Thursday, May 3, 2012

Islamophobia: Europe's New Political Disease - The Platform - Forensic Psychiatry News

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Middle East Media Research Institute



Sam Harris, Racial Profiling and American Muslims
Huffington Post (blog)
In fact, last year you wrote this about the 2011 attacks orchestrated by Anders Behring Breivik in Norway that resulted in the deaths of over 70 people: One can only hope that the horror and outrage provoked by Breivik's behavior will temper the ...
Islamophobia: Europe's New Political DiseaseThe Platform

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Europe’s New Political Disease       


Posted by: Dr Muhammad Abdul Bari Tags: ,,,,,,,,, Posted date: May 1, 2012 | 3 Comments
The rise in anti-Muslim sentiment in Europe is a troubling reality to which political parties are lending legitimacy and exploiting

A new wave of anti-Muslim intolerance and antagonism is sweeping Europe. The far right political gains seen in some parts of the continent are alarming. Anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim and extreme right parties seem to be cashing in on economic hardship and austerity measures. In a blinkered world of ‘us’ and ‘them’ they have found in Europe’s Muslim citizens the ‘others’.
In this fevered atmosphere of rising nationalism Islam, the religion of its most-impoverished people, is taking over the continent. Never mind the agonies such sentiments caused when acted upon by the Norway killer, Anders Breivik last year. “Racism is the lowest form of stupidity; Islamophobia is the height of common sense!” said one group in 2008.
To any person with a modicum of common sense such attitudes are absurd and bordering on a mythical view of reality. We must check their rise. In a powerful indictment, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, Thomas Hammarberg, posted a blog about how European Muslims are stigmatised by populist rhetoric (October 2010).
“European countries appear to face another crisis beyond budget deficits – the disintegration of human value. One symptom is the increasing expression of intolerance towards Muslims. Opinion polls in several European countries reflect fear, suspicion and negative opinions of Muslims and Islamic culture,” he wrote.
He was not alone in giving Europeans this warning; many people across British politics and media have shared similar sentiments for some time. Amnesty International has shared this concern. In its April 2012 report Choice and prejudice: discrimination against Muslims in Europe Amnesty exposes the impact of discrimination on Muslims. Marco Perolini, Amnesty’s expert on discrimination, says: “Muslim women are being denied jobs and girls prevented from attending regular classes just because they wear traditional forms of dress, such as the headscarf. Men can be dismissed for wearing beards associated with Islam. …. Rather than countering these prejudices, political parties and public officials are all too often pandering to them in their quest for votes.”
Amnesty International has accused France, Belgium and the Netherlands of failing to implement proper laws banning discrimination in employment.
It is disheartening that a continent that had learnt many lessons in such a hard way, after the devastation of the two World Wars, and which prides itself in equality and human rights, is allowing itself to be influenced by the forces of intolerance and hate. It is now open season to malign Muslims because of their religious and cultural practices. Yet Muslim immigrants arriving after the war joined in the effort to rebuild the economies of war-torn Europe in the 1950s. In almost every field of life, Muslims have been an integral part of the European tapestry. Muslims are today at home in Europe, have been contributors to its past and are stakeholders in its future.
Yet the language and rhetoric used by the Far Right and the level of political expediency in mainstream European politics is mind boggling. The hate mongers are apparently succeeding in swapping a racist agenda for an Islamophobic one. The lacklustre response from European leaders has paved the way for anti-Muslim bigotry to move closer to the mainstream.
It took a cold-blooded massacre of 77 Norwegian youths by a far-right ‘Christian’ extremist, Anders Behring Breivik last summer, to shake the conscience of Europe’s political class. It was a horrendous wake-up call to home-grown far-right violence and ideology, inspired by the rhetoric of vote-chasing politicians, pseudo academics, media analysts and hate groups like the English Defence League (EDL) in Britain. Breivik, in his recent trial, has made vitriolic attack on European leaders for their ‘impotence’ to stand up against Muslim ‘conquest’ of Europe. In this, he is propounding the ‘Eurabia’ fantasy that is central to the so-called ‘counter jihadist’ movement propelled by ideologues in the USA.
Elsewhere, in countries like France, the shockwave of the far-right Front National polling nearly one fifth of French voters in the first round of the presidential elections is still reverberating. Both the socialist candidate and the incumbent President are now wooing the supporters of Marine le Pen.
We should not be complacent in Britain. The recent news that the EDL has joined hands with the British Freedom Party (BFP) is going to have political implications. The BFP was formed in 2010 by disaffected members of the BNP and whatever its stated objectives, its main target is the Muslim community. It wants to ban the Niqab, stop the building of new mosques and Islamic schools and outlaw Sharia (as if it runs Britain!) including Islamic finance. The news that EDL head Tommy Robinson is to be appointed Deputy Leader of the British Freedom Party has alarmed anti-racist groups like HOPE not hate and others.
The alliance of EDL and BFP would be more dangerous than the BNP: the current EDL head ‘Tommy Robinson’ (real name: Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, a tanning salon manager from Luton) has a better media presence than the Holocaust-denying Nick Griffin. In focusing on Islam and the threat of ‘Islamist extremists’ they can have a bigger appeal than the simple racist agenda of the BNP. With political trust at an all-time low, this far right alliance may take advantage of voter apathy in national and local politics to advance their cause.
Be that as it may, we must stand firm and not let our country and continent slip into the intolerant past. We must join hands to slay the dragon of Islamophobia and help build Europe again with everyone’s help, Muslim and non-Muslim, alike. It is time we listen to the voices of sanity, not hate.

