.
Patience gains all things.
Who has God wants nothing.
God alone suffices.
If the religious language bothers you, Eckhart Tolle says much the same when he writes in A New Earth:
Once you see and accept the transience of all things and the inevitability of change, you can enjoy the pleasures of the world while they last without fear of loss or anxiety about the future. When you are detached, you gain a higher vantage point from which to view the event in your life instead of being trapped inside them.
Absolutely everything, especially our feelings and emotions, is impermanent. By simply remembering that nothing ever stays, I am freed from the suffocating thoughts of my depression — the formidable fear that this sadness will always be with me, as well as the circumstances that are causing it. By acknowledging the transience of life, I am again called to pay attention to the present moment, where there is more peace and calm than I think.
Join Project Hope & Beyond, the new depression community.
Originally posted on Sanity Break at Everyday Health.
Saturday, April 29, 2017
Which Hot Button Words Are Dealbreakers in Relationships?
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I was reading about certain words that should never be used in advertising because they yield poor results. The article pointed out that people are far less likely to click on the word “submit” on a web site because it is too committal. As an alternative, “click here” is better, and “click here to receive whatever is being offered” is better yet. The article went on to point out how language can be a turn on or a turn off when making decisions.
As I read, I started to consider some of the keywords that don’t fly too well in the realm of relationships. I couldn’t help but ponder words like “obey,” for instance; a word that was once the norm in traditional wedding vows (and may still be in certain circles). Using “obey” in the realm of relationships is a deal breaker for many of us, including several terms that mean something similar. (Ironically, when I looked up synonyms of “obey”, “submit” came up!) Even reference to the “head of the household” can be an indicator of a power hierarchy. If this is okay with you, no problem, but if not, paying attention to this kind of terminology may assist you in avoiding some major struggles.
In my work as an online dating advisor, I would guide people to watch for the themes they, or the people they were interested in, posted in their profiles. I encouraged them to watch for the underlying messages that they were sharing through, often unconscious, choices. Repetitious sexual content, mention of alcohol and drugs, complaints about previous partners, a clear portrayal of low self-esteem, or elevated ego are all little red flags to watch for in an online write-up. Even in our face-to-face relationships, we all drop indicators of our beliefs and attitudes everywhere we go through our language and choice of words.
Some words aren’t the issue themselves, but rather the problem arises with the timing of their use. For instance, “love” — a word we clearly associate with relationships — can serve as a bomb if dropped too soon or a detriment if not used soon enough. “Commitment,” “monogamy,” and “marriage,” can freak people out when thrown around too early in the dating process, as well. And equally, at some point in the relationship, a lack of willingness to use these terms may be a deal breaker.
What we call each other at different stages of the relationship may also be an indicator calling for attention. Referring to your date as your “boyfriend,” or “girlfriend” can cause just as many problems as referring to your boyfriend or girlfriend as your “date” or your “lover.” Your level of commitment, or lack thereof, is revealed in your choice of labels, as is how you define the relationship.
How we refer to sex may also be a trigger. For some calling it “making love” (instead of sex) may be an issue, while for others it may be exactly the other way around.
How we talk about previous partners and past relationships can also reveal hot button issues. I have a friend who is adamant that people should refer to their previous husband or wife as “former spouse” rather than their “ex”, as he feels it is far more honoring of the major role they have previously played. While you may prefer not to honor those that have come before you, the truth of the matter is that in time you may be the next on the “ex” list wishing for more honor.
For me, a hot button is to refer to breaking up as “dumped,” as in “I dumped him or her.” We dump trash, not people. Using this term for breaking up can be an indicator that the respect levels of people and relationships may be sorely lacking.
People will often reveal early in the relationship where the big issues will lay ahead simply in their words. The problem is that we don’t often listen, or pay attention until the situation gets out of control. While everyone’s hot button issues may be slightly different, we would all benefit by paying a little closer attention to what is said, what is meant, and what is being revealed.
Rather than just considering what your hot button issues are when someone else utters them, be sure to practice awareness of the words you use as well — the words or the timing of your words, that may be pushing others away. Your own clarity and impeccability with the alignment of your words and your intended meaning will set the tone of deeper discussions, and greater understanding.
What are your hot button words or terms in the realm of relationships?
This post courtesy of Spirituality & Health.
