Verified hormone therapy improves episodic memory performance in healthy postmenopausal women

Studies of hormone therapy (HT) and cognition have yielded conflicting results. The aim of this observational study was to examine the effect of estradiol, via serum verified HT (estradiol, estriol, progesterone) and endogenous estradiol, on 108 healthy postmenopausal women's cognitive performance. The results demonstrated that the 43 HT-users performed at a significantly higher level than non-users on episodic memory tasks and on a verbal fluency task, whereas HT-users and non-users did not differ on tasks assessing semantic memory and spatial visualization. In addition, there was a positive relationship between serum estradiol level and episodic memory performance, indicating that postmenopausal HT is associated with enhanced episodic memory and verbal fluency, independent of age and education. These observational results suggest that HT use may be sufficient to exert small, yet positive effects on female sensitive cognitive tasks. Hormone therapy compliance and formulation is discussed as confounding factors in previous research.     

Dissociation of event-related potentials indexing arousal and semantic cohesion during emotional word encoding

Event-related potential (ERP) studies have shown that emotional stimuli elicit greater amplitude late positive-polarity potentials (LPPs) than neutral stimuli. This effect has been attributed to arousal, but emotional stimuli are also more semantically coherent than uncategorized neutral stimuli. ERPs were recorded during encoding of positive, negative, uncategorized neutral, and categorized neutral words. Differences in LPP amplitude elicited by emotional versus uncategorized neutral stimuli were evident from 450 to 1000 ms. From 450 to 700 ms, LPP effects at midline and right hemisphere frontal electrodes indexed arousal, whereas LPP effects at left hemisphere centro-parietal electrodes indexed semantic cohesion. This dissociation helps specify the processes underlying emotional stimulus encoding, and suggests the need to control for semantic cohesion in emotional information processing studies.     

Age differences in fluid intelligence: contributions of general slowing and frontal decline

The current study examined the contributions of general slowing and frontal decline to age differences in fluid intelligence. Participants aged 20-89 years completed Block Design, Matrix Reasoning, simple reaction time, choice reaction time, Wisconsin Card Sorting, and Tower of London tasks. Age-related declines in fluid intelligence, speed of processing, and frontal function were observed. Hierarchical regression analyses showed that the processing speed and frontal function measures accounted for significant variance in fluid intelligence performance, but there was also a residual effect of age after controlling for each variable individually as well as both variables. An additional analysis showed that the variance in fluid intelligence that was attributable to processing speed was not fully shared with the variance attributable to frontal function. These findings suggest that the age-related decline in fluid intelligence is due to general slowing and frontal decline, as well as other unidentified factors.     

Life before and after quitting smoking: an electronic diary study

This article describes a multidimensional, multivariate, and multilevel approach to the assessment of nicotine withdrawal. In this prospective study, 70 adult smokers assigned to an active or placebo nicotine patch condition completed multiple daily assessments using an electronic diary. Average and individual growth curves were estimated for affective and nonaffective withdrawal symptoms. All symptoms but hunger increased significantly on the quit day and remained elevated for three weeks. Variability in symptom experiences across individuals increased from pre- to post-quit. Relations between symptom reports (e.g., negative affect or craving) and episodic events (e.g., stressful events or seeing someone smoke) changed from pre-quit to post-quit. Pre-quit increases in negative affect and quit-day increases in craving were inversely related to abstinence three months after the quit day, suggesting that anticipatory and immediate reactions to quitting influence success.     

Do humans and baboons use the same information when categorizing human and baboon faces?

What information is used for sorting pictures of complex stimuli into categories? We applied a reverse correlation method to reveal the visual features mediating categorization in humans and baboons. Two baboons and 6 humans were trained to sort, by species, pictures of human and baboon faces on which random visual noise was superimposed. On ambiguous probe trials, a human-baboon morph was presented, eliciting "human" responses on some trials and "baboon" responses on others. The difference between the noise patterns that induced the two responses made explicit the information mediating the classification. Unlike the humans, the baboons based their categorization on information that closely matched that used by a theoretical observer responding solely on the basis of the pixel similarities between the probe and training images. We show that the classification-image technique and principal components analysis provide a method to make explicit the differences in the information mediating categorization in humans and animals.     

Reactive and proactive aggression: stability of constructs and relations to correlates

The authors examined short-term temporal stability of reactive and proactive aggression, as well as short-term consistency of differential relations of reactive versus proactive aggression to 4 correlates. The authors used parent, teacher, peer, and self-report measures twice across 1 year to assess reactive aggression, proactive aggression, hyperactivity, social skills, anger expression, and depressive symptoms of 2nd-grade boys and girls (N = 57). Both subtypes of aggression remained stable across the year, even when the other subtype of aggression was explained at each assessment. Reactive aggression, but not proactive aggression, was consistently positively related to hyperactivity, poor social skills, and anger expression at each assessment.     

The Social Ecological Model and Physical Activity in African American Women

Little is known about the social and contextual correlates (e.g., social norms, environment, social networks, and organizational support) influencing the adoption and maintenance of regular physical activity among minority and underserved populations. The purpose of this review was to apply the social ecological model to better understand physical activity among African American women. A review of the literature pertaining to correlates of physical activity among African American women was conducted and applied to a social ecological perspective. Understanding and addressing social and contextual correlates of physical activity behavior among African American women are necessary to establish comprehensive programs, particularly within community settings. The social ecological model provides a strong theoretical basis to guide physical activity intervention in this population.