The Shame Response to Rejection

This small book, consisting of ten short chapters in only 51 pages of text, carries a powerful message. It discusses a concept few, if any, mental health professionals will have learned about in their academic studies or subsequent experience.

According to the author, a psychoanalyst with years of experience in correctional settings, the shame response is a primitive physiological response to rejection, which can lead to great anger and violence. An understanding of this phenomenon can be of enormous help to the clinician working with young people in school or with probationers, parolees, or prison inmates.

The recent upsurge of violence in society in general and schools in particular has left both policy makers and mental health clinicians with feelings of frustration and powerlessness. This book offers a therapeutic mechanism that can be applied in many cases in the service of violence prevention. It should be required reading in training programs in psychiatry, psychology, social work, and psychiatric nursing.

Dr. Halpern is professor emeritus of psychiatry at New York Medical College in Valhalla.