Is Speech Arrest during Wada Testing a Valid Method for Determining Hemispheric Representation of Language?

Background and objective: The intracarotid amobarbital procedure, or Wada test, is the method of choice to determine hemispheric representation of language, and is routinely used in the presurgical evaluation for intractable epilepsy. Some investigators perform comprehensive language assessments, but others base language lateralization solely on speech arrest. This study sought to determine whether speech arrest alone during Wada testing provides valid data regarding language lateralization. Methods: The subjects (previously reported) were 21 patients evaluated for intractable epilepsy, who underwent language lateralization by Wada testing and functional MRI (FMRI). For each patient, language representation was determined by calculating: (1) a Wada laterality index based exclusively on speech arrest; (2) a Wada laterality index based on comprehensive language assessment; and (3) an FMRI laterality quotient. Correlation coefficients and categorical classifications were analyzed. Results: There was no significant correlation between the Wada laterality quotient derived from duration of speech arrest and either the comprehensive Wada language laterality score (r= .35,p= .12) or FMRI language laterality score (r= .32,p= .16). Categorical classification as left, right or bilateral language also showed marked discordance between speech arrest and the other two methods. Conclusion: Duration of speech arrest during Wada testing is not a valid measure of language dominance.     

The role of personality in crowding research

An analysis of variance was carried out on Ss who were tested with a letter-cancellation task under four experimental conditions, two levels each of crowding and disconfirmation of expectancy. Eight types of Ss were distinguished based on sex and high or low scores on E and N. The crowding situation and disconfirmation of expectancy was found to affect extraverts significantly more than introverts, as predicted by the Brebner-Cooper model. It was confirmed that personality is an important variable in crowding research.     

On knowing how well one is remembering: The persistence of strategy use during transfer

A potential cause for children's failure to transfer learning strategies was explored in the present study. A self-monitoring process was suggested to be essential for evaluating one's own level of performance and the effectiveness of various mnemonic strategies. Matched on free recall scores in this study's first sort-and-recall phase, first, third, and fifth graders (ages 7, 9, and 11 years, respectively) were assigned to one of three treatment groups or a control group. During Phase II, the treatment groups received instruction in sorting pictures according to semantic similarities in preparation for future recall. In addition, Groups 3 and 4 later received feedback indicating their Phase II improvement in performance. A cause-and-effect relationship between strategy use and enhanced recall was further suggested to Group 4. Among third graders, only those provided with feedback and strategy instruction continued to rely upon the input organization strategy when faced with transfer tasks in Phase III. Both enhanced recall and improved sorting styles were observed for these subjects in Phase III. Some first graders also showed improved sorting styles and improved recall following feedback, while fifth graders showed enhanced recall even without experimenter-provided feedback. Subject's responses to a metamemory interview provided additional support for the hypothesis that the self-monitoring of memory performance is more likely to be part of fifth graders' (than first graders') memory abilities.     

An ethics of suffering: does it solve the problems we want to solve?: commentary

Erich H. Loewy proposes to elevate the moral obligation to prevent and relieve suffering to the level of a prima facie moral duty by delineating which beings are of primary moral worth and which are of secondary moral worth. Sentient beings have a capacity to suffer and are therefore of primary moral worth. Beings that are insentient cannot suffer; therefore such beings are only of secondary moral worth. Objects of secondary moral worth include patients in a persistent vegetative state (PVS) and brain-dead patients. This proposal, he says, would solve a number of problems in clinical bioethics. First, it would help to clarify our moral duties at the bedside. And secondly, by creating a hierarchy of moral values, it helps to differentiate which patients are owed our primary allegiance and resources. Despite his extensive and painstaking proof, I believe several questions remain about the use of the "capacity of sentient beings to suffer" as a basis for a universal grounding in ethics.     

A structured approach to microcomputer system design

A simple “building block” philosophy for construction of high-performance microcomputer-based systems utilizing I/O functional definition and a structured implementation of MOS/LSI semiconductor devices.     

Age differences in coping resources and satisfaction with life among middle-aged,young-old,and oldest-old adults

The authors examined age differences in perceived coping resources and satisfaction with life across 3 older-adult age groups (45-64, 65-74, and 75 years and older). The 98 participants represented healthy, socially active, community-residing adults. Group comparisons were made on 12 individual coping scales, and an overall coping resource effectiveness score was computed. No significant differences were found for 11 of the coping resources or for overall coping resource effectiveness. Similar consistencies in life satisfaction were found across the 3 age groups. The findings indicate that (a) for healthy adults, the oldest old cope at least as effectively as their younger counterparts, despite their likelihood of encountering increased levels of stress; and (b) psychologically, old age may be viewed as a time of resilience and fortitude.     

Hotep's Story: Exploring the Wounds of Health Vulnerability in the US

A wide variety of forms of domination hasresulted in a highly heterogeneous health riskcategory, ``the vulnerable.' The study of healthinequities sheds light on forces thatgenerate, sustain, and alter vulnerabilities toillness, injury, suffering and death. Thispaper analyzes the case of a high-risk teenfrom a Boston ghetto that illuminatesintersections between ``race' and class in theconstruction of vulnerability in the US.Exploration of his ``wounds' helps specify howlarge-scale social and cultural forces becomeembodied as individual experience of disparatehealth risk. The case demonstrates that healthinequities would not occur if resources –employment, income, wealth, education, housing,profiling in the legal system, and health care– were more justly managed in keeping withstandards outlined in the Universal Declarationof Human Rights. Professional responses to the``wounds of vulnerability' may reveal importantaspects of who we are and what our work asscholars, practitioners, and advocates mustbecome.     

The effects of adult aging and induced positive and negative mood on planning

Changes in executive functions have been found in older adults and also in young adults experiencing positive or negative mood states. The current study investigated the hypothesis that older adults would show greater executive function impairment following mood induction than young adults. Ninety-six participants (half aged 19-37, half aged 53-80) completed a neutral, positive, or negative mood induction procedure, followed by the Tower of London planning task. Significant interactions were found between age and mood such that older adults showed greater planning impairment than young adults in both the positive and negative mood conditions. Emotionally salient events occurring before testing may interfere with executive function in older adults.     

Meaning through syntax is insufficient to explain comprehension of sentences with reduced relative clauses: comment on McKoon and Ratcliff (2003)

The authors argue that the meaning through syntax (MTS) model proposed by G. McKoon and R. Ratcliff fails to account for the comprehension of sentences with reduced relative clauses. First, the theory's core assumptions regarding verb-based event representations and how they link to constructions are incompatible with well-established analyses from the lexical semantics literature. Second, the MTS theory provides neither a principled nor a consistent account for why some reduced relatives are hard whereas others are easy. Finally, McKoon and Ratcliff's critique of constraint-based models is flawed in that sometimes they tested a nonexistent theory and sometimes they provided evidence for the constraint-based models against which they were arguing.