Differences in alexithymia and emotional awareness in exhaustion syndrome and chronic fatigue syndrome

Symptoms of Exhaustion Syndrome (ES) and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) are overlapping and create difficulties of differential diagnosis. Empirical studies comparing ES and CFS are scarce. This study aims to investigate if there are any emotional differences between ES and CFS. This cross‐sectional study compared self‐reported alexithymia and observer‐rated emotional awareness in patients with ES (n = 31), CFS (n = 38) and healthy controls (HC) (n = 30). Self‐reported alexithymia was measured with the Toronto Alexithymia Scale‐20 (TAS‐20) and emotional awareness with an observer‐rated performance test, the Level of Emotional Awareness Scale (LEAS). Additionally, depression and anxiety were scored by the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS). Results show that patients with ES expressed higher self‐reported alexithymia in the TAS‐20 compared to HC, but had similar emotional awareness capacity in the observer‐rated performance test, the LEAS. Patients with CFS expressed more difficulties in identifying emotions compared to HCs, and performed significantly worse in the LEAS‐total and spent more time completing the LEAS as compared to HC. Correlation and multiple regressions analyses revealed that depression and anxiety positively correlated with and explained part of the variances in alexithymia scores, while age and group explained the major part of the variance in LEAS. Findings of this study indicate that emotional status is different in patients with ES and CFS with respect to both self‐reported alexithymia and observer‐rated emotional awareness. Emotional parameters should be approached both in clinical investigation and psychotherapy for patients with ES and CFS.     

Psychopathology and behavior problems in children and adolescents with Williams syndrome: Distinctive relationships with cognition

Several studies have documented the high prevalence of psychopathology and behavior problems in Williams syndrome (WS). However, the links between cognitive development and such symptoms need further clarification. Our study aims to expand current knowledge on levels of behavior problems and its links to cognition in a sample of Brazilian individuals with WS. A total of 25 children and adolescents with WS and their parents participated in this study. The participants’ IQs were assessed with the Wechsler Scales of Intelligence (for children or adults) and parental reports of psychopathology/behavior problems were collected using the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL). The presence of clinically significant attention problems was a main feature in our sample of children and adolescents with WS. In the children, higher IQ scores were found to be significantly associated with less externalizing problems, while in the adolescents cognitive abilities were found to be associated with less internalizing symptoms. These results provide further insight into the links between psychopathology and behavior problems and cognitive abilities in WS, and suggest the need to take age into consideration when analyzing such relationships.     

Beyond differences between the body schema and the body image: insights from body hallucinations

The distinction between the body schema and the body image has become the stock in trade of much recent work in cognitive neuroscience and philosophy. Yet little is known about the interactions between these two types of body representations. We need to account not only for their dissociations in rare cases, but also for their convergence most of the time. Indeed in our everyday life the body we perceive does not conflict with the body we act with. Are the body image and the body schema then somehow reshaping each other or are they relatively independent and do they only happen to be congruent? On the basis of the study of bodily hallucinations, we consider which model can best account for the body schema/body image interactions.     

中医"证"本质研究的无序与有序

中医"证"本质的研究结果呈现弱特异性的.证是宏观概念,既呈现着多态性,又呈现着同态性,无序中包含着有序,有序中亦体现着无序.对于"证"研究中出现的弱特异性的研究结果,应将其看成这一证候的几种不同状态;对不同证候得出的同一研究结果的处理也是如此.具体技术上的处理包括:对研究思路更新;对证候规范化;大范围科研协作.强调了大范围科研协作.     

"证"与"辨证"之我见

以"证"与"辨证"的关系阐发有关概念,认为对证的概念不应一概而论,在此基础上把证细分为两个概念,提出有形之证和无形之证,辨证的过程就是构建一个"无形之证"理论模型的过程,用来解说有形之证,达到无形之证与有形之证的最大吻合.     

从系统论分析肾病综合症的诊断治疗

分析系统论方法主要基本原则在肾病综合症诊治中的指导性作用.揭示在医学科学研究中自觉、主动地运用辩证思维方法和系统论科学方法,可以拓展研究的新思路,为疾病的诊治提供最佳方案,对促进和指导医学研究发展有极其重要的意义.     

Flexible coping responses to severe acute respiratory syndrome-related and daily life stressful events

Based on the theoretical framework of coping flexibility, the present study examined the coping flexibility of university students in response to severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS)-related and daily life stressful events. The Coping Flexibility Questionnaire was used to investigate 93 university students' coping responses toward 10 SARS-related stressful events and 10 daily life stressful events that generally occur among university students. Results showed that the patterns of coping flexibility were different for the two types of stressful events. The flexible and the active-inflexible patterns were most commonly found in coping with daily life stressful events. By contrast, the passive-inconsistent pattern was dominant when coping with daily life stressful events. Moreover, participants showed lower discriminating ability to situation controllability, and displayed poorer strategy-situation fit to cope with SARS-related events than with daily life stressful events. The theoretical and practical implications of this study are discussed.     

The extent of working memory deficits associated with Williams syndrome: exploration of verbal and spatial domains and executively controlled processes

The present study investigated verbal and spatial working memory (WM) functioning in individuals with the neuro-developmental disorder Williams syndrome (WS) using WM component tasks. While there is strong evidence of WM impairments in WS, previous research has focused on short-term memory and has neglected assessment of executive components of WM. There is a particular lack of consensus concerning the profile of verbal WM functioning in WS. Here, WS participants were compared to typically developing participants matched for (1) verbal ability and (2) spatial ability (N = 14 in each of the 3 groups). Individuals with WS were impaired on verbal WM tasks, both those involving short-term maintenance of information and executive manipulation, in comparison to verbal-matched controls. Surprisingly, individuals with WS were not impaired on a spatial task assessing short-term maintenance of information in memory (remembering spatial locations) compared to spatial-matched controls. They were, however, impaired on a spatial executive WM task requiring the manipulation of spatial information in memory. The present study suggests that individuals with WS show WM impairments that extend to both verbal and spatial domains, although spatial deficits are selective to executive aspects of WM function.     

OSAHS在2型糖尿病发病中的作用与对策

阻塞性睡眠呼吸暂停综合征（obstructive sleep apnea hypopnea syndrome,OSAHS）是一种常见的睡眠呼吸紊乱性疾病,以睡眠时反复发作的上气道部分或完全阻塞为特征。近年发现OSAHS与2型糖尿病之间有着明显的相关性,二者均为心血管疾病的高危因素,合并存在能够严重影响生命质量与预期寿命...