BIOFEEDBACK AS A METHOD FOR STUDENTS’ MENTAL STATE ASSESSMENT

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M. Yu. Ababkova

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Introduction. Neurotechnologies based on the principles of a nervous system functioning are being introduced into modern educational process more and more actively. Neurotechnology-based devices give the chance to develop new educational products; to enlarge the content of education by means of transition from text, graphic and sound content filling of educational process to use of tactile, motor, emotional, and other content. One of the most perspective neurotechnologies for the field of education is the method of biofeedback (BF which enables to define students’ mental state, change various physiological processes proceeding from the obtained data, correct educational process, and improve its quality and effectiveness.The aim of the present publication is to identify the opportunities of the biofeedback method application for educational purposes.Methodology and research methods. A pilot study on the basis of biofeedback technique was conducted in order to study the influence of active learning methods on students’ mental state mastering in specialty “Advertising and Public Relations”. H. Eysenck’s PEN Model was used to form focus-groups (control and experimental; psychophysiological technique CMS (Current Mental State was applied for results processing. Also, such methods as comparative analysis, induction and generalization were used.Results. A true picture of psychological attributes of students’ mental condition has been received for efficient studying of the current psychological state on psychophysiological functions, and training active methods impact on a condition of mentality of students according to the results of cardiorhythmogram.The main results of a pilot research were quantitative data (as percentage points of the current mental and psychological conditions of examinees. The obtained results have reflected the degree of attributes manifestation such as general adaptive resource, degree of mobility (lability of

Influence of social class perceptions on attributions among mental health practitioners.

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Thompson, Mindi; Diestelmann, Jacob; Cole, Odessa; Keller, Abiola; Minami, Takuya

2014-01-01

A vignette-based study assessed the influence of social class attributions toward a hypothetical client's difficulty. 188 licensed mental health professionals who were recruited through professional listservs completed an online survey after reviewing one of two versions of a vignette describing a hypothetical client that varied based on social class cues. As expected, this sample of licensed mental health practitioners detected social class differences based on the descriptors of the hypothetical client across the two vignettes. These perceived social class differences, however, did not impact participants' attributions toward the client for causing or solving her problems, level of Global Assessment of Functioning score ascribed to the client, or willingness to work with the client. There was no evidence that participants differentially ascribed attributions based on social class. Implications and directions for future research are provided.

Canadian military personnel's population attributable fractions of mental disorders and mental health service use associated with combat and peacekeeping operations.

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Sareen, Jitender; Belik, Shay-Lee; Afifi, Tracie O; Asmundson, Gordon J G; Cox, Brian J; Stein, Murray B

2008-12-01

We investigated mental disorders, suicidal ideation, self-perceived need for treatment, and mental health service utilization attributable to exposure to peacekeeping and combat operations among Canadian military personnel. With data from the Canadian Community Health Survey Cycle 1.2 Canadian Forces Supplement, a cross-sectional population-based survey of active Canadian military personnel (N = 8441), we estimated population attributable fractions (PAFs) of adverse mental health outcomes. Exposure to either combat or peacekeeping operations was associated with posttraumatic stress disorder (men: PAF = 46.6%; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 27.3, 62.7; women: PAF = 23.6%; 95% CI = 9.2, 40.1), 1 or more mental disorder assessed in the survey (men: PAF = 9.3%; 95% CI = 0.4, 18.1; women: PAF = 6.1%; 95% CI = 0.0, 13.4), and a perceived need for information (men: PAF = 12.3%; 95% CI = 4.1, 20.6; women: PAF = 7.9%; 95% CI = 1.3, 15.5). A substantial proportion, but not the majority, of mental health-related outcomes were attributable to combat or peacekeeping deployment. Future studies should assess traumatic events and their association with physical injury during deployment, premilitary factors, and postdeployment psychosocial factors that may influence soldiers' mental health.

Mentalizing animals

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kasperbauer, Tyler Joshua

2017-01-01

Ethicists have tended to treat the psychology of attributing mental states to animals as an entirely separate issue from the moral importance of animals’ mental states. In this paper I bring these two issues together. I argue for two theses, one descriptive and one normative. The descriptive thesis...... holds that ordinary human agents use what are generally called phenomenal mental states (e.g., pain and other emotions) to assign moral considerability to animals. I examine recent empirical research on the attribution of phenomenal states and agential states (e.g., memory and intelligence) to argue...... that phenomenal mental states are the primary factor, psychologically, for judging an animal to be morally considerable. I further argue that, given the role of phenomenal states in assigning moral considerability, certain theories in animal ethics will meet significant psychological resistance. The normative...

Conversations about mental states and theory of mind development during middle childhood: A training study.

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Bianco, Federica; Lecce, Serena; Banerjee, Robin

2016-09-01

Despite 30years of productive research on theory of mind (ToM), we still know relatively little about variables that influence ToM development during middle childhood. Recent experimental studies have shown that conversations about the mind affect ToM abilities, but they have not explored the mechanisms underlying this developmental effect. In the current study, we examined two potential mechanisms through which conversations about mental states are likely to influence ToM: an increased frequency of references to mental states when explaining behavior and an increased accuracy of mental-state attributions. To this aim, we conducted a training study in which 101 children were assigned to either an intervention condition or a control condition. The conversation-based intervention was made up of four sessions scheduled over 2weeks. Children completed a battery of assessments before and after the intervention as well as 2months later. The groups were equivalent at Time 1 (T1) for age, family affluence, vocabulary, and executive functions. The ToM group showed an improvement in ToM skills (as evaluated on both the practiced tasks and a transfer task). Mediation analyses demonstrated that the accuracy of mental-state attributions, but not the mere frequency of mental-state references, mediated the positive effect of conversations about the mind on ToM development. Our results indicate that conversational experience can enhance mental-state reasoning not by simply drawing children's attention to mental states but rather by scaffolding a mature understanding of social situations. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Beyond attributions: Understanding public stigma of mental illness with the common sense model.

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Mak, Winnie W S; Chong, Eddie S K; Wong, Celia C Y

2014-03-01

The present study applied the common sense model (i.e., cause, controllability, timeline, consequences, and illness coherence) to understand public attitudes toward mental illness and help-seeking intention and to examine the mediating role of perceived controllability between causal attributions with public attitudes and help seeking. Based on a randomized household sample of 941 Chinese community adults in Hong Kong, results of the structural equation modeling demonstrated that people who endorsed cultural lay beliefs tended to perceive the course of mental illness as less controllable, whereas those with psychosocial attributions see its course as more controllable. The more people perceived the course of mental illness as less controllable, more chronic, and incomprehensible, the lower was their acceptance and the greater was mental illness stigma. Furthermore, those who perceived mental illness with dire consequences were more likely to feel greater stigma and social distance. Conversely, when people were more accepting, they were more likely to seek help for psychological services and felt a shorter social distance. The common sense model provides a multidimensional framework in understanding public's mental illness perceptions and stigma. Not only should biopsychosocial determinants of mental illness be advocated to the public, cultural myths toward mental illness must be debunked.

Perceived Interpersonal Discrimination and Older Women’s Mental Health: Accumulation Across Domains, Attributions, and Time

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Bécares, Laia; Zhang, Nan

2018-01-01

Abstract Experiencing discrimination is associated with poor mental health, but how cumulative experiences of perceived interpersonal discrimination across attributes, domains, and time are associated with mental disorders is still unknown. Using data from the Study of Women’s Health Across the Nation (1996–2008), we applied latent class analysis and generalized linear models to estimate the association between cumulative exposure to perceived interpersonal discrimination and older women’s mental health. We found 4 classes of perceived interpersonal discrimination, ranging from cumulative exposure to discrimination over attributes, domains, and time to none or minimal reports of discrimination. Women who experienced cumulative perceived interpersonal discrimination over time and across attributes and domains had the highest risk of depression (Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale score ≥16) compared with women in all other classes. This was true for all women regardless of race/ethnicity, although the type and severity of perceived discrimination differed across racial/ethnic groups. Cumulative exposure to perceived interpersonal discrimination across attributes, domains, and time has an incremental negative long-term association with mental health. Studies that examine exposure to perceived discrimination due to a single attribute in 1 domain or at 1 point in time underestimate the magnitude and complexity of discrimination and its association with health. PMID:29036550

A Cross-sectional Survey of Disability Attributed to Mental Disorders and Service Use in China

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Li-Li Shang

2017-01-01

Conclusions: There are statistical differences of disability prevalence attributed to mental disorders by people and region in China. Service use in disabled people with mental disorders is insufficient.

State-level Medicaid expenditures attributable to smoking.

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Armour, Brian S; Finkelstein, Eric A; Fiebelkorn, Ian C

2009-07-01

Medicaid recipients are disproportionately affected by tobacco-related disease because their smoking prevalence is approximately 53% greater than that of the overall US adult population. This study estimates state-level smoking-attributable Medicaid expenditures. We used state-level and national data and a 4-part econometric model to estimate the fraction of each state's Medicaid expenditures attributable to smoking. These fractions were multiplied by state-level Medicaid expenditure estimates obtained from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to estimate smoking-attributable expenditures. The smoking-attributable fraction for all states was 11.0% (95% confidence interval, 0.4%-17.0%). Medicaid smoking-attributable expenditures ranged from $40 million (Wyoming) to $3.3 billion (New York) in 2004 and totaled $22 billion nationwide. Cigarette smoking accounts for a sizeable share of annual state Medicaid expenditures. To reduce smoking prevalence among recipients and the growth rate in smoking-attributable Medicaid expenditures, state health departments and state health plans such as Medicaid are encouraged to provide free or low-cost access to smoking cessation counseling and medication.

Using fiction to assess mental state understanding: a new task for assessing theory of mind in adults.

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David Dodell-Feder

Full Text Available Social functioning depends on the ability to attribute and reason about the mental states of others--an ability known as theory of mind (ToM. Research in this field is limited by the use of tasks in which ceiling effects are ubiquitous, rendering them insensitive to individual differences in ToM ability and instances of subtle ToM impairment. Here, we present data from a new ToM task--the Short Story Task (SST--intended to improve upon many aspects of existing ToM measures. More specifically, the SST was designed to: (a assess the full range of individual differences in ToM ability without suffering from ceiling effects; (b incorporate a range of mental states of differing complexity, including epistemic states, affective states, and intentions to be inferred from a first- and second-order level; (c use ToM stimuli representative of real-world social interactions; (d require participants to utilize social context when making mental state inferences; (e exhibit adequate psychometric properties; and (f be quick and easy to administer and score. In the task, participants read a short story and were asked questions that assessed explicit mental state reasoning, spontaneous mental state inference, and comprehension of the non-mental aspects of the story. Responses were scored according to a rubric that assigned greater points for accurate mental state attributions that included multiple characters' mental states. Results demonstrate that the SST is sensitive to variation in ToM ability, can be accurately scored by multiple raters, and exhibits concurrent validity with other social cognitive tasks. The results support the effectiveness of this new measure of ToM in the study of social cognition. The findings are also consistent with studies demonstrating significant relationships among narrative transportation, ToM, and the reading of fiction. Together, the data indicate that reading fiction may be an avenue for improving ToM ability.

Using Fiction to Assess Mental State Understanding: A New Task for Assessing Theory of Mind in Adults

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Dodell-Feder, David; Lincoln, Sarah Hope; Coulson, Joseph P.; Hooker, Christine I.

2013-01-01

Social functioning depends on the ability to attribute and reason about the mental states of others – an ability known as theory of mind (ToM). Research in this field is limited by the use of tasks in which ceiling effects are ubiquitous, rendering them insensitive to individual differences in ToM ability and instances of subtle ToM impairment. Here, we present data from a new ToM task – the Short Story Task (SST) - intended to improve upon many aspects of existing ToM measures. More specifically, the SST was designed to: (a) assess the full range of individual differences in ToM ability without suffering from ceiling effects; (b) incorporate a range of mental states of differing complexity, including epistemic states, affective states, and intentions to be inferred from a first- and second-order level; (c) use ToM stimuli representative of real-world social interactions; (d) require participants to utilize social context when making mental state inferences; (e) exhibit adequate psychometric properties; and (f) be quick and easy to administer and score. In the task, participants read a short story and were asked questions that assessed explicit mental state reasoning, spontaneous mental state inference, and comprehension of the non-mental aspects of the story. Responses were scored according to a rubric that assigned greater points for accurate mental state attributions that included multiple characters’ mental states. Results demonstrate that the SST is sensitive to variation in ToM ability, can be accurately scored by multiple raters, and exhibits concurrent validity with other social cognitive tasks. The results support the effectiveness of this new measure of ToM in the study of social cognition. The findings are also consistent with studies demonstrating significant relationships among narrative transportation, ToM, and the reading of fiction. Together, the data indicate that reading fiction may be an avenue for improving ToM ability. PMID:24244736

Atribuição de estados mentais no discurso de crianças do espectro autístico The attribution of mental states in the speech of children with autistic spectrum disorders

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Lyvia Christina Camarotto Battiston Rodrigues

2011-03-01

Full Text Available OBJETIVO: Analisar a atribuição de estados mentais no discurso de crianças pertencentes aos Distúrbios do Espectro Autístico e verificar a modificação no vocabulário e extensão frasal desses, após período de terapia fonoaudiológica. MÉTODOS: Foram colhidas amostras de fala da avaliação fonoaudiológica inicial, após seis meses e um ano de terapia fonoaudiológica, registradas nos prontuários de cinco crianças com autismo infantil e cinco com síndrome de Asperger para caracterização do desempenho verbal e da habilidade de atribuição de estados mentais de cada criança. Considerando-se apenas as emissões espontâneas, foram verificadas as palavras pertencentes às classes substantivo e verbo e classificadas como termos que referem estados físicos e mentais. A comparação entre os três momentos foi realizada por meio da avaliação da significância entre as medianas das amostras obtidas (teste da mediana, com diferença significativa ao nível de 10%. RESULTADOS: Verificou-se aumento no número de palavras emitidas e também no número de palavras por frase emitida entre os períodos de avaliação e após um ano de terapia fonoaudiológica para crianças com autismo infantil. Não foram encontradas diferenças para a atribuição de verbos de estados físicos e mentais e substantivos de estados mentais para ambos os grupos, sendo observada diminuição na emissão de substantivos de estados físicos no grupo autismo infantil. CONCLUSÃO: A atribuição de estados mentais aumentou após período de intervenção terapêutica fonoaudiológica, porém, sem diferença significativa, verificando-se aumento no comportamento verbal de crianças com autismo infantil.PURPOSE: To analyze the attribution of mental states in the speech of children within the Autistic Spectrum Disorders, and verify the modification in their vocabulary and phrasal extension, after a period of speech-language therapy. METHODS: Speech samples from the

College students' stigmatization of people with mental illness: familiarity, implicit person theory, and attribution.

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Lyndon, Amy E; Crowe, Allison; Wuensch, Karl L; McCammon, Susan L; Davis, Karen B

2016-11-25

Stigma associated with mental illness (MI) results in underutilization of mental health care. We must understand factors contributing to stigma to shape anti-stigma campaigns. To investigate the factors influencing stigma in university students. Undergraduate psychology students completed measures on causal attribution, stigma, social distance, implicit person theory (IPT), and familiarity. The hypothesis was partially supported; people who felt personality traits were unchangeable (i.e. entity IPT) were more likely to stigmatize individuals with mental disorders and desired more social distance from them. Familiarity with people with a MI individually predicted less desire for social distance, yet the redundancy of the predictors made the effect of familiarity on stigma fall just short of statistical significance. Judgments of biogenetic causal attribution were related to higher stigma levels, but not so when familiarity and IPT were taken into account. Educational campaigns may be effective by focusing on aspects of MI highlighting similarity with non-diagnosed people, and that people with MI can recover.

Mental Health of Survivors of the 2010 Haitian Earthquake Living in the United States

Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

2010-04-16

Thousands of survivors of the 2010 Haitian Earthquake are currently living in the United States. This podcast features a brief non-disease-specific interview with Dr. Marc Safran, CDC's longest serving psychiatrist, about a few of the mental health challenges such survivors may face.  Created: 4/16/2010 by CDC Center of Attribution: Mental and Behavioral Health Team, 2010 CDC Haiti Earthquake Mission, CDC Emergency Operations Center.   Date Released: 5/6/2010.

Exploring Work-Related Causal Attributions of Common Mental Disorders.

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Olsen, Ingrid Blø; Øverland, Simon; Reme, Silje Endresen; Løvvik, Camilla

2015-09-01

Common mental disorders (CMDs) are major causes of sickness absence and disability. Prevention requires knowledge of how individuals perceive causal mechanisms, and in this study we sought to examine work-related factors as causal attribution of CMDs. A trial sample of n = 1,193, recruited because they struggled with work participation due to CMDs, answered an open-ended questionnaire item about what they believed were the most important causes of their CMDs. The population included participants at risk of sickness absence, and participants with reduced work participation due to sickness absence, disability or unemployment. We used thematic content analysis and categorized responses from 487 participants who reported work-related factors as causal attributions of their CMDs. Gender differences in work-related causal attributions were also examined. The participants attributed their CMDs to the following work-related factors; work stress, leadership, reduced work participation, job dissatisfaction, work conflict, social work environment, job insecurity and change, workplace bullying, and physical strain. Women tended to attribute CMDs to social factors at work. Findings from this study suggest several work-related risk factors for CMDs. Both factors at the workplace, and reduced work participation, were perceived by study participants as contributing causes of CMDs. Thus, there is a need to promote work participation whilst at the same time targeting aversive workplace factors. Further, our findings indicate that work-related factors may affect women and men differently. This illustrates that the association between work participation and CMDs is complex, and needs to be explored further.

Quality or quantity? Exploring the relationship between Public Open Space attributes and mental health in Perth, Western Australia.

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Francis, Jacinta; Wood, Lisa J; Knuiman, Matthew; Giles-Corti, Billie

2012-05-01

Mental health is a public health priority globally. Public Open Space (POS) may enhance mental health by facilitating contact with nature and the development of supportive relationships. Despite growing interest in the influence of the built environment on mental health, associations between POS attributes and mental health remain relatively unexplored. In particular, few studies have examined the relative effects of the quantity and quality of POS within a neighbourhood on mental health. Guided by a social-ecological framework, this study investigated the relationship between POS attributes (i.e., quantity and quality) and better mental health (i.e., low risk of psychological distress) in residents of new housing developments in the Perth metropolitan area, Western Australia. The extent to which relationships between POS attributes and mental health were confounded by psychosocial factors (e.g., social support, sense of community) and frequent use of POS was also explored. Data were obtained from a cross-sectional survey (n = 911), a POS audit, and Geographical Information Systems, and was analysed using logistic regression. Approximately 80% of survey participants were at low risk of psychological distress. Residents of neighbourhoods with high quality POS had higher odds of low psychosocial distress than residents of neighbourhoods with low quality POS. This appeared to be irrespective of whether or not they used POS. However, the quantity of neighbourhood POS was not associated with low psychological distress. From a mental health perspective, POS quality within a neighbourhood appears to be more important than POS quantity. This finding has policy implications and warrants further investigation. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

An audience research study to disseminate evidence about comprehensive state mental health parity legislation to US State policymakers: protocol.

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Purtle, Jonathan; Lê-Scherban, Félice; Shattuck, Paul; Proctor, Enola K; Brownson, Ross C

2017-06-26

A large proportion of the US population has limited access to mental health treatments because insurance providers limit the utilization of mental health services in ways that are more restrictive than for physical health services. Comprehensive state mental health parity legislation (C-SMHPL) is an evidence-based policy intervention that enhances mental health insurance coverage and improves access to care. Implementation of C-SMHPL, however, is limited. State policymakers have the exclusive authority to implement C-SMHPL, but sparse guidance exists to inform the design of strategies to disseminate evidence about C-SMHPL, and more broadly, evidence-based treatments and mental illness, to this audience. The aims of this exploratory audience research study are to (1) characterize US State policymakers' knowledge and attitudes about C-SMHPL and identify individual- and state-level attributes associated with support for C-SMHPL; and (2) integrate quantitative and qualitative data to develop a conceptual framework to disseminate evidence about C-SMHPL, evidence-based treatments, and mental illness to US State policymakers. The study uses a multi-level (policymaker, state), mixed method (QUAN→qual) approach and is guided by Kingdon's Multiple Streams Framework, adapted to incorporate constructs from Aarons' Model of Evidence-Based Implementation in Public Sectors. A multi-modal survey (telephone, post-mail, e-mail) of 600 US State policymakers (500 legislative, 100 administrative) will be conducted and responses will be linked to state-level variables. The survey will span domains such as support for C-SMHPL, knowledge and attitudes about C-SMHPL and evidence-based treatments, mental illness stigma, and research dissemination preferences. State-level variables will measure factors associated with C-SMHPL implementation, such as economic climate and political environment. Multi-level regression will determine the relative strength of individual- and state

A case report using the mental state examination scale (MSES): a tool for measuring change in mental state.

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Fernando, Irosh; Carter, Gregory

2016-02-01

There is a need for a simple and brief tool that can be used in routine clinical practice for the quantitative measurement of mental state across all diagnostic groups. The main utilities of such a tool would be to provide a global metric for the mental state examination, and to monitor the progression over time using this metric. We developed the mental state examination scale (MSES), and used it in an acute inpatient setting in routine clinical work to test its initial feasibility. Using a clinical case, the utility of MSES is demonstrated in this paper. When managing the patient described, the MSES assisted the clinician to assess the initial mental state, track the progress of the recovery, and make timely treatment decisions by quantifying the components of the mental state examination. MSES may enhance the quality of clinical practice for clinicians, and potentially serve as an index of universal mental healthcare outcome that can be used in clinical practice, service evaluation, and healthcare economics. © The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists 2015.

Causal attributions of vineyard executives – A mental model study of vineyard management☆

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Martin FG Schaffernicht

2017-12-01

Full Text Available This article contributes a reference of causal attributions made by vineyard executives in Chile, where increasing costs and stagnating prices challenge the vineyards’ profits. The investigation was motivated by the question how executives interpret the industry's mid term future and how they reflect on steering their companies. Based on in-depth interviews, causal maps were elaborated to represent the executives’ mental models. These are represented as sequences of attributions, connecting variables by causal links. It was found that some mental models guide policies bound to increase the prices, whereas other models suggest taking the prices as givens and control costs. The collection of causal attributions of the vineyard executives (CAVE has been made publicly available. As a result, CAVE can be used by other management scholars to elicit other executives’ mental models and increase the data base available. Since such research will be cumulative, a minimum size for meaningful statistical analysis can be reached, opening up an avenue for improving the design of business policies. CAVE can also serve executives and consultants in constructing causal argumentations and business policies. Future research and development of supporting software are called for. Keywords: Mental models, Strategy, Business model

Association between baseline psychological attributes and mental health outcomes after soldiers returned from deployment.