Image from: www.islamineurope.blogspot.com

Conrad Black Nears End of Jail Term - Wall Street Journal - Forensic Psychiatry News

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Conrad Black Nears End of Jail Term - Wall Street Journal

via prisons - Google News on 5/2/12

Toronto Star


Welcome back, Conrad!
Globe and Mail
Lord Black, she notes, “is now a very informed and outspoken commentator on prison reform, and does not think the government's expensive mega-jails plan will work.” Believe it or not, Ms. Atwood and Lord Black have become BFF. When Payback, her book on ...

Conrad Black granted permission to live in Canada after release from prisonToronto Star

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Conrad Black Nears End of Jail Term - Wall Street Journal

OTTAWA—One-time media mogul Conrad Black is set to leave a Florida jail as early as Saturday, triggering a wave of speculation over whether he'll be allowed back into Canada after famously renouncing his citizenship.
Lord Black was convicted of fraud and obstruction of justice in the U.S. in 2007, and is due to finish off his 42-month sentence in days. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Prisons indicated Black's "actual or projected" release from a Miami penitentiary was May 5.
An attorney for Lord Black declined to comment.
Lord Black was born in Canada but renounced his citizenship in 2001, after he was offered a life peerage in Britain's House of Lords. Then-Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien said Canada had the right to block him from accepting the post while he held a Canadian passport.
With his impending release, questions have swirled over whether he'd be let back into Canada considering the revoked citizenship and his felony conviction. On Tuesday, Canada's government seemed to suggest he could come back.
Canada's Immigration Minister, Jason Kenney, told reporters the government generally approves over 10,000 temporary permits a year for foreign nationals to enter Canada, with a "large number of those" granted to people with criminal records. In those cases, immigration officials have determined that the crimes were nonviolent offenses, "and the individual has a low risk to reoffend and (doesn't) pose a risk to Canadian society," he said.
He declined to comment specifically on Lord Black, citing privacy issues.
Fanning speculation, the Globe and Mail newspaper in Toronto reported Tuesday that the Canadian government had granted Black a one-year temporary resident permit. Government officials declined to comment.
Lord Black, who presided over a media empire that at one time included London's Daily Telegraph and the Chicago Sun-Times, initially served more than two years of his jail term. He was then freed on bail in July 2010 after the U.S. Supreme Court narrowed the reach of a federal law that gave prosecutors the authority to bring cases against executives who deprive companies of their "honest services." The justices then ordered the lower courts to take another look at Lord Black's conviction.
A U.S. District Court judge in Chicago ordered Black in June 2011 to return to prison for about a year on top of the 29 months he had already served.
Lord Black has one compelling reason to get back to Canada later this month. His book, "A Matter of Principle," is a finalist for Canada's National Business Book Award. In the book, he maintains his innocence and recounts his fight in the U.S. justice system. The award will be announced later this month in Toronto.

