Science has spoken: Tell the truth on Facebook or risk your reputation

Humble behavior equals better impressions

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON

 

IMAGE: ADAM FETTERMAN, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF PSYCHOLOGY AND DIRECTOR OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON PERSONALITY, EMOTION, AND SOCIAL COGNITION LAB, FOUND THAT THE BEST COURSE OF ACTION ON SOCIAL MEDIA IS TO BE HUMBLE AND PUBLICLY ADMIT YOU ARE WRONG IF YOU ARE. view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON

Online social networks (OSN) like Facebook and Twitter have created a space for people to easily express their opinions, which can encourage open dialogue and stimulate plenty of disagreements. Research now reveals that just like in face-to-face relationships, intellectually humble behavior, like admitting when you are wrong, leads to better impression formation online. 

“Willingness to engage in wrongness admission is positively correlated with agreeableness, openness to experience, honesty/humility and emotional intelligence,” reports Adam Fetterman, assistant professor of psychology and director of the Personality, Emotion, and Social Cognition Lab at the University of Houston in the journal Social Psychology. “With potentially hundreds (or more, depending on their privacy settings) of passive witnesses, the user can admit that they are wrong or avoid doing so. We found that the OSN user’s best course of action, here, is to publicly admit that they are wrong.” 

In other words, like the old statesman Benjamin Franklin advised in the 1700’s, ‘Honesty is the best policy,’ at least if you want people to think well of you online.  

In four experiments, participants read a staged argument on a Facebook wall – a section of Facebook that allows users to post information and engage in discussion – between two users. The argument was focused on a made-up food additive and reflected common themes of health food discourse on OSNs at the time of the study to increase realism. 

The final post by Participant A contained the manipulation. In one (admission) condition, Participant A ended the conversation by posting, “…I guess I am wrong and you are right on this. Thanks for posting those links and thanks for the conversation!” In the other (refuse) condition, Participant A ended the conversation by posting, “…I still think I am right and you are wrong. Thanks for posting those links and thanks for the conversation!”  

“Those who witnessed an OSN user engage in wrongness admission rated that user as higher in communion and competence traits compared witnessing a user not engaging in wrongness admission,” said Fetterman. “Furthermore, we found that those in the wrongness admission condition were more likely to indicate interest in interacting with the admitting user compared to those in the nonadmission conditions.” 

Humans have an inherent need to form and maintain relationships but forming them online can be tricky with people gathering information about you based merely on textual and pictorial information posted.  

“People tend to form the most positive impressions for those on OSNs who display communal, open and humble online behaviors,” said Fetterman. “Wrongness admission serves as a cue of intellectual humility, communion, and competence. Although the admitter is telling onlookers that they have been incompetent in this instance, it suggests that they are willing to work together and that they are competent enough to recognize faulty knowledge and change it.” 

In a humorous ending to the research report, Fetterman concludes: “Therefore, wrongness admission on OSNs appears to lead to better impression formation outcomes than not admitting. At least, that is what we can conclude until someone provides evidence that we are wrong.  

If such a time comes, we will never admit it.” 

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JOURNAL

Social Psychology

ARTICLE TITLE

When You Are Wrong on Facebook, Just Admit It

PRISON NATION USA

Punishments for violating supervised release may violate constitutional rights

New legal analysis finds that revocation of supervised release is often used as an alternative to prosecution and a tool of immigration enforcement

Peer-Reviewed Publication

PENN STATE

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — People who violate their supervised release — a period of community supervision after release from prison — by committing new crimes are punished not only for their crimes, but also for violating their supervision. In a new paper to be published in the Virginia Law Review, Jacob Schuman, assistant professor of law, Penn State, conducted the first comprehensive examination of how revocation of supervised release for new criminal conduct contributes to mass incarceration — a term referring to the high rates of incarceration in the United States. He also investigates how these punishments are used as a tool of immigration enforcement.

“Every year, approximately 50,000 federal prisoners finish their prison sentences and begin serving terms of supervised release, with the average term of post-release supervision lasting 47 months,” said Schuman. “Approximately one-third of these defendants are eventually found in violation of their supervised release and sent back to prison — about half the time for non-criminal conduct, like missing a meeting or skipping curfew (technical violations), and the other half for new crimes, which I call ‘criminal violations.’” 

