Response inhibition in adults and teenagers: spatiotemporal differences in the prefrontal cortex

Inhibition is a core executive function reliant on the frontal lobes that shows protracted maturation through to adulthood. We investigated the spatiotemporal characteristics of response inhibition during a visual go/no-go task in 14 teenagers and 14 adults using magnetoencephalography (MEG) and a contrast between two no-go experimental conditions designed to eliminate a common confound in earlier studies comparing go with no-go trials. Source analyses were performed using an event-related beamformer algorithm with co-registered individual structural MRIs. Performance was controlled to be similar across subjects. Analyses of MEG data revealed bilateral prefrontal activity in the inhibitory condition for both age groups, but with different spatiotemporal patterns: around 300ms after stimulus onset in middle frontal gyri in teenagers vs. around 260ms in inferior frontal gyri in adults. Moreover, the inhibition of a prepotent motor response showed a stronger recruitment of the left hemisphere in teenagers than in adults and of the right hemisphere in adults than in teenagers. These findings provide high-resolution temporal and spatial information regarding response inhibition in adolescents compared to adults, independent of motor components and performance differences.     

历史唯物主义与精神生活的现代性处境

<正>精神生活是一种人类生活的基本维度,是人类生命获得意义和价值的重要的生活样式,也是人的存在本质、价值追求、文化教养乃至一个民族或社会文明发展程度的重要表征。伴随着席卷全球的现代化浪潮和时代精神的转变,精神生活问题已经成为我们这一时代的焦点问题之一。反思人类精神生     

Behaviorally inhibited temperament is associated with severity of post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms and faster eyeblink conditioning in veterans

Prior studies have sometimes demonstrated facilitated acquisition of classically conditioned responses and/or resistance to extinction in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). However, it is unclear whether these behaviors are acquired as a result of PTSD or exposure to trauma, or reflect preexisting risk factors that confer vulnerability for PTSD. Here, we examined classical eyeblink conditioning and extinction in veterans self-assessed for current PTSD symptoms, exposure to combat, and the personality trait of behavioral inhibition (BI), a risk factor for PTSD. A total of 128 veterans were recruited (mean age 51.2 years; 13.3% female); 126 completed self-assessment, with 25.4% reporting a history of exposure to combat and 30.9% reporting current, severe PTSD symptoms (PTSS). The severity of PTSS was correlated with current BI (R(2) = 0.497) and PTSS status could be predicted based on current BI and combat history (80.2% correct classification). A subset of the veterans (n = 87) also completed the eyeblink conditioning study. Among veterans without PTSS, childhood BI was associated with faster acquisition; veterans with PTSS showed delayed extinction, under some conditions. These data demonstrate a relationship between current BI and PTSS, and indicate that the facilitated conditioning sometimes observed in patients with PTSD may partially reflect personality traits such as childhood BI that pre-date and contribute to vulnerability for PTSD.     

“It’s Not Like Judgment Day”: Public Understanding of and Reactions to Personalized Genomic Risk Information

The value of genomic risk assessment depends upon patients making appropriate behavioral changes in response to increased risk leading to disease prevention and early detection. To date, few studies have investigated consumers’ response to personalized genomic disease risk information. To address this gap, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 60 adults participating in the Coriell Personalized Medicine Collaborative. The interviews took place after receiving results providing genomic and other risk information for up to eight common complex diseases. We found that participants were most likely to recall results which conferred an increased risk or those of particular personal interest. Participants understood the multi-factorial nature of common complex disease, and generally did not have negative emotional responses or overly deterministic perceptions of their results. Although most participants expressed a desire to use results to improve their health, a minority had actually taken action (behavior change or shared results with their doctor) at the time of the interview. These results suggest that participants have a reasonable understanding of genomic risk information and that provision of genomic risk information may motivate behavior change in some individuals; however additional work is needed to better understand the lack of change seen in the majority of participants.     