The majority of those admitted to prison are there because of drug- or property-related offenses, not for violent crimes - Selected Blogs

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The majority of those admitted to prison are there because of drug- or property-related offenses, not for violent crimes. In Canada, only 22 per cent of people admitted to provincial or territorial prisons were admitted for violent crimes and 49 per cent of people admitted to federal prisons were for violent crimes. Of the 4,600 people admitted to prison in Nova Scotia, less than 300 were sentenced for violent crimes. Even when exploring crimes classified as violent crimes, many are influenced or impacted by other factors such as mental health, poverty, or self-defense. Who derives safety from prisons and police and why is a question that relates closely to systems of privilege. For those people who have never faced police repression, the police seem like an important institution, but for communities that have been impacted by racial profiling and police brutality, the police represent a threat to the health of the community.

via go it alone (together) by goitalonetogether on 5/2/12
Image“Words Break Down Walls” by Molly Fair
In April, I gave a talk on prisons for a monthly series of political discussions on issues from an anti-capitalist approach called Living Theory.
Some of the people who attended wanted a copy of the presentation I gave, so I’ve posted it. It borrows from the first issue of our Papers for the People series.

“You really ought to be absolutely sure before you strap a person down and kill him,” Judge Michael Keasler said - Forensic Psychiatry News

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via Faktensucher by curi56 on 5/3/12
Reblogged from *CLAIM YOUR INNOCENCE*:
Update may 2 2012 Source : http://www.texastribune.org
Sensitive to dozens of DNA exonerations in recent years, judges on the nine-member Texas Court of Criminal Appeals today grilled the Texas solicitor general about what harm could be done by granting death row inmate Hank Skinner‘s decade-old request for biological analysis of crime scene evidence.
“You really ought to be absolutely sure before you strap a person down and kill him,” Judge Michael Keasler said.
Weiterlesen… 1.585 more words

Allen Frances, M.D.: Wonderful News: DSM 5 Finally Begins Its Belated and Necessary Retreat | Psychology Today

Allen Frances, M.D.

Wonderful News: DSM 5 Finally Begins Its Belated and Necessary Retreat | Psychology Today

DSM5 in Distress
The DSM's impact on mental health practice and research.

Wonderful News: DSM 5 Finally Begins Its Belated and Necessary Retreat

Perhaps this will be the beginning of real reform.
Sigh of relief. The DSM 5 website announced this morning that two of its most controversial proposals have finally been dropped. We have dodged bullets on Psychosis Risk and Mixed Anxiety Depression. Both are now definitively rejected as official DSM 5 diagnoses and instead are being exiled to the appendix. And one other piece of good news-the criteria set for Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder has been tightened (not enough, but every little bit helps).
The world is a safer place now that 'Psychosis Risk' will not be in DSM 5. Its rejection saves our kids from the risk of unnecessary exposure to antipsychotic drugs (with their side effects of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular problems, and shortened life expectancy). 'Psychosis Risk' was the single worst DSM 5 proposal—we should all be grateful that DSM 5 has finally come to its senses in dropping it.
For the first time in its history, DSM 5 has shown some flexibility and capacity to correct itself. Hopefully, this is just the beginning of what will turn out to be a number of other necessary DSM 5 retreats. Today's revisions should be just the first step in a systematic program of reform—a prelude to all the other changes needed before DSM 5 can become a safe and scientifically sound document.
The turnabout here can be attributed to the combination of: 1) extensive criticism from experts in the field; 2) public outrage; 3) uniformly negative press coverage; and, 4) the abysmal results in DSM 5 field testing. The same factors working together should deep six many of the other risky DSM 5 proposals. This is certainly no time for complacency. Much of the rest of DSM 5 is still a mess. The reliabilities achieved for many of the other disorders are apparently unbelievably low and the writing of the criteria sets is still unacceptably imprecise. The following specific issues need to be addressed.
1) Why introduce Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder when it has been studied by only one research team for only six years and risks further encouraging the inappropriate use of antipsychotic drugs for kids with temper tantrums?
2) Why have a diagnosis for Minor Neurocognitive Disorder that will unnecessarily frighten many people who have no more than the memory problems of old age?
3) Why insist on removing the Bereavement exclusion—thus allowing the inappropriate diagnosis of Major Depressive Disorder in people who are experiencing normal grief?
4) Why open the floodgates to even more over-diagnosis and over-medication of Attention Deficit Disorder (by raising the allowed age of onset to 12)?
5) Why dramatically lower the threshold for Generalized Anxiety Disorder when this will confound mental disorder with the anxiety and sadness of everyday life?
6) Why combine substance abuse with substance dependence under the rubric of Addictive Disorders—when this confuses their different treatment needs and creates unnecessary stigma for many young people who will never go on to 'addiction'?
7) Why include a category for Behavioral Addictions that will open the door to the mislabeling as mental disorder all sorts of normal interests and passions? The DSM 5 suggestion to include 'internet addiction' in the Appendix is an ominous first step.
8) Why include wording in the Pedophilia criteria set that will invite further forensic abuse of the already much misused Paraphilia section?
9) Why label as mental disorder the experience of indulging in one binge eating episode a week for three months?
10) Why introduce a system of personality diagnosis so complicated it will never be used and will give dimensional diagnosis an undeserved bad name?
11) Why not delay publication of DSM 5 to allow enough time to complete the previously planned and crucial second stage of field testing that was abruptly cancelled because of the constant administrative delays in completing the first stage? This is the only way to guarantee acceptable reliability. We should not accept ambiguously worded DSM 5 diagnoses whose reliability barely exceeds chance?
12) And most fundamental. Why not allow for an independent scientific review of all the remaining controversial DSM 5 changes. This has been proposed by fifty-one mental health organizations as the only way to guarantee a credible DSM 5?
The public has 6 weeks to comment on the current DSM 5 suggestions. Then there will be a round of final decisions- with everything probably sewn up by mid-fall. This opening chink in the previously impervious DSM 5 armor should spur renewed efforts to get the rest of DSM 5 right.
For more on the latest revisions of the DSM 5 criteria sets, see here.
Take this last opportunity to be heard.

