From Academia to Practice: Why It Matters

The world is increasingly complex, but the way we communicate doesn’t have to be. From Academia to Practice: Why It Matters bridges the gap between mental health academia and science to practical take-away messages. This series will be of interest for healthcare professional audiences of all disciplines as well as those working in probation and parole, and legal service fields, as well as people who are interested in what’s happening at the intersection of mental health and the law.

These regular news posts will provide short and condensed plain language summaries of our International Forensic Psychiatry Lecture Series talks and other academic pieces from the Forensic Psychiatry Institute.

The lecture series is produced by Drs. Gary Chaimowitz, Mini Mamak, Heather Moulden, and Sébastien Prat, and Knowledge Translation Specialist Diana Marginean. From Academia to Practice is produced by Virginia St-Denis and Diana Maginean.

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Flowchart shows guiding principle of religion and terrorism attitudes pointing to severity of terrorism. Pointing to religion are religious commitment and adverse childhood experiences. Pointing to terrorism attitudes is religion, antisocial personality disorder, political commitment, and adverse childhood experiences.

Terrorism and Terror Management Theory

What if the 2002 movie Minority Report was real? What if we could identify someone about to commit a crime and stop them beforehand? Terrorism research tends to focus on the same thing. If we could figure out who the terrorists are or who they are likely to be, wouldn’t it be nice if we could stop them before they did it? Unfortunately, there are no simple answers to the questions of what causes terrorism and what causes somebody to become a suicide bomber. There isn’t one pathway to becoming a terrorist.Continue reading→

Silhouette of five men where suits, trench coats, and fedoras.

Neither Gangs nor Stalking: A Review of “Gang Stalking” Allegations in the U.S. Federal Court System

Gang stalking refers to allegations of surveillance, harassment, and general victimization by unknown agents. People who identify as victims of gang stalking (targeted individuals) allege that these gangs use covert and co-ordinated methods, advanced technological weapons, and mind control to harass them. Many targeted individuals believe that the gang stalking is the work of the government or other state actors, which may cause them to launch lawsuits against the government or other perpetrators.Continue reading→

Line drawing of a boy and woman

Childhood Sexual Abuse by Women Against Boys

When it comes to sexual abuse, a new, broader theoretical framework needs to include gender diversity. When a woman sexually abuses a boy, the woman and the boy each experience events differently than men who sexually abuse girls. These discussions need to include stereotypes about dangerous females, male sexuality, normal sexual experimentation, and the social worth of males’ perceptions of female sexual attention.Continue reading→

Child's drawing of their self-portrait with a hole in the torso, where they feel empty.

“Lay Not Thine Hand Upon the Lad”: The Importance of Childhood Trauma for Forensic Science

We have lived with childhood trauma since Biblical times, hence the quote from Genesis, where Abraham was about to sacrifice his son, Isaac. We have become used to it. That is why helping people with childhood trauma needs preparation. That includes more than simply being well-informed about trauma and its effects on children and their development. It also includes our ongoing self-care.Continue reading→

Venn diagram showing Religious (Karezza), Manosphere (NoFap) and Feminist overlapping, with the words Anti-masturbation and anti-porn in the middle.

Risks of Modern Anti-masturbation Movements on Young Men: Studies of NoFap and Karezza

The religious group Karezza and NoFap share ideologies against self-pleasure by masturbation and pornography. NoFap calls themselves a cult and their followers the NoFap Army. The International Centre for Counter Terrorism calls NoFap an extreme misogynist group. Experts recommended that mental health care providers who work with men affected by these violent extremists follow the Quebec Service model to help men who want to leave.Continue reading→

Four stacked stones on one side of a wooden plank is being balanced by one stone further away from the fulcrom stone.

How to Predict Repeat Sexual Offending Through a Protective Lens

There are many evidence-based risk assessment tools that help mental health professionals predict whether a person will sexually reoffend. However, these tools typically take a negative, biased, and demotivating approach. With therapy increasingly adopting a strengths-based approach, Dr. Gwenda M. Willis was searching for an assessment tool that aligned with her strengths-based approach to therapy. Enter the Structured Assessment of PROtective Factors against Sexual Offending or SAPROF-SO. Continue reading→