Public Forum on Faith and Mental Health

PUBLIC FORUM ON FAITH AND MENTAL HEALTH

Date: Thursday 18th October 2007
Time: 7.00 pm - 9.00 pm
Venue: Gloucester Room, Ilford Central Library, Clements Road, Ilford,
Essex, IG1 1EA

The aim of the forum will be to investigate the role of spirituality in mental health and examine how faith leaders can play a vital role in fostering a greater understanding of this complex area, as well as helping those affected by the illness to move towards recovery.

Speakers will include Peter Spelman (Principal Officer for Mental Health in Redbridge since October 2000) and Professor Adil Al-Mousawi (Visiting Professor, Faculty of Health and Human Sciences, University of Hertfordshire, and Consultant Psychiatrist, Mental Health Centre,
Northwick Park Hospital). The forum is a free event, open to all, and refreshments will be provided.

For more information please contact:
Tel: 020 8708 2478 / 07894 354 019
E-mail: aslam.el-soudani@redbridge.gov.uk

Depression leads to worst health

Depression leads to worst health

Depression is a more disabling condition than angina, arthritis, asthma and diabetes, World Health Organization research shows.
And those with depression plus a chronic illness, such as diabetes, fare particularly badly, the study of more than 245,000 people suggests.

Better treatment for depression would improve people's overall health, the researchers concluded in the Lancet.

Experts called for better funding for mental health services.

Dr Somnath Chatterji and colleagues asked people from 60 countries taking part in the World Health Survey a variety of questions about their health, such as how they sleep, how much pain they have, and whether they have any problems with memory or concentration.

After taking into account factors such as poverty and other health conditions, the researchers found that depression had the largest effect on worsening health.

And people with depression who also had one or more chronic diseases had the worst health scores of all the diseases looked at or combinations of diseases.

Urgency

Dr Somnath Chatterji said: "The co-morbid state of depression incrementally worsens health compared with depression alone, with any of the chronic diseases alone, and with any combination of chronic diseases without depression.

"These results indicate the urgency of addressing depression as a public health priority to reduce disease burden and disability, and to improve the overall health of populations."

The team called on doctors around the world to be more alert in the diagnosis and treatment of the condition, noting that it is fairly easy to recognise and treat.

Marcus Roberts, head of policy at mental health charity Mind, said the impact of depression could be devastating on relationships, finances and physical health.

"The treatment of depression must be given equal footing to the treatment of other conditions.

"While treatments for most physical health problems are readily accessible, mental health treatments such as talking therapies are limited, with some patients waiting months or even years for their first appointment with a therapist."

He added that mental health was often overlooked in those with chronic health problems, as doctors focused on the physical symptoms.

'Vast sea of misery'

A spokesperson for the Department of Health said: "Seven million adults in England suffer from a common mental health problem such as anxiety, eating disorders and depression.

"We recognise that many of those with depression do not receive treatment at the moment, partly because they do not seek appropriate help.

"The government is committed to providing greater choice and access to timely and appropriate treatment options and is currently working to expand access to and choice of talking therapies in the NHS."

Marjorie Wallace, chief executive of the mental health charity SANE, said: "We now have yet more evidence, as if it were needed, of the destructive and life-threatening effects of depression, which this global study shows can be an even greater danger than many chronic physical conditions.

"Yet even in developed countries like our own, proper diagnosis and appropriate treatment can be patchy at best.

"A vast sea of misery could be avoided if this condition received the same attention and resources as Aids or cancer."

Lynn Mitchell, who has terminal lung condition, chronic obstructive lung disease, reached rock bottom two years ago with her depression.

And although she had always received quick treatment for her lung problems on the NHS she struggled to get help for her mental illness.

Now she is on antidepressants and feels a different woman.

"I think if I hadn't had help with my mental attitude I would have been dead.

"My life was so bad and so bleak it was just horrendous really. I didn't want to live but now I don't want to die."

