The generalized truncation method (formerly referred to as the proximal correction method) was recently introduced for the time-discretization of parabolic variational inequalities. The main attraction of the method --- which generalizes the truncation method developed by A. Berger for obstacle problems --- is the fact that the problems to be solved at each time step are elliptic equations rather than elliptic variational inequalities.
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In this paper we apply the new method to a class of problems which includes parabolic variational inequalities as a special case. The convergence results which we obtain in this general context also give rise to new results when applied to the special case of variational inequalities.
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We also discuss the applications of our results to several problems that occur in various branches of applied Mathematics.