Controversies in counseling for mitochondrial conditions

A healthy woman sought preconceptional genetic counseling regarding a family history of a mitochondrial myopathy in her brother and retinitis pigmentosa (RP) in her two maternal aunts. Several questions were raised: (1) What is the likelihood of a familial mitochondrial condition? (2) What molecular tests or prenatal screening can we offer? (3) How would these tests help assess the likelihood of a familial mitochondrial condition? A mitochondrial mutation previously identified in the brother consisted of a heteroplasmic 2.9 kb deletion. We detected this deletion in the peripheral blood of the brother by PCR amplification of the deletion breakpoint, but not in his mother, the consultand, nor in one of the two aunts affected with RP. Although the molecular analysis was encouraging to the consultand, a familial mitochondrial disorder could not be eliminated with certainty. The pros and cons of prenatal testing for mitochondrial disorders are discussed in general, and as specifically related to this family.     

Models of high-dimensional semantic space predict language-mediated eye movements in the visual world

In the visual world paradigm, participants are more likely to fixate a visual referent that has some semantic relationship with a heard word, than they are to fixate an unrelated referent [Cooper, R. M. (1974). The control of eye fixation by the meaning of spoken language. A new methodology for the real-time investigation of speech perception, memory, and language processing. Cognitive Psychology, 6, 813-839]. Here, this method is used to examine the psychological validity of models of high-dimensional semantic space. The data strongly suggest that these corpus-based measures of word semantics predict fixation behavior in the visual world and provide further evidence that language-mediated eye movements to objects in the concurrent visual environment are driven by semantic similarity rather than all-or-none categorical knowledge. The data suggest that the visual world paradigm can, together with other methodologies, converge on the evidence that may help adjudicate between different theoretical accounts of the psychological semantics.     

Trauma healing in refugee camps in Guinea: a psychosocial program for Liberian and Sierra Leonean survivors of torture and war

From 1999 to 2005, the Minneapolis-based Center for Victims of Torture (CVT) served Liberian and Sierra Leonean survivors of torture and war living in the refugee camps of Guinea. A psychosocial program was developed with 3 main goals: (a) to provide mental health care, (b) to train local refugee counselors, and (c) to raise community awareness about war trauma and mental health. Utilizing paraprofessional counselors under the close, on-site supervision of expatriate clinicians, the treatment model blended elements of Western and indigenous healing. The core component consisted of relationship-based supportive group counseling. Clinical interventions were guided by a 3-stage model of trauma recovery (safety, mourning, reconnection), which was adapted to the realities of the refugee camp setting. Over 4,000 clients were provided with counseling, and an additional 15,000 were provided with other supportive services. Results from follow-up assessments indicated significant reductions in trauma symptoms and increases in measures of daily functioning and social support during and after participation in groups. The treatment model developed in Guinea served as the basis for CVT's ongoing work with survivors in Sierra Leone and Liberia. ((c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved).     

Word meaning and the control of eye fixation: semantic competitor effects and the visual world paradigm

When participants are presented simultaneously with spoken language and a visual display depicting objects to which that language refers, participants spontaneously fixate the visual referents of the words being heard [Cooper, R. M. (1974). The control of eye fixation by the meaning of spoken language: A new methodology for the real-time investigation of speech perception, memory, and language processing. Cognitive Psychology, 6(1), 84-107; Tanenhaus, M. K., Spivey-Knowlton, M. J., Eberhard, K. M., & Sedivy, J. C. (1995). Integration of visual and linguistic information in spoken language comprehension. Science, 268(5217), 1632-1634]. We demonstrate here that such spontaneous fixation can be driven by partial semantic overlap between a word and a visual object. Participants heard the word ‘piano’ when (a) a piano was depicted amongst unrelated distractors; (b) a trumpet was depicted amongst those same distractors; and (c), both the piano and trumpet were depicted. The probability of fixating the piano and the trumpet in the first two conditions rose as the word ‘piano’ unfolded. In the final condition, only fixations to the piano rose, although the trumpet was fixated more than the distractors. We conclude that eye movements are driven by the degree of match, along various dimensions that go beyond simple visual form, between a word and the mental representations of objects in the concurrent visual field.     