What’s unique about criminal violations, Schuman explained, is that they are also punishable through criminal prosecution. By revoking supervised release for criminal violations in addition to prosecuting them, the government can add years to people’s sentences, sometimes even doubling them.

For example, Schuman, who was a public defender in Philadelphia prior to joining the faculty at Penn State, described a case in which he represented a woman who was addicted to drugs and was selling them to support her habit. The woman was sentenced to four years in prison, along with four years of supervised release.

“During her supervised release, she was again caught selling drugs,” said Schuman, “so she received a new sentence of four years for selling the drugs, along with another four years in prison for violating her supervised release, for a total of eight years in state and federal prisons. In other words, her sentence was effectively doubled.”

In his research, Schuman examined (1) the extent to which criminal violations of supervised release contribute to incarceration, (2) the ways that revocations of supervised release may be used as an additional justification for punishing criminal conduct and as an easier alternative to criminal prosecution and (3) the use of supervised release as a tool of immigration enforcement.

According to Schuman, advocates for criminal justice reform typically focus on technical violations because they involve less serious conduct. However, he said, focusing only on technical violations misses a major part of the story. Criminal violations, his research revealed, contribute the majority of prison time imposed through revocation of supervised release. Despite the violations being more aggravated, he argued, the punishment still warrants examination for constitutionality and fairness.

To determine the amount of punishment resulting from criminal violations, Schuman examined data from the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s first report on supervised release violations, published in July 2020. The report gathered data from more than 100,000 revocation hearings in federal district courts between 2013 and 2017. By analyzing these data, Schuman found that criminal violations accounted for two-thirds of the total prison time imposed.

“This equates to about 8,200 years of imprisonment imposed by federal judges annually through revocations of supervised release for criminal violations, on top of the many years of imprisonment imposed through prosecutions for the crimes themselves,” said Schuman. “In my paper, I argue that these revocations inflict unfair double punishment and erode constitutional rights.”

Schuman noted that the government may use revocation of supervised release as an easier alternative to criminal prosecution. For example, Schuman described a case in which a man on supervised release was prosecuted for assault and won at trial with a “not guilty” verdict.  Nevertheless, the court still revoked the man’s supervised release as a way to send him back to prison. “The fact that a jury is required to try a criminal case but not to revoke supervised release raises serious questions about the constitutionality of the supervised-release system.”

Indeed, Schuman referenced a 2019 decision by the Supreme Court, United States v. Haymond, which struck down a five-year mandatory minimum sentence for sex offenders who violated their supervised release by committing a new sex crime. In that case, the Supreme Court concluded that the minimum sentence was unconstitutional because it “more closely resemble[d] the punishment of new criminal offenses, but without granting a defendant the rights, including the jury right, that attend a new criminal prosecution.”

Schuman said one area where revocation of community supervision is often used as an alternative to prosecution is in immigration enforcement. He explained that just like U.S. citizen criminal defendants, non-citizen defendants can also be sentenced to a term of supervised release to follow imprisonment. Yet under U.S. immigration law, these defendants are also very likely to be deported from the United States after they are released from prison. The reason for sentencing them to supervised release, according to the courts, is that if they attempt to return the United States, they can be punished for violating their supervised release.

“My analysis of the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s database revealed that revocations of illegal reentry accounts for up to one-third of all revocations along the U.S.-Mexico border and one-third of revocations for criminal violations nationally, making it among the most commonly punished criminal violations of supervised release. This suggests that supervised release is being used not only as a program of surveillance, but also as a tool of immigration enforcement.”

Schuman said the original purpose of the supervised release system was to help individuals reintegrate into society as constructive individuals, but his findings suggest that the system is instead often used as a tool for punishing criminal conduct. He concluded, “I propose that the Sentencing Commission stop recommending consecutive sentences for criminal violations, and that the Department of Justice should instruct federal prosecutors not to use revocation as an alternative to criminal prosecution except to prevent an imminent public safety threat.”

