Truth That Hurts...... (c) T.Vossen 2019
Showing posts with label End Sex Trafficking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label End Sex Trafficking. Show all posts
3.01.2019
5.26.2013
Open Up & Write About It - 2013 Recovering Trauma
Truth That Hurts......
http://www.apa.org/research/action/writing.aspx
Writing about difficult, even traumatic, experiences appears to be good for health on several levels - raising immunity and other health measures and improving life functioning.
Findings
Deep disclosure improves mood, objective and subjective health, and the ability to function well. Classic studies by psychologist James W. Pennebaker, PhD and his colleagues have proved the health value of personal disclosure. In a classic 1988 study by Pennebaker, Kiecolt-Glaser and Glaser, 50 healthy undergraduates were assigned to write about either traumatic experiences or superficial topics for four days in a row. Six weeks after the writing sessions, students in the trauma group reported more positive moods and fewer illnesses than those writing about everyday experiences. Furthermore, improved measures of cellular immune-system function and fewer visits to the student health center for those writing about painful experiences suggested that confronting traumatic experiences was physically beneficial.
Pennebaker followed up in other settings. At the Dallas Memorial Center for Holocaust Studies, he and his colleagues videotaped interviews with more than 60 Holocaust survivors while taking their physiological measurements. Later, they classified each survivor, based on the interview, as a low, midlevel or high "discloser." High and midlevel disclosers were significantly healthier a year after the interviews than the low disclosers.
A joint 1994 study by psychologists and outplacement firm Drake Beam Morin followed 63 professionals who had been laid off from their jobs for eight months after they were assigned to one of three writing conditions. In the experimental condition, participants were instructed to write about their deepest thoughts and feelings about the layoff and about how their lives, personal and professional, had been affected. In the control condition, participants were told to write about their plans for the day and their job search activities. In the no-writing condition, participants were given no particular writing instruction. After five consecutive days of 30-minute writing sessions, researchers started tracking employment status. Participants who wrote about losing their jobs were much more likely to find new ones in the months following the study.
Extending the research to medical patients, in 1999, Joshua Smyth and Arthur Stone and colleagues at SUNY at Stony Brook assigned patients with asthma and rheumatoid arthritis either to write about the most stressful event of their lives or to write about a neutral topic. Four months later, asthma patients in the experimental group showed improvements in lung function and arthritis patients in the experimental group showed a reduction in disease severity. In all, 47 percent of the patients who disclosed stressful events showed clinically relevant improvement, whereas only 24 percent of the control group exhibited such improvement.
Significance
Findings like these underscore that writing is an easy, inexpensive, independent and relatively universal way for people can resist the mental and physical ravages of stress and disease. Research findings that disclosure aids hiring and even improves grade-point average highlight the practical value of disclosure in some form.
Practical Application
Anyone who has benefited from keeping a diary or a journal can further justify the time and effort, secure in the knowledge that disclosing innermost thoughts and feelings - even or especially about bad experiences -- is good for health. Therapists increasingly encourage patients to undertake writing exercises outside of the clinical setting. Meanwhile, bookstores do a brisk business in selling blank journals and there are books and even a magazine that guide people through the process.
Cited Research
Pennebaker, J.W. (1997). Opening Up: The Healing Power of Expressing Emotion. New York: Guilford Press.
Pennebaker, J. W., Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K., & Glaser, R. (1988). Disclosure of traumas and immune function: Health implications for psychotherapy. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, Vol. 56, pp. 239-245.
Smyth, J. M., Stone, A. A., Hurewitz, A., & Kaell, A. (1999). Effects of writing about stressful experiences on symptom reduction in patients with asthma or rheumatoid arthritis. Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 281, pp. 1304-9.
Spera, S. P., Buhrfeind, E. D. & J.W. Pennebaker, (1994). Expressive writing and coping with job loss. Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 37, pp. 722-733.
Cited from American Psychological Association, October 23, 2003
http://www.apa.org/research/action/writing.aspx
5.24.2012
Measure of a Mother’s Love: How Early Neglect Derails Child Development
Truth That Hurts......
Most people don’t need science to appreciate the importance of a mother’s love. But to understand how early maltreatment can derail a child’s development requires careful study — and is fraught with ethical peril.
Such research is therefore often conducted in animals. A new analysis of data on 231 rhesus macaque monkeys explored the effects of three early-childhood conditions on the animals’ later lives. About half of the monkeys were raised normally by their mothers, living in social groups with other monkeys — a condition similar to their natural environment.
