Katruccy Tenório Medeiros

Representações sociais do uso e abuso de drogas entre familiares de usuários

The abusive use of legal and illegal drugs has been the focus of a great world worry, being considered by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a chronicle and recurrent disease, with serious personal and social consequences. This qualitative nature research aimed to study the social representation about the drugs, which were elaborated by 37 chemical dependent relatives (alcohol and crack). Individual interviews were done, with semi-structured script; data were analyzed by the software ALCESTE. The results indicated that these relatives represented the drugs as something harmful, which harms the family relationships, being responsible for conflicts and family disharmony. According to these representation, drugs lead to emotional overload and stress states, highlighted by behavioral changes and finantial questions, due to the aggravation of the dependence and to the frequent hospitalizations. The absence of drugs was pointed as one of the forms of reaching the quality of life of the relatives.

Vivências e Representações sobre o Crack: Um Estudo com Mulheres Usuárias

Este estudio tuvo como objetivo conocer y analizar las representaciones sociales sobre el crack elaboradas por dependientes quimicas en tratamiento, utilizando la Teoria de las Representaciones Sociales. Participaron 45 usuarias de crack (edad media de 29,11 y DT = 7,99), internas en Comunidades Terapeuticas y Clinicas de Rehabilitacion, en los Estados de PB y PE. Como instrumentos, fueron utilizados un cuestionario y una entrevista casi estructurada. Los datos fueron analizados por medio del software Alceste. Los resultados indicaron que el crack es representado como un elemento devastador y disgregador, responsable por causar abandono o alejamiento de las funciones femeninas. Se verifico tambien que la figura de la mujer usuaria es vista como un problema de orden moral, ocasionando una representacion despreciativa. Esas construcciones, al mismo tiempo que son individuales y sociales, ejercen influencia en la forma en que la sociedad encara a la mujer dependiente quimica, reforzando barreras sociales que dificultan la busqueda de tratamiento y la recuperacion de las mismas.

Psychosocial x biomedical paradigm: where is the social representation anchored in psychic suffering?

This study aims to determine the social representation of mental health professionals, university students from the health area, and secondary school students with regard to the crazy person and the mentally ill person, regarding the paradigms of mental health care. The study sample was composed of 150 participants, with 50 in each social group. For data collection, the free word association technique (TALP) was used, with the prompts “crazy person” and “mentally ill person”. The data were analyzed using the Tri-Deux-Mots software, through correspondence factor analysis. The secondary school students and university students presented representations of the crazy person and the mentally ill person anchored in the biomedical paradigm, which emphasizes medicalization and hospitalization with regard to mental health care. The professionals, on the other hand, presented representations anchored in the psychosocial paradigm, which guides the ideas of the Psychiatric Reform. It is recognized that although mental health care in Brazil is based on the principles of the Reform, there is still a negative view of the mentally ill person/crazy person on the part of society anchored in the biomedical paradigm, which reinforces the exclusion and maintenance of the social stigma that these individuals face.

Evidence of factorial validity and accuracy of attitudes in mental health scale

Abstract This study gathered evidence of factorial validity and internal consistency of the Attitudes in Mental Health Scale. Twostudies were performed. A total of 404 college students, including women (69.6%) with a mean age of 24 years(Standard Deviation = 5.67), participated in Study 1. A total of 396 college students, including females (69.9%) witha mean age of 23 years (Standard Deviation = 5.41), participated in Study 2. In the first study, an exploratory factorialanalysis indicated the existence of two factors (biomedical paradigm, α = 0.71; psychosocial paradigm, α = 0.66) witha total of 15 items. In the second study, a confirmatory factorial analysis indicated that the bifactorial model that wasproposed for the scale was adequate: χ²/ df = 2.41, GFI = 0.93 and RMSEA = 0.06, 90%IC [0.05 - 0.07]. The resultsconcluded that this measure can be adequately applied in studies in the proposed measurement context. Keywords : Attitudes scale; Mental health; Test reliability; Test validity.

Experiencias y Representaciones sobre el Crack: Un Estudio con Mujeres Usuarias

Este estudio tuvo como objetivo conocer y analizar las representaciones sociales sobre el crack elaboradas por dependientes quimicas en tratamiento, utilizando la Teoria de las Representaciones Sociales. Participaron 45 usuarias de crack (edad media de 29,11 y DT = 7,99), internas en Comunidades Terapeuticas y Clinicas de Rehabilitacion, en los Estados de PB y PE. Como instrumentos, fueron utilizados un cuestionario y una entrevista casi estructurada. Los datos fueron analizados por medio del software Alceste. Los resultados indicaron que el crack es representado como un elemento devastador y disgregador, responsable por causar abandono o alejamiento de las funciones femeninas. Se verifico tambien que la figura de la mujer usuaria es vista como un problema de orden moral, ocasionando una representacion despreciativa. Esas construcciones, al mismo tiempo que son individuales y sociales, ejercen influencia en la forma en que la sociedad encara a la mujer dependiente quimica, reforzando barreras sociales que dificultan la busqueda de tratamiento y la recuperacion de las mismas.

Experiences and Representations about Crack: An Approach to Female Drug-Users

Este estudio tuvo como objetivo conocer y analizar las representaciones sociales sobre el crack elaboradas por dependientes quimicas en tratamiento, utilizando la Teoria de las Representaciones Sociales. Participaron 45 usuarias de crack (edad media de 29,11 y DT = 7,99), internas en Comunidades Terapeuticas y Clinicas de Rehabilitacion, en los Estados de PB y PE. Como instrumentos, fueron utilizados un cuestionario y una entrevista casi estructurada. Los datos fueron analizados por medio del software Alceste. Los resultados indicaron que el crack es representado como un elemento devastador y disgregador, responsable por causar abandono o alejamiento de las funciones femeninas. Se verifico tambien que la figura de la mujer usuaria es vista como un problema de orden moral, ocasionando una representacion despreciativa. Esas construcciones, al mismo tiempo que son individuales y sociales, ejercen influencia en la forma en que la sociedad encara a la mujer dependiente quimica, reforzando barreras sociales que dificultan la busqueda de tratamiento y la recuperacion de las mismas.