Women's decision making and experience of subsequent pregnancy following stillbirth.

INTRODUCTION: This study sought to increase understanding of women's thoughts and feelings about decision making and the experience of subsequent pregnancy following stillbirth (intrauterine death after 24 weeks' gestation). METHODS: Eleven women were interviewed, 8 of whom were pregnant at the time of the interview. Modified grounded theory was used to guide the research methodology and to analyze the data. RESULTS: A model was developed to illustrate women's experiences of decision making in relation to subsequent pregnancy and of subsequent pregnancy itself. DISCUSSION: The results of the current study have significant implications for women who have experienced stillbirth and the health professionals who work with them. Based on the model, women may find it helpful to discuss their beliefs in relation to healing and health professionals to provide support with this in mind. Women and their partners may also benefit from explanations and support about the potentially conflicting emotions they may experience during this time.

Individual Aspirations and Satisfaction:Quantifying the Importance of Homeownership

Residential satisfaction is often used as a barometer to assess the performance of public policy and programmes designed to raise individuals' well-being. However, the fact that responses elicited from residents might be biased by subjective, non-observable factors casts doubt on whether these responses can be taken as trustable indicators of the individuals' housing situation. Emotional factors such as aspirations or expectations might affect individuals' cognitions of their true residential situation. To disentangle this puzzle, we investigated whether identical residential attributes can be perceived differently depending on tenure status. Our results indicate that tenure status is crucial not only in determining the level of housing satisfaction, but also regarding how dwellers perceive their housing characteristics. Keywords: Housing satisfaction, subjective well-being, homeownership. JEL classification: D1, R2.

Intra-Group Competition and Inter-Group Conflict: An Application to Northern Ireland

This paper reviews four economic theories of leadership selection in conflictual settings. The first of these by Cukierman and Tomassi (1998) labeled the ‘information rationale’, argues that hawks may actually be necessary to initiate peace agreements. The second labeled the ‘bargaining rationale’ borrowing from Hamlin and Jennings (2007) agrees with the conventional wisdom that doves are more likely to secure peace, but post-conflict there are good reasons for hawks to be rationally selected. The third found in Jennings and Roelfsema (2008) is labeled the social psychological rationale. This captures the idea of a competition over which group can form the strongest identity, so can apply to group choices which do not impinge upon bargaining power. As in the bargaining rationale, dove selection can be predicted during conflict, but hawk selection post-conflict. Finally, the expressive rationale is discussed which predicts that regardless of the underlying structure of the game (informational, bargaining, psychological) the large group nature of decision-making by making individual decision makers non-decisive in determining the outcome of elections may cause them to make choices based primarily on emotions which may be invariant with the mode of group interaction, be it conflictual or peaceful. Finally, the paper analyses the extent to which the theories can throw light on Northern Ireland electoral history over the last 25 years.

Kangaroo mother care diminishes pain from heel lance in very preterm neonates: a crossover trial.

BACKGROUND: Skin-to-skin contact, or kangaroo mother care (KMC) has been shown to be efficacious in diminishing pain response to heel lance in full term and moderately preterm neonates. The purpose of this study was to determine if KMC would also be efficacious in very preterm neonates. METHODS: Preterm neonates (n = 61) between 28 0/7 and 31 6/7 weeks gestational age in three Level III NICU's in Canada comprised the sample. A single-blind randomized crossover design was employed. In the experimental condition, the infant was held in KMC for 15 minutes prior to and throughout heel lance procedure. In the control condition, the infant was in prone position swaddled in a blanket in the incubator. The primary outcome was the Premature Infant Pain Profile (PIPP), which is comprised of three facial actions, maximum heart rate, minimum oxygen saturation levels from baseline in 30-second blocks from heel lance. The secondary outcome was time to recover, defined as heart rate return to baseline. Continuous video, heart rate and oxygen saturation monitoring were recorded with event markers during the procedure and were subsequently analyzed. Repeated measures analysis-of-variance was employed to generate results. RESULTS: PIPP scores at 90 seconds post lance were significantly lower in the KMC condition (8.871 (95%CI 7.852-9.889) versus 10.677 (95%CI 9.563-11.792) p < .001) and non-significant mean differences ranging from 1.2 to1.8. favoring KMC condition at 30, 60 and 120 seconds. Time to recovery was significantly shorter, by a minute(123 seconds (95%CI 103-142) versus 193 seconds (95%CI 158-227). Facial actions were highly significantly lower across all points in time reaching a two-fold difference by 120 seconds post-lance and heart rate was significantly lower across the first 90 seconds in the KMC condition. CONCLUSION: Very preterm neonates appear to have endogenous mechanisms elicited through skin-to-skin maternal contact that decrease pain response, but not as powerfully as in older preterm neonates. The shorter recovery time in KMC is clinically important in helping maintain homeostasis. TRIAL REGISTRATION: (Current Controlled Trials) ISRCTN63551708.

