Psychiatry All books
François Ansermet, Pierre Magistretti
To Each His Own Brain Biology of the Unconscious
This book is the result of the coming together of psychoanalysis and neuroscience around the shared observation that experience leaves a mark. Although the idea that experience produces psychic imprints - whether conscious or unconscious - has always been central to psychoanalysis, it was not until recently that findings in neurobiology demonstrated that neuronal plasticity existed and that it operated throughout a person's life. This constant remodelling in relation to experience poses certain basic questions about each individual's identity and future. How does psychic life emerge from experience and from what it imprints? What are the respective contributions of external stimuli (the reality behind experience) and of internal stimuli (the imprinted marks)? How do the mechanisms of synaptic plasticity participate in the establishment of an unconscious internal reality? What is the role of the body in this new dynamic organisation? This book provides the foundations for a better understanding of the relations between neuroscience and psychoanalysis and offers an original theory of the unconscious, by combining recent findings in neurobiology with the basic principles of psychoanalysis. Eschewing genetic determinism, it shows that each individual is different and each brain unique. Pierre Magistretti, a physician and neurobiologist, is a professor of physiology and director of the Centre for Psychiatric Neuroscience at the University of Lausanne's medical school. In addition, he is the president of the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies. François Ansermet is a psychoanalyst and professor of child and adolescent psychology at the University of Lausanne. He is the co-author, with O. Halfon and B. Pierrehumbert, of Filiations psychiques (Presses Universitaires de France, 2000).
Willy Pasini
Jealousy
The sexual revolution of the 1960s undermined fidelity as well as jealousy, both of which were regarded as out-dated bourgeois concepts. Since then, jealousy has become unacceptable - something that should be hidden because it is somehow shameful. But what if jealousy were intrinsic to human nature, asks Willy Pasini. What if it were an essential part of all of us - a disease that some of us develop while others remain healthy carriers? If jealousy concerns all of us, argues Pasini, we must accept its reality, learn not to be afraid of it and put an end to our feelings of shame and embarrassment. That is the first step. The second step consists in trying to educate our feelings of jealousy, instead of denying them. We can do this by playing with allusions and illusions, with the extraordinary - and forgotten - power of flirtation, with the lightness of being. Here is a book that should help turn jealousy into a positive factor - and even into an aphrodisiac. A psychiatrist and sexologist, Willy Pasini is the author of many best-selling books, including À quoi sert le couple? and Les Nouveau Comportements sexuels, both published by Editions Odile Jacob.
Yves Simon
How to Overcome Bulimia
Bulimia is increasingly common, particularly among girls. A recent study of high-school-age girls revealed that 20 % suffered from regular bulimic episodes. Approaching bulimia from both a psychological and a behavioural angle, the authors offer a practical, scientifically tested method to overcome the disorder. This is an indispensable book for patients, their friends and family, as well as for members of the medical profession Yves Simon is a medical psychiatrist and director of the anorexia/bulimia programme at the Free University of Brussels. François Nef is a psychologist teaching at the Free University of Brussels. Both Doctors Simon and Nef are specialists in eating disorders and behaviour.
Jacques Barillon, Paul Bensussan
A Criminal Desire
Jacques Barillon and Paul Bensussan show, on a European scale, the ravages caused by an overly psychological approach to the law. They resolutely denounce the extremes and excesses of the new moral and sexual order that is now being proposed for the general good. It will mean tolerating that the judicial system, primarily concerned with the victims well-being, will renounce enforcing the Law, with the approval of psychiatrists and psychologists. This is an indispensable and disturbing book that should help to awaken our anaesthetised critical sense. Jacques Barillon is an internationally renowned lawyer specialising in criminal law. Paul Bensussan, a psychiatrist, sexologist and legal expert, specialises in sex crimes.
Michel Lemay
Autism Today
What do we know about autism today ? How can it be treated ? What is the cause ? In this book, the author offers a clear appraisal of the contributions and failures of various disciplines (psychoanalysis, neurobiology, genetics, chemical and drug treatment, and behavioural and cognitive therapies), and makes a case for a multidisciplary type of medicine. It offers both parents and professionals a great source of strength with which to fight against autism. Michel Lemay is a psychiatrist and professor of child and adolescent psychiatry. A world-renowned specialist in autism, he is the director of the clinic on autism and invasive development disorders at the Hôpital Sainte-Justine in Montreal.