SOURCE

Is fasting beneficial for human health?

Assalamu alaykum

Well Ramadan has already come and we have only 18 days remaining! How quickly does something you love go when it has just arrived.

For us who fast, we know how we benefit from the yearly abstinence. However now we se that the rest of the world has found evidence to support what we have known all our lives.

Of course fasting has many benefit not least medical and physical ones, it is not these reasons why we fast. Fasting brings about Taqwa, fear of Allah and relistion of His blessing that He has bestowed upon us. By fasting we empathise and sympathise with the oor who have no food, or drink as well as those who cannot get married or those who cannot be with their spouses. In this blessed month we have the pooptunity to overcome Shaytaan and his hole he has on us, this month is the time we can put into practice the template of beleif we want to achieve... so achieve it what you waiting for!!!

Is fasting beneficial for human health?

Fasting during Ramadan is one of the basic religious duties of Muslims. In the past it was thought that the benefits of fasting were limited to spiritual and emotional effects. However, recent studies indicate that a person can benefit in many physical and psychological ways from fasting. The studies reveal that the body’s immune system, blood circulation, digestive organs, reproductive and urinary systems as well as the heart may all benefit from fasting.

Many Muslims think that fasting has a detrimental effect on their physical performance. Such thinking has led many Islamic countries to decrease working hours during Ramadan.

But a new U.S. study conducted by the Institute of Islamic Medicine for Education and Research in Panama City, Florida has proven that fasting does not have a negative effect on the muscles or on physical performance. Nor does it necessarily result in tiredness or lethargy.

The study concluded that there is in fact an improvement in the body’s ability to bear physical and muscular effort and the performance of the heart is also said to improve. The study monitored the physical performance of 20 healthy people, including 12 males and 8 females, before and during fasting. The participant’s ages ranged from 12 to 52 years old.

The study found that participants’ heart rates decreased from 170 beats per minute before fasting to 159 per minute while fasting. That suggests a 6 percent improvement in heart rate. Moreover, a significant improvement in blood pressure was also recorded.

The study also found that participants noticed less breathing difficulties during Ramadan, and felt less tiredness in the legs when exercising. Muscle performance was also said to improve.

Various other studies have shown that fasting increases the amount of free fatty acids in the blood, which aside from glucose are the body’s main source of energy. Fatty acids help to reduce the depletion of glycogen in the liver and muscles during exercise, and prevent the depletion of glucose in blood. Under the normal conditions, glucose is the main source of energy. However, physical effort forces the body to use up glucose quickly, leaving a person feeling tired and exhausted.

The body’s dependence on glucose decreases during fasting since sufficient quantities of amino acids are available in the blood to supply the body with energy. The result of this is an improvement in overall muscle performance.

Another recent study, prepared by Dr. Jad al-Moula Abdul-Aziz, a professor at the Faculty of Medicine of Cairo University, concluded that fasting helps to eliminate about 35 percent of the toxins that accumulate in the body during our normal activities such as eating and breathing. Fasting helps to reduce these harmful toxins and in so doing protects the body’s cells from diseases and delays aging.

Another scientific study shows that fasting helps to regulate the blood pressure. Dr. Ibrahim Hamed, researcher in the Department of Food Sciences and Nutrition, at the National Research Center in Cairo, concluded that fasting is an effective treatment for patients suffering from arteriosclerosis, characterized by the hardening of plaque-covered arteries. During a period of fasting, which continues for more than 12 hours a day, the digestive system has nothing to do and thus stops working. This prevents the blood from gathering around the stomach and intestines and allows the circulatory system to flow freely and regularly, which as a side effect may reduce pain caused by arteriosclerosis.

He added that during a period of fasting, the body burns any stored fats in the body and converts them to energy. This, it has been found, reduces the possibility of infecting healthy people with arteriosclerosis.

