Posted on 05/25/2011 5:23:22 PM PDT by Cardhu
Institute uses punishment machine to discipline severely autistic and emotionally disturbed children by giving them electric shocks
The founder of a controversial school that treats severely autistic and emotionally disturbed children by shocking them into submission with the use of electrodes has been forced to quit the institution and serve five years' probation.
Matthew Israel, a Harvard-trained psychologist, has created a treatment that is unique to the US and possibly the world. The Judge Rotenberg Center, just outside Boston, disciplines its students using a punishment machine that Israel invented called the GED, which gives a two-second electric shock to the skin of up to 90 milliamps.
At the centre, which was profiled by the Guardian earlier this year, students wear backpacks around the clock with the GED electric generators inside them, and are zapped using remote control devices controlled by their carers. In some cases, they are shocked as often as 30 times a day as a means of dissuading them from behaviour deemed dangerous to themselves or others.
The criminal charges brought against Israel relate to an incident in August 2007 at one of the school's residential homes where students sleep at night. A call came in from someone posing as an authorised supervisor, who informed the carers on duty that two teenagers had misbehaved and should be given shock treatment.
At 2am, the boys were strapped on boards and given multiple shocks. One of the boys, aged 18, was shocked 77 times over a three-hour period and the other boy, aged 16, was shocked 29 times. It was later discovered that the initial call had been a hoax.
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
Dr Ray Stantz: You know, it just occurred to me that we really haven't had a successful test of this equipment.
Dr. Egon Spengler: I blame myself.
Dr. Peter Venkman: So do I.
Dr Ray Stantz: Well, no sense in worrying about it now.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Why worry? Each one of us is carrying an unlicensed nuclear accelerator on his back.
It would probably work for ADD as well. But automate the system with timers and motion sensors.
That’s shocking! Does it work in treating rabid liberals, or Chris Matthews for excessive tinkling down the leg?
sounds like a reinvented working-dog training collar
in dog training, multiple shocks over a short period of time would create paranoia and mistrust - and ruin the dog
why would anyone think different results would be obtained with humans?
How is this legal?
Matthew Israel, a Harvard-trained psychologist... invented... the GED, which gives a two-second electric shock to the skin of up to 90 milliamps... students wear backpacks around the clock with the GED electric generators inside them, and are zapped using remote control devices controlled by their carers... The criminal charges brought against Israel relate to an incident in August 2007... A call came in from someone posing as an authorised supervisor, who informed the carers on duty that two teenagers had misbehaved and should be given shock treatment. At 2am, the boys were strapped on boards and given multiple shocks. One of the boys, aged 18, was shocked 77 times over a three-hour period and the other boy, aged 16, was shocked 29 times. It was later discovered that the initial call had been a hoax.Sounds like Harvard needs to start a Mengele Chair in the School of Behavioral Sciences.
why isn’t this a$$hat behind bars????
Look! It's another gem from the halls of the Ivy League!
I have two points of view on this.
The first is just recently, someone with clinical autism “snapped out of it” somehow, and achieved a normal range of awareness. This presented a very unique opportunity, because for the first time, doctors could hear what autism is like, from an autistic person’s point of view.
From their description, autism came across as acute sensory overload, which explains many of its common characteristics. Typically, one of the most important functions of the brain is to *ignore* sensory input, to keep our brains from being overloaded. So well over 90% of our sensory input is ignored.
A big element of autism might very well be a fault in this mechanism.
But likewise, if a person is having sensory overload to the point of being unable to function, an electrical shock might break through all of the conflict, and give them a simple response to do or not do. To train them to not do destructive or self-destructive things.
Severely autistic children have been known to do self-destructive things, like bang their head against a wall repeatedly with destructive force, or chew on their own arms.
Since no other treatments were effective at the time, Bettelheim thought a brief noninjurious shock from a shock prod was a reasonable alternative since it did have the expected effect of suppressing the damaging behavior.
I don't know, but suspect there is a connection between that early work and the thinking behind this Harvard guy's technique.
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