Die DPG-Praxis-Studie

All psychotherapeutic methods must be scientifically evaluated. Empirical evaluation of evidence is a prerequisite for acceptance as scientific psychotherapy as well as for payment by health insurance. Currently the psychotherapy methods accepted within the German health system (behavioural therapy, psychodynamic psychotherapy, and analytic psychotherapy) are reviewed by a governmental evaluation committee concerning evidence, necessity and cost-effectiveness. The DPG practice study has basically two aims: 1) to conduct a large naturalistic study to investigate effectiveness, sustainability and economic aspects of psychodynamic and analytic psychotherapy and 2) to offer a framework for psychoanalytic institutes, members, candidates or groups to realize own research ideas by collecting additional data within the study. The present article describes the background, main research questions, structure and design of the DPG practice study with regard to the evaluation questions.     

Conditions for growth in one-person startups: a longitudinal study spanning eight years

In the European Union, one-person businesses (OPBs) are increasingly regarded as an important alternative to dependent employment. From an economic policy standpoint, the growth potential of such businesses is especially attractive. This paper analyzes the growth potential of OPBs by postulating five key groups of enterprise growth predictors: personal traits, resources, strategy, industry, and organizational structures and systems. The framework model was adapted to suit the specific circumstances of OPBs. The model was tested using a longitudinal data set comprising 188 OPBs which were observed over a period of eight years. At the end of the observation period, the OPBs included in the study had an average of 1.33 employees. The gender of the founder, capital requirements at the time of establishment, and growth strategy proved to be the most important predictors of growth. In addition, human capital resources also tended to have a positive impact. The traits of the person founding the business were not found to affect growth. In summary, it is possible to draw empirically reliable conclusions about growth potential on the basis of the ?seriousness? of an OPB startup project.     

Temporal processing capabilities in repetition conduction aphasia

This study investigates the temporal resolution capacities of the central-auditory system in a subject (NP) suffering from repetition conduction aphasia. More specifically, the patient was asked to detect brief gaps between two stretches of broadband noise (gap detection task) and to evaluate the duration of two biphasic (WN-3) continuous noise elements, starting with white noise (WN) followed by 3 kHz bandpass-filtered noise (duration discrimination task). During the gap detection task, the two portions of each stimulus were either identical (“intra-channel condition”) or differed (“inter-channel condition”) in the spectral characteristics of the leading and trailing acoustic segments. NP did not exhibit any deficits in the intra-channel condition of the gap detection task, indicating intact auditory temporal resolution across intervals of 1–3 ms. By contrast, the inter-channel condition yielded increased threshold values. Based upon the “multiple-looks” model of central-auditory processing, this profile points at a defective integration window operating across a few tens of milliseconds – a temporal range associated with critical features of the acoustic speech signal such as voice onset time and formant transitions. Additionally, NP was found impaired during a duration discrimination task addressing longer integration windows (ca. 150 ms). Concerning speech, this latter time domain approximately corresponds to the duration of stationary segmental units such as fricatives and long vowels. On the basis of our results we suggest, that the patient’s auditory timing deficits in non-speech tasks may account, at least partially, for his impairments in speech processing.     

Regionale Psychiatrieberichterstattung

In diesem Beitrag werden zun?chst die Motivation, das Konzept und die Datenquellen der 2006 eingeführten Vorarlberger Psychiatrieberichterstattung dargestellt. Dann erfolgt, mit Hilfe definierter Kennzahlen, anhand der Ergebnisse für das Berichtsjahr 2008 ein überblick über die in die Berichterstattung einbezogenen Hilfsangebote und ihre Nutzer. Die Kennzahlen beschreiben den Umfang der Hilfen, das dafür eingesetzte Fachpersonal und die betreuten Patienten. Beispielhaft werden sodann M?glichkeiten der empirischen überprüfung des Zielgruppenbezugs und der regionalen Bedarfsgerechtigkeit der Hilfen erl?utert. Der Beitrag schlie?t mit einigen Bemerkungen zu den geplanten n?chsten Schritten auf dem Weg zu einer kontinuierlichen Qualit?tsentwicklung der regionalen psychiatrischen Versorgung, die das gesamte Netzwerk der Hilfen einbezieht und dabei auch die Notwendigkeit und Wirksamkeit der therapeutischen Ma?nahmen im Einzelfall in den Blick nimmt.     

Gender Differences in Self-Reports of Depression: The Response Bias Hypothesis Revisited

This study was designed to revisit the response bias hypothesis, which posits that gender differences in depression prevalence rates may reflect a tendency for men to underreport depressive symptoms. In this study, we examined aspects of gender role socialization (gender-related traits, socially desirable responding, beliefs about mental health and depression) that may contribute to a response bias in self-reports of depression. In addition, we investigated the impact of two contextual variables (i.e., cause of depression and level of intrusiveness of experimental follow-up) on self-reports of depressive symptoms. Results indicated that men, but not women, reported fewer depressive symptoms when consent forms indicated that a more involved follow-up might occur. Further, results indicated differential responding by men and women on measures of gender-related traits, mental health beliefs, and beliefs about depression and predictors of depressed mood. Together, our results support the assertion that, in specific contexts, a response bias explanation warrants further consideration in investigations of gender differences in rates of self-reported depression.     