Research Launch:

Research Launch: Providing Faith & Culturally Sensitive Support to Young British Muslims

(Report written and researched by Rabia Malik, Aaliyah Shaikh, Mustafa Suleyman)

One Whitehall Place, London - Thursday 6th September – 6.00pm-8.00pm

The National Youth Agency is pleased to launch the findings of research carried out in partnership with The Muslim Youth Helpline.

The report seeks to redress lack of research and data available to inform service providers and policy makers about the social condition of Muslim youth. With over 50% of the UK Muslim population under the age of 25 years of age, according to the last census, there are little if any effective national services reaching out to young Muslims.

The Muslim Youth Helpline (MYH) provides faith and culturally sensitive peer support services to young British Muslims aged 16-25 years of age across a range of BME communities across the UK. The services of MYH are designed to reduce the isolation of young Muslims in the UK. Since its inception it has been run by Young British Muslims, for young British Muslims.

The research, carried out with MYH users and volunteers, highlights the sociological and psychological issues facing young British Muslims and their impact on mental health; develops an understanding of young Muslim clients and workers experiences of MYH and identify features of good practice; and highlights areas of concern and possible ways forward for policy makers, service providers and Muslim communities and raises awareness of potential challenges The research will be of interest to policy makers, researchers, providers of children and young people’s services, and others. Speakers will include the authors of the research report, and representatives form both The NYA and MYH. There will be an opportunity for networking from 7.00pm, when soft drinks and canapés will be provided.

Please confirm your attendance by either replying to this email on events@nya.org. uk or calling the events team on 0116 242 7501. Please specify your

Name

Organisation

Postal address

Any special requirements you may have

Please forward to a colleague if you are unable to attend.





Amy Lawrence, Events Team
The National Youth Agency
Eastgate House,
19-23 Humberstone Road,
Leicester,
LE5 3GJ
Email: amyl@nya.org. uk
Telephone: 0116 242 7366
Fax : 0116 242 7502

Psychologists and Torture

Assalamu alaykum

August issue of the British Psychologist - The Psychologist magazine, has an intriging article, please read and share your thoughts.

August 2007 484
The Psychologist Vol 20 No 8

Psychologists and torture

More than a question of interrogation

MARK BURTON and CAROLYN KAGAN on how organised psychology should respond.

HOW can organised psychology best promote and protect human rights in relation to military occupation and the detention of terrorist suspects or insurgents?

The very terms used to pose this question indicate its fundamentally political nature. ‘Organised psychology’ refers to bodies like the British Psychological Society and the American Psychological Association (APA), but such bodies represent a variety of interests. For example, there are significant numbers of US psychologists in the pay of the military and related state organisations, as well as an APA ‘Division of Peace Psychology’. ‘Military occupation’ can indicate a particular understanding of the situations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine or Haiti, with varying views on where the liberation of the populations and the bringing of democracy sit on the agenda. ‘Terrorist suspects’ or ‘insurgents’ implies contrasting understandings of the motives of political violence, and of how people should be treated.

The APA has entered this complex sociopolitical debate about psychologists’ role in ‘national security’ (see The Psychologist, News, October 2006, and this month; Letters, November 2006). There are a number of key issues, not all of which were reported by The Psychologist or have surfaced within the APA debate. The main purpose here is not to document the debate and internal politics of the APA – that can be found elsewhere (Behnke, 2006; Moorhead-Slaughter, 2006; Psychologists for Social Responsibility, 2006a; Soldz, 2006a, 2006b; Summers, 1992); instead, the intention is to contextualise this debate in the wider debates and controversies on psychological torture. While the key issues we discuss have the APA at their heart, they are relevant to us all, due to the extensive influence of the APA over professional psychology worldwide.

What constitutes ‘torture’?
The APA’s President’s Task Force Report on Psychological Ethics and National Security (The PENS Report: APA, 2005) embraces the US government’s ‘Reservations, Declarations and Understandings’ to the United Nations Convention on Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or punishment (see McCoy, 2006; Soldz, 2006b). There are no less than 19 of these reservations (in itself remarkable), but the central issue is the definition of psychological torture itself.