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Shen, Yu-Chu; Arkes, Jeremy; Lester, Paul B

2017-10-05

Psychological health is vital for effective employees, especially in stressful occupations like military and public safety sectors. Yet, until recently little empirical work has made the link between requisite psychological resources and important mental health outcomes across time in those sectors. In this study we explore the association between 14 baseline psychological health attributes (such as adaptability, coping ability, optimism) and mental health outcomes following exposure to combat deployment. Retrospective analysis of all U.S. Army soldiers who enlisted between 2009 and 2012 and took the Global Assessment Tools (GAT) before their first deployment (n = 63,186). We analyze whether a soldier screened positive for depression and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after returning from deployment using logistic regressions. Our key independent variables are 14 psychological attributes based on GAT, and we control for relevant demographic and service characteristics. In addition, we generate a composite risk score for each soldier based on the predicted probabilities from the above multivariate model using just baseline psychological attributes and demographic information. Comparing those who scored in the bottom 5 percentile of each attribute to those in the top 95 percentile, the odds ratio of post-deployment depression symptoms ranges from 1.21 (95% CI 1.06, 1.40) for organizational trust to 1.73 (CI 1.52, 1.97) for baseline depression. The odds ratio of positive screening of PTSD symptoms ranges from 1.22 for family support (CI 1.08, 1.38) to 1.51 for baseline depression (CI 1.32, 1.73). The risk profile analysis shows that 31% of those who screened positive for depression and 27% of those who screened positive for PTSD were concentrated among the top 5% high risk population. A set of validated, self-reported questions administered early in a soldier's career can predict future mental health problems, and can be used to improve workforce fit and

42 CFR 431.620 - Agreement with State mental health authority or mental institutions.

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2010-10-01

... 42 Public Health 4 2010-10-01 2010-10-01 false Agreement with State mental health authority or mental institutions. 431.620 Section 431.620 Public Health CENTERS FOR MEDICARE & MEDICAID SERVICES... GENERAL ADMINISTRATION Relations With Other Agencies § 431.620 Agreement with State mental health...

Mental state talk by Danish preschool children

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Ane Knüppel

2008-02-01

Full Text Available Sixteen 4 to 6-year-old Danish children were video-recorded, while interacting spontaneously with their family in their homes. The mental state talk of the children was identified and analysed with respect to three mental domains: desire, feeling and cognition, and was compared to data from a similar study carried out with Canadian families (Jenkins et al., 2003. Our results suggest some cross-cultural differences in children’s mental state talk. First, Danish children produce a larger variation of mental state talk words than Canadian children do, and second, the distribution of mental state talk across the three domains differed for the two language groups. Semantic variation between Danish and English was identified in the study, which may partly explain the findings. Furthermore we present a usage-based approach to the investigation of children’s development of psychological categories in language as well as cross-linguistically.

Knowledge and causal attributions for mental disorders in HIV-positive children and adolescents: results from rural and urban Uganda.

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Nalukenge, W; Martin, F; Seeley, J; Kinyanda, E

2018-05-02

Increasing availability of antiretroviral treatment (ART) has led HIV to be considered a chronic disease, shifting attention to focus on quality of life including mental wellbeing. We investigated knowledge and causal attributions for mental disorders in HIV-positive children and adolescents in rural and urban Uganda. This qualitative study was nested in an epidemiological mental health study among HIV-positive children and adolescents aged 5-17 years in rural and urban Uganda. In-depth interviews were conducted with caregivers of HIV-positive children (5-11 years) and adolescents (12-17 years) in HIV care. Interviews were audio recorded with permission from participants and written consent and assent sought before study procedures. Thirty eight participants (19 caregivers, 19 children/adolescents) were interviewed. Age range of caregivers was 28-69 years; majority were female (17). Caregivers had little knowledge on mental disorders ;only 3 related the vignette to a mental problem  and attributed it to: improper upbringing, violence, poverty and bereavement. Five adolescents identified vignettes as portraying mental disorders caused by: ill-health of parents, bereavement, child abuse, discrimination, HIV and poverty. Caregivers are not knowledgeable about behavioural and emotional challenges in HIV-positive children/adolescents. Mental health literacy programmes at HIV care clinics are essential to enhance treatment-seeking for mental health.

Social attribution skills of children born preterm at very low birth weight.

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Williamson, Kathryn E; Jakobson, Lorna S

2014-11-01

Children born prematurely at very low birth weight (social functioning, including autism spectrum disorders (e.g., Johnson et al., 2010). In the current study, we used the Happé-Frith animated triangles task (Abell, Happé, & Frith, 2000) to study social attribution skills in this population. In this task, typical viewers attribute intentionality and mental states to shapes, based on characteristics of their movements. Participants included 34 preterm children and 36 full-term controls, aged 8-11 years. Groups were comparable in terms of age at test, gender, handedness, and socioeconomic status; they also performed similarly on tests of selective attention/processing speed and verbal intelligence. Relative to full-term peers, preterm children's descriptions of the animations were less appropriate overall; they also overattributed intentionality/mental states to randomly moving shapes and underattributed intentionality/mental states to shapes that seemed to be interacting socially. Impairments in the ability to infer the putative mental states of triangles from movement cues alone were most evident in children displaying more "autistic-like" traits, and this may reflect atypical development of and/or functioning in, or atypical connections between, parts of the social brain.

Features of Speech Reactions to Mental State Concepts

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Ekaterina M. Alekseeva

2017-11-01

Full Text Available The article is devoted to the problem of mental state associative speech representation. The study involved 31 Russian-speaking subjects (27 females and 4 males at the age of 18 - 22 years old. The experimental procedure using DMDX program allowed to measure the time of speech response to stimuli - the concepts of 25 mental states. The average reaction time to the concepts of mental states, shown on the computer monitor, made 2114.68 milliseconds. The most rapid associative speech response was the response to the following stimuli: "ecstasy" (1452.54 msec, "meditation" (1569.26 msec, "tranquility" (1685.21 msec, the slowest response is the response to "interest" (2517.5 msec and "indecision" (2454.63 msec. In total, 448 associations were given to the concepts of 25 mental states by tested subjects - speech reactions, i.e. 17.9 associations per mental state on the average. The greatest number of speech associations (24 was given to the concept of love. The smallest number was given to the concept of ecstasy (11 associations. Associative fields of mental states (meditation, ecstasy, melancholy, tiredness, loneliness have the most pronounced core. The prospects of the study consist in the performance of a similar associative experiment among the representatives of another culture, as well as in the studying of an estimated and situational associative representation of mental states.

The animacy advantage for free-recall performance is not attributable to greater mental arousal.

Science.gov (United States)

Popp, Earl Y; Serra, Michael J

2018-01-01

People often demonstrate better memory for animate concepts (e.g., lion and sailor) than for inanimate concepts (e.g., hammer and mountain). Researchers have attributed this effect to an adaptive memory mechanism that favours information relevant for survival, including information about living things. In the present experiment, we examined the hypothesis that people demonstrate better free-recall performance for animate than inanimate words because animate words tend to be associated with greater mental arousal than inanimate words, a factor that was not controlled for in previous experiments on this topic. To this end, we matched animate and inanimate word lists on mental arousal (and several other factors), and compared participants' free-recall performance for the two word types. We were able to replicate past findings that participants' free-recall of animate words exceeds their free-recall of inanimate words, but we found no support for the possibility that the effect stems from differences in mental arousal between animate and inanimate concepts, as this effect maintained even when the word lists were matched on mental arousal. The present results therefore indicate that mental arousal cannot explain the effects of animacy on free-recall performance.

Belief attribution despite verbal interference.

Science.gov (United States)

Forgeot d'Arc, Baudouin; Ramus, Franck

2011-05-01

False-belief (FB) tasks have been widely used to study the ability of individuals to represent the content of their conspecifics' mental states (theory of mind). However, the cognitive processes involved are still poorly understood, and it remains particularly debated whether language and inner speech are necessary for the attribution of beliefs to other agents. We present a completely nonverbal paradigm consisting of silent animated cartoons in five closely related conditions, systematically teasing apart different aspects of scene analysis and allowing the assessment of the attribution of beliefs, goals, and physical causation. In order to test the role of language in belief attribution, we used verbal shadowing as a dual task to inhibit inner speech. Data on 58 healthy adults indicate that verbal interference decreases overall performance, but has no specific effect on belief attribution. Participants remained able to attribute beliefs despite heavy concurrent demands on their verbal abilities. Our results are most consistent with the hypothesis that belief attribution is independent from inner speech.

The Burden Attributable to Mental and Substance Use Disorders as Risk Factors for Suicide: Findings from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2010

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Ferrari, Alize J.; Norman, Rosana E.; Freedman, Greg; Baxter, Amanda J.; Pirkis, Jane E.; Harris, Meredith G.; Page, Andrew; Carnahan, Emily; Degenhardt, Louisa; Vos, Theo; Whiteford, Harvey A.

2014-01-01

Background The Global Burden of Disease Study 2010 (GBD 2010) identified mental and substance use disorders as the 5th leading contributor of burden in 2010, measured by disability adjusted life years (DALYs). This estimate was incomplete as it excluded burden resulting from the increased risk of suicide captured elsewhere in GBD 2010's mutually exclusive list of diseases and injuries. Here, we estimate suicide DALYs attributable to mental and substance use disorders. Methods Relative-risk estimates of suicide due to mental and substance use disorders and the global prevalence of each disorder were used to estimate population attributable fractions. These were adjusted for global differences in the proportion of suicide due to mental and substance use disorders compared to other causes then multiplied by suicide DALYs reported in GBD 2010 to estimate attributable DALYs (with 95% uncertainty). Results Mental and substance use disorders were responsible for 22.5 million (14.8–29.8 million) of the 36.2 million (26.5–44.3 million) DALYs allocated to suicide in 2010. Depression was responsible for the largest proportion of suicide DALYs (46.1% (28.0%–60.8%)) and anorexia nervosa the lowest (0.2% (0.02%–0.5%)). DALYs occurred throughout the lifespan, with the largest proportion found in Eastern Europe and Asia, and males aged 20–30 years. The inclusion of attributable suicide DALYs would have increased the overall burden of mental and substance use disorders (assigned to them in GBD 2010 as a direct cause) from 7.4% (6.2%–8.6%) to 8.3% (7.1%–9.6%) of global DALYs, and would have changed the global ranking from 5th to 3rd leading cause of burden. Conclusions Capturing the suicide burden attributable to mental and substance use disorders allows for more accurate estimates of burden. More consideration needs to be given to interventions targeted to populations with, or at risk for, mental and substance use disorders as an effective strategy for suicide

Self-awareness moderates the relation between maternal mental state language about desires and children's mental state vocabulary.

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Taumoepeau, Mele; Ruffman, Ted

2016-04-01

In this intervention study, we tested the differential effect of talking about children's desires versus talking about others' thoughts and knowledge on children's acquisition of mental state vocabulary for children who did and did not have mirror self-recognition. In a sample of 96 mother-toddler dyads, each mother was randomly assigned a specially constructed, interactive lift-the-flap book to read to her child three times a week for 4 weeks. In the child desire condition the story elicited comments regarding the child's desires, and in the cognitive condition the story elicited the mother's comments about her own thoughts and knowledge while reading the story. Children's mirror self-recognition and mental state vocabulary were assessed at pre- and post-test. Children in the condition that focused on the child's desires showed a significantly greater increase in their mental state vocabulary; however, this effect was moderated by their levels of self-awareness, with children benefitting more from the intervention if they also showed self-recognition at pre-test. We argue that the combination of specific types of maternal talk and children's prior insights facilitates gains in children's mental state vocabulary. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

State-Level Estimates of Obesity-Attributable Costs of Absenteeism

Science.gov (United States)

Andreyeva, Tatiana; Luedicke, Joerg; Wang, Y. Claire

2014-01-01

Objective To provide state-level estimates of obesity-attributable costs of absenteeism among working adults in the U.S. Methods Nationally-representative data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) for 1998–2008 and from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) for 2012 are examined. The outcome is obesity-attributable workdays missed in the previous year due to health, and their costs to states. Results Obesity, but not overweight, is associated with a significant increase in workdays absent, from 1.1 to 1.7 extra days missed annually compared to normal weight employees. Obesity-attributable absenteeism among American workers costs the nation an estimated $8.65 billion per year. Conclusion Obesity imposes a considerable financial burden on states, accounting for 6.5%–12.6% of total absenteeism costs in the workplace. State legislature and employers should seek effective ways to reduce these costs. PMID:25376405

Labelling people as having personality disorder: Effects upon the attributions and intended behaviours of student mental health nurses.

OpenAIRE

Magness, Laura

2013-01-01

Objectives The aim was to investigate whether there are differences in the attributions, emotional reactions and intended behaviours of student mental health nurses towards individuals with personality disorder, compared to those with schizophrenia. The relationships between attributions, emotional reactions and intended behaviours were also investigated. Method An experimental mixed design was used. Participants were randomly allocated into two groups: one viewing the label of perso...

Children's mental health and collective violence: a binational study on the United States-Mexico border.

Science.gov (United States)

Leiner, Marie; Puertas, Hector; Caratachea, Raúl; Avila, Carmen; Atluru, Aparna; Briones, David; Vargas, Cecilia de

2012-05-01

To investigate the risk effects of poverty and exposure to collective violence attributed to organized crime on the mental health of children living on the United States-Mexico border. A repeated, cross-sectional study measured risk effects by comparing scores of psychosocial and behavioral problems among children and adolescents living on the border in the United States or Mexico in 2007 and 2010. Patients living in poverty who responded once to the Pictorial Child Behavior Checklist (P+CBCL) in Spanish were randomly selected from clinics in El Paso, Texas, United States (poverty alone group), and Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico (poverty plus violence group). Only children of Hispanic origin (Mexican-American or Mexican) living below the poverty level and presenting at the clinic for nonemergency visits with no history of diagnosed mental, neurological, or life-threatening disease or disability were included. Exposure to collective violence and poverty seemed to have an additive effect on children's mental health. Children exposed to both poverty and collective violence had higher problem scores, as measured by the P+CBCL, than those exposed to poverty alone. It is important to consider that children and adolescents exposed to collective violence and poverty also have fewer chances to receive treatment. Untreated mental health problems predict violence, antisocial behaviors, and delinquency and affect families, communities, and individuals. It is crucial to address the mental health of children on the border to counteract the devastating effects this setting will have in the short term and the near future.

Maternal Mental State Language and Preschool Children's Attachment Security: Relation to Children's Mental State Language and Expressions of Emotional Understanding

Science.gov (United States)

Mcquaid, Nancy; Bigelow, Ann E.; McLaughlin, Jessica; MacLean, Kim

2008-01-01

Mothers' mental state language in conversation with their preschool children, and children's preschool attachment security were examined for their effects on children's mental state language and expressions of emotional understanding in their conversation. Children discussed an emotionally salient event with their mothers and then relayed the…

Research on Attribute Reduction in Hoisting Motor State Recognition of Quayside Container Crane

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Li, F.; Tang, G.; Hu, X.

2017-07-01

In view of too many attributes in hoisting motor state recognition of quayside container crane. Attribute reduction method based on discernibility matrix is introduced to attribute reduction of lifting motor state information table. A method of attribute reduction based on the combination of rough set and genetic algorithm is proposed to deal with the hoisting motor state decision table. Under the condition that the information system's decision-making ability is unchanged, the redundant attribute is deleted. Which reduces the complexity and computation of the recognition process of the hoisting motor. It is possible to realize the fast state recognition.

Mental State Talk Structure in Children’s Narratives: A Cluster Analysis

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Giuliana Pinto

2017-01-01

Full Text Available This study analysed children’s Theory of Mind (ToM as assessed by mental state talk in oral narratives. We hypothesized that the children’s mental state talk in narratives has an underlying structure, with specific terms organized in clusters. Ninety-eight children attending the last year of kindergarten were asked to tell a story twice, at the beginning and at the end of the school year. Mental state talk was analysed by identifying terms and expressions referring to perceptual, physiological, emotional, willingness, cognitive, moral, and sociorelational states. The cluster analysis showed that children’s mental state talk is organized in two main clusters: perceptual states and affective states. Results from the study confirm the feasibility of narratives as an outlet to inquire mental state talk and offer a more fine-grained analysis of mental state talk structure.

Business as usual--at the state mental hospital.

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Fowlkes, M R

1975-02-01

Despite official policy and professional emphasis to the contrary, the custodial mental hospital continues to exist as a major form of state-provided mental health care. In this paper, one such institution, "New England State Hospital", is described, and the various features of hospital organization that sustain a system of custodial care are discussed. Although the custodial hospital offers little to its patients, its persistent survival can be explained by the number of non-patient vested interests that are well served by the state hospital, precisely in its existing custodial form. The case study of New England State Hospital suggests that reform of state mental institutions depends less on a programmatic formulation of desired changes than on an understanding of the structured resistance to such changes.

MENTAL STATE LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT: THE LONGITUDINAL ROLES OF ATTACHMENT AND MATERNAL LANGUAGE.

Science.gov (United States)

Becker Razuri, Erin; Hiles Howard, Amanda R; Purvis, Karyn B; Cross, David R

2017-05-01

Maternal mental state language is thought to influence children's mental state language and sociocognitive understanding (e.g., theory of mind), but the mechanism is unclear. The current study examined the longitudinal development of mental state language in mother-child interactions. The methodology included assessments of the child and/or mother-child dyad at six time points between 12 to 52 months of the child's age. Measures determined child's attachment style and language abilities, and mental state language used by mother and child during a block-building task. Results showed that (a) mental state talk, including belief and desire language, increased over time; (b) there were differences between the type of mental state words used by the mother in insecure versus secure dyads; (c) there were differences in patterns of mental state words used in both mothers and children in insecure versus secure dyads; and (d) attachment appeared to exert a consistent influence over time. © 2017 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health.

Effects of user mental state on EEG-BCI performance

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Andrew eMyrden

2015-06-01

Full Text Available Changes in psychological state have been proposed as a cause of variation in brain-computer interface performance, but little formal analysis has been conducted to support this hypothesis. In this study, we investigated the effects of three mental states - fatigue, frustration, and attention - on BCI performance. Twelve able-bodied participants were trained to use a two-class EEG-BCI based on the performance of user-specific mental tasks. Following training, participants completed three testing sessions, during which they used the BCI to play a simple maze navigation game while periodically reporting their perceived levels of fatigue, frustration, and attention. Statistical analysis indicated that there is a significant relationship between frustration and BCI performance while the relationship between fatigue and BCI performance approached significance. BCI performance was 7% lower than average when self-reported fatigue was low and 10% lower than average when self-reported frustration was low. A multivariate analysis of mental state revealed the presence of contiguous regions in mental state space where BCI performance was more accurate than average, suggesting the importance of moderate fatigue for achieving effortless focus on BCI control, frustration as a potential motivating factor, and attention as a compensatory mechanism to increasing frustration. Finally, a visual analysis showed the sensitivity of underlying class distributions to changes in mental state. Collectively, these results indicate that mental state is closely related to BCI performance, encouraging future development of psychologically adaptive BCIs.

Mental Health Services to State Corrections Inmates. Staff Brief 86-10.

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Henkel, Jane R.

This report was written for the Advisory Committee on Mentally Ill Inmates of the Wisconsin State Legislative Council's Special Committee on Mental Health Issues. It describes mental health services to inmates of Wisconsin's state prisons. Part I describes the organization of state level responsibilities for corrections, including the state…

How Medicaid agencies administer mental health services: results from a 50-state survey.

Science.gov (United States)

Verdier, James; Barrett, Allison

2008-10-01

This brief report describes some notable variations in how state Medicaid agencies administer and fund Medicaid mental health services. Hour-long telephone interviews were conducted with all state and District of Columbia Medicaid directors or their designees. Responses indicated that Medicaid and mental health agencies were located within the same umbrella agency in 28 states, potentially facilitating collaboration. The mental health agency provided funding for some Medicaid mental health services in 32 states, and counties provided such funding in 22 states. Medicaid agencies generally delegated more authority to state mental health agencies in states where some Medicaid funding came from mental health sources and also in states where both agencies were in the same umbrella agency. The increasing role of Medicaid in funding state mental health services, combined with new federal limits on Medicaid financing of these services, underscores the importance of interagency collaboration and better alignment of Medicaid and mental health responsibilities.

Mini mental state examination

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kørner, Ejnar Alex; Lauritzen, Lise; Wang, August

2008-01-01

INTRODUCTION: The Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) is widely used in Denmark, but often in non-validated versions. In 2000 a cross-sectional workgroup decided on a new common version of the MMSE with a corresponding manual, which is validated for the first time in the present study. MATERIALS...... the severity of dementia disorders. Udgivelsesdato: 2008-Feb-25...

Changes in mental state associated with prison environments: a systematic review.

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Walker, J; Illingworth, C; Canning, A; Garner, E; Woolley, J; Taylor, P; Amos, T

2014-06-01

To develop an understanding of the stability of mental health during imprisonment through review of existing research evidence relating physical prison environment to mental state changes in prisoners. A systematic literature search was conducted looking at changes in mental state and how this related to various aspects of imprisonment and the prison environment. Fifteen longitudinal studies were found, and from these, three broad themes were delineated: being imprisoned and aspects of the prison regime; stage of imprisonment and duration of sentence; and social density. Reception into prison results in higher levels of psychiatric symptoms that seem to improve over time; otherwise, duration of imprisonment appears to have no significant impact on mental health. Regardless of social density, larger prisons are associated with poorer mental state, as are extremes of social density. There are large gaps in the literature relating prison environments to changes in mental state; in particular, high-quality longitudinal studies are needed. Existing research suggests that although entry to prison may be associated with deterioration in mental state, it tends to improve with time. Furthermore, overcrowding, ever more likely as prison populations rise, is likely to place a particular burden on mental health services. © 2013 John Wiley & Sons A/S. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Seeing mental states: An experimental strategy for measuring the observability of other minds

Science.gov (United States)

Becchio, Cristina; Koul, Atesh; Ansuini, Caterina; Bertone, Cesare; Cavallo, Andrea

2018-03-01

Is it possible to perceive others' mental states? Are mental states visible in others' behavior? In contrast to the traditional view that mental states are hidden and not directly accessible to perception, in recent years a phenomenologically-motivated account of social cognition has emerged: direct social perception. However, despite numerous published articles that both defend and critique direct perception, researchers have made little progress in articulating the conditions under which direct perception of others' mental states is possible. This paper proposes an empirically anchored approach to the observability of others' mentality - not just in the weak sense of discussing relevant empirical evidence for and against the phenomenon of interest, but also, and more specifically, in the stronger sense of identifying an experimental strategy for measuring the observability of mental states and articulating the conditions under which mental states are observable. We conclude this article by reframing the problem of direct perception in terms of establishing a definable and measurable relationship between movement features and perceived mental states.