Read more: http://healthland.time.com/2012/05/24/the-measure-of-a-mothers-love-how-early-deprivation-derails-child-development/?iid=hl-article-mostpop1#ixzz1vpk5ZYA4
Toni L.Vossen 2012
Most people don’t need science to appreciate the importance of a mother’s love. But to understand how early maltreatment can derail a child’s development requires careful study — and is fraught with ethical peril.
Such research is therefore often conducted in animals. A new analysis of data on 231 rhesus macaque monkeys explored the effects of three early-childhood conditions on the animals’ later lives. About half of the monkeys were raised normally by their mothers, living in social groups with other monkeys — a condition similar to their natural environment.
One quarter of the monkeys were reared in a nursery without their mothers until day 37, when they were placed in groups of four other monkeys of a similar age.
The final group was also nursery-raised at first, but then these babies were transferred to a cage, where they spent most of their time, with a hot water bottle covered in terrycloth. (Two hours a day, these monkeys were allowed to interact with other monkeys their age.) The condition was similar to that used in the well-known “cloth mother” primate experiments by Harry Harlow, which had previously demonstrated that proper psychological and physical development of infants requires nurturing and attention from a parent, not just the provision of food and water. In that research, socially isolated monkey babies that were removed from their mothers were found to prefer clinging to a cloth-covered surrogate mother for comfort, rather than a harsh wire sculpture, even when only the metal mother provided bottles of milk.
While such experimentation sounds cruel, this type of research has been critical in helping change policies in human orphanages that had for centuries treated infants equally inhumanely. Despite early evidence that orphanage infants were far more likely to die than others, proponents argued that it didn’t matter whether children had “parents” specially devoted to them at the orphanage, claiming that simply feeding and changing them appropriately would be adequate until adoptive parents were found. Babies, they said, couldn’t remember anyway.
The harrowing consequences of these theories were most vividly brought to light in Romania in the 1980s and ’90s, when a ban on abortion led to a surge in orphanage babies. The longer these children were left in their cribs, simply being fed and changed without individualized affection, the more damage was seen, even if the orphanage was clean and well-run. Many children developed autistic-like behaviors, repetitively rocking or banging their heads. Some were cold and withdrawn or indiscriminately affectionate; some alternated between these extremes. And they simply didn’t grow like normal infants: their head circumferences were abnormally small and they had problems with attention and comprehension.
Still, orphanage advocates blamed pre-existing problems that had led parents to give up the children in the first place, not institutional conditions. This debate continued until researchers were allowed to randomize abandoned infants without clear birth defects to either usual orphanage care or foster care from birth. (To mitigate the thorny ethics of the study, adoption was encouraged as early as possible for the orphanage-assigned kids, even though that could have potentially weakened the findings.)
Nonetheless, the study showed that the children who were placed in foster care developed normally, with appropriate head sizes, and less distress, better attentional skills and a 9-point higher IQ on average, compared with children sent to orphanages. Follow-up studies found that the orphanage-raised group was more than twice as likely to develop mental illness, compared with those who’d been in foster care. More than 50% of the orphanage group was diagnosed with at least one mental illness.
Only after this research was published in 2007 did Romania change its policies, though there are still some countries that continue to place abandoned infants in these dangerous settings. Because the problem persists, and also because other early child abuse and neglect can replicate such situations, ongoing study of what harms children in early childhood and what helps their recovery is needed.
In the new research, the monkeys remained in the various rearing conditions — with their mothers, with peers or mainly isolated — until they were about six months old. That’s the human equivalent of age 3 — when the brain is developing at a faster rate than at any other time in postnatal life.
After the 6-month period, the monkeys were placed in a mixed social group, comparable to the normal conditions for their species. They were studied when they were about 1 year old.
The results differed by gender, an effect also seen in humans suffering from child maltreatment. Male monkeys reared in isolation were nearly twice as likely to come down with physical illnesses as those reared by their mothers or with peers. They were also more than five times as likely to show stereotyped behavior, the repetitive motions similar to the rocking or head-banging seen in some cases of autism and in orphanage-reared infants. The peer-reared males were about three times more likely to engage in stereotyped behavior, compared with those raised by their mothers.
In females, surprisingly, the peer-reared group did worse than the monkeys raised in isolation. They were far more likely to be wounded and to suffer hair loss than monkeys raised by their mothers or in isolation. The researchers found that the peer-reared females were more aggressive than other monkeys, suggesting that the wounds may have resulted from fights and the hair loss from hair-pulling by others.
