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Paraphilias and Related Disorders

NCJ Number
140348
Journal
Psychiatric Annals Volume: 22 Issue: 6 Dated: (June 1992) Pages: complete issue
Editor(s)
P R Adson
Date Published
1992
Length
67 pages
Annotation
These essays reflect extensive clinical expertise with paraphilic disorders and associated cultural and social factors and specifically examine sexual compulsivity and violence and sex offender treatment.
Abstract
The first essay discusses what may appear to be sexual behavior but what may be construed as an affective response to escape unbearable conflict. Such displacement has therapeutic implications, particularly with reference to victimology and "social service police" who are legally obligated to criminalize such behavior. On the positive side, the criminal justice system and the health care community have combined efforts to generate a cooperative therapeutic-custodial regimen to cope with deviant expressions of sexuality. The second essay addresses the "metastasis" and "social malignancy" of sexual violence. Deviant sexual behavior is viewed as the physical instrument for expressing violence that harms the victim, the assailant, and public welfare. The biological substrate of paraphilias is the focus of the third essay, and the analysis considers the role of alcohol and drug dependence as contributing factors. The fourth essay reviews therapeutic regimens for sex offenders, based on variants of individual and group techniques. The fifth essay implies that paraphilia and related disorders represent psychological defenses portrayed by obsessive-compulsive disorders. The final two essays explore the treatment of serious juvenile sex offenders and the similarity between paraphilia's symptomatic expressions of post-traumatic stress disorder. References and tables