Rationalising ‘Irrational’ Support for Political Violence

This paper provides a rationale for group support for political violence when violence does not provide a material benefi t. A theory of fairness is adopted to demonstrate that although group violence may not be the equilibrium of a material game it may be a fairness equilibrium in a game containing psychological payoffs. For this to happen the material stakes must be perceived as low and psychological payoffs are expressive. Although the material stakes are actually high, members of each group may choose expressively to support the use of violence because the probability of being decisive is low. The paper also considers the possibility of peace emerging as a fairness equilibrium. This can only happen if each group perceives the other as making some sacrifi ce in choosing peace.

Inseguridad ciudadana subjetiva/miedo al delito: límites para la viabilidad de la transferencia de políticas de seguridad

Proyecto de investigación realizado a partir de una estancia en el Centre of Criminology de la University of Toronto, Canadà, entre 2006 y 2008. El miedo al delito como ámbito temático lleva 40 años de andadura y cuenta con cientos de investigaciones en su acervo. Dicha subdisciplina ha utilizado la expresión “miedo al delito” para referirse a un conjunto de conceptos académicos que ella misma va desarrollando, así como a lo que considera una experiencia subjetiva que pretende estudiar. Tanto el concepto como la experiencia han sido vagamente catalogados de respuesta emocional frente al delito o imágenes asociadas a éste. A pesar de los estudios más empíricos y de las teorías más positivistas, que tratan el miedo al delito como un fenómeno que puede ser medido y a cuyo conocimiento nos podemos ir aproximando cada vez con mayor precisión, con el trabajo de este proyecto se puede concluir que el miedo al delito constituye un elemento semántico-conceptual de las categorías académica y popular de delito. Los enfoques culturalistas o hermenéuticos han apuntado esta cuestión pero, simultáneamente, han seguido admitiendo la complementariedad entre enfoques. En principio, admitir el valor constitutivo del miedo al delito en la noción de delito parece que no excluye la necesidad de conocer si los temores a ser víctima de un delito han aumentado en nuestra ciudad, ni el saber por qué ello ha sido así. Apropiarse de tales saberes tal vez sea la única forma de aislar factores discretos que puedan ser manipulados en políticas públicas para erradicar el temor cuyo incremento se supone verificado con las mediciones. Sin embargo, puesto que lo registrado han sido actitudes cognitivas y no emociones, los eventuales programas de intervención deberían ser ideados en el mejor de los casos, con la misma complejidad que la propia formación de creencias lo que lo haría inoperativo. Acción bianual.

Environmental Kuznets Curves for Carbon Emissions: A Critical Survey

The empirical finding of an inverse U-shaped relationship between per capita income and pollution, the so-called Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC), suggests that as countries experience economic growth, environmental deterioration decelerates and thus becomes less of an issue. Focusing on the prime example of carbon emissions, the present article provides a critical review of the new econometric techniques that have questioned the baseline polynomial specification in the EKC literature. We discuss issues related to the functional form, heterogeneity, “spurious” regressions and spatial dependence to address whether and to what extent the EKC can be observed. Despite these new approaches, there is still no clear-cut evidence supporting the existence of the EKC for carbon emissions. JEL classifications: C20; Q32; Q50; O13 Keywords: Environmental Kuznets Curve; Carbon emissions; Functional form; Heterogeneity; “Spurious” regressions; Spatial dependence.Residential satisfaction is often used as a barometer to assess the performance of public policy and programmes designed to raise individuals' well-being. However, the fact that responses elicited from residents might be biased by subjective, non-observable factors casts doubt on whether these responses can be taken as trustable indicators of the individuals' housing situation. Emotional factors such as aspirations or expectations might affect individuals' cognitions of their true residential situation. To disentangle this puzzle, we investigated whether identical residential attributes can be perceived differently depending on tenure status. Our results indicate that tenure status is crucial not only in determining the level of housing satisfaction, but also regarding how dwellers perceive their housing characteristics. Keywords: Housing satisfaction, subjective well-being, homeownership. JEL classification: D1, R2.

