Daniella Moriarty

I've been reading the recent manuscript "The Law Meets Psychological Expertise: Eight Best Practice Considerations for Evaluating the Quality of Forensic Psychological Assessments" by Neal, Martire, Johan and Mathers. This was submitted for publication on the 17th February 2022 and it's incredibly interesting. It outlines eight main considerations for evaluating the quality of forensic psychological assessments: Foundational validity of the assessment Validity of the assessment as applied Management and mitigation of bias Attention to quality assurance Appropriately qualified expression of results and opinion Explicit consideration of limitations and assumptions Weighing alternative views or disagreements Adherence with ethical obligations, codes of conduct and rules of evidence. I've attached this piece to this post just in case anyone else wants to give it a read. I was just wondering what you all thought about it?

This one is more of a person post as I've lost too people close to me in the last four days. I've been heavily disassociating and I can recognise myself doing it. I wondered if any of you have any resources around grief or how to navigate this? Or any studies that are maybe related that can help me to manage my behaviours or process this loss in a healthier way? I hope you're all well.

So I've been thinking in the past couple of days about the idea of "retail therapy" being used to combat depression, and especially about the way this is portrayed in the media and on TV. Do you think that there's any truth in the idea of retail therapy? Would it be more effective for those without depression or with? Also, do you think those who have depression are more susceptible to influence from advertisers? Do you think it is a form of exploitation if those with depression are specifically targeted? I'm going to research this tomorrow but I was wondering if you guys had any idea.

Claire Smith in her book (Anxiety: The Missing Stage of Grief) argues that "While many people experience anxiety for a variety of reasons — divorce, moving, illness, a genetic predisposition — the kind of anxiety that is brought on as result of losing someone close to you is its own breed. While grief anxiety maintains many of the same characteristics as generalized anxiety, there is an underlying situational cause. So when we can allow ourselves to grieve and truly explore the impact of the loss, we are better able to ease and manage the anxiety that accompanies it." Do you think that there is a correlation between grief and other mental disorders? Do you think that anxiety could be considered the sixth step of grief or do you think that there is a different step entirely?

I've been thinking a lot about the mention of Milgram's experiment the other day and it reminded me of watching Derren Brown's social experiments. One of these is called The Gameshow and offers fascinating insight into how people act when they are masked and in control of another's fortune. It feels reminiscent to Zimardo's Stanford Prison Experiment (I think I'm going to do a post on this tomorrow). The link for this if anyone wants to watch it is here: https://www.channel4.com/programmes/derren-brown-the-specials/on-demand/47993-002 . It is honestly quite harrowing the extent that people go to and the lack of empathy showed when they are in a group of people acting the same. He has done many other experiments in this season and it is a modern day study. We'd all like to think that we would never go through with the acts in Milgram's, Zimbardo's or even Derren Brown's study. It is quite scary to consider what we are all capable of.

I recently bought a little book on psychology to learn a little more and I came across this quote from Abraham Maslow: "If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail." How true do you think this is? I think it makes a really good point about how our perspectives influence how we combat problems or how sometimes we take part in self fulfilling prophecies.

I was just wondering if anyone knew any information on studies on whether self help books are actually proven to help consumers? I see self helps books everywhere for things like grief, depression, anxiety and much more, and I was interested in if they worked or not.

The Mental Health Association has declared their Mental Health Awareness Week to be from the 9th May 2022 - 15th May 2022. Their focal topic this week is loneliness. The global pandemic has caused such an impact on mental health and the isolation that coincided with this only emphasised the issue. Loneliness is a huge contributing factor to depression and due to this, I thought it would be appropriate to post the link to their website here: https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/campaigns/mental-health-awareness-week This has useful information on loneliness and resources on there that can help. I would be interested in learning more on how the pandemic has impacted mental disorders so if anyone has any recommendations of places to start, I'd really appreciate it! I hope you're all well.

