Without any sampling, we included all IV drug abusers of Kashan prison in our study. They were assessed through GHQ-28 and demographic characteristic questionnaire. In addiction, they were interviewed via DSM-IV check list and evaluated by three psychiatrists.

Through psychiatric interviews, the most common disorders, in this study, include anti-social personality disorder in 28 persons (93/6%), mood disorder in 21 ones (47/7%), anxiety disorder in 8 ones (18/8%) and adjustment disorder in 3 ones (6/8%)19 ones (43/1%) multi disorder and 25 ones (56/8%) one disorder. In this study, no meaningful relationship between disorder and marital status, job and educational level could be found, but it should be emphasized that the emergence of mental disorder among the unemployed male IV drug abusers and those male IV drug abusers younger than 30 has been more than other IV drug abusers.

Based on the findings of this study, IV drug abusers are not in good mental health. This subject investigation needs more comprehensive and extensive study in this area.

The purposes of this study were to determine the mental health and defenses mechanism level, to compare mental health with defenses mechanism, personal and cases data, and to compare defenses mechanism with personal and cases data among country-wide Thai inmates and prisoners.

The samples, selected from jails and prisons around country by stratified systematic random sampling, comprised of 5,274 inmates and prisoners during March to May, 2003. Data were collected by three sets of questionnaires, which were personal and case data, Thai Mental Health Indicators (66-items version), and Defense Style Questionnaire 40 (DSQ-40) respectively. Data were analyzed by using descriptive statistics, Pearson chi-square test, Mann-Whitney U test and Kruskal-Wallis test.

Most of samples, classified by types of jails and prisons, had poor mental health. Their mature defenses mechanism score was higher than neurotic and immature defenses mechanism respectively. The respondents who stay in different types of jails and prisons; who had different age, educational levels, sentenced status, numbers of crime-doing and numbers of criminal cases, had significantly different mental health level. They used different defenses mechanism significantly among different mental health, age, sex and educational level. The samples who had different numbers of crime-doing and numbers of criminal cases, and who convicted to different crimes, used some different immature defenses mechanism significantly.

The results of this study can be used as the basic benchmark for mental health development monitoring in the jails and prisons.

The study aimed to investigate relationship between personality characteristics and optimism in university students.

Study sample included a number of students that randomly were selected. To measure characteristics of personality questionnaire, NEO-FFI and optimism inventory was used. After collecting data Pearson correlation coefficient was used to analyze the data.

Findings showed that there were positive significant correlation between Extroversion, Agreement, Conscience and optimism in university students.

Based on results, it is recemonded that with applying plans to increase optimism elements in students, mental health will increase.

The stress of infertility is the problem that involves many couples. The reaction manner of infertile couples to this stress and finally the mental health of them are affected by many factors that one of them is the coping styles that such couples use in contrast with the stressor.

This research with the aim of realizing psychological aspects of infertility and showing it's effects, studies the coping styles and the mental health of infertile men and women to the stress of infertility.

The questionnaire of mental health(GHQ), the questionnaire of coping styles of Lazarus and Folkman and the scale of stressor factors, filled by infertile couples(40 men, 40 women). Acquired information, analysed with the X^2 test, independent T test, dependent T test, U Man Witney test and the ways of regression analysis.

Infertile women have less mental health rather than infertile men, and also results show that infertile couples use problem focused coping less than emotion focus coping and such people that use problem focused coping more than emotion focus coping, have higher mental health.

The results of this study emphasis on effective role of coping styles that infertile couples use,for prediction of mental health and the role of gender on relation between mentioned variables.

Religious orientation can be understood in terms of two dimensions: extrinsic religiosity and intrinsic religiosity. Those with an “intrinsic religious” orientation dedicated their life to God or a higher power and reported they were less afraid of death and experienced greater feelings of well-being, happiness and mental health than people who fit into the “extrinsic religious” category of using religion for external ends, such as a way to make friends or increase community social standing.

80 senile people were randomly selected and Allport's religious orientation scale (AROS), Argyle's happiness inventory (AHI) and General Health Questionnaire (GHQ) were administered on them. Pearson correlation formula was used for analyzing the data.

Findings showed that there is negative and significant correlation between intrinsic religious orientation and components of mental illness, positive and significant correlation between extrinsic religious orientation and components of mental illness, negative and significant correlation between components of mental illness and happiness.

In seeking of satisfaction and happiness of / in life people choose some ways. One of the most ways is being religious and religious orientation. In religious orientation, people with intrinsic religious orientation tend to internal value and personal relationship with God and this attitudes makes them hopefully in life and make happy them in every time of life. People with extrinsic religious orientation tend to be religious for getting the situation and prestige and social confirmation. When they do not reach to their goals they disappoint specially in aging period and get depressed.

