Hi everyone:
I have a question about how to handle a situation. I noticed that one
of my teaching assistants (a female undergraduate student) had what
appeared to be numerous small cut marks (maybe about one to two inches
long) on top of four of her fingers (typically the part of the finger
that the wedding ring goes on), as well as small cut marks on the base
and side of her palm and the sides of her wrist. These marks only
appeared on her right fingers, hand, and wrists. She is right-hand
dominant.
At first I thought these might have been marks made by a red pen, but on
closer inspection they seemed to be cuts. Looks like they might be cuts
from a razor blade or other sharp object. The cuts on the wrist are in
a lateral direction--they run perpendicular to the direction in which
the blood vessels run.
I noticed them yesterday and they were still there today, although they
were not as noticeable and seemed to have healed some. When I saw them
yesterday I asked the student what happened to her hand and wrist. She
responded, "Oh, I don't know" and changed the subject. She seems to try
to hide these marks a little bit, but I haven't had problems noticing
them. This student is very bright, has a lot of responsibility in the
program, and has a lot of plans for the future with her career and her
boyfriend.
My concern is that this student might be involved in self-mutilating
behavior. If this were a client of mine, I would not hesitate to ask
about it. And I would certainly ask a client if I were to see it.
However, because this is a teaching assistant--someone who essentially
works for me--I'm not sure how to handle this. It's possible that it is
not self-mutiliating behavior, but it raised my clinical antennae and
I'm not sure how to proceed. I'm also wondering if I'm reading too much
into this. Maybe they were just pen marks, maybe she got the marks for
someplace else.
I suppose the bigger question here is what do we as faculty do when it
appears that our students have emotional or mental problems, but we are
not certain.
All advice welcome!
Rod
___________________________________
Roderick D. Hetzel, Ph.D.
Rochester Institute of Technology
Department of Psychology
George Eastman Building
18 Lomb Memorial Drive
Rochester, New York 14623
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (email)
