Intimate Partner Sexual Violence: A Phenomenological Interpretative Analysis Among Female Survivors in France.

Despite its prevalence, intimate partner sexual violence (IPSV) remains a concealed and poorly understood form of violence against women. Although it is associated with numerous detrimental effects on mental health, very little is known about the subjective meaning of IPSV for survivors. This study addresses this gap by exploring IPSV from the perspective of female survivors within the context of their relationship with a male partner, using interpretative phenomenological analysis. This study seeks to provide a detailed examination of the personal experience of IPSV and to illuminate its meaning from a personal standpoint. We conducted in-depth interviews with seven IPSV survivors who were recruited after filing a complaint for intimate partner violence (IPV) in France. In total, five superordinate themes were identified: (a) "Setting the stage" describes how the complex dynamics preceding IPSV influence self-representation; (b) "Feeling like I'm nothing" describes the emotional experience of IPSV; (c) "Trying to get it, not getting it" describes how IPSV generates intense cognitive load; (d) "Looking back, developing a theory" describes how IPSV is interpreted retrospectively after breaking up with a violent partner; and (e) "Today: living with it" describes how IPSV affects the present. This study highlights how emotional distress and cognitive uncertainty are present on the way to IPSV, through IPSV, and even after filing charges and separating from the violent partner. Additionally, it shows that survivors attribute IPSV to a sense of individual vulnerability related to romantic love, hope, and traumatic childhood history. This study presents unique findings as it is the first one to explore the lived experience of IPSV among a sample of French IPV survivors.

Intimate Partner Sexual Violence: An Exploratory Study on Sexual Victimization Profiles Among Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence in France.

Intimate partner sexual violence (IPSV) is a common form of intimate partner violence (IPV). This study aimed to (a) identify a typology of intimate partner sexual victimization among French women victims of IPV on the basis of the frequency of various forms of sexual violence and (b) evaluate whether these profiles differ in several clinical characteristics. A total of 93 women consulting a specialized hospital service were recruited. Cluster analyses suggested four profiles: highly frequent rapes (5.4%), predominant sexual coercion (20.4%), medium frequency of all forms (20.4%), and low frequency of all forms (19.4%). Further person-centered research focusing on IPSV is warranted.

Perceptions of the Post First-Lockdown Era in the Current Covid-19 Pandemic: Quantitative and Qualitative Survey of the French Population.

Introduction: A pandemic with the severity of COVID-19 affects people's lives physically, as well as their daily routines, views of the world, and emotional balance. Lockdown is often an unpleasant experience due to a separation from loved ones, loss of freedom, and uncertainty over the disease status. To adjust, individuals and groups have had to adapt their perceptions of the event to the current scenario. This study aims to describe the perceptions of confined people on the changes occurring in their lives in the aftermath of the COVID-19 lockdown. Methods: A total of 1,534 individuals (26.6% men; 73.4% women; mean age 41.6) responded to the questionnaire comprising 19 closed and five open-ended questions about the changes they anticipated in their lives in the immediate post-confinement era. Results: Two definite groups appeared in the results: those who lived the confinement pleasantly, and those for which it was painful. They differ according to their confinement conditions and perceived degree of exposure to the virus. There seems to be a link for those who had a pleasant experience to a lower perceived exposure to the virus and less burdensome confinement conditions (young children, surface area, etc.). Lockdown conditions seem to influence the respondents' perceptions: a pleasant experience is associated with a vision of the society's evolution at large, and the care about its economic and professional progress; a painful one is associated more with focusing on the immediate needs of social support and personal well-being. Discussion: Emotional experience during lockdown impacts the perception of its aftermath, with hope and anxiety becoming two ways of coping with uncertainty.

Differentiating unipolar and bipolar depression: Contribution of the Rorschach test (Comprehensive System).

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to contribute to differential diagnoses of unipolar and bipolar depression using cognitive variables of the Rorschach test (Comprehensive System). METHOD: One hundred forty one depressed inpatients (71 bipolar, 70 unipolar; mean age = 46, SD = 15.8; 64% women) previously evaluated and comparable regarding clinical characteristics of their illness (including current mood symptoms) were blindly tested using the Rorschach test (C.S.). RESULTS: The cognitive profile of bipolar depressed patients was more impaired than the cognitive profile of unipolar depressed patients. Combining four cognitive specificities (tolerance to ambiguity, discrimination failure, difficulties in controlling ideational impulses, and impulsive or negligent processing) in a logistic regression model allows the identification of bipolarity with acceptable accuracy. CONCLUSIONS: Some aspects of cognitive functioning, as assessed with the Rorschach test (CS), appear to be useful to capture some important cognitive specificities of bipolar depression and could contribute to differential diagnoses of mood disorders.