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Cognitive neuropsychiatry - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cognitive neuropsychiatry - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cognitive neuropsychiatry
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Cognitive neuropsychiatry is a growing multidisciplinary field arising out of cognitive psychology and neuropsychiatry that aims to understand mental illness and psychopathology in terms of models of normal psychological function. A concern with the neural substrates of impaired cognitive mechanisms links cognitive neuropsychiatry to the basic neuroscience. Alternatively, CNP provides a way of uncovering normal psychological processes by studying the effects of their change or impairment.
The term "cognitive neuropsychiatry” was coined by Prof Hadyn Ellis (Cardiff University ) in a paper “The cognitive neuropsychiatric origins of the Capgras delusion”, presented at the International Symposium on the Neuropsychology of Schizophrenia, Institute of Psychiatry, London (Coltheart, 2007).
Although clinically useful, current syndrome classifications (e.g DSM-IV; ICD-10) have no empirical basis as models of normal cognitive processes. Neuropsychological accounts of how the brain ‘works’would ever be complete without a cognitive level of analysis. CNP moves beyond diagnosis and classification to offer a cognitive explanation for established psychiatric behaviours, regardlessof whether the symptoms are due to recognized brain pathology or to dysfunction in brain areas or networks without structural lesions.
CNP has been influential, not least because of its early success in explaining some previously bizarre psychiatric delusions, most notably the Capgras delusion, Fregoli delusion and other delusional misidentification syndromes.

[edit] External links

[edit] Further reading

  • Ellis & Young (1990). Accounting for delusional misidentifications. British Journal of Psychiatry
  • Frith C. (1992) The Cognitive Neuropsychology of schizophrenia
  • David T (1993). Cognitive Neuropsychiatry Psychological Medicine
  • Charlton B. (1995) Cognitive neuropsychiatry and the Future of Diagnosis: a "PC" model of the Mind.'British Journal of Psychiatry
  • Halligan, P.W. Marshall, J.C. (1996) ''Method in Madness: Case Studies in Cognitive Neuropsychiatry. Psychology Press. ISBN 0-86377-442-3
  • Halligan, P.W., and David, A.S. (2001). Cognitive Neuropsychiatry: towards a scientific psychopathology. Nature Neuroscience Review,
  • Coltheart (2007). Bartlett Lecture: Quarterly J Exp Psych.

[edit] See also

Cognitive neuropsychology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cognitive neuropsychology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cognitive neuropsychology
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Cognitive neuropsychology is a branch of cognitive psychology that aims to understand how the structure and function of the brain relates to specific psychological processes. It places a particular emphasis on studying the cognitive effects of brain injury or neurological illness with a view to inferring models of normal cognitive functioning. Evidence is based on case studies of individual brain damaged patients who show deficits in brain areas and from patients who exhibit double dissociations. From these studies researchers infer that different areas of the brain are highly specialised. It can be distinguished from cognitive neuroscience which is also interested in brain damaged patients but is particularly focused on uncovering the neural mechanisms underlying cognitive processes.[1]

Contents

[hide]

