Quality of Life,Anxiety and Depression in Soft Tissue Sarcomas as Compared to More Common Tumours: An Observational Study

The aim of this study is to compare the quality of life and the levels of anxiety and depression in a relatively large group of subjects undergoing chemotherapy for soft tissue sarcoma and a control group of subjects undergoing chemotherapy for the most common types of cancer. 56 soft tissue sarcoma affected patients and 56 patients with common tumours, homogeneous in regards to stages of disease and sociodemographic characteristics, were enrolled in two oncological centres in Turin, Italy. Quality of life was assessed by Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General and anxiety and depression by Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale. All patients had ongoing chemotherapy. The comparison between the two groups shows no difference in either quality of life or in anxiety and depression. There are instead gender differences, since females in the group of common tumours show higher levels of anxiety in comparison to those affected by sarcomas, while males show, at a lower degree, the opposite trend. This study suggest that levels of Quality of Life, anxiety and depression are similar in rare and common tumours. The majority of patients are able to cope with the disease in an adaptive manner. However, for some patients the disease poses a threat to their physical and mental integrity; psychological support of these patients may reduce the development of significant morbidity and help patients to better manage the course of the disease and the effects of the treatment.     

Rethinking Medical Humanities

This paper questions different conceptions of Medical Humanities in order to provide a clearer understanding of what they are and why they matter. Building upon former attempts, we defend a conception of Medical Humanities as a humanistic problem-based approach to medicine aiming at influencing its nature and practice. In particular, we discuss three main conceptual issues regarding the overall nature of this discipline: (i) a problem-driven approach to Medical Humanities; (ii) the need for an integration of Medical Humanities into medicine; (iii) the methodological requirements that could render Medical Humanities an effective framework for medical decision-making.     

Parental Loss During Childhood and Outcomes on Adolescents’ Psychological Profiles: A Longitudinal Study

The loss of a parent during childhood is a traumatic experience that can bring about several difficulties in adaptation and psychopathological problems over time during the child’s development. The present study assesses the psychological functioning of a sample of non-referred pre-adolescents and adolescents and considers the impact of the loss of a significant caregiver on their current psychological profiles. Three groups of subjects were considered, as follows: Group A experienced loss between birth and 3 years of age; Group B experienced loss between 3 and 10 years of age; and Group C experienced no loss. The results show that there is a significant decrease in psychopathological risk and improvement in subjects’ scores in the transition from pre-adolescence to mid-late adolescence. Adolescents who have suffered the loss of a caregiver within the first three years of life, however, continue to report higher scores than the other two groups, denoting no improvement in their psychological welfare.     

Knowledge space theory, formal concept analysis, and computerized psychological assessment

In the present study, the use of knowledge space theory (KST), jointly with formal concept analysis (FCA), is proposed for developing a formal representation of the relations between the items of a questionnaire and a set of psychodiagnostic criteria. This formal representation can be used to develop an efficient adaptive tool for psychological assessment. Rusch and Wille (1996) have shown some interesting connections between KST and FCA; these connections are applied in the construction of knowledge structures, starting from a formal context representing the relations between items and criteria. The proposed general methodology was applied, as an example, to the Maudsley Obsessional-Compulsive Questionnaire. We used a data set provided by a sample of patients with a diagnosis of obsessive-compulsive disorder to validate the obtained structures. The parameters of the basic local independence model (BLIM) were estimated for the obtained knowledge structures. The fit of each model was tested by parametric bootstrap because of the sparseness of the derived data matrix. The results are discussed in light of both psychological and methodological relapses. In particular, we propose a reinterpretation of the BLIM parameters that seems suitable for testing reliability and construct validity; furthermore, it is pointed out how the obtained structures could represent the starting point for the development of a computerized assessment tool.     

Commensurate-incommensurate phase transition in muthmannite,AuAgTe2: first evidence of a modulated structure at low temperature

To study the temperature-dependent structural changes and to analyze the crystal chemical behavior of silver as a function of temperature, a crystal of muthmannite, AuAgTe₂, has been investigated by X-ray single-crystal diffraction methods at 300 K and 110 K. At room temperature, muthmannite was confirmed as belonging to the space group P2/m, while at low temperature (110 K) it undergoes a reversible commensurate–incommensurate phase transition with a modulation wave vector q = 0.215(1)a* + 0.379(2)c*. Muthmannite reconverts to the commensurate type upon returning to room temperature, thus indicating that the phase transition is completely reversible in character. The average structure of the low-temperature muthmannite remains monoclinic, space group P2/m, and shows only normal thermal compression over the entire temperature range investigated. Crystal-chemical characteristics are compared with published data on the other members of the system Au–Ag–Te. Speculations on the possible origin of the modulated structure at low temperature are also given.     

