The parental overprotection scale: associations with child and parental anxiety

Background: Parental overprotection has commonly been implicated in the development and maintenance of childhood anxiety disorders. Overprotection has been assessed using questionnaire and observational methods interchangeably; however, the extent to which these methods access the same construct has received little attention. Edwards, 2008 and Edwards et al., 2010 developed a promising parent-report measure of overprotection (OP) and reported that, with parents of pre-school children, the measure correlated with observational assessments and predicted changes in child anxiety symptoms. We aimed to validate the use of the OP measure with mothers of children in middle childhood, and examine its association with child and parental anxiety. Methods: Mothers of 90 children (60 clinically anxious, 30 non-anxious) aged 7–12 years completed the measure and engaged in a series of mildly stressful tasks with their child. Results: The internal reliability of the measure was good and scores correlated significantly with observations of maternal overprotection in a challenging puzzle task. Contrary to expectations, OP was not significantly associated with child anxiety status or symptoms, but was significantly associated with maternal anxiety symptoms. Limitations: Participants were predominantly from affluent social groups and of non-minority status. Overprotection is a broad construct, the use of specific sub-dimensions of behavioural constructs may be preferable. Conclusions: The findings support the use of the OP measure to assess parental overprotection among 7–12 year-old children; however, they suggest that parental responses may be more closely related to the degree of parental rather than child anxiety.

Solar wind-magnetosphere coupling functions on timescales of 1 day to 1 year

There are no direct observational methods for determining the total rate at which energy is extracted from the solar wind by the magnetosphere. In the absence of such a direct measurement, alternative means of estimating the energy available to drive the magnetospheric system have been developed using different ionospheric and magnetospheric indices as proxies for energy consumption and dissipation and thus the input. The so-called coupling functions are constructed from the parameters of the interplanetary medium, as either theoretical or empirical estimates of energy transfer, and the effectiveness of these coupling functions has been evaluated in terms of their correlation with the chosen index. A number of coupling functions have been studied in the past with various criteria governing event selection and timescale. The present paper contains an exhaustive survey of the correlation between geomagnetic activity and the near-Earth solar wind and two of the planetary indices at a wide variety of timescales. Various combinations of interplanetary parameters are evaluated with careful allowance for the effects of data gaps in the interplanetary data. We show that the theoretical coupling, P�, function first proposed by Vasyliunas et al. is superior at all timescales from 1-day to 1-year.

Parents' verbal communication and childhood anxiety: a systematic review

Parents’ verbal communication to their child, particularly the expression of fear-relevant information (e.g., attributions of threat to the environment), is considered to play a key role in children’s fears and anxiety. This review considers the extent to which parental verbal communication is associated with child anxiety by examining research that has employed objective observational methods. Using a systematic search strategy, we identified 15 studies that addressed this question. These studies provided some evidence that particular fear-relevant features of parental verbal communication are associated with child anxiety under certain conditions. However, the scope for drawing reliable, general conclusions was limited by extensive methodological variation between studies, particularly in terms of the features of parental verbal communication examined and the context in which communication took place, how child anxiety was measured, and inconsistent consideration of factors that may moderate the verbal communication–child anxiety relationship. We discuss ways in which future research can contribute to this developing evidence base and reduce further methodological inconsistency so as to inform interventions for children with anxiety problems.

Assessing the accuracy of a computerized decision support system for digoxin dosing in primary care: an observational study

Background: This study was carried out as part of a European Union funded project (PharmDIS-e+), to develop and evaluate software aimed at assisting physicians with drug dosing. A drug that causes particular problems with drug dosing in primary care is digoxin because of its narrow therapeutic range and low therapeutic index. Objectives: To determine (i) accuracy of the PharmDIS-e+ software for predicting serum digoxin levels in patients who are taking this drug regularly; (ii) whether there are statistically significant differences between predicted digoxin levels and those measured by a laboratory and (iii) whether there are differences between doses prescribed by general practitioners and those suggested by the program. Methods: We needed 45 patients to have 95% Power to reject the null hypothesis that the mean serum digoxin concentration was within 10% of the mean predicted digoxin concentration. Patients were recruited from two general practices and had been taking digoxin for at least 4 months. Exclusion criteria were dementia, low adherence to digoxin and use of other medications known to interact to a clinically important extent with digoxin. Results: Forty-five patients were recruited. There was a correlation of 0·65 between measured and predicted digoxin concentrations (P < 0·001). The mean difference was 0·12 μg/L (SD 0·26; 95% CI 0·04, 0·19, P = 0·005). Forty-seven per cent of the patients were prescribed the same dose as recommended by the software, 44% were prescribed a higher dose and 9% a lower dose than recommended. Conclusion: PharmDIS-e+ software was able to predict serum digoxin levels with acceptable accuracy in most patients.

Detecting an impact of predation on bird populations depends on the methods used to assess the predators

Summary 1. In recent decades there have been population declines of many UK bird species, which have become the focus of intense research and debate. Recently, as the populations of potential predators have increased there is concern that increased rates of predation may be contributing to the declines. In this review, we assess the methodologies behind the current published science on the impacts of predators on avian prey in the UK. 2. We identified suitable studies, classified these according to study design (experimental ⁄observational) and assessed the quantity and quality of the data upon which any variation in predation rates was inferred. We then explored whether the underlying study methodology had implications for study outcome. 3. We reviewed 32 published studies and found that typically observational studies comprehensively monitored significantly fewer predator species than experimental studies. Data for a difference in predator abundance from targeted (i.e. bespoke) census techniques were available for less than half of the 32 predator species studied. 4. The probability of a study detecting an impact on prey abundance was strongly, positively related to the quality and quantity of data upon which the gradient in predation rates was inferred. 5. The findings suggest that if a study is based on good quality abundance data for a range of predator species then it is more likely to detect an effect than if it relies on opportunistic data for a smaller number of predators. 6. We recommend that the findings from studies which use opportunistic data, for a limited number of predator species, should be treated with caution and that future studies employ bespoke census techniques to monitor predator abundance for an appropriate suite of predators.