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JOURNAL

Virginia Law Review

A unique machine-learning model predicts homelessness among US soldiers before their transition to civilian life

A study by a Mass General-led team could lead to more targeted strategies to prevent homelessness among military personnel

Peer-Reviewed Publication

MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL

BOSTON –Researchers led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Harvard Medical School (HMS) have found that lifetime depression, trauma of having a loved one murdered, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are the three greatest predictors of homelessness among U.S. Army soldiers after transitioning to civilian life. Their study, published in American Journal of Preventive Medicine, used an innovative machine-learning approach to accurately predict which military personnel are at greatest risk and should therefore be targeted with specific interventions to mitigate their chances of becoming homeless.

“We’ve long been limited in our ability to predict and prevent homelessness because most approaches have been focused on helping people after they’ve become homeless, rather than taking action before it ever occurs,” says lead author Katherine Koh, MD, an investigator at MGH and for the Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program. “Our prediction model is highly actionable and we’re now designing an intervention that links the most vulnerable soldiers to support services before their active duty ends, then follows them over time.”

Currently, there are an estimated 40,000 homeless veterans in the U.S., comprising eight percent of the homeless population. In 2009, the Obama administration announced a national initiative to end veteran homelessness within five years, committing significant federal resources to the effort. While homelessness has decreased about 50 percent since then, veterans remain disproportionately represented in the homeless population, and in 2020 the number of homeless veterans increased for the first time in years.

As part of their study, MGH and other academic partners drew on data from nearly 17,000 soldiers between 2011 and 2014 as part of the Army’s STARRS-LS study, which asked questions about housing history, adverse childhood experiences, traumatic events or stressors in their lives, and physical and mental health problems. Using machine-learning versus traditional statistical methodology, researchers coded the responses to establish a model to predict who might be at greatest risk of homelessness. Of the approximately 2,000 predictor variables the model considered, self-reported lifetime histories of depression, trauma of having a loved one murdered, and post-traumatic stress disorder were found to be the strongest predictors.

“For the first time we’re applying to homelessness a ‘personalized medicine approach’ that leverages differences in an individual’s biology, lifestyle and environment to determine who is at greatest risk with a higher degree of precision than ever before,” notes Ronald Kessler, PhD, a nationally recognized sociologist and senior author of the study. Plans call for giving soldiers nearing the end of their active duty questionnaires, he adds, that would help the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to identify and proactively target at-risk soldiers with case management intervention.

“The presence of veterans among the homeless population in this country is still regarded by many as a matter of public shame, and for decades wasn’t given the attention it deserves,” says Koh. “Our collaborative work is directly addressing that problem, and we believe utilizing prediction models such as the one we’ve developed could play a role in preventing homelessness not only among veterans, but also other high-risk populations.”

Koh is an instructor in the Department of Psychiatry at MGH and Harvard Medical School. Kessler is professor of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School. Co-authors include Murray Stein, MD, MPH, professor of Psychiatry and Public Health and vice-chair for Clinical Research in Psychiatry at University of California San Diego, and Robert Ursano, MD, professor of Psychiatry and Neuroscience at Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences.

The study was funded by HHS, NIH, National Institute of Mental Health (NIH/NIMH), and the Department of Defense.

About the Massachusetts General Hospital

Massachusetts General Hospital, founded in 1811, is the original and largest teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School. The Mass General Research Institute conducts the largest hospital-based research program in the nation, with annual research operations of more than $1 billion and comprises more than 9,500 researchers working across more than 30 institutes, centers and departments. In August 2021, Mass General was named #5 in the U.S. News & World Report list of "America’s Best Hospitals." MGH is a founding member of the Mass General Brigham healthcare system.

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DOI

10.1016/j.amepre.2021.12.028 

ARTICLE TITLE

Predicting Homelessness Among U.S. Army Soldiers No Longer on Active Duty

Why is the 100-year-old BCG vaccine so broadly protective in newborns?

