Authors On Air With Cathy Maxwell
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UNHALLOWED GROUND is the bone-chilling story of a woman who buys and restores a historic Florida mansion, after dismissing the horror stories of past residents vanishing and a long-dead housekeeper who practiced black magic.
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Firesetting in childhood and adolescence: early sign of psychopathology?
This past week, police officers in Florida arrested an 18-year-old kid as prime suspect in a wave of cat killings and mutilations. The killing and torturing of animals for pleasure (excluding traditional hunting) is one of the strongest signs of serious psychopathology. Firesetting is likely a close second, with most adults and adolescents who engage in arson also have a history of childhood firesetting. But until now, most studies have not been able to accurately examine what type of firesetting is predictive of later problems? For example, some children who engage in firesetting do not engage in arson or have serious psychopathology. So what are the characteristics (severity, duration, etc) that are associated with such ‘transitional’ or ‘phase’ firesetting versus a firesetting behavior that is more chronic and potentially pathological?
In an upcoming issue of the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry a team of researchers from the University of Toronto in Canada conducted a large epidemiological examination of firesetting among 3,965 Canadian children and adolescents in grades 7 to 12. The authors examined the correlates of 4 types of firesetters:
- No history of fire setting
- Desisters: History of firesetting but none during the past year
- Low frequency (1-2 during past year)
- High frequency (3+ times during the past year)
The authors then examined the following variables:
- sex
- age
- school level
- grades
- is family intact?
- welfare involvement?
- difficulty with peers
- daily smoking
- binge drinking
- cannabis use
- other illicit drug use
- delinquent behaviors
- Ritalin use
- high sensation seeking personality
- psychological distress
- suicidal ideation
The Results:
- 72% of the sample had either never engaged in fire setting (32%) or had engaged sometime during their lives but not during the past year (40.5%)
- 27% reported engaging in firesetting during the past 12 months.
- When compared to those with no history of firesetting, the “desisters” were were more likely to be male, older, smokers, cannabis users, high sensation seekers, and have high levels of psychological distress.
- When compared to those with no history of firesetting, the high frequency fire setters were more likely to be male, have low parental monitoring, be binge drinkers, cannabis users, illicit drug users, have a history of delinquent behaviors, be sensation seeking, have high levels of psychological distress, and have suicidal ideation. This profile was almost identical to the profile of low frequency firesetters.
While controlling for other variables:
One way to conceptualize these findings is to examine the factors that predicted high/low frequency firesetters but die no predict ‘desisters’. For example, low parental monitoring was associated with low/high frequency firesetters but not with desisters. This suggests that low parental monitor is a risk factor in more chronic firesetting behaviors and that parental monitoring may not have an impact on isolated events of firesetting that do not become chronic. Cannabis was associated with all groups, so it’s not that informative. This is not surprising given that cannabis use is very frequent among teens. However, other illicit drug use was associated with frequent fire setting only, likely reflecting the severity of behavior problems among these teens. This is supported by the finding that only the low and high frequency fire setters, and not the desisters, were more likely to have a history of delinquent behaviors.
The Reference: MacKay, S., Paglia-Boak, A., Henderson, J., Marton, P., & Adlaf, E. (2009). Epidemiology of firesetting in adolescents: mental health and substance use correlates Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry DOI: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2009.02103.x
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At what price entitlement?
A couple of recent incidents have had me thinking of entitlement—both, interestingly enough, involving my favorite baseball team, The Florida Marlins. (Bear with me, I’m a baseball nut.) Anyhow, I love the Marlins. They’re the most bargain basement team in the majors, in terms of their salaries and as such, they’re also one of the youngest, most enthusiastic teams and a lot of fun to watch play.
