Histamine reverses a memory deficit induced in rats by early postnatal maternal deprivation

Early partial maternal deprivation causes long-lasting neurochemical, behavioral and brain structural effects. In rats, it causes a deficit in memory consolidation visible in adult life. Some of these deficits can be reversed by donepezil and galantamine, which suggests that they may result from an impairment of brain cholinergic transmission. One such deficit, representative of all others, is an impairment of memory consolidation, clearly observable in a one-trial inhibitory avoidance task. Recent data suggest a role of brain histaminergic systems in the regulation of behavior, particularly inhibitory avoidance learning. Here we investigate whether histamine itself, its analog SKF-91844, or various receptor-selective histamine agonists and antagonists given into the CA1 region of the hippocampus immediately post-training can affect retention of one-trial inhibitory avoidance in rats submitted to early postnatal maternal deprivation. We found that histamine, SKF-91844 and the H2 receptor agonist, dimaprit enhance consolidation on their own and reverse the consolidation deficit induced by maternal deprivation. The enhancing effect of histamine was blocked by the H2 receptor antagonist, ranitidine, but not by the H1 receptor antagonist pyrilamine or by the H3 antagonist thioperamide given into CA1 at doses known to have other behavioral actions, without altering locomotor and exploratory activity or the anxiety state of the animals. The present results suggest that the memory deficit induced by early postnatal maternal deprivation in rats may in part be due to an impairment of histamine mediated mechanisms in the CA1 region of the rat hippocampus.     

Mood and fluency: The case of pronunciation ease,liking and trust

We explored the impact of mood on the judgemental consequences of word pronounceability in six Experiments (1 preregistered, total N = 1183). Positive and negative mood was induced via video clips (all but Experiment 4) and subliminal affective primes (Experiment 4). Additionally, participants were presented with easy- and difficult-to-pronounce letter strings. These were framed as target words to be judged for liking (Experiments 1–2), as names of eBay sellers to be judged for trustworthiness (Experiments 3–5), or as either seller names or passwords to provoke opposing interpretations of pronunciation fluency (Experiment 6). While pronounceability showed a robust effect across experiments, mood did not modulate the judgemental use of (Experiments 1–4), the correction for (Experiment 5) and the interpretation (Experiment 6) of word pronounceability. In conclusion, the judgemental effects of pronounceability persist despite the presence of more objective and task-pertinent cues, resist judgemental correction and remain unaffected by affective states.     

Spiritist Hospital Chaplaincy in Brazil: 5 Years of Documented Experience

Spiritist Hospital Chaplaincy in Brazil has been growing significantly in recent years, with the implementation of new services through the work of Spiritist Medical Associations (SMAs) in different regions of the country. This article describes the importance of historical interconnections from the advent of spiritism in the world and its introduction in Brazil to the emergence of Spiritist Hospital Chaplaincy in our country and presents the documented experience over 5 years of spiritist chaplain care, in the period from 2012 to 2016, guided by the SMA of Piracicaba at the Unimed Hospital of Piracicaba (São Paulo). We documented 41,914 visits to 13,983 inpatients and an analysis of these records allowed us to reflect on the importance of this service and confirm its expansion and acceptance by different contemporary religious beliefs.     

Explaining enkratic asymmetries: knowledge-first style

There are two different kinds of enkratic principles for belief: evidential enkratic principles and normative enkratic principles. It’s frequently taken for granted that there’s not an important difference between them. But evidential enkratic principles are undermined by considerations that gain no traction at all against their normative counterparts. The idea that such an asymmetry exists between evidential and normative enkratic principles is surprising all on its own. It is also something that calls out for explanation. Similarly, the considerations that undermine evidential enkratic principles also undermine certain narrow-scope evidential principles. This too generates explanatory questions. I show how a knowledge-first view of rationality can easily address these (and further) explanatory questions. Thus we have one more reason to put knowledge first in epistemology.     

The Emotion Regulation Strategies of Adolescents and their Parents: An Experience Sampling Study

Parents are the main socialization agents in the development of emotion regulation (ER). In this study, we evaluated adolescents’ and their respective parents’ perspectives about their use of two ER strategies (cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression) in daily life. In addition, we evaluated the within-family associations between adolescents’ and their parents’ use of strategies. We controlled for adolescents’ gender and age and the perceived quality of their relationships with their parents (mothers and fathers). The sample consisted of 33 12- to 18-year-old adolescent–father–mother triads, totaling 99 participants. Parents and adolescents reported their use of ER strategies in response to eight random prompts throughout the day, by means of the experience sampling method for 1 week. Participants provided 4082 reports on their momentary experiences. The data were analyzed using multilevel modeling to account for the hierarchical structure of the repeated daily assessments. The significant association between parents’ and adolescents’ use of ER strategies was specific to mother–adolescent dyads. The significant association between adolescents’ and their mothers’ ER strategies varied as a function of the adolescents’ age and the quality of their relationship with their mothers according to adolescents’ reports, but not as a function of adolescent gender. These findings suggest that mothers have a role in their adolescents’ emotion regulation in a developmental period characterized by autonomy from parental guidance.     

Should Authors be Requested to Suggest Peer Reviewers?

As part of a continuous process to explore the factors that might weaken or corrupt traditional peer review, in this paper, we query the ethics, fairness and validity of the request, by editors, of authors to suggest peer reviewers during the submission process. One of the reasons for the current crisis in science pertains to a loss in trust as a result of a flawed peer review which is by nature biased unless it is open peer review. As we indicate, the fact that some editors and journals rely on authors’ suggestions in terms of who should peer review their paper already instills a potential way to abuse the trust of the submission and publishing system. An author-suggested peer reviewer choice might also tempt authors to seek reviewers who might be more receptive or sympathetic to the authors’ message or results, and thus favor the outcome of that paper. Authors should thus not be placed in such a potentially ethically compromising situation, especially as a mandatory condition for submission. However, the fact that they do not have an opt-out choice during the submission process—especially when using an online submission system that makes such a suggestion compulsory—may constitute a violation of authors’ rights.