Essential activities in a session of brief dynamic/interpersonal psychotherapy.

Therapeutic discourse combines inquiry and dialogue strategies, which correspond, respectively, to the construction and deconstruction of a patient's maladaptive personal story line. This story line refers to a pattern of dysfunctional thinking/emotional management and a corresponding maladaptive interpersonal pattern that has been identified as the root cause of the patient's presenting problems. Identifying and critically examining a patient's personal story line is the superordinate technical strategy that guides our work each session.

Identity disturbance in adolescence: associations with borderline personality disorder.

Although establishing a coherent identity is often viewed as a normative developmental task of adolescence, an important question is whether forms of identity disturbance seen in adult personality disorders can also be distinguished in adolescents. If so, such disturbances would constitute an essential target for research and clinical interventions. The goal of this study is to investigate the nature of identity disturbance in an adolescent clinical sample and to explore its links with personality pathology, particularly borderline personality disorder.

Countertransference phenomena and personality pathology in clinical practice: an empirical investigation.

Objective: This study provides initial data on the reliability and factor structure of a measure of countertransference processes in clinical practice and examines the relation between these processes and patients' personality pathology.

Method: A national random sample of 181 psychiatrists and clinical psychologists in North America each completed a battery of instruments on a randomly selected patient in their care, including measures of axis II symptoms and the Countertransference Questionnaire, an instrument designed to assess clinicians' cognitive, affective, and behavioral responses in interacting with a particular patient.

Results: Factor analysis of the Countertransference Questionnaire yielded eight clinically and conceptually coherent factors that were independent of clinicians' theoretical orientation: 1) overwhelmed/disorganized, 2) helpless/inadequate, 3) positive, 4) special/overinvolved, 5) sexualized, 6) disengaged, 7) parental/protective, and 8) criticized/mistreated.

Fostering ethical willingness: integrating emotional and contextual awareness with rational analysis.

Ethical dilemmas are inherently challenging. By definition, clinicians decide between conflicting principles of welfare and naturally confront competing pulls and inclinations. This investigation of students' responses to an ethical scenario highlights how emotions and concerns can interfere with willingness to implement ethical knowledge.

Relationship of depression to diabetes types 1 and 2: epidemiology, biology, and treatment.

This article reviews the rapidly accumulating literature on the relationship between mood disorders and diabetes mellitus. Recent studies have demonstrated that depression and its associated symptoms constitute a major risk factor in the development of type 2 diabetes and may accelerate the onset of diabetes complications. Since the mid-1980s, multiple longitudinal and cross-sectional studies have scrutinized the association of diabetes with depressive symptoms and major depression.