Using a microcomputer for on-line psychiatric assessment

The on-line computer-assisted psychiatric system has been shown to be effective in bringing about an improvement in mental health service delivery. However, it was initially developed on a computer system that was too costly for most potential users. The present paper describes the approach used to implement the on-line assessment system on an inexpensive microcomputer, the PDP-11 V03.     

Losing claims of rights

Conclusion I have contended that acting on some principle and complaining when others act in accordance with the same principle in similar circumstances is morally improper. By wrongdoing one forfeits the right to claim the right (s)he disregards in interacting with others. This is not equivalent to a view that one's acting in a certain way justifies others acting in that way, i.e. that by wrongdoing one forfeits rights (s)he disregards in interacting with others. It may still be morally improper to treat malfeasors in the same way they treat us but, I have argued, they cannot themselves claim a right not to be treated in that way.This analysis of the right to claim rights can help explain the change in moral status of wrongdoers in two important ways. First, if there are some non-forfeitable human rights, the loss of moral standing of one who disregards those rights in others can be explained. Second, and perhaps potentially more important, if having a right implies the right holder's being justified in claiming it, we have a basis for saying all human rights are forfeitable.This second position would require a tightening of the link between the right to X and the ancillary right to claim the right to X. I have not undertaken that burden here. Instead, I argued that the loss of the right to claim is, itself, a significant loss.     

The physician’s role in the protection of human research subjects

Responsibility for the protection of human research subjects is shared by investigators, research ethics committees, sponsors/funders, research institutions, governments and, the focus of this article, physicians who enrol patients in clinical trials. The article describes the general principles of the patient-physician relationship that should regulate the participation of physicians in clinical trials and proposes guidelines for determining when and how such participation should proceed. The guidelines deal with the following stages of the trial: when first considering participation, when deciding whether to enrol patients, when asking patients to participate, when the trial is underway and when it is completed.     

Accounting for cognitive aging: context processing, inhibition or processing speed?

Age-related deficits in context processing were examined in relationship to two predominant theories of cognitive aging (the Inhibitory Deficit and Processing Speed Models). Older and younger adults completed a measure of context processing (AX Continuous Performance Test (CPT) task) as well as a computerized battery of inhibitory tasks: Stroop, garden path sentences, go no-go, and the stop-signal paradigm. Participants also completed a simple processing speed task. After controlling for baseline differences in processing speed, age effects were detected on the AX-CPT. Smaller, but significant age effects were noted on the Stroop and stop-signal tasks, but no significant age effects were found on the garden path sentence and go no-go tasks. Intertask correlations were weak, providing little evidence for a homogenous or uniform construct of inhibition. The sensitivity of the AX-CPT to cognitive aging is discussed in the context of existing theories of cognitive aging. The authors suggest that deficits in context processing and utilization may underlie cognitive aging phenomena.     

Attitude toward Christianity and paranormal belief among 13- to 16-yr.-old students

A small but statistically significant positive correlation (r = .17) was found in a sample of 279 13- to 16-yr.-old students in Wales between scores on the Francis Scale of Attitude toward Christianity and on a new Index of Paranormal Belief. These data suggest that there is little common variance between attitude toward Christianity and belief in the paranormal.     

Are generalised scalar implicatures generated by default? An on-line investigation into the role of context in generating pragmatic inferences

Recent research in semantics and pragmatics has revived the debate about whether there are two cognitively distinct categories of conversational implicatures: generalised and particularised. Generalised conversational implicatures are so-called because they seem to arise more or less independently of contextual support. Particularised implicatures are more context-bound. The Default view is that generalised implicatures are default inferences and that their computation is relatively autonomous--being computed by some default mechanism and only being open to cancellation at a second stage when contextual assumptions are taken into consideration (i.a.). It is at that second stage where contextual assumptions are considered that particularised implications are computed. By contrast, Context-Driven theorists claim that both generalised and particularised implicatures are generated by the same process and only where there is contextual support (Chierchia, 2004; Horn, 1984; Levinson, 2000 i.a.). In this paper, we present three on-line studies of the prototypical cases of generalised implicatures: the scalar implicatures 'some of the Fs' > 'not all the Fs' and 'X or Y' > 'either X or Y but not both'. These studies were designed to test the context-dependence and autonomy of the implicatures. Our results suggest that these scalar implicatures are dependent on the conversational context and that they show none of the autonomy predicted by the Default view. We conclude with a discussion of the degree to which such implicatures are purely context-driven and whether an interactionist default position may also be plausible.     

Autobiographical memory in the euthymic phase of recurrent depression

The authors investigated autobiographical memory specificity in subjects who formerly had depression. In 122 euthymic patients with at least two previous major depressive episodes, memory specificity was significantly impaired compared to matched control participants but not related to residual symptoms and illness characteristics, was not differentially affected by cognitive therapy, and was also not predictive of relapse/recurrence during the 2-year follow-up. However, memory specificity was associated with age, education, and immediate and delayed memory recall. The results suggest that memory specificity may reflect a global cognitive impairment that remains in patients who (formerly) had depression but does not constitute a trait marker for vulnerability for relapse/recurrence.     

Sex education attitudes and outcomes among North American women

Attitudes and outcomes of sex education received by North American women are examined via an Internet survey (N = 1,400). Mean age was 19.5, with 24% reporting one or more unplanned pregnancies. Women were more satisfied with sex education from informal sources than from parents, schools, and physicians. Those receiving sex education from parents or schools reported fewer pregnancies and abortions. In school, women receiving a combination of contraceptive and abstinence education and those receiving primarily abstinence education were least likely to experience unplanned pregnancy. Religious identification was significantly related to unplanned pregnancy and type of sex education received from parents. These factors seem to play a significant role in reducing unplanned pregnancy and abortion.     

Reduced autobiographical memory specificity and rumination in predicting the course of depression

Reduced autobiographical memory (AM) specificity is a known vulnerability factor for depression. AM specificity was investigated as a predictor of depression with the Autobiographical Memory Test (J. M. G. Williams & K. Broadbent, 1986). When baseline depression scores were partialed, reduced AM specificity to negative cue words predicted higher levels of depression at 7-month follow-up. Once rumination was taken into account by means of the Rumination on Sadness Scale (M. Conway, P. A. R. Csank, S. L. Holm, & C. K. Blake, 2000), AM specificity no longer predicted depression, suggesting that the predictive value of AM specificity observed in previous studies might be--at least partly--explained as an effect of rumination. Further mediation analyses indeed revealed support for rumination as a mediator of the relation between reduced AM specificity and poor outcome of depression.