This Posture Doubles Dating Success On Tinder And Face-To-Face
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The posture that makes both sexes look more attractive.
Both men and women look more attractive when they adopt an expansive posture, a new study finds.
Expansive postures include having the arms outward rather than folded, generally leaning backwards or with the legs apart rather than crossed.
Expansive gestures tend to signify openness and dominance, which is why they are seen as more attractive.
Dr Tanya Vacharkulksemsuk, the study’s first author, said:
“We have seen it within the animal world, that taking on extra space and maximizing presence inside a physical space can be used as signal for attracting a mate.
By applying dominance they are attempting to signal to some potential mate ‘I can do things, I’ve got a space within this hierarchy, I get access to sources.'”
The researchers recorded a speed dating event and used data from the dating app Tinder to verify their hypothesis.
In both cases people were more likely to be picked when they adopted more expansive postures.
The authors write in the paper:
“These findings indicate that in modern-day dating contexts, in which initial attraction often is determined by a rapid decision following a brief interaction or seeing a photograph, displays of expansive posture increase one’s chances of initial romantic success.”
The Tinder part of the study is more convincing because here the researchers created two different profiles for the same person.
In one profile they were adopting a hunched/arms folded posture.
In the other they had a more expansive posture: for example, leaning back or with arms outward.
The authors write:
“In a dating world in which success sometimes is determined by a split-second decision rendered after a brief interaction or exposure to a static photograph, single persons have very little time to make a good impression.
Our research suggests that a nonverbal dominance display increases a person’s chances of being selected as a potential mate.
[…]
Expansiveness makes the dating candidate appear more dominant.”
The study was published in the journal PNAS (Vacharkulksemsuk et al., 2016).
Drinking wine image from Shutterstock
The New Perfection: Pretty Good
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Welcome to the University of North Carolina or, more apropos, the University of No Chance. At least regarding my likelihood of graduation.
A self-conscious freshman, I remember the red ink coating my first Chapel Hill exam. As I replayed the exam, those latent doubts about my academic ability crescendoed into full-throated roars. What am I doing here? I wondered. I don’t belong at such a prestigious university. Will I even make it to graduation?
During my freshman year, Fear Factor was more than a reality television show. There were panicked phone calls to my beleaguered mother. Somehow an Econ 101 exam (or another test) was indicative of my intelligence, academic future, and job employability.
From my admittedly strained logic, an unsatisfactory grade doomed me to a career specializing in office drudgery. In this black and white (and Carolina blue) environment, I first experienced the perfectionist’s pratfalls.
Growing up, I was an unrelenting perfectionist. For one middle school science project, I shredded one draft after another. The project needed to be “perfect” — or else it faced a quick, merciful death in the wastepaper basket. An overflowing wastepaper basket.
Welcome to the perfectionist’s creed. In our ceaseless quest for perfection, we forget that pretty good is, well, pretty good.
As I have aged and wizened, I chuckle and, yes, wince at my youthful perfectionism. But there are still those nagging questions: Is this good enough? Am I good enough?
Like most perfectionists, there is a perverse pride in criticizing — even demeaning — myself. By holding myself up to lofty, unrealistic standards, I inoculate myself from external criticism. It isn’t valid; they don’t share my ambition and drive. But in this vicious quest for perfection, I mastered the art of self-sabotage. As my overriding fear of failure and rigid adherence to perfection threatened to topple me, I would retreat into the familiar and — shhh — easy.
With a hat tip to Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project, I have slowly learned to change my thought process. How so? I have learned to embrace failure — albeit grudgingly.
As a youngster, I chafed at failure. If I couldn’t immediately grasp an academic concept, my roiling emotions would boil over. Perfectionism and impatience have been swirling currents throughout my life, derailing personal and professional accomplishments with a cold sneer.
Even now — before a new challenge, the fear of failure echoes through my synapses. My mind shrugs off accomplishments with a casual wave. But Rubin’s “failure is fun” maxim reverberates–even more so as I transition into a new profession. I am more willing to embrace the unknown–writing for Psych Central, traveling to foreign countries, pursuing a graduate degree.
Failure still stings — that’s a given. But as a recovering perfectionist, I understand that you can ace one test and fail life’s most important one. And that lesson is more impactful than any degree or Econ 101 exam.