Changes in mental state and behaviour in Huntington's disease.

Science.gov (United States)

Eddy, Clare M; Parkinson, Ellice G; Rickards, Hugh E

2016-11-01

Changes in mental state and behaviour have been acknowledged in Huntington's disease since the original monograph in 1872 provided evidence of disinhibition and impaired social cognition. Behavioural problems can manifest before obvious motor symptoms and are frequently the most disabling part of the illness. Although pharmacological treatments are used routinely for psychiatric difficulties in Huntington's disease, the scientific evidence base for their use is somewhat sparse. Moreover, effective treatments for apathy and cognitive decline do not currently exist. Understanding the social cognitive impairments associated with Huntington's disease can assist management, but related therapeutic interventions are needed. Future research should aim to design rating scales for behaviour and mental state in Huntington's disease that can detect change in clinical trials. Generally, communication and understanding of behaviour and mental state in Huntington's would be enhanced by a clear conceptual framework that unifies ideas around movement, cognition, emotion, behaviour, and mental state, reflecting both the experience of the patient and their underlying neuropathology. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Predicting everyday functional abilities of dementia patients with the Mini-Mental State Examination.

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Razani, Jill; Wong, Jennifer T; Dafaeeboini, Natalia; Edwards-Lee, Terri; Lu, Po; Alessi, Cathy; Josephson, Karen

2009-03-01

The Mini-Mental State Examination is a widely used cognitive screening measure. The purpose of the present study was to assess how 5 specific clusters of Mini-Mental State Examination items (ie, subscores) correlate with and predict specific areas of daily functioning in dementia patients, 61 patients with varied forms of dementia were administered the Mini-Mental State Examination and an observation-based daily functional test (the Direct Assessment of Functional Status). The results revealed that the orientation and attention subscores of the Mini-Mental State Examination correlated most significantly with most functional domains. The Mini-Mental State Examination language items correlated with all but the shopping and time orientation tasks, while the Mini-Mental State Examination recall items correlated with the Direct Assessment of Functional Status time orientation and shopping tasks. Stepwise regression analyses found that among the Mini-Mental State Examination subscores, orientation was the single, best independent predictor of daily functioning.

An Exploration of Secondary Students' Mental States When Learning about Acids and Bases

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Liu, Chia-Ju; Hou, I-Lin; Chiu, Houn-Lin; Treagust, David F.

2014-01-01

This study explored factors of students' mental states, including emotion, intention, internal mental representation, and external mental representation, which can affect their learning performance. In evaluating students' mental states during the science learning process and the relationship between mental states and learning…

[Dangerous states and mental health disorders: perceptions and reality].

Science.gov (United States)

Tassone-Monchicourt, C; Daumerie, N; Caria, A; Benradia, I; Roelandt, J-L

2010-01-01

Image of Madness was always strongly linked with the notion of "dangerousness", provoking fear and social exclusion, despite the evolution of psychiatric practices and organisation, and the emphasis on user's rights respect. Mediatization and politicization of this issue through news item combining crime and mental illness, reinforce and spread out this perception. This paper presents a review of the litterature on social perceptions associating "dangerousness", "Insanity" and "mental illness", available data about the link between "dangerous states" and "psychiatric disorders", as well as the notion of "dangerousness" and the assessment of "dangerous state" of people suffering or not from psychiatric disorders. MAPPING OF SOCIAL REPRESENTATIONS: The French Survey "Mental Health in General Population: Images and Realities (MHGP)" was carried out between 1999 and 2003, on a representative sample of 36.000 individuals over 18 years old. It aims at describing the social representations of the population about "insanity/insane" and "mental illness/mentally ill". The results show that about 75% of the people interviewed link "insanity" or "mental illness" with "criminal or violent acts". Young people and those with a high level of education more frequently categorize violent and dangerous behaviours in the field of Mental illness rather than in that of madness. CORRELATION BETWEEN DANGEROUS STATE AND PSYCHIATRIC DISORDERS: in the scientific literature, all experts reject the hypothesis of a direct link between violence and mental disorder. Besides, 2 tendencies appear in their conclusions: on one hand, some studies establish a significative link between violence and severe mental illness, compared with the general population. On the other hand, results show that 87 to 97% of des aggressors are not mentally ills. Therefore, the absence of scientific consensus feeds the confusion and reinforce the link of causality between psychiatric disorders and violence. OFFICIAL

Associations between causal attributions and personal stigmatizing attitudes in untreated persons with current mental health problems.

Science.gov (United States)

Stolzenburg, Susanne; Freitag, Simone; Schmidt, Silke; Schomerus, Georg

2018-02-01

Past research has shown that among the general public, certain causal explanations like biomedical causes are associated with stronger desire for social distance from persons with mental illness. Aim of this study was to find out how different causal attributions of persons with untreated mental health problems regarding their own complaints are associated with stigmatizing attitudes, anticipated self-stigma when seeking help and perceived stigma-stress. Altogether, 207 untreated persons with a current depressive syndrome were interviewed. Biomedical causes, but also belief in childhood trauma or unhealthy behavior as a cause of the problem, were associated with stronger personal stigma and with more stigma-stress. Similarities and differences to findings among the general population and implications for future research are discussed. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

A pilot test of a new stated preference valuation method. Continuous attribute-based stated choice

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ready, Richard; Fisher, Ann; Guignet, Dennis; Stedman, Richard; Wang, Junchao

2006-01-01

A new stated preference nonmarket valuation technique is developed. In an interactive computerized survey, respondents move continuous sliders to vary levels of environmental attributes. The total cost of the combination of attributes is calculated according to a preprogrammed cost function, continuously updated and displayed as respondents move the sliders. Each registered choice reveals the respondent's marginal willingness to pay for each of the attributes. The method is tested in a museum exhibit on global climate change. Two construct validity tests were conducted. Responses are sensitive to the shape of the cost function in ways that are consistent with expectations based on economic theory. Implied marginal willingness to pay values were similar to those estimated using a more traditional paired comparisons stated choice format. However, responses showed range effects that indicate potential cognitive biases. (author)

Estimating mental states of a depressed person with bayesian networks

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Klein, Michel C.A.; Modena, Gabriele

2013-01-01

In this work in progress paper we present an approach based on Bayesian Networks to model the relationship between mental states and empirical observations in a depressed person. We encode relationships and domain expertise as a Hierarchical Bayesian Network. Mental states are represented as latent

A preliminary study of the mini-mental state examination in a Spanish child population.

Science.gov (United States)

Rubial-Alvarez, Sandra; Machado, María-Clara; Sintas, Elena; de Sola, Susana; Böhm, Peter; Peña-Casanova, Jordi

2007-11-01

The Mini-Mental State Examination is one of the most widely used screening tests for the adult population in daily neurologic practice. The aim of this study was to describe and to analyze the results of the Mini-Mental State Examination administered to Spanish children and to assess the relationship between Mini-Mental State Examination scores and the child's mental age/intelligence quotient. The study population included 181 children whose ages ranged between 4 and 12 years. The neuropsychologic battery consisted of the Mini-Mental State Examination and Kaufman Brief Intelligence Test. Percentiles were obtained for the Mini-Mental State Examination total score according to age ranges. Performance gradually increased from 4 to 10 years of age when a plateau in the total Mini-Mental State Examination score was reached. At the age of 6 years, results exceeded 24 on average. Pairwise mean comparisons showed statistically significant differences between the age groups (P Mini-Mental State Examination score correlated significantly with the child's chronologic (r = 0.80, P mental (r = 0.76, P Mini-Mental State Examination in a Spanish child population as well as a first step for the assessment of the usefulness of this instrument as a cognitive screening tool for children's development.

Theory of mind in the wild: toward tackling the challenges of everyday mental state reasoning.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Annie E Wertz

Full Text Available A complete understanding of the cognitive systems underwriting theory of mind (ToM abilities requires articulating how mental state representations are generated and processed in everyday situations. Individuals rarely announce their intentions prior to acting, and actions are often consistent with multiple mental states. In order for ToM to operate effectively in such situations, mental state representations should be generated in response to certain actions, even when those actions occur in the presence of mental state content derived from other aspects of the situation. Results from three experiments with preschool children and adults demonstrate that mental state information is indeed generated based on an approach action cue in situations that contain competing mental state information. Further, the frequency with which participants produced or endorsed explanations that include mental states about an approached object decreased when the competing mental state information about a different object was made explicit. This set of experiments provides some of the first steps toward identifying the observable action cues that are used to generate mental state representations in everyday situations and offers insight into how both young children and adults processes multiple mental state representations.

State and non-state mental health service collaboration in a South African district: a mixed methods study.

Science.gov (United States)

Janse van Rensburg, André; Petersen, Inge; Wouters, Edwin; Engelbrecht, Michelle; Kigozi, Gladys; Fourie, Pieter; van Rensburg, Dingie; Bracke, Piet

2018-05-01

The Life Esidimeni tragedy in South Africa showed that, despite significant global gains in recognizing the salience of integrated public mental health care during the past decade, crucial gaps remain. State and non-state mental health service collaboration is a recognized strategy to increase access to care and optimal use of community resources, but little evidence exist about how it unfolds in low- to middle-income countries. South Africa's Mental Health Policy Framework and Strategic Plan 2013-20 (MHPF) underlines the importance of collaborative public mental health care, though it is unclear how and to what extent this happens. The aim of the study was to explore the extent and nature of state and non-state mental health service collaboration in the Mangaung Metropolitan District, Free State, South Africa. The research involved an equal status, sequential mixed methods design, comprised of social network analysis (SNA) and semi-structured interviews. SNA-structured interviews were conducted with collaborating state and non-state mental health service providers. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with collaborating partners and key stake holders. Descriptive network analyses of the SNA data were performed with Gephi, and thematic analysis of the semi-structured interview data were performed in NVivo. SNA results suggested a fragmented, hospital centric network, with low average density and clustering, and high authority and influence of a specialist psychiatric hospital. Several different types of collaborative interactions emerged, of which housing and treatment adherence a key point of collaboration. Proportional interactions between state and non-state services were low. Qualitative data expanded on these findings, highlighting the range of available mental health services, and pointed to power dynamics as an important consideration in the mental health service network. The fostering of a well-integrated system of care as proposed in the MHPF requires

Steady-state evoked potentials possibilities for mental-state estimation

Science.gov (United States)

Junker, Andrew M.; Schnurer, John H.; Ingle, David F.; Downey, Craig W.

1988-01-01

The use of the human steady-state evoked potential (SSEP) as a possible measure of mental-state estimation is explored. A method for evoking a visual response to a sum-of-ten sine waves is presented. This approach provides simultaneous multiple frequency measurements of the human EEG to the evoking stimulus in terms of describing functions (gain and phase) and remnant spectra. Ways in which these quantities vary with the addition of performance tasks (manual tracking, grammatical reasoning, and decision making) are presented. Models of the describing function measures can be formulated using systems engineering technology. Relationships between model parameters and performance scores during manual tracking are discussed. Problems of unresponsiveness and lack of repeatability of subject responses are addressed in terms of a need for loop closure of the SSEP. A technique to achieve loop closure using a lock-in amplifier approach is presented. Results of a study designed to test the effectiveness of using feedback to consciously connect humans to their evoked response are presented. Findings indicate that conscious control of EEG is possible. Implications of these results in terms of secondary tasks for mental-state estimation and brain actuated control are addressed.

The Effects of Romantic Love on Mentalizing Abilities.

Science.gov (United States)

Wlodarski, Rafael; Dunbar, Robin I M

2014-12-01

The effects of the human pair-bonded state of "romantic love" on cognitive function remain relatively unexplored. Theories on cognitive priming suggest that a state of love may activate love-relevant schemas, such as mentalizing about the beliefs of another individual, and may thus improve mentalizing abilities. On the other hand, recent functional MRI (fMRI) research on individuals who are in love suggests that several brain regions associated with mentalizing may be "deactivated" during the presentation of a love prime, potentially affecting mentalizing cognitions and behaviors. The current study aimed to investigate experimentally the effect of a love prime on a constituent aspect of mentalizing-the attribution of emotional states to others. Ninety-one participants who stated they were "deeply in love" with their romantic partner completed a cognitive task involving the assessment of emotional content of facial stimuli (the Reading the Mind in the Eyes task) immediately after the presentation of either a love prime or a neutral prime. Individuals were significantly better at interpreting the emotional states of others after a love prime than after a neutral prime, particularly males assessing negative emotional stimuli. These results suggest that presentation of a love stimulus can prime love-relevant networks and enhance subsequent performance on conceptually related mentalizing tasks.

The social Bayesian brain: does mentalizing make a difference when we learn?

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Marie Devaine

2014-12-01

Full Text Available When it comes to interpreting others' behaviour, we almost irrepressibly engage in the attribution of mental states (beliefs, emotions…. Such "mentalizing" can become very sophisticated, eventually endowing us with highly adaptive skills such as convincing, teaching or deceiving. Here, sophistication can be captured in terms of the depth of our recursive beliefs, as in "I think that you think that I think…" In this work, we test whether such sophisticated recursive beliefs subtend learning in the context of social interaction. We asked participants to play repeated games against artificial (Bayesian mentalizing agents, which differ in their sophistication. Critically, we made people believe either that they were playing against each other, or that they were gambling like in a casino. Although both framings are similarly deceiving, participants win against the artificial (sophisticated mentalizing agents in the social framing of the task, and lose in the non-social framing. Moreover, we find that participants' choice sequences are best explained by sophisticated mentalizing Bayesian learning models only in the social framing. This study is the first demonstration of the added-value of mentalizing on learning in the context of repeated social interactions. Importantly, our results show that we would not be able to decipher intentional behaviour without a priori attributing mental states to others.

Feasibility of a multiple-choice mini mental state examination for chronically critically ill patients.

Science.gov (United States)

Miguélez, Marta; Merlani, Paolo; Gigon, Fabienne; Verdon, Mélanie; Annoni, Jean-Marie; Ricou, Bara

2014-08-01

Following treatment in an ICU, up to 70% of chronically critically ill patients present neurocognitive impairment that can have negative effects on their quality of life, daily activities, and return to work. The Mini Mental State Examination is a simple, widely used tool for neurocognitive assessment. Although of interest when evaluating ICU patients, the current version is restricted to patients who are able to speak. This study aimed to evaluate the feasibility of a visual, multiple-choice Mini Mental State Examination for ICU patients who are unable to speak. The multiple-choice Mini Mental State Examination and the standard Mini Mental State Examination were compared across three different speaking populations. The interrater and intrarater reliabilities of the multiple-choice Mini Mental State Examination were tested on both intubated and tracheostomized ICU patients. Mixed 36-bed ICU and neuropsychology department in a university hospital. Twenty-six healthy volunteers, 20 neurological patients, 46 ICU patients able to speak, and 30 intubated or tracheostomized ICU patients. None. Multiple-choice Mini Mental State Examination results correlated satisfactorily with standard Mini Mental State Examination results in all three speaking groups: healthy volunteers: intraclass correlation coefficient = 0.43 (95% CI, -0.18 to 0.62); neurology patients: 0.90 (95% CI, 0.82-0.95); and ICU patients able to speak: 0.86 (95% CI, 0.70-0.92). The interrater and intrarater reliabilities were good (0.95 [0.87-0.98] and 0.94 [0.31-0.99], respectively). In all populations, a Bland-Altman analysis showed systematically higher scores using the multiple-choice Mini Mental State Examination. Administration of the multiple-choice Mini Mental State Examination to ICU patients was straightforward and produced exploitable results comparable to those of the standard Mini Mental State Examination. It should be of interest for the assessment and monitoring of the neurocognitive

The Effects of Romantic Love on Mentalizing Abilities

Science.gov (United States)

Wlodarski, Rafael; Dunbar, Robin I. M.

2015-01-01

The effects of the human pair-bonded state of “romantic love” on cognitive function remain relatively unexplored. Theories on cognitive priming suggest that a state of love may activate love-relevant schemas, such as mentalizing about the beliefs of another individual, and may thus improve mentalizing abilities. On the other hand, recent functional MRI (fMRI) research on individuals who are in love suggests that several brain regions associated with mentalizing may be “deactivated” during the presentation of a love prime, potentially affecting mentalizing cognitions and behaviors. The current study aimed to investigate experimentally the effect of a love prime on a constituent aspect of mentalizing—the attribution of emotional states to others. Ninety-one participants who stated they were “deeply in love” with their romantic partner completed a cognitive task involving the assessment of emotional content of facial stimuli (the Reading the Mind in the Eyes task) immediately after the presentation of either a love prime or a neutral prime. Individuals were significantly better at interpreting the emotional states of others after a love prime than after a neutral prime, particularly males assessing negative emotional stimuli. These results suggest that presentation of a love stimulus can prime love-relevant networks and enhance subsequent performance on conceptually related mentalizing tasks. PMID:26167112

The Relationships of Mental States and Intellectual Processes in the Learning Activities of Students

Science.gov (United States)

Prokhorov, Alexander O.; Chernov, Albert V.; Yusupov, Mark G.

2016-01-01

Investigation of the interaction of mental states and cognitive processes in the classroom allows us to solve the problem of increasing the effectiveness of training by activating cognitive processes and management of students' mental states. This article is concerned with the most general patterns of interaction between mental state and…

State mental health policy: Maryland's shared leadership approach to mental health transformation: partnerships that work.

Science.gov (United States)

Semansky, Rafael M

2012-07-01

In 2005, Maryland received a mental health transformation grant from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Maryland's transformation efforts have differed from those in other grantee states and have evolved into a shared leadership approach that harnesses the power of leaders from all sectors of the community. This column describes Maryland's reform efforts, focusing in particular on the development of the position of a peer employment specialist to improve placement of consumers in employment. This shared leadership approach has the potential to enhance long-term sustainability of reform initiatives and uses fewer state resources.

The Current Mental State of School Students in Online Learning Conditions

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kovalevskaya E.V.,

2015-08-01

Full Text Available This article discusses the results of a study of actual mental state of high school students who are active subjects of career self-determination in terms of interactive learning. There are four groups of methods of interactive training: psychological training, art therapy, cognitive, and game training. The main task, which is solved by a researcher in a formative experiment with the use of each of these methods, is to establish significant differences in health, activity and mood as the indicators of current mental state of students in the classroom. As a result, we found that the most significant improvements in the current mental state takes place when using art and game therapy, so these techniques should be used in groups of students with low motivation to work, as well as in the adverse psychological climate. Less significant was the improvement of the current mental state after psychological training due to the fact that this method allow to update and seek solutions to the most important intrapersonal issues and require the implementation of a deeper reflection

Adopting the perspective of another in belief attribution: contribution of Relational Frame Theory to the understanding of impairments in schizophrenia.

Science.gov (United States)

Villatte, Matthieu; Monestès, Jean-Louis; McHugh, Louise; Freixa i Baqué, Esteve; Loas, Gwenolé

2010-06-01

Impaired ability of identifying mental states is a characteristic of schizophrenia spectrum disorders. In particular, people suffering from this illness tend to fail at attributing a belief to another, which has been linked to difficulties in changing interpersonal perspective. Following the view of Relational Frame Theory on perspective-taking skills, the current study aimed at examining the involvement of social anhedonia, one of the frequent features of schizophrenia, in the development of deficits in reversing the I-YOU relation (i.e., adopting the perspective of another). A task consisting of attributing a belief to another or to the self was employed with 30 non-clinical participants with a high level of social anhedonia and with 15 patients diagnosed with schizophrenia. In comparison to two control groups, both experimental groups showed significant poorer performance when adopting the perspective of another. These results constitute important indications to target specific relational repertoires when attempting to remediate impairments in mental states attribution linked to schizophrenia.

The mental health state of atomic bomb survivors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nakane, Yoshibumi; Imamura, Yoshihiro; Yoshitake, Kazuyasu; Honda, Sumihisa; Mine, Mariko; Hatada, Keiko; Tomonaga, Masao; Tagawa, Masuko

1997-01-01

Our department of Neuropsychiatry has clarified the clinical features of several mental disorders and surveyed the causes of those disorders from the psychosocial aspect using the methodology of epidemiological psychiatric approach. Using this previous research experience, we began a long-planned study to examine the mental health state of atomic bomb survivors. Fifty-one years have passed since the atomic bombing, and the survivors must have suffered various psychosocial stresses, other than any direct effect on the central nervous system from exposure to radiation, and it is assumed that victims' mental state has been affected in various ways as a result. The subjects of the survey were 7,670 people who had regular health examinations for atomic bomb survivors during the study period of three years and who consented to participate in the study. Of the total, 226 subjects were selected for a second phase according to the results of the General Health Questionnaire 12-item Version which was used in the first phase of the survey. The results were as follows: 1. The distance from the hypocenter was related to the degree of ill health, and the percentage of people with a high score was greater among those exposed to the atomic bomb in proximity to the hypocenter. 2. 14.6% of the subjects were diagnosed as having some kind of mental disorders according to clinical interviews by trained psychiatrists. These results had not expected prior to the study. On the based of the study, we will try to establish a mental health support system for atomic bomb survivors. (author)

The mental health state of atomic bomb survivors

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Nakane, Yoshibumi; Imamura, Yoshihiro; Yoshitake, Kazuyasu; Honda, Sumihisa; Mine, Mariko; Hatada, Keiko; Tomonaga, Masao [Nagasaki Univ. (Japan). School of Medicine; Tagawa, Masuko

1997-03-01

Our department of Neuropsychiatry has clarified the clinical features of several mental disorders and surveyed the causes of those disorders from the psychosocial aspect using the methodology of epidemiological psychiatric approach. Using this previous research experience, we began a long-planned study to examine the mental health state of atomic bomb survivors. Fifty-one years have passed since the atomic bombing, and the survivors must have suffered various psychosocial stresses, other than any direct effect on the central nervous system from exposure to radiation, and it is assumed that victims` mental state has been affected in various ways as a result. The subjects of the survey were 7,670 people who had regular health examinations for atomic bomb survivors during the study period of three years and who consented to participate in the study. Of the total, 226 subjects were selected for a second phase according to the results of the General Health Questionnaire 12-item Version which was used in the first phase of the survey. The results were as follows: 1. The distance from the hypocenter was related to the degree of ill health, and the percentage of people with a high score was greater among those exposed to the atomic bomb in proximity to the hypocenter. 2. 14.6% of the subjects were diagnosed as having some kind of mental disorders according to clinical interviews by trained psychiatrists. These results had not expected prior to the study. On the based of the study, we will try to establish a mental health support system for atomic bomb survivors. (author)

State narcissism and aggression: The mediating roles of anger and hostile attributional bias.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Caina; Sun, Ying; Ho, Man Yee; You, Jin; Shaver, Phillip R; Wang, Zhenhong

2016-07-01

Prior research has documented a relationship between narcissism and aggression but has focused only on dispositional narcissism without considering situational factors that may increase narcissism temporarily. This study explored the possibility that an increase in state narcissism would foster aggressive responding by increasing anger and hostile attributional bias following unexpected provocation among 162 college students from China. We created a guided-imagination manipulation to heighten narcissism and investigated its effects on anger, aroused hostile attribution bias, and aggressive responses following a provocation with a 2 (narcissism/neutral manipulation) × 2 (unexpected provocation/positive evaluation condition) between-subjects design. We found that the manipulation did increase self-reported state narcissism. The increase in state narcissism in turn heightened aggression, and this relation was mediated by increased anger. Regardless of the level of state narcissism, individuals were more aggressive after being provoked and this effect of provocation was mediated by hostile attributional bias. The findings indicate that narcissism can be temporarily heightened in a nonclinical sample of individuals, and that the effect of state narcissism on aggression is mediated by anger. Differences between state and trait narcissism and possible influences of culture are discussed. Aggr. Behav. 42:333-345, 2016. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Impairments of spontaneous and deliberative mentalizing co-occur, yet dissociate, in schizophrenia.

