Neuropsychological outcomes of pediatric demyelinating diseases: a review

Immune-mediated central nervous system (CNS) demyelinating diseases impact various areas of the brain, optic nerves, and/or spinal cord and can result in a wide range of neurologic symptoms including adverse cognitive outcomes. Neuropsychological outcomes in adult multiple sclerosis (MS) are well documented, while literature on such outcomes in pediatric cohorts is more limited. Furthermore, literature on neuropsychological outcomes in pediatric acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM), neuromyelitis optica (NMO), and transverse myelitis (TM) is even more limited. This paper is the first to review what is known about neuropsychological outcomes associated with immune-mediated CNS demyelinating diseases, with a focus on pediatric MS, ADEM, NMO, and TM. Additionally, this review illuminates the need to clarify differences in neuropsychological sequelae between conditions, characterize longitudinal cognitive outcomes, and investigate neuropsychological outcomes in relation to clinical variables (e.g., age of onset, disease duration, number of relapses) and psychosocial variables (e.g., fatigue, emotional problems, behavioral functioning) to better understand neuropsychological outcomes associated with these conditions.     

Frequency of Nightmares and Gender Significantly Predict Distressing Dreams of German Athletes Before Competitions or Games

Important sports events are highlights and stressful situations in every athlete's career. This stress might alter the dream content of athletes and consequently evoke disturbed dreaming. In this study, the authors asked 840 German athletes from various sports about distressing dreams on the nights before an important competition or game. About 15% of the athletes stated that they experienced at least 1 distressing dream before an important competition or game during the preceding 12 months. An almost equal number of athletes reported at least 1 distressing dream in their sports career. With respect to the base rate, in about 3% of the events a distressing dream occurred. Reported dream content referred mainly to athletic failure. The main risk factor for an athlete experiencing a distressing dream before a competition appears to be the frequency of experienced nightmares in general. Future research should use diary techniques to study the impact of distressing dreams on the next-day athletic performance in a competition or game.     

A Cautious Note on Auxiliary Variables That Can Increase Bias in Missing Data Problems

The treatment of missing data in the social sciences has changed tremendously during the last decade. Modern missing data techniques such as multiple imputation and full-information maximum likelihood are used much more frequently. These methods assume that data are missing at random. One very common approach to increase the likelihood that missing at random is achieved consists of including many covariates as so-called auxiliary variables. These variables are either included based on data considerations or in an inclusive fashion; that is, taking all available auxiliary variables. In this article, we point out that there are some instances in which auxiliary variables exhibit the surprising property of increasing bias in missing data problems. In a series of focused simulation studies, we highlight some situations in which this type of biasing behavior can occur. We briefly discuss possible ways how one can avoid selecting bias-inducing covariates as auxiliary variables.     

Literatur in Examensarbeiten

After the Second World War up to the 1980s Harald Schultz-Hencke’s so-called German neopsychoanalysis was an important theoretical reference for psychoanalysts in the German Psychoanalytical Society (DPG). Simultaneously, however, references were increasingly being made to quintessential psychoanalytical sources which of course had an impact on the psychoanalytical training. The references in final papers of a DPG psychoanalytical institute from 1971–2008 were compared to the references in clinical papers of the International Journal of Psychoanalysis. It can be shown that the influence of German neopsychoanalysis in the final theses of the psychoanalytical institute in question has diminished since the 1990s and has become irrelevant in the twenty-first century.     

Multiple Mediators of the Attitude Similarity-Attraction Relationship: Dominance of Inferred Attraction and Subtlety of Affect

The authors examined the mediation of the attitude similarity–attraction relationship. When affect was the sole measured mediating variable, the hypothesized partial mediation held in Experiment 1 (N = 60). In Experiment 2 (N = 96), ratings of the 3 potential mediators (affect, inferred attraction, and cognitive evaluation) and of an irrelevant variable (inferred cognitive evaluation) were taken at 2 orders of mediator measurement. The attitude similarity-attraction link was more strongly mediated by inferred attraction than by cognitive evaluation. Surprisingly, however, the effect of affect on attraction was reversed in the multiple-mediation analysis. Post hoc analyses disclosed that affect transmitted the similarity effect from its preceding variable only to the succeeding one. Theoretical and methodological implications of the dominance of inferred attraction and the subtlety of affect are discussed.     

Two different types of shear-deformation behaviour in Au–Cu multilayers

Localised shear deformation of a material is usually identified as a particular feature of deformation inhomogeneity. Here, we show two different types of shear deformation-behaviour that occurred in Au–Cu multilayers subjected to microindentation load, namely, a cooperative-layer-buckling-induced shear banding in a nanoscale multilayer and a direct localised shearing across a layer interface along a shear plane in a submicron-scale multilayer. Theoretical analysis indicates that the formation of the two different types of shear deformation in the multilayers depends on a competition between the dislocation-pile-up-induced stress concentration at the layer interface and the barrier strength of the layer interface for glissile dislocation transmission.     

Book reviews

Islam and Politics in Central Asia by M. Haghayeghi. London: Macmillan, 1995, 264 pp.

Empire's Edge: Travels in South‐Eastern Europe, Turkey and Central Asia by Scott Malcomson. Boston USA and London: Faber and Faber, 1994, 256 pp. Paperback, £8.99.

The Resurgence of Central Asia: Islam or Nationalism by Ahmed Rashid. London and New Jersey: Zed Books, 1994, x+278 pp. Hardback, £36.95, $59.95; Paperback, £14.95, $25.00.

Pride of Small Nations: The Caucasus and Post‐Soviet Disorder by Suzanne Golden‐berg. London and New Jersey: Zed Books, 1994. xvi+233 pp. Hardback, £36.95, $55.00; Paperback, £14.95, $22.50.

The North Caucasus Barrier: the Russian Advance towards the Muslim World edited by M. Bennigsen Broxup. London: Hurst, 1992, xvii+252 pp. Hardback. Paperback, 1996, £14.95.     

Directed forgetting for categorised pictures: recognition memory for perceptual details versus gist

ABSTRACT

Item-based directed forgetting (DF) was tested using 2-alternative forced-choice recognition to examine the effects of forgetting instructions on memory for perceptual detail and gist of categorised pictures of scenes and objects in three experiments. When the distractor is from the same category as the target (exemplar test condition), discrimination must be based on memory for perceptual details, whereas recognition can be based on gist or general category information when the distractor is from a novel category (novel test condition). Recognition accuracy was greater for Remember-cued than Forget-cued pictures when discrimination must be based on perceptual details in the exemplar test condition but not when discrimination could be based on gist in the novel test condition. Accuracy in scene and object recognition is greater for gist than for perceptual details, and DF instructions serve to reduce recognition memory based on perceptual details.     

用转化思维指导中西医治疗子宫内膜异位症

子宫内膜异位症为育龄妇女常见疑难疾病.本文在临床实践中,先分析目前中西医各自相关理论的局限,再分别采用对方的理论视角审视己方的观察结果,得出结论认为病因病机是机体全身适应性降低导致自身原有的生理因子表现为病理作用,在生殖系统即为内膜异位的各种病症,治疗原则均不应是单单拮抗相关的病理因子,而应该调和包括雌激素在内的各种因子以增强机体的适应能力,进而设计个体化的中西药治疗方案,进行分阶段、恢复生理节律为目的,精确调理生殖激素的治疗.