The Secret of Faces: Commentary on Paper by Rachael Peltz

Dr. Rachael Peltz stresses the aesthetic dimension of analysis. In fact the aesthetic experience can serve as a model for all that is deepest and truest in our lives and in the analytic encounter. We all have an “inner painter” which transforms primitive sensoriality into images or pictograms and then tie them up into oneiric thoughts, dreaming and thinking in order to give a personal meaning to experience. This model gives us the possibility in the clinical work to be more attentive to the musical, rhythmic, or semiotic aspects of the interaction between patient and analyst. Dr. Peltz shows in a beautiful vignette how, equating analysis to the aesthetic experience, it is possible to help the patient to reach a fuller sense of consonance and contact between mind and body.     

Alienation and empathy as mediators of the relation between Social Dominance Orientation,Right-Wing Authoritarianism and expressions of racism and sexism

Prior research has established a link between Social Dominance Orientation (SDO), empathy, and generalized measures of prejudice. Whether empathy functions as a mediator for more specific forms of prejudice has not been studied. Furthermore, alienation and its role in predicting prejudice have been given little attention in the literature. Our results found that empathy functioned as a mediator for SDO, but only for sexism, not racism. Alienation was found to act as a mediator between SDO and both racism and sexism. The relation between Right-Wing Authoritarianism and racism and sexism was not mediated by alienation.     

Social Context in HCl: A New Framework for Mental Models,Cooperation, and Communication

This article considers current research in computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW), computer-mediated communication (CMC), and distributed artificial intelligence (DAl). These areas need an articulated model of social contexts to bridge the persisting gap between social and technological dimensions in computer system design and use. A conceptual model of context is presented to account for both cooperation-conflict and communication-negotiation processes. The model conceives of contexts as including not only physical objects and other people but also social norms which influence both individuals and organizations. It assumes that computer system use occurs in social scenarios in which the features cannot be reduced to any type of input or data in the world that designers and users can process along with other information coming from the current task. The model is built on three levels: from social contexts as normative order (Level 1), to specific and intrinsically complex situations (Level 2), to person-computer interactions for the performance of particular tasks (Level 3). The model has three main implications. First, Human-Computer Interaction (HCl) studies—especially scenario-based design—may profit from a fresh topdown approach to designers' and users' mental models taking into account normative social processes which have been neglected in previous research. Second, CSCW may realize how deeply discrepant perspectives affect multi-agent environments and why in real working life negotiation is intertwined with cooperation. Designers may use this insight to design systems allowing more place for negotiation among actors. Third, we should dismiss the view that CMC lacks adequate social cues and fosters impulsive behavior. Cognitive processes such as categorization, stereotype construction, and social identification can make electronic environments even more strongly sensible to social norms than face-to-face communication. Context, according to our model, is not restricted to the physical copresence of other people but consists mainly of processes providing situations with socially recognizable meaning.     

Line bisection and cognitive plasticity of unilateral neglect of space

Patients with neglect of the left half of space were asked to bisect lines of different lengths. The leftmost points of the represented lines, determined on the basis of the midpoints set by the patients on the objective lines, were the dependent variable. It was thus possible to recognize diverse patterns of behavior which were conceivably averaged away in earlier investigations. In discussing the results, the question is raised of whether unilateral neglect of space may be altered by cognitive processes.     

Attentional orienting across the sensory modalities

This event-related potential study investigated (i) to what extent incongruence between attention-directing cue and cued target modality affects attentional control processes that bias the system in advance to favor a particular stimulus modality and (ii) to what extent top-down attentional control mechanisms are generalized for the type of information that is to be attended. To this end, both visual and auditory word cues were used to instruct participants to direct attention to a specific visual (color) or auditory (pitch) stimulus feature of a forthcoming multisensory target stimulus. Effects of cue congruency were observed within 200 ms post-cue over frontal scalp regions and related to processes involved in shifting attention from the cue modality to the modality of the task-relevant target feature. Both directing visual attention and directing auditory attention were associated with dorsal posterior positivity, followed by sustained fronto-central negativity. However, this fronto-central negativity appeared to have an earlier onset and was more pronounced when the visual modality was cued. Together the present results suggest that the mechanisms involved in deploying attention are to some extent determined by the modality (visual, auditory) in which attention operates, and in addition, that some of these mechanisms can also be affected by cue congruency.     