The US reservations, at least if narrowly interpreted, would exempt hooding, forced adoption of stress positions, isolation and sleep denial – the very techniques that formed the core of the CIA methods used at occupied Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib, and elsewhere (McCoy, 2006; Physicians for Human Rights, 2005) and by the British in Northern Ireland in the early 1970s (Watson, 1978). Basoglu et al. (2007) have recently provided empirical evidence that ‘psychological manipulations, humiliating treatment, and forced stress positions, do not seem to be substantially different from physical torture in terms of the severity of mental suffering they cause, the underlying mechanism of traumatic stress, and their long-term psychological outcome’. So when the APA condemned torture, it may be argued that its definition, being parasitic on the US reservations, excluded precisely the kind of torture (approved by Defence
Secretary Rumsfeld in December 2002) based on psychological research and which psychological interrogation consultants might advise on. Similarly, the reservations and the APA exclude from the definition of torture the newer use of cultural, religious and sexual ridicule again documented at Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib.

The role of psychologists

The APA also legitimises the role of psychologists in interrogation:

…it is consistent with the APA Ethics Code for psychologists to serve in consultative roles to interrogation and information-gathering processes for national security-related purposes…
(APA, 2005, p.1)

While the APA declaration is clear that the same ethical rules apply to those in healthcare roles and those in other roles, this legitimation is in stark contrast to the position adopted by the World Medical Association, its 1975 declaration of Tokyo following the BMA review of the Northern Ireland experience. This declaration proscribed the participation of physicians in designing, or even monitoring, interrogation strategies. This rule was also adopted by both the American Medical Association (AMA) and the American Psychiatric Association.

Moreover, the 1982 United Nations General Assembly addressed the ethical questions associated with the participation of medical and other health workers in the interrogation of detainees. These principles establish as an absolute rule that health workers ‘may not engage, actively or passively, in acts which constitute participation in, complicity in, incitement to or attempts to commit torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment’ (cited in Rubinstein et al., 2005).

Therefore, by allowing psychologists to participate or assist in the interrogation process, the APA is adopting a position out of step with both the medical profession (as Anne Anderson of Psychologists for Social Responsibility pointed out in a letter in 2006 to APA President Gerald Koocher) and the wider UN declaration on health workers, while at the same time making a declaration that appears to condemn psychological torture.

The US context is distinctive. The military established Behavioural Science Consultation Teams to advise the Guantánamo interrogators (Miles, 2007; Physicians for Human Rights, 2005; Soldz, 2006a, 2006b). While the AMA and the American Psychiatric Association gave clear directions that this was inappropriate, the APA, following its military-dominated PENS Task Force, leaves the road open. Perhaps this is why the US military is reported as saying that it is planning to ‘use only psychologists…to help interrogators devise strategies to get information from detainees at places like Guantánamo Bay’ (New York Times, 7 June 2006, cited by Psychologists for Social Responsibility, 2006b).

The BPS (2005) made a clear declaration against torture and the participation of psychologists and the use of psychological knowledge in its design. While it does not explicitly proscribe the
participation of psychologists in interrogation, it does endorse the UN declaration. Its position is at least implicitly in line with the medical bodies listed above, and at variance with the APA.

Just following orders?

Most concerning of all, the APA allows its members the ‘Nuremberg defence’ that ‘I was only following orders’. Article 1.02 of the 2002 revision of the APA Ethics Code reads:

If psychologists’ ethical responsibilities conflict with law, regulations, or other governing legal authority, psychologists make known their commitment to the Ethics Code and take steps to resolve the conflict. If the conflict is unresolvable via such means, psychologists may adhere to the requirements of the law, regulations, or other governing legal authority. (APA, 2002)

The implication is that psychologists are permitted to assist in torture and abuse if they can claim that they first tried to resolve the conflict between their ethical responsibility and the law, regulations or government legal authority. Otherwise they can invoke the Nuremberg defence, but would still of course be out of step with international law. But this problem would not arise at all if there were a clear ban on all participation in interrogation, as suggested by Anne Anderson’s letter to Gerald Koocher of the APA.