Lexicality and Stimulus Length Effects in Italian Dyslexics: Role of the Overadditivity Effect

The effect of lexicality and stimulus length was studied in 32 third- and fourth-grade Italian dyslexics and in 86 age-matched controls. A visual lexical decision task was used. As proposed by Faust et al. (1999) Faust, M. E., Balota, D. A., Spieler, D. H. and Ferraro, F. R. 1999. Individual differences in information-processing rate and amount: Implications for group differences in response latency. Psychological Bulletin, 125: 777–799. [INFOTRIEVE][CROSSREF][CSA][Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], the results were analyzed in terms of raw reaction time (RT) data and using the z-score transformation to control for the presence of overadditivity effects. In terms of RTs, dyslexics showed a larger difference between words and nonwords (lexicality effect) and between short and long stimuli (length effect) than proficient readers. When data were transformed into z scores, only the group by length interaction remained significant while that with lexicality vanished. This pattern indicates that stimulus length has a specific role in Italian dyslexics’ reading deficit; in contrast, slowness in responding to nonwords was not specific but was interpreted as one aspect of dyslexics’ general inability to deal with alphabetical material (overadditivity effect).     

Route and survey processing of topographical memory during navigation

We investigated the characteristics of route and survey processing of a unique complex virtual environment both at the behavioral and brain levels. Prior to fMRI scanning, participants were trained to follow a route and to learn the spatial relationships between several places, acquiring both route and survey knowledge from a ground-level perspective. During scanning, snapshots of the environment were presented, and participants were required to either indicate the direction to take to follow the route (route task), or to locate unseen targets (survey task). Data suggest that route and survey processing are mainly supported by a common occipito-fronto-parieto-temporal neural network. Our results are consistent with those gathered in studies concerning the neural bases of route versus survey knowledge acquired either from different perspectives or in different environments. However, rather than arguing for a clear distinction between route and survey processing, “mixed” strategies are likely to be involved when both types of encoding take place in the same environment.     

Infants' individuation of agents and inert objects

Using the violation-of-expectancy method, we investigated 10-month-old infants' ability to rely on dynamic features in object individuation processes. Infants were first familiarized to events in which two different objects repeatedly appeared and disappeared, one at a time from behind a screen; at test, the screen was removed, revealing either one or two objects. In Experiment 1, one self-moving non-rigid agent and one inert object were involved in each trial, while in Experiment 2 two different agents were presented. Infants preferred to look at one-object outcomes in Experiment 1, but they did not show any preference for one- or two-object outcomes in Experiment 2. The results suggest that infants can use dynamic information to detect agents in complex individuation tasks before they can rely on shape or surface features. We propose that the sortals agent and inert object appear in development before 12 months without a substantial contribution of linguistic experience. These findings may motivate a revision of current theories on the development of kind-based individuation and object files.     

Self-efficacy moderates the relationship between stress appraisal and quality of life among rescue workers

Abstract

Rescue workers are frequently exposed to highly stressful situations during their everyday work activity. Stress and coping theory emphasizes the interaction between primary and secondary appraisal in determining coping responses to stressful events and quality of life. According to Social Cognitive Theory, stress reactions depend on self-appraisal of coping capabilities.

The present study investigated whether self-efficacy moderates the relationship between stress appraisal and professional quality of life. A self-administered questionnaire was submitted to a sample of 451 Italian rescue workers (firefighters, paramedics, and medical technicians), including the Professional Quality of Life Scale, which measures three dimensions of emergency workers' quality of working life: compassion fatigue, burnout, and compassion satisfaction. Multiple regression analyses indicated that the relationship between stress appraisal and professional quality of life was significant only among rescue workers with low levels of self-efficacy but not among those with higher levels of self-efficacy. These results confirmed the expectations based on Social Cognitive Theory that self-efficacy buffers the impact of perceived stressful encounters on professional quality of life. Results suggest the usefulness of interventions aimed at increasing rescue workers' psychosocial skills.     

Emotionally Focused Couple Therapy With Neurodegenerative Diseases: A Pilot Study

ABSTRACT

This research wants to verify the effectiveness of couple's treatment, when a neurodegenerative disease affects one of the two partners. The disease affects not only the ailing individual, but also the dynamics within the couple. Fourteen patients affected by neurodegenerative diseases participated in an emotionally focused couple therapy (EFT) with their spouses. We collected a measure of the quality of life (SF-36) and relationship satisfaction (DAS) at the beginning and at the end of the treatment for both partners. The results show an improvement in quality of life and couple contentment, underlining the usefulness of such a psychotherapeutic intervention on the couple.