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Langdon, Robyn; Flynn, Michaela; Connaughton, Emily; Brüne, Martin

2017-11-01

Evidence of impairment in explicit mentalizing in people with schizophrenia has inspired interventions to improve awareness of others' mental states in these individuals. Less is known of implicit mentalizing in schizophrenia, with current findings mixed. We sought to resolve previous inconsistencies using Heider & Simmel's (H&S) classic animation to elicit spontaneous mentalizing and examined relations between spontaneous and deliberative mentalizing. Forty-five schizophrenia outpatients and 27 general-community controls completed two explicit theory-of-mind (TOM) tasks and then described the H&S animation (to elicit spontaneous social attributions about emotionally driven, as well as goal-driven, behaviours), before and after an instruction to think of the shapes as people. Accuracy of basic and social facts and frequencies of personification and different mental-state terms were recorded. Explicit TOM performance was impaired in patients. Patients also generated fewer social (but not basic) facts than controls to describe the H&S animation, and used less mental-state language, before, and even more so, after the 'people' instruction, despite that both groups had used more personification terms after the 'people' instruction. Measures of explicit and spontaneous mentalizing contributed independently to discriminating between groups. Patients respond less to the bottom-up signals of agency that ought normally to elicit spontaneous social attributions, even when cued to think of the stimuli as people, and the stimuli depict emotionally driven, as well as goal-driven, behaviour. That impairments of spontaneous and deliberative mentalizing dissociate in schizophrenia suggests that training deliberative mentalizing may not be enough; interventions to improve spontaneous mentalizing are also needed. Findings People with schizophrenia were less likely than controls to spontaneously attribute causal mental states when viewing dynamic signals of emotionally driven and

Attributing Crop Production in the United States Using Artificial Neural Network

Science.gov (United States)

Ma, Y.; Zhang, Z.; Pan, B.

2017-12-01

Crop production plays key role in supporting life, economy and shaping environment. It is on one hand influenced by natural factors including precipitation, temperature, energy, and on the other hand shaped by the investment of fertilizers, pesticides and human power. Successful attributing of crop production to different factors can help optimize resources and improve productivity. Based on the meteorological records from National Center for Environmental Prediction and state-wise crop production related data provided by the United States Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service, an artificial neural network was constructed to connect crop production with precipitation and temperature anormlies, capital input, labor input, energy input, pesticide consumption and fertilizer consumption. Sensitivity analysis were carried out to attribute their specific influence on crop production for each grid. Results confirmed that the listed factors can generally determine the crop production. Different state response differently to the pertubation of predictands. Their spatial distribution is visulized and discussed.

Voting pattern of mental patients in a community state hospital.

Science.gov (United States)

Klein, M M; Grossman, S A

1967-06-01

The voting pattern of mental patients in a community-based state hospital was studied. Patients were polled on the New York City mayoralty race. A comparison to the vote of the general population revealed that the hospital sample vote resembled most closely the election results of the hospital district. The results highlight the advantage of community-centered mental health facilities, which undertake the treatment and rehabilitation of mental patients under conditions that maintain ties with family and community.

Decoding subjective mental states from fMRI activity patterns

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Tamaki, Masako; Kamitani, Yukiyasu

2011-01-01

In recent years, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) decoding has emerged as a powerful tool to read out detailed stimulus features from multi-voxel brain activity patterns. Moreover, the method has been extended to perform a primitive form of 'mind-reading,' by applying a decoder 'objectively' trained using stimulus features to more 'subjective' conditions. In this paper, we first introduce basic procedures for fMRI decoding based on machine learning techniques. Second, we discuss the source of information used for decoding, in particular, the possibility of extracting information from subvoxel neural structures. We next introduce two experimental designs for decoding subjective mental states: the 'objective-to-subjective design' and the 'subjective-to-subjective design.' Then, we illustrate recent studies on the decoding of a variety of mental states, such as, attention, awareness, decision making, memory, and mental imagery. Finally, we discuss the challenges and new directions of fMRI decoding. (author)

Attribute measurement systems prototypes and equipment in the United States

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Langner, D.C.; Landry, R.P.; Hsue, S.-T.; MacArthur, D.W.; Mayo, D.R.; Smith, M.K.; Nicholas, N.J.; Whiteson, R.

2001-01-01

Since the fall of 1997, the United States has been developing prototypical attribute verification technology for potential use by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) under the Trilateral Initiative. The first attribute measurement equipment demonstration took place in December 1997 at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. This demonstration led to a series of joint Russian Federatioin/US/IAEA technical discussions that focused on attribute measurement technology that could be applied to plutonium bearing items having classified characteristics. A first prototype attribute verification system with an information barrier was demonstrated at a Trilateral Technical Workshop in June 1999 at Los Alamos. This prototype nourished further fruitful discussions between the three parties that has in turn led to the documents discussed in a previous paper. Prototype development has continued in the US, under other initiatives, using an integrated approach that includes the Trilatleral Initiative. Specifically for the Trilateral Initiative, US development has turned to some peripheral equipment that would support verifications by the IAEA. This equipment includes an authentication tool for measurement systems with information barriers and in situ probes that would facilitate inspections by reducing the need to move material out of storage locations for reverification. In this paper, we will first summarize the development of attribute verification measurement system technology in the US and then report on the status of the development of other equipment to support the Trilateral Initiative.

Spatially distributed effects of mental exhaustion on resting-state FMRI networks.

Science.gov (United States)

Esposito, Fabrizio; Otto, Tobias; Zijlstra, Fred R H; Goebel, Rainer

2014-01-01

Brain activity during rest is spatially coherent over functional connectivity networks called resting-state networks. In resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging, independent component analysis yields spatially distributed network representations reflecting distinct mental processes, such as intrinsic (default) or extrinsic (executive) attention, and sensory inhibition or excitation. These aspects can be related to different treatments or subjective experiences. Among these, exhaustion is a common psychological state induced by prolonged mental performance. Using repeated functional magnetic resonance imaging sessions and spatial independent component analysis, we explored the effect of several hours of sustained cognitive performances on the resting human brain. Resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging was performed on the same healthy volunteers in two days, with and without, and before, during and after, an intensive psychological treatment (skill training and sustained practice with a flight simulator). After each scan, subjects rated their level of exhaustion and performed an N-back task to evaluate eventual decrease in cognitive performance. Spatial maps of selected resting-state network components were statistically evaluated across time points to detect possible changes induced by the sustained mental performance. The intensive treatment had a significant effect on exhaustion and effort ratings, but no effects on N-back performances. Significant changes in the most exhausted state were observed in the early visual processing and the anterior default mode networks (enhancement) and in the fronto-parietal executive networks (suppression), suggesting that mental exhaustion is associated with a more idling brain state and that internal attention processes are facilitated to the detriment of more extrinsic processes. The described application may inspire future indicators of the level of fatigue in the neural attention system.

Norms Inform Mental State Ascriptions: A Rational Explanation for the Side-Effect Effect

Science.gov (United States)

Uttich, Kevin; Lombrozo, Tania

2010-01-01

Theory of mind, the capacity to understand and ascribe mental states, has traditionally been conceptualized as analogous to a scientific theory. However, recent work in philosophy and psychology has documented a "side-effect effect" suggesting that moral evaluations influence mental state ascriptions, and in particular whether a behavior is…

COGNITIVE MODELING OF EPISTEMIC MENTAL STATES

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yurovitskaya, L.N.

2017-03-01

Full Text Available Epistemic states of mind, connected with the cognitive activity of a man, are aimed not only at apprehending the world around us, but also at the process of this apprehension. A very important step on this way is an attempt to model these states and processes in terms of formal logics and semantics, irrespective of the language of cognition. The article presents the idea of how formal logical and linguistic modeling of the process of thinking shows the correlation and the interdependence of semantic units connected with mental activities of human brain. The basic notions of the conceptual field of cognition are presented in the article

Mental health in the Middle East: an Egyptian perspective.

Science.gov (United States)

Okasha, A

1999-12-01

This article introduces the reader to mental health in the Middle East with an Egyptian perspective, from the Pharaonic era through the Islamic Renaissance, up until the current state. During Pharaonic times, mental illness was not known as such, as there was no separator between Soma and Psyche. Actually, mental disorders were described as symptoms of the heart and uterine diseases, as stated in Eber's and Kahoun's papyri. In spite of the mystical culture, mental disorders were attributed and treated on a somatic basis. In the Islamic era, mental patients were never subjected to any torture or maltreatment because of the inherited belief that they may be possessed by a good Moslem genie. The first mental hospital in Europe was located in Spain, following the Arab invasion, and from then on it propagated to other European countries. The 14th century Kalawoon Hospital in Cairo had four departments, including medicine, surgery, ophthalmology, and mental disorders. Six centuries earlier, psychiatry in general hospitals was recognized in Europe. The influence of Avicenna and Elrazi and their contributions to European medicine is well-known. This article discusses further the current state of the mental health services in Egypt and the transcultural studies of the prevalence and phenomenology of anxiety, schizophrenia, depression, suicide, conversion, and obsessive compulsive disorders. An outline of psychiatric disorders in children is discussed. The problem of drug abuse is also addressed, especially that in Egypt after 1983, where drugs like heroine replaced the common habit of hashish.

Mental Development of Children with Non-epileptic Paroxysmal States in Medical History

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Turovskaya N.G.,

2015-10-01

Full Text Available The author studied mental functions disorders in children with a history of paroxysmal states of various etiologies and compared mental development disorder patterns in patients with epileptic and non-epileptic paroxysms. Study sample were 107 children, aged 6 to 10 years. The study used experimental psychological and neuropsychological techniques. According to the empirical study results, non-epileptic paroxysms unlike epileptic much less combined with a number of mental functions disorders and intelligence in general. However, non-epileptic paroxysmal states as well as epileptic seizure associated with increasing activity exhaustion and abnormal function of the motor analyzer (dynamic and kinesthetic dyspraxia. Visual memory disorders and modal-nonspecific memory disorders have more pronounced importance in the mental ontogenesis structure in children with convulsive paroxysms compared to children with cerebral pathology without paroxysms history

Attitude towards Epilepsy and Mental Illness in Ekiti State, Nigeria ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Nekky Umera

Social Sciences, University of Ado Ekiti, Ekiti State, P.M.B. 5363 Ekiti. State, Nigeria ... Nigeria, towards epilepsy and mental illness in terms of work opportunities .... have a negative impact in the management of epilepsy (Nbuko et al, 2003).

Structural and functional social network attributes moderate the association of self-rated health with mental health in midlife and older adults.

Science.gov (United States)

Windsor, Tim D; Rioseco, Pilar; Fiori, Katherine L; Curtis, Rachel G; Booth, Heather

2016-01-01

Social relationships are multifaceted, and different social network components can operate via different processes to influence well-being. This study examined associations of social network structure and relationship quality (positive and negative social exchanges) with mental health in midlife and older adults. The focus was on both direct associations of network structure and relationship quality with mental health, and whether these social network attributes moderated the association of self-rated health (SRH) with mental health. Analyses were based on survey data provided by 2001 (Mean age = 65, SD = 8.07) midlife and older adults. We used Latent Class Analysis (LCA) to classify participants into network types based on network structure (partner status, network size, contact frequency, and activity engagement), and used continuous measures of positive and negative social exchanges to operationalize relationship quality. Regression analysis was used to test moderation. LCA revealed network types generally consistent with those reported in previous studies. Participants in more diverse networks reported better mental health than those categorized into a restricted network type after adjustment for age, sex, education, and employment status. Analysis of moderation indicated that those with poorer SRH were less likely to report poorer mental health if they were classified into more diverse networks. A similar moderation effect was also evident for positive exchanges. The findings suggest that both quantity and quality of social relationships can play a role in buffering against the negative implications of physical health decline for mental health.

The Burden of disease attributable to mental and substance use disorders in Brazil: Global Burden of Disease Study, 1990 and 2015.

Science.gov (United States)

Bonadiman, Cecília Silva Costa; Passos, Valéria Maria de Azeredo; Mooney, Meghan; Naghavi, Mohsen; Melo, Ana Paula Souto

2017-05-01

Mental and substance use disorders (MD) are highly prevalent and have a high social and economic cost. To describe the burden of disease attributable to mental and substance use disorders in Brazil and Federated Units in 1990 and 2015. Descriptive study of the burden of mental and substance use disorders, using age-standardized estimates from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2015: years of life lost due to premature mortality (YLL); years lived with disability (YLD); and disability-adjusted life year (DALY=YLL+YLD). In Brazil, despite low mortality rates, there has been a high burden for mental and substance use disorders since 1990, with high YLD. In 2015, these disorders accounted for 9.5% of all DALY, ranking in the third and first position in DALY and YLD, respectively, with an emphasis on depressive and anxiety disorders. Drug use disorders had their highest increase in DALY rates between 1990 and 2015 (37.1%). The highest proportion of DALY occurred in adulthood and in females. There were no substantial differences in burden of mental and substance use disorders among Federated Units. Despite a low mortality rate, mental and substance use disorders are highly disabling, which indicates the need for preventive and protective actions, especially in primary health care. The generalization of estimates in all the Federated Units obtained from studies conducted mostly in the south and southeast regions probably does not reflect the reality of Brazil, indicating the need for studies in all regions of the country.

Preschool-aged children’s understanding of gratitude: Relations with emotion and mental state knowledge

Science.gov (United States)

Nelson, Jackie A.; de Lucca Freitas, Lia Beatriz; O’Brien, Marion; Calkins, Susan D.; Leerkes, Esther M.; Marcovitch, Stuart

2016-01-01

Developmental precursors to children’s early understanding of gratitude were examined. A diverse group of 263 children were tested for emotion and mental state knowledge at ages 3 and 4, and their understanding of gratitude was measured at age 5. Children varied widely in their understanding of gratitude, but most understood some aspects of gratitude-eliciting situations. A model-building path analysis approach was used to examine longitudinal relations among early emotion and mental state knowledge and later understanding of gratitude. Children with a better early understanding of emotions and mental states understand more about gratitude. Mental state knowledge at age 4 mediated the relation between emotion knowledge at age 3 and gratitude understanding at age 5. The current study contributes to the scant literature on the early emergence of children’s understanding of gratitude. PMID:23331105

A New Attribute Control Chart using Multiple Dependent State Repetitive Sampling

KAUST Repository

Aldosari, Mansour Sattam; Aslam, Muhammad; Jun, Chi-Hyuck

2017-01-01

In this manuscript, a new attribute control chart using multiple dependent state repetitive sampling is designed. The operational procedure and structure of the proposed control chart is given. The required measures to determine the average run length (ARL) for in-control and out-of-control processes are given. Tables of ARLs are reported for various control chart parameters. The proposed control chart is more sensitive in detecting a small shift in the process as compared to the existing attribute control charts. The simulation study shows the efficiency of the proposed chart over the existing charts. An example is given for the illustration purpose.

A New Attribute Control Chart using Multiple Dependent State Repetitive Sampling

KAUST Repository

Aldosari, Mansour Sattam

2017-03-25

In this manuscript, a new attribute control chart using multiple dependent state repetitive sampling is designed. The operational procedure and structure of the proposed control chart is given. The required measures to determine the average run length (ARL) for in-control and out-of-control processes are given. Tables of ARLs are reported for various control chart parameters. The proposed control chart is more sensitive in detecting a small shift in the process as compared to the existing attribute control charts. The simulation study shows the efficiency of the proposed chart over the existing charts. An example is given for the illustration purpose.

Law & psychiatry: Gun laws and mental illness: how sensible are the current restrictions?

Science.gov (United States)

Appelbaum, Paul S; Swanson, Jeffrey W

2010-07-01

This column describes federal and state laws to restrict access to firearms among people with mental illness. The contribution to public safety of these laws is likely to be small because only 3%-5% of violent acts are attributable to serious mental illness, and most do not involve guns. The categories of persons with mental illnesses targeted by the laws may not be at higher risk of violence than other subgroups in this population. The laws may deter people from seeking treatment for fear of losing the right to possess firearms and may reinforce stereotypes of persons with mental illnesses as dangerous.

Attribute Obfuscation with Gradient Reversal

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Emmery, Chris; Manjavacas, Enrique; Chrupala, Grzegorz

2018-01-01

Recent advances in computational stylometry have demonstrated that automatically inferring quite an extensive set of personal attributes from text alone (e.g. gender, age, education, socio-economic status, mental health issues) is not only feasible, but can often rely on little supervision. This

ATTRIBUTION OF CONDUCT TO A STATE-THE SUBJECTIVE ELEMENT OF THE INTERNATIONAL RESPONSIBILITY OT THE STATE FOR INTERNATIONALLY WRONGFUL ACTS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

FELICIA MAXIM

2012-05-01

Full Text Available In order to establish responsibility of states for internationally wrongful act, two elements are identified. First, the conduct in question must be attributable to the State under international law. Secondly, for responsibility to attach to the act of the State, the conduct must constitute a breach of an international legal obligation in force for that State at that time. For particular conduct to be characterized as an internationally wrongful act, it must first be attributable to the State. The State is a real organized entity, a legal person with full authority to act under international law. But to recognize this is not to deny the elementary fact that the State cannot act of itself. States can act only by and through their agents and representatives. In determining what constitutes an organ of a State for the purposes of responsibility, the internal law and practice of each State are of prime importance. The structure of the State and the functions of its organs are not, in general, governed by international law. It is a matter for each State to decide how its administration is to be structured and which functions are to be assumed by government. But while the State remains free to determine its internal structure and functions through its own law and practice, international law has a distinct role. Conduct is thereby attributed to the State as a subject of international law and not as a subject of internal law. The State as a subject of international law is held responsible for the conduct of all the organs, instrumentalities and officials which form part of its organization and act in that capacity, whether or not they have separate legal personality under its internal law.

The appreciation of visual jokes in people with schizophrenia: a study of 'mentalizing' ability.

Science.gov (United States)

Corcoran, R; Cahill, C; Frith, C D

1997-04-11

It has been suggested that certain characteristic symptoms of schizophrenia reflect a specific deficit in the ability to attribute mental states to others ('mentalizing'). Patients with negative features, particularly social withdrawal and blunted affect, those with thought disorder and patients with paranoid symptoms have difficulties when they try to infer what is going on in the minds of other people. This study examines this notion using two sets of cartoon jokes. While the first set can be understood purely using physical and semantic analysis, the second set requires that the viewer appreciates the mental state of the main character in order to 'get' the joke. For control subjects there was no difference in the ability to understand the two types of joke, while the schizophrenic patients found the mental state jokes significantly more difficult to understand. This effect was most marked in patients with behavioural disorders and those reporting passivity experiences. Those with paranoid delusions also showed a selective comprehension deficit with the mental state stimuli. Patients who were symptom free at the time of testing showed normal performance.

Personality disorder is an excess risk factor for physical multimorbidity among women with mental state disorders.

Science.gov (United States)

Quirk, Shae E; Stuart, Amanda L; Berk, Michael; Pasco, Julie A; Brennan Olsen, Sharon L; Koivumaa-Honkanen, Heli; Honkanen, Risto; Lukkala, Pyry S; Chanen, Andrew M; Kotowicz, Mark; Williams, Lana J

2017-11-01

We examined whether mental state disorders (lifetime mood, anxiety, eating, substance misuse) with comorbid personality disorder are associated with physical multimorbidity in a population-based sample of women. Mental state and personality disorders were assessed using semi-structured diagnostic interviews. Clinical measures were performed and medical conditions, medication use and lifestyle factors were documented by questionnaire. Mental state disorders were associated with higher odds of physical multimorbidity; risk was especially high for those with comorbid personality disorder. These findings suggest that mental state and physical comorbidity might be worsened by the additional comorbidity of personality disorder. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Through your eyes or mine? The neural correlates of mental state recognition in Huntington's disease.

Science.gov (United States)

Eddy, Clare M; Rickards, Hugh E; Hansen, Peter C

2018-03-01

Huntington's disease (HD) can impair social cognition. This study investigated whether patients with HD exhibit neural differences to healthy controls when they are considering mental and physical states relating to the static expressions of human eyes. Thirty-two patients with HD and 28 age-matched controls were scanned with fMRI during two versions of the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Task: The standard version requiring mental state judgments, and a comparison version requiring judgments about age. HD was associated with behavioral deficits on only the mental state eyes task. Contrasting the two versions of the eyes task (mental state > age judgment) revealed hypoactivation within left middle frontal gyrus and supramarginal gyrus in HD. Subgroup analyses comparing premanifest HD patients to age-matched controls revealed reduced activity in right supramarginal gyrus and increased activity in anterior cingulate during mental state recognition in these patients, while manifest HD was associated with hypoactivity in left insula and left supramarginal gyrus. When controlling for the effects of healthy aging, manifest patients exhibited declining activation within areas including right temporal pole. Our findings provide compelling evidence for a selective impairment of internal emotional status when patients with HD appraise facial features in order to make social judgements. Differential activity in temporal and anterior cingulate cortices may suggest that poor emotion regulation and emotional egocentricity underlie impaired mental state recognition in premanifest patients, while more extensive mental state recognition impairments in manifest disease reflect dysfunction in neural substrates underlying executive functions, and the experience and interpretation of emotion. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Social status determinants of control in individuals' accounts of their mental illness.