As Miles (2004) indicates, the notion that by being present in compromised interrogations psychologists can prevent harm is almost certainly illusory, with significant risks of being ‘drawn in’ to the whole process. An ethical rulebook is a weak safeguard in such total institutions as
the Guantánamo or Abu Ghraib prisons, or in many other military and penal contexts.

The roots of the APA position

The APA rests its declarations on two ethical principles, the first is the uncontroversial ‘do no harm’, while the second is that ‘psychologists are aware of their professional and scientific responsibilities to society’. Former APA President Gerald Koocher (cited in Soldz 2006c) used the combination of these principles to legitimise the involvement of US psychologists in interrogation and other roles in State security.

However, in our view the problem is not one of individual professional practice but of collusion with a whole oppressive system. The APA’s position is arguably consistent with a 50-year history of psychologists’ collaboration with US state security. As detailed by McCoy (2006), the CIA took up Hebb’s Canadian defencefunded work on sensory deprivation, funding further work to take it to its limits in producing psychological breakdown. This research and the phenomenon of sensory deprivation is the cornerstone of psychological torture, a paradigm refined
over the years (CIA, n.d.-b). This further development has been done within the
agency – for example in the mass torture of prisoners during the Vietnam war (McCoy, 2006), or through the culture-specific elements added for Muslim detainees in the present conflict (Physicians for Human Rights, 2005; Soldz, 2006b). It has also been done through further commissioned research, typically through CIA-created funding vehicles such as the Human
Ecology Fund (Greenfield, 1977; Harper, 2004; McCoy, 2006; Watson, 1978).

The symbiotic relationship of US psychology with influential sections of the US military-security establishment is also suggested by the majority of psychologists on the PENS Task Force with links to the military (see e.g. tinyurl.com/2186at), and what Soldz has argued are carefully crafted rules and guidance to psychologists on this question. He suggests that the APA leadership does not want to risk governmental support for psychology. As the APA Division 19 (Military Psychology) proudly proclaims, the US Department of Defence is the largest employer of psychologists worldwide. The problem is that support of psychology by the past and current US governments is, almost by definition, compromising for the ethics of the profession, not merely at the level of codes of practice but in terms of the very construction of the discipline itself together with its knowledge. Psychologists of our generation simply didn’t learn how classic research by Hebb, Schein, Orne (Harper, 2004), Janis and possibly Milgram (McCoy, 2006) was funded by the defence establishment with a view to improved social control in global conflicts.

As a further example of psychological complicity with state security, Gray and Zielinski (2006) argue that the CIA’s handbook on counter-insurgency (CIA, n.d.-a), used to such devastating effect on human rights in Central America, is likely to have been written by psychologists.
Considering the wording, and taking account of the size of the psychological operations units in the US army (the 4th Psychological Operations Group at Fort Bragg currently has 1300 staff and accounts for 26 per cent of the 5000 total: Pike, 2006), we too find this plausible.

More than interrogation

No doubt some readers will be thinking that this is dirty work, but someone has to do it – that the ends, in terms of intelligence gained from interrogation, justifies the means. Yet consider the current conflict in Iraq: is the use of torture and ill treatment really a matter of interrogation and intelligence? It seems that in the 10 known US prisons, more than 50,000 people were detained at some point in 2005. Many were ill-treated using the various techniques known as psychological torture. At least 26 have been killed (Physicians for Human Rights, 2005). In addition to the death toll for Iraqis outside prison – some 186,000 excess deaths attributable to the coalition forces (Burnham et al., 2006) – and atrocities like the destruction of Fallujah, this massive intervention has the familiar characteristics of the regimes imposed on Vietnam and in
Latin America, where social control is imposed on a population by the establishment of fear. It has been suggested (e.g. Gray, 2006) that many of the torture victims are not actually interrogated, and are returned in extreme distress as a lesson to the population – just as the mutilated corpses left by the US-trained death squads in the Latin American dictatorships had the same purpose (CIA, n.d.-a).