Shiryl lost 172 pounds
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Transformation of the Day: Shiryl lost 172 pounds. Crohn’s Disease, depression and fatigue were making her very unhappy. She became a vegetarian and developed a true passion for fitness. Check out what she shared with us about her journey. Hi, my name is Shiryl and I used to weigh 380 pounds. I have been overweight the majority of […]
April 29, 2017 at 03:18AM
Transformation of the Day: Shiryl lost 172 pounds. Crohn’s Disease, depression and fatigue were making her very unhappy. She became a vegetarian and developed a true passion for fitness. Check out what she shared with us about her journey. Hi, my name is Shiryl and I used to weigh 380 pounds. I have been overweight the majority of […]
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April 29, 2017 at 03:18AM
Psych Central Attends HealtheVoices 2017 Patient Advocacy Conference
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This past weekend, a group of over 100 online health advocates gathered in Chicago to attend the third annual HealtheVoices conference. I attended because of the work I do as a mental health activist. Psych Central’s founder, Dr. John Grohol, sat on the advisory panel, and hosted a panel discussion about privacy and dealing with trolls online.
The organizers describe the HealtheVoices Conference as:
“… a first-of-its-kind, weekend-long conference that brings together online advocates from across various health conditions for an opportunity to learn, share and connect. Sponsored by Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a Johnson & Johnson company, the conference seeks to provide valuable content, such as tips to further engage and grow an audience; thought-provoking conversation; and networking opportunities for online health advocates.”
First Hand Account of HealtheVoices 2017
This was Dr. Grohol’s third year and my first year attending the HealtheVoices conference. As a first time attendee, my first impression was simply: wow. The three-day event was jam-packed with learning and networking opportunities, with lots of breaks mixed in.
Our agenda included educational classes such as E2 (Empathy and Emotion): Navigating the Advocacy Landscape While Maintaining Your Own Mental Well-Being, Storytelling in a Mobile World, and Media 101: Approaching and Building Relationships with the Media. They even offered Restorative Vinyasa Yoga early Saturday morning.
We also had group meals, where the organizers smartly moved our seats around to ensure we always sat with different people. This afforded us the opportunity to speak to everyone. I must admit, I didn’t initially like the idea, but by the end, I was really impressed with how it encouraged me to step outside my comfort zone and meet new people.
Hands down, my two favorite sessions were The Facebook Family of Apps & the Patient Journey and The 10 Fundamentals of YouTube: How to set a Creative Strategy. I learned a lot that will help me with mental health advocacy. I also realized that companies like Facebook and YouTube aren’t able to respond to health advocates individually. But because we were all in one place and worked together, we were able to attract their attention — hopefully to the benefit of us all.
Dr. Grohol led a panel discussion on the last day of the conference that focused on privacy issues and dealing with trolls online that featured Anna Norton (@thesnowapewife) and Kamaria Laffrey (@mrs_kam).
Mental Health Advocacy Meets Physical Health Advocacy
As this was Dr. Grohol’s third time attending the conference, he noticed the upward trend of mental health advocates in attendance. I heard that in years one and two, only four or five mental health advocates were included. This year, that number had ballooned into 11 total in attendance.
Dr. Grohol said, “I was especially happy to see that we’ve been able to grow the voices of people who represent mental health concerns at this year’s conference, because their voices have historically often been squelched or minimized. To hear how so many people struggle with mental health issues, even when it’s not the primary area of their advocacy, is also an eye-opening reminder that these things affect all of us, everywhere. Mental illness doesn’t discriminate against anyone, for any reason. It’ll hit you just as readily if you’re dealing with a chronic health condition as much as it will if you’re not.”
That mental health and physical health are linked was a great discussion that was had, both formally and informally throughout the weekend. One attendee told me that “just because you have [a physical illness] doesn’t mean you can’t have a mental health problem as well — and vice versa.”
Final Thoughts on HealtheVoices 2017
I believe that Dr. Grohol says it best when he said, “There are some truly amazing people in advocacy doing important work every day, helping others gain the support and understanding we would all look forward to, if newly diagnosed. I also have to express my appreciation for the good folks at Janssen, who have the vision for this conference and have expanded it every year, while listening to attendees’ feedback to keep improving upon it each time.
“Putting all these smart, passionate people together in one room has made a significant difference and impact. It helps to re-energize me every year, and helps me find renewed passion for my own work, too.”