Study finds changes in metabolite and lipid profiles, providing clues for designing future vaccines for newborns

Peer-Reviewed Publication

BOSTON CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL

The century-old Bacille Calmette-Guérin (BCG) vaccine against tuberculosis is one of the world’s oldest and most widely used vaccines, used to immunize 100 million newborns every year. Given in countries with endemic TB, it has surprisingly been found to protect newborns and young infants against multiple bacterial and viral infections unrelated to TB. There’s even some evidence that it can reduce severity of COVID-19.

What’s special about BCG vaccine? How does it protect infants so broadly? It turns out little is known. To understand its mechanism of action, researchers at the Precision Vaccines Program at Boston Children’s Hospital partnered with the Expanded Program on Immunization Consortium (EPIC), an international team studying early life immunization, to collect and comprehensively profile blood samples from newborns immunized with BCG, using a powerful “big data” approach.

Their study, published online May 3 in Cell Reports, found that the BCG vaccine induces specific changes in metabolites and lipids that correlate with innate immune system responses. The findings provide clues toward making other vaccines more effective in vulnerable populations with distinct immune systems, such as newborns.

Small babies, big data

First author Joann Diray Arce, PhD, and her colleagues began with blood samples from low-birthweight newborns in Guinea Bissau who were enrolled in a randomized clinical trial to receive BCG either at birth or after a delay of six weeks. Both groups had small blood samples taken at four weeks (after BCG was given to the first group, and before it was given to the second group).

Using metabolomics and lipidomics, the team comprehensively profiled the impact of BCG immunization on the newborns’ blood plasma. They found that BCG vaccines given at birth changed metabolite and lipid profiles in newborns’ blood plasma in a pattern distinct from those in the delayed-vaccine group. The changes correlated with changes in cytokine production, a key feature of innate immunity.

The researchers had parallel findings when they tested BCG in cord blood samples from a cohort of Boston newborns and samples from a separate NIH/NIAID-funded Human Immunology Project Consortium study of newborns in The Gambia and Papua New Guinea.

“We now have some lipid and metabolic biomarkers of vaccine protection that we can test and manipulate in mouse models,” says Arce. “We studied three different BCG formulations and showed that they converge on similar pathways of interest. Reshaping of the metabolome by BCG may contribute to the molecular mechanisms of a newborn’s immune response.”

“A growing number of studies show that BCG vaccine protects against unrelated infections,” says Ofer Levy, MD, PhD, director of the Precision Vaccines Program and the study’s senior investigator. “It’s critical that we learn from BCG to better understand how to protect newborns. BCG is an ‘old school’ vaccine — it’s made from a live, weakened germ — but live vaccines like BCG seem to activate the immune system in a very different way in early life, providing broad protection against a range of bacterial and viral infections. There’s much work ahead to better understand that and use that information to build better vaccines for infants.”

The study was supported by the NIAID (U19AI118608, U01 AI124284), the Precision Vaccines Program at Boston Children’s Hospital, and the Mueller Health Foundation. Levy is a named inventor on several Boston Children's Hospital patents relating to human microphysiologic assay systems and vaccine adjuvants. Coauthors Scott McCulloch and Greg Michelotti are employees of Metabolon Inc. The other authors declare no competing financial interests.

About Boston Children’s Hospital

Boston Children’s Hospital is ranked the #1 children’s hospital in the nation by U.S. News & World Report and is the primary pediatric teaching affiliate of Harvard Medical School. Home to the world’s largest research enterprise based at a pediatric medical center, its discoveries have benefited both children and adults since 1869. Today, 3,000 researchers and scientific staff, including 10 members of the National Academy of Sciences, 25 members of the National Academy of Medicine and 10 Howard Hughes Medical Investigators comprise Boston Children’s research community. Founded as a 20-bed hospital for children, Boston Children’s is now a 415-bed comprehensive center for pediatric and adolescent health care. For more, visit our Answers blog and follow us on social media @BostonChildrens, @BCH_Innovation, Facebook and YouTube.

The Precision Vaccines Program fosters collaboration among academia, government and industry to develop next generation vaccines to protect vulnerable populations. Follow PVP on social media: @PrecVaccines.

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JOURNAL

Cell Reports

DOI

10.1016/j.celrep.2022.110772 

COI STATEMENT

Ofer Levy is a named inventor on several Boston Children's Hospital patents relating to human microphysiologic assay systems and vaccine adjuvants. Coauthors Scott McCulloch and Greg Michelotti are employees of Metabolon Inc. The other authors declare no competing financial interests.