Structural validation of the ORTO-12-FR questionnaire among a French sample as a first attempt to assess orthorexia nervosa in France.

PURPOSE: To the best of our knowledge, no scientific publications on orthorexia nervosa have been based on a French population. The goal of our study was to confirm the factor structure of the French version of the ORTO-15 questionnaire. METHODS: An online survey (N = 768) was conducted asking participants (84.77% were women) to answer several questions about their dietary habits and to assess orthorexia nervosa using the ORTO-15 scale. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used for the validation. RESULTS: Given our results, we deemed it necessary to adapt the French version of the ORTO-15 questionnaire by omitting three items. The CFA supported the ORTO-12-FR (composed of 12 items and addressing three domains: rational, emotional, and behavioral) as the better-fitting model, with an internal consistency of 0.73. The Comparative Fit Index value was 0.93, the Tucker-Lewis Index was 0.90, and the Root Mean-Square Error of Approximation was 0.05. CONCLUSIONS: Our results provide evidence for the reliability of ORTO-12-FR with a French population. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: V, descriptive cross-sectional study.

Relation between cognitive restraint and weight: Does a content validity problem lead to a wrong axis of care?

The aim of this research is to examine the relation between weight and cognitive restraint (CR), which is the intention to control food intake in order to maintain or lose weight, in a general French population sample. Is CR more prevalent in individuals with obesity than overweight, underweight or normal-weight subjects in this cross-sectional study? Are people affected by obesity non-restrained eaters? A total of 507 French people (80.2% women and 19.8% men), aged 18-78 years, responded to an online questionnaire. It appears that the most used questionnaire measuring CR has content validity problems as it seems to measure effective control and not the intention. Therefore, a numeric scale was used to answer the questions. Even if it is not possible in this study to test a causal link with latent variable modelling, our results seem to show that people with obesity more frequently intend to eat less or to eat healthier and/or to eat less sugar and fat than other people in order to control their weight. However, people affected by obesity do not succeed in so doing. These results raise the question of treatments advocating the increase of self-control. Finally, it would be necessary to obtain a real, scientific consensus on what CR is and on how to measure it in order to study the most effective treatments for people with overweight or obesity.

Prefrontal cortex dysfunction in patients with suicidal behavior.

BACKGROUND: Abnormal serotonergic neurotransmission has long been demonstrated in suicidal behavior. The dorsal and median raphe nuclei housing the main serotonergic cell bodies and the prefrontal cortex (PFC), particularly the ventral part innervated by the serotonergic system, have therefore been studied extensively in suicidal behavior research. However, only a few studies have described neuropsychological function impairment in suicidal patients. We investigated PFC-related neuropsychological function in patients with suicidal behavior, separating dorsolateral PFC (DLPFC)- and orbitofrontal cortex (OFC)-related functions. METHOD: We compared 30 euthymic patients with suicidal behavior aged 18-65 years with 39 control subjects, for the following neuropsychological domains: global intellectual functioning, reward sensitivity, initiation, inhibition, and working memory. Patients and controls were compared by means of univariate and multivariate analyses, adjusting for age at interview, level of education and mood state at the time of evaluation. Trait impulsivity, measured with the Barratt Impulsivity Scale version 10 (BIS-10), was also included as a covariate in a subset of analyses. RESULTS: Multivariate comparisons demonstrated significant executive function deficits in patients with suicidal behavior. In particular, we observed impairment in visuospatial conceptualization (p<0.0001), spatial working memory (p=0.001), inhibition (Hayling B-A, p=0.04; go anticipations, p=0.01) and visual attention (or reading fluency) (p=0.002). Similar results were obtained following adjustment for motor impulsivity as a covariate, except for spatial working memory. CONCLUSIONS: These deficits are consistent with prefrontal dysfunction in patients with suicidal behavior. Differentiation between DLPFC- and OFC-related neuropsychological functions showed no specific dysfunction of the orbitofrontal region in patients with suicidal behavior in our sample.