I absolutely agree with you, Gemma. I do think that many of these
children have "adapted"/adopted these skills as a result of their
experiences of life at many levels. Whilst, as you say, this has been a
much discussed point, it does not appear to be one which has produced a
meaningful resolution, as far as I am aware. Therefore, I welcome further
discussion as to how we can take the academic concept and apply it to the
complexities that affect everyday lives.
Elaine
> I also work in a child & family service and am aware of several of my
> colleagues struggling with the same dilemma as Elaine raised,
>
> However, my particular issue is how does a child reach a position in
> life where this kind of way of relating to the world becomes his only /
> best / most accessible solution?
>
> My guess would be that this has been largely via a range of external
> influences from the societal to the parental
>
> Then to say that the child themselves has a "disorder" because the way
> of relating that they have developed in order to survive does not prove
> "adaptive" seems false, unfair, even immoral to me
>
> I know this is an old point now, that has been much discussed, but
> surely we can find ways of providing help without having to use the
> labels?
>
> Gemma
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: The UK Community Psychology Discussion List
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Elaine Douglas
> Sent: 10 January 2008 13:11
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Screening of children
>
> David and John,
>
> I find David's viewpoint regarding the creation and application of
> medical
> labels as a means of controlling individuals persuasive and provides an
> alternative view of the issue from the mainstream and traditional.
> However, the complexities and difficulties for me to fully adopt this
> stance come from my interactions with some children who have been
> "labelled" ODD. I suppose, a difficulty in applying the concept to the
> child and family who are dealing with this on an everyday basis.
>
> Yes, I can see that there is a genuine case that the children are
> rebellious and defiant against the confines that, for example, school
> places upon them. However, many of the children that I have seen with
> this diagnosis are rebellious and defiant to a level that pervades
> almost
> every aspect of their lives and severely impacts their ability to have
> relationships, access to education and cuts them off from the kind of
> opportunities that are fought for under probably any kind of
> discrimination act that we can think of, whether it be disability,
> gender,
> race or age. Often the family are at a loss as to what to do and how to
> help their child - which, as you know, is where psychology comes in by
> providing access to 'help and support'. I do see that whilst psychology
> as a profession continues to provide this well-intentioned labelling
> service it maintains the status quo, but to remove this access to help
> and
> support without other changes in society, for example, alternative
> methods
> of accessing education etc, then the child and their family are left
> high
> and dry by everyone. The question arises for me, if we are indeed to
> take
> the stance and fight against the diagnosis and labelling of children,
> then
> how do we do so without denying support to the children and families
> who,
> with or without the label, desire it?
>
> Elaine
>
>
>
>> Dear John,
>>
>> Re "Well I actually might be interested in the reference if you have
> it
>> handy."
>>
>> The reference is: Nikolas Rose (1996) Inventing Our Selves:
> Psychology,
>> Power and Personhood. Cambridge University Press.
>>
>> The whole book is brilliant in my view but there will not be much new
> to
>> those familiar with Rose's important contributions to critical
> thinking
>> about psy, because versions of many of the chapter were previously
>> published as papers. Chapter 5 (Psychology as an Individualising
>> Technology) is especially relevant to the point in hand. Rose
> summarises
>> its contents thus: "In Chapter 5 I develop Michel Foucault's
> hypothesis
>> that all the disciplines bearing the prefix psy or psycho have their
>> origin in what he terms a reversal of the political axis of
>> individualisation. I examine the role of the psychological sciences as
>> techniques for the disciplining of human difference: individualising
>> humans through classifying them, calibrating their capacities and
>> conducts, inscribing and recording their attributes and deficiencies,
>> managing and utilising their individuality and variability" (page 19).
>> Rose's work and critical scholarship more broadly is hugely important
> to
>> community psychology, in my view, but usually difficult to access for
>> those who have been thoroughly disabled by acritical ways of thinking,
>> mainstream ways of learning and conventional understandings of
>> 'knowledge'. A key insight is that psy-disciplines do not come to know
>> about an independently existing world of psychological phenomena but
>> construct them and are best understand as part of the technology
> through
>> which people are governed.
>>
>> I note that you object to "the kind of certainties in this kind of
>> argument" on the basis of "the reality" (for you) (apparently without
>> irony) and that the 'reality' is that people's 'lives may be
> improved' by
>> labelling with disability, detaining them against their will in locked
>> wards and their generating profits for the pharmaceutical companies.