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Maher, Erin J; Kroska, Amy

2002-09-01

We examine the determinants of patients' accounts of their own mental illness. In particular, we examine the factors that affect the likelihood of attributing one's own mental illness to controllable factors rather than non-controllable factors. Our quantitative measure of attributional control is derived from the coding of in-depth interviews with people with severe mental illness seeking treatment for the first time (N = 144). We find that those who occupy positions of social disadvantage (particularly African-American males and those who receive public assistance) are less likely to attribute their illness to controllable sources, suggesting that personal mental illness attributions are systematically related to a person's social location. We outline the significance of these findings for research on the psychological consequences of mental illness attributions.

Implications of State Policy Changes on Mental Health Service Models for Students with Disabilities

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Lawson, Janelle E.; Cmar, Jennifer L.

2016-01-01

For over 25 years, students with disabilities in California received educationally related mental health services through interagency collaboration between school districts and county mental health agencies. After a major change in state policy that eliminated state-mandated interagency collaboration, school districts in California are now solely…

Structural Сharacteristics of Mental States in Women Experiencing Difficulties Coping with Midlife Crisis

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Skripacheva E.H.,

2015-10-01

Full Text Available The development of a midlife crisis in women is accompanied by forming mental states that affect the quality of life and determine the possibilities of transformation of midlife crisis into a new stage of self-development. Study sample were 168 women, aged 30 to 44 years. We used projective techniques, questionnaires, content analysis as study methods. The deviation indicator from autogenous norm of M. Lusher test in women with the crisis symptoms has a rather strong positive correlation with the «negative conditions» index (r=0,4; p<0,001. We have identified the parameters of mental states (antipathy, anxiety, tension, asintonia, fatigue that may contribute to the formation of negative mental states in general, hampering personal and social changes in the midlife crisis. The article defines the dominant motivations meaningful for development and transformation of midlife crisis in women. The results complement the scientific understanding of mental states and age characteristics from a gender perspective

O papel dos estados na política de saúde mental no Brasil The role of States in mental health policy in Brazil

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Aline Gabriela Simon

2011-11-01

Full Text Available Este artigo analisa o papel dos estados na política de saúde mental no Brasil no período de 1990 a 2009. A metodologia incluiu a aplicação de questionário eletrônico nas coordenações estaduais de saúde mental de 24 estados brasileiros, revisão documental e análise de base de dados oficiais. Os resultados obtidos apontaram que os estados utilizam várias estratégias e instrumentos na condução da política de saúde mental, principalmente no monitoramento e na prestação de serviços. No entanto, percebeu-se que os estados ainda não desenvolvem de forma sistemática as funções de planejamento, coordenação federativa e coordenação da atenção. O financiamento em saúde mental representa um dos grandes desafios para a gestão dessa área nos estados. Os achados deste estudo sugerem que a superação dos desafios relacionados à condução estadual da política de saúde mental depende da articulação entre governo federal, estados e municípios na elaboração de políticas que atendam à especificidade de cada região, da promoção de um planejamento participativo e de investimentos para o setor.This article examines the role of States in mental health policy in Brazil from 1990 to 2009. The methods included the use of an electronic questionnaire on State coordination of mental health in 24 Brazilian States, document review, and analysis based on official data. The results showed that the States use various strategies and tools to conduct mental health policy, especially in monitoring and services delivery. However, the study showed that States have not developed systematic approaches to planning, coordination with other levels of government, or coordination of care. Funding poses a major challenge for management of mental health at the State level. The study suggests that overcoming the challenges in mental health policy depends on the relationship between the Federal government, States, and Municipalities in drafting

Traumatic injury and perceived injustice: Fault attributions matter in a "no-fault" compensation state.

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Liane J Ioannou

Full Text Available Traumatic injury can lead to loss, suffering and feelings of injustice. Previous research has shown that perceived injustice is associated with poorer physical and mental wellbeing in persons with chronic pain. This study aimed to identify the relative association between injury, compensation and pain-related characteristics and perceived injustice 12-months after traumatic injury.433 participants were recruited from the Victorian Orthopedic Trauma Outcomes Registry and Victorian State Trauma Registry, and completed questionnaires at 12-14 months after injury as part of an observational cohort study. Using hierarchical linear regression we examined the relationships between baseline demographics (sex, age, education, comorbidities, injury (injury severity, hospital length of stay, compensation (compensation status, fault, lawyer involvement, and health outcomes (SF-12 and perceived injustice. We then examined how much additional variance in perceived injustice was related to worse pain severity, interference, self-efficacy, catastrophizing, kinesiophobia or disability.Only a small portion of variance in perceived injustice was related to baseline demographics (especially education level, and injury severity. Attribution of fault to another, consulting a lawyer, health-related quality of life, disability and the severity of pain-related cognitions explained the majority of variance in perceived injustice. While univariate analyses showed that compensable injury led to higher perceptions of injustice, this did not remain significant when adjusting for all other factors, including fault attribution and consulting a lawyer.In addition to the "justice" aspects of traumatic injury, the health impacts of injury, emotional distress related to pain (catastrophizing, and the perceived impact of pain on activity (pain self-efficacy, had stronger associations with perceptions of injustice than either injury or pain severity. To attenuate the likelihood of

Mental Health of Prisoners: Identifying Barriers to Mental Health Treatment and Medication Continuity

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Connell, Nadine M.

2014-01-01

Objectives. We assessed mental health screening and medication continuity in a nationally representative sample of US prisoners. Methods. We obtained data from 18 185 prisoners interviewed in the 2004 Survey of Inmates in State and Federal Correctional Facilities. We conducted survey logistic regressions with Stata version 13. Results. About 26% of the inmates were diagnosed with a mental health condition at some point during their lifetime, and a very small proportion (18%) were taking medication for their condition(s) on admission to prison. In prison, more than 50% of those who were medicated for mental health conditions at admission did not receive pharmacotherapy in prison. Inmates with schizophrenia were most likely to receive pharmacotherapy compared with those presenting with less overt conditions (e.g., depression). This lack of treatment continuity is partially attributable to screening procedures that do not result in treatment by a medical professional in prison. Conclusions. A substantial portion of the prison population is not receiving treatment for mental health conditions. This treatment discontinuity has the potential to affect both recidivism and health care costs on release from prison. PMID:25322306

Inverse Effects of Oxytocin on Attributing Mental Activity to Others in Depressed and Healthy Subjects: A Double-Blind Placebo Controlled fMRI Study.

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David Pincus

2010-10-01

Full Text Available Background: Oxytocin is a stress-attenuating and pro-social neuropeptide. To date, no study has looked at the effects of oxytocin in modulating brain activity in depressed individuals nor attempted to correlate this activity with attribution of mental activity in others. Method: We enrolled 10 unmedicated depressed adults and 10 matched healthy controls in a crossover, double blind placebo controlled fmri 40 i.u. intra-nasal oxytocin study (20 i.u. per nostril. Each subject performed Reading the Mind in the Eyes task (RMET before and after inhalation of oxytocin or placebo control for a total of 80 scans. Results: Before oxytocin administration, RMET engaged medial and lateral prefrontal cortex, amygdala, insula and associative areas. Depressed subjects showed increased anterior ventral activation for the RMET minus gender identification contrast whereas matched controls showed increased dorsal and frontal activity. Compared to placebo, oxytocin in depressed subjects showed increased activity in the superior middle frontal gyrus and insula, while controls exhibited more activity in ventral regions. Oxytocin also led to inverse effects in reaction times on attribution task between groups, with controls getting faster and depressed individuals slower to respond. Conclusion: Depression is associated with increased paralimbic activity during emotional mental attribution of others, appearing to be distinctly modulated by oxytocin when compared to healthy controls. Further studies are needed to explore long-term exposure to pro-social neuropeptides on mood in depressed populations and assess their clinical relevance.

Amygdala volume linked to individual differences in mental state inference in early childhood and adulthood

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Katherine Rice

2014-04-01

Full Text Available We investigated the role of the amygdala in mental state inference in a sample of adults and in a sample of children aged 4 and 6 years. This period in early childhood represents a time when mentalizing abilities undergo dramatic changes. Both children and adults inferred mental states from pictures of others’ eyes, and children also inferred the mental states of others from stories (e.g., a false belief task. We also collected structural MRI data from these participants, to determine whether larger amygdala volumes (controlling for age and total gray matter volume were related to better face-based and story-based mentalizing. For children, larger amygdala volumes were related to better face-based, but not story-based, mentalizing. In contrast, in adults, amygdala volume was not related to face-based mentalizing. We next divided the face-based items into two subscales: cognitive (e.g., thinking, not believing versus affective (e.g., friendly, kind items. For children, performance on cognitive items was positively correlated with amygdala volume, but for adults, only performance on affective items was positively correlated with amygdala volume. These results indicate that the amygdala's role in mentalizing may be specific to face-based tasks and that the nature of its involvement may change over development.

Mother and Infant Talk about Mental States Relates to Desire Language and Emotion Understanding

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Taumoepeau, Mele; Ruffman, Ted

2006-01-01

This study assessed the relation between mother mental state language and child desire language and emotion understanding in 15--24-month-olds. At both times point, mothers described pictures to their infants and mother talk was coded for mental and nonmental state language. Children were administered 2 emotion understanding tasks and their mental…

Microstructural Correlates of Emotional Attribution Impairment in Non-Demented Patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.

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Crespi, Chiara; Cerami, Chiara; Dodich, Alessandra; Canessa, Nicola; Iannaccone, Sandro; Corbo, Massimo; Lunetta, Christian; Falini, Andrea; Cappa, Stefano F

2016-01-01

Impairments in the ability to recognize and attribute emotional states to others have been described in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients and linked to the dysfunction of key nodes of the emotional empathy network. Microstructural correlates of such disorders are still unexplored. We investigated the white-matter substrates of emotional attribution deficits in a sample of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients without cognitive decline. Thirteen individuals with either probable or definite amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and 14 healthy controls were enrolled in a Diffusion Tensor Imaging study and administered the Story-based Empathy Task, assessing the ability to attribute mental states to others (i.e., Intention and Emotion attribution conditions). As already reported, a significant global reduction of empathic skills, mainly driven by a failure in Emotion Attribution condition, was found in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients compared to healthy subjects. The severity of this deficit was significantly correlated with fractional anisotropy along the forceps minor, genu of corpus callosum, right uncinate and inferior fronto-occipital fasciculi. The involvement of frontal commissural fiber tracts and right ventral associative fronto-limbic pathways is the microstructural hallmark of the impairment of high-order processing of socio-emotional stimuli in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. These results support the notion of the neurofunctional and neuroanatomical continuum between amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal dementia.

An empirical analysis of mental state talk and affect regulation in two single-cases of psychodynamic child therapy.

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Halfon, Sibel; Bekar, Ozlem; Gürleyen, Büşra

2017-06-01

Literature has shown the importance of mentalizing techniques in symptom remission and emotional understanding; however, no study to date has looked at the dynamic relations between mental state talk and affect regulation in the psychotherapy process. From a psychodynamic perspective, the emergence of the child's capacity to regulate affect through the therapist's reflection on the child's mental states is a core aspect of treatment. In an empirical investigation of 2 single cases with separation anxiety disorder, who were treated in long-term psychodynamic play therapy informed with mentalization principles, the effect of therapists' and children's use of mental state talk on children's subsequent capacity to regulate affect in play was assessed. One case was a positive outcome case, whereas the other did not show symptomatic improvement at the end of treatment. Children's and therapists' utterances in the sessions were coded using the Coding System for Mental State Talk in Narratives, and children's play was coded by Children's Play Therapy Instrument, which generated an index of children's "affect regulation." Time-series Granger Causality tests showed that even though both therapists' use of mental state talk significantly predicted children's subsequent affect regulation, the association between child's mental state talk and affect regulation was only supported for the child who showed clinically significant symptom reduction. This study provided preliminary support that mental state talk in psychodynamic psychotherapy facilitates emotion regulation in play. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

Music Composition from the Brain Signal: Representing the Mental State by Music

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Dan Wu

2010-01-01

Full Text Available This paper proposes a method to translate human EEG into music, so as to represent mental state by music. The arousal levels of the brain mental state and music emotion are implicitly used as the bridge between the mind world and the music. The arousal level of the brain is based on the EEG features extracted mainly by wavelet analysis, and the music arousal level is related to the musical parameters such as pitch, tempo, rhythm, and tonality. While composing, some music principles (harmonics and structure were taken into consideration. With EEGs during various sleep stages as an example, the music generated from them had different patterns of pitch, rhythm, and tonality. 35 volunteers listened to the music pieces, and significant difference in music arousal levels was found. It implied that different mental states may be identified by the corresponding music, and so the music from EEG may be a potential tool for EEG monitoring, biofeedback therapy, and so forth.

Industrial neuroscience in aviation evaluation of mental states in aviation personnel

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Borghini, Gianluca; Di Flumeri, Gianluca; Babiloni, Fabio

2017-01-01

This book discusses the emerging field of industrial neuroscience, and reports on the authors’ cutting-edge findings in the evaluation of mental states, including mental workload, cognitive control and training of personnel involved either in the piloting of aircraft and helicopters, or in managing air traffic. It encompasses neuroimaging and cognitive psychology techniques and shows how they have been successfully applied in the evaluation of human performance and human-machine interactions, and to guarantee a proper level of safety in such operational contexts. With an introduction to the most relevant concepts of neuroscience, neurophysiological techniques, simulators and case studies in aviation environments, it is a must-have for both students and scientists in the field of aeronautic and biomedical engineering, as well as for various professionals in the aviation world. This is the first book to intensively apply neurosciences to the evaluation of human factors and mental states in aviation.

Teachers' Language in Interactions: An Exploratory Examination of Mental State Talk in Early Childhood Education Classrooms

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King, Elizabeth; La Paro, Karen

2015-01-01

Research Findings: This study examined 34 Head Start teachers' use of four categories of mental state talk (verbalizations of mental processes using emotion terms, cognition terms, desire terms, and perception terms) during naturally occurring classroom interactions. Transcriptions from classroom videos were coded for mental state talk…

Mental State Decoding in Adolescent Boys with Major Depressive Disorder versus Sex-Matched Healthy Controls.

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Mellick, William; Sharp, Carla

2016-01-01

Several adult depression studies have investigated mental state decoding, the basis for theory of mind, using the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test. Findings have been mixed, but a comprehensive study found a greater severity of depression to be associated with poorer mental state decoding. Importantly, there has yet to be a similar study of adolescent depression. Converging evidence suggests that atypical mental state decoding may have particularly profound effects for psychosocial functioning among depressed adolescent boys. Adolescent boys with major depressive disorder (MDD, n = 33) and sex-matched healthy controls (HCs, n = 84) completed structured clinical interviews, self-report measures of psychopathology and the Child Eyes Test (CET). The MDD group performed significantly better than HCs on the CET overall (p = 0.002), underscored by greater accuracy for negatively valenced items (p = 0.003). Group differences on items depicting positive (p = 0.129) and neutral mental states (p = 0.081) were nonsignificant. Enhanced mental state decoding among depressed adolescent boys may play a role in the maintenance of and vulnerability to adolescent depression. Findings and implications are discussed. Limitations of this study include a reliance on self-report data for HC boys, as well as a lack of 'pure' depression among the boys with MDD. © 2016 S. Karger AG, Basel.

The concept of stigma in mental illness as applied to Haitian Americans.

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Dieujuste, Colette

2016-06-01

To report on the analysis of the concept of the stigma of mental illness within the Haitian American community. Mental illness is a highly stigmatized condition within certain communities making it challenging for individuals to seek effective treatment. The consequences of such stigma can have lifelong corollaries for the individuals, the families and the communities. The concept of stigma is not fully developed in nursing; clarity of the concept of stigma of mental illness is still needed in the nursing literature. In order to assist patients in accessing mental health services, the concept of stigma must first be clarified. The method used for this concept analysis was that of Walker and Avant. Five attributes were identified, creating the following definition: labelling, stereotype, negative attitude, emotional response, and discrimination. The antecedents for stigma of mental illness are lack of knowledge about mental illness, emotional state and cultural beliefs and values. The origins of stigmatization of mental illness among Haitian Americans need to be understood. Mental health illnesses are stigmatized within the Haitian culture, which presents as a barrier to accessing help for many Haitian American women suffering from mental illness. The defining attributes can be used to develop tools to help clinicians identify patients being stigmatized. Once stigma is recognized, nurses can develop strategies and policies that can mitigate the effects of stigmatization of mental illness among this patient population. Further research is essential to examine the ways in which this concept impacts the Haitian American community, as well as effective strategies to help minimize its effects. © 2016 International Council of Nurses.

Here, There and Everywhere: Emotion and Mental State Talk in Different Social Contexts Predicts Empathic Helping in Toddlers

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Jesse eDrummond

2014-04-01

Full Text Available A growing body of literature suggests that parents socialize early-emerging prosocial behavior across varied contexts and in subtle yet powerful ways. We focus on discourse about emotions and mental states as one potential socialization mechanism given its conceptual relevance to prosocial behavior and its known positive relations with emotion understanding and social-cognitive development, as well as parents’ frequent use of such discourse beginning in infancy. Specifically, we ask how parents’ emotion and mental state talk with their toddlers relates to toddlers’ helping and how these associations vary by context. Children aged 18- to 30-months (n=38 interacted with a parent during book reading and joint play with toys, two everyday contexts that afford parental discussion of emotions and mental states. Children also participated in instrumental and empathic helping tasks. Results revealed that although parents discuss mental states with their children in both contexts, the nature of their talk differs: during book reading parents labeled emotions and mental states significantly more often than during joint play, especially simple affect words (e.g. happy, sad and explanations or elaborations of emotions; whereas they used more desire talk and mental state words (e.g. think, know in joint play. Parents’ emotion and mental state discourse related to children’s empathic, emotion-based helping behavior; however, it did not relate to instrumental, action-based helping. Moreover, relations between parent talk and empathic helping varied by context: children who helped more quickly had parents who labeled emotion and mental states more often during joint play and who elicited this talk more often during book reading. As emotion and mental state talk both varies between contexts and exhibits context-specific associations with empathic prosocial behavior early in development, we conclude that such discourse may be a key form of socialization

Empathy and aversion: the neural signature of mentalizing in Tourette syndrome.

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Eddy, C M; Cavanna, A E; Hansen, P C

2017-02-01

Previous studies suggest that adults with Tourette syndrome (TS) can respond unconventionally on tasks involving social cognition. We therefore hypothesized that these patients would exhibit different neural responses to healthy controls in response to emotionally salient expressions of human eyes. Twenty-five adults with TS and 25 matched healthy controls were scanned using fMRI during the standard version of the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Task which requires mental state judgements, and a novel comparison version requiring judgements about age. During prompted mental state recognition, greater activity was apparent in TS within left orbitofrontal cortex, posterior cingulate, right amygdala and right temporo-parietal junction (TPJ), while reduced activity was apparent in regions including left inferior parietal cortex. Age judgement elicited greater activity in TS within precuneus, medial prefrontal and temporal regions involved in mentalizing. The interaction between group and task revealed differential activity in areas including right inferior frontal gyrus. Task-related activity in the TPJ covaried with global ratings of the urge to tic. While recognizing mental states, adults with TS exhibit greater activity than controls in brain areas involved in the processing of negative emotion, in addition to reduced activity in regions associated with the attribution of agency. In addition, increased recruitment of areas involved in mental state reasoning is apparent in these patients when mentalizing is not a task requirement. Our findings highlight differential neural reactivity in response to emotive social cues in TS, which may interact with tic expression.

Alzheimer's Dementia: Performance on the Mini-Mental State Examination.

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Teng, Evelyn Lee; And Others

1987-01-01

Analyzed the performance of Alzheimer's patients (N=141) on the Mini-Mental State Examination. Performance on all items showed significant negative correlation with the duration of the illness. The most difficult item was "recall," and the improvement in recall was obtained with cuing. (Author/ABB)

Mental states inside out: switching costs for emotional and nonemotional sentences that differ in internal and external focus.

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Oosterwijk, Suzanne; Winkielman, Piotr; Pecher, Diane; Zeelenberg, René; Rotteveel, Mark; Fischer, Agneta H

2012-01-01

Mental states-such as thinking, remembering, or feeling angry, happy, or dizzy-have a clear internal component. We feel a certain way when we are in these states. These internal experiences may be simulated when people understand conceptual references to mental states. However, mental states can also be described from an "external" perspective, for example when referring to "smiling." In those cases, simulation of visible outside features may be more relevant for understanding. In a switching costs paradigm, we presented semantically unrelated sentences describing emotional and nonemotional mental states while manipulating their internal or external focus. The results show that switching costs occur when participants shift between sentences with an internal and an external focus. This suggests that different forms of simulation underlie understanding these sentences. In addition, these effects occurred for emotional and nonemotional mental states, suggesting that they are grounded in a similar way-through the process of simulation.

Surveys of medical seeking preference, mental health literacy, and attitudes toward mental illness in Taiwan, 1990–2000

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Chia-Yi Wu

2014-01-01

Conclusion: Attribution of depressive and anxiety symptoms appeared to be more likely to influence help-seeking behaviors than attitudes toward mental illness. Enhancing public mental health literacy toward depression may help facilitate help-seeking in response to potential mental illness.

State of the Nigerian child - neglect of child and adolescent mental health: a review.

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Atilola, O; Ayinde, O O; Emedoh, C T; Oladimeji, O

2015-05-01

As most child health initiatives in Nigeria lack a child and adolescent mental health (CAMH) strategy, CAMH issues have remained obscure to the country's policy-makers. The lack of current and representative epidemiological data on the mental health of Nigerian children continues to be a barrier to advocacy for CAMH policy initiatives. In view of the importance of CAMH to national development, there must be a continued search for ways of bringing the state of CAMH in Nigeria to the attention of policy-makers. To use information from UNICEF's State of the World's Children as proxy data to speculate on the state of child mental health in Nigeria. With a view to discussing its CAMH implications, social and health indicators in the Nigerian child were extracted from UNICEF's 2012 edition. Most of the social and health indicators assessed reflect significant mental health risks. Up to 65% of households live on less than US$1·25 per day, child malnutrition is evident in up to 40% of children, and the primary and secondary school net enrolment ratios are only 63% and 25%, respectively. In addition, the rate of attendance for antenatal care was 45%, and only 39% of deliveries were supervised by skilled birth attendants. Child labour and under-age marriage is very common. A literature review demonstrates that children living in these circumstances are at significant risk of mental health problems. Current data on the state of Nigerian children contain indices that can serve as proxy information for the state of CAMH in the country. Policy-makers need to invest more in pre-emptive child health initiatives as a way of preserving the physical and mental health of children.