[edit] History


"Front and lateral view of the cranium, representing the direction in which the iron traversed its cavity..." [2]
The modern science of cognitive neuropsychology emerged during the 1960s as a reaction to behaviorism. Scientists realized that there were other sources of data and consciousness became a major area of interest. A particular area of interest for cognitive psychologists was memory. By studying patients with amnesia, which was caused by injuries to the medial temporal cortex, scientists were able to determine the affected areas of the brain. A patient with amnesia will not be able to remember events of the previous day (episodic memory,) but they will still remember how to tie their shoes (procedural memory,) remember a series of numbers for a few seconds (working memory) and be able to recall historical events they have learned in school (semantic memory.)[4][5] Many other studies like this have been done in the field of neuropsychology examining lesions and the effect they have on certain areas of the brain and their functions. [2]
The case of Phineas Gage was one of the earliest in which a brain injury provided clues to the function of a particular brain area. Gage survived an 1848 accident in which an iron rod 1¼ inches in diameter was driven through one or both of his frontal lobes. Though he suffered no loss of sensory or motor function, Gage's consequent personality changes prevented his return to his position as a railway construction foreman (though most presentations of Gage greatly exaggerate his psychological changes—see Phineas Gage).

Broca's area and Wernicke's area.
Similarly, Paul Broca's 1861 post mortem study of an aphasic patient, known as "Tan" after the only word which he could speak, showed that an area of the left frontal lobe (now known as Broca's area) was damaged. As Tan was unable to produce speech but could still understand it, Broca argued that this area might be specialised for speech production and that language skills might be localised to this cortical area.
Clues about the role of the occipital lobes in the visual system were provided by soldiers returning from World War I. The small bore ammunition often used in this conflict occasionally caused focal brain injuries. Studies of soldiers with such wounds to the back of their head showed that areas of blindness in the visual field were dependent on which part of the occipital lobe had been damaged, suggesting that specific areas of the brain were responsible for sensation in specific visual areas, known as retinotopy.

Most of HM's hippocampus was removed bilaterally.
Studies on Patient HM are commonly cited as some of the precursors, if not the beginning of modern cognitive neuropsychology. HM had parts of his medial temporal lobes surgically removed to treat intractable epilepsy in 1953. The treatment proved successful in reducing his dangerous seizures, but left him with a profound but selective amnesia. Because HM's impairment was caused by surgery, the damaged parts of his brain were precisely known, information which was usually not knowable in a time before accurate neuroimaging became widespread. This allowed detailed connections to be made between theories of memory formation and the brain structures removed in HM.
These and similar studies had a number of important implications. The first is that certain cognitive processes (such as language) could be damaged separately from others, and so might be handled by distinct and independent cognitive and neural processes. (For more on the cognitive neuropsychological approach to language, see Eleanor Saffran, among others.) The second is that such processes might be localised to specific areas of the brain. Whilst both of these claims are still controversial to some degree, the influence led to a focus on brain injury as a potentially fruitful way of understanding the relationship between psychology and neuroscience.
During the 1960s, information processing became the dominant model in psychology for understanding mental processes. This provided an important theoretical basis for cognitive neuropsychology, as it allowed an explanation of what areas of the brain might be doing (i.e. processing information in specific and specialised ways) and also allowed brain injury to be understood in abstract terms as impairment in the information processing abilities of larger cognitive systems.

[edit] Methods

By understanding what a person can no longer do, and correlating this with a knowledge of exactly which parts of the nervous system are damaged, it is possible to infer previously undiscovered functional relationships. This is called the lesion method.
By using this method, it should also be possible to discover whether a skill is handled by a single cognitive process or a combination of several working together. For example, if a theory states that reading and writing are simply different skills stemming from a single cognitive process, it should not be possible to find a person who, after brain injury, can write but not read or read but not write. This selective breakdown in skills suggests that different parts of the brain are specialised for the different processes and so the cognitive systems are separable.
The philosopher Jerry Fodor has been particularly influential in cognitive neuropsychology, particularly with the idea that the mind, or at least certain parts of it, may be organised into independent modules. Evidence that cognitive skills may be damaged independently seem to support this theory to some degree, although it is clear that some aspects of mind (such as belief for example) are unlikely to be modular. Ironically, Fodor (a strict functionalist) rejects the idea that the neurological properties of the brain have any bearing on its cognitive properties and doubts the whole discipline of cognitive neuropsychology.
Cognitive neuropsychology also uses many of the same techniques and technologies from the wider science of neuropsychology and fields such as cognitive neuroscience. These may include neuroimaging, electrophysiology and neuropsychological tests to measure either brain function or psychological performance.
The principles of cognitive neuropsychology have recently been applied to mental illness, with a view to understanding, for example, what the study of delusions may tell us about the function of normal belief. This relatively young field is known as cognitive neuropsychiatry.