The prevalence of psychotic disorders is %2-%2.5 in general population. This study has been performed to evaluate mental health status in caregivers of patients with chronic psychiatric disorders. Materials and methods: This research was a descriptive - Analytic study performed in Mazandaran province northern Iran. Two hundred caregivers of patients with sever psychiatric disorders completed (GHQ-28) and Demographic Questionnaire. The caregivers had to care at least one year continuously. Sever psychiatric disorders is referred to patients with schizoaffective or schizophrenia or bipolar mood disorder that at least 2 years was passed from onset of disease. Data were analyzed in descriptive statistical method with SPSS soft ware.

Our study showed that %35 of caregivers had GHQ>23 and didn’t have mental health. We found significant association between patients age, Age of onset of disease with GHQ Score (p=0.0001). And there was an association between caregivers’ GHQ score with marital status in patients, although this was not significant (p=0.08). In addition, the X2 test didn’t show significant relationship between duration and type of disease and patient's sex and caregiver's sex with GHQ score.

According to the results of pervious studies and ours, it seems that further investigations with more samples and other Questionnaire is needed to evaluate of caregivers needs and it is suggested that a logical planning be conducted by the authorities, to decrease caregivers’ burden.

In general, recent cognitive training has received increasing interest as a solution to age-related cognitive decline. Although the general public's interest in cognitive or brain training is increasing, the generalizing or transfer effect of such training remains unclear. We previously introduced a new cognitive intervention program for senile dementia, named learning therapy. The principle of learning therapy is to activate the prefrontal cortex by solving simple mathematical and language problems. The purpose of this study was to examine the beneficial effects of a new cognitive intervention program designed for normal aged people, the concepts of which are is derived from learning therapy.

We applied a similar daily cognitive training program to community-dwelling seniors to determine the effects of training on cognitive functions, particularly on the function of the prefrontal cortex, by a single-blind randomized controlled trial and a large scale cohort study. In these studies, neuropsychological measures were determined prior to and after six months of the intervention (post-test) by mini-mental state examination (MMSE), frontal assessment battery at bed side (FAB), and a digit-symbol substitution test (DST) of WAIS-R.

The results indicate that the transfer effect of cognitive intervention by reading and solving arithmetic problems on non-targeted cognitive functions was demonstrated in both studies, and are convincing evidence that cognitive training has the beneficial effects of maintaining and improving cognitive functions.

The psychological stimulations made possible by expertise and technology in brain science can improve the higher cognitive functions of seniors.

Positive influence of emotional intelligence (EI) on psychological functions originaly indicated and entered by Golman (1995) in scientific literature. Now it is fast growing use in academic settings organizations and showed that higher levels of it can be important in positive behavior of humans. So the aim of this study was measuring the relationship of emotional intelligence and addiction to internet.

100 university students randomly selected and Schutte's Self- Report E / I Test (SSREIT) and Addiction to Interne Inventory (AII) administered on participants. It was hypothesized that higher levels of emotional intelligence would be associated with lower levels of addiction to internet.

Findings showed that there is negative significant correlation between components of emotional intelligence including appraisal of emotion, utilization of emotion and general score of emotional intelligence. It confirmed that higher levels of emotional intelligence related to lower levels of addiction to internet.

For decreasing of addiction to internet it is advised to apply plans to foster and increase of emotional intelligence components and decrease addiction to internet.

Measuring clinical and functional outcomes in mental health is becoming an increasingly complex and costly endeavour. It is with considerable regularity that tens and hundreds of millions of dollars are spent to develop electronic health records, yet today functional integrated products that can operate across domains of health have yet to be identified. The purpose of this paper is to describe ways and means of measuring functional and clinical outcomes across complicated case mixes and treatment domains in hospital and community treatment settings.

Data from several electronic records and data sources (n = 100,000) are used to illustrate the burden of measurement, data quality and related issues that practitioners face when collecting, analyzing and interpreting data in the age of information and accountability in health care. A practical, flexible, modular, and dynamic tool for measuring functional and clinical outcomes across treatment and education settings is described (TRACT: treatment response application for client tracking).

Relatively simple, modular approaches to clinical and functional outcome measurement that are integrated into medical practice have the lowest burden and highest yield in terms of demonstrating evidence-based practice, treatment effectiveness, and system level accountability.

Simple modular approaches to measuring complex phenomena, such as the effect of multiple treatment interventions in complex environments and against backgrounds of comorbid disorders, are likely to have high quality yields in terms of identifying promising and evidence-based practices through use of the highest standards available to an examination of practice in the field.

Professional risk assessment provides estimates of future risk in terms of nature, frequency and severity as well as may determine treatment services required of an offender under parole or probation supervision. This study examined the predictive validity of the HCR-20 (Webster, Douglas, Eaves, & Hart, 1997) in a Lithuanian forensic context.

