ARTICLE CRITIQUE

A Critique of Current Work on Brain Studies



A Critique of Current Work on Brain Studies

Introduction

This paper will be providing a Critique of Current Work on Brain Studies. For this the article I have selected is “Monitoring and Management of Antipsychotic-Related Metabolic and Endocrine Adverse Events in Pediatric Patients”.

Article Summary 

Current treatment programs for antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) and psychopathy, as well as conduct disorder in children, indicate the lack of biological treatment approaches and the need for a more symptom-based approach. About one to six percent of individuals in the general population have ASPD, and up to one percent has psychopathy. In the prison population, 50-80 percent meet the criteria for ASPD, and 15-25 percent meet the criteria for psychopathy. Whereas most individuals diagnosed with psychopathy meet the criteria for ASPD, only a minority of individuals with ASPD would receive a diagnosis of psychopathy. ASPD and psychopathy have a multifaceted aetiology that involves both genetic and environmental factors and gene-environment interactions. Both disorders are heritable, with antisocial behavior in children with callous-unemotional traits and psychopathy being highly heritable. Unfortunately, few effective treatments exist for ASPD, and various pessimistic claims have been made regarding the treatment of psychopaths. A widespread belief that psychopaths are immune to treatment prevailed for decades and still does today among many experts.

Discussion Analysis

A recent review by Christine Litschge and colleagues investigated the effectiveness of current treatment programs by looking at 26 meta-analytic studies composed of nearly 2,000 treatment studies and involving more than 100,000 children and adolescents with conduct problems. They found that the majority of effect sizes, as in the effectiveness of the treatment program in reducing aggressive and disruptive behavior, was small to medium in magnitude (d < 0.36). As suggested by Jacob Cohen, reported effect sizes of d = 20 are considered small, sizes of d = 0.50 are considered medium, and sizes of d = 0.80 are considered large. All but three studies involved some kind of behavioral treatment program, such as cognitive behavioral therapy, peer-management therapy, family therapy, and self-management therapy. Multimodal types of therapies, comprising 25 percent of the studies, produced the largest effects (d > 0.76). Only one meta-analysis on drug therapies was included, which assessed the effectiveness of three common  medications (Adderall, methylphenidate, and Concerta) in 683 children with ADHD. These stimulant drug therapies produced moderate to large effect sizes on covert (d = 0.69) and ...