Outcomes of menthol cigarette ban among youth in England

JAMA Network Open

Peer-Reviewed Publication

JAMA NETWORK

About The Study: This survey study of more than 7,000 smokers ages 16 to 19 found that the menthol cigarette ban in England was associated with a substantial decrease in the proportion who smoke menthol cigarettes, while the rate remained stable among youth in Canada and the United States.

Authors: Katherine A. East, Ph.D., of King’s College London, is the corresponding author.

To access the embargoed study: Visit our For The Media website at this link https://media.jamanetwork.com/ 

(doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.10029)

Editor’s Note: Please see the article for additional information, including other authors, author contributions and affiliations, conflict of interest and financial disclosures, and funding and support.

#  #  #

Embed this link to provide your readers free access to the full-text article This link will be live at the embargo time http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.10029?utm_source=For_The_Media&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=ftm_links&utm_term=050322

About JAMA Network Open: JAMA Network Open is the new online-only open access general medical journal from the JAMA Network. On weekdays, the journal publishes peer-reviewed clinical research and commentary in more than 40 medical and health subject areas. Every article is free online from the day of publication.

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JOURNAL

JAMA Network Open

China’s segregated school system hinders migrants

Book Announcement

CORNELL UNIVERSITY

ITHACA, N.Y. -- 

When Eli Friedman set out to write his second book, he intended to focus on the segregated education system in China and how it affected teachers’ work, but quickly found that the project moved in an unexpected direction.

“When I started talking to teachers about their work, it just brought up so many other problems,” said Friedman, associate professor and chair of international and comparative labor in the ILR School. “They talked about normal workplace concerns around wages and working hours, but also the bigger problems that really had to do with a broader social environment and the fact that the government was taking all of these steps to make their lives extremely difficult – both the teachers and the families that they were serving.”

“The Urbanization of People,” to be released in May by the Columbia University Press, reveals how cities in China have granted public goods to the privileged while condemning poor and working-class migrants to insecurity, constant mobility and degraded educational opportunities.

“In China, the public schools are the good schools and the private schools are the bad ones,” Friedman said. “For people excluded from public schools, there is a shadow education system – private schools that receive little or no money from the government. They are totally dependent on tuition, but they serve a poor population, so they operate under unbelievably tight financial constraints.”

Using the schools as a backdrop, Friedman investigates how the state manages flows of people into the city, often by limiting educational opportunities to the children of “migrants” – rural Chinese that move to the large cities for better work opportunities. There are now nearly 300 million such migrants in China who are living outside of their place of official registration, which means they can be denied access to social services.

“In 2014, the government established this ‘population redline’ of 23 million for Beijing and basically told local government officials that they need to find ways of getting rid of some of the ‘less desirable’ people in the cities,” said Friedman. “And they used all kinds of mechanisms, including relocating labor-intensive industries outside of the city, demolishing whole informal settlements, but also demolishing or closing the schools and making it harder for the children of people who are from rural areas to get into public schools within the city and thereby believing, correctly I think, that if the children can’t get into schools, the parents will have to leave.”

Friedman conducted roughly 250 interviews with teachers and migrants in Beijing, as well as in the city of Guangzhou in the south, the city of Guiyang in the southwest, and the city of Chengdu in the western part of the country.

Through his research, Friedman found that when private schools shut down, migrant parents are left in a precarious position. If the parents are lucky, they might find another neighborhood school to take their children. The other options are to move somewhere else – which can affect their work – or to send the children back to the rural area to live with extended family – which has created the phenomenon of nearly 60 million “left behind children” who are living without their parents.

“You set up your life in a particular way and need it to continue that way,” Friedman said. “And if one of legs of that table falls, then everything can collapse.”

Friedman’s first book, “Insurgency Trap: Labor Politics in Postsocialist China,” published in 2014, explored Chinese state-labor relations. Through that book, he first began to hear the concerns of migrant parents.