Differential effects of progesterone and medroxyprogesterone on delay eyeblink conditioning in ovariectomized rats

Ovarian hormones modulate acquisition processes involved in classical conditioning. Although progesterone has been indirectly implicated, its role in classical conditioning of the eyeblink response has not been directly investigated. We assessed the effects of daily dosing of progesterone or medroxyprogesterone (MPA), a non-metabolized synthetic progestin, upon the acquisition of a classically conditioned eyeblink response in ovariectomized (OVX) female rats. Rats were dosed 4h prior to each training session with 0.1 or 1.5 mg/kg of either of these hormones or sesame oil. A delay conditioning paradigm was employed using a 500 ms conditioned stimulus coterminating with a 10 ms 10 V unconditioned stimulus. At the low dose, progesterone and MPA rats did differ from each other, with MPA-treated rats learning slower, but neither group differed from OVX-oil or Sham-oil controls. No group differences in acquisition were observed at the higher dose. During extinction trials, high-dose MPA-treatment and OVX-oil groups extinguished quicker than the high-dose progesterone-treated group. In addition, unconditional response (UR) amplitudes were lower in all OVX groups, regardless of hormone or oil treatment, compared to the sham-oil group. Since MPA did not affect extinction, it is likely the slower extinction in the progesterone-treated rats is due to a metabolite of progesterone. Corticosterone is discussed as a likely candidate for such a role. In addition, we found chronic absence of ovarian hormones decreased UR amplitudes, although differences in UR amplitudes were not associated with changes in the acquisition process. These results are discussed with respect to differences in the hormonal effects upon acquisition versus extinction processes and how these data may explain reports of learning differences in women based on oral contraceptive usage.     

不同联想等级语词的启动效应及其发展研究

以汉字常用词为材料,使用经过大量统计工作建立的语词联想等级量表,来探讨语词的联想等级、学习时的加工水平、以及年龄变量对语词记忆启动效应的影响。结果发现：ａ、不同联想等级间语词启动效应有显著差异,ｂ、加工水平对启动效应的影响只在大学年龄被试中才显示出来,ｃ、年龄对启动效应的影响,主要是通过其与语词联想等级相互作用产生的。     

幼儿与成人依恋关系的特质和同伴交往能力的联系

参加研究的被试是来自北京某公立幼儿园的７８名幼儿和他们的母亲（７８位）以及幼儿园老师（１２位）。幼儿平均年龄为四岁十个月。用来测量亲子和师生依恋关系的工具是中文版的沃特斯－迪因儿童依恋行为分类卡片。儿童同伴交往能力用同伴间社会交往测量和教师的评分来评定。研究结果表明,亲子依恋和师生依恋关系的安全性与学前儿童的同伴交往能力有显著相关,依恋安全性得分高的幼儿具有较低的攻击性、乐于帮助别人、在群体中更受同伴喜爱。     

Expectancy and stimulus frequency: A comparative analysis in rats and humans

We examined whether expectancy, one of several factors influencing attention, is similarly affected in rats and humans by manipulation of relative stimulus frequency, A two-choice reaction time (RT) task was developed for rats, and an analogous task was used for humans. Errors, RTs, discriminability, and response bias were measured. Both rats and humans shifted their response bias to the more frequent stimulus, with no change in overall discriminability. As stimulus probability or stimulus repetition increased, RTs and errors decreased. These results illustrate the similarity of expectancy in rats and humans. This two-choice RT task for rats can be used in future studies to examine the neuronal mechanisms of expectancy and attention.     

幼儿不同交往类型的心理特征的比较研究

本研究综合运用社会测量法、访谈法和问卷评价法,探讨、比较了受欢迎型、被拒绝型、被忽视型和一般型四种基本同伴交往类型幼儿在心理特征上的异同。结果发现,各类型幼儿在行为、性格、情绪情感、交往积极主动性和交往技能、策略等特征上均存在非常显著的差异,各类型幼儿上述诸方面的表现均不相同。     

中学班级环境与学生学业成绩的关系

本文以<我的班级>为测量工具,对珠三角地区某三个初级中学365名学生为被试,探讨初中班级环境的特点及其与学生学业成绩的关系.结果表明:师生关系与语文、数学、英浯这三科的成绩呈显著的正相关;师生关系、同学关系对学生学业成绩有显著的正向预测作用;学习负担与学生学习成绩呈显著的负相关.