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Robert Van Gulick explains how integration and unity play an important role in a number of current theories and models of consciousness. Normal consciousness is unified in a variety of ways but many disorders of disunity can also occur. What can we learn from them about consciousness and unity? What theories of consciousness might help us better understand the nature and basis of such disorders? Van Gulick first surveys the diverse types of conscious unity. He then briefly describes five theories of consciousness that involve integration, that is, Baars’s Global Workspace Theory (GWT), Tononi's Integrated Information Theory (IIT), Jesse Prinz's AIR theory (Attended Intermediate Representation), Tim Bayne's Phenomenal Unity thesis, and the combination of his own HOGS (Higher-order Global States) model with Virtual Self Realism (VSR). In that context, he discusses three specific pathologies of disunity -- neglect and extinction, dissociative identity disorder, and split-brains–and each is considered in relation to the integration based theories of consciousness.

Anyone familiar with prisons in the UK will have heard of Erwin James. No one writes about imprisonment as he does. Now an accomplished author and journalist, he provides an account of the role education in his life; first its premature closure through neglectful teachers and abusive family circumstances, then a surprise reopening and rediscovery of latent talent in a prison setting. The Open University, books, wide reading, some supportive teachers and a long prison sentence provide Erwin with hope for another life, a life outside. This moving and beautifully written chapter is proof of its realisation.

Child abuse is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in the United States and other countries. It is the second leading cause of death among children in the US. All 50 States, the District of Columbia, and the US Territories have mandatory child abuse and neglect reporting laws that require certain professionals and institutions to report suspected maltreatment to a child protective services (CPS) agency. Four major types of maltreatment are considered: neglect, physical abuse, psychological maltreatment, and sexual abuse (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2010). Once an allegation or referral of child abuse is received by a CPS agency, the majority of reports receive investigations to establish whether or not an intervention is needed. Some reports receive an alternative response in which safety and risk assessments are conducted, but the focus is on working with the family to address issues. Investigations involve gathering evidence to substantiate the alleged maltreatment. Data from reports on child abuse is derived from the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS), which aggregates and publishes statistics from state child protection agencies. The first report from NCANDS was based on data for 1990. Case-level data include information about the characteristics of reports of abuse and neglect that are made to CPS agencies, the children involved, the types of maltreatment that are alleged, the dispositions of the CPS responses, the risk factors of the child and the caregivers, the services that are provided, and the perpetrators (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2010). During 2010, the NCANSDS reported that an estimated 3.3 million referrals estimated to include 5.9 million children were received by CPS agencies. Of the nearly 2 million reports that were screened and received a CPS response, 90.3% received an investigation response and 9.7% received an alternative response (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2010). Of the 1,793,724 reports that received an investigation in 2010, 436,321 were substantiated; 24,976 were found to be indicated (likely but unsubstantiated); and 1,262,118 were found to be unsubstantiated. Three-fifths of reports of alleged child abuse and neglect were made by professionals.

“Threats to Space Heritage Sites” explores a number of threats to space heritage sites on Earth and the Moon. It begins with an overview of what threats mean for the significance and integrity of a site, and include factors like environmental damage, neglect, and failure to properly identify resources which can lead to create adverse effects. The authors call upon the federal government, private sector, and public to preserve important sites in space heritage before they are lost or damaged.

This chapter defends a sufficientarian approach to parental rights, arguing for a particular account of the good enough upbringing, which should be a condition of holding parental rights that takes into account both the interests of the child and the parent. The chapter discusses views abuse or neglect the child’s best interests as conditions attached to parental rights concluding that neither are satisfactory. The chapter argues that parental rights are conditional on not being excessively worse than the best available parent, where excess is determine by the importance of a better upbringing to the child. The chapter discusses this view in relation to practical guidelines used to determine parental rights.

This chapter examines the application of solution-focused brief therapy by school social workers working with youth that have experienced child maltreatment. It provides an overview of child maltreatment, the role of the school social worker when working with this population, the neurological impact of child maltreatment and two case examples. The case examples offer practical insight into the solution-focused techniques that may be applied as well as a discussion around appropriate conversations regarding age and mandated reporting. The chapter also makes a distinction between the services provided by agencies that specialize in treating child abuse and neglect versus the role of the school social worker. For example, once a claim is substantiated, treatment is provided by an agency that specialize in treating abuse and neglect, and the role of the school social worker is to focus on the child in the school environment.

This chapter provides a review of research on parental warmth and parental rejection and their associations with physical aggression and violence. There is consistent evidence that parental warmth is inversely associated with violent behavior, but the effects are not very strong. By contrast, there is robust evidence that indicators of parental rejection, seen as the far end of a warmth-rejection continuum, are correlated with physically aggressive and violent behavior. The studies as a whole suggest that violent offenders have experienced less warmth and greater rejection from parents than nonviolent-only offenders. The evidence suggests that low parental warmth is associated with nonviolent offending as consistently as it is with violent offending. The association between parental rejection and offending is clearly more consistent for violent than nonviolent antisocial behavior. The finding is important in light of commentary made about the average expectable environment in Chapter 2.

Many authors see child abuse as a very important cause of violent behavior. In this chapter we examined published evidence on the association between physical abuse, neglect, sexual abuse and trauma and behavior outcomes in victims. The comprehensive review indicates that all forms of abuse, as well as indicators of trauma, are associated with violent offending, but they are also consistently associated with nonviolent offending. The findings also strongly indicate that physical abuse experience is more prominent among violent offenders than nonviolent offenders, however, leading to questions about aspects of physical abuse that lead to violent behavior in victims, rather than general antisociality.

This chapter surveys books and articles on the Soviet economy published in 1948-1991 and finds that Sovietologists afforded the military sector little attention, both relative to its importance and relative to the attention lavished on the other, lower-priority sectors. Literature on Soviet economy contains few chapters, articles, and books on the military sector, compared to other sectors. Thus, textbooks on the Soviet economy have 136 chapters on civilian sectors, and only eight on the military sector. Disproportionately many of those appeared in the final years of the USSR, and few of the military economy publications have been produced by American Sovietologists. Post mortem writings on Sovietology have not detected this gap in the scholarship. A survey of comparative systems and introductory economics textbooks shows that Sovietologists failed to persuade other economists that the military sector was merited a mention in popular treatments of the Soviet economy.