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Biomedical subjects

P C Horton

Publications and source records attributed to P C Horton.

14 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1992

Alexithymia--state and trait.

Alexithymia is conceptualized as both affect-deficit disorder and continuous personality variable. Two-hundred-sixty-four adolescents were surveyed using (1) a core symptom questionnaire for alexithymic state; (2) the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS), and (3) the Solacing Methods Questionnaire. Three percent were positive for core symptoms and used significantly fewer solacers than matched controls (p = 0.048); the affect-deficit disorder hypothesis is supported. Twenty-three percent were TAS-positive suggesting the need for a trait measure. However, only one of the 8 core symptom subjects was TAS-positive raising a question about the sensitivity of the TAS to the extreme cases on which the alexithymia concept is based. While 62.5% of the matched controls reported using memories for solace, none of the core symptom subjects did; one of the alexithymic's central problems may consist in finding psychological as opposed to action-oriented and physical comfort.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

Alexithymia and solace.

Thirteen alexithymic patients and 13 panic disorder patients were compared with matched controls regarding their use of self-solacing strategies. Whereas the panic disorder group used significantly more (p less than 0.001) solacing objects, activities and sounds than normals, the alexithymic subjects used significantly fewer self-solacing strategies (p less than 0.001). In view of the developmental, clinical and subjective importance of the ability to solace oneself, the hypothesis that alexithymia may, in some cases, represent a basic feeling deficit is supported.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1988

Positive emotions and the right parietal cortex.

The achievement of a state of solace is a developmental necessity to the unfolding of the capacity for positive emotions. In addition, solace is a significant subjective component of noninstinctual feelings such as love, joy, gratitude, and rapture. Pure solace is experienced primarily in relation to the sense of self, whereas the solace derivatives connect, in varying degrees, with objects external to the self. Psychiatrists see many patients who are unsolaceable and who, because of this, cannot experience sustained positive emotion of any kind. Those diagnosed as personality, conduct, and behaviorally disordered, as well as those with alexithymia, are particularly likely to exhibit a basic unsolaceability. The psychiatrist should also be alert to a deficiency of positive emotion in those with attention deficit disorder and the so-called learning disability syndrome. The coexistence of unsolaceability with features of right parietal cortex dysfunction suggests a directionality of positive emotional experience and parietal neocortical activity. The tertiary zones of the right parietal cortex appear to be the structural system most likely to subserve complex positive affects.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1976

The psychological treatment of personality disorder.

The author presents three case reports of individuals with personality disorder, none of whom demonstrated significant ability for transitional relatedness before therapy. In therapy, he conceptualized for the two adult patients the importance of their inability to experience in the transitional mode; he offered concrete potential transitional objects to the one child patient. The therapeutic results were good.

Adult↗
PubMed1976

Personality disorder and parietal lobe dysfunction.

An inability to relate transitionally is a major feature of personality disorder. The developmental independence of transitional relatedness from verbal-symbolic growth, its orienting function, and the nature of its visual and tactile components support the conclusion that it is a function of the nondominant parietal lobe. Therefore it can be hypothesized that dysfunction of this area is the cerebral analogue of personality disorder. The fact that unawareness of illness ("anosognosia") in conjunction with grossly intact intellectual function is common to both personality disorder and minor parietal lobe dysfunction further supports this hypothesis.

Adult↗