An enduring conflict

We would like to conclude by broadening the perspective further, just as radical psychologists have tried to argue that psychology should extend its analysis to the societal construction of psychological life and the mechanisms of social control (Armistead, 1974; Martín-Baró, 1996;
Parker, 1999). In our view, the imperialist state has for years been harnessing its psychology to refine its methods of social control (Herman, 1995; Prilleltensky, 1994), whether through anti-democratic, pro-system propaganda in the core countries of the West (Carey, 1997) or in
the control of those populations who try to take on the empire and its economic system (Duckett, 2005; Lira, 2000; Martín-Baró, 1988).

The implication of this analysis is that socially responsible psychologists should by all means work to achieve a coherent stance by organised psychology on torture and interrogation. This stance should be backed by a clear ethical code, and it should a) prohibit any involvement in
interrogation; b) prohibit psychologists from taking research and development money from state security organisations; and c) encourage involvement in the promotion of humane policies of detention and crime prevention, and against neocolonial military adventures.

But we should not fall into the trap of thinking that this will change the basic paradigm of social control exerted by the state, which will also pick up and use psychological knowledge not produced in a military/state security context. Nor will it do much by itself to reduce the influence of the security apparatus on North American psychology – itself the hegemonic force in world psychology, and one that touches us all.

■ Mark Burton is a qualified clinical psychologist who now works as a manager in a public service. He writes here in a personal capacity. He is also a Visiting Professor at Manchester Metropolitan University.

■ Carolyn Kagan is Professor of Community Social Psychology and Director of the Research Institute for Health and Social Change at Manchester Metropolitan University.

DISCUSS AND DEBATE
How can psychologists best work to prevent military interventions in other countries?

How can psychologists best support initiatives to end torture and abuse of people in detention?
Have your say on these or other issues this article raises. E-mail ‘Letters’ on psychologist@bps.org.uk or contribute (members only) via http://www.psychforum.org.uk/.

WEBLINKS

On the APA controversy: tinyurl.com/38dopfPsychologists for Social Responsibility: http://www.psysr.org/ The Martín Baró Fund: tinyurl.com/27qwbaThe CIA’s interrogation manual: www.kimsoft.com/2000/kubark.htm UN Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment: www.hrweb.org/legal/cat.html

References

American Psychological Association.(2002). Ethical principles ofpsychologists and code of conduct.Retrieved 23 Jan 2007 fromwww.apa.org/ethics/code2002.html

American Psychological Association.(2005). Report of the AmericanPsychological Association Presidential

Task Force on Psychological Ethicsand National Security.Washington,DC:Author.Armistead, N. (Ed.). (1974).

Reconstructing social psychology.Harmondsworth: Penguin.Basoglu, M., Livanou, M. & Crnobari, C.(2007).

Torture vs other cruel,inhuman, and degrading treatment:Is the distinction real or apparent?Archives of General Psychiatry, 64,277–285.Behnke, S. (2006).

Ethics andInterrogations: Comparing andcontrasting the AmericanPsychological,American Medicaland American Psychiatric

Association positions. APA Monitor,37(7), 66.British Psychological Society. (2005).

Declaration by The BPS concerningtorture and other cruel, inhumanor degrading treatment orpunishment. The Psychologist, 18(4),190.Burnham, G., Lafta, R., Doocy, S. &Roberts, L. (2006).

Mortality after the 2003 invasion of Iraq: a crosssectionalcluster sample study. TheLancet, 368(9545), 1421–1428.Carey,A. (1997).