This research includes a sample of criminal offenders and a sample of forensic psychiatric patients (a total of 118 participants). The HCR-20 was coded on the basis of file information.

The mean HCR-20 scores were: Total score = 14.96 (SD = 6.56), H-scale = 8.42 (SD = 3.61), C-scale = 2.57 (SD = 2.16), R-scale = 3.89 (SD = 2.55). ROC analyses of the HCR-20 subscales showed AUC's of .72 for the H Scale, .69 for the C Scale and .58 for the R Scale.

The HCR-20 total score and final risk judgments were significantly more accurate in predicting violent recidivism (p < .05). Results indicate the predictive ability of the instrument may be maximized when judgments of final risk are used rather than an actuarial approach wherein individual risk factors are summed.

To construct and test the validity of a new psychometric questionnaire to assess psychological impact of facial lipoatrophy (ABCD-F), that is the most stigmatizing feature of HIV-related lipodystrophy.

• Construction: The development went through Focus groups and Content Validity, Item reduction and Exploratory Factor Analysis.

• Validation: ABCD-F questionnaire was administered together with ABCD and MOS HIV questionnaires. The Cronbach's Alfa was used to test internal consistency, while convergent validity and divergent validity were analyzed by the correlations with MOS, ABCD items and BMI and CD4 counts respectively.

42 HIV+ people participated to focus groups. In the EFA the 17 Items were aggregated around psychological distress and role functioning domains.

ABCD-F showed high internal consistency (Chronbach's alpha = 0.95). Both convergent and divergent validity were confirmed. ABCD-F scores were highly correlated to Physical Health Summary (B 0.59; 95% [CI] 0.35; 0.84; p< 0.0001), Mental Health Summary (B-1.54; 95% [CI] 1.15; 1.93; p< 0.0001), and weakly correlated to CD4 count (B-0.02; 95% [CI] -0.01; 0.06; p=0.54) and HIV viral load (B-0.004; 95% [CI] -2.69; 2.69; p=1.00).

ABCD-F is a valid and reliable questionnaire to assess psychological impact of facial lipoatrophy (FLA).

ABCD-F may result as a useful tool both in clinical and research settings: it's able to identify people experiencing greater psychological impact due to FLA. It may become an objective instrument to evaluate priority and efficacy of plastic surgery to treat lipodystrophy. In research setting may be used to compare different populations or different treatments of FLA.

Studies have shown police corruption to be a major problem within the police and security forces in the former war-torn Balkan nations, notably Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Serbia. Current European Union and USA training programs do not adequately address the issue of mental and character suitability for law enforcement personnel. An existing, and little used, Slavic-language version of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI-201) is grossly lacking in that it is too short a version and does not lend itself to the rich predictived material that makes the MMPI a viable and strong assessment tool. The MMPI-201 profile also omits critical clinical scales.

We have translated and modernized the first 360 items in the original MMPI into the Slavic language thereby providing a viable personality inventory that can draw on over 60 years of predictive research relevant to professional suitability as well as ruling-out any presenting clinical mental health and/or charaterologic problems. We are currently in the process of validating this instrument by using both the “alternate test” and “test-retest” modes. Here, students, who are competent in both the Slavic and English languages, enrolled in the College of Criminal Sciences and the Law, in both Bosnia and Serbia are administered both the English and Slavic-language instruments at different settings at least a week apart. Both versions are then compared for each subject (N= 50 to 100 for each country) relevant to an estimation of fit for assessing the reliability of the Slavic-Language Personality Inventory.

There is a need for real-time capability to detect inconsistencies in efficacy outcome measures and to predict individual-level or group-level placebo response. Training and calibration to improve reliability is one method; though this can be undermined by the enrollment of placebo responders.

A pattern recognition matrix for placebo-response in schizophrenia was developed based on a Phase II study of schizophrenia conducted in the US. A data monitoring algorithm based on the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS) was retrospectively applied to the unblinded data and score patterns for the placebo responders versus placebo non-responders were analyzed.

A total of 35 placebo responders and 35 randomly selected placebo non-responders were compared. For specific patterns during the first 2 visits, patients were significantly likely to be placebo responders. Within this sample of patients who were randomized to placebo, those who demonstrated the pattern within the initial study visits were approximately three times more likely (OR=2.9, p=0.027) to demonstrate a placebo response.

This initial finding suggests that this method could aid in the detection of placebo response early in a trial. In concert with a data-monitoring process we would expect more robust signal detection. The use of the same system, coupled with ongoing training has demonstrated significant improvements in reliability, increasing the ICC by 19% in a 3-month period. If deployed at startup, this method provides a cost-effective way of managing the data quality in RCTs.

