The automatic recording of aggression in pigeons: A comparison of two methods with live targets

Three pigeons were exposed to a fixed-time response independent food-delivery schedule and a live target pigeon restrained in a holder mounted on a spring and microswitch assembly. This common method of recording aggression was compared with a photocell system, and both were evaluated by observation of video-tape recordings. Dependent variables included the number of interfood intervals with an attack, attacks per minute, and attack duration. The photocell proved more reliable than the microswitch and correlated highly with observations of both the number of interfood intervals with an attack for three subjects and attack duration for two. Neither apparatus provided accurate information about the rate of attacks. The microswitch apparatus was not sensitive to changes in the subject’s attack topography, while both recording devices were susceptible to activation by responses in the attacking pigeon other than discrete pecks or physical blows. In view of these findings, attacks per minute may not be an appropriate measure of aggression in studies using such devices.     

The many faces of Pan: psychological and physiological differences among three types of panic attacks.

The thesis of this paper is that failure to recognize the psychological and physiological differences among panic attacks within DSM-IIIR precludes meaningful comparisons and evaluations of research findings, confounds theoretical issues, and impairs the development of more specific, and thereby more effective, programs of treatment. To remedy this, a recommendation is made to define panic attacks on the basis of psychological and physiological distinctions that fit three categories of severity: Type I (classic panic attack), Type II (anticipatory panic attack), and Type III (cognitive panic attack). The logical-empirical rationale for the categories recommended is presented in the context of relevant research findings. Implications for theory, experimental design, and treatment are discussed.     

Does War Hurt? Effects of Media Exposure After Missile Attacks on Chronic Pain

This study focused on the effects of exposure to terrorist missile attacks on the physical and mental well being of chronic pain patients. In this prospective and longitudinal design, 55 chronic pain patients treated at a specialty pain clinic completed self-report questionnaires regarding their pain, depression and anxiety pre- and post a three week missile attack on the southern region of Israel. In addition, levels of direct and indirect exposure to the attacks were measured. Results of regression analyses showed that exposure to the attacks through the media predicted an increase in pain intensity and in the sensory component of pain during the pre-post war period, but did not predict depression, anxiety or the affective component of pain. These findings contribute to the understanding of the effects of terrorism on physical and emotional distress and identify chronic pain patients as a vulnerable population requiring special attention during terrorism-related stress.     

An investigation of the psychological effects of the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York City: developing and implementing research in the acute postdisaster period

The September 11, 2001, attack on New York City was the largest human-made disaster in United States history. In the first few days after the attack, it became clear that the scope of the attacks (including loss of life, property damage, and financial strain) was unprecedented and that the attacks could result in substantial psychological sequelae in the city population. Researchers at the Center for Urban Epidemiologic Studies at the New York Academy of Medicine designed and implemented an assessment of the mental health of New Yorkers 5-8 weeks after the attacks. To implement this research in the immediate postdisaster period, researchers at the center had to develop, in a compressed time interval, new academic collaborations, links with potential funders, and unique safeguards for study respondents who may have been suffering from acute psychological distress. Results of the assessment contributed to a New York state mental health needs assessment that secured Federal Emergency Management Agency funding for mental health programs in New York City. This experience suggests that mechanisms should be in place for rapid implementation of mental health assessments after disasters.     

Morbidity rate in delirium tremens

On evaluating an analysis of 105 cases of delirium tremens over a period of five years in a psychiatric base-unit, the following findings were obtained: Delirium tremens, particularly in conjunction with secondary diseases, constitutes a life-endangering medical emergency and requires intensive medical treatment. Letality was 8,57%. The morbidity-rate and the relapse-rate showed a clearly marked increase; the age of contracting the disease had its frequency peak between 30 and forty, i. e. earlier than in many other statistical surveys. Epileptic attacks as symptoms starting off or accompanying delirium occurred in almost one third of our delirium patients. The impact which these attacks have on the development in the course of process-like alcoholism was discussed.     