I wasn't entirely sure whether to post this in this category or whether this would go under general discussion but as this can lead to the victim experiencing CPTSD, I thought I'd post it here. I mentioned insidious abuse and trauma in a comment the other day and a few people expressed an interest in learning more. I hope this post helps! First off, I've found a definition that puts it a lot better than I did. This website (https://vawnet.org/sc/definitions#:~:text=5.,and%20groups%20impacted%20by%20poverty.) defines insidious trauma as: "Insidious trauma refers to the daily incidents of marginalization, objectification, dehumanization, intimidation, et cetera that are experienced by members of groups targeted by racism, heterosexism, ageism, ableism, sexism, and other forms of oppression, and groups impacted by poverty. Maria Root, who coined the term insidious trauma described the concepts as follows: "Traumatogenic effects of oppression that are not necessarily overtly violent or threatening to bodily well-being at the given moment but that do violence to the soul and spirit. " (Root 1992; Brown & Ballou, 1992)." Although there are definitely larger implications of insidious trauma and abuse, let us just consider Maria Root's original definition for now. There is an analogy that helped me to understand the concept further: 'if you attempt to place a person in a boiling bath, they will indeed jump out sensing danger. However, if you run a cold bath for a person and slowly heat up the water around them, it is harder for them to sense the change. This means that they are unlikely to feel the danger, and most likely won't remove themselves from the situation until they are burnt. Then they realise the danger that they were in through hindsight'. There are many forms of abuse that can result in the victim experiencing insidious trauma, for example emotional abuse (such as gaslighting, destruction of self-esteem, isolation from family/friends) often takes place subtly and then grows which, as Maria Root suggests, does "violence to the soul and spirit". The article that I had been trying to find was 'Insidious Emotional Trauma: The Body Remembers …' by Lorraine Cates. Unfortunately, I can't find this to link it but I did find this abstract which may ne helpful: "insidious emotional trauma, a concept that is defined as the repetitive demonization of emotionality during development and beyond. The analytic treatment centers on the phenomenological investigation of bodily emotion, which is viewed as having mutative power when called into the service of development. Clinical vignettes highlight salient theoretical points: (a) the influence of mutual engagement in capturing the emotional moment from which traumatic memory materializes, (b) the shame of being as the most radical of the injurious consequences of emotional demonization, and (c) dissociation as a flight from traumatic emotional vulnerability to disembodied cognition." Also, this website is really helpful (https://www.complextrauma.org/complex-trauma/death-by-a-thousand-cuts/) in relation to trauma and the types of insidious abuse that people can be subjected to. I hope this was helpful and I'll keep looking for resources that can help!

So I wrote both of my dissertations on trauma when I was at university. I've always been interested in the relationship between trauma and the liminal space, and the impact this exposure can have on people (PTSD, dissociation, etc). One of the articles I found was by Cathy Caruth. One of the quotes that has stuck out to me is that to "be traumatized is precisely to be possessed by an image or event. And thus the traumatic symptom cannot be interpreted, simply, as a distortion of reality, nor as the lending of unconscious meaning to a reality it wishes to ignore, nor as the repression of what once was wished". What do you think of this outlook? Do you agree or disagree with the definition that Caruth offers here and/or in the rest of the essay? I'll attach it to this post in case anyone is interested in reading further.

Hi there! I made a post yesterday about what sparked my interests in the topic of forensics and psychology. Replying to this post today made me wonder what began this interest in others. Was it maybe something you studied or school or a book you read that peaked your interest? I find it fascinating to learn how we are loving such different lives but ended up on the same forum.

I personally grew up watching shows such as: Bones, Monk, Criminal Minds and many more. This massively sparked my interest in forensic science and psychology. However, do you think that the unrealistic depictions sometimes do more to damage these subjects than they do to encourage people to study them? Do you think that psychological profiles are as accurate as they seem and are reliable in criminal cases?

There have been articles recently detailing four key advancements in forensic science. This one in particular caught my eye: https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/advances-in-forensic-science-criminal-investigations/134276/. The four advancements are detailed as being: the preservation of bone proteins, a simpler way to view fingerprints, focusing on proteomes in forensic science, and the development of a new hand held device to instantly detect compounds. What do you think about these advancements? Do you think any of these stand out as being more beneficial to the field of forensic science than the others?

Although Complex PTSD is a fairly new concept, there is a lot of research out there regarding it. I was just wondering on a basic level what the differences between PTSD and Complex PTSD are? Are there any distinguishing factors that leads to either diagnosis?