Presurgical Coping, Depression, and Quality of Life in Persons with Parkinson's Disease

This study describes utilization of coping strategies and evaluates the interaction between coping strategies, depression, and quality of life (QOL) in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) who are being considered for neurosurgical intervention. Eighty patients (mean age 61.7 years) with PD being evaluated for possible deep brain stimulation completed self-report instruments of coping strategies (Coping Responses Inventory), depression (Beck Depression Inventory), and disease-specific QOL (Parkinson's Disease Questionnaire-39). Analyses showed that patients with PD cope with the acute stressor of approaching neurosurgery through a variety of strategies, but particularly avoidant and behavioral strategies. When the correlated but apparently opposing effects of cognitive and behavioral strategies were teased apart, greater use of cognitive strategies was associated with more severe depressive symptomatology (and poorer QOL), while greater use of behavioral strategies appeared to be associated with less depression. Depressive symptomatology, in turn, was associated with poorer QOL. However, coping had minimal direct association with QOL. From this it was concluded that patients with advanced PD generate a variety of coping responses to an acute stressor such as surgery, and the use of behavioral strategies, in particular seeking of alternative enjoyable activities, may be associated with better mood if salutary effects are not overwhelmed by less helpful cognitive coping techniques. The minimization of depressive symptomatology, in turn, is associated with better QOL.     

小学生喜好的外在奖赏及其运用

采用问卷调查法 ,以杭州市三所小学 3 1 8名小学生为被试 ,考察了他们对目前学校常用的 2 0种奖项的喜好特点。目的在于揭示这些奖项对小学生的潜在意义 ,为教师运用外在奖赏激励学生学习提供依据。结果表明 :(1 )小学生最喜欢社会认同类 ,其次是特权类 ,最后是学校奖项与零食类奖赏。他们最喜欢的前五种奖赏是 :书、奖状、好分数、玩电脑、去图书馆看书。 (2 )小学生在喜好的奖赏及其结构特点上均存在年级与性别差异。     

Brain Oxidative Damage Following Acute Immobilization and Mild Emotional Stress

We studied the role of free radicals on brain oxidative damage in rats after acute immobilization stress (restraint) and mild emotional stress (handling). To investigate brain oxidative damage, CuZn and Mn dependent superoxide dismutase (CuZn SOD, Mn SOD) activities, lipid peroxidation (TBARs), Na ⁺ K ⁺ ATPase activity, protein carbonyl (PrC), and reduced and oxidized glutathione (GSH, GSSG) levels were measured in the cerebral cortex (CTX), hippocampus (HIP), and striatum (ST) of the animals after the two different stress stimuli. Because stress produces abnormalities in the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, the intensity of the two stress conditions were measured by plasmatic corticosteroid (COR) levels: particularly, COR levels doubled in handled rats and increased 15-fold in restrained animals. The SOD activities increased in CTX and decreased in HIP of the handled rats, while in ST a significant decrease in handled animals but an increase in restrained animals occurred. TBARs, GSH, and GSSG levels remained unchanged, while an index of glutathione redox decreased significantly in ST of handled animals and in CTX of restrained ones. Na ⁺ K ⁺ ATPase activity increased significantly in the HIP and ST of both groups of stressed rats. The stress induced a remarkable increase in PrC levels in all studied cerebral areas. These findings provide evidence to support the idea that stress produces oxidants but that the oxidative damage in stress differs in cerebral areas and could contribute to the degenerative mechanism of aging.     

Information about foregone rewards impedes dynamic decision-making in older adults

“Making an informed decision” implies that more information leads to better decisions, yet it may be the case that additional information biases decisions in a systematic and sometimes detrimental manner. In the present study, we examined the effect of additional information on older adults’ decision-making using a task for which available rewards were dependent on the participant’s recent pattern of choices. The optimal strategy was to forego the immediately rewarding option in favor of the option that yielded larger delayed reward. We found that providing information about true foregone rewards – the reward that would have been received had the participant chosen the other option – significantly reduced older adults’ decision-making performance. However, false foregone rewards – foregone rewards manufactured to make the long-term option appear more immediately rewarding – led older adults to perform at a level equal to younger adults. We conclude that providing information about foregone rewards biases older adults toward immediate rewards at a greater rate than younger adults, leading to poorer older adult performance when immediate rewards and long-term rewards conflict, but intact performance when immediate rewards and long-term rewards appear to align.     

The effects of sport dance on brain connectivity and body intelligence

Dancing is characterised by physical movement in accordance with rhythm perception. Twelve sport dancers and 12 age- and sex-matched young adults who had no dance experience (control group) were recruited. Body intelligence and brain activity were assessed in both groups using the Body Intelligence Scale (BIS) and resting state functional magnetic resonance imaging. BIS scores of dancers were higher than those of control subjects. The dancer group showed increased functional connectivity from the precentral gyrus to the right cingulate gyrus, right occipital fusiform gyrus, right inferior frontal gyrus, right medial frontal gyrus, left inferior frontal gyrus, right parietal postcentral gyrus, and right frontal lobe compared with control subjects. Sport dancers had increased body intelligence sensitivity compared with matched controls. In addition, the characteristics of dance, including physical movement in accordance with rhythm perception, might be associated with increased brain activity in the somatosensory and rhythm perception networks.     

Tool use in left brain damage and Alzheimer's disease: What about function and manipulation knowledge?

Tool use disorders are usually associated with difficulties in retrieving function and manipulation knowledge. Here, we investigate tool use (Real Tool Use, RTU), function (Functional Association, FA) and manipulation knowledge (Gesture Recognition, GR) in 17 left‐brain‐damaged (LBD) patients and 14 AD patients (Alzheimer disease). LBD group exhibited predicted deficit on RTU but not on FA and GR while AD patients showed deficits on GR and FA with preserved tool use skills. These findings question the role played by function and manipulation knowledge in actual tool use.     

脑死与放弃治疗

符合医学标准又为亲属认定已死亡者,理应放弃治疗;符合脑死亡标准,应说服亲属同意作放弃治疗决策;对已确无救治希望,或虽经抢救治疗必然发生植物生存状态的极重病例,或已是植物生存状态者,也应作出放弃治疗的决策,除遵循医学原则和生命的价值、伦理原则外,要充分尊重病重的意志。放弃治疗的决策还应考虑到亲属的心理承受问题。     

脑激活定律

用物理学的观点在系统水平上讨论脑内功能子系统的脑区激活及相互作用。引入一些参量描述脑功能特性 ,并且根据现有实验事实提出脑激活的四条定律。     

From Maclean's Triune Brain Concept to the Conflict Systems Neurobehavioral Model: The Subjective Basis of Moral and Spiritual Consciousness

This paper builds upon a critically clarified statement of the triune brain concept to set out the conflict systems neurobehavioral model. The model defines the reciprocal algorithms (rules of procedure) of behavior from evolved brain structure. The algorithms are driven by subjectively experienced behavioral tension as the self-preservational programming, common to our ancestral vertebrates, frequently tugs and pulls against the affectional program-ming of our mammalian legacy. The yoking ( zygon ) of the dual algorithmic dynamic accounts for the emergence of moral and spiritual consciousness as manifested in the universal norm of reciprocity and in the work of such thinkersas Martin Buber and Paul Tillich.