Juvenile firesetting: a unique syndrome or an advanced level of antisocial behavior?

The current study examined whether juvenile firesetting represents a unique syndrome or an advanced level of antisocial behavior. Thirty-six incarcerated juvenile delinquents, all of whom met criteria for a diagnosis of Conduct Disorder, served as subjects and were categorized into one of three groups: firesetters, non-firesetters but comparable to firesetters in number of conduct disorder symptoms, and non-firesetters who displayed fewer conduct disorder symptoms than the other two groups. Caregivers completed the Child Behavior Checklist on the youth to provide information about the severity and range of psychopathology. The results indicated that firesetters and non-firesetters who had a comparable number of symptoms did not differ from one another on the CBCL subscales of adolescent psychopathology but both differed from the group with fewer symptoms. These results suggest that firesetting does represent an advanced level of antisocial behavior, but that firesetting is not a unique syndrome, at least not in terms of caretakers' perceptions of the youths' problematic behavior. Implications for treatment of firesetters are presented.

Sociometric status of clinic-referred children with attention deficit disorders with and without hyperactivity.

Peer sociometric nominations of clinic-referred children given the diagnosis of Attention) Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity (ADD/H) or Attention Deficit Disorder without Hyperactivity (ADD/WO) were compared to one another and to those of normal control children. Only children with ADD diagnoses in the absence of other major diagnoses were included. Both children with ADD/H (n = 16) and ADD/WO (n = 11) received significantly fewer "liked most" nominations, more "liked least" nominations, and lower social preference scores than normal control (n = 45) children. These results confirm previous findings of social deficits in children with ADD/H, even when codiagnoses are excluded. In addition, they support the validity of the diagnostic category of ADD/WO by demonstrating that the ADD/WO behavior pattern is apparently "psychopathological" in being associated with peer unpopularity after codiagnoses are excluded. When larger groups including all codiagnoses (primarily Conduct Disorder) of children with ADD/H (n = 36) and ADD/WO (n = 20) were compared, identical patterns of peer unpopularity were found, except that children with ADD/H also were significantly more likely to be nominated as a child who "fights most."

The association between social withdrawal and internalizing problems of children.

Children identified as low-frequency interactors or socially withdrawn were compared to outgoing children to evaluate whether socially withdrawn children display concurrent internalizing problems. From a sample of 640 children in grades 2-5, 48 children were identified by teachers as low-frequency interactors and 72 children were selected as outgoing or sociable. When these two groups were compared on a battery of teacher, peer, and self-report measures that assessed internalizing difficulties, the low-frequency interactors were found to display concurrent problems in adjustment. Children who rarely interacted with peers were less well liked by their peers, displayed poorer self-concepts, and were more depressed and anxious than sociable children. In contrast to these findings regarding internalizing problems, the two groups did not differ on measures of externalizing problems. The results lend support to the concurrent validity of the low-interaction method of identifying socially withdrawn children.

Self-report of the frequency and phenomenology of verbal hallucinations.

This study was an assessment of several parameters of verbal hallucinations ("voices") based on the self-report of 52 hallucinating psychiatric patients. These subjects were asked to estimate the frequency of their hallucinations and to rate phenomenological aspects (loudness, clarity, location, reality) of their most recent hallucination. Each parameter was assessed with two visual analogue scales which differed in their wording of the dimension. Results showed that the reliability of the subjects' estimates on the parameters differed greatly. Clarity was most reliably reported and reality was least reliably reported. Historical notions that schizophrenics characteristically perceive external "voices" and that such "voices" are perceived as more real were not supported. There was a significant negative correlation between the perceived location and the perceived clarity of hallucinations. No significant differences in mean parameter scores were found between two groups of subjects, schizophrenics and affective psychotics.

Social cognitive biases and deficits in aggressive boys.

3 studies are reported which assess the nature and limits of a known bias on the part of aggressive boys to overattribute hostile intentions to peers. The first study determined that this bias is restricted to attributions of a peer's behavior toward an aggressive boy, and not to attributions of a peer's behavior toward a second peer. Biased attributions were implicated as a direct precedent to aggressive responses. The second study assessed the role of selective attention to and recall of hostile social cues in the formation of a biased attribution. It was found that selective recall of hostile cues did lead to a biased attribution, but that selective recall did not fully account for the attributional differences between aggressive and nonaggressive boys. Also, specific deficits in recall by aggressive boys were identified. The third study involved naturalistic observation of the peer-directed aggressive behaviors of boys in a controlled setting. It was found that the biased attributions of aggressive boys may have some basis in their experience, in that they were frequently the targets of peers' aggressive behavior. Their own aggressive behavior toward peers, however, occurred at a much higher rate than the rate at which they were the targets of aggression. These findings led to the formation of a social-information-processing model of aggressive behavior.

Self-help groups: the members' perspectives.

The emergence of self-help groups as an important source of help-giving for persons with psychological problems has occurred without a systematic attempt to tap an important source of information about this phenomenon: the members themselves. Eighty members of nine self-help groups were surveyed. The results of this study suggest that self-help groups serve a different population than do professional therapists, that the help-giving processes are mainly supportive in nature, and that an optimistic attitude toward increased collaboration between professional care-givers and self-help groups is justified. Questions for further research are discussed.