Pain and Pain-Related Impairment in Adults with Cystic Fibrosis

The Multidimensional Pain Inventory (MPI) was utilized in a sample of adult outpatients with cystic fibrosis (CF) to assess their perception of pain and its psychosocial consequences. Subsequently, the data were compared to the ratings of pain and pain-related impairment in these patients as perceived by two nurses from the CF treatment team, as well as to a quantitative measure of illness severity. The results of these comparisons demonstrate that the majority of adult outpatients with CF reported experiencing lower levels of pain and pain-related impairment than expected, although the male patients tend to report experiencing significantly less impact in these domains than do the female patients. Additionally, the nurses do not underestimate the degree to which patients, especially males, experience pain and pain-related interference from chronic illness. Finally, there was no significant relationship between patients' self-report of pain severity or pain-related interference and an objective measure of disease severity.     

自控摄入小剂量酒精影响熟练驾驶行为的实验研究

一个小样本受试者内设计实验,受试者在实验允许的酒精剂量范围内自由选择摄入量。实验安排饮酒前,酒后３０分钟、１１０分钟和１７０分钟四个测试阶段,分别检验受试者在模拟驾驶和实际驾驶两项任务中的认知行为。酒后３０分钟实际驾驶的技能与其他三个测试期相比存在有意义的差别显著性;模拟测试任务中酒后对红、黄两种信号灯的认知反应时之间呈现显著性差别,酒后１１０分钟对黄色信号灯的反应明显延迟。研究提示：受试对酒精感受性的估计是不可靠的,小剂量酒精也能对驾驶行为构成伤害。     

Evaluating the Factor Structure of the MIDI Personality Scale Using Exploratory Structural Equation Modeling

This study investigated the factor structure of the 26‐item Midlife Development Inventory (MIDI) Personality Scale in a sample of 2,720 Americans. It was found that whereas confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) did not provide an acceptable fit to the data, exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM) provided an acceptable fit. The results of ESEM revealed that the a priori five‐factor structure of personality was generally consistent with the data, and all items had salient loadings on their target factors. ESEM also revealed that some of the items contributed significantly to more than one personality factor. The results are in line with previous research, and indicate that ESEM is more suitable than CFA for the study of personality traits.     

Do physical and relational aggression explain adolescents' friendship selection? The competing roles of network characteristics,gender, and social status

The role of physical and relational aggression in adolescents' friendship selection was examined in a longitudinal sample of 274 Chilean students from 5th and 6th grade followed over 1 year. Longitudinal social network modeling (SIENA) was used to study selection processes for aggression while influence processes were controlled for. Furthermore, the effects of network characteristics (i.e., reciprocity and transitivity), gender, and social status on friendship selection were examined. The starting assumption of this study was that selection effects based on aggression might have been overestimated in previous research as a result of failing to consider influence processes and alternative characteristics that steer friendship formation. The results show that selection effects of both physical and relational aggression disappeared when network effects, gender, and social status were taken into account. Particularly gender and perceived popularity appeared to be far more important determinants of friendship selection over time than aggression. Moreover, a peer influence effect was only found for relational aggression, and not for physical aggression. These findings suggest that similarity in aggression among befriended adolescents can be considered to be mainly a by-product rather than a leading dimension in friendship selection.     

Physiological indicators of driver workload during car-following scenarios and takeovers in highly automated driving

