Rob Waters
Rob Waters is the former editor of the men's health channel at WebMD and a former contributing editor to the Psychotherapy Networker.
Contributed by Rob Waters
7 Results
Depression: Have We Got It Wrong?
Questions about the serotonin hypothesis
Two new studies suggest that the conventional wisdom fostered by drug companies about what causes depression and how both the brain and the Prozac generation of antidepressants actually work is overly simplistic, if not wrong. Taken together, the studies suggest that, while serotonin and other neurotransmitters may well affect mood and behavior, the mechanism by which they do so is far more complex than the "boost serotonin, elevate mood" equation embraced by popular culture. Read More
Children in Crisis?
Concerns about the growing popularity of the bipolar diagnosis
Bipolar disorder was first flagged as a pediatric illness in the mid-1990s, when researchers led by Joseph Biederman of Harvard and Barbara Geller of Washington University in St. Louis published papers describing "mania-like symptoms" in young patients, many of whom were also diagnosed with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (AD/HD). Concerns about the growing popularity of the bipolar diagnosis are discussed. Read More
Stop the Merry-Go-Round
Sweeping changes are urgently needed in today's foster care system
A few other states and cities, including New York City and Illinois, have made changes in their foster care programs similar to Alabama's. But first, both went through what [Richard Wexler] calls a "foster care panic," when a child who'd been reported to the foster care system was brutally beaten or killed. Read More
The Ethics of Involuntary Treatment
Should some sex offenders be hospitalized indefinitely?
These laws are patterned on long-standing statutes that allow for involuntary commitment of people with severe psychiatric disorders. There's one key difference, however: under the terms of a 1997 Supreme Court decision, "sexual predators" don't need to be diagnosed as "mentally ill," but, rather, must be repeat offenders who are determined by clinicians to have a "mental abnormality" that makes them likely to reoffend. Read More
Judith Wallerstein and the Great Divorce Debate
Are the Unions the Answer to Managed Care?
Judith Wallerstein, now 78, is the grand dame of divorce researchers; she's been studying the impact of divorce on children for 30 years, since the modern American divorce boom was launched in California in the early 1970s. She's troubled by what she's seen, but she insists the Times headline, which pegged her as a "Resolute Adversary of Divorce," is a serious distortion of her actual views. Read More