Mental states, processes, and conscious intent in Libet's experiments

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The meaning and significance of Benjamin Libet's studies on the timing of conscious will have been widely discussed, especially by those wishing to draw sceptical conclusions about conscious agency and free will. However, certain important correctives for thinking about mental states and processes undermine the ...

Identifying the most efficient items from the Mini-Mental State Examination for cognitive function assessment in older Taiwanese patients.

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Lou, Meei-Fang; Dai, Yu-Tzu; Huang, Guey-Shiun; Yu, Po-Jui

2007-03-01

The purpose of the study was to identify the most efficient items from the Mini-Mental State Examination for assessment of cognitive function. The Mini-Mental State Examination is the most frequently used cognitive screening instrument. However, the Mini-Mental State Examination has been criticized for insensitivity to mild cognitive dysfunction, limited memory assessment and variability in level of difficulty of the individual items. This study used secondary data analysis. Item response theory two-parameter model was used to analyse the data from the admission assessment of mental status by the Mini-Mental State Examination for 801 patients. By using item response analysis, 16 items were selected from the original 30-item Mini-Mental State Examination. The 16 items included mainly the measures of orientation, recall and attention and calculation. The internal consistency of the 16-item Mini-Mental State Examination was 0.84. The proposed new cut-off point for the 16-item Mini-Mental State Examination was 11. The correct classification rate was 0.94, the sensitivity was 100% and the specificity was 97.4%, when compared with the original 30-item Mini-Mental State Examination from the cut-off point of 24. This new cut-off point was determined for the purpose of over-identifying patients at risk so as to ensure early detection of and prevention from the onset of cognitive disturbance. Only a few items are needed to describe the subject's cognitive status. Using item response theory analysis, the study found that the Mini-Mental State Examination could be simplified. Deleting the items with less variation makes this assessment tool not only shorter, easier to administer and less strenuous for respondents, but also enables one to maintain validity as a cognitive function test for clinical setting.

Mini-mental Parkinson (MMP) as a dementia screening test: comparison with the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE).

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Larner, Andrew J

2012-07-01

As populations age, screening instruments for cognitive impairment and dementia will become of increasing importance in clinical practice. Mini-Mental Parkinson (MMP), a derivative of the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), was originally described as a cognitive screening instrument for use in Parkinson's disease. Its item content addresses some of the acknowledged shortcomings of the MMSE. Pragmatic use of MMP in general cognitive clinics has not previously been examined. To compare the performance of two scales, Mini-Mental Parkinson (MMP) and the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), as cognitive screening instruments for dementia in a memory clinic population. MMP was administered prospectively to 201 consecutive new patient referrals independent of other tests used to establish dementia diagnosis according to standard diagnostic criteria (DSM-IV). Diagnostic utility of MMP for dementia was measured and compared with MMSE. MMP proved easy to use and acceptable to patients. Optimal test accuracy (0.86) was at MMP cutoff of ≤ 17/32, with sensitivity 0.51, specificity 0.97, positive predictive value 0.83, negative predictive value 0.87, and area under Receiver Operating Characteristic curve 0.89. Using a higher cutoff (≤ 29/32), MMP sensitivity was 1.00 with specificity 0.70. MMP scores correlated with MMSE (r = 0.93) and diagnostic agreement was high (κ = 0.85). MMP is a useful screening instrument in the memory clinic setting, with patients who fall below the designated cutoff requiring further investigation to ascertain a cause for their cognitive impairment.

Detecting Mental States by Machine Learning Techniques: The Berlin Brain-Computer Interface

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Blankertz, Benjamin; Tangermann, Michael; Vidaurre, Carmen; Dickhaus, Thorsten; Sannelli, Claudia; Popescu, Florin; Fazli, Siamac; Danóczy, Márton; Curio, Gabriel; Müller, Klaus-Robert

The Berlin Brain-Computer Interface Brain-Computer Interface (BBCI) uses a machine learning approach to extract user-specific patterns from high-dimensional EEG-features optimized for revealing the user's mental state. Classical BCI applications are brain actuated tools for patients such as prostheses (see Section 4.1) or mental text entry systems ([1] and see [2-5] for an overview on BCI). In these applications, the BBCI uses natural motor skills of the users and specifically tailored pattern recognition algorithms for detecting the user's intent. But beyond rehabilitation, there is a wide range of possible applications in which BCI technology is used to monitor other mental states, often even covert ones (see also [6] in the fMRI realm). While this field is still largely unexplored, two examples from our studies are exemplified in Sections 4.3 and 4.4.

Individuals with Mental Retardation and the Criminal Justice System: The View from States' Attorneys General.

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McAfee, James K.; Gural, Michele

1988-01-01

Results of a survey of state attorneys general (N=46) found that, with few exceptions, identification of persons with mental retardation in criminal justice is neither systematic nor probable. Protections lie in statutes pertaining to mental illness rather than to mental retardation. (Author/DB)

Modulating functional and dysfunctional mentalizing by transcranial magnetic stimulation

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Tobias eSchuwerk

2014-11-01

Full Text Available Mentalizing, the ability to attribute mental states to others and oneself, is a cognitive function with high relevance for social interactions. Recent neuroscientific research has increasingly contributed to attempts to decompose this complex social cognitive function into constituting neurocognitive building blocks. Additionally, clinical research that focuses on social cognition to find links between impaired social functioning and neurophysiological deviations has accumulated evidence that mentalizing is affected in most psychiatric disorders. Recently, both lines of research have started to employ transcranial magnetic stimulation: the first to modulate mentalizing in order to specify its neurocognitive components, the latter to treat impaired mentalizing in clinical conditions. This review integrates findings of these two different approaches to draw a more detailed picture of the neurocognitive basis of mentalizing and its deviations in psychiatric disorders. Moreover, we evaluate the effectiveness of hitherto employed stimulation techniques and protocols, paradigms and outcome measures. Based on this overview we highlight new directions for future research on the neurocognitive basis of functional and dysfunctional social cognition.

Microstructural Correlates of Emotional Attribution Impairment in Non-Demented Patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Chiara Crespi

Full Text Available Impairments in the ability to recognize and attribute emotional states to others have been described in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients and linked to the dysfunction of key nodes of the emotional empathy network. Microstructural correlates of such disorders are still unexplored. We investigated the white-matter substrates of emotional attribution deficits in a sample of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients without cognitive decline. Thirteen individuals with either probable or definite amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and 14 healthy controls were enrolled in a Diffusion Tensor Imaging study and administered the Story-based Empathy Task, assessing the ability to attribute mental states to others (i.e., Intention and Emotion attribution conditions. As already reported, a significant global reduction of empathic skills, mainly driven by a failure in Emotion Attribution condition, was found in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis patients compared to healthy subjects. The severity of this deficit was significantly correlated with fractional anisotropy along the forceps minor, genu of corpus callosum, right uncinate and inferior fronto-occipital fasciculi. The involvement of frontal commissural fiber tracts and right ventral associative fronto-limbic pathways is the microstructural hallmark of the impairment of high-order processing of socio-emotional stimuli in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. These results support the notion of the neurofunctional and neuroanatomical continuum between amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and frontotemporal dementia.

Psychometric Properties of the Folstein Mini-Mental State Examination

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Lopez, Michael N.; Charter, Richard A.; Mostafavi, Beeta; Nibut, Lorraine P.; Smith, Whitney E.

2005-01-01

Criterion-referenced (Livingston) and norm-referenced (Gilmer-Feldt) techniques were used to measure the internal consistency reliability of Folsteins Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) on a large sample (N = 418) of elderly medical patients. Two administration and scoring variants of the MMSE Attention and Calculation section (Serial 7s only…

Story Discourse and Use of Mental State Language between Mothers and School-Aged Children with and without Visual Impairment

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Tadic, Valerija; Pring, Linda; Dale, Naomi

2013-01-01

Background: Lack of sight compromises insight into other people's mental states. Little is known about the role of maternal language in assisting the development of mental state language in children with visual impairment (VI). Aims: To investigate mental state language strategies of mothers of school-aged children with VI and to compare…

Here, there and everywhere: emotion and mental state talk in different social contexts predicts empathic helping in toddlers.

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Drummond, Jesse; Paul, Elena F; Waugh, Whitney E; Hammond, Stuart I; Brownell, Celia A

2014-01-01

A growing body of literature suggests that parents socialize early-emerging prosocial behavior across varied contexts and in subtle yet powerful ways. We focus on discourse about emotions and mental states as one potential socialization mechanism given its conceptual relevance to prosocial behavior and its known positive relations with emotion understanding and social-cognitive development, as well as parents' frequent use of such discourse beginning in infancy. Specifically, we ask how parents' emotion and mental state talk (EMST) with their toddlers relates to toddlers' helping and how these associations vary by context. Children aged 18- to 30-months (n = 38) interacted with a parent during book reading and joint play with toys, two everyday contexts that afford parental discussion of emotions and mental states. Children also participated in instrumental and empathic helping tasks. Results revealed that although parents discuss mental states with their children in both contexts, the nature of their talk differs: during book reading parents labeled emotions and mental states significantly more often than during joint play, especially simple affect words (e.g., happy, sad) and explanations or elaborations of emotions; whereas they used more desire talk and mental state words (e.g., think, know) in joint play. Parents' emotion and mental state discourse related to children's empathic, emotion-based helping behavior; however, it did not relate to instrumental, action-based helping. Moreover, relations between parent talk and empathic helping varied by context: children who helped more quickly had parents who labeled emotion and mental states more often during joint play and who elicited this talk more often during book reading. As EMST both varies between contexts and exhibits context-specific associations with empathic prosocial behavior early in development, we conclude that such discourse may be a key form of socialization in emerging prosociality.

Key attributes of expert NRL referees.

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Morris, Gavin; O'Connor, Donna

2017-05-01

Experiential knowledge of elite National Rugby League (NRL) referees was investigated to determine the key attributes contributing to expert officiating performance. Fourteen current first-grade NRL referees were asked to identify the key attributes they believed contributed to their expert refereeing performance. The modified Delphi method involved a 3-round process of an initial semi-structured interview followed by 2 questionnaires to reach consensus of opinion. The data revealed 25 attributes that were rated as most important that underpin expert NRL refereeing performance. Results illustrate the significance of the cognitive category, with the top 6 ranked attributes all cognitive skills. Of these, the referees ranked decision-making accuracy as the most important attribute, followed by reading the game, communication, game understanding, game management and knowledge of the rules. Player rapport, positioning and teamwork were the top ranked game skill attributes underpinning performance excellence. Expert referees also highlighted a number of psychological attributes (e.g., concentration, composure and mental toughness) that were significant to performance. There were only 2 physiological attributes (fitness, aerobic endurance) that were identified as significant to elite officiating performance. In summary, expert consensus was attained which successfully provided a hierarchy of the most significant attributes of expert NRL refereeing performance.

The importance of communication for clinical leaders in mental health nursing: the perspective of nurses working in mental health.

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Ennis, Gary; Happell, Brenda; Broadbent, Marc; Reid-Searl, Kerry

2013-11-01

Communication has been identified as an important attribute of clinical leadership in nursing. However, there is a paucity of research on its relevance in mental health nursing. This article presents the findings of a grounded theory informed study exploring the attributes and characteristics required for effective clinical leadership in mental health nursing, specifically the views of nurses working in mental health about the importance of effective communication in day to day clinical leadership. In-depth interviews were conducted to gain insight into the participants' experiences and views on clinical leadership in mental health nursing. The data that emerged from these interviews were constantly compared and reviewed, ensuring that any themes that emerged were based on the participants' own experiences and views. Participants recognized that effective communication was one of the attributes of effective clinical leadership and they considered communication as essential for successful working relationships and improved learning experiences for junior staff and students in mental health nursing. Four main themes emerged: choice of language; relationships; nonverbal communication, and listening and relevance. Participants identified that clinical leadership in mental health nursing requires effective communication skills, which enables the development of effective working relationships with others that allows them to contribute to the retention of staff, improved outcomes for clients, and the development of the profession.

Mini‑Mental State Exam versus Montreal Cognitive Assessment in ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Background: Mini‑mental state exam (MMSE) was used several times but no study has examined cognition on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) in diabetes and diabetic retinopathy (DR). In this study, we compared MMSE with MoCA in patients with DR and searched for an association between the severity of DR ...

Different contexts, different effects? Work time and mental health in the United States and Germany.

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Kleiner, Sibyl; Schunck, Reinhard; Schömann, Klaus

2015-03-01

This paper takes a comparative approach to the topic of work time and health, asking whether weekly work hours matter for mental health. We hypothesize that these relationships differ within the United States and Germany, given the more regulated work time environments within Germany and the greater incentives to work long hours in the United States. We further hypothesize that German women will experience greatest penalties to long hours. We use data from the German Socioeconomic Panel and the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth to examine hours effects on mental health score at midlife. The results support our initial hypothesis. In Germany, longer work time is associated with worse mental health, while in the United States, as seen in previous research, the associations are more complex. Our results do not show greater mental health penalties for German women and suggest instead a selection effect into work hours operating by gender. © American Sociological Association 2015.

Minding the Gap: Narrative Descriptions about Mental States Attenuate Parochial Empathy

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Bruneau, Emile G.; Cikara, Mina; Saxe, Rebecca

2015-01-01

In three experiments, we examine parochial empathy (feeling more empathy for in-group than out-group members) across novel group boundaries, and test whether we can mitigate parochial empathy with brief narrative descriptions. In the absence of individuating information, participants consistently report more empathy for members of their own assigned group than a competitive out-group. However, individualized descriptions of in-group and out-group targets significantly reduce parochial empathy by interfering with encoding of targets’ group membership. Finally, the descriptions that most effectively decrease parochial empathy are those that describe targets’ mental states. These results support the role of individuating information in ameliorating parochial empathy, suggest a mechanism for their action, and show that descriptions emphasizing targets’ mental states are particularly effective. PMID:26505194

Does Individual Stigma Predict Mental Health Funding Attitudes? Toward an Understanding of Resource Allocation and Social Climate.

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DeLuca, Joseph S; Clement, Timothy W; Yanos, Philip T

2017-01-01

The uneven progression of mental health funding in the United States, and the way that the funding climate seems to be influenced by local and regional differences, raises the issue of what factors, including stigma, may impact mental health funding decisions. Criticisms that mental health stigma research is too individually-focused have led researchers to consider how broader, macro-level forms of stigma - such as structural stigma - intersect with micro-level forms of individual stigma. While some studies suggest that macro and micro stigma levels are distinct processes, other studies suggest a more synergistic relationship between structural and individual stigma. Participants in the current study (N = 951; national, convenience sample of the U.S.) completed a hypothetical mental health resource allocation task (a measure of structural discrimination). We then compared participants' allocation of resources to mental health to participants' endorsement of negative stereotypes, beliefs about recovery and treatment, negative attributions, intended social distancing, microaggressions, and help-seeking (measures of individual stigma). Negative stereotyping, help-seeking self-stigma, and intended social distancing behaviors were weakly but significantly negatively correlated with allocating funds to mental health programs. More specifically, attributions of blame and anger were positively correlated to funding for vocational rehabilitation; attributions of dangerousness and fear were negatively correlated to funding for supported housing and court supervision and outpatient commitment; and attributions of anger were negatively correlated to funding for inpatient commitment and hospitalization. Individual stigma and sociodemographic factors appear to only partially explain structural stigma decisions. Future research should assess broader social and contextual factors, in addition to other beliefs and worldviews (e.g., allocation preference questionnaire, economic

Maternal Mental State Talk and Infants' Early Gestural Communication

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Slaughter, Virginia; Peterson, Candida C.; Carpenter, Malinda

2009-01-01

Twenty-four infants were tested monthly for the production of imperative and declarative gestures between 0 ; 9 and 1 ; 3 and concurrent mother-infant free-play sessions were conducted at 0 ; 9, 1 ; 0 and 1 ; 3 (Carpenter, Nagell & Tomasello, 1998). Free-play transcripts were subsequently coded for maternal talk about mental states. Results…

Eugenics, genetics, and mental illness stigma in Chinese Americans.

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WonPat-Borja, Ahtoy J; Yang, Lawrence H; Link, Bruce G; Phelan, Jo C

2012-01-01

The increasing interest in the genetic causes of mental disorders may exacerbate existing stigma if negative beliefs about a genetic illness are generally accepted. China's history of policy-level eugenics and genetic discrimination in the workplace suggests that Chinese communities will view genetic mental illness less favorably than mental illness with non-genetic causes. The aim of this study is to identify differences between Chinese Americans and European Americans in eugenic beliefs and stigma toward people with genetic mental illness. We utilized data from a 2003 national telephone survey designed to measure how public perceptions of mental illness differ if the illness is described as genetic. The Chinese American (n = 42) and European American (n = 428) subsamples were analyzed to compare their support of eugenic belief items and measures of stigma. Chinese Americans endorsed all four eugenic statements more strongly than European Americans. Ethnicity significantly moderated the relationship between genetic attribution and three out of five stigma outcomes; however, genetic attribution actually appeared to be de-stigmatizing for Chinese Americans while it increased stigma or made no difference for European Americans. Our findings show that while Chinese Americans hold more eugenic beliefs than European Americans, these attributions do not have the same effect on stigma as they do in Western cultures. These results suggest that future anti-stigma efforts must focus on eugenic attitudes as well as cultural beliefs for Chinese Americans, and that the effects of genetic attributions for mental illness should be examined relative to other social, moral, and religious attributions common in Chinese culture.

Gaius Caligula's mental illness.

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Sidwell, Barbara

2010-01-01

The strange behavior of emperor Gaius has been the subject of debate for many historians. Some charge him with madness and attribute it to his illness in A.D. 37, whereas others believe it occurred later, or else had nothing to do with his sickness.We have no real evidence to reconstruct his mental state. Therefore speculations about madness are fruitless, as they can't be proven. Also, his madness belongs to a discourse which originates mainly from the senatorial narrative that sought to discredit him through any means possible. Thus, his acts should be seen from other angles, and the search for "mad Caligula" abandoned.

Mozart at play: the limitations of attributing the etiology of genius to tourette syndrome and mental illness.

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Powell, Henry; Kushner, Howard I

2015-01-01

There has been a persistent attempt to explain Mozart's talent as connected to physical and mental illness. While Mozart's musical compositions and performances were often acclaimed for their "taste," the composer's personal behavior sometimes astonished those who witnessed "blödeln" or wild horseplay, practical joking, and scatological humor. Most recently, Mozart's eccentric behavior has been attributed to Gilles de la Tourette syndrome. This chapter investigates the evidence for these retrospective diagnoses and reassesses this evidence by paying particular attention to the milieu in which Mozart lived. We argue that Mozart's putative pathological behavior was a manifestation of his resilience in face of multiple adversities and was deeply rooted in his sense of play. Our hypothesis is that play, rather than neuropsychiatric disease, was essential to the operation of his genius. © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Barriers to treatment seeking for anxiety disorders: initial data on the role of mental health literacy.

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Coles, Meredith E; Coleman, Shannon L

2010-01-01

Anxiety disorders represent the single largest mental health problem in the United States [Greenberg et al., 1999. J Clin Psychiatry 60:427-435; Rice and Miller, 1998. Br J Psychiatry 173:4-9]. However most individuals with anxiety disorders never seek treatment [Henderson et al., 2002. Can J Psychiatry 47:819-824; Mojtabai et al., 2002. Arch Gen Psychiatry 59:77-84; Roness et al., 2005. Acta Psychiatr Scand 111:51-58]. Deficits in the ability to recognize anxiety disorders and beliefs about them, (i.e., "mental health literacy") may contribute to low levels of help seeking. Survey data assessing mental health literacy for multiple anxiety disorders and for depression were collected from 284 undergraduate students enrolled in psychology courses at a public university in the United States. Specifically, respondents were presented with vignettes portraying individuals experiencing various forms of mental illness and were asked to label the disorder, its cause and whether or not they would recommend treatment. Findings showed that social phobia and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) were associated with recognition rates that were generally high and similar to depression (approximately 80%). In contrast, less than half of the respondents labeled panic disorder or generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) correctly. Symptoms of OCD were attributed to mental illness by approximately 50% of respondents, but such attributions were rare for the other anxiety disorders studied (anxiety disorders and according to perceptions of the causes of symptoms. Given that the current sample was well-educated young adults, mental health literacy of the general public may be even lower.

Mother and Infant Talk about Mental States: Systemic Emergence of Psychological Lexicon and Theory of Mind Understanding

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Rollo, D.; Buttiglieri, F.

In recent years, a number of studies that have examined how social experiences are related to children's theory of mind development, have found that: (1) the frequency of mothers' mental state utterances used in mother-child picture-book reading, is correlated with children's theory of mind abilities; (2) mothers' use of cognitive terms is related more strongly to children's theory of mind performances than the mothers' references to other mental states, such as desires or emotions (Adrian, Clemente, Villanueva, Rieffe, 2005; Ruffman, Slade, Crowe, 2002; Taumoepeau, Ruffman, 2006; Dunn, 2002). Despite the evidence for the role of mothers' language, there is disagreement over how exactly it improves children's theory of mind development. In short, mentalistic comments contain distinctive words, grammatical constructions and pragmatic features. The question is, however, which factor is critical (de Rosnay, Pons, Harris, Morrell, 2004). The present study addresses this issue and focuses on relationship between mothers' mental state terms and children's performances in theory of mind tasks (emotion understanding and false belief tasks). Mothers were asked to read some pictures to 10 children between 3;0 and 5;0. Among the different mental state references (perceptual, emotional, volitional, cognitive, moral and communicative), it was found that the frequency and variety of mothers' mental state words were significantly associated with children's mental lexicon. In addition, emotional terms correlated positively with children's false belief performance. Kind of emotional words that are used by the mothers with reference to the Italian language will be discussed.

Parent-child picture-book reading, mothers' mental state language and children's theory of mind.