Dyspneic-fear and catastrophic cognitions in hyperventilatory panic attacks

The tenability of cognitive explanations of the experience of fear during panic attacks (viz. Ley's misattribution-of-symptoms hypothesis and Beck's and Clark's catastrophic-misinterpretation-of-symptoms hypotheses) is seriously questioned by findings from three independent lines of research: (a) Wolpe and Rowan's observation that catastrophic cognitions follow fear, (b) Rachman, Levitt and Lopatka's reports of panic attacks without fearful cognitions, and (c) reports of panic attacks during sleep occurring predominately during non-dreaming stages of sleep. Recognition of these findings led Ley to reject his misattribution-of-symptoms hypothesis in favor of an innate emotional-respiratory-response explanation. The revised hyperventilation theory now maintains that fear experienced during a hyperventilatory panic attack is caused by severe dyspnea in the context of little or no perceived control over the causes of the dyspnea (i.e. dyspneic-fear). Cognitions during panic attacks are discussed in terms of the cognitive deficit that results from the cerebral hypoxia produced by hyperventilation. Implications for theory and treatment are discussed.     

The persistence of attack satiation in female golden hamsters

Female hamsters were allowed to attack a series of target hamsters until they reached a criterion of attack satiation. Following delays of 0, 24, or 48 hr they were then presented with a novel “probe” target. Attacks on the probe target were reduced to 26% of baseline at 0 delay and had returned to 71% of baseline by 48 hr. The number of attacks necessary to achieve satiation criterion increased then decreased over the three test occasions, suggesting that habituationlike processes may contribute to, but cannot wholly account for, the satiation effect.     

Treatment of panic attacks using cognitive therapy without exposure or breathing retraining

Cognitive treatment of panic attacks is based on the hypothesis that panic results from the catastrophic misinterpretation of bodily sensations, and that changing such misinterpretations will block the occurrence of panic. The treatment normally involves an integrated set of cognitive and behavioural techniques. In a consecutive series of panic patients, a multiple baseline across subjects design was used to investigate whether a modified form of treatment involving only cognitive procedures could reduce panic attack frequency. The results provide preliminary evidence that cognitive procedures directed at changing misinterpretations of bodily sensations can reduce panic attack frequency, and also that cognitive procedures which do not target misinterpretations may not reduce panic.     

Attack efficacy in volleyball: elite male teams

The goal was to identify performance indicators predicting attack efficacy in volleyball's game phase denominated Complex II, i.e., the counter-attack. 28 games from the 2007 Men's World Cup were analyzed. Attack efficacy was predicted by three primary variables: Attack tempo, Attack type, and Number of blockers. Power attack and Attack tempo 1 increased the probability of an Attack point. The supremacy of Attack tempo 3 and the high frequency of Two blockers and Three blockers reflected the difficulty of efficient attack during Complex II. Despite unfavourable conditions, attackers managed to execute Power attacks in the majority of the situations, and score a high frequency of Attack points.     

Male-female differences and the influence of neonatal and adult testosterone on intraspecies aggression in rats.

Male and female albino rats were tested for intraspecies aggression without the use of shock. In the first experiment, male pairs showed more biting attacks, offensive sideways movements, and self-grooming than did female pairs; male pairs also showed more stereotyped defensive/submissive behaviors and were wounded more frequently. The second experiment examined the effects of neonatal castration and testosterone propionate (TP) administration on fighting. Males castrated at birth attacked other males less frequently than did controls when tested with TP treatment as adults. The TP given at birth to neonatally castrated males restored attacks to control levels. Females given TP as neonates did not differ from either male or female controls. Other aggressive/defensive behaviors, however, did not show this pattern. The results suggest that while the presence of testosterone during a brief postnatal period and during adulthood is necessary for attack behavior to occur, other related behaviors may not be affected in a similar manner.     

Attack, avoidance, and escape reactions to aversive shock

Aversive stimuli are known to produce the behaviors of both escape and attack. The interaction between these two basic reactions was studied with rats and monkeys using many shock-escape and shock-avoidance procedures. All procedures produced attack if a target was present, the attacks occurring shortly after shock delivery. The number of attacks during escape or avoidance was a direct function of the number and duration of shocks received. Consequently, any aspect of the procedure that produced many shocks also produced many attacks such as initial acquisition, extinction, or an increase of the response requirement for escape. The escape tendency acquired prepotency over the tendency to attack since successful escape eliminated attack behavior. The attack tendency retarded escape behavior only during acquisition when the preoccupation with attack precluded the opportunity to learn the escape response. This mutual interference of escape and attack was eliminated when the attack and avoidance tendencies were combined by using biting attack as the shock-avoidance response. The result was unusually rapid conditioning of the biting-attack response. These interactions indicate that both the attack and escape tendency should be considered whenever aversive stimulation is delivered.     