> Of
>> course, during slavery some argued that the 'reality' was that some
> human
>> beings' lives were improved by being labelled as 'slaves', detained
>> against their will and generating profits for plantation owners and
>> pointed out that some slaves were 'well kept', 'well dressed', 'well
> fed'
>> etc. Psy-technicians also colluded then of course as now. Samuel
>> Cartwright presented a paper to the Medical Association of Louisiana
> on
>> the 'disorder' drapetomania which had the "diagnostic symptom, the
>> absconding from service." Cartwright also 'discovered' a psychiatric
>> disease called dysaesthesia aethiopica which was responsible for
> laziness
>> amongst slaves. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drapetomania; Thank
> goodness
>> we don't live in such benighted times any more . . . oh what's that
> psy
>> technicians have come up with? Oppositional Defiant Conduct Disorder?
>>
>> "ODD is one of two potentially serious psychiatric disorders that may
> be
>> seen in up to 30 to 50 per cent of children with ADD (although both
> are
>> separate problems - they aren't caused by ADD). The other condition is
>> conduct disorder (CD). Both occur mostly in boys, but ODD is more
> common
>> than CD, appears at an earlier age and is generally less severe. The
> first
>> signs usually become apparent at about the age the child starts
> school,
>> about four or five. In the early stages it can be difficult to
> diagnose -
>> many children of this age have periods when they're negative, hostile
> or
>> defiant. However, when this behaviour persists while playmates leave
> it
>> behind them, the problem may become clearer. The American DSM criteria
> for
>> diagnosing ODD are:
>>
>> 1. A pattern of negative, hostile and defiant behaviour lasting at
> least
>> six months during which four or more of the following are present:
> often
>> loses temper, argues with adults, actively defies adults' requests,
>> deliberately annoys people, blames others, touchy or easily annoyed,
> angry
>> or resentful or spiteful or vindictive.
>> 2. This behaviour causes clinically significant impairment in
> social,
>> academic or occupational functioning.
>> 3. The behaviour doesn't exclusively occur during a psychotic or
> mood
>> disorder.
>> 4. The behaviour doesn't meet the criteria for conduct disorder or
>> antisocial personality disorder."
>>
>> http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/ask_the_doctor/odd.shtml
>>
>> BB Lahey, B Applegate, RA Barkley, B Garfinkel, K McBurnett, L Kerdyk,
> L
>> Greenhill, GW Hynd, PJ Frick and J Newcorn Am J Psychiatry 1994;
>> 151:1163-1171
>> DSM-IV field trials for oppositional defiant disorder and conduct
> disorder
>> in children and adolescents
>>
>> http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/151/8/1163
>>
>> David
>>
>> The reality for me is that I find the kind of certainties in this kind
>> of argument unconvincing as my own experiences is that the "procedure
>> through which psy-technicians create and reinforce ideologies of
>> Normality" sometimes actually works out quite well for all its faults.
> A
>> pros and cons argument if you like. People may be helped, their lives
>> may be improved, resources may become available (such as for some
>> children labelled with a something like Aspergers). Incidentally I
> feel
>> the same way about compulsory detention and treatment and even about
>> "big Pharma".
>>
>> My point is that these issues seem to me to often be ambigious and
> there
>> are useful aspects in all of the things which you have dismissed. I am
>> aware of many of the problems you suggest and of the way in which
>> individuals use and misuse labels, treratments without regard to the
>> complexities. The's just it really. It is a complex reality My
> problem
>> with the argument initially put forward is that that It seems to me
> that
>> the desirability/morality/utility of any such processes seems (and
>> correct me if I'm wrong) deemed worthless for ideological reasons.
>>
>> John
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: David Fryer [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
>> Sent: 09 January 2008 15:28
>> To: [log in to unmask]; McGowan John (Sussex Partnership
>> Trust)
>> Subject: Re: Screening of children
>>
>> Re "I can help feeling that banning screening (or diagnostic
> labelling)
>> is
>> a rather unsophisticated response to a complex issue."
>>
>> One objection to such screening (and its associated rag bag of normal
>> distributions of psychological variables, norms etc) is that it is a
>> procedure through which psy-technicians create and reinforce
> ideologies
>> of
>> normality which then open the way for the 'ab'-normal to be
> constructed
>> as
>> disability (and via dominant medical models) positioned as in need
>> of 'treatment' through medication which creates bigger and bigger and
>> more
>> lucrative markets of consumers for big pharma. Banning screening could
>> be
>> argued to be a sophisticated response to the psy-complex issue. Nik
> Rose
>> argues the important part of this more fully and coherently if you are
>> interested (and also if you are not interested).
>>
>> Help us to be the best we can be ...
>>
>> Become a member of Sussex Partnership and help us to fight stigma and
>> raise the profile of mental wellbeing.
>>
>> Visit our Foundation Trust membership web page for more information
> and a
>> membership application form.
>>
>>
> ************************************************************************
> *
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>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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