A Systematic Review of Studies Reporting Data-Driven Cognitive Subtypes across the Psychosis Spectrum

Neuropsychology Review - The delineation of cognitive subtypes of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder may offer a means of determining shared genetic markers and neuropathology among individuals...     

Delay-dependent involvement of the rat entorhinal cortex in habituation to a novel environment

Evidence has accumulated that the entorhinal cortex (EC) is involved in memory operations underlying formation of a long-term memory. Because entorhinal-lesioned rats are impaired for long delays in delayed matching and non-matching to sample tasks, it has been proposed that EC contributes to the maintenance of information in short-term memory. In the present study, we asked whether such a time-limited role applies also when learning complex spatial information in a novel environment. We therefore examined the effects of EC lesions on habituation in an object exploration task in which a delay of either 4 min or 10 min is imposed between successive sessions. EC-lesioned rats exhibited a deficit in habituation at 10 min but not 4 min delays. Following habituation, reactions to spatial change (object configuration) and non-spatial change (novel object) were also examined. EC-lesioned rats were impaired in detecting the spatial change but were able to detect a non-spatial change, irrespective of the delay. Overall, the results suggest that EC is involved in maintaining a large amount of novel, multidimensional information in short-term memory therefore enabling formation of long-term memory. Switching to a novelty detection mode would then allow the animal to rapidly adapt to environmental changes. In this mode, EC would preferentially process spatial information rather than non-spatial information.     

Disclosing Fathers’ HIV Infection to their Sons in Togo

This study examined the views of parents living with HIV/AIDS (PLWHA) and healthcare providers in Togo, on the appropriateness of HIV-infected fathers disclosing their serostatus to their sons. In early 2016, 177 PLWHA (95 mothers and 82 fathers) and 123 healthcare providers (20 physicians, 24 nurses, 41 nurse’s aides, 13 health counsellors, and 25 psychologists) judged the appropriateness of disclosure in 48 scenarios. These scenarios were composed by systematically varying the levels of four factors derived from previous studies on disclosure of bad news: the visibility of symptoms, the son’s level of psychological robustness, the son’s age, and whether the mother was involved in the decision. Seven qualitatively different positions were found: Depends on Son’s Maturity (20%), Depends on Mother’s Involvement in the Decision and Son’s Maturity (19%), Always Quite Appropriate (16%), Depends on Visibility of Symptoms and Son’s Maturity (15%), Depends on Mother’s Involvement in the Decision (14%), Depends on Son’s Age (9%), and Don’t Tell to Adult Son (7%). Healthcare providers (59% of nurses and 25% of physicians) were more likely than PLWHA (10%) to endorse the view that disclosure is Always Quite Appropriate. These findings suggest that interventions to encourage and support parental HIV disclosure in Togo, and possibly in other sub-Saharan African countries, must not be “one size fits all”, but must be tailored in design and implementation to address parents’ differing views, fears, and needs.     

The gender-marking effect in spoken word recognition

In this paper we examine whether the recognition of a spoken noun is affected by the gender marking—masculine or feminine—that is carried by a preceding word. In the first of two experiments, the gating paradigm was used to study the access of French nouns that were preceded by an appropriate gender marking, carried by an article, or preceded by no gender marking. In the second experiment, subjects were asked to make a lexical decision on the same material. A very strong facilitatory effect was found in both cases. The origin of the gender-marking effect is discussed, as well as the level of processing involved—lexical or syntactic.     

La perspective future des personnes âgées en fonction de la perte d'autonomie et du type d'habitation

Cet article porte sur la perspective future (PF) et rapporte les résultats d'une enquête auprès de 351 personnes âgées en perte d'autonomie fonctionnelle vivant chez elles ou en résidence pour personnes âgées. Les aspirations, buts ou projets, éléments constitutifs de la PF, sont recueillis au moyen de la technique des phrases à compléter. Les réponses sont classées selon leur contenu et leur extension temporelle. L'exploration du contenu révèle que la santé constitue la préoccupation principale des personnes âgées et que les aspirations à l'actualisation de soi de même que les motivations à caractère altruiste diminuent avec la perte d'autonomie. L'extension de la PF n'est pas affectée par les deux types d'habitation considérés dans cette recherche, mais elle subit une réduction avec la baisse de l'autonomie fonctionnelle.     

Multisensory integration in multiple reference frames in the posterior parietal cortex

Spatial information processing takes place in different brain regions that receive converging inputs from several sensory modalities. Because of our own movements—for example, changes in eye position, head rotations, and so forth—unimodal sensory representations move continuously relative to one another. It is generally assumed that for multisensory integration to be an orderly process, it should take place between stimuli at congruent spatial locations. In the monkey posterior parietal cortex, the ventral intraparietal (VIP) area is specialized for the analysis of movement information using visual, somatosensory, vestibular, and auditory signals. Focusing on the visual and tactile modalities, we found that in area VIP, like in the superior colliculus, multisensory signals interact at the single neuron level, suggesting that this area participates in multisensory integration. Curiously, VIP does not use a single, invariant coordinate system to encode locations within and across sensory modalities. Visual stimuli can be encoded with respect to the eye, the head, or halfway between the two reference frames, whereas tactile stimuli seem to be prevalently encoded relative to the body. Hence, while some multisensory neurons in VIP could encode spatially congruent tactile and visual stimuli independently of current posture, in other neurons this would not be the case. Future work will need to evaluate the implications of these observations for theories of optimal multisensory integration.Edited by: Marie-Hélène Giard and Mark Wallace     

Personality,self‐esteem,and self‐construal as correlates of forgivingness

The relationship between forgivingness (enduring resentment, sensitivity to circumstances, and overall propensity to forgive) and a number of personality dimensions relevant to forgivingness was examined. These dimensions were self‐esteem, shyness and embarrassment, on one hand, and self‐construal and perceived loneliness, on the other hand. The main relationships between forgivingness and personality concerned the interpersonal dimensions of personality: shyness, embarrassment, independence from others, and interdependence with others. However, the intra‐personal, strictly self‐referential concomitants of these dimensions (self‐esteem and loneliness) were not much linked to forgivingness. Furthermore, each personality factor had a distinct link with forgivingness: independence made the resentment still more enduring, shyness and social embarrassment exacerbated the sensitivity to circumstances, and interdependence increased the willingness to forgive. These findings throw light on the double aspect of forgiveness as intra‐ and inter‐individual and on the relative independence of these aspects. The observed pattern of relationships varied notably (and significantly) as a function of the participants' genders. It could be therefore important, in future studies, to compute systematically correlation coefficients or assess main effects separately for women and men. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.