In her chapter “Selling Psychology as Science”, at the end of the section “Abuse of Numbers”, in which she provides a number of examples of number abuse -- amongst them the infamous example of the “rape of numbers” that was provided by the report “Changing the Landscape: Ending Violence -- Achieving Equality, Final Report of the Canadian Panel on Violence  Against Women, Statistics Canada, November 1993”, she comments as follows (page 142):

While this study serves as an example of the misuse of data and statistics to support a strong bias and a political cause, it is by no means alone in doing  this.⁴⁰ Gilbert refers to such estimates and “data” as “advocacy numbers,  figures that embody less an effort at scientific understanding than an attempt to persuade the public that a problem is vastly larger than commonly recognized. Advocacy numbers are derived not through outright deceit but through a more subtle process of distortion. Under the veil of social science, rigorous research methods are employed to measure a problem defined so broadly that it forms a vessel into which  almost any human difficulty can be poured.”⁴¹ Research findings, just because they appear in journals, have lots  of numbers, receive government support or are reported in the media, are not necessarily scientific. The Psychology Industry is very effective in mis-using its numbers to support its views and to sell itself.

40. Another example is found in an oft-quoted study sponsored by Ms. magazine which stated that 25% of all women have been raped by the time they are in college. However, this figure was based on a question which did not ask women if they had been raped but rather whether they had ever “given in to sexual intercourse when (they) didn’t want to because (they) were overwhelmed by a man’s continual arguments and pressure.” 73% of these women, who were categorized as rape victims, did not define their experience as “rape.” It was Mary Koss, the psychologist conducting the study, who defined it as rape stating that the women themselves didn’t recognize what had really happened to them. Katie Roiphe, in her book The Morning After, concluded that this spoke more about change in sexual politic than about sexual behaviour or violence. See Koss, Mary, Gidycz, Christine A., and Wisniewski, Nadine. “The Scope of Rape: Incidence and Prevalence of Sexual Aggression and Victimization in a National Sample of Higher Education Students.” Journal of Consukingand Clinical Psychology, 55(2), 1987, p.162-70; and Roiphe, p.52.

41. Gilbert, Neil. “The phantom epidemic of sexual assault.” The Public Interest, 1991, 103, p. 63.

In the section titled “ Psychotherapy Evaluation”, Dr. Dineen cites from a letter by Loftus, Grant, Franklin, Parr, and Brown, in which they reported the results of a preliminary study investigating a number of  “outcome effects” of therapy focussing on repressed memories, and the costs involved (page 161):

    In 1990, Washington State permitted individuals to seek treatment under the Crime Victim Act if they claimed previously repressed memory for childhood sexual abuse. From 1991 - 1995, 670 repressed memory claims were filed. Of these 325 (49%) were allowed.
    In the study, a nurse consultant (LP) reviewed 183 of these claims. Of these, 30 were “randomly selected for a preliminary profile.” Some of the findings of this analysis are reported here. The sample was almost exclusively female (29/30 = 97%) and Caucasian (29/30 = 97%), with ages ranging from 15 to 67 yrs with a mean of 43 yrs.
    The women (and one man) saw primarily Masters level therapists (26/30 = 87%), although 2 saw a Ph.D., 2 saw an MD, and 6 saw a Master’s level therapist in conjunction with an MD. The first memory surfaced during therapy in 26 cases (26/30 = 87%) .
All 30 were still in therapy three years after their first memory surfaced. Over half were still in therapy five years after the first memory surfaced (18/30 = 60%).
    Prior to memories, only 3 (10%) exhibited suicidal ideation or attempts; after memories, 20 (67%) exhibited suicidal ideation or attempts. Prior to memories, only 2 (7%) had been hospitalized; after memories, 11 (37%) had been hospitalized. Prior to memories, only 1 (3%) had engaged in self-mutilation; after memories 8 (27%) had engaged in self-mutilation.
    Virtually all the patients (29/30 = 97%) contended they had been abused in satanic rituals. They claimed their abuse began when they were, on average, 7 months old. Parents and other family members were allegedly involved in the ritualistic abuse in all cases (29 /29); Most remembered birth and infant cannibalism (22/29 = 76%) and consuming body parts (22/29 = 76%); The majority remembered being tortured with spiders (2()/29 = 69%). All remembered torture or mutilation (29/29). There were no medical exams corroborating the torture or mutilation.
    The sample of (mostly) women was fairly well educated, and most had been employed before entering therapy (25/30 = 83%), many of them in the health-care industry (15/30) . Three years into therapy, only 3 of 30 (10%) were still employed. Of the 30, 23 (77%) were married before they entered therapy and got their first memory; Within three years of this time, 11/23 (48%) were separated or divorced. Seven (23%) lost custody of minor children; All (30/30) were estranged from their extended families.
    Whereas the average cost of a mental health claim in the Crime Victim Compensation Program that did not involve repressed memory was $2,672, the average cost for the 183 repressed memory claims was dramatically higher: $12,296.

It seems to me that the psychologists involved in the therapy of these victims of a money-hungry industry used a manual of indicators of satanic ritualistic abuse that is very similar to that applied by the social workers and psychologists who laid the charges of satanic ritualistic abuse in the Broxtowe Case in Nottinghamshire, U.K. (See JET Report at: http://www.theconvergence.com/mirror/jetrep/). But then, why should anyone be surprised at this. In the JET report it states that of the 300 or so representatives of the Psychological Industry at a London conference, 97% stated that they truly believe that satanic ritualistic abuse is a reality, although it has not been proven yet that such conspiracies have happened in any of the cases that have been brought into the courts. It seems that to become a psychologist one must suspend all common sense and embrace the belief of the absurd.

Dr. Dineen ends this section in that chapter of her book with this comment:

In many ways it becomes an enthralling dance of the patient and therapist, each responding to the moves and sways of the other and each believing that they are getting somewhere together. But when the music stops, the dance is over and therapy is finished, the most likely conclusion is that they aren't much further ahead, that they are about where they began, with both just a little tireder and one a little (or a lot) poorer and the other a little (or a lot) richer.

To me it seems that we have not yet come out of the dark ages. There may be little hope that we will manage to do that, unless we forget about trying to supplant the methods of the Inquisition with those of the Psychological Industry. If you ask me, I think that the people under the Spanish inquisition were better off than we are now. Just compare the 60,000 victims that were prosecuted during the 600 years of the Spanish Inquisition with the 3 million annual victims of virtually almost always false abuse allegations of today’s witch hunt in the U.S.A. alone, a witch hunt that is instigated by the psychologist-inspired search for victimhood. It is too bad, but perhaps out of the scope of Dr. Dineen’s book, that she did not consider that aspect of the social costs of the art (claimed by some to be a science) of psychology. Then again maybe I’ll find appropriate comments as I work my way toward the end of her book -- it’s fascinating!