Anyhow, a few weeks ago Chris Coghlan, a Marlin rookie just three or four days out of being called up, hit his first major league home run. Has to be one of the most exciting moments ever, right? And I’m sure it was, but the shine was somewhat taken off by what happened afterward. See, he hit the dinger at Miller Park, home of the Milwaukee Brewers. The Brewers, unfortunately, have among their fan ranks, a guy who calls himself “The Happy Youngster.” (Website, t-shirts, and all.) The guy is a self-professed ballhawk, living out in the bleachers for the purpose of catching home run balls. And he happened to catch Coghlan’s homer. Now, it’s a common practice in baseball for a player to exchange a signed ball or bat in order to get a personal milestone home run ball returned. So it’s not a surprise that Happy Youngster expected a trade to happen. This guy was downright organized. By the next inning, when the network’s roving reporter caught up to the guy, he had his list of demandsrequests, written out on a piece of paper that he proudly held up for the camera. He didn’t simply want a ball or bat signed by Coghlan, he wanted the signed ball and bat, plus a signed bat from All-Star shortstop Hanley Ramirez, plus a pair of tickets to the upcoming Marlins/Yankees game. Oh, and a picture with Coghlan. His reasoning? Coghplan should be happy to hand over everything and with a smile on his face. After all, the fans pay, right? It’s no less than what they deserve.
“I explained that ballhawking is my hobby and that what I was asking in return was fair,” Yohanek said Thursday, in an e-mail to the Associated Press. “I told him I make $50,000 a year working in law enforcement and that I didn’t feel like I was asking for too much. He responded, ‘Good for you.’ Real classy. Way to respect law enforcement. Way to respect a fan.”
‘Scuse me while I call foul. Way to respect a fan? He’s acting as if he’s… entitled to all those goodies. No. No, he’s not. And let me say it once more with a Whitney Houston emphasis, oh, hell to the no. He paid to watch nine innings of baseball. That’s precisely what he got. Anything else, extra innings, a picture flash on the big screen, a ball caught, whether a foul or a homer or just an extra tossed into the stands by a player in between innings… bonus and nothing more and certainly not to be expected.
Contrast that with earlier this week. Another Marlins rookie, Brett Carroll, hits his first major league home run, off 300-game and future Hall of Famer, Randy Johnson. Again, a fan in the bleachers caught it. The roving reporter asked what he wanted in exchange for the ball—all the fan wanted was to shake Carroll’s hand and congratulate him. The reporter then asked “and if Carroll offers a signed ball or bat?” the fan laughed and said, no, he wouldn’t turn it down. (He got a signed bat.)
By now you’re probably saying, “So okay, Barb, what does this have to do with writing and/or reading?”
More than you’d think, actually. Around the same time that Coghlan vs. the Over Entitled Nitwit situation was making the national sports news, Neil Gaiman posted a blog on, you guessed it, entitlement. A fan had written him complaining about George R.R. Martin’s lack of communication on the progress of his next A Song of Ice and Fire novel and wanted some of Neil’s insight as to what responsibility he thought George owed his fans and wasn’t George letting his fans down by, you know, having a life and having the nerve to blog about it, instead of writing the book, right now.
Neil’s response? “George R.R. Martin is not your bitch.”
Pithiness aside, what I really liked about Neil’s response goes right back to the whole theme of entitlement. He pointed out that there has recently been this trend among readers whereupon they believe that by buying the first book in a series, the reader has entered into some sort of contract requiring the writer to devote themselves exclusively to writing each subsequent book until the series is complete. His take? A reader pays their money for a book. That one book.
I think this was especially resonant because lately, I’ve been seeing variations of this same theme of entitlement and it’s been fairly universal. There’s wonder as to what writers could possibly be doing that could take them away from writing The Next Book. And upon discovery that a writer is doing something other than writing The Next Book, readers coming back with commentary that could be interpreted as veiled (and not-so-veiled) threats—step it up, Sparky, or that reader can easily move on to another writer. (Uh, you really think writers don’t know that? C’mon.) Not only that, but that writers should be downright grateful (groveling welcome) and apply themselves diligently to serve the needs of their readers.
Really? I mean, it’s not that I’m not grateful for the people who have read my books and who share with me their enjoyment—believe me, I am. I cherish each and every reader who has gone out of their way to tell me they loved something I wrote. But see, herein lies the difference—being “grateful for” is not the same as being “beholden to”, which is the tone this commentary is starting to take on. Also, writers don’t necessarily set out to serve the needs of readers. Speaking for myself, I set out to serve something within myself. I choose to share it with readers—I want to share it—and I work darned hard to do so.
And really isn’t that what every reader should want? That a writer take the time to write the best possible book? I mean, not only does the writer benefit from the sense of accomplishment from a job well done, not simply for themselves, but for the publisher who’s actually paying them for the manuscript, but the reader benefits as well by getting their money’s worth for that one book. Sounds like a win/win situation to me.
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