Pilot study of light therapy and neurocognitive performance of attention and memory in healthy subjects

The aim of this pilot study was to investigate whether light therapy improves healthy subjects' neurocognitive performance of attention, memory, and language. Ten subjects were treated with white bright light for 5 days and a control group of 10 with no treatment were assessed with a battery of neurocognitive tests which included the Stroop Colour Word Interference Test, the Verbal Fluency Test, the Story Recall Test, and the Word Pairs Recall Test. Analysis showed improvements in cognitive scores in both groups, although on all the cognitive tests the mean difference scores between baseline and endpoint were significantly larger in the light-treated group. These preliminary results suggest that short-term bright light may exert beneficial effects on cognitive functions.     

Neural correlates of transformational apparent motion

Transformational apparent motion (TAM) arises when a shape that is abruptly flashed on and off next to a static shape of similar color or texture appears as a protrusion that extends and retracts smoothly from the static object. Here we report that the strength of the TAM percept can be predicted from the waveform of visual evoked potentials (VEPs) measured while observers rated their percepts. The VEPs at pattern onset and offset are maximally symmetric when the static inducer and the flashing patches of the display are of the same contrast. VEP symmetry is affected by how the two patches can be matched as a single surface and may reflect the relative contribution of different motion and object detection systems in visual cortex.     

Genetic Counseling Dilemmas for a Patient with Sporadic Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis,Frontotemporal Degeneration & Parkinson’s Disease

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), frontotemporal degeneration and Parkinson’s disease may be different expressions of the same neurodegenerative disease. However, association between ALS and parkinsonism-dementia complex (ALS-PDC) has only rarely been reported apart from the cluster detected in Guam. We report a patient presenting with ALS-PDC in whom pathological mutations/expansions were investigated. No other family members were reported to have any symptoms of a neurological condition. Our case demonstrates that ALS-PDC can occur as a sporadic disorder, even though the coexistence of the three clinical features in one patient suggests a single underlying genetic cause. It is known that genetic testing should be preferentially offered to patients with ALS who have affected first or second-degree relatives. However, this case illustrates the importance of genetic counseling for family members of patients with sporadic ALC-PDC in order to provide education on the low recurrence risk. Here, we dicuss the ethical, psychological and practical consequences for patients and their relatives.     

“Measuring up to Measure” Dysmorphophobia as a Language Game

We look into the transformation of meanings in psychotherapy and suggest a clinical application for Wittgenstein’s intuitions concerning the role of linguistic practices in generating significance. In post-modern theory, therapy does not necessarily change reality as much as it does our way of experiencing it by intervening in the linguistic-representational rules responsible for constructing the text which expresses the problem. Since “states of mind assume the truths and forms of the language devices that we use to represent them” (Foucault, 1963, p. 57), therapy may be intended as a narrative path toward a new naming of one’s reified experiences. The clinical problem we consider here, the pervasive feeling of inadequacy due to one’s excessive height (dysmorphophobia), is an excellent example of “language game” by which a “perspicuous representation” (the “therapy” proposed by Wittgenstein in the 1953) may bring out alternatives to linguistically-built “traps”, putting the blocked semiotic mechanism back into motion.     

Peer victimization, depressive symptoms, and high salivary cortisol predict poorer memory in children

The predictive relations of peer victimization, depressive symptoms, and salivary cortisol on memory in 168 children aged 12 at Time 1 (T1) were examined using a longitudinal design in which data were collected on four occasions over a 2-year period. Results indicated that: (1) peer victimization, depressive symptoms, and evening cortisol were stable over time, (2) peer victimization and elevated symptoms of depression were concurrently linked at each time, (3) T1 peer victimization predicted elevated symptoms of depression at T2 which in turn predicted lower cortisol levels at T3, and (4) controlling for earlier associations, T3 peer victimization, depressive symptoms, and higher morning and evening cortisol levels uniquely predicted memory deficits at T4. The links between elevated cortisol, symptoms of depression, and poor memory are consistent with published research on depressed adults and extend the findings to children exposed to peer victimization. These findings highlight that peer abuse is harmful and may impact children's long-term mental health and memory functioning.