Eye movements are functional during face learning

In a free viewing learning condition, participants were allowed to move their eyes naturally as they learned a set of new faces. In a restricted viewing learning condition, participants remained fixated in a single central location as they learned the new faces. Recognition of the learned faces was then tested following the two learning conditions. Eye movements were recorded during the free viewing learning condition, as well as during recognition. The recognition results showed a clear deficit following the restricted viewing condition, compared with the free viewing condition, demonstrating that eye movements play a functional role during human face learning. Furthermore, the features selected for fixation during recognition were similar following free viewing and restricted viewing learning, suggesting that the eye movements generated during recognition are not simply a recapitulation of those produced during learning.     

The facial pattern of disgust, appetence, excited joy and relaxed joy: an improved facial EMG study

The purpose of the study was to investigate the facial muscle pattern of disgust in comparison to appetence and joy, using an improved facial EMG method. We analyzed the activity of nine facial muscles in forty healthy subjects. The subject group was randomly divided into two groups (oversaturated vs. hungry) of ten women and ten men each. Four different emotions (disgust, appetence, excited-joy and relaxed-joy) were induced by showing pictures from the IAPS. Pre-visible facial muscle activity was measured with a new facial EMG. A Visual Analog Scale (VAS) was established. Disgust is represented by a specific facial muscle pattern involving M.corrugator and M.orbicularis oculi, clearly distinguishing it from the facial patterns of appetence and joy. The intensity of disgust is stronger in a state of hunger than under oversaturation and is altogether stronger in females than in males. Our findings indicate the possibility to explore the entire emotion system successfully through a state-of-the-art psychophysiological method like our EMG device.     

THE MOTIVATIONAL PROPERTIES OF SCHEDULE-INDUCED POLYDIPSIA1

Schedule-induced polydipsia occurred during initial magazine training to Noyes pellets (45 mg), disappeared when lever-pressing was acquired on a continuous reinforcement schedule (CRF), and reappeared when the food contingency was changed to a 1-min variable interval schedule (VI 1 min). Polydipsia also developed under a VI 1 min food schedule when water was concurrently available on various fixed ratios (FR), rather than being freely available. The level of the polydipsia and its motivating properties allow it to be classified as a form of adjunctive behavior.     

Adolescent Neural Responses to Antismoking Messages,Perceived Effectiveness,and Sharing Intention

ABSTRACT

Health communication delivered via media channels can substantially influence adolescents’ choices, and the effects of messages are amplified through interpersonal sharing. However, the underlying psychological and neurocognitive mechanisms that influence message effectiveness and likelihood of sharing are not well understood, especially among adolescents. Based on research in adults, we hypothesized and preregistered that message-induced neural activation in regions associated with self-reflection, social processing, and positive valuation would be related to greater perceived ad effectiveness and intentions to share messages. We focused on brain activity in meta-analytically defined regions associated with these three processes as 40 adolescent nonsmokers viewed advertisements from “The Real Cost” antismoking campaign. Perceived message effectiveness was positively associated with brain activity in the hypothesized social processing regions and marginally associated with brain activity in self-relevance regions, but not associated with brain activity in valuation regions. By contrast, intentions to share the messages were not associated with neural response in these 3 systems. In contrast to previous neuroimaging studies with adult subjects, our findings highlight the role of social cognition in adolescent processing of persuasive messages. We discuss the possibility that the mental processes responsive to effective and shareworthy messages may reflect developmental processes pertinent to media effects.     

Young Freud's linkage with Persia

Abstract

Sigmund Freud's hands helped to mutilate a volume containing a series of “colored plates” like the one replicated in Figure 1 in the text. As a young adult, his personal library included a fairytale whose German text was entitled Die Träumleiter: Ein Marchen. No one has yet been able to authenticate the author's identity beyond the following imprint: “S. Andreas (1832).” The poetic play centers upon a celestial meeting featuring Shakespeare, Goethe, and Dschami. It has been translated into English (The dream ladder: A fairy tale), but still awaits a psychoanalytically informed exegesis.