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Biomedical subjects

A Sugarman

Publications and source records attributed to A Sugarman.

25 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed1982

Ego boundary disturbance in anorexia nervosa: preliminary findings.

Boundary disturbance and the developmental level of the Rorschach human representations of anorectic patients were studied. A group of 12 anorectics was compared with a control group in regard to their degree of boundary disturbance, the developmental level of their human responses, the degree to which they attribute affect to their percepts, and the nature and degree of drive-dominated ideation. The anorectic patients showed significantly more contamination responses, reflective of a breakdown in their self-other boundaries. The affect elaboration, human representations, and drive-dominated ideation measures failed to differentiate the two groups. These findings provide preliminary support for clinical observations from both individual and family perspectives that families of anorectics show greater boundary disturbance which appears to be internalized by these patients. Thus, much of their symptomatology might be understood as an attempt to gain autonomy through an overaccentuation of the boundary between themselves and others. The failure of the drive-dominated ideation measures to differentiate the two groups supports the deemphasis of the role of psychosexual factors.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1981

Borderline and schizophrenic patients. A comparative study of defensive structure.

Historically unresolved diagnostic questions regarding the borderline diagnosis and its relationship to schizophrenia are explored. Is the borderline syndrome a subvariant of schizophrenia or does it constitute a distinct diagnostic entity in its own right with specific, common, and identifiable features which set this group of patients off from others? Based on recent developments in psychoanalytic object relations theory, a Rorschach scoring manual designed to assess the primitive defenses that are conceptualized to underlie as well as organize the borderline patient was applied to independently selected samples of hospitalized borderline (DSM-III criteria) and schizophrenic (Research Diagnostic Criteria) adolescent and young patients. Consistent and significant differences were found between groups on the basis of defensive functioning. Borderline patients were found to use test measures of splitting, primitive devaluation, idealization, denial, and projective identification significantly more than schizophrenic patients. The levels of inter-rater reliability and the direction of the results in discriminating borderline from schizophrenic patients on the basis of defensive functioning indicate that the Rorschach Scoring System is a reliable and valid instrument. The implications of the results in terms of the differential diagnostic issues, the nature of borderline defenses, and the utilization of the Rorschach as a research instrument are considered.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1978

Is psychodiagnostic assessment humanistic?

The views of psychologists associated with the humanistic orientation in regard to psychodiagnostic assessment was examined. For the most part these theorists describe assessment as nonhumanistic. Their concerns about assessment were divided into five categories: that assessment is reductionistic; it is artificial; it does not pay attention to the examiner-patient relatinship; it judges people; it is overly intellectual. These concerns were elaborated and then responded to from a pro-assessment stance. Although these criticisms could be valid, their validity was said to reflect poor diagnostic practice rather than an inherent weakness in the assessment enterprise. As long as the examiner attempts actively to engage the patient in the assessment process and is aware of the interpersonal context of the test responses and behavior, then psychodiagnostic assessment is consistent with a humanistic orientation.

Humanism↗