“In talking to a lot of migrant workers for my first project, their biggest concerns were often not what was happening in the workplace, but about getting their kids into school,” Friedman said. “If you have kids, in order for your life to feel stabilized, you need a job and you need enough money to pay the rent, but you also need to feel like your kids have a future in the place that you live. So oftentimes, education was their bigger concern.

“The migrant workers that are the thread that connects these two projects.”

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Mental illness plays havoc with the mind as well as the heart

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA

University of South Australia scientists have uncovered another reason why society should be paying more attention to mental health: it is closely aligned to blood pressure and heart rate variations.

A new study published in BioMedical Engineering draws a link between mental illness and widely fluctuating blood pressure, which can lead to cardiovascular disease and organ damage.

UniSA researcher Dr Renly Lim and colleagues from Malaysian universities say there is clear evidence that mental illness interferes with the body’s autonomic functions, including blood pressure, heart rate, temperature and breathing.

“We reviewed 12 studies on people with anxiety, depression and panic disorders and found that, regardless of age, mental illness is significantly associated with greater blood pressure variations during the day,” Dr Lim says.

“We also found that for people who are mentally ill, their heart rate does not adapt to external stressors as it should.

“Contrary to what many people think, a healthy heart is not one that beats like a metronome. Instead, it should adjust to withstand environmental and psychological challenges. A constantly changing heart rate is actually a sign of good health.”

Reduced heart rate variation (HRV) is common in people with mental illness and indicates that the body’s stress response is poor, exacerbating the negative effects of chronic stress.

Unlike a person’s heart rate – how many times a heart beats in a minute – which is usually consistent, HRV is more complex and is the time between two heartbeats, which should change according to external stressors.

“What we aim for is not a constantly changing heart rate but a high heart rate variation. This is achieved through a healthy diet, exercise, low stress and good mental health.”

Low HRV occurs when a person’s body is in fight-or-flight mode, easily stressed and common in people with chronic diseases, including cardiovascular and mental health problems.

While large blood pressure variations (BPV) during the day are not ideal, at night the systolic pressure should dip by between 10-20 per cent to allow the heart to rest. The researchers found that in people with mental health issues, their blood pressure does not drop sufficiently at night.

The reduced dipping – under 10 per cent – can be caused by many factors, including autonomic dysfunction, poor quality of sleep and disrupted circadian rhythms that regulate the sleep-wake cycle.

“The takeout from this study is that we need to pay more attention to the physical impacts of mental illness,” Dr Lim says.

“It is a major global burden, affecting between 11-18 per cent (one billion) of people worldwide. Since mental illness can contribute to the deterioration of heart and blood pressure regulation, early therapeutic intervention is essential.”

 

Notes for editors

“Association between mental illness and blood pressure variability: a systematic review” is published in BioMedical Engineering. For a copy of the paper, email candy.gibson@unisa.edu.au

The research was undertaken at the University of Malaya, University of South Australia, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, and Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman.

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JOURNAL

BioMedical Engineering OnLine

DOI

10.1186/s12938-022-00985-w 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Meta-analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Association between mental illness and blood pressure variability: a systematic review

How can mental health professionals open their minds to psychosis?

(READ R D LAING'S MICROACID SESSIONS WITH PATIENTS)

Peer-Reviewed Publication

UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM

Effective clinical care for patients with psychosis means understanding the ‘lived experience’ of their delusions, say researchers at the Universities of Birmingham, York and Melbourne.

By understanding the intricacies of feelings, attitudes, and experiences which are interlinked with delusions, clinicians will be better able to build trust and genuine engagement with patients.

In a new study, published today (4 May 2022) in The Lancet Psychiatry, researchers collated and reviewed first-hand accounts of the experience of delusions from patients with psychosis in mental health settings. In their review, the team used a new methodological approach informed by philosophy to combine and synthesis all the available qualitative evidence. The team then developed a new model to better understand how delusions emerge and are shaped by different contexts from multiple levels of explanation.

The authors examined the experiences of more than 370 patients, described in 24 different scientific studies and found a number of themes that were common across all the studies.

