Rehabilitation Treatments for Adults with Behavioral and Psychosocial Disorders Following Acquired Brain Injury: A Systematic Review

This review was aimed at systematically investigating the treatment efficacy and clinical effectiveness of neurobehavioral rehabilitation programs for adults with acquired brain injury and making evidence-based recommendations for the adoption of these rehabilitation trainings. Using a variety of search procedures, 63 studies were identified and reviewed using a set of questions about research methods, treatments, results and outcomes for the 1,094 participants. The 63 studies included treatments falling into three general categories: approaches based on applied behavior analysis, interventions based on cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT), and comprehensive-holistic rehabilitation programs (CHRPs). Considerable heterogeneity exists in the reviewed literature among treatment methods and within reported sample subjects. Despite the variety of methodological concerns, results indicate that the greatest overall improvement in psychosocial functioning is achieved by CHRP that can be considered a treatment standard for adults with behavioral and psychosocial disorders following acquired brain injury. Both approaches based on applied behavior analysis and CBT can be said to be evidence-based treatment options. However, findings raise questions about the role of uncontrolled factors in determining treatment effects and suggest the need for rigorous inclusion/exclusion criteria, with greater specification of theoretical basis, design, and contents of treatments for both interdisciplinary-comprehensive approaches and single-case methodologies.     

Completeness theorems for some intermediate predicate calculi

We give completeness results — with respect to Kripke's semantic — for the negation-free intermediate predicate calculi: (1) $$\begin{gathered} BD = positive predicate calculus PQ + B:(\alpha \to \beta )v(\beta \to \alpha ) \hfill \\ + D:\forall x\left( {a\left( x \right)v\beta } \right) \to \forall xav\beta \hfill \\ \end{gathered}$$ (2) $$T_n D = PQ + T_n :\left( {a_0 \to a_1 } \right)v \ldots v\left( {a_n \to a_{n + 1} } \right) + D\left( {n \geqslant 0} \right)$$ and the superintuitionistic predicate calculus: (3) $$B^1 DH_2^ \urcorner = BD + intuitionistic negation + H_2^ \urcorner : \urcorner \forall xa \to \exists x \urcorner a.$$ The central point is the completeness proof for (1), which is obtained modifying Klemke's construction [3]. For a general account on negation-free intermediate predicate calculi — see Casari-Minari [1]; for an algebraic treatment of some superintuitionistic predicate calculi involving schemasB andD — see Horn [4] and Görnemann [2].     

On the extension of intuitionistic propositional logic with Kreisel-Putnam's and Scott's schemes

LetSKP be the intermediate prepositional logic obtained by adding toI (intuitionistic p.l.) the axiom schemes:S = ((? ?α→α)→α∨ ?α)→ ?α∨ ??α (Scott), andKP = (?α→β∨γ)→(?α→β)∨(?α→γ) (Kreisel-Putnam). Using Kripke's semantics, we prove:

1. SKP has the finite model property;
2. SKP has the disjunction property.

In the last section of the paper we give some results about Scott's logic S = I+S.     

Lexicality and Stimulus Length Effects in Italian Dyslexics: Role of the Overadditivity Effect

The effect of lexicality and stimulus length was studied in 32 third- and fourth-grade Italian dyslexics and in 86 age-matched controls. A visual lexical decision task was used. As proposed by Faust et al. (1999) Faust, M. E., Balota, D. A., Spieler, D. H. and Ferraro, F. R. 1999. Individual differences in information-processing rate and amount: Implications for group differences in response latency. Psychological Bulletin, 125: 777–799. [INFOTRIEVE][CROSSREF][CSA][Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], the results were analyzed in terms of raw reaction time (RT) data and using the z-score transformation to control for the presence of overadditivity effects. In terms of RTs, dyslexics showed a larger difference between words and nonwords (lexicality effect) and between short and long stimuli (length effect) than proficient readers. When data were transformed into z scores, only the group by length interaction remained significant while that with lexicality vanished. This pattern indicates that stimulus length has a specific role in Italian dyslexics’ reading deficit; in contrast, slowness in responding to nonwords was not specific but was interpreted as one aspect of dyslexics’ general inability to deal with alphabetical material (overadditivity effect).     

The combined effect of gaze direction and facial expression on cueing spatial attention

Empirical evidence shows an effect of gaze direction on cueing spatial attention, regardless of the emotional expression shown by a face, whereas a combined effect of gaze direction and facial expression has been observed on individuals' evaluative judgments. In 2 experiments, the authors investigated whether gaze direction and facial expression affect spatial attention depending upon the presence of an evaluative goal. Disgusted, fearful, happy, or neutral faces gazing left or right were followed by positive or negative target words presented either at the spatial location looked at by the face or at the opposite spatial location. Participants responded to target words based on affective valence (i.e., positive/negative) in Experiment 1 and on letter case (lowercase/uppercase) in Experiment 2. Results showed that participants responded much faster to targets presented at the spatial location looked at by disgusted or fearful faces but only in Experiment 1, when an evaluative task was used. The present findings clearly show that negative facial expressions enhance the attentional shifts due to eye-gaze direction, provided that there was an explicit evaluative goal present.     

Flooded by a wall of water: parent–child reminiscing about local environment and unwanted changes

This article examines the long-lasting effects of an unwanted place change (i.e., the construction of a dam) on the social representations (SRs) of places and of place-community relationship. The study integrates an SRs approach, generative semiotics, and methods borrowed from research on the social making of autobiographical memory. The aim is to explore whether and how intergenerational family narratives contribute to the transmission of SRs. Parent-child pairs were asked to share episodes linked to the dam. Video-recordings were submitted to thematic content analysis and semiotic analysis. Results show that parents and children associate the dam with a radical transformation: it acts as a performer of separation between the community and its territory. The analysis of interactions gives further insights into the how family and community memories are connected. This first attempt confirms the potentialities of the integrated approach to understanding the processes of intergenerational transmission of social representations, and paves the way to further refinements.     

Differences between experts and non-experts in photographic perception and assessment

How professional skills and schemata do affect cognition, evaluative dimensions and aesthetic perception of pictures? And what about the effect of social elements like a smiling or serious subject pictured? The present study investigates the differences between Experts (photo professionals) and inexperienced individuals in perception and evaluation of photographs. Furthermore, it approaches the influence of different facial expressions (Reis et al. in Euro J Soc Psychol 20(3):259-267, 1990). People with well-developed schemes in photography should evaluate pictures through assessment, while inexperienced people should evaluate pictures through appraisal? N = 118, 60 Experts and 58 inexperienced people were asked to evaluate a set of stimulus pictures throughout: (a) 'The Circumplex Model of Affect' (PAQs) to measure 4 affective dimensions; and (b) a Semantic Differential made of 9 couples of bipolar adjectives to measure 2 evaluative dimensions (Aesthetics and Distinctive Features). Results partially confirmed the hypotheses: Experts differ significantly from Non-experts in picture evaluations. Smile arouses more positive evaluations, but only in the inexperienced group. No subject position effects were found. These results are in concordance with previous research about Expert and Non-expert evaluation, and they open new questions about facial expressions studies.