Auditory evoked potentials and sex-related differences in brain development

Auditory evoked potentials (AEPs) were obtained to probe tones which were delivered during the presentation of complex verbal and nonverbal auditory stimulation to 3-month-old infants. Significant sex-dependent AEP amplitude asymmetries were found. Females produced higher-amplitude responses from the left hemisphere and males produced higher-amplitude responses from the right hemisphere during both the verbal and nonverbal presentations. No significant AEP asymmetries were obtained in an independent group of infants that received only the probe tones. These findings are consistent with theories and behavioral data suggesting differences between males and females in the development of language and spatial functions.     

Auditory-verbal short-term memory impairment and conduction aphasia

The specific impairment of performance on repetition tasks has classically been identified with conduction aphasia. It is argued that this impairment can be subdivided and a deficit in span performance distinguished from that of the reproduction of single words. An explanation of the span deficit in terms of auditory-verbal short-term memory is preferred to hypotheses involving disconnections or damage to order retention systems. It is shown that a short-term memory component is present in many patients previously classified as conduction aphasics.     

Ethical and methodological aspects of medical computer data bases and knowledge bases

Ethical problems are related to computer data bases, containing data on individuals and groups of persons, as well as to computer knowledge bases, containing general rules and elements of expert systems.In the present essay the following conclusions are made regarding computer data bases: privacy, security, and confidentiality of medical computer data bases should be ensured. This duty should rest with physicians in hospitals. The principle of informed consent should be applied to gathering information which is to be stored and processed by computers. Information stored in computer data bases should not be used for purposes for which the subjects (patients as well as personnel) have not given their consent. In order to decrease the possibility of misuses of medical data bases containing information on individuals, these registers should not be linked to other central data bases.     

An acoustical analysis of stutterer''s speech prior to and at the termination of speech therapy

The speech of nine adult stutterers was analyzed acoustically prior to and at the termination of a modified Van Riperian procedure to determine if therapy produced discernable changes in their post-therapy fluent speech. The findings indicate that stuttering frequency decreased significantly and reading rate decreased by a statistically insignificant amount during the course of therapy. Vowel duration and the occurrence of voicing during the stop consonant production increased significantly. These findings support the hypothesis that stuttering therapy can affect more than the fluency and rate characteristics of the stutterer's posttherapy speech.     

New Constitutionalism and the Social Reproduction of Caring Institutions

This essay analyzes neo-liberal economic agreements and legal and political frameworks or what has been called the “new constitutionalism,” a governance framework that empowers market forces to reshape economic and social development worldwide. The article highlights some consequences of new constitutionalism for caring institutions specifically, and for what feminists call social reproduction more generally: the biological reproduction of the species; the reproduction of labor power; and the reproduction of social institutions and processes associated with the creation and maintenance of communities. New constitutional governance frameworks fundamentally reshape conditions under which the care of human beings takes place. Caring institutions once governed by enabling professions geared to universal care are now determined increasingly by market values and private forces, and driven directly by the profit motive. This is one of the reasons why neo-liberalism is increasingly contested in both the North and the global South.     

Genetic Evaluation and Counseling of Couples with Recurrent Miscarriage: Recommendations of the National Society of Genetic Counselors

The objective of this document is to provide recommendations for genetic evaluation and counseling of couples with recurrent miscarriage (RM). The recommendations are the opinions of the multidisciplinary Inherited Pregnancy Loss Working Group (IPLWG), with expertise in genetic counseling, medical genetics, maternal fetal medicine, internal medicine, infectious disease, cytogenetics, and coagulation disorders. The IPLWG defines RM as three or more clinically recognized consecutive or non-consecutive pregnancy losses occurring prior to fetal viability (<24 weeks gestation). These recommendations are provided to assist genetic counselors and other health care providers in clinical decision-making, as well as to promote consistency of patient care, guide the allocation of medical resources, and increase awareness of the psychosocial and cultural issues experienced by couples with RM. The IPLWG was convened with support from the March of Dimes Western Washington State Chapter and the University of Washington Division of Medical Genetics. The recommendations are U.S. Preventive Task Force Class III, and are based on clinical experiences, review of pertinent English-language published articles, and reports of expert committees. This document reviews the suspected causes of RM, provides indications for genetic evaluation and testing, addresses psychosocial and cultural considerations, and provides professional and patient resources. These recommendations should not be construed as dictating an exclusive course of medical management, nor does the use of such recommendations guarantee a particular outcome. The professional judgment of a health care provider, familiar with the circumstances of a specific case, should always supersede these recommendations.     

Compromised item detection: A Bayesian change-point perspective

Psychometric methods for accurate and timely detection of item compromise have been a long-standing topic. While Bayesian methods can incorporate prior knowledge or expert inputs as additional information for item compromise detection, they have not been employed in item compromise detection itself. The current study proposes a two-phase Bayesian change-point framework for both stationary and real-time detection of changes in each item's compromise status. In Phase I, a stationary Bayesian change-point model for compromise detection is fitted to the observed responses over a specified time-frame. The model produces parameter estimates for the change-point of each item from uncompromised to compromised, as well as structural parameters accounting for the post-change response distribution. Using the post-change model identified in Phase I, the Shiryaev procedure for sequential testing is employed in Phase II for real-time monitoring of item compromise. The proposed methods are evaluated in terms of parameter recovery, detection accuracy, and detection efficiency under various simulation conditions and in a real data example. The proposed method also showed superior detection accuracy and efficiency compared to the cumulative sum procedure.     

在亮度对比和颜色对比下立体视知觉的定量研究

研究了在亮度对比与等亮度颜色对比的条件下,受试者分辨随机点阵立体图对的立体视敏度（最小视差）．结果表明：（１）在亮度对比条件下,立体视敏度随对比度的增加而增加,１０％的对比度即可引起立体视知觉,对比度大于３０％时达到饱和;（２）在亮度对比与等亮度颜色对比两种不同的条件下,受试者的立体视敏度不存在有统计学意义的差异;（３）当双眼分别接受不同颜色的等亮度立体图刺激时,与亮度对比条件相比,受试者的立体视敏度无明显差异;（４）当受试者双眼分别接受由亮度对比和颜色对比形成的立体图刺激时,只有当颜色对比图中图形与背景间的对比度超过等亮度值３８％以上时,才能形成立体视知觉．以上结果提示,大、小细胞系统（包括斑点系统与斑点间系统）均参与立体视知觉信息的传递．     

On the nature of the verbal memory deficit in Alzheimer''s disease

Verbal memory was investigated in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) with previously documented deficits in word production and comprehension. Procedures were employed to evaluate word recall and recognition within the context of both "multistore" and "levels of processing" models of memory. In addition, memory abilities were evaluated with respect to performance on measures of verbal fluency and language comprehension. As expected, the AD patients performed significantly worse than normal individuals on all tasks. However, in each experiment their pattern of recall across conditions was found to be qualitatively similar to that produced by normal subjects. It was argued that the memory impairment associated with Alzheimer's disease may be largely due to an inability to encode a sufficient number of stimulus features or attributes. Furthermore, this encoding deficit includes, but is not limited to, semantic attributes. Similarities between the performance of the AD patients and reported findings with Korsakoff patients and normal subjects with "weak" memory were discussed.