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ "The term cognitive neuropsychology often connotes a purely functional approach to patients with cognitive deficits that does not make use of, or encourage interest in, evidence and ideas about brain systems and processes"-- Daniel L. Schater (2000) Understanding Implicit memory: A cognitive neruoscience approach in Michael S. Gazzaniga (ed.) Cognitive neuroscience: a reader. Wiley-Blackwell.
  2. ^ Harlow (1868)

[edit] Further reading

Cognitive Aspects of Normal and Delusional Belief Formations

Cognitive Aspects of Normal and Delusional Belief Formations


References and Links


belief formation delusional disorder - Pubmed Search     RSS

via pubmed: belief formation del... by Abdel-Hamid M, Brüne M on 4/26/12
Neuropsychological aspects of delusional disorder.
Curr Psychiatry Rep. 2008 Jun;10(3):229-34
Authors: Abdel-Hamid M, Brüne M
Abstract
Delusional disorders (DDs) are clinically rare syndromes characterized by false beliefs that are held with firm conviction despite counterevidence. The neuropsychology of DDs is poorly understood. Two partially opposing models--a cognitive bias model and a cognitive deficit model--have received mixed empiric support, partly because most research has been carried out in patients with paranoid schizophrenia, with which the nosologic association of DDs is unknown. Based on these models, we review empiric findings concerning the neuropsychology of DDs (narrowly defined). We conclude that DDs can best be seen as extreme variations of cognitive mechanisms involved in rapid threat detection and defensive harm avoidance. From this viewpoint, the two models seem to be complementary in explanatory power rather than contradictory. Future research may help to clarify the question of gene-environment interaction involvement in the formation of delusional beliefs.
PMID: 18652791 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

via pubmed: belief formation del... by Coltheart M on 4/26/12
Cognitive neuropsychiatry and delusional belief.
Q J Exp Psychol (Hove). 2007 Aug;60(8):1041-62
Authors: Coltheart M
Abstract
Cognitive neuropsychiatry is a new field of cognitive psychology which seeks to learn more about the normal operation of high-level aspects of cognition such as belief formation, reasoning, decision making, theory of mind, and pragmatics by studying people in whom such processes are abnormal. So far, the high-level cognitive process most widely studied in cognitive neuropsychiatry has been belief formation, investigated by examining people with delusional beliefs. This paper describes some of the forms of delusional belief that have been examined from this perspective and offers a general two-deficit cognitive-neuropsychiatric account of delusional belief.
PMID: 17654390 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

via pubmed: belief formation del... by Lawrence E, Peters E on 4/26/12
Reasoning in believers in the paranormal.
J Nerv Ment Dis. 2004 Nov;192(11):727-33
Authors: Lawrence E, Peters E
Abstract
Reasoning biases have been identified in deluded patients, delusion-prone individuals, and believers in the paranormal. This study examined content-specific reasoning and delusional ideation in believers in the paranormal. A total of 174 members of the Society for Psychical Research completed a delusional ideation questionnaire and a deductive reasoning task. The reasoning statements were manipulated for congruency with paranormal beliefs. As predicted, individuals who reported a strong belief in the paranormal made more errors and displayed more delusional ideation than skeptical individuals. However, no differences were found with statements that were congruent with their belief system, confirming the domain-specificity of reasoning. This reasoning bias was limited to people who reported a belief in, rather than experience of, paranormal phenomena. These results suggest that reasoning abnormalities may have a causal role in the formation of unusual beliefs. The dissociation between experiences and beliefs implies that such abnormalities operate at the evaluative, rather than the perceptual, stage of processing.
PMID: 15505516 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

via pubmed: belief formation del... by Stompe T, Ortwein-Swoboda G, Ritter K, Schanda H on 4/26/12
Old wine in new bottles? Stability and plasticity of the contents of schizophrenic delusions.
Psychopathology. 2003 Jan-Feb;36(1):6-12
Authors: Stompe T, Ortwein-Swoboda G, Ritter K, Schanda H
Abstract
A number of recent case reports published during the last 20 years described a quick inclusion of new technologies and cultural innovations into schizophrenic delusions which led many of the authors to the conclusion that the 'Zeitgeist' is creating new delusional contents. On the other hand, long-term comparisons and comparative transcultural studies on delusions showed, despite a certain degree of variability, a stability of delusional themes over longer periods of time. Combining anthropological and historical theories of the development of societies with a differentiated psychopathological approach (Klosterkötter's three-stage model of the formation of schizophrenic delusions), we were able to resolve the problem of the ostensibly divergent results: there are only a few themes of extraordinary anthropological importance for the organization of human relationships which can be found in every epoch and in different cultures (persecution, grandiosity, guilt, religion, hypochondria, jealousy, and love). With the exception of persecution and grandiosity, these themes showed a certain variability over time and between cultures. The 'new' themes, referring to the development of modern technology and the rapid changes of 'cultural patterns' turned out to be only the shaping of the basic delusional themes on the 3rd stage of Klosterkötter's phase model (concretization).
PMID: 12679586 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