Donor's and organ representations in liver, kidney, heart and lung transplantation : a qualitative longitudinal study

Purpose: Organ transplantation is a biological and psychological challenge and graft acceptance is an important achievement for patients. Patients' concerns toward the deceased donor and the organ may contribute to this process. Method: Forty-seven patients involved in heart (N=9), liver (N=8), lung (N=14) and kidney (N=16) transplantation participated in IRB-approved longitudinal semi-structured interviews: (T1) registered on the waiting-list, (T2) six months and (T3) twelve months after transplantation. Qualitative pattern analysis (QUAPA) was carried out on the verbatim transcripts and concerns about the donor and the organ were then analysed. Results: - Donor's representation: At T1, patients were reluctant to talk about the donor: 27% expressed culpability and 19% accepted the clause of anonymity. At T2, intense emotions were associated with the reminiscing about the donor and 45% highlighted the generosity of his/her act. In addition, heart, lung and kidney recipients were concerned about the donor's identity: 42% challenged the clause of anonymity. Liver recipients complained about anonymity, but could nevertheless cope with it. At T3, 47% of heart, lung and kidney recipients thought daily of the donor and 33% were still looking for information about him/her. Liver recipients rarely have thoughts about the donor. - Organ representation: At T1, organ descriptions were biomedical (49% of the interviewees) and more rarely, mainly heart candidates, referred to the symbolic meaning of the organ. After transplantation (T2-T3), function was underlined. Acceptance and organ integration were associated with post-operative outcomes (23%) and psychological well-being (45%). Some patients (32%) inferred the donor's personality from the organ quality and felt privileged having received an organ in such a good state. Conclusion: Donor's representations should be explored during the transplantation process as they play an important role in the psychological acceptance of the graft.

An affective approach to moral motivation

Over the last few years, there has been a surge of work in a new field called "moral psychology", which uses experimental methods to test the psychological processes underlying human moral activity. In this paper, I shall follow this line of approach with the aim of working out a model of how people form value judgements and how they are motivated to act morally. I call this model an "affective picture": 'picture' because it remains strictly at the descriptive level and 'affective' because it has an important role for affects and emotions. This affective picture is grounded on a number of plausible and empirically supported hypotheses. The main idea is that we should distinguish between various kinds of value judgements by focusing on the sort of state of mind people find themselves in while uttering a judgement. "Reasoned judgements" are products of rational considerations and are based on preliminary acceptance of norms and values. On the contrary, "basic value judgements" are affective, primitive and non-reflective ways of assessing the world. As we shall see, this analysis has some consequences for the traditional internalism-externalism debate in philosophy; it highlights the fact that motivation is primarily linked to "basic value judgements" and that the judgements we openly defend might not have a particular effect on our actions, unless we are inclined to have an emotional attitude that conforms to them.

A Case of Framing Effects: The Elicitation of Time Preferences.

We compare three methods for the elicitation of time preferences in an experimental setting: the Becker-DeGroot-Marschak procedure (BDM); the second price auction; and the multiple price list format. The first two methods have been used rarely to elicit time preferences. All methods used are perfectly equivalent from a decision theoretic point of view, and they should induce the same ‘truthful’ revelation i dominant strategies. In spite of this, we find that framing does matter: the money discount rates elicited with the multiple price list tend to be higher than those elicited with the other two methods. In addition, our results shed some light on attitudes towards time, and they permit a broad classification of subjects depending on how the size of the elicited values varies with the time horizon.

No evidence for immune priming in ants exposed to a fungal pathogen.

There is accumulating evidence that invertebrates can acquire long-term protection against pathogens through immune priming. However, the range of pathogens eliciting immune priming and the specificity of the response remain unclear. Here, we tested if the exposure to a natural fungal pathogen elicited immune priming in ants. We found no evidence for immune priming in Formica selysi workers exposed to Beauveria bassiana. The initial exposure of ants to the fungus did not alter their resistance in a subsequent challenge with the same fungus. There was no sign of priming when using homologous and heterologous combinations of fungal strains for exposure and subsequent challenges at two time intervals. Hence, within the range of conditions tested, the immune response of this social insect to the fungal pathogen appears to lack memory and strain-specificity. These results show that immune priming is not ubiquitous across pathogens, hosts and conditions, possibly because of immune evasion by the pathogen or efficient social defences by the host.

Predator-prey chemical warfare determines the expression of biocontrol genes by rhizosphere-associated Pseudomonas fluorescens.