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Adrian, Juan E; Clemente, Rosa A; Villanueva, Lidon; Rieffe, Carolien

2005-08-01

This study focuses on parent-child book reading and its connection to the development of a theory of mind. First, parents were asked to report about frequency of parent-child storybook reading at home. Second, mothers were asked to read four picture-books to thirty-four children between 4;0 and 5;0. Both frequency of parent-child storybook reading at home, and mother's use of mental state terms in picture-books reading tasks were significantly associated with success on false belief tasks, after partialling out a number of potential mediators such as age of children, verbal IQ, paternal education, and words used by mothers in joint picture-book reading. Among the different mental state references (cognitive terms, desires, emotions and perceptions), it was found that the frequency and variety of cognitive terms, but also the frequency of emotional terms correlated positively with children's false belief performance. Relationships between mental state language and theory of mind are discussed.

Inside the nation's largest mental health institution: a prevalence study in a state prison system.

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Al-Rousan, Tala; Rubenstein, Linda; Sieleni, Bruce; Deol, Harbans; Wallace, Robert B

2017-04-20

The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world which has created a public health crisis. Correctional facilities have become a front line for mental health care. Public health research in this setting could inform criminal justice reform. We determined prevalence rates for mental illnesses and related comorbidities among all inmates in a state prison system. Cross-sectional study using the Iowa Corrections Offender Network which contains health records of all inmates in Iowa. The point prevalence of both ICD-9 and DSM-IV codes for mental illnesses, timing of diagnosis and interval between incarceration and mental illness diagnosis were determined. The average inmate (N = 8574) age was 36.7 ± 12.4 years; 17% were ≥50 years. The majority of inmates were men (91%) and white (65%).Obesity was prevalent in 38% of inmates, and 51% had a history of smoking. Almost half of inmates were diagnosed with a mental illness (48%), of whom, 29% had a serious mental illness (41% of all females and 27% of all males), and 26% had a history of a substance use disorder. Females had higher odds of having both a mental illness and substance use disorder. Almost all mental illness diagnoses were first made during incarceration (99%). The mean interval to diagnosis of depression, anxiety, PTSD and personality disorders were 26, 24, 21 and 29 months respectively. Almost 90% of mental illnesses were recognized by the 6 th year of incarceration. The mean interval from incarceration to first diagnosis (recognition) of a substance abuse history was 11 months. There is a substantial burden of mental illness among inmates. Racial, age and gender disparities in mental health care are coupled with a general delay in diagnosis and treatment. A large part of understanding the mental health problem in this country starts at prisons.

Mini mental state examination. Validering af en ny dansk udgave

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Korner, E.A.; Lauritzen, L.; Nilsson, F.M.

2008-01-01

INTRODUCTION: The Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) is widely used in Denmark, but often in non-validated versions. In 2000 a cross-sectional workgroup decided on a new common version of the MMSE with a corresponding manual, which is validated for the first time in the present study. MATERIALS...

Mini-mental state examination as a predictor of mortality among older people referred to secondary mental healthcare.

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Su, Yu-Ping; Chang, Chin-Kuo; Hayes, Richard D; Perera, Gayan; Broadbent, Matthew; To, David; Hotopf, Matthew; Stewart, Robert

2014-01-01

Lower levels of cognitive function have been found to be associated with higher mortality in older people, particularly in dementia, but the association in people with other mental disorders is still inconclusive. Data were analysed from a large mental health case register serving a geographic catchment of 1.23 million residents, and associations were investigated between cognitive function measured by the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and survival in patients aged 65 years old and over. Cox regressions were carried out, adjusting for age, gender, psychiatric diagnosis, ethnicity, marital status, and area-level socioeconomic index. A total of 6,704 subjects were involved, including 3,368 of them having a dementia diagnosis and 3,336 of them with depression or other diagnoses. Descriptive outcomes by Kaplan-Meier curves showed significant differences between those with normal and impaired cognitive function (MMSE scoremental health services regardless of a dementia diagnosis. Causal pathways between this exposure and outcome (for example, suboptimal healthcare) need further investigation.

School Mental Health: The Impact of State and Local Capacity-Building Training

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Stephan, Sharon; Paternite, Carl; Grimm, Lindsey; Hurwitz, Laura

2014-01-01

Despite a growing number of collaborative partnerships between schools and community-based organizations to expand school mental health (SMH) service capacity in the United States, there have been relatively few systematic initiatives focused on key strategies for large-scale SMH capacity building with state and local education systems. Based on a…

Social, state and political society: Reflections on Mental Health Policy

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sofia Laurentino

2014-06-01

Full Text Available This article intends to develop a historical, theoretical and critical debate about mental health, as a social policy, resulting from the dialectical relationship between state and civil society. The adopted methodology is qualitative, consisting on a bibliographical and reflexive review, through which it aims to evaluate positions of various authors on the subject. A discussion of the historical development of the Mental Health policy in Brazil was made, emphasizing the presence of various social movements, such as the Workers in Mental Health Movement, the Sanitary Reform Movement, the Psychiatric Reform Movement and the Anti-Asylum Movement. Therefore, it is verified that society has great ability to fight for effective social policies, in order to mitigate the destructive effects of capitalism. It is concluded that, although social policy is incapable of overcoming the social order, it includes significant changes to the recognition and assurance of rights to the people deprived of wealth and power in society.

Examining the reliability and validity of the Hebrew version of the Mini Mental State Examination.

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Werner, P; Heinik, J; Mendel, A; Reicher, B; Bleich, A

1999-10-01

The Mini Mental State Examination is used worldwide for the screening and diagnosis of dementia. The aim of the present study was to examine the reliability and validity of the Hebrew version of the Mini Mental State Examination. The Hebrew version of the Mini Mental State Examination was administered to 36 demented and 19 non-demented elderly persons. Test-retest reliability scores were calculated as exact agreement rates, and ranged from good to excellent for all the items. Strong convergent validity, as measured by the correlation between the MMSE and the CAM-COG (r = 0.94), was found. Good predictive value was observed as over three-quarters of the participants were correctly classified as demented or non-demented. The Hebrew version of the MMSE was found to be a useful and valid instrument for the determination of dementia in the elderly population.

Legal frameworks and key concepts regulating diversion and treatment of mentally disordered offenders in European Union member states.

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Dressing, Harald; Salize, Hans Joachim; Gordon, Harvey

2007-10-01

There is only limited research on the various legal regulations governing assessment, placement and treatment of mentally ill offenders in European Union member states (EU-member states). To provide a structured description and cross-boundary comparison of legal frameworks regulating diversion and treatment of mentally disordered offenders in EU-member states before the extension in May 2004. A special focus is on the concept of criminal responsibility. Information on legislation and practice concerning the assessment, placement and treatment of mentally ill offenders was gathered by means of a detailed, structured questionnaire which was filled in by national experts. The legal regulations relevant for forensic psychiatry in EU-member states are outlined. Definitions of mental disorders given within these acts are introduced and compared with ICD-10 diagnoses. Finally the application of the concept of criminal responsibility by the law and in routine practice is presented. Legal frameworks for the processing and placement of mentally disordered offenders varied markedly across EU-member states. Since May 2004 the European Union has expanded to 25 member states and in January 2007 it will reach 27. With increasing mobility across Europe, the need for increasing trans-national co-operation is becoming apparent in which great variation in legal tradition pertains.

Acquisition of mental state language in Mandarin- and Cantonese-speaking children.

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Tardif, T; Wellman, H M

2000-01-01

Children's theory of mind appears to develop from a focus on desire to a focus on belief. However, it is not clear (a) whether this pattern is universal and (b) whether it could also be explained by linguistic and sociocultural factors. This study examined mental state language in 10 Mandarin-speaking (21-27 months) and 8 Cantonese-speaking (18-44 months) toddlers. The results suggest a pattern of theory-of-mind development similar to that in English, with early use of desire terms followed by other mental state references. However, the Chinese-speaking children used desire terms much earlier, and the use of terms for thinking was very infrequent, even for Mandarin-speaking adults. This finding suggests a consistency in the overall sequence, but variation in the timing of beginning and end points, in children's theory-of-mind development across cultures.

MENTAL HEALTH OF INCARCERATED WOMEN IN THE STATE OF RIO DE JANEIRO

OpenAIRE

Santos, Márcia Vieira dos; Alves, Valdecyr Herdy; Pereira, Audrey Vidal; Rodrigues, Diego Pereira; Marchiori, Giovanna Rosário Soanno; Guerra, Juliana Vidal Vieira

2017-01-01

ABSTRACT Objective: identifying the factors related to the mental health of women in a prison in the Statey of Rio de Janeiro. Method: a descriptive, exploratory and qualitative study conducted between October 2014 and January 2015 in a female prison in the State of Rio de Janeiro. Forty (40) incarcerated women were interviewed. The information collected was discussed based on content analysis, using a thematic based modality. Results: the following factors that affect the mental health o...

Dynamic learning and context-dependence in sequential, attribute-based, stated-preference valuation questions

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Thomas P. Holmes; Kevin J. Boyle

2005-01-01

A hybrid stated-preference model is presented that combines the referendum contingent valuation response format with an experimentally designed set of attributes. A sequence of valuation questions is asked to a random sample in a mailout mail-back format. Econometric analysis shows greater discrimination between alternatives in the final choice in the sequence, and the...

Story discourse and use of mental state language between mothers and school-aged children with and without visual impairment.

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Tadić, Valerija; Pring, Linda; Dale, Naomi

2013-01-01

Lack of sight compromises insight into other people's mental states. Little is known about the role of maternal language in assisting the development of mental state language in children with visual impairment (VI). To investigate mental state language strategies of mothers of school-aged children with VI and to compare these with mothers of comparable children with typically developing vision. To investigate whether the characteristics of mother-child discourse were associated with the child's socio-communicative competence. Mother-child discourse with twelve 6-12-year-old children with VI was coded during a shared book-reading narrative and compared with 14 typically sighted children matched in age and verbal ability. Mothers of children with VI elaborated more and made significantly more references to story characters' mental states and descriptive elaborations than mothers of sighted children. Mental state elaborations of mothers in the VI group related positively with the level produced by their children, with the association remaining after mothers' overall verbosity and children's developmental levels were controlled for. Frequency of maternal elaborations, including their mental state language, was related to socio-communicative competence of children with VI. The findings offer insights into the potential contribution of maternal verbal scaffolding to mentalistic language and social-communicative competences of children with VI. © 2013 Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists.

Sex Role Attributions of American-Indian Women.

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Portman, Tarrell Awe Agahe

2001-01-01

Examines the sex role attributes of American-Indian women as compared to a predominately White normative group using the short form of the Bem Sex Role Inventory. Results indicate a significant difference on the masculine subscale between the two groups with American-Indian women having higher scores. Provides implications for mental health…

Public and nonprofit funding for research on mental disorders in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

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Chevreul, Karine; McDaid, David; Farmer, Carrie M; Prigent, Amélie; Park, A-La; Leboyer, Marion; Kupfer, David J; Durand-Zaleski, Isabelle

2012-07-01

To document the investments made in research on mental disorders by both government and nonprofit nongovernmental organizations in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States. An exhaustive survey was conducted of primary sources of public and nonprofit organization funding for mental health research for the year 2007 in France and the United Kingdom and for fiscal year 2007-2008 in the United States, augmented with an examination of relevant Web sites and publications. In France, all universities and research institutions were identified using the Public Finance Act. In the United Kingdom, we scrutinized Web sites and hand searched annual reports and grant lists for the public sector and nonprofit charitable medical research awarding bodies. In the United States, we included the following sources: the National Institutes of Health, other administrative entities within the Department of Health and Human Services (eg, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), the Department of Education, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Department of Defense, and the National Science Foundation and, for nonprofit funding, The Foundation Center. We included research on all mental disorders and substance-related disorders using the same keywords. We excluded research on mental retardation and dementia and on the promotion of mental well-being. We used the same algorithm in each country to obtain data for only mental health funding in situations in which funding had a broader scope. France spent $27.6 million (2%) of its health research budget on mental disorders, the United Kingdom spent $172.6 million (7%), and the United States spent $5.2 billion (16%). Nongovernmental funding ranged from 1% of total funding for mental health research in France and the United States to 14% in the United Kingdom. Funding for research on mental disorders accounts for low proportions of research budgets compared with funding levels for research on other major health problems, whereas

Stated Preference Methods for Valuation of Forest Attributes

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Thomas P. Holmes; Kevin J. Boyle

2003-01-01

The valuation methods described in this chapter are based on the idea that forest ecosystems produce a wide variety of goods and services that are valued by people. Rather than focusing attention on the holistic value of forest ecosystems as is done in contingent valuation studies, attribute-based valuation methods (ABMs) focus attention on a set of attributes that...

Health state utility values of high prevalence mental disorders in Australia: results from the National Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing.

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Mihalopoulos, Cathrine; Engel, Lidia; Le, Long Khanh-Dao; Magnus, Anne; Harris, Meredith; Chatterton, Mary Lou

2018-04-09

High prevalence mental disorders including depression, anxiety and substance use disorders are associated with high economic and disease burden. However, there is little information regarding the health state utility values of such disorders according to their clinical severity using comparable instruments across all disorders. This study reports utility values for high prevalence mental disorders using data from the 2007 Australian National Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing (NSMHWB). Utility values were derived from the AQoL-4D and analysed by disorder classification (affective only (AD), anxiety-related only (ANX), substance use only (SUB) plus four comorbidity groups), severity level (mild, moderate, severe), symptom recency (reported in the past 30 days), and comorbidity (combination of disorders). The adjusted Wald test was applied to detect statistically significant differences of weighted means and the magnitude of difference between groups was presented as a modified Cohen's d. In total, 1526 individuals met criteria for a 12-month mental disorder. The mean utility value was 0.67 (SD = 0.27), with lower utility values associated with higher severity levels and some comorbidities. Utility values for AD, ANX and SUB were 0.64 (SD = 0.25), 0.71 (SD = 0.25) and 0.81 (SD = 0.19), respectively. No differences in utility values were observed between disorders within disorder groups. Utility values were significantly lower among people with recent symptoms (within past 30 days) than those without; when examined by diagnostic group, this pattern held for people with SUB, but not for people with ANX or AD. Health state utility values of people with high prevalence mental disorders differ significantly by severity level, number of mental health comorbidities and the recency of symptoms, which provide new insights on the burden associated with high prevalence mental disorders in Australia. The derived utility values can be used to populate future

Theory of Mind: Children's Understanding of Mental States

Science.gov (United States)

Saracho, Olivia N.

2014-01-01

For more than three decades, theory of mind (ToM) has been one of the leading and prevalent issues in developmental psychology. ToM is the ability to ascribe mental states (e.g. beliefs, intents, desires, pretending, knowledge) to oneself and others as well as to recognise that others have beliefs, desires, and intentions that differ from…

Culture, attribution and automaticity: a social cognitive neuroscience view.

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Mason, Malia F; Morris, Michael W

2010-06-01

A fundamental challenge facing social perceivers is identifying the cause underlying other people's behavior. Evidence indicates that East Asian perceivers are more likely than Western perceivers to reference the social context when attributing a cause to a target person's actions. One outstanding question is whether this reflects a culture's influence on automatic or on controlled components of causal attribution. After reviewing behavioral evidence that culture can shape automatic mental processes as well as controlled reasoning, we discuss the evidence in favor of cultural differences in automatic and controlled components of causal attribution more specifically. We contend that insights emerging from social cognitive neuroscience research can inform this debate. After introducing an attribution framework popular among social neuroscientists, we consider findings relevant to the automaticity of attribution, before speculating how one could use a social neuroscience approach to clarify whether culture affects automatic, controlled or both types of attribution processes.

Trends In News Media Coverage Of Mental Illness In The United States: 1995-2014.

Science.gov (United States)

McGinty, Emma E; Kennedy-Hendricks, Alene; Choksy, Seema; Barry, Colleen L

2016-06-01

The United States is engaged in ongoing dialogue around mental illness. To assess trends in this national discourse, we studied the volume and content of a random sample of 400 news stories about mental illness from the period 1995-2014. Compared to news stories in the first decade of the study period, those in the second decade were more likely to mention mass shootings by people with mental illnesses. The most frequently mentioned topic across the study period was violence (55 percent overall) divided into categories of interpersonal violence or self-directed (suicide) violence, followed by stories about any type of treatment for mental illness (47 percent). Fewer news stories, only 14 percent, described successful treatment for or recovery from mental illness. The news media's continued emphasis on interpersonal violence is highly disproportionate to actual rates of violence among those with mental illnesses. Research suggests that this focus may exacerbate social stigma and decrease support for public policies that benefit people with mental illnesses. Project HOPE—The People-to-People Health Foundation, Inc.

New measures of mental state and behavior based on data collected from sensors, smartphones, and the Internet.

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Glenn, Tasha; Monteith, Scott

2014-12-01

With the rapid and ubiquitous acceptance of new technologies, algorithms will be used to estimate new measures of mental state and behavior based on digital data. The algorithms will analyze data collected from sensors in smartphones and wearable technology, and data collected from Internet and smartphone usage and activities. In the future, new medical measures that assist with the screening, diagnosis, and monitoring of psychiatric disorders will be available despite unresolved reliability, usability, and privacy issues. At the same time, similar non-medical commercial measures of mental state are being developed primarily for targeted advertising. There are societal and ethical implications related to the use of these measures of mental state and behavior for both medical and non-medical purposes.

Attribution style, theory and empirical findings

OpenAIRE

Krohn, Charlotte

2017-01-01

Master i læring i komplekse systemer Attribution theory is a long-standing and widely discussed theory that addresses individuals’ explanation of causes of events. People attribute events of success and failure individually. Previous studies indicate that performance in sporting events may be improved by changing individuals’ attribution style. Article one describes attribution and attribution theory as state of the art. The article addresses the most important findings within attribution ...

Mini-Exame do Estado Mental: características psicométricas em idosos ambulatoriais Mini-Mental State Examination: psychometric characteristics in elderly outpatients

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Roberto A Lourenço

2006-08-01

Full Text Available OBJETIVO: Avaliar as características de medida do Mini-Exame do Estado Mental em idosos atendidos em um ambulatório geral. MÉTODOS: O total de 303 indivíduos (>65 anos foi submetido à avaliação geriátrica com vários instrumentos, inclusive o Mini-Exame do Estado Mental. Foram calculadas a sensibilidade, a especificidade, os valores preditivos positivo e negativo e a curva ROC. RESULTADOS: A sensibilidade, a especificidade, os valores preditivos positivo e negativo e a área sob a curva ROC foram 80,8%, 65,3%, 44,7%, 90,7% e 0,807, respectivamente (ponto de corte 23/24. O melhor ponto de corte para indivíduos analfabetos foi 18/19 (sensibilidade =73,5%; especificidade =73,9%, e para aqueles com instrução escolar foi 24/25 (sensibilidade =75%; especificidade =69,7%. CONCLUSÕES: Para o rastreamento cognitivo de idosos atendidos em ambulatórios gerais pelo Mini-Exame do Estado Mental, a escolaridade deverá ser considerada para a adoção do ponto de corte mais adequado.OBJECTIVE: To assess the psychometric characteristics of the Mini-Mental State Examination in elderly outpatients who seek primary health care. METHODS: A total of 303 subjects (>65 years underwent comprehensive geriatric assessment with functional tools, including Mini-Mental State Examination. Sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, and ROC curve were calculated. RESULTS: Sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values, and area under ROC curve were 80.8%, 65.3%, 44.7%, 90.7% and 0.807 respectively (cutoff point =23/24. The best cutoff point for illiterate was 18/19 (sensitivity =73.5%; specificity =73.9%; and for literate was 24/25 (sensitivity =75%; specificity =69.7%. CONCLUSIONS: While screening elderly outpatients for dementia, schooling must be considered in the choice of the best cutoff point in the Mini-Mental State Examination.

Directory of Facilities for Mentally Ill Children in the United States.

Science.gov (United States)

National Association for Mental Health, New York, NY.

Facilities for mentally ill children are listed by states in this directory for parents and professional people. Each entry includes information on diagnostic considerations, capacity, admission criteria, whether the facility is residential or day care, geographic eligibility, and fees. Separate indexes list residential and day care facilities and…

[Mini-Mental State Examination: Screening and Diagnosis of Cognitive Decline, Using New Normative Data].

Science.gov (United States)

Santana, Isabel; Duro, Diana; Lemos, Raquel; Costa, Vanessa; Pereira, Miguel; Simões, Mário R; Freitas, Sandra

2016-04-01

The Mini-Mental State Examination is the most commonly used cognitive screening test. In Portugal, the cut-off scores are defined according to literacy groups, but different proposals have been recommended by more representative studies. We therefore propose to confirm the influence of demographical variables, such as age and education, in the subjectâs performance; evaluating the discriminant ability of the new normative data; and to further examine the diagnostic acuity of the validated cut-off scoring for mild cognitive impairment and for the most prevalent types of dementia. Our study includes 1 441 educated subjects, divided into seven subgroups: Mild cognitive impairment, Alzheimer's disease, frontotemporal dementia, vascular dementia, dementia with Lewy bodies, community-controls and memory clinic-controls. Altogether age and education explain 10.4% of the Mini-Mental State Examination results variance, with both variables contributing significantly to the resultsâ prediction. The diagnostic acuity based on the most recent normative data was always higher than the one obtained through the validation cut-off scoring, revealing an overall excellent specificity (superior to 90%) and different sensitivity values: excellent for mild Alzheimer's disease (91%), good for dementia with Lewy Bodies (78%) and low for mild cognitive impairment (65%), frontotemporal dementia and vascular dementia (55%). The performance on the Mini-Mental State Examination is influenced by age and education, supporting the use of normative data that consider those variables. With this approach, the Mini-Mental State Examination could be a sensitive and specific instrument for the Alzheimer's disease screening among all healthcare levels. Nevertheless, its diagnostic acuity is limited in other conditions frequently seen in memory clinics, such as Mild Cognitive Impairment and other types of dementia.

International conference. Mental health consequences of the Chernobyl disaster: current state and future prospects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nyagu, A.I.

1995-01-01

Proceedings of the International Conference on the mental health consequences of the Chernobyl disaster: current state and future prospects was introduced.The questions connected with: 1. Mental health disorders biological basis after ionizing radiation influence; 2. Psychiatric aspects of the Chernobyl disaster; 3. Social stress following contradictory information: ways for its overcoming; 4. Rehabilitation and prophylactic measures for mental and nervous disorders. Psycho social rehabilitation of survivors; 5. Psychosomatic effects and somato-neurological consequences of the Chernobyl disaster; 6. Psychosomatic health of children and adolescents survivors of the Chernobyl disaster; 7. Brain damage as result of prenatal irradiation

Deaths Attributable to Diabetes in the United States: Comparison of Data Sources and Estimation Approaches.

