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One of the major features of our modern world is its complexity and « informal » form. The “answers” to this complexity are various too. The educational issue would then be to identify relevant cultural solutions. Based on a chosen sample corpus of literature for young learners, the author will assess specific structuring configurations. We shall see that varied narratives have substantial and accessible responses to fundamental questioning. Literature for youth would then significantly broaden a way to engage young children into the world.

Keywords: albums, petite enfance, oeuvres ouvertes, thèmes existentiels, éducation, picture books, early childhood, “open works”, existential topics, education, álbumes, primera infancia, obras abiertas, temas existenciales, educación

SUMMARYIn this article the author recounts, with the aid of her diary, her encounter with a client during the last days of her life. She testifies to the nobility and beauty which can surround the dying and their families, when the person who is dying, as well as his family, can speak simply, although with pain at times, of what they are going through. The author testifies also of what was touched in her, as a human being, when she witnessed the death of this woman, younger than herself, this mother who left behind her young children. The author also attempts to sensitize the reader to the phenomenon of the humane death, and to show how a helping person can intervene in the network surrounding a dying individual.

SUMMARYThe actual language on mental health in Quebec is founded on a série of premises that generally remain implicit or are introduced as postulates of "good will" with regard to reality. The authors want to question the significance and the real range of those premises by using a comparative analysis. Considering the concept of desinstitutionalization as used in different countries, they detect the ambiguities and the differences due to the context and to the postulates specific to each of those systems. Then, to elaborate our own premises, they utilize a decentralization method: with the help of their knowledge of other cultural ways of reacting to the problems of psychiatry-mental health, on the one hand in Africa, and on the other from data gathered in Quebec from psychiatric patients, ex-patients and friends. This twofold study leads them to express, compare and criticize what they introduce as the three main premises of mental health language in Quebec: to popularize psychiatric-mental health problems and to introduce a standardization of the people and a uniformity of structure in a field that remains very complex. A study of the theoretical character of this model, of its moralizing dimension and of the key-actors who contribute to its definition, allows them to describe the socio-historic context. The authors question the possibility of introducing a new dimension in our ways of thinking, management and action.

SummaryThe practice of therapy by a group of mental health personnel characterized by a humanistic approach to therapy is analyzed here, from the point of view of a culturally innovative act. In the general framework of a sociology of social action and of social movements, such a cultural act can become a driving element in the constitution of a socio-cultural movement, on the basis of the affirmation of a greater wholeness of the human individual in various sectors of life. The most innovative characteristic in the type of practice examined is a communicational pragmatic which challenges the relationship theory-practice and the relationship professional-client in the context of a more traditional type of intervention in mental health. This challenge is distinct, moreover, from a counter-cultural view of rupture in that it is situated to a greater extent within a relationship of social conflict.

ABSTRACT This research aims at evaluating in individuals suffering from panic-agoraphobia disorder without social phobia the presence or not of various levels of social anxiety. The study also evaluates the impact of this symptomatic comorbidity on the efficiency of two modes of cognitive behaviorial treatment, namely an auto-directed treatment and a treatment directed by the therapist. The study attempts to determine if the application of a cognitive behavioral treatment program positively or negatively influences the various levels of anxiety. On the other hand, the study evaluates if levels of social anxiety influences the efficiency of the cognitive behavioral treatment in regards to agoraphobic symptomatology. The sample includes 51 people (26 in a therapist-directed treatment and 25 in a auto-directed treatment) suffering from DSM-IV panic disorder with agoraphobia. The authors observed a relatively equivalent number of individuals with a panic-agoraphobia disorder presenting social anxiety at a weak, moderate and high level for the two groups in treatment. Moreover, the authors noted a significant improvement not only of the symptoms of agoraphobia-panic disorder, but also of social anxiety symptoms. There are less participants presenting high or moderate levels of social anxiety after treatment. The two modes of treatment are equivalent in regards to their efficiency. Finally, results only partially indicate that high and moderate levels of social anxiety possibly have a negative influence on the efficiency of treatment as measured by certain components of the disorder. Consequences related to this symptomatic comorbidity as well as possible explanations of various impacts of the efficiency of the treatment are discussed.