Rare male aggression directed toward females in a female‐dominated society: Baiting behavior in the spotted hyena

Spotted hyenas (Crocuta crocuta) are gregarious carnivores. The females are socially dominant to males, and adult males rarely direct aggression toward adult females. This study analyzed all cases in which adult immigrant males behaved aggressively toward adult females in a large population of free‐living hyenas in Kenya, observed for 11 years. Our goals were to describe the conditions under which male attacks on females occur, and address possible adaptive functions. Most aggression directed by adult immigrant males against females occurred when coalitions of two or more males attacked a single adult female, who typically responded by defending herself and fighting back. Male aggression against females frequently occurred at sites of ungulate kills, but males never behaved aggressively toward females over food, and all male attacks on females were unprovoked. Although no mounting or other copulatory behaviors ever occurred during or immediately after an attack, the number of male attacks on females peaked around the time of conception. Daily rates at which males attacked females did not vary with female social rank. However, daily attack rates did vary significantly with female reproductive state, and the highest rates of male attack on females were observed during the two stages of the reproductive cycle during which females were most likely to conceive litters. The adaptive significance of male aggression against females in this species remains unknown, but a tight association between male attacks on females and a female's time of conception provides strong evidence of some role for male aggression in hyena sexual behavior. In particular, our data are consistent with hypotheses suggesting that male aggression toward females in this species either serves to inform females about male fitness or represents sexual harassment. Aggr. Behav. 29:457–474, 2003. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Semantics for Higher Level Attacks in Extended Argumentation Frames Part 1: Overview

In 2005 the author introduced networks which allow attacks on attacks of any level. So if a → b reads a attacks b, then this attack can itself be attacked by another node c. This attack itself can attack another node d. This situation can be iterated to any level with attacks and nodes attacking other attacks and other nodes. In this paper we provide semantics (of extensions) to such networks. We offer three different approaches to obtaining semantics.

1. The translation approach This uses the methodology of ‘Logic by translation’. We translate faithfully the new networks into ordinary Dung networks with more nodes and extract the semantics from the translation.
2. The labelling approach This method regards the arrows as additional entities to be attacked and to mount attacks and applies a variation of the usual machinery of Camindada like labelling to the network. The new concept we need to employ here is that of ‘joint attacks’.
3. The logic programming approach We translate the higher level network into a logic program and obtain semantics for it through known semantics for logic programs.

We then compare our methods with those of S. Modgil and P. M. Dung et al.     

Development and maintenance of attack in pigeons during variable-interval reinforcement of key pecking

Key-peck responses of two pigeons were maintained on variable-interval schedules of food reinforcement in the presence of a stuffed pigeon to study the characteristics of attack induced by that schedule. The mean interval of the schedule was increased from 15 sec to 600 sec in eight steps before an intermediate interval was reintroduced. The principal characteristics of attack were: (1) substantial attack first occurred on a variable-interval schedule of 90 sec in one pigeon and at 180 sec in the other, (2) the highest attack rates occurred on variable-interval schedules of 300 sec and 600 sec, (3) attack rate generally increased to a maximum and then decreased to a lower level across sessions at each schedule, (4) attacks developed a postreinforcement locus across the initial sessions on all schedules and, except on variable-interval schedules of 300 and 600 sec, occurred primarily in the postreinforcement period during extended training, (5) attack rates and key-peck rates were not recovered when the intermediate-length schedules were reintroduced, and (6) attack rate and key-peck rates were negatively correlated. Except for the fact that the maximum attack rates occurred at interfood intervals of 300 and 600 sec, and that attack and key-peck rates were negatively correlated, these findings have counter-parts in experiments with other reinforcement schedules.     