Finally, he added, “This was just an amazing year for patient advocates and activists who attended HealtheVoices 2017.”
Janssen Pharmaceuticals reimbursed all attendees for their travel expenses for the conference, including room and board. All opinions expressed in the blog entry are the author’s own.
Strong Parent-Child Bond Can Help Kids Thrive Despite Poverty
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Children in low-income families have a greater chance of thriving when they have high-levels of parental involvement and supervision, according to new research from the National Center for Children in Poverty (NCCP) at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health.
For the study, NCCP researchers used data from more than 2,200 low-income families who were participating in the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study. They found that school-age children who reported high levels of parental involvement and supervision were more likely to report behaviors associated with positive emotional development and social growth.
Research has shown that living in poverty can produce environmental stressors that lead to negative behaviors in children, such as inattention, impulsivity, aggression, withdrawal, depression, anxiety, or fearfulness. In addition, children living in poverty are far more likely to have trouble developing social-emotional competence — the ability to manage emotions, express needs and feelings, deal with conflict, and get along with others.
“Too often, when poor families are discussed, the focus is on deficits,” said Renée Wilson-Simmons, Dr.PH., NCCP. director and a co-author of the report. “And chief among those deficits is what’s seen as parents’ inability to successfully parent their children.”
Wilson-Simmons challenged the deficits focus, adding that despite the multitude of obstacles low-income parents face, many of them succeed in helping their children flourish.
“They raise children who possess the social-emotional competence needed to develop and keep friendships; establish good relationships with parents, teachers, and other adults; and experience a range of achievements that contribute to their self-confidence, self-esteem, and self-efficacy. These families have something to teach us all about thriving amidst adversity.”
Protective factors range from exhibiting a positive outlook, establishing family routines, and spending sufficient family time together to having good financial management skills, an adequate support network, and the willingness to seek help.
The researchers found that low-income parents who provide their children with warmth and nurturance as well as rules and consequences are helping them develop both socially and emotionally in ways that will serve them well as they develop into adults.
Some findings from the study include the following:
- low-income parents (or primary caregivers) who know their children’s friends are twice as likely to have children who do not to engage in problem behaviors compared to parents rated as low in parental supervision;
- parents who attend events important to their children are twice as likely to have children who do not engage in negative behaviors compared to those who rarely attend important events;
- parents who treat their children fairly were twice as likely to have children who did not engage in negative behaviors as those whose children felt that they are treated unfairly “often” or “always.”
Overall, most of the nine-year-olds surveyed rated their caregiver high on all of the factors NCCP researchers used to measure resiliency in low-income families:
- 68 percent reported that their primary caregiver (most often their mother) had knowledge of what they did during their free time and the friends with whom they spent time
- 74 percent said their mother “always” or “often” spent enough time with them, and 76 percent said they talked about things that matter “extremely well” or “quite well”
- 92 percent rated their relationship with their mother as “extremely close” or “quite close”
“The good news is that parents who struggle financially are still finding ways to have the kinds of interactions with their children that help them to develop socially and emotionally, despite the many external stressors competing for their attention,” said co-author Yang Jiang, Ph.D., who led data analysis.
“Since we know that children do better when their families do better, it’s important that advocates and policymakers bolster families’ efforts by supporting policies and programs that help parents develop strong connections with their children.”
Source: Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health
Study Finds Cost to Tying Self-Esteem to Money
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A new study suggests a psychological cost to the pursuit of more money.
Although the pursuit of money is not in and of itself bad, when people tie their self-worth to the pursuit of financial success, they are more vulnerable to negative psychological consequences, according to Dr. Lora Park, an associate professor of psychology at the University at Buffalo and the study’s lead author.
According to the study’s findings, basing self-esteem on financial success led to making more financially-based social comparisons with others, feeling less autonomy and control over one’s life, and experiencing more financial hassles, stress and anxiety. These findings were evident even after accounting for other variables, such as financial status, materialistic values, and importance of financial goals, according to researchers.
“People don’t often think of the possible downsides of wrapping their identity and self-worth around financial pursuits, because our society values wealth as a model of how one should be in the world,” said Park. “It’s important to realize these costs because people are gravitating toward this domain as a source of self-esteem without realizing that it has these unintended consequences.”
For the study, researchers recruited 349 college students and a nationally representative group of 389 participants after developing a scale to measure Financial Contingency of Self-Worth (CSW), or the degree to which people base their self-esteem on financial success.
