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Biomedical subjects

A M Nicholi

Publications and source records attributed to A M Nicholi.

18 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1983

The nontherapeutic use of psychoactive drugs. A modern epidemic.

The current widespread nontherapeutic use of psychoactive drugs began among a small group of college students in the early 1960s. It spread with explosive force into an epidemic of extraordinary scope involving all regions of the country, all socioeconomic classes, and all age groups. This article reviews the drugs currently used and identifies those who use them. It discusses the complex, rapidly changing patterns of use and the consequences of this epidemic for both the individual and the society. The inhalants, phencyclidine, cocaine, heroin, the psychotherapeutics (methaqualone and amphetamine), and marijuana are the most widely used drugs. Recent clinical and laboratory research indicates that these drugs pose serious hazards to physical and mental health. Marijuana is the most widely used illicit drug; one quarter of the entire U.S. population have used the drug, and 20 million people use it daily. The short-term and long-term adverse effects of marijuana have important social implications. Recent data suggest that drug users possess limited inner resources to cope with psychological stress and that they take drugs to fill a moral and spiritual void and to meet intense emotional needs. It is proposed that these character traits and emotional conflicts of drug users may reflect recent changes in child rearing and family stability.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1982

Mass hysteria among schoolchildren. Early loss as a predisposing factor.

On May 21, 1979, an outbreak of illness spread swiftly among elementary school students in a Boston suburb. Of 224 boys and girls attending an assembly, 34 were hospitalized with severe dizziness, weakness, hyperventilation, headache, nausea, and abdominal pain. Sudden remission of symptoms, preponderance in girls, and failure of an extensive epidemiological investigation to detect an organic cause indicated mass hysteria. To test the hypothesis that previous loss influenced a child's vulnerability to current loss and predisposed that child to mass hysteria, we compared the incidence of family disruption in the hospitalized children with that in the nonhospitalized children. A significantly higher rate of parental divorce (P less than .00005) and death within the family (P less than .0005) occurred among the hospitalized children. These findings suggest a relationship between childhood loss and susceptibility to mass hysteria.

Adolescent↗