Taking the risk out ofdemocracy: Corporate propagandaversus freedom and liberty (editedby A. Lowrey). Champaign, IL:University of Illinois Press.CIA. (n.d.-a).

CIA Manual: Psychological operations in guerrilla warfare.Retrieved 3 October, 200, from www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episodes/18/documents/cia.ops/CIA. (n.d.-b).

KUBARK Counterintelligence interrogation: The CIA’s secret manual on coercivequestioning. Retrieved 30November 2006 fromwww.kimsoft.com/2000/kubark.htmDuckett, P. (2005). Globalised violence, community psychology and thebombing and occupation ofAfghanistan and Iraq. Journal ofCommunity and Applied SocialPsychology, 15, 414–423.Gray, G. (2006). [Letter to the editor].

Torture, 16(1), 65–66.Gray, G. & Zielinski,A. (2006).

Psychology and US psychologists intorture and war in the Middle East.Torture, 16(2), 128–133.Greenfield, P. (1977).

CIA’s behaviorcaper. APA Monitor, 1(December),10–11.Harper, D. (2004).

Psychology and the‘War on Terror’. Journal of Critical Psychology, Counselling and Psychotherapy, 4(1), 1–10.Herman, E. (1995).

The romance ofAmerican psychology: Political culturein the age of experts. Berkeley, CA:University of California Press.Lira, E. (2000).

Psicología del miedo yconducta colectiva en Chile (Thepsychology of fear and collectivebehaviour in Chile). In I. Martín-Baró (Ed.) Psicología social de laguerra. San Salvador: UCA Editores.Martín-Baró, I. (1988).

From dirty warto psychological war:The case of El Salvador. In A.Aron (Ed.) Flight,exile and return: Mental health andthe refugee. San Francisco:CHRICA.Martín-Baró, I. (1996).

Writings for aliberation psychology. New York:Harvard University Press.McCoy,A. (2006). A question of torture:CIA interrogation from the Cold Warto the War on Terror.New York:Metropolis.Miles, S.H. (2004).

Abu Ghraib: Itslegacy for military medicine. TheLancet, 364, 725–729.Miles, S.H. (2007). Medical ethics andthe interrogation of Guantánamo.American Journal of Bioethics. 7(4),5–11.Moorhead-Slaughter,O. (2006).

Ethicsand national security. APA Monitor,37(4), 20.Parker, I. (1999). Critical psychology:Critical links.

Annual Review ofCritical Psychology, 1, 3–18.Physicians for Human Rights (2005).Break them down: Systematic use oftorture by US forces. Cambridge, MA:Author. www.phrusa.org/research/torture/pdf/psych_torture.pdf.Pike, J. (2006). 4th PsychologicalOperations Group (Airborne).Retrieved 19 November 2006from tinyurl.com/2yoyg4Prilleltensky, I. (1994).

The morals and politics of psycholgy: psychological discourse and the status quo.Albany,NY:New York University Press.

Psychologists for Social Responsibility.(2006a). [Press release]. Retrieved 23 Jan 2007 fromtinyurl.com/3a9drz .

Psychologists for Social Responsibility.(2006b, June 21, 2006). Psychologist surge Guantanamo closure. Retrieved 23 Jan 2007 fromtinyurl.com/2jbasa.Rubinstein, L., Pross, C., Davidoff, F. &Iacopino,V. (2005).

Coercive US interrogation policies:A challenge to medical ethics. Journal of the American Medical Association,294(12), 1544–1549.Soldz, S. (2006a).

A profession struggles tosave its soul: Psychologists, Guantánamoand torture. Retrieved 14 Sept 2006 from www.counterpunch.org/soldz08012006.htmlSoldz, S. (2006b).

Bad faith and distortions from the AmericanPsychological Association: Protecting the torturers. Retrieved 14 Sept2006 from www.counterpunch.org/soldz09062006.htmlSoldz, S. (2006c, 12 June) ‘Psyche,science and society’ blog. Retrieved23 January 2007 fromtinyurl.com/yfjpyb.Summers, C. (1992).