While the males had high levels of a stress hormone known as cortisol and low levels of the metabolite of the mood-related neurotransmitter serotonin, this difference was not seen in females. Lead author Gabriella Conti of the University of Chicago suggests that this may be because in the womb, female fetuses are also more resilient than males.
High levels of stress hormones can increase risk for both mental and physical illnesses, including depression, which also can involve low levels of serotonin.
The authors conclude: “[T]he lack of a secure attachment relationship in the early years has detrimental consequences for both physical and mental health later in life, with long-lasting effects that vary by sex. The persistence of these effects after the end of treatment emphasizes the need to intervene early in life to prevent long-term damage.”
Another of the paper’s authors, the Nobel-prize-winning economist James Heckman, has long argued that investing in early childhood education provides a greater return for society than virtually any other type of spending, not only because of increased educational success and productivity, but also because of reduced crime, addiction, distress and disorder. This study, he says, “shows that early life conditions critically affect adult health. Maternal attachment plays a fundamental role in shaping who we are; remove it and the harm is great.”
Indeed, research on early interventions for at-risk families, such as the Nurse Family Partnership and the Perry Preschool Project — which, respectively, provides care for low-income mothers and babies, and offers high-quality preschool education for poor African American children — has shown significant reductions in crime and teen pregnancy, along with gains in education and employment when the children involved in the programs grow up.
It may seem obvious that an isolated, parentless toddler — with or without social contact with peers — will suffer emotionally from lack of parental love. What’s not obvious is that without devoted, repeated acts of love, a child’s brain doesn’t make the growth hormone needed for proper mental and physical development and numerous other imbalances are also created.
While we must try to spare all children, and even other primates, from being subjected to these dysfunctional early life environments, we still need to study how to best overcome them. Fortunately, children overcome troubled childhoods all the time: many children who are adopted out of harmful settings do manage to adjust and ultimately thrive. The earlier they are reached, the better they do. Comparing them with those who do not do as well — and in nonhuman primates, focusing on the resilient animals — could provide important insight into how to help.
The research was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Read more: http://healthland.time.com/2012/05/24/the-measure-of-a-mothers-love-how-early-deprivation-derails-child-development/?iid=hl-article-mostpop1#ixzz1vpk5ZYA4
Toni L.Vossen 2012
Please Help ....
Truth That Hurts......
Toni L.Vossen 2012
- Related Topics:
- early childhood,
- early childhood deprivation,
- early life adversity,
- maternal love,
- monkeys,
- mothers,
- orphanages,
- primates,
- Romanian orphans,
- Childhood,
- Family & Parenting
- The Man Who Remade Motherhood
Toni L.Vossen 2012
Save US Jesus
Truth That Hurts......
When survivors of childhood abuse and other victimizations
seek assistance from victim service providers and community
institutions, they often have a complex array of needs. Some
need mental health and substance abuse treatment; others
require help with complicated legal matters. Still others want
employment or vocational assistance or advocacy for disability
benefits. Responding comprehensively to this range of needs
challenges service providers to think in new ways
about staff training and supervision, community
collaborations, and cross-systems service designs.
Without this more complex and innovative thinking,
victims may not receive the help that they need.
Every day, every night, victim advocates talk with
survivors of sexual violence who have
experienced more than one type of violent
victimization and whose needs are complex.
Many sexual assault service providers reported that
more than half of their clients were
incest survivors, and clients with childhood abuse and
multiple victimizations faced
difficult issues which made providing
adequate assistance to them more challenging.
Because they seem to need more or different
services
services
than sexual assault survivors having a single victimization,
these conversations raise difficult questions for advocates:
How will I need to respond differently to these survivors?
· Does my agency offer what these survivors
are asking for and what they need?
What is the role of my agency in serving these survivors?
Where else can these survivors turn for assistance?
What can I do when there is no help available?
· What is my role regarding assisting
and advocating for these individuals?
What is beyond my capacity?
How will I cope with the experience
of working with these
survivors and the exposure to
this type of victimization?
c/o Toni L.Vossen 2010
Does a Better Memory Equal Greater PTSD Risk?
Truth That Hurts......
Toni L.Vossen 2012
Strong recall may be genetically associated with heightened flashbacks of trauma and pain, according to new research.
A good memory is typically seen as a powerful advantage, an aid to intelligence and socializing. But when experience is traumatic, this asset may become a serious liability, according to new research on survivors of the Rwandan genocide.
