A review of eating disorders research in Mexico

The objective of this paper is to summarize research findings on eating disorders and the current state of the field in Mexico. Papers published in indexed journals and graduate dissertations were retrieved, using “eating disorders,” “anorexia nervosa,” “bulimia nervosa,” “body image,” “binge eating,” “restrained eating,” “weight and shape concern,” and “dieting” as keywords. These were combined with the Boolean operator “AND” with “Mexico” and “Latin America.” Findings are presented for epidemiology, the validity of assessment instruments, comorbidity, and risk factors. A national representative survey found a prevalence of 1.8% for bulimia nervosa, and no cases of anorexia nervosa. However, the lack of studies with confirmatory clinical interview and other national or regional representative samples makes it difficult to reach conclusions about the actual prevalence. A number of instruments for the detection of eating disorders and disordered eating have been validated for the Mexican population. The comorbidity of eating disorders in Mexico includes drug and alcohol abuse, obesity, and borderline personality disorder. Risk factors found included body weight and cultural pressure to be thin. Future lines of research should include epidemiological studies with representative samples and diagnosis confirmation, longitudinal studies, and the exploration of protective and risk factors specific to this population.     

Tool-use in a display behaviour by Eurasian beavers (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Castor fiber</Emphasis>)

Tool use is rare amongst rodents and has never been recorded in connection with agonistic displays. We witnessed a behaviour, stick display (StD), involving tool use in free-living Eurasian beavers (Castor fiber) that we conclude is a display behaviour. Two beavers were the main performers of the signal that was observed in at least six beavers from three families. Beavers reacted to displays by increased evasive and agonistic behaviours compared with their usual behavioural patterns when at territory borders. The behaviour was almost exclusively seen between rivals at territory borders. We suggest that the display is used in agonistic encounters, mainly in a territorial context. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Metacognitive monitoring and control processes involved in primary school children's test performance

Background Within the context of students' self‐regulated learning, the interplay between learners' individual characteristics and the context of testing have been emphasized for assessing learning outcomes. Aims The present study examined metacognitive monitoring and control processes in elementary schoolchildren's test taking behaviour and explored the impacts of these metacognitive skills for the accuracy and the quantity of test performance. Sample and methods A total of 133 participants from third and fifth grade did a cloze test about a previously learned science topic, gave confidence judgments for every answer, and were then allowed to cross‐out answers if they wished. Two different mock scoring schemes for test performance were compared with a control group. Results Results revealed well‐developed monitoring skills indicating that by the age of 9 children can reliably distinguish between correct and incorrect answers. As for control skills, 11‐ and 12‐year‐olds proved to be better able to improve their test performance by selectively withdrawing answers that would have been incorrect than the 9‐ to 10‐year‐olds. Conclusions The study offers evidence for the impact of metacognitive processes in students' learning outcomes and documents strategic behaviour during test taking, as well as developmental progression in the involved skills.     

Media Context, Female Body Size and Perceived Realism

Women with larger body types are underrepresented and presented negatively on television. Two experiments explored the possibility that program context, specifically the roles women play on television, may influence judgments about the realism of various women’s body types. Both experiments, one with 92 undergraduate students at a large university in the northeastern United States, and one with 69 mall patrons in the same area, found that while the body type of an actress had little effect in a domestic setting, larger women were perceived as less realistic and less likely to get a television role in a professional setting. The results have implications for how audiences judge body types and for how audiences make realism judgments.     

Selective Attention and Perceptual Load in Autism Spectrum Disorder

ABSTRACT— It has been suggested that the locus of selective attention (early vs. late in processing) is dependent on the perceptual load of the task. When perceptual load is low, irrelevant distractors are processed (late selection), whereas when perceptual load is high, distractor interference disappears (early selection). Attentional abnormalities have long been reported within autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and this study is the first to examine the effect of perceptual load on selective attention in this population. Fourteen adults with ASD and 23 adults without ASD performed a selective attention task with varying perceptual loads. Compared with the non-ASD group, the ASD group required higher levels of perceptual load to successfully ignore irrelevant distractors; moreover, the ASD group did not show any general reduction in performance speed or accuracy. These results suggest enhanced perceptual capacity in the ASD group and are consistent with previous observations regarding superior visual search abilities among individuals with ASD.     

The Neurobiological Underpinnings of Coping With Pain

ABSTRACT— The biopsychosocial model treats pain as resulting from a complex interaction of biological, psychological, and social factors. Individual differences in approaches to coping with pain-related symptoms are important determinants of pain-related outcomes, and are often classified under the "psychological" category within the biopsychosocial model. However, engagement in various cognitive, affective, and behavioral pain-coping strategies appears to exert biological effects, which we review here. Pain-coping activities such as catastrophizing, distracting oneself from pain sensations, or reappraisal of pain may exert effects on activity in a variety of pain-processing and pain-modulatory circuits within the brain, as well affect the functioning of neuromuscular, immune, and neuroendocrine systems. The interface between pain-related neurobiology and the use of specific pain-coping techniques represents an important avenue for future pain research.     

Spatial memory in the grey mouse lemur (Microcebus murinus)

Wild animals face the challenge of locating feeding sites distributed across broad spatial and temporal scales. Spatial memory allows animals to find a goal, such as a productive feeding patch, even when there are no goal-specific sensory cues available. Because there is little experimental information on learning and memory capabilities in free-ranging primates, the aim of this study was to test whether grey mouse lemurs (Microcebus murinus), as short-term dietary specialists, rely on spatial memory in relocating productive feeding sites. In addition, we asked what kind of spatial representation might underlie their orientation in their natural environment. Using an experimental approach, we set eight radio-collared grey mouse lemurs a memory task by confronting them with two different spatial patterns of baited and non-baited artificial feeding stations under exclusion of sensory cues. Positional data were recorded by focal animal observations within a grid system of small foot trails. A change in the baiting pattern revealed that grey mouse lemurs primarily used spatial cues to relocate baited feeding stations and that they were able to rapidly learn a new spatial arrangement. Spatially concentrated, non-random movements revealed preliminary evidence for a route-based restriction in mouse lemur space; during a subsequent release experiment, however, we found high travel efficiency in directed movements. We therefore propose that mouse lemur spatial memory is based on some kind of mental representation that is more detailed than a route-based network map. Electronic supplementary material  The online version of this article (doi:) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Educating Political Adversaries: Chantal Mouffe and Radical Democratic Citizenship Education

Many scholars in the area of citizenship education take deliberative approaches to democracy, especially as put forward by John Rawls, as their point of departure. From there, they explore how students’ capacity for political and/or moral reasoning can be fostered. Recent work by political theorist Chantal Mouffe, however, questions some of the central tenets of deliberative conceptions of democracy. In the paper I first explain the central differences between Mouffe’s and Rawls’s conceptions of democracy and politics. To this end I take Eamonn Callan’s Creating Citizens as an example of Rawlsian political education and focus on the role of conflict and disagreement in his account. I then address three areas in which political education would need to change if it were to accept Mouffe’s critiques of deliberative approaches to democracy and her proposal for an agonistic public sphere. The first area is the education of political emotions; the second is fostering an understanding of the difference between the moral and the political; the third is developing an awareness of the historical and contemporary political projects of the “left” and “right.” I propose that a radical democratic citizenship education would be an education of political adversaries.