This driving simulator study, conducted as a part of Horizon2020-funded L3Pilot project, investigated how different car-following situations affected driver workload, within the context of vehicle automation. Electrocardiogram (ECG) and electrodermal activity (EDA)-based physiological metrics were used as objective indicators of workload, along with self-reported workload ratings. A total of 32 drivers were divided into two equal groups, based on whether they engaged in a non-driving related task (NDRT) during automation (SAE Level 3) or monitored the drive (SAE Level 2). Drivers in both groups were exposed to two counterbalanced experimental drives, lasting ∼ 18 min each, of Short (0.5 s) and Long (1.5 s) Time Headway conditions during automated car-following (ACF), which was followed by a takeover that happened with or without a lead vehicle. Results showed that driver workload due to the NDRT was significantly higher than both monitoring the drive during ACF and manual car-following (MCF). Furthermore, the results indicated that a lead vehicle maintain a shorter THW can significantly increase driver workload during takeover scenarios, potentially affecting driver safety. This warrants further research into understanding safe time headway thresholds to be maintained by automated vehicles, without placing additional cognitive or attentional demands on the driver. Our results indicated that ECG and EDA signals are sensitive to variations in workload, which warrants further investigation on the value of combining these two signals to assess driver workload in real-time, to help future driver monitoring systems respond appropriately to the limitations of the driver, and predict their performance in the driving task, if and when they have to resume manual control of the vehicle after a period of automated driving.     

Affective atmospheres of weapons technologies: The case of battle drones,combat fighters and bodies in contemporary German geopolitics

Using the example of the defense and security sector at the Innovation and Leadership in Aerospace aviation fair in Berlin, this paper interrogates how the presentation of weapons technologies at German security and aviation fairs produces a/effects that influence the body and serve to legitimize political decisions. It examines to what extent the body becomes the site of geopolitical negotiation via affective atmospheres and how different scales interact within this process. First, I argue that affective connections between weapons technologies and spectators are essential for legitimizing warfare technologies. Second, I argue that affects of weapons technologies are subject to ambivalence and ambiguity, and that they are to be understood as entangled with other affects in the same body. Third, I argue that affects become effective across material and spatial scales. Drawing on geographic work on affective atmospheres, debates in intimate geopolitics and feminist science and technology studies, the paper contributes to critical geopolitics by unpacking the role of affective dimensions in naturalizing the development and acquisition of weapons technologies. In doing so, it also contributes to debates on the methodological operationalization of theories of affect and to emotional geographies of (in)security.     

Between place and territory: Young people's emotional geographies of security and insecurity in Brussels' deprived areas

While much of literature on place attachment describes it as an affective bond between a (young) person and place, with positive psychosocial consequences such as identification, rootedness and belonging, some authors are cautious and stress that an enhanced attachment to place, termed “territoriality”, may have negative consequences such as hostility towards outsiders and a sense of non-belonging elsewhere. In this paper, I ask how we should understand this difference and how the analysis of young people's emotional geographies of (in)security can bring light to this question. The paper finds that emotional geographies of (in)security are instrumental in understanding how a “positive” attachment to place may lead to a “negative” attachment to territory, how some young people emotionally attach to places and some are inclined to claim these places against outsiders (and also at the expense of other members of the community). This explicit appropriation of public spaces in the home neighbourhood is co-constituted by feeling secure inside and insecure outside the area. Territoriality may be a response to or an expression of ontological insecurity and of the inner unease that prompts them to strange avoidance and contorted strategies for manipulating spaces and setting boundaries designed to secure the self.     

Longitudinal study of striatal activation to reward and loss anticipation from mid-adolescence into late adolescence/early adulthood

Adolescent risk-taking behavior has been associated with age-related changes in striatal activation to incentives. Previous cross-sectional studies have shown both increased and decreased striatal activation to incentives for adolescents compared to adults. The monetary incentive delay (MID) task, designed to assess functional brain activation in anticipation of reward, has been used extensively to examine striatal activation in both adult and adolescent populations. The current study used this task with a longitudinal approach across mid-adolescence and late adolescence/early adulthood. Twenty-two participants (13 male) were studied using the MID task at two time-points, once in mid-adolescence (mean age = 16.11; SD = 1.44) and a second time in late adolescence/early adulthood (mean age = 20.14; SD = .67). Results revealed greater striatal activation with increased age in high- compared to low-incentive contexts (incentive magnitude), for gain as well as for loss trials (incentive valence). Results extend cross-sectional findings and show reduced striatal engagement in adolescence compared to adulthood during preparation for action in an incentive context.