For most participants, for example, delusions were not just a symptom of illness or an irrational belief. Delusions often were the most compelling way that the person could make sense of their life, in the context of a radical alteration of reality and intense emotions. While the experience could be hostile, sparking fear or panic, individuals could also experience awe or wonder, or deep meaning in their delusions.

When reality is altered in this way, individuals can struggle to make sense of their own identity, experiencing self-doubt or a loss of control or, conversely, the feeling that they are someone special, or with a unique purpose. In the latter case, the delusional experience seemed to provide a sense of coherence, purpose and belonging at a time of intense life stress and can therefore be interpreted as temporarily adaptive or beneficial.

“These experiences are complex and nuanced,” said lead author Dr Rosa Ritunnano, consultant psychiatrist and researcher at the University of Birmingham’s Institute for Mental Health and the University of Melbourne. “When we train clinicians in treating psychosis, we need to ensure they are going beyond ‘correcting’ a dysfunction or ‘curing’ a symptom. Instead, by trying to understand how the delusion is shaped by the patient’s emotions, life experiences and socio-cultural contexts, we can devise treatment and support that is more relevant to the individual.”

The approach has particular resonance for situations in which a patient may be detained without their consent with the aim of protecting themselves from harm. The number of patients detained in this way has been steadily rising for several years, with particular ethnic groups and those with learning disabilities being particularly impacted in this process.

“One of the main issues is that all too often, the patient’s voice is lost within the process of trying to help them,” says Dr Clara Humpston, one of the senior authors on the paper. “Carers, clinicians and family members all have a challenging task in learning how to listen. That means accepting that there may not be a shared view of reality, but the patient’s experience is still true and valid, and ought not to be silenced.”

 

 

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JOURNAL

The Lancet Psychiatry

DOI

10.1016/S2215-0366(22)00104-3 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

Subjective experience and meaning of delusions in psychosis: a systematic review and qualitative evidence synthesis

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

3-May-2022

Prison must not be ‘default option’ to cover up lack of support in care system and community

Girls and women who have been through the care system should be diverted away from custodial sentences into community alternatives wherever possible, says a new report published today.

Reports and Proceedings

LANCASTER UNIVERSITY

Girls and women who have been through the care system should be diverted away from custodial sentences into community alternatives wherever possible, says a new report published today.

And, adds the study, moves to prevent the criminalisation of girls in care need to be high on the agenda for change.

‘Disrupting the Routes between Care and Custody for Girls and Women’ is a hard-hitting report by Dr Claire Fitzpatrick and Dr Katie Hunter, from the Centre for Child and Family Justice Research at Lancaster University, Dr Julie Shaw, of Liverpool John Moores University, and Dr Jo Staines, of the University of Bristol.

Funded by the Nuffield Foundation, and launched at an online event today, the research explores the neglected experiences of imprisoned women from care, as well as those of care-experienced girls and young women in the community with youth justice system contact. As a minority within the justice system, girls and women are particularly likely to have their needs overlooked.

This study reveals how girls in care may experience ‘over-scrutiny’ in some care settings, leading to their unnecessary criminalisation, which contrasts directly to the lack of support they may face in relation to experiences of victimisation, leaving care support and imprisonment.

Highlighting evidence of the ‘immense harm’ that can come from imprisonment, the report states: “Prison must cease to be a default option when the lack of support in care and the community essentially helps to reproduce the well-trodden routes between care and custody”.

It also urges ‘far greater recognition’ of the profound impact of imprisonment across the generations, particularly on care-experienced mothers.

The research team call on local authorities, including Directors of Children’s Services, as well as Chief Constables, to renew their commitment to procedures aimed at preventing unnecessary criminalisation of children in care.

Despite increased recognition of this problem, and ongoing efforts to prevent it, police call-outs for minor incidents in some care homes remains a risk for some children.

As 18-year old study interviewee ‘Ellie’ said: “There’s still this stigma within the care system of you are in care, therefore every minor accident you have…is clearly intentional… let’s get you arrested.”  

The study found that girls in care who are in conflict with the law may be stigmatised not just because of their care status but also because of negative judgements relating to their gender or ethnicity.

