Interactive effects of social network centrality and social identification on stress

The present study aimed to integrate the social identity approach to health and well-being with social network analysis. Previous research on the effects of social network centrality on stress has yielded mixed results. Building on the social identity approach, we argued that these mixed results can be explained, in part, by taking into account the degree to which individuals identify with the social network. We hence hypothesized that the effects of social network centrality on stress are moderated by social identification. Using a full roster method, we assessed the social network of first-year psychology students right after the start of their study programme and three months later. The effects of network centrality (betweenness, closeness, eigenvector centrality) and social identification on stress were examined using structural equation models. As predicted, our results revealed a significant interaction between network centrality and social identification on stress: For weakly or moderately identified students, network centrality was positively related to stress. By contrast, for strongly identified students, network centrality was unrelated to stress. In conclusion, our results point to the perils of being well-connected yet not feeling like one belongs to a group.     

Being a body and having a body. The twofold temporality of embodied intentionality

The body is both the subject and object of intentionality: qua Leib, it experiences worldly things and qua Körper, it is experienced as a thing in the     

Enhancement of auditory fear conditioning after housing in a complex environment is attenuated by prior treatment with amphetamine

Prior exposure to drugs of abuse has been shown to occlude the structural plasticity associated with living in a complex environment. Amphetamine treatment may also occlude some cognitive advantages normally associated with living in a complex environment. To test this hypothesis we examined the influence of prior exposure to amphetamine on fear conditioning in rats housed in either a standard or complex environment. Housing in a complex environment facilitated fear learning to an auditory conditioned stimulus (CS), but not to the training context, relative to animals housed singly or in a social group. Prior treatment with amphetamine eliminated this effect. These results indicate that living in a complex environment facilitates conditional freezing to an auditory CS, and that this effect is abolished by pretreatment with amphetamine.     

Evaluation of a mental health treatment court with assertive community treatment

Without active engagement, many adults with serious mental illnesses remain untreated in the community and commit criminal offenses, resulting in their placement in the jails rather than mental health facilities. A mental health treatment court (MHTC) with an assertive community treatment (ACT) model of case management was developed through the cooperative efforts of the criminal justice and mental health systems. Participants were 235 adults with a serious mental illness who were booked into the county jail, and who volunteered for the study. An experimental design was used, with participants randomly assigned to MHTC or treatment as usual (TAU), consisting of adversarial criminal processing and less intensive mental health treatment. Results were reported for 6 and 12 month follow-up periods. Clients in both conditions improved in life satisfaction, distress, and independent living, while participants in the MHTC also showed reductions in substance abuse and new criminal activity. Outcomes are interpreted within the context of changes brought about in the community subsequent to implementation of the MHTC.     

Contextual and auditory fear conditioning are mediated by the lateral, basal, and central amygdaloid nuclei in rats

A large body of literature implicates the amygdala in Pavlovian fear conditioning. In this study, we examined the contribution of individual amygdaloid nuclei to contextual and auditory fear conditioning in rats. Prior to fear conditioning, rats received a large electrolytic lesion of the amygdala in one hemisphere, and a nucleus-specific neurotoxic lesion in the contralateral hemisphere. Neurotoxic lesions targeted either the lateral nucleus (LA), basolateral and basomedial nuclei (basal nuclei), or central nucleus (CE) of the amygdala. LA and CE lesions attenuated freezing to both contextual and auditory conditional stimuli (CSs). Lesions of the basal nuclei produced deficits in contextual and auditory fear conditioning only when the damage extended into the anterior divisions of the basal nuclei; damage limited to the posterior divisions of the basal nuclei did not significantly impair conditioning to either auditory or contextual CS. These effects were typically not lateralized, although neurotoxic lesions of the posterior divisions of the basal nuclei had greater effects on contextual fear conditioning when the contralateral electrolytic lesion was placed in the right hemisphere. These results indicate that there is significant overlap within the amygdala in the neural pathways mediating fear conditioning to contextual and acoustic CS, and that these forms of learning are not anatomically dissociable at the level of amygdaloid nuclei.     

Electrolytic lesions of the medial prefrontal cortex do not interfere with long-term memory of extinction of conditioned fear

Lesion studies indicate that rats without the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) have difficulty recalling fear extinction acquired the previous day. Several electrophysiological studies have also supported this observation by demonstrating that extinction-related increases in neuronal activity in the mPFC participate in expression of fear extinction. However, a more recent study has shown that fear extinction can be recalled, in certain circumstances, without mPFC potentiation, suggesting contribution of other circuits. Here, we examined this possibility in rats that were subjected to auditory fear conditioning, extinction training, and extinction retention test 7 d later. Electrolytic lesions were made in the mPFC, the motor cortex (MO), the dorsal septum (SEP), or the mediodorsal thalamus (MD), because of their potential participation in conditioned fear inhibition; combined lesions including the mPFC with the MO, SEP, or MD were also made. The lesions were made either 1 wk before conditioning or 1 d after extinction training. All rats normally extinguished their conditioned freezing behavior during extinction training and did not display any return of this behavior during the retention test. These data reveal that the mPFC is not required for the acquisition, the expression, or the retrieval of extinction memories but do not exclude the possibility that the mPFC normally participates in these processes.     

Emotion Dysregulation in Comorbid Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and Substance Use Disorders: A Narrative Review

Co-occurrence of substance use disorders (SUDs) and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is extremely common and is associated with elevated dropout and relapse rates. Given that PTSD/SUD co-occurrence rates among veterans have been found to be as high as 55?75%, it is important to identify mechanisms that may affect the interplay of both disorders. Emotion dysregulation (ED) presents a candidate mechanism that may underlie poor treatment response in co-occurring PTSD/SUD. This article proposes a transdiagnostic emotion regulation framework that considers ED conceptualized as a combination of low ability to tolerate emotional distress (low distress tolerance) and difficulties in the goal-directed use of emotion regulation strategies as a key risk factor in co-occurring PTSD/SUD. The authors review empirical findings from self-report and laboratory-based studies of ED in PTSD. They describe psychological explanations of the emotion-substance relationship and review studies documenting ED in SUDs and in co-occurring PTSD/SUD. The literature on ED in PTSD/SUD suggests that (a) patients with PTSD may resort to substances to cope with trauma-related symptoms due to ED, and (b) ED may maintain SUD symptoms and interfere with psychological treatment. Longitudinal studies on bidirectional relationships between ED and substance use in PTSD are needed, particularly research examining the course of ED in PTSD patients who use substances versus those who do not.     

Reinforcing Gender Roles at the Male Strip Show: A Qualitative Analysis of Men who Dance for Women (MDW)

While stripping has been an attractive topic among sociologists for several decades, much of the existing research concentrates on women who dance for men (WDM) and men who dance for men (MDM). In this study, I use qualitative methods to understand the experiences of men who dance for women (MDW). I spent 18 months at a strip club that I call “Dandelion's,” and conducted 22 in-depth interviews with male strippers. Specifically, I explore how the male strip show reproduces traditional, stereotypical gender roles in two main ways: dancers’ physical interactions with customers, and their hypermasculine presentations of self.     

The interior and the abject: uses and abuses of the female in the middle ages

In this paper I argue that during the High Middle Ages definitions of the female as distinct from the life led by women played a crucial role in defining social boundaries and solidifying new systems of power. I suggest that there were two female figures that were crucial to these definitions: the mother and the virgin. While the mother image was invoked to describe the internal functioning of the Christian community, the virgin metaphor drew the external boundaries and defined the Christian community's relation to the non‐Christian other.