via pubmed: belief formation del... by Garety PA, Hemsley DR, Wessely S on 4/26/12
Reasoning in deluded schizophrenic and paranoid patients. Biases in performance on a probabilistic inference task.
J Nerv Ment Dis. 1991 Apr;179(4):194-201
Authors: Garety PA, Hemsley DR, Wessely S
Abstract
An experiment is described in which deluded subjects with a diagnosis of schizophrenia or of delusional disorder (paranoia) were compared with a nondeluded psychiatric control group and a normal control group on a probabilistic inference task. Factors relevant to belief formation and maintenance were investigated. Deluded subjects requested less information before reaching a decision and were more ready to change their estimates of the likelihood of an event when confronted with potentially disconfirmatory information. No differences were found between the two diagnostic groups of deluded subjects. The results are discussed in light of prevailing theories of the importance of abnormal experience rather than reasoning biases in the formation and maintenance of delusional beliefs. It is suggested that a reasoning abnormality is involved, which may coexist with perceptual abnormalities.
PMID: 2007889 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

*

belief formation neuropsychiatry - pubmed search     RSS

via pubmed: belief formation neu... by Gerrans P on 4/26/12
Delusions as performance failures.
Cogn Neuropsychiatry. 2001 Aug;6(3):161-73
Authors: Gerrans P
Abstract
UNLABELLED: Delusions are explanations of anomalous experiences. A theory of delusion requires an explanation of both the anomalous experience and the apparently irrational explanation generated by the delusional subject. Hence, we require a model of rational belief formation against which the belief formation of delusional subjects can be evaluated.
METHOD: I first describe such a model, distinguishing procedural from pragmatic rationality. Procedural rationality is the use of rules or procedures, deductive or inductive, that produce an inferentially coherent set of propositions. Pragmatic rationality is the use of procedural rationality in context. I then apply the distinction to the explanation of the Capgras and the Cotard delusions. I then argue that delusions are failures of pragmatic rationality. I examine the nature of these failures employing the distinction between performance and competence familiar from Chomskian linguistics.
RESULTS: This approach to the irrationality of delusions reconciles accounts in which the explanation of the anomalous experience exhausts the explanation of delusion, accounts that appeal to further deficits within the reasoning processes of delusional subjects, and accounts that argue that delusions are not beliefs at all. (Respectively, one-stage, two-stage, and expressive accounts.)
CONCLUSION: In paradigm cases that concern cognitive neuropsychiatry the irrationality of delusional subjects should be thought of as a performance deficit in pragmatic rationality.
PMID: 16571516 [PubMed]

via pubmed: belief formation neu... by Coltheart M on 4/26/12
Cognitive neuropsychiatry and delusional belief.
Q J Exp Psychol (Hove). 2007 Aug;60(8):1041-62
Authors: Coltheart M
Abstract
Cognitive neuropsychiatry is a new field of cognitive psychology which seeks to learn more about the normal operation of high-level aspects of cognition such as belief formation, reasoning, decision making, theory of mind, and pragmatics by studying people in whom such processes are abnormal. So far, the high-level cognitive process most widely studied in cognitive neuropsychiatry has been belief formation, investigated by examining people with delusional beliefs. This paper describes some of the forms of delusional belief that have been examined from this perspective and offers a general two-deficit cognitive-neuropsychiatric account of delusional belief.
PMID: 17654390 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Flaskerud JH.
Issues Ment Health Nurs. 2000 Jan-Feb;21(1):5-29. Review.
 

