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By Karen Herrera-Ferrá, Arleen Salles and Laura Cabrera Karen Herrera-Ferrá, MD, MA lives in Mexico City and founded the Mexican Association of Neuroethics . She has a Post-doctorate in Neuroethics ( Neuroethics Studies Program at the Pellegrino Center for Clinical Bioethics (PCCB) at Georgetown University ), a MA on Clinical Psychology, and an MD. She also has a Certificate on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and another one on History of Religions. She has a one-year fellowship on Psychosis and another on OCD. She is currently a PhD Candidate on Bioethics. On May 2016 she developed a national project to formally introduce and develop neuroethics in her country. The main focus of this project is to depict and include national leaders in mental health, interested in neuroethics, so to inform and divulge this discipline among scholars and society. She also works as a mental health clinician in a private hospital, lectures in different hospitals and Universities in Mexico and is an Affiliate...

By Jennifer C. Sarrett, MEd, MA Jennifer Sarrett is a 2013 recipient of the Emory Center for Ethics Neuroethics Travel Award. She is also a doctoral candidate at Emory University’s Graduate Institute of Liberal Arts working on her dissertation which compares parental and professional experiences of autism in Atlanta, GA and Kerala, India as well as the ethical issues that arise when engaging in international, autism-related work. From June 26 - 29, 2013, the Society for Disability Studies (SDS) held their annual conference in Orlando, Florida.  SDS is the primary scholarly association for the field of Disability Studies, which is an academic field of study exploring the meanings and implications of normativity, disability, and community. As with other identity-based fields of studies, including Women’s Studies, Queer Studies, and African-American Studies, the Society for Disability Studies thinks about difference and works to expose and eradicate stigma and inequality related to p...

By Guest Contributor Racheal Borgman, MA   DSM IV-TR via Wikipedia.org The rhetorical component of illness is an important extension to the issues raised in last month’s post on the DSM . As Anjana Kallarackal pointed out, there are concerns aplenty when it comes to the DSM and how the committee goes about its categorizing work. But I was especially interested by the very first response to the post, by David Nicholson : "I wonder if it would be useful to try to put a number to the "negative consequences" of a given addiction… If we could decide how damaging some addiction was, maybe that would tell us how much to medicalize it as well. Insurance companies could decide that they'd cover cognitive behavioral therapy for internet addiction, but nothing beyond that." It’s an incredibly tempting solution. But then there’s the pesky rhetorical component of illness that must be contended with. For instance, how do we: know that an illness is an illness? know that a p...

It is hard enough to communicate ideas verbally when you feel that language cannot adequately express your thoughts. Now imagine that there is a barrier to the fluency of your speech. For many people who have speech impediments such as stuttering, this frustration is a daily reality. Having a speech impediment can often result in discrimination for children at school and when seeking employment opportunities. According to a recent survey conducted by the National Stuttering Association (NSA), 8 out of 10 children with speech impediments are bullied [i]. Unfortunately, this harassment is likely to continue well into adulthood: it is reported upwards of 40% of people who stutter are denied a job or a promotion (NSA, 2009). Image Credit: Weinstein Company It is then no wonder that approximately 90% of adults and teens with stuttering disabilities have sought treatment to overcome stuttering (NSA, 2009). Scientists have recently...