Marie-Christine Hardy-Baylé, Christine Bronnec
What are the Limits of Psychiatry ?
On the one hand, an ever increasing demand, on the other, widespread agreement that the profession in is the grip of a crisis. The result is that the supply is badly equipped to deal with the demand. What are the origins of this crisis ? Does it run as deep as the very foundations and identity of psychiatry itself ? In particular, what can be done to transform this natural diversity into a real strength ? Psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, Marie-Christine Hardy-Baylé works at the André-Mignot hospital, and is a professor of medicine at the University of Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines. She heads the Association for the Promotion of Public Health of Yvelines Sud. A hospital director, Christine Bronnec, is in charge of the ANEAS project to evaluate psychiatric needs, and is co-president of the Association for the Promotion of Public Health of Yvelines Sud.
Mouzayan Osseiran-Houbballah
The Child Soldier
The existence of thousands of child-soldiers is one of the scandals of our time. UNICEF has estimated their number in the world today at 300,000 a figure that has grown in recent years due to the increase in the number of civil wars. What happens to them when the fighting ceases? Why are they no longer visible in Beirut, or elsewhere? Why do so many of them end up in drug-detoxification centres? What does the future hold for these children who know nothing besides how to handle weapons? Mouzayan Osseiran-Houbballah is a psychologist.
Gustave-Nicolas Fischer
Mental Wounds The Strength to Start Over
This book is about the victims of psychological trauma: survivors of war atrocities, torture and attacks, as well as those men and women who suffer daily from emotional harassment. The author shows how these mental wounds can be cared for and how they can heal: by working on memory, through speech, through the support of therapy, by a gesture of reparation, and through forgiveness. Such is the healing process that will help victims to return to life and understand the price. Gustave-Nicolas Fischer teaches psychology and directs the laboratory of psychology at the University of Metz.
Catherine Clément, Tobie Nathan
The Couch and the Grigri
This work is a fascinating discussion between a practising analyst who has not ceased to confront his discipline with other disciplines of the mind, and a philosopher with great psychoanalytic experience. It aims to show how cultural heritage a debt linking each generation to its ancestors shapes both how we represent reality and our emotional universe. The authors thoughts and conclusions are thoroughly backed up with a variety of specific examples and observations. Tobie Nathan is an ethno-psychologist and teaches clinical and pathological psychology at the University of Paris VIII. Catherine Clément is a writer and philosopher.
Raymond Cahn
The End of the Couch ?
Why do psychoanalysts refuse to review their methods, while simultaneously recognising that life-styles have evolved and that new pathologies have come into existence? Why, for example, do they remain devoted to the psychoanalysts couch, while realising that certain cures are at a dead-end? This is a controversial work on the challenges facing psychoanalysis a field that had its hour of glory in the 1960s but has since been somewhat discredited. Raymond Cahn is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst.
Claude Olievenstein, Carlos Parada
Like A Cannibalistic Angel Drugs, Adolescents and Society
Does it make sense to place hallucinogens and hard drugs in the same category and to regard them all as addictive? Should tobacco and alcohol be put on the same plane as heroin, cocaine and crack ? With the assistance of Carlos Parada, his collaborator at the Centre Médical de Marmottan, Claude Olievenstein offers the reader his latest thoughts and ideas on the highly distinctive world of substance abusers, which is characterised by pleasure, withdrawal, the need for warmth and haste and, above all, by instability and chaos. Claude Olievenstein is the head doctor at the Centre Médical de Marmottan, in Paris, and a senior research fellow at the University of Lyon-II. Carlos Parada, a physician specialising in drug addiction, works at the Centre Médical de Marmottan.
Jean Adès, Michel Lejoyeux
Give Me More! Gambling, Sex, Work, Money
Do we live in an age of addictions? Some pass their time in the office, to the detriment of their family life. Others blow their budget on useless and spontaneous buys. Others still crave thrills and sensations, obtained through participating in extreme sports. But is there a link between a drug addict and a person addicted to shopping, sex or work? Are these new dependencies increasingly frequent, symptomatic of our society? Where does pleasure stop and danger begin? Jean Adès is professor of medicine. Professor Michael Lejoyeux is a psychiatrist.
