TESTICULAR SELF-EXAMINATION: VALIDATION OF A TRAINING STRATEGY FOR EARLY CANCER DETECTION

Testicular self-examination (TSE) can lead to early diagnosis and treatment of testicular cancer, the third leading cause of death in young men. We evaluated the effectiveness of a brief and specific checklist for teaching TSE skills. Ten men were videotaped while performing testicular self-examinations before and after training. The TSE training resulted in large and significant increases in the number of TSE steps completed and duration of the TSE. Two urological validation measures supported the improvements observed in the mens' self-examinations. Subjects reported continued performance of TSE during a follow-up telephone interview. This pilot study indicates that a brief and specific checklist is an effective strategy for teaching early cancer detection skills.     

Physiological and psychological effects of acute intentional hyperventilation

Research is reviewed which suggests that hyperventilation syndrome is an underdiagnosed disorder for the presentation of many patients experiencing apparent anxiety states. In a test of this hypothesis, 21 normal individuals (9 female) underwent a 2 min period of intentional hyperventilation following a 10 min baseline phase. Hyperventilation was accompanied by increased subjective anxiety and tachycardia, and indications of peripheral vasoconstriction. Following hyperventilation, Ss experienced increased levels of state anxiety and perceived autonomic arousal, as indexed by self-report instruments. These results support the hypothesis that undiagnosed hyperventilatory phenomena may be etiologically implicated in states of pathologic anxiety.     

Parents' perceptions of the quality of infant sleep behaviours and practices: A qualitative systematic review

A systematic review of qualitative studies was conducted to explore how parents perceive sleep quality in their infants aged 0–24 months and the factors that influence these perceptions. A systematic search of the databases Scopus, Embase, Cinahl, PsycInfo and MEDLINE, was undertaken to identify eligible peer-reviewed studies published between 2006–2021. Ten papers met inclusion criteria and were subsequently included in the review. Evaluation of papers with the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme qualitative checklist classified papers as weak, moderate or strong, with half considered strong. Thematic synthesis identified one superordinate theme, culture, and five interrelated subordinate themes regarding how parents perceive their infant's sleep and the factors that may influence these perceptions. These themes were: (1) Infants physical and emotional comfort; (2) Beliefs regarding safety; (3) Parental and familial wellbeing; (4) Perceived degree of infant agency; (5) Influence of external beliefs and opinions. The findings from this review may assist practitioners in providing parents with personalized and culturally sensitive information regarding infant sleep and may also inform antenatal and early intervention practices, subsequently minimizing parental distress regarding infant sleep patterns.     

An electronic aid for presenting equivalent information in concept identification

An electronic aid to assist in administering concept-identification problems with floating solutions is described. Digital circuitry generates all combination pairs from four selection switches, presents a particular comparison of these pairs, and, on command of the E, eliminates selected pairs from future comparisons. Each comparison is designed to minimize the information fed back to the S. The apparatus is used to administer and evaluate performance on conjunctive and disjunctive problems that are matched for information gain.     

The speed of visual processing in children and adults: Effects of backward and forward masking

Children, 4-5 and 9-10 years old, and college-age adults were tested on two visual masking tasks. The first task required the Ss to identify whether a tachistoscopically presented bar was horizontal or vertical The second task, also using tachistoscopic presentation of stimuli, required Ss to locate a horizontal (or vertical) bar in a matrix of vertical (or horizontal) bars. In both tasks, backward masking produced greater disruption than did forward masking, and the amount of disruption induced by both backward and forward masking decreased as age increased. An Age by Masking Condition interaction was found only in the location task and reflected a much greater difference between backward- and forward-masking conditions for the youngest group than for the older groups. On the basis of these findings and other considerations, it was concluded that only in the location task, which presumably required visual search, was the speed of visual processing slower in the younger group.     

The development of socialization skills in an electively mute child

In a booth designed especially for work with both autistic and electively mute children, a 4-yr-old girl named Dolly, who had no communicative speech or imitative skills, was given a preliminary session in which her verbal output was assessed. To elicit sounds from Dolly, an instrument called a “color organ” was used as a positive reinforcer. After this baseline assessment, in 40 half-hour sessions, Dolly was taught to make eye contact with E, and to obey instructions—although it was first necessary to extinguish her disruptive behavior, particularly her opérant crying. In addition, she learned non-verbal imitative behavior, such as hand clapping; and verbal imitative behavior, such as saying “Hi!” Social (play) sessions were begun after session 21, and continued for the remaining time. These were helpful in generalizing Dolly's learned skills to an environment other than the booth; and to other tasks, such as singing “Ee-eye-ee-eye-oh” in the refrain of the song, “Old McDonald”; and pointing to E's eyes, saying “ice”.     

Taming the Heathkit-Votrax speech synthesizer

Three inexpensive text-to-speech synthesizers are described, intelligibility data from a pilot experiment are reported, and software is offered that has been written to facilitate the phonemic programming of the Heathkit-Votrax synthesizer.     

CHANGING PROTECTIVE AND RISKY BEHAVIORS TO PREVENT CHILD-TO-PARENT TRANSMISSION OF CYTOMEGALOVIRUS

Child-to-parent transmission of cytomegalovirus may be reduced by increasing protective behaviors (handwashing and glove use) and decreasing risky behaviors (intimate contact between child and parent). This study showed that an educational intervention resulted in increases in reported and objective measures of protective behaviors and decreases in reported risky behaviors. Further study must determine if changes in protective and risky behavior are maintained and prevent cytomegalovirus transmission.