Electroencephalographic evidence for improved visual working memory performance during standing and exercise

While a substantial body of research has investigated the effects of aerobic exercise on cognitive performance, few have monitored exercise‐concurrent cognitive processes via electroencephalography and fewer still using an event‐related potential (ERP) approach. As such, little is known regarding how the temporal dynamics of cognitive processing are influenced during aerobic activity. Here, we aimed to elucidate the influence of aerobic exercise on the temporal dynamics of concurrent visual working memory (VWM) performance. Participants performed a VWM retro‐cue task at rest and during aerobic exercise across two postural modalities: seated (using a stationary bicycle) and standing upright (using a treadmill). Three consecutive phases of the VWM processing pipeline were assessed by means of lateralized ERPs: access of VWM representations, response selection, and response execution. Aerobic exercise and upright posture were found to have significant effects on VWM performance, facilitating processing speed in the retro‐cue task. This facilitation arose primarily at an intermediary stage between the phases of accessing VWM representations and response selection. Our findings hold implications not only for understanding the influence of aerobic activity on VWM, but also for contemporary models of VWM that are built exclusively on data recorded during stationary, seated conditions.     

The influence of syllable onset complexity and syllable frequency on speech motor control

Functional imaging studies have delineated a "minimal network for overt speech production", encompassing mesiofrontal structures (supplementary motor area, anterior cingulate gyrus), bilateral pre- and postcentral convolutions, extending rostrally into posterior parts of the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) of the language-dominant hemisphere, left anterior insula as well as bilateral components of the basal ganglia, the cerebellum, and the thalamus. In order to further elucidate the specific contribution of these cerebral regions to speech motor planning, subjects were asked to read aloud visually presented bisyllabic pseudowords during functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The test stimuli systematically varied in onset complexity (CCV versus CV) and frequency of occurrence (high-frequency, HF versus low-frequency, LF) of the initial syllable. A cognitive subtraction approach revealed a significant main effect of syllable onset complexity (CCV versus CV) at the level of left posterior IFG, left anterior insula, and both cerebellar hemispheres. Conceivably, these areas closely cooperate in the sequencing of subsyllabic aspects of the sound structure of verbal utterances. A significant main effect of syllable frequency (LF versus HF), by contrast, did not emerge. However, calculation of the time series of hemodynamic activation within the various cerebral structures engaged in speech motor control revealed this factor to enhance functional connectivity between Broca's area and ipsilateral anterior insula.     

Contributions of volumetrics of the hippocampus and thalamus to verbal memory in temporal lobe epilepsy patients

Recent theories have posited that the hippocampus and thalamus serve distinct, yet related, roles in episodic memory. Whereas the hippocampus has been implicated in long-term memory encoding and storage, the thalamus, as a whole, has been implicated in the selection of items for subsequent encoding and the use of retrieval strategies. However, dissociating the memory impairment that occurs following thalamic injury as distinguished from that following hippocampal injury has proven difficult. This study examined relationships between MRI volumetric measures of the hippocampus and thalamus and their contributions to prose and rote verbal memory functioning in 18 patients with intractable temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE). Results revealed that bilateral hippocampal and thalamic volume independently predicted delayed prose verbal memory functioning. However, bilateral hippocampal, but not thalamic, volume predicted delayed rote verbal memory functioning. Follow-up analyses indicated that bilateral thalamic volume independently predicted immediate prose, but not immediate rote, verbal recall, whereas bilateral hippocampal volume was not associated with any of these immediate memory measures. These findings underscore the cognitive significance of thalamic atrophy in chronic TLE, demonstrating that hippocampal and thalamic volume make quantitatively, and perhaps qualitatively, distinct contributions to episodic memory functioning in TLE patients. They are also consistent with theories proposing that the hippocampus supports long-term memory encoding and storage, whereas the thalamus is implicated in the executive aspects of episodic memory.     

Additional-singleton interference in efficient visual search: A common salience route for detection and compound tasks

In efficient search for feature singleton targets, additional singletons (ASs) defined in a nontarget dimension are frequently found to interfere with performance. All search tasks that are processed via a spatial saliency map of the display would be predicted to be subject to such AS interference. In contrast, dual-route models, such as feature integration theory, assume that singletons are detected not via a saliency map, but via a nonspatial route that is immune to interference from cross-dimensional ASs. Consistent with this, a number of studies have reported absent interference effects in detection tasks. However, recent work suggests that the failure to find such effects may be due to the particular frequencies at which ASs were presented, as well as to their relative saliency. These two factors were examined in the present study. In contrast to previous reports, cross-dimensional ASs were found to slow detection (target-present and target-absent) responses, modulated by both their frequency of occurrence and saliency (relative to the target). These findings challenge dual-route models and support single-route models, such as dimension weighting and guided search.