There is also a serious need to recognise the limits of official files which could lead to negative perceptions of individuals. Girls and women felt strongly that they wanted workers to look beyond their official histories, avoid over-reliance on their files, and take time to get to know them and the context of their lives. 

Interviews were undertaken with 37 care-experienced women from across three prisons in England and 17 care-experienced girls and young women in the community across England who had also had youth justice involvement.

Many participants described backgrounds of abuse, serious violence and trauma, and had multiple experiences of victimisation throughout their lives. Violence and abuse at home was the most common reason reported for entering the care system. 

Over a third of care-experienced participants reported their first justice system contact occurred whilst in care. Of these, 11 were in children’s homes at the time of this contact, and over-criminalisation for minor offences in children’s homes was a common theme.

An escalation in offence seriousness was a feature of many women’s lives. For some, offending behaviour worsened after the ‘cliff edge’ of support after leaving care.

The research also includes interviews with 40 professionals who work with care-experienced women and girls, with expertise stemming from across a range of professional spheres.

 These interviews highlighted a commitment to diverting children from the youth justice system, and a recognition that this needed to involve far more than just avoiding prosecution.

Meanwhile, care-experienced girls and women reported that trusted relationships were key for providing and receiving support. Promoting such relationships requires going beyond the basics of providing accommodation, to being trauma responsive, supporting staff and raising aspirations.

Lead author Dr Fitzpatrick says: “Too many women in prison today were the girls in care of yesterday, and systemic failings in the wider society perpetuate this problem. We must do more to prevent this, and listening to, and learning from, the stories of criminalised girls and women is a vital starting point.”

The Director of Justice at the Nuffield Foundation, Rob Street, says: "There is a persistent over-representation of care-experienced girls and women in the youth and criminal justice systems. Encouragingly, this study presents clear recommendations which could improve the lives of these girls and women by breaking the link between care and custody which can impact care leavers throughout their lives.”

Report recommendations include:

• Placing a statutory duty on local authorities to prevent unnecessary criminalisation of children in care
• Recognising the limits of official care files and moving beyond them
• Promoting trusted and consistent relationships and challenging stigma
• Diverting girls and women from custody wherever possible
• Confronting the intergenerational harms that imprisonment creates

The study is officially launched on May 4 at an online end of project event called 'Disrupting the Routes between Care and Custody for Girls and Women'.

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METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

'Disrupting the Routes between Care and Custody for Girls and Women

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-May-2022

How common are medication-related errors in home care?

Peer-Reviewed Publication

WILEY

In a questionnaire-based study published in Pharmacology Research & Perspectives that included 485 fully trained nurses of 107 home care services, nearly half of all nursing staff made at least one error within the last year when administering medications.  

In the study, 41.6% of nurses reported medication errors within a 12-month period, and 14.8% did not provide an answer. Medication errors experienced by patients include taking the wrong dose or quantity of a particular drug, as well as omission of a drug or taking unlicensed drugs. 

Nurses who had attended medication training within the last 2 years were less likely to make errors. 

“The study results underline the need for regularly recurring medication training for nurses to ensure a high level of patient safety—especially in the home care sector, as nurses are the only professional group on site,” said lead author Sandra Strube-Lahmann, RN, MSc, PhD, of Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, in Germany.

URL Upon Publication: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/prp2.953

About the Journal

Pharmacology Research & Perspectives is the outlet for fundamental and applied pharmacology. An official journal of the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics and the British Pharmacological Society this gold open access journal publishes original research, reviews and perspectives in all areas of preclinical and clinical pharmacology, education and related research areas including articles that disprove a hypothesis.

About Wiley

Wiley is a global leader in research and education, unlocking human potential by enabling discovery, powering education, and shaping workforces. For over 200 years, Wiley has fueled the world’s knowledge ecosystem. Today, our high-impact content, platforms, and services help researchers, learners, institutions, and corporations achieve their goals in an ever-changing world. Visit us at  Wiley.com, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn.

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JOURNAL

Pharmacology Research & Perspectives

DOI

10.1002/prp2.953 

ARTICLE TITLE

Patient Safety in Homecare: A Multicenter Cross-sectional Study about Medication Errors and Medication Management of Nurses

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

4-May-2022