via pubmed: belief formation neu... by Ladowsky-Brooks R, Alcock JE on 4/26/12
Semantic-episodic interactions in the neuropsychology of disbelief.
Cogn Neuropsychiatry. 2007 Mar;12(2):97-111
Authors: Ladowsky-Brooks R, Alcock JE
Abstract
INTRODUCTION: The purpose of this paper is to outline ways in which characteristics of memory functioning determine truth judgements regarding verbally transmitted information.
METHOD: Findings on belief formation from several areas of psychology were reviewed in order to identify general principles that appear to underlie the designation of information in memory as "true" or "false".
RESULTS: Studies on belief formation have demonstrated that individuals have a tendency to encode information as "true" and that an additional encoding step is required to tag information as "false". This additional step can involve acquisition and later recall of semantic-episodic associations between message content and contextual cues that signal that information is "false". Semantic-episodic interactions also appear to prevent new information from being accepted as "true" through encoding bias or the assignment of a "false" tag to data that is incompatible with prior knowledge.
CONCLUSIONS: It is proposed that truth judgements are made through a combined weighting of the reliability of the information source and the compatibility of this information with already stored data. This requires interactions in memory. Failure to integrate different types of memories, such as semantic and episodic memories, can arise from mild hippocampal dysfunction and might result in delusions.
PMID: 17453893 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

via pubmed: belief formation neu... by Cashmore AR on 4/26/12
The Lucretian swerve: the biological basis of human behavior and the criminal justice system.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2010 Mar 9;107(10):4499-504
Authors: Cashmore AR
Abstract
It is widely believed, at least in scientific circles, that living systems, including mankind, obey the natural physical laws. However, it is also commonly accepted that man has the capacity to make "free" conscious decisions that do not simply reflect the chemical makeup of the individual at the time of decision--this chemical makeup reflecting both the genetic and environmental history and a degree of stochasticism. Whereas philosophers have discussed for centuries the apparent lack of a causal component for free will, many biologists still seem to be remarkably at ease with this notion of free will; and furthermore, our judicial system is based on such a belief. It is the author's contention that a belief in free will is nothing other than a continuing belief in vitalism--something biologists proudly believe they discarded well over 100 years ago.
PMID: 20142481 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
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A monothematic delusion is a delusional state that only concerns one particular topic. This is contrasted by what is sometimes called multi-thematic or polythematic delusions where the person has a range of delusions (typically the case of schizophrenia). These disorders can occur within the context of schizophrenia or dementia or they can occur without any other signs of mental illness. When these disorders are found outside the context of mental illness, they are often caused by organic disfunction as a result of traumatic brain injury, stroke, or neurological illness.
People who suffer from these delusions as a result of organic dysfunction often do not suffer from any obvious intellectual deficiency nor do they have any other symptoms. Additionally, a few of these people even have some awareness that their beliefs are bizarre, yet they cannot be persuaded that their beliefs are false.[citation needed]

[edit] Types

The delusions that fall under this category are:
  • Capgras delusion: the belief that (usually) a close relative or spouse has been replaced by an identical-looking impostor.
  • Fregoli delusion: the belief that various people who the believer meets are actually the same person in disguise.
  • Intermetamorphosis: the belief that people in one's environment swap identities with each other whilst maintaining the same appearance.
  • Subjective doubles: a person believes there is a doppelgänger or double of him or herself carrying out independent actions.
  • Cotard delusion: the belief that oneself is dead or does not exist; sometimes coupled with the belief that one is putrifying or missing internal organs.
  • Mirrored-self misidentification: the belief that one's reflection in a mirror is some other person.
  • Reduplicative paramnesia: the belief that a familiar person, place, object or body part has been duplicated. For example, a person may believe that they are in fact not in the hospital to which they were admitted, but in an identical-looking hospital in a different part of the country.
  • Somatoparaphrenia: the delusion where one denies ownership of a limb or an entire side of one's body (often connected with stroke).
  1. ^ Davies, M., Coltheart, M., Langdon, R., Breen, N. (2001). "Monothematic delusions: Towards a two-factor account" (PDF). Philosophy, Psychiatry and Psychology 8: 133–158. doi:10.1353/ppp.2001.0007. http://philrsss.anu.edu.au/~mdavies/papers/mono.pdf.
  2. ^ Sellen, J., Oaksford, M., Langdon, R., Gray, N. (2005). "Schizotypy and Conditional Reasoning". Schizophrenia Bulletin 31 (1): 105–116. doi:10.1093/schbul/sbi012. http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/31/1/105.
  3. ^ Dudley RE, John CH, Young AW, Over DE (May 1997). "Normal and abnormal reasoning in people with delusions". Br J Clin Psychol 36 (Pt 2): 243–58. PMID 9167864.
  4. ^ a b Stone, T. (2005). "Delusions and Belief Formation" (Powerpoint). http://www.lsbu.ac.uk/psycho/teaching/ppfiles/cicp-l5.ppt.
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