To study sexual problems of our patients and standardizing it for patients with or without religious and cultural restrains we developed a questionnaire with 240 phrases that were extracted from a pool of 1400 sentences addressing sexual problems. Sixty four scales under four headings (sexual general characteristics, deviations, dysfunctions and psychodynamic syndromes) (16 items each) were evaluated based on criteria of DSM-IV and ICD 10. Five validity scales (honesty, desirability, debasement, guilt feeling and overall validity) were also used for better assessment.

A total of 1300 patients in the four variants of the test were evaluated during a time span of 7 years. The questions were presented to examinees at 8th. Grade and higher in a calm environment and the results were evaluated by a computer software specifically developed for this purpose.

The last version of the test was completed by 734 patients with excellent compliance. It was of nice politeness and comprehensiveness. For almost all scales the sensitivity and specificity were around 85 and 92% respectively.

We conclude that QSAF 2009 is an excellent tool both in clinics (diagnosis and follow up) and epidemiology with high sensitivity and specificity. It has also application in cross cultural studies, medico - legal issues and medical documentation. It prevents face to face interviews, breaks patients’ resistance and is less time consuming than scheduled interviews.

In this study we assess the sensitivity of REF scale to detect the disorganization of patient's mental state longitudinally.

Participants: It's a 35-year-old man diagnosed with Schizotypal Personality Disorder. He had a psychotic breakdown and he is being treated with haloperidol. The psychological intervention is cognitive type.

Design, materials and procedure: We used an experimental adaptation of the REF-scale. This self-applied scale consists of 34 items that evaluate the referential thinking in Likert format. We employed a longitudinal design (brief time-series). C Young (p < 0.01) was used for the statistical analysis of the data and the method of least squares to obtain the trend line. We included 103 measures registered at an interval of 3 days.

It's observed a significant declining trend in the whole of the measures both intensity and frequency from the beginning of therapy. However, we observed a significant declining trend in intensity but not in frequency when we analyzed the data from the 50th measurement, which was the period during which the patient got worse.

It's confirmed again that the REF-scale is a stable and reliable measure. It's able to detect changes in the patient's evolution of the referential thinking from the beginning of therapy. In addition, the REF-scale is sensitive detecting decompensations in patients. Therefore, we conclude REF scale is a useful measure for the subsequent decision-making therapeutic.

In previous works we demonstrated the utility of the REF scale for the assessment referential thinking (Rodríguez-Testal et al., 2001) although it wasn't specific for patients with psychotic disorder (Rodríguez-Testal et al., 2008).

We analyzed the psychometric properties of reliability and validity of the REF scale. We compared the differences in referential thinking between subjects with and without psychopathology. In the patient group we will not obtain differences in referential-thinking between diagnosis types of Axis I, Axis II, or patients with diagnoses on both axes.

Participants: 120 subjects, 70 patients attending a private center of clinic psychology, 64.3 % women, mean age = 35.21 (SD = 10.5) and 50 controls selected from the normal population, 54 % women, mean age = 33.48 (SD = 10.83).

It was applied a cross design for a correlation method of comparison between groups. All the analysis were accepted at p< .05.

We reached adequate internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha= .90, split-half reliability= .83 and .82). The test-restest reliability was significant (mean interval of 44 days). There are significant differences in referential thinking between subjects with and without psychopathology (t=3.8; p=.001). There are significant differences in referential thinking between types of diagnoses (F=3.99; p=.001).

The REF scale has adequate psychometric properties (reliability and validity). It discriminated between patients and no-patients, and between the different types of diagnoses, especially for those who suffer psychotic disorders.

In previous works we used the REF scale of referential thinking as criterion of therapeutic evolution (Benítez-Hernández et al., 2006; Rodríguez-Testal et al., 2009).

We designed a group therapy of social skills for monitoring and modification of the referential thinking. We predict a decrease of referential thinking (frequency and intensity) both in pretest and posttest measures for each session, as in the progress of the all sessions as a whole.

Participants: 5 women from 24 to 38 years old with the diagnoses: Panic Disorder with Agoraphobia and history of Sexual Abuse; generalized Social Phobia; Avoidance Personality Disorder; Bipolar I Disorder; Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Avoidance Personality Disorder. It's employed a longitudinal design (brief time-series) of REF measurement (frequency and intensity) at a weekly interval. C Young (p < 0.01) was used for the statistical analysis of the data, t (paired samples) and the method of least squares to obtain the trend line.

• #1: frequency-posttest (p=.01).

• #2: intensity-pretest (p =.01); intensity-posttest, C =.663 (p< .01).

• #3: intensity-pretest, C =.772 (p< .01), intensity-posttest, C =.681 (p< .01).

• #4: frequency-pretest, C =.695 (p< .01), frequency- posttest, C =.74 (p< .01).

• #5: frequency-pretest and frequency-posttest (p>.01).

Preliminary analysis indicates an improvement of referential thinking in the frequency and intensity both intra and inter-sessions. More therapy sessions are needed to reflect a change statistically significant.