From One to Two: Can Visual Feedback Improve the Light Touch Effects on Postural Sway?

The postural control is improved by implicit somatosensory information from lightly touching a rigid bar or explicit visual information about the postural sway. Whether these two additional sources provided at the same time further reduce the postural sway is still unknown. Participants stood on a force plate as quiet as possible lightly touching the bar while received or not visual feedback of the center of pressure position on a monitor screen. Postural sway reduced similarly with the light touch regardless of the additional visual feedback. The findings suggested that providing explicit visual feedback of the center of pressure does not increase the light touch effects on the postural sway. The importance of the implicit somatosensory information on postural control is discussed.     

Amygdalar Volume in Borderline Personality Disorder With and Without Comorbid Post-traumatic Stress Disorder: A Meta-analysis

IntroductionFour studies have found a smaller amygdalar volume in patients with borderline personality disorder (BPD) relative to controls, whereas four other studies have found similar amygdalar volume in BPD patients relative to controls. This study aims to compare amygdalar volumes of BPD patients with controls, and also to compare BPD patients with and without post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) with controls in order to determine whether PTSD can explain the heterogeneity of findings.MethodSystematic review and meta-analysis of magnetic resonance imaging studies that measured amygdalar volumes in BPD patients and healthy controls.FindingsA significant reduction of amygdalar volumes in BPD patients was confirmed (p < .001). However, data from the studies that discriminated BPD patients with and without PTSD indicated that amygdalar volumes were significantly smaller in BPD patients without PTSD relative to controls (left: p = .02; right: p = .05), but not in BPD patients with PTSD relative to controls (left: p = .08; right: p = .20).ConclusionThis meta-analysis suggests that amygdalar volumes are reduced in patients with BPD. This pattern is confirmed in BPD patients without PTSD, but not in BPD patients with PTSD, raising the possibility that reduced amygdalar volume in BPD patients cannot be explained by comorbid PTSD.     

Combat exposure, psychological symptoms, and marital satisfaction in National Guard soldiers who served in Operation Iraqi Freedom from 2005 to 2006

In current military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, US National Guard (NG) troops are serving longer deployments than ever before. Little is known, however, about how such deployments affect this population of individuals, relative to active component (AC) troops. This study investigated the extent of combat exposure, severity of post-deployment psychological symptoms, and general interpersonal functioning, as well as the interrelationships of these variables, in 50 NG soldiers who served a 12-month deployment in Iraq from 2005 to 2006. The results indicate that combat exposure and post-deployment post-traumatic stress symptoms in this sample are greater than those in NG veterans of past military operations, and similar to those of full-time soldiers in current operations. Furthermore, the patterns of interrelationships between combat exposure, psychological symptoms, and interpersonal variables were similar to those detected in prior research on AC troops. These results suggest that NG veterans of current military operations may require similar services as active duty veterans. Given that NG troops are less integrated into the military structure, specific outreach efforts may be needed to help NG veterans to receive such services.     

Equivalence-based instruction to teaching reading by families and teachers students with autism and/or intellectual disabilities

The study evaluated the learning of computerized equivalence-based reading instruction in students with intellectual disability and/or autism who attend regular school when exposed to a teaching practices package (teaching practices programmed) conducted by different educational agents (parents, regular classroom teachers, and special education teachers) in school settings and at home. The students were exposed to teaching packages that were applied by educational agents. The study has two hypotheses. First, the involvement of teachers and families in implementing interventions, in the presence of the researcher, may contribute to their learning to read in inclusive classrooms and at home. Secondly, the teaching of reading in Portuguese language may be favored by the direct teaching of syllables. A multiple baseline procedure was used to evaluate the teaching of three sets of words. Students improved from zero reading skills in the pretest to an average of 80% correct responses out of 21 taught words.