Soil bacteria are heavily consumed by protozoan predators, and many bacteria have evolved defense strategies such as the production of toxic exometabolites. However, the production of toxins is energetically costly and therefore is likely to be adjusted according to the predation risk to balance the costs and benefits of predator defense. We investigated the response of the biocontrol bacterium Pseudomonas fluorescens CHA0 to a common predator, the free-living amoeba Acanthamoeba castellanii. We monitored the effect of the exposure to predator cues or direct contact with the predators on the expression of the phlA, prnA, hcnA, and pltA genes, which are involved in the synthesis of the toxins, 2,4-diacetylphloroglucinol (DAPG), pyrrolnitrin, hydrogen cyanide, and pyoluteorin, respectively. Predator chemical cues led to 2.2-, 2.0-, and 1.2-fold increases in prnA, phlA, and hcnA expression, respectively, and to a 25% increase in bacterial toxicity. The upregulation of the tested genes was related to the antiprotozoan toxicity of the corresponding toxins. Pyrrolnitrin and DAPG had the highest toxicity, suggesting that bacteria secrete a predator-specific toxin cocktail. The response of the bacteria was elicited by supernatants of amoeba cultures, indicating that water-soluble chemical compounds were responsible for induction of the bacterial defense response. In contrast, direct contact of bacteria with living amoebae reduced the expression of the four bacterial toxin genes by up to 50%, suggesting that protozoa can repress bacterial toxicity. The results indicate that predator-prey interactions are a determinant of toxin production by rhizosphere P. fluorescens and may have an impact on its biocontrol potential.

Emotional intelligence: On definitions, neuroscience, and marshmallows

In his timely article, Cherniss offers his vision for the future of "Emotional Intelligence" (EI). However, his goal of clarifying the concept by distinguishing definitions from models and his support for "Emotional and Social Competence" (ESC) models will, in our opinion, not make the field advance. To be upfront, we agree that emotions are important for effective decision-making, leadership, performance and the like; however, at this time, EI and ESC have not yet demonstrated incremental validity over and above IQ and personality tests in meta-analyses (Harms & Credé, 2009; Van Rooy & Viswesvaran, 2004). If there is a future for EI, we see it in the ability model of Mayer, Salovey and associates (e.g, Mayer, Caruso, & Salovey, 2000), which detractors and supporters agree holds the most promise (Antonakis, Ashkanasy, & Dasborough, 2009; Zeidner, Roberts, & Matthews, 2008). With their use of quasi-objective scoring measures, the ability model grounds EI in existing frameworks of intelligence, thus differentiating itself from ESC models and their self-rated trait inventories. In fact, we do not see the value of ESC models: They overlap too much with current personality models to offer anything new for science and practice (Zeidner, et al., 2008). In this commentary we raise three concerns we have with Cherniss's suggestions for ESC models: (1) there are important conceptual problems in both the definition of ESC and the distinction of ESC from EI; (2) Cherniss's interpretation of neuroscience findings as supporting the constructs of EI and ESC is outdated, and (3) his interpretation of the famous marshmallow experiment as indicating the existence of ESCs is flawed. Building on the promise of ability models, we conclude by providing suggestions to improve research in EI.

Cognitive and Emotional Deficits Associated with Minor and Serious Delinquency in High-Risk Adolescents

This study aims at evaluating how minor and serious delinquency relates to cognitive and emotional functioning in high-risk adolescents, taking problematic substance use into account. In 80 high-risk adolescent males (13-19 years), the frequency of minor and serious offences committed over the last year was predicted, in multiple regression analyses, from problematic substance use, intellectual efficiency, trait impulsivity, alexithymia (inability to express feelings in words), and cognitive coping strategies. Both minor and serious delinquency were more frequent in adolescents with more problematic substance use and higher intellectual efficacy. Minor delinquency was further related to a tendency to act out when experiencing negative emotions, and difficulties in focusing energy on instrumental action when under stress; while serious delinquency was predominantly and strongly related to rigid and dichotomous thinking. The results underline the heterogeneous nature of delinquency, minor offences being primarily associated with emotional regulation deficits, while major offences are related with a lack of cognitive flexibility.

Glomus intraradices induces changes in root system architecture of rice independently of common symbiosis signaling

? Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi colonize the roots of most monocotyledons and dicotyledons despite their different root architecture and cell patterning. Among the cereal hosts of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, Oryza sativa (rice) possesses a peculiar root system composed of three different types of roots: crown roots; large lateral roots; and fine lateral roots. Characteristic is the constitutive formation of aerenchyma in crown roots and large lateral roots and the absence of cortex from fine lateral roots. Here, we assessed the distribution of colonization by Glomus intraradices within this root system and determined its effect on root system architecture. ? Large lateral roots are preferentially colonized, and fine lateral roots are immune to arbuscular mycorrhizal colonization. Fungal preference for large lateral roots also occurred in sym mutants that block colonization of the root beyond rhizodermal penetration. ? Initiation of large lateral roots is significantly induced by G. intraradices colonization and does not require a functional common symbiosis signaling pathway from which some components are known to be needed for symbiosis-mediated lateral root induction in Medicago truncatula. ? Our results suggest variation of symbiotic properties among the different rice root-types and induction of the preferred tissue by arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. Furthermore, signaling for arbuscular mycorrhizal-elicited alterations of the root system differs between rice and M. truncatula.