Engineering Values Into Genetic Engineering: A Proposed Analytic Framework for Scientific Social Responsibility

Recent experiments have been used to “edit” genomes of various plant, animal and other species, including humans, with unprecedented precision. Furthermore, editing the Cas9 endonuclease gene with a gene encoding the desired guide RNA into an organism, adjacent to an altered gene, could create a “gene drive” that could spread a trait through an entire population of organisms. These experiments represent advances along a spectrum of technological abilities that genetic engineers have been working on since the advent of recombinant DNA techniques. The scientific and bioethics communities have built substantial literatures about the ethical and policy implications of genetic engineering, especially in the age of bioterrorism. However, recent CRISPr/Cas experiments have triggered a rehashing of previous policy discussions, suggesting that the scientific community requires guidance on how to think about social responsibility. We propose a framework to enable analysis of social responsibility, using two examples of genetic engineering experiments.     

The short-form Buss-Perry Aggression Questionnaire (BPAQ-SF): a validation study with federal offenders

The 12-item short form of the Buss-Perry Aggression Questionnaire (BPAQ-SF) was originally developed by Bryant and Smith (2001) and modified and confirmed using confirmatory factor analysis with mentally ill offenders by Diamond, Wang, and Buffington-Vollum (2005). In the current study, construct validity of the BPAQ-SF was assessed with a sample of 1,181 male and 435 female general population federal offenders. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the four-factor structure. Tests confirmed factorial invariance across gender for all loadings and covariances. Reliabilities were found to be adequate and comparable to those found in the studies cited above. Concurrent validity was supported by high correlations between the subscales of the BPAQ-SF and several relevant subscales on the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI). In addition, those offenders with prior history of violence, head injuries, childhood abuse, residential treatment, custody, or foster care as a child had higher scores on the BPAQ subscales.     

Interactive effects of APOE and CHRNA4 on attention and white matter volume in healthy middle-aged and older adults

In the present study, we investigated age-related changes in interactions between efficiency of neuronal repair mechanisms and efficiency of cholinergic neurotransmission in the context of attentional orienting. In addition, we explored white matter volume changes as possible neuronal underpinnings. A sample of 230 healthy middle-aged (53–64 years) and older (65–75 years) adults was genotyped for polymorphisms of APOE and CHRNA4, a nicotinic receptor subunit gene. Participants were administered a visuospatial attention task involving letter discrimination with location cues of varying validity. Genotype effects on white matter volume were also investigated in a subset of participants who received MRI scans. APOE interacted with CHRNA4, such that APOE-ε4 carriers who were also CHRNA4 TT homozygotes showed disproportionately slowed reaction time (RT) following invalid location cues. The interaction was stronger in the middle-aged participants than in the older participants. There was also a trend for individuals with combined APOE-ε4/CHRNA4 TT genotypes to show both lower white matter volume and slower overall RT on the attention task. The interaction of a neurotransmission gene (CHRNA4) and a susceptibility gene (APOE) suggests that the efficiency of neuronal repair mechanisms may modulate the cholinergic system to influence attentional function.     

Regarding time-sharing with convergent operations

This study contrasts the structural bottleneck and the resource view of attentional limits in time-sharing performance. The research incorporated features of the psychological refractory period (PRP) and the relative priority paradigm designed to maximize joint performance. A main distinction between the two attention views was their prediction on the extent that graded performance tradeoff was possible with graded priority changes. Detailed analysis of the performance and time-sharing strategies called into question the conclusions based exclusively on the PRP paradigm.     

The association between maternal smoking and secondhand exposure and autonomic functioning at 2-4 weeks of age

This study examined the association between maternal smoking and exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) during pregnancy and infant heart rate. Participants were 62 mother-infant dyads where mother smoked during pregnancy, 47 dyads where mother did not smoke during pregnancy but was exposed to ETS and 47 dyads where mother did not smoke and was not exposed to ETS. Average heart rate (HR) and respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) were assessed at 2-4 weeks of age during sleep. Infants in both exposure groups had higher HR and lower RSA than nonexposed infants. Furthermore, boys in both exposure groups had higher HR and lower RSA than girls. These results highlight the importance of considering prenatal ETS exposure and infant gender when assessing infant outcomes.     

The classification of violence risk

The Classification of Violence Risk (COVR) is an interactive software program designed to estimate the risk that a person hospitalized for mental disorder will be violent to others. The software leads the evaluator through a chart review and a brief interview with the patient. At the end of this interview, the software generates a report that contains a statistically valid estimate of the patient's violence risk-ranging from a 1% to a 76% likelihood of violence-including the confidence interval for that estimate, and a list of the risk factors that the program took into account to produce the estimate. In this article, the development of the COVR software is described and several issues that arise in its administration are discussed.     

Native Americans and alcohol: past, present, and future

Native Americans have higher rates of alcohol use, frequency of use, and increased rates of fetal alcohol syndrome, compared with other ethnic groups (J. Hisnanick, 1992; P. A. May, 1996; J. M. Wallace et al., 2003). High prevalence rates of alcohol misuse among Native Americans must be understood in light of their unique history, which has resulted in trauma and exposure to many risk factors for problem alcohol use. Many risk factors have been identified in the general population; however, only some of these risk factors have been examined among Native American populations. The unique history and world view of Native Americans mean that, often, risk factors operate differently from the way they do in other populations. The authors discuss interventions and promising treatments.     

Antecedents and Consequences of Perceived Barriers to Obtaining Mentoring: A Longitudinal Investigation

Mentoring is prototypically intended to advance the personal and professional growth of new employees at work. Although meta‐analyses have found that receiving mentoring can result in beneficial outcomes for employees' career success, employees may perceive barriers to obtaining a mentor. The present research examined antecedents and consequences to perceived barriers to mentoring in business and administrative jobs in a field study over 2 years. Socioeconomic origin, positive affectivity, organizational development culture, and previous mentoring experience predicted perceived barriers to mentoring after 2 years. New employees' perceived barriers to mentoring at Time 1 predicted changes in mentoring received and income after 2 years. Implications of this study, including a proposed mentoring training program, and directions for future research are discussed.     

Mourning Religion: A Response

Mourning Religion is a brilliant collection of essays responding both to Freud’s essay “Mourning and Melancholia” and Peter Homans’ assertion that the academic study of religion represents a creative expression of mourning the loss of religion in secular (western) society. This essay poses questions concerning the role of theology as a mode of analysis; Ricoeur’s concept of “second naiveté” in relation to disillusionment and religion; Celia Brickman’s reflections on globalization, marginalization, and a shift in psychological language from “primitivity” to “vulnerability”; the role of the body in the work of religious studies; melancholia as “re-membering” amid multiplicity and fragmentation; and mourning as protest and resistance. The essay concludes with a reflection on ambiguity and transcendence in dialogue with Freud’s essay “On Transience.”