A policy maker’s dilemma: Preventing terrorism or preventing blame

Although anti-terrorism policy should be based on a normative treatment of risk that incorporates likelihoods of attack, policy makers’ anti-terror decisions may be influenced by the blame they expect from failing to prevent attacks. We show that people’s anti-terror budget priorities before a perceived attack and blame judgments after a perceived attack are associated with the attack’s severity and how upsetting it is but largely independent of its likelihood. We also show that anti-terror budget priorities are influenced by directly highlighting the likelihood of the attack, but because of outcome biases, highlighting the attack’s prior likelihood has no influence on judgments of blame, severity, or emotion after an attack is perceived to have occurred. Thus, because of accountability effects, we propose policy makers face a dilemma: prevent terrorism using normative methods that incorporate the likelihood of attack or prevent blame by preventing terrorist attacks the public find most blameworthy.     

When Anxiety Symptoms Masquerade as Medical Symptoms: What Medical Specialists Know about Panic Disorder and Available Psychological Treatments

Under-recognition of somatic symptoms associated with panic in primary care settings results in unnecessary and costly diagnostic procedures and inappropriate referrals to cardiologists, gastroenterologists, and neurologists. In the current study specialists’ knowledge regarding the nature and treatment of panic were examined. One-hundred and fourteen specialists completed a questionnaire assessing their knowledge about panic attacks, including their perceptions of psychologists’ role in treating panic. Respondents answered 51% of knowledge items correctly. Although most knew the definition of a panic attack, they knew less about clinical features of panic and its treatment. Specifically, whereas 97.4% believed medication effectively relieves panic symptoms, only 32.5% knew that cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) is a first-line treatment. Only 6% reported knowing how to implement CBT, and only 56.1% recognized that psychologists could effectively treat panic. These findings demonstrate significant gaps in specialists’ knowledge about panic and the need to enhance physician knowledge about panic attacks and their treatment.     

Attitudinal and Emotional Consequences of Islamist Terrorism. Evidence from the Berlin Attack

Studies about Islamist-inspired terror attacks in the Western world have identified a recently declining impact on public opinion. What explains this development? I argue that the wider audience of terrorist attacks has become desensitized. Cognitive desensitization occurs when citizens increasingly expect an attack, reducing the likelihood of attitudinal change. Emotional desensitization occurs when audiences lose sensitivity to attacks, tempering emotional arousal. To assess the implications of desensitization, I analyze a survey conducted around the Berlin Christmas market attack in 2016 and account for baseline information of the surveyed individuals, an approach not used before due to data limitations. I find that attitudes like trust in government, national identification, and views of Islam remain unchanged. Sadness and anger are heightened in the immediate aftermath of the attack. The wider German audience may thus have expected an attack but still be emotionally sensitive to it in the short term. These findings are relevant as political leaders have justified important policy changes in fields like migration and even war making with reference to supposed shifts in public opinion after attacks.     

The psychodynamic of panic attacks: A useful integration of psychoanalysis and neuroscience1

This article tries to explain, in the light of some neuroscientific and psychoanalytical considerations, the repetitive pattern of panic attacks. Freud considered the panic attack as an ‘actual neurosis’ not involving any conflictual process. Recent neuroscientific findings indicate that psychosomatic reactions, set off by a danger situation, depend on the primitive circuit of fear (including the amygdala) characterised by its speed, but lack accurate responses and may also be activated by harmless stimuli perceived erroneously as dangerous. The traumatic terror is stored in implicit memory and may be set off by a conditioned stimulus linked to a previous danger situation. In the panic attack, the traumatic event is created by the imagination and this construction (a micro‐delusion), built in loneliness and anxiety, has the same power as the real trauma. A mutual psychosomatic short‐circuit between body and psyche, in which terror reinforces the somatic reactions and the psychic construction, is established. Therefore, it is important to highlight these constructions in order to analyse and transform them. In the second part of the article the author reviews the main psychoanalytical theories about panic attacks, stressing how, in his opinion, panic attack is a consequence of the breakdown of the defence organisation at various levels and may appear during periods of life crisis. Two patients suffering from a deficit of personal identity are presented. The various organisations and the different levels (biological, neuroscientific, associative, traumatic) of the panic attack determine different kinds of therapeutic approaches (pharmacological, cognitive and psychoanalytical). While the psychopharmacological treatment is aimed at reducing the neurovegetative reaction and the cognitive method is attempting to correct the associative and perceptive processes of fear signals, psychoanalytical therapy represents both a specific means to free patients from panic attacks as well as an indispensable route for their emotional growth.