Researchers at the University of Basel in Switzerland studied a gene for a protein called PKCA, which is known to be involved in the encoding of emotional memories. In healthy Swiss adults, a variant called rs4790904 was found to be associated with visual memory.
There are three versions of rs4790904: AA, AG and GG. In one experiment including over 700 healthy adults from Switzerland, people with the AA variant had better recall of happy or otherwise emotionally positive and neutral images. A brain imaging experiment including nearly 400 Swiss adults also linked the AA version with improved memory for pictures with either a positive or negative emotional tone.
Researchers then studied the same gene in 347 adult Rwandan refugees who were living at the Nakivale refugee camp in Uganda. All of them had been exposed to the trauma of the 1994 Rwandan genocide, which had forced them to flee their homes. Around 800,000 people were slaughtered in 100 days during the genocide, when Hutu militias and gangs attacked the minority Tutsi population and those sympathetic to them.
Thirty-nine percent of the refugees had current symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), an anxiety disorder marked by a sense of repeatedly re-experiencing the emotional and physical sensations linked to the trauma, often triggered by sensory reminders of the event, like sudden loud noises. People with PTSD typically try to avoid these cues, which can result in isolation and increased distress.
Rwandan refugees with the AA variant were more likely to have PTSD than those with the other versions of the gene — particularly symptoms of re-experiencing the traumatic event, like flashbacks. Avoidance of trauma reminders was also more common in those with the AA version.
According to the study, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the findings point to a “genetic link between the predisposition to build strong memory and the risk for PTSD.”
The research also adds to increasing evidence that many “positive” genes also have a downside — and similarly, many “negative” ones have an upside. For example, one gene linked with a tendency for children to share treats with others is also linked to ADHD and later in life, promiscuity and addiction.
The genetics of autism similarly seem to show a mix of increased vulnerabilities and strengths. In fact, the “intense world” theory of autism suggests that the condition may result from having a brain that takes in too much, resulting in difficulty accommodating the overload of sensations, associations and memories. This could result in a sensitive type of higher intelligence, which can simultaneously lead to withdrawal and repetitive behaviors in an attempt to impose order on the overwhelming input.
When we contemplate enhancing memory, it’s important to consider that this will strengthen our recall of disaster and pain, not just success and pleasure. There’s no free lunch, it seems.
Toni L.Vossen 2012
5.23.2012
I'm 5 years older than my sister was when she was killed.......
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Originally published: Sunday, 01/05/03
Trucker charged in deadly crash
Associated PressTrucker charged in deadly crash
CHEHALIS, Wash. – A Tacoma truck driver accused of killing four women in an August crash on Interstate 5 falsified his log books and had been driving more hours than legally allowed, authorities said.
Sergey B. Stakhovich, a Russian immigrant and U.S. citizen with seven children, appeared in Lewis County Superior Court on Friday. Bail was set at $50,000.
Stakhovich is accused of four counts of vehicular homicide in the Aug. 24 crash.
The 43-year-old was driving a United Road Service auto transporter truck that crashed through several vehicles as traffic slowed in front of him.
Stakhovich, who suffered only minor injuries, told investigators that before the wreck, he had set the truck's cruise control to 58 mph. At first he didn't notice traffic slowing and, when he did, he might have hit the accelerator instead of the brake, he said.
Stakhovich allegedly falsified his driving time logbook several times between Aug. 6 and Aug. 24, according to court documents. The documents also said Stakhovich had been on duty for 31 hours since his last eight-hour sleep period and had been driving straight for 16 hours.
State and federal regulations require truckers to take eight-hour sleep breaks and to drive no more than 16 hours in a 24-hour period.
State Patrol detectives arrested Stakhovich at his home Thursday morning. The arrest followed a four-month investigation by the Washington State Patrol's major accident investigation team.
Killed in the crash were Yvonne M. Wright, 74, of Winlock; Jeri L. Cozad, 52, of Kelso; and Valerie G. Stuber, 47, and Michelle M. Ross, 27, both of Longview.
5.22.2012
Truth That Hurts......
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To save young girls from sex trafficking!
Any gift given will be
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You’ll be touching the life of a young girl whose innocence has been violated, her childhood stolen ... a girl sold, enslaved, abused almost beyond imagination. Deena beautifully represents what God can do in the life of a girl through your compassionate giving.
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Toni L.Vossen 2010
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