In a well-received book some years ago, a psychiatrist described his mother’s naked body being used as a card-playing table by his father and cronies. In a paper by a psychoanalyst-psychiatrist (Bulletin of the Menninger Clinic, “The Sad Soul of the Psychiatrist,” early 1970s), it was stated that clinicians who treat children do Read More
A Psychologist's Thoughts on Clinical Practice, Behavior, and Life
Psychiatrists’ Families Aren’t Healthier Than President Trump’s!
January 6, 2018
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Should America Adopt China's Way of Education?
September 11, 2017
The (September 9-10, 2017) Wall Street Journal's article, "Why American Students Need Chinese #Schools," makes several points: that, in China, the teacher rules supreme over the parent, and that effort and drill are considered the educational pathway to success. There, teachers engage in behavior which would cause their arrest for child abuse in America. Yet, Read More
Diagnosing Bullying
August 22, 2017
Though all agree that bullying is bad, its complexity and that of the victim are often downplayed. In fact, bullies may primarily be sadistic, depressed, or anxious; and victims may primarily be submissive, provocative, or masochistic. Varying teacher and family dynamics exist for each, ranging from fear and helplessness, to parents who gain vicarious Read More
Fanciful Explanations of Autism and Parental Guilt
December 1, 2016
While parents rarely feel guilty when their child becomes physically ill, this is not true when they develop emotional problems.
Autism is perhaps the most affected disturbance by this attitude for, in its severest form, it devastates family life. Recent infant research has confirmed what clinicians have long known: that the parent-child interaction plays Read More
Autism is perhaps the most affected disturbance by this attitude for, in its severest form, it devastates family life. Recent infant research has confirmed what clinicians have long known: that the parent-child interaction plays Read More
Why Some Children Lack Psychological “Sturdiness”
July 18, 2016
Parents know that infants vary greatly in their “sturdiness,” their ability to tolerate separation from them. Children with extreme responses to separation are buffeted by panic after instances of parental “abandonment” that is manageable for less vulnerable youngsters.
Parental unavailability is devastating for them, promoting clinginess and a desperate need to ensure parental proximity. Read More
Parental unavailability is devastating for them, promoting clinginess and a desperate need to ensure parental proximity. Read More
The Similarity Between Dying Schools and Dying Businesses
June 2, 2015
As a psychologist, I've long found that parents complain most about schools. They are, as institutions, hermetically sealed, uninterested in any opinion that doesn't agree with their own and, when their efforts with troubled children fail (as almost always happens), the parents become termed expert and the school demands that they resolve their child's Read More
President Obama's Proposal of Free E-books Reflects Naive Psychology
May 25, 2015
President Obama's proposal to provide free E-books reflects naive psychology since there are already free books available through school and local libraries. What is needed is for parents to read to toddlers and to speak with rather than to their children (i.e., explain why something shouldn't be done rather than saying, "Do Read More
Confused Child/Disabled Adult
May 8, 2015
ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) and AD/HD (Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder) have been widely used terms to diagnose children's problematic behavior for the past fifty years though the particular symptoms that they comprise have been noted for two hundred years ("mental restlessness").
Fifty years ago the symptoms were believed to reflect MBD (Minimal Brain Dysfunction). Yet rather Read More
Fifty years ago the symptoms were believed to reflect MBD (Minimal Brain Dysfunction). Yet rather Read More
Why A Financial Journalist Should Resist Giving Parenting Advice
May 8, 2015
Several years ago The Wall Street Journal published an article by a financial columnist on how to discipline children, using his experience with his teenage son as an example.
Basically, his advice was to take away something which the child likes but not something which would impact their future ( Read More
Basically, his advice was to take away something which the child likes but not something which would impact their future ( Read More
The Illogic of Diagnosing Youth with Bipolar Disorder
May 8, 2015
It is both clinically and logically incorrect to diagnose a child or teenager as suffering from Bipolar Disorder since this diagnosis is classified as a personality disorder and requires an adult mental structure which youth, by definition, do not possess.