They then conducted a series of experiments to examine the effects of threatening people’s sense of financial security.
“When we asked people to write about a financial stressor, they experienced a drop in their feelings of autonomy,” Park said. “They also showed more disengagement from their financial problems — they gave up searching for solutions. We didn’t find this in people who didn’t tie their self-esteem to financial success or among those who were asked to write about an academic stressor.”
In the essays, researchers also coded the type of language participants used to describe their financial problems.
“We found that people who highly based their self-worth on financial success used more negative emotion-related words, like sadness and anger,” Park said. “This demonstrates that just thinking about a financial problem generates a lot of stress and negative emotions for these individuals.”
But this effect is eliminated if you get people to self-affirm by giving them an opportunity to think about their personal strengths, according to Park.
“This suggests that self-esteem concerns emerge when people are thinking about financial problems, but if you can repair their self-esteem by having them think about their strengths, then there is no reduction in feelings of autonomy,” she said.
A final study found that people who based their self-esteem on financial success — and were led to believe that they would experience financial instability in their future — became more cautious when it came to extravagant spending decisions. This could be interpreted as a desire to protect their self-esteem following this financial threat, Park suggested.
The study was published in the journal Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
Source: University at Buffalo
Photo: Credit: University at Buffalo.
Global Data Suggests Food Insecurity Can Impact Mental Health
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A new study has found that food insecurity is linked to poorer mental health and specific psychosocial stressors.
The new study finds that food insecurity (FI) — which affects nearly 795 million people worldwide — may be a key contributor to common mental disorders through several different mechanisms.
First, by generating uncertainty over the ability to maintain food supplies or to acquire sufficient food in the future, FI can provoke a stress response that may contribute to anxiety and depression. And getting food in socially unacceptable ways can induce feelings of alienation, powerlessness, shame, and guilt that are associated with depression.
FI may also magnify socioeconomic disparities within households and communities that could increase cultural sensitivities and influence overall mental well-being.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, food insecurity means that a household’s economic and social conditions make access to adequate food limited or uncertain — and can lead to hunger.
The study was conducted by Andrew D. Jones, Ph.D., of the Department of Nutritional Sciences in the School of Public Health at the University of Michigan. He used data from the 2014 Gallup World Poll (GWP). FI data were available for 147,826 individuals across 11 world regions encompassing 149 countries. The extent of FI ranged from 18.3 percent in East Asia to 76.1 percent in Sub-Saharan Africa, according to the data.
Mental health status was determined using the Negative Experience Index (NEI) and the Positive Experience Index (PEI), two five-question surveys that examine topics such as pain, sadness, enjoyment, feelings of respect, and other factors. Data for the mental health indices were available for 152,696 individuals, Jones noted.
The PEI was highest in Latin America and the Caribbean region (79.4) and lowest in Russia and the Caucasus (59.2), while the NEI was lowest in Central Asia (17.4) and highest in the Middle East and North Africa region (34.9).
Jones found that FI was associated with poorer mental health status in a dose-response fashion, comparing NEI vs. FI for multiple age ranges. An inverse effect was found for PEI vs. FI data.
The consistent dose-response trend suggests a causal association between FI and mental health status, according to Jones.
“This trend suggests that the psychosocial stressors that underlie the mental health indices examined may be amplified with increasing FI,” he said. “For example, anxiety related to one’s ability to acquire sufficient food in the future may be provoked even under conditions of mild FI, and is likely to increase with moderate and severe FI. Alternatively, multiple pathways from FI to poorer mental health may be invoked with increasing severity of FI.
“Under conditions of more severe FI, for example, individuals may resort to acquiring food in socially unacceptable ways as a coping strategy. The feelings of shame and guilt associated with this behavior could compound pre-existing anxiety precipitated by mild FI to yield even poorer mental health conditions.”
Jones acknowledges the possibility that the direction of the association between FI and mental health status could be the reverse — that poor mental health could drive FI.
He notes, however, that this is the first study to carry out a global analysis of this association and so further research is needed.
“Developing robust monitoring systems and strengthening the measurement of both FI and mental health to more comprehensively understand their relation across contexts may help to inform interventions that can effectively address the mental health consequences of FI,” he concluded.
The study was published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
Source: Elsevier
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