Validity of post-proline splitting dipeptidyl aminopeptidase activities in the cerebrospinal fluid for neurologic and psychiatric diagnosis

The dipeptidyl-peptidase activity of 650 liquores cerebrospinalis was obtained by means of the substrate Gly-Pro-NHNp (Gly-Pro-4-nitroanilid) at pHs of 5.5 and 7.4. In comparison with a reference collective, the suitability of the method as a supplementary liquor parameter in neurological psychiatric diagnosis was examined. The introduction of the measurement at pH 7.4 can be particularly recommended for the distinguishing of bacterial and nonbacterial meningitis.     

Perceptions by the aged of crime, criminals, and the criminal justice system

A general fear of crime victimization led to modified activities in the community and feelings of relative safety in their own area for 132 elderly respondents on a 24-item questionnaire. They held sympathetic views of crime perpetrators as disadvantaged victims of society themselves, but came to the unlikely conclusions that more police control and harsher prison sentences are needed.     

A new quantitative approach to the assessment of stages of vigilance as defined by spatiotemporal EEG patterning

Electroencephalographically oriented research on vigilance needs valid measures for assessing the level of vigilance between wakefulness and sleep. When studying different psychologically, psychopathologically, and pharmacologically induced states, special attention has to be paid to minor alterations of the level of vigilance which are reflected, essentially, in topographical changes of alpha-activity (Stage A). Since vigilance is a dynamic process, brief fluctuations in the range of a few seconds must also be recorded. In our opinion existing methods of quantification do not fully meet these demands. We have, therefore, developed a relatively simple procedure which can be characterized as an attempt quantitatively to reconstruct visually, i.e., spatiotemporally defined patterns of vigilance. The usefulness of this method, which also has certain limitations, has been demonstrated in psychopharmacological studies.     

Effect of directed attention on cerebral asymmetries in stuttering adults

9 stutterers and 9 nonstutterers were administered a dichotic digits test under conditions of free recall and directed attention. Analysis indicated right-ear preference for both groups and no differences between the free recall and directed listening conditions. Results are discussed in relation to previous studies in which dichotic digit-stimuli were presented to stutterers.     

Sentential constants in R and R⌝

In this paper, we shall confine ourselves to the study of sentential constants in the system R of relevant implication.In dealing with the behaviour of the sentential constants in R, we shall think of R itself as presented in three stages, depending on the level of truth-functional involvement.     

A note on the computation of the second-order derivatives of the elementary symmetric functions in the rasch model

Jansen (1984) gave explicit formulas for the computation of the second-order derivatives of the elementary symmetric functions. But they are only applicable to those pairs of items which have unequal parameters. It is shown here that for equal parameters similar explicit formulas do exist, too, facilitating the application of the Newton-Raphson procedure to estimate the parameters in the Rasch model and related models according to the conditional maximum likelihood principle.The author wishes to thank the reviewers for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this paper.