Antisocial Problems Research Articles

Psychiatric Problems in Women Admitted to an Alcoholic Detoxification Center

The authors studied 293 consecutive female admissions to a public detoxification facility. One-half had a primary diagnosis of alcoholism; the rest had primary diagnosis of affective disorder (14%), antisocial personality (14%), drug abuse (6%) or did not meet the criteria for alcoholism (13%). Each subgroup had unique social backgrounds and characteristic histories of involvement with alcohol, drugs, and antisocial problems. The primary alcoholic woman in the detoxification center resembles the primary alcoholic man in the same setting. The authors underscore the importance of socioeconomic strata and primary versus secondary diagnosis in understanding the prognosis for alcoholics.

Drug Abuse Among Alcoholic Women

Of 293 women in an alcoholic treatment center, two-thirds have received prescriptions for drugs of potential abuse, usually hypnotic and antianxiety drugs. One-third of the women admitted abusing substances; 80% of these subjects got prescriptions for potential drugs of abuse while actively abusing. These figures are alarming in light of the lack of evidence that antianxiety drugs, hypnotics, and stimulants are effective in treating alcoholics and drug abusers. Drug-misusing women in this sample reported more suicide attempts and early antisocial problems and had received more psychiatric care than nonabusers. The authors urge that hypnotics, antianxiety drugs, and stimulants almost never be prescribed to outpatient alcoholics and that analgesics be prescribed only with great care.

Features of children taken to juvenile court for failure to attend school.

The social reports on 84 children taken to court for failure to attend school were studied. Independent raters were able to assess reliably the presence and absence of a variety of variables concerned with the individual's behaviour, school, family, and involvement with social work agencies. In 68 instances teacher's questionnaires measuring psychiatric disturbance had been completed. There was no evidence that truancy in these circumstances is a homogenous condition. At least 3 independent sets of features appear to be involved in most cases. One involves antisocial and educational problems ('clinical truancy'), a second is concerned with adverse social factors and parental complicity ('school withdrawal'), and a third set includes a tendency to social isolation ('school refusal'). There was no evidence that individuals tend to exhibit one of these features to the exclusion of the others.

Family history as a diagnostic aid in two samples of adolescents.

Psychiatric diagnostic patterns were examined in two different samples of adolescents, one a group of psychiatric inpatients and the second youth apprehended by the law for alcohol-related difficulties. Affective disorder in parents was most closely correlated with a similar patient diagnosis or constellation of depressive-type symptoms in both samples of youth. Parental antisocial personalities, alcohol abuse, or drug problems correlated most closely with high levels of similar difficulties in individuals in the two studied groups. However, antisocial, alcohol, or drug problems of a mild degree were present in all subgroups of the two samples, perhaps representing a nonspecific reaction to parental illness or the occurrence of a broken home. A follow-up of future problems in both samples will be carried out to determine the importance of the family history and clinical picture in predicting the future course of problems.

Problems of Inpatient Treatment of Addiction

There are many problems encountered in the inpatient treatment of addiction. Because drugs provide emotional and physical comfort, the addict has mixed feelings about cure. There is another complexity of addiction, in that it is often a part of a rather broad antisocial problem. In treating addiction the characterologic problem of delinquency also requires treatment, and both aspects are chronic problems. Fortunately, both have a tendency to be self-limiting in duration. Meanwhile treatment presents frustrations to the professional. The addict is immature, demanding, manipulating, he is often intolerant of personal discomfort and he has difficulty in postponing gratification and' in forming deep human relationships. Where the addict appears in treatment, contraband drugs tend to appear and security measures are required during detoxification and also during the continuing period of treatment. Medical problems include the fact that many addicts have combined addiction; they are dependent upon opiates and a...

The relation of childhood behavior problems to adult psychiatric status: a 30-year follow-up study of 150 subjects.

1. A preliminary report of the first 150 interviewed subjects in a long-term (30-year) follow-up study has been presented. This report emphasizes the adult psychiatric diagnoses and their relation to childhood problems. 2. Patients referred to a child guidance clinic 30 years ago were found to have a high rate of psychiatric disease as adults as compared with a matched group of normal controls. They differed little from the normal controls in their rate of neurotic reactions but presented many cases of sociopathic personalities, psychotic reactions, and alcoholism. 3. The patients who contributed primarily to the diagnosis of sociopathic personality were those who had been juvenile delinquents as children. Many of those who were psychotic as adults had a history of anti-social behavior in childhood without court hearings. Patients who were psychiatrically well as adults came mainly from the group with neurotic problems as children. The relations between the specific presenting problem and the adult psychiatric disease show that the well group was characterized by problems such as fighting, sex problems, tantrums, and the classic neurotic traits of childhood. 4. While children with neurotic problems came from families of better socio-economic background than children with anti-social problems and delinquency, class background was not found to account for the greater proportion of psychiatrically well as adults among the subjects who had had neurotic problems in childhood. 5. While patients had a higher rate of broken homes than controls, broken homes were not found to be related to the continuance of psychiatric problems into adult life. 6. Although the rate of psychiatric disease is very high in the patient group, very few of them have sought any psychiatric help.