Obsessions and compulsions in autistic spectrum disorders

Questions have been raised as to whether the patterns of thoughts and behaviours experienced by individuals with autistic spectrum disorders (ASD) can be indicative of comorbid obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). The current study aimed to compare the experiences of adults with ASD or OCD and healthy controls (HC) in terms of the symptoms experienced and the associated emotions and responses. Associations between autistic traits and OCD severity were explored. A cross-sectional design utilising MANOVA, ANOVA and correlation was employed. Methods: Eighteen participants with ASD, 20 with OCD and 19 healthy controls completed self-report measures and interviews assessing IQ, comorbid diagnoses, OCD symptoms, autistic traits and emotions and responses associated with obsessional thoughts. Participants with ASD scored significantly higher than healthy controls in terms of OCD severity and also number of obsessions and compulsions and associated distress. While the OCD and ASD groups did not differ significantly on OCD severity, the OCD group reported significantly higher levels of sadness, worry, shame, guilt and disapproval triggered by obsessions. The ASD and healthy control groups were largely comparable on these factors. Associations were found between OCD severity and particular domains which are typically impaired in ASD, including social skills, attention switching, communication and imagination. Findings suggest that OCD symptoms may be common and a source of distress in individuals with ASD, thus perhaps warranting psychological intervention. Further research into the exact nature of this distress and how this can be assessed is required

The Journal of Major General Robert Stearne of the Royal Regiment of Ireland

This article contains an analysis of Major General Robert Stearne’s journal of his service with the Royal Regiment of Ireland between 1678 and 1717. The article examines the provenance of the manuscript and addresses a major problem regarding its authenticity and relationship to the published accounts written by his regimental comrades. In so doing, it attempts to bring greater clarity to the question of its originality and to the sources that may have been used in its production. It then addresses the place of the journal within the historiography of the period and explores some of the new information that it contains

A TILE FROM ROMAN VIENNA IN JOHANNESBURG

Recently Mr W.H. Grimm, who grew up in Vienna, asked me to decipher the letters on a fragment of a tile which he had found as a boy at Carnuntum. Apparently it was lying on the roadside having been thrown there by a farmer ploughing an adjacent field

A ROMAN INSCRIPTION IN CAPE TOWN

The South African Cultural History Museum in Cape Town is well known for its fine collections, not least those of Greek and Roman antiquities.2 On my last visit to Cape Town I was surprised to see something in the museum which I had not noticed before, a Latin inscription attached to the wall. There are of course very few ancient Latin inscriptions in South Africa

Roman Warfare

ROTH, Jonathan P 2009. Roman Warfare. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pbk. R250. ISBN 978-0-521-53726-1.Jonathan Roth of San Jose State University, known as an expert on military logistics, has written this attractive Cambridge Introduction to Roman Civilization volume on Roman Warfare. The series is designed for students with no prior knowledge of Roman antiquity. The book comprises an Introduction on Sources and Methods (pp. 1-6) and 15 chapters on Roman warfare from the beginnings to the fall of the Western Empire in AD 476, using a chronological approach. There are 68 illustrations and maps, a Timeline, a Glossary, a Glossary of People, a Bibliography (which includes several websites) and an Index

SOME ROMAN COINS FROM REGENSBURG IN JOHANNESBURG

Last year Mr. R. Faltermeier, a student in the Department of Classics at the University of the Witwatersrand, brought me nine Roman coins which he asked me to identify. He said that they had been brought to South Africa when his father had emigrated here from Regensburg in Germany

Large-scale instabilities in a STOVL upwash fountain

The fountain flow created by two underexpanded axisymmetric, turbulent jets impinging on a ground plane was studied through the use of laser-based experimental techniques. Velocity and turbulence data were acquired in the jet and fountain flow regions using laser doppler velocimetry and particle image velocimetry. Profiles of mean and rms velocities along the jet centreline are presented for nozzle pressure ratios of two, three and four. The unsteady nature of the fountain flow was examined and the presence of large-scale coherent structures identified. A spectral analysis of the fountain flow data was performed using the Welch method. The results have relevance to ongoing studies of the fountain flow using large eddy simulation techniques

A FURTHER LATIN INSCRIPTION AND AN AMPHORA IN CAPE TOWN

In a former volume of this journal I described a Latin inscription in the Cape Town Museum (Akroterion XLVI [2001] 99f.). On a subsequent visit to the city, I went to the Wine Museum on the Groot Constantia estate.2 I was interested to find two Roman objects there, an inscription and an amphora

Simulating alternative internationals: geopolitics role-playing in UK schools

Simulation and role-play have a proven track record as pedagogic techniques to provide students with insights into geopolitics, diplomacy, and international relations. Since the first Model United Nations (MUN) in 1947, simulations have proliferated within secondary and tertiary educational settings. However, these activities overwhelmingly focus on recognised nation-states, neglecting polities that are not UN member states, but that are often acutely affected by conflict and human rights abuses. This paper is part of a broader project that is seeking to bring the realities and stories from such communities, territories, and peoples – a number of which have come together as the ‘Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization’ (UNPO) – to a wider audience. Loosely based on MUN simulations, the ‘Model UNPO’ exercise involves participants being assigned a UNPO member, researching that polity’s context and rights claims, and coming together for a structured role-play debate. Drawing on participant observation of Model UNPO exercises with 16–18 year old students at thirteen UK secondary schools we examine how geopolitics can be taught and learned within school classroom settings, how young people make sense of geopolitics, and how they imagine and articulate alternative internationals. We assess what simulation exercises can offer to understandings of the intersection of young peoples’ geopolitics and geographies of education. In doing so, we analyse how students draw on ‘known worlds’ and advocate for possible worlds through role-playing unrepresented diplomats, and examine the role of clause writing in the scripting of geopolitical imaginaries, and how role-playing forges empathy and solidarities. We conclude by making the case for foregrounding young people as critical and creative geopolitical thinkers