Militarism, humanwelfare, and the APA EthicalPrinciples of Psychologists. Ethics &Behavior, 2(4), 287–310.Watson, P. (1978).War on the Mind:Themilitary uses of psychology. NewYork: Basic Books.August 2007487

Islamic Religiosity Models & Scales Thematic Issue JMMH

JOURNAL OF MUSLIM MENTAL HEALTH
Announces

"ISLAMIC RELIGIOSITY – MEASURES AND MENTAL HEALTH
Guest Editors:
Mona M. Amer, Ph.D. - Yale University School of Medicine; monaamer75@gmail. com
Ralph W. Hood, Jr., Ph.D. - University of Tennessee at Chattanooga; Ralph-Hood@utc. edu

The Journal of Muslim Mental Health is pleased to announce the upcoming thematic issues focused on Islamic religiosity scheduled for publication November 2007 and May 2008. The two issues will: explore theoretical controversies and practical challenges in researching psychology of religion among Muslims, introduce new measures of religiosity for use with Muslim populations, and explore the links between religiosity and aspects of interpersonal and mental health.

Instruments discussed in the thematic issues assess constructs such as:
- Religious commitment and general religiosity
- Questing and religious reflection
- Fundamentalism
- Religious coping
- Perceived religious discrimination
- Religiosity in spousal selection and marital satisfaction

The thematic issues have international representation, with authors from:
- Australia
- Kuwait
- Iran
- Pakistan
- United Arab Emirates
- United Kingdom
- United States

Additional features are included such as book review and clinical case study.

In light of the dearth of validated instruments for use with Muslims, this will be an essential reference volume for researchers and clinicians working with Muslim populations.

For more information about the Journal of Muslim Mental Health and how to subscribe, please visit
http://www.tandf. co.uk/journals/ titles/15564908. asp
or contact: journal@muslimmenta lhealth.com .

My Iraq: Child psychiatrist

As part of the BBC's Iraq week, child psychiatrist Dr Haidr al-Maliki describes his personal and professional anxieties.

My Iraq: Child psychiatrist


Dr Haidr al-Maliki was an army psychiatrist during Saddam Hussein's regime.

He now works as a child psychiatrist at Ab Ibn Rushed Hospital in Baghdad. He lives with his wife and four children.

There used to be about 80 psychiatrists in Iraq, now there are just 20 to 25.

And some of them will leave. Fifteen or so will eventually go to the UAE or to Jordan; it's difficult.

About a year ago, during Ramadan, four boys aged about 15 to 20 came into my private clinic, in front of my patient.

They asked "Are you Dr Haidr?" I said yes. And they shot me several times.

One bullet went into my right shoulder, another into my right arm. I am left with nerve injury and muscle atrophy.

Afterwards they told me I couldn't go to my clinic and that I had to leave the country. They didn't say why.

So, now I don't go out, I just stay at home. My own private jail.

During Saddam's regime we could take our families to the cinema.

I want to drink, I want to dance, I want to visit my friends. But I can't do anything. If I even think about going for a drink in my club 500m from my house, I will be killed.

Iraqi people are living in difficult times. Most of us have been exposed to aggression: attacks in the street, car bombings, kidnappings.

Most Iraqi people now deal with each other in an aggressive way; they show disturbed behaviour; they have lost their civility.

We don't know how to treat these problems really.

But I can't leave Iraq. If I and my friends leave, who will help our people?

Limitations of care

I was asked to open the child psychiatry centre in Ab Ibn Rushed hospital, but I have no training in children, really.

I read books and I try to help.

Most of the children are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, especially those who have been exposed to kidnapping.

Most of the children I see are bedwetting. They have disturbed behaviour or epilepsy.

We treat them with simple medication; it is very difficult.

Most of the families come here for help and sometimes we can do nothing for them, except offer support and advice.

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