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Stokes, Andrew; Preston, Samuel H

2017-01-01

The goal of this research was to identify the fraction of deaths attributable to diabetes in the United States. We estimated population attributable fractions (PAF) for cohorts aged 30-84 who were surveyed in the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) between 1997 and 2009 (N = 282,322) and in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) between 1999 and 2010 (N = 21,814). Cohort members were followed prospectively for mortality through 2011. We identified diabetes status using self-reported diagnoses in both NHIS and NHANES and using HbA1c in NHANES. Hazard ratios associated with diabetes were estimated using Cox model adjusted for age, sex, race/ethnicity, educational attainment, and smoking status. We found a high degree of consistency between data sets and definitions of diabetes in the hazard ratios, estimates of diabetes prevalence, and estimates of the proportion of deaths attributable to diabetes. The proportion of deaths attributable to diabetes was estimated to be 11.5% using self-reports in NHIS, 11.7% using self-reports in NHANES, and 11.8% using HbA1c in NHANES. Among the sub-groups that we examined, the PAF was highest among obese persons at 19.4%. The proportion of deaths in which diabetes was assigned as the underlying cause of death (3.3-3.7%) severely understated the contribution of diabetes to mortality in the United States. Diabetes may represent a more prominent factor in American mortality than is commonly appreciated, reinforcing the need for robust population-level interventions aimed at diabetes prevention and care.

Deaths Attributable to Diabetes in the United States: Comparison of Data Sources and Estimation Approaches.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Andrew Stokes

Full Text Available The goal of this research was to identify the fraction of deaths attributable to diabetes in the United States.We estimated population attributable fractions (PAF for cohorts aged 30-84 who were surveyed in the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS between 1997 and 2009 (N = 282,322 and in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES between 1999 and 2010 (N = 21,814. Cohort members were followed prospectively for mortality through 2011. We identified diabetes status using self-reported diagnoses in both NHIS and NHANES and using HbA1c in NHANES. Hazard ratios associated with diabetes were estimated using Cox model adjusted for age, sex, race/ethnicity, educational attainment, and smoking status.We found a high degree of consistency between data sets and definitions of diabetes in the hazard ratios, estimates of diabetes prevalence, and estimates of the proportion of deaths attributable to diabetes. The proportion of deaths attributable to diabetes was estimated to be 11.5% using self-reports in NHIS, 11.7% using self-reports in NHANES, and 11.8% using HbA1c in NHANES. Among the sub-groups that we examined, the PAF was highest among obese persons at 19.4%. The proportion of deaths in which diabetes was assigned as the underlying cause of death (3.3-3.7% severely understated the contribution of diabetes to mortality in the United States.Diabetes may represent a more prominent factor in American mortality than is commonly appreciated, reinforcing the need for robust population-level interventions aimed at diabetes prevention and care.

EEG Eye State Identification Using Incremental Attribute Learning with Time-Series Classification

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Ting Wang

2014-01-01

Full Text Available Eye state identification is a kind of common time-series classification problem which is also a hot spot in recent research. Electroencephalography (EEG is widely used in eye state classification to detect human's cognition state. Previous research has validated the feasibility of machine learning and statistical approaches for EEG eye state classification. This paper aims to propose a novel approach for EEG eye state identification using incremental attribute learning (IAL based on neural networks. IAL is a novel machine learning strategy which gradually imports and trains features one by one. Previous studies have verified that such an approach is applicable for solving a number of pattern recognition problems. However, in these previous works, little research on IAL focused on its application to time-series problems. Therefore, it is still unknown whether IAL can be employed to cope with time-series problems like EEG eye state classification. Experimental results in this study demonstrates that, with proper feature extraction and feature ordering, IAL can not only efficiently cope with time-series classification problems, but also exhibit better classification performance in terms of classification error rates in comparison with conventional and some other approaches.

Neurotization indicators and state of mental desadaptation in personnel of internal affairs organs

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Vyshnichenko S.I.

2013-06-01

Full Text Available The article describes the data of psychological testing of personnel of internal affairs organs, using LNP test: levels of neuroticism and psychopathsation, prevalence of levels of neuroticism among the personnel, the relationship between neuroticism level and clinical groups (mentally healthy, with burnout syndrome and with non-psychotic mental disorders. Level of neuroticism reflects both dynamic and static (states and properties personality characteristics, i.e. neuroticism is elective personality variable. The clinical picture is characterized by manifestations of asthenonevurotic and psycho-vegetative syndromes. More often among those with non-psychotic mental disorders a high (100% level of neuroticism, increased (87.5% and in the zone of uncertain diagnosis (50% occur, than among those with burnout syndrome, and lower than normal (36.36% and low (19.08% neuroticism level – more often among with burnout syndrome, than in those with non-psychotic mental disorders. Level of neuroticism on the verge of normal and pathological conditions occurs mostly in people with burnout syndrome (50% and non-psychotic mental disorders (50%.

Neural imaging to track mental states while using an intelligent tutoring system.

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Anderson, John R; Betts, Shawn; Ferris, Jennifer L; Fincham, Jon M

2010-04-13

Hemodynamic measures of brain activity can be used to interpret a student's mental state when they are interacting with an intelligent tutoring system. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) data were collected while students worked with a tutoring system that taught an algebra isomorph. A cognitive model predicted the distribution of solution times from measures of problem complexity. Separately, a linear discriminant analysis used fMRI data to predict whether or not students were engaged in problem solving. A hidden Markov algorithm merged these two sources of information to predict the mental states of students during problem-solving episodes. The algorithm was trained on data from 1 day of interaction and tested with data from a later day. In terms of predicting what state a student was in during a 2-s period, the algorithm achieved 87% accuracy on the training data and 83% accuracy on the test data. The results illustrate the importance of integrating the bottom-up information from imaging data with the top-down information from a cognitive model.

Symptoms and Etiological Attribution: A Cross-Sectional Study in Mexican Outpatients with Psychosis and Their Relatives

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Rodríguez-Hansen, Gisela

2016-01-01

This cross-sectional study aimed at identifying the most common attributions of their mental disorder in a Mexican patients who have experienced psychosis and their relatives and exploring how having experienced or not characteristic psychotic symptoms and their present clinical status might affect their etiological attributions. Past and current symptom profiles of 66 patients were as assessed with the SCID-I (Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis I Disorders) and the PANSS (Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale), respectively. The etiological attribution of psychosis of patients (n = 62) and the relatives (n = 65) was assessed with the Angermeyer and Klusmann scale comprising 30 items into five categories: biology, personality, family, society, and esoteric. Patients and relatives attribute psychosis mainly to social factors. Relatives' attributions were not influenced by clinical profile of patients, whereas in the case of patients it was only current clinical status that showed a difference, with those in nonremission scoring higher personality and family factors. Acknowledging patients' and relatives' beliefs about mental disorders at onset and later on is particularly important in psychosis, a mental condition with severe and/or persistent symptoms, in order to promote better involvement in treatment and in consequence efficacy and recovery. PMID:27413550

Fast mental states decoding in mixed reality.

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De Massari, Daniele; Pacheco, Daniel; Malekshahi, Rahim; Betella, Alberto; Verschure, Paul F M J; Birbaumer, Niels; Caria, Andrea

2014-01-01

The combination of Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) technology, allowing online monitoring and decoding of brain activity, with virtual and mixed reality (MR) systems may help to shape and guide implicit and explicit learning using ecological scenarios. Real-time information of ongoing brain states acquired through BCI might be exploited for controlling data presentation in virtual environments. Brain states discrimination during mixed reality experience is thus critical for adapting specific data features to contingent brain activity. In this study we recorded electroencephalographic (EEG) data while participants experienced MR scenarios implemented through the eXperience Induction Machine (XIM). The XIM is a novel framework modeling the integration of a sensing system that evaluates and measures physiological and psychological states with a number of actuators and effectors that coherently reacts to the user's actions. We then assessed continuous EEG-based discrimination of spatial navigation, reading and calculation performed in MR, using linear discriminant analysis (LDA) and support vector machine (SVM) classifiers. Dynamic single trial classification showed high accuracy of LDA and SVM classifiers in detecting multiple brain states as well as in differentiating between high and low mental workload, using a 5 s time-window shifting every 200 ms. Our results indicate overall better performance of LDA with respect to SVM and suggest applicability of our approach in a BCI-controlled MR scenario. Ultimately, successful prediction of brain states might be used to drive adaptation of data representation in order to boost information processing in MR.

Hydrotherapy in state mental hospitals in the mid-twentieth century.

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Harmon, Rebecca Bouterie

2009-08-01

This research describes nurses' experiences in administering "the water cure," hot or cold wet sheet packs, and continuous tub baths in state mental hospitals during the early twentieth century. Student and graduate nurses were required to demonstrate competence in hydrotherapy treatments used to calm agitated or manic patients in the era before neuroleptics. The nurses interviewed for this study indicated that, although labor intensive, hydrotherapy worked, at least temporarily. Although no longer used in state hospitals, hydrotherapy is regaining popularity with the general public and may serve as an adjunct to pharmacological treatments to calm hospitalized patients in the future.

Response Patterns in Health State Valuation Using Endogenous Attribute Attendance and Latent Class Analysis.

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Hole, Arne Risa; Norman, Richard; Viney, Rosalie

2016-02-01

Not accounting for simplifying decision-making heuristics when modelling data from discrete choice experiments has been shown potentially to lead to biased inferences. This study considers two ways of exploring the presence of attribute non-attendance (that is, respondents considering only a subset of the attributes that define the choice options) in a health state valuation discrete choice experiment. The methods used include the latent class (LC) and endogenous attribute attendance (EAA) models, which both required adjustment to reflect the structure of the quality-adjusted life year (QALY) framework for valuing health outcomes. We find that explicit consideration of attendance patterns substantially improves model fit. The impact of allowing for non-attendance on the estimated QALY weights is dependent on the assumed source of non-attendance. If non-attendance is interpreted as a form of preference heterogeneity, then the inferences from the LC and EAA models are similar to those from standard models, while if respondents ignore attributes to simplify the choice task, the QALY weights differ from those using the standard approach. Because the cause of non-attendance is unknown in the absence of additional data, a policymaker may use the range of weights implied by the two approaches to conduct a sensitivity analysis. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Inside the nation’s largest mental health institution: a prevalence study in a state prison system

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Tala Al-Rousan

2017-04-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world which has created a public health crisis. Correctional facilities have become a front line for mental health care. Public health research in this setting could inform criminal justice reform. We determined prevalence rates for mental illnesses and related comorbidities among all inmates in a state prison system. Methods Cross-sectional study using the Iowa Corrections Offender Network which contains health records of all inmates in Iowa. The point prevalence of both ICD-9 and DSM-IV codes for mental illnesses, timing of diagnosis and interval between incarceration and mental illness diagnosis were determined. Results The average inmate (N = 8574 age was 36.7 ± 12.4 years; 17% were ≥50 years. The majority of inmates were men (91% and white (65%.Obesity was prevalent in 38% of inmates, and 51% had a history of smoking. Almost half of inmates were diagnosed with a mental illness (48%, of whom, 29% had a serious mental illness (41% of all females and 27% of all males, and 26% had a history of a substance use disorder. Females had higher odds of having both a mental illness and substance use disorder. Almost all mental illness diagnoses were first made during incarceration (99%. The mean interval to diagnosis of depression, anxiety, PTSD and personality disorders were 26, 24, 21 and 29 months respectively. Almost 90% of mental illnesses were recognized by the 6th year of incarceration. The mean interval from incarceration to first diagnosis (recognition of a substance abuse history was 11 months. Conclusions There is a substantial burden of mental illness among inmates. Racial, age and gender disparities in mental health care are coupled with a general delay in diagnosis and treatment. A large part of understanding the mental health problem in this country starts at prisons.

The Change of Music Preferences Following the Onset of a Mental Disorder.

Science.gov (United States)

Gebhardt, Stefan; von Georgi, Richard

2015-02-24

A psychiatric population (n=123) was examined on how music preferences had changed after the onset of a mental disorder. Most patients did not change their previous music preference; this group of patients considered music helpful for their mental state, showed more attractivity and enforcement as personality traits and used music more for emotion modulation. Patients who experienced a preference shift reported that music had impaired them during the time of illness; these patients showed less ego-strength, less confidence and less enforcement and used music less for arousal modulation. A third subgroup stopped listening to music completely after the onset of the mental disorder; these patients attribute less importance to music and also reported that music had impaired their mental state. They showed more ego-strength and used music less for emotion modulation. The results suggest that the use of music in everyday life can be helpful as an emotion modulation strategy. However, some patients might need instructions on how to use music in a functional way and not a dysfunctional one. Psychiatrists and psychotherapists as well as music therapists should be aware of emotion modulation strategies, subjective valence of music and personality traits of their patients. Due to the ubiquity of music, psychoeducative instructions on how to use music in everyday life plays an increasing role in the treatment of mental illness.

The Change of Music Preferences Following the Onset of a Mental Disorder

Science.gov (United States)

Gebhardt, Stefan; von Georgi, Richard

2015-01-01

A psychiatric population (n=123) was examined on how music preferences had changed after the onset of a mental disorder. Most patients did not change their previous music preference; this group of patients considered music helpful for their mental state, showed more attractivity and enforcement as personality traits and used music more for emotion modulation. Patients who experienced a preference shift reported that music had impaired them during the time of illness; these patients showed less ego-strength, less confidence and less enforcement and used music less for arousal modulation. A third subgroup stopped listening to music completely after the onset of the mental disorder; these patients attribute less importance to music and also reported that music had impaired their mental state. They showed more ego-strength and used music less for emotion modulation. The results suggest that the use of music in everyday life can be helpful as an emotion modulation strategy. However, some patients might need instructions on how to use music in a functional way and not a dysfunctional one. Psychiatrists and psychotherapists as well as music therapists should be aware of emotion modulation strategies, subjective valence of music and personality traits of their patients. Due to the ubiquity of music, psychoeducative instructions on how to use music in everyday life plays an increasing role in the treatment of mental illness. PMID:26266024

Mental illness: psychiatry's phlogiston.

Science.gov (United States)

Szasz, T

2001-10-01

In physics, we use the same laws to explain why airplanes fly, and why they crash. In psychiatry, we use one set of laws to explain sane behaviour, which we attribute to reasons (choices), and another set of laws to explain insane behaviour, which we attribute to causes (diseases). God, man's idea of moral perfection, judges human deeds without distinguishing between sane persons responsible for their behaviour and insane persons deserving to be excused for their evil deeds. It is hubris to pretend that the insanity defence is compassionate, just, or scientific. Mental illness is to psychiatry as phlogiston was to chemistry. Establishing chemistry as a science of the nature of matter required the recognition of the non-existence of phlogiston. Establishing psychiatry as a science of the nature of human behaviour requires the recognition of the non-existence of mental illness.

Mental illness and the right to vote: a review of legislation across the world.

Science.gov (United States)

Bhugra, Dinesh; Pathare, Soumitra; Gosavi, Chetna; Ventriglio, Antonio; Torales, Julio; Castaldelli-Maia, João; Tolentino, Edgardo Juan L; Ng, Roger

2016-08-01

The right to vote is an important right signifying freedom of thought as well as full citizenship in any setting. Right to vote is enshrined and protected by international human rights treaties. The right of 'everyone' to take part in the political process and elections is based on universal and equal suffrage. Although these International Conventions have been ratified by the large majority of United Nations Member States, their application across the globe is by no means universal. This study sets out to examine the domestic laws of UN Member States in order to explore whether individuals with mental health problems have the right to vote in actuality and, thu,s can participate in political life. Through various searches, electoral laws and Constitutions of 193 Member States of the United Nations were studied. The authors were able to find legislation and/or Constitutional provisions in 167 of the 193 Member States. Twenty-one countries (11%) only placed no restrictions on the right to vote by persons with mental health problems. Over one third of the countries (36%) deny all persons with any mental health problems a right to vote without any qualifier. Some of these discriminatory attitudes are reflected in the multiplicity of terms used to describe persons with mental health problems. Another 21 countries (11%) denied the right to vote to detained persons; of these, nine Member States specifically denied the right to vote to persons who were detained under the mental health law, while the remainder denied the right to vote to all those who were interdicted or judicially interdicted. It would appear that in many countries the denial of voting rights is attributed to a lack of ability to consent by the individuals with mental illness. Further exploration of explanation is required to understand these variations, which exist in spite of international treaties.

Trends In News Media Coverage Of Mental Illness In The United States: 1995–2014

Science.gov (United States)

McGinty, Emma E.; Kennedy-Hendricks, Alene; Choksy, Seema; Barry, Colleen L.

2016-01-01

The United States is engaged in ongoing dialogue around mental illness. To assess trends in this national discourse, we studied the volume and content of a random sample of 400 news stories about mental illness from the period 1995–2014. Compared to news stories in the first decade of the study period, those in the second decade were more likely to mention mass shootings by people with mental illnesses. The most frequently mentioned topic across the study period was violence (55 percent overall) divided into categories of interpersonal violence or self-directed (suicide) violence, followed by stories about any type of treatment for mental illness (47 percent). Fewer news stories, only 14 percent, described successful treatment for or recovery from mental illness. The news media’s continued emphasis on interpersonal violence is highly disproportionate to actual rates of violence among those with mental illnesses. Research suggests that this focus may exacerbate social stigma and decrease support for public policies that benefit people with mental illnesses. PMID:27269031

Attribution Theory and Crisis Intervention Therapy.

Science.gov (United States)

Skilbeck, William M.

It was proposed that existing therapeutic procedures may influence attributions about emotional states. Therefore an attributional analysis of crisis intervention, a model of community-based, short-term consultation, was presented. This analysis suggested that crisis intervention provides attributionally-relevant information about both the source…

Biogenetic models of psychopathology, implicit guilt, and mental illness stigma

OpenAIRE

Rüsch, Nicolas; Todd, Andrew R.; Bodenhausen, Galen V.; Corrigan, Patrick W.

2010-01-01

Whereas some research suggests that acknowledgment of the role of biogenetic factors in mental illness could reduce mental illness stigma by diminishing perceived responsibility, other research has cautioned that emphasizing biogenetic aspects of mental illness could produce the impression that mental illness is a stable, intrinsic aspect of a person (“genetic essentialism”), increasing the desire for social distance. We assessed genetic and neurobiological causal attributions about mental il...

Effect of shift work on mental state of factory workers.

Science.gov (United States)

Kaneko, Shin-Ya; Maeda, Takafumi; Sasaki, Akihiko; Sato, Akihiko; Tanaka, Kazuko; Kobayashi, Toshio; Tanaka, Masatoshi; Fukushima, Tetsuhito

2004-06-01

This paper examines the effects of shift work on the mental state of factory workers. As an indicator of the workers' mental condition, the authors used a scoring system (referred to below as the 'depression tendency score') based on the SRQ-D investigative report. The depression tendency score of the men was higher among the shift worker group than among the regular day worker group (p workers was higher than that of the male regular day workers among skilled workers (p worker group and the shift worker group. However, the depression tendency score of the female two-shift workers was higher than that of the female regular day workers among skilled workers (p work and that of women is affected by two-shift work because of the difference in modern societal/home role between man and woman.

Body-related state shame and guilt in women: do causal attributions mediate the influence of physical self-concept and shame and guilt proneness.

Science.gov (United States)

Crocker, Peter R E; Brune, Sara M; Kowalski, Kent C; Mack, Diane E; Wilson, Philip M; Sabiston, Catherine M

2014-01-01

Guided by the process model of self-conscious emotions, this study examined whether physical self-concept (PSC) and shame and guilt proneness were associated with body-related self-conscious emotions of state shame and guilt and if these relationships were mediated by attributions of stability, globality, and controllability. Female participants (N=284; Mean age=20.6±1.9 years) completed measures of PSC and shame and guilt proneness before reading a hypothetical scenario. Participants completed measures of attributions and state shame and guilt in response to the scenario. Significant relationships were noted between state shame and attributions of globality and controllability, and shame proneness, guilt proneness, and PSC. Similar relationships, with the additional predictor of stability, were found for state guilt. Mediation analysis partially supported the process model hypotheses for shame. Results indicate PSC and shame proneness are important in predicting body-related emotions, but the role of specific attributions are still unclear. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Service user involvement in mental health care: an evolutionary concept analysis.

Science.gov (United States)

Millar, Samantha L; Chambers, Mary; Giles, Melanie

2016-04-01

The concept of service user involvement is an evolving concept in the mental health-care literature. This study sought to explore and analyse the concept of service user involvement as used in within the field of mental health care. An evolutionary concept analysis was conducted using a literature-based sample extracted from an electronic database search. One hundred and thirty-four papers met the inclusion criteria and were analysed to discover key attributes, antecedents and consequences of service user involvement and to produce a definition of the concept. Five key attributes of service user involvement within the context of mental health care were identified: a person-centred approach, informed decision making, advocacy, obtaining service user views and feedback and working in partnership. Clarity of the attributes and definition of the concept of service user involvement aims to promote understanding of the concept among key stakeholders including mental health professionals, service users and community and voluntary organizations. The findings of the research have utility in the areas of theory and policy development, research on service user involvement in mental health care and service user involvement in mental health practice. Directions for further research regarding the concept are identified. © 2015 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Correlates of Level and Change in the Mini-Mental State Examination

Science.gov (United States)

Soubelet, Andrea; Salthouse, Timothy A.

2011-01-01

The goal of the current project was to determine (a) the cognitive abilities assessed by the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE; M. F. Folstein, S. E. Folstein, & P. R. McHugh, 1975), (b) whether the same abilities are associated with MMSE performance among people of different ages, and (c) whether the same abilities are involved in changes…

Rethinking School Safety in the Age of Empire: Militarization, Mental Health, and State Violence

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Laura Jordan Jaffee

2018-02-01

Full Text Available Calls for stricter gun control and mental health screening often come on the heels of school shootings, which have raised national concerns about school safety. The implication is that people with psychiatric disabilities are dangerous or threatening, and that preventing them from owning guns will make schools safer. This paper challenges this assumption by considering dominant discourses about school safety and mental health alongside the increasing militarization of U.S. schools. Advocating reducing violence by identifying individuals with psychiatric disabilities—or those labelled with mental illnesses presumed to render them dangerous—erases the profound state violence schools engender in the service of empire while perpetuating ableist assumptions about people with psychiatric disabilities. In the age of empire and endless imperialist war, we need to challenge prevailing conceptions of both school safety and mental health.

Concepts in context: Processing mental state concepts with internal or external focus involves different neural systems

Science.gov (United States)

Oosterwijk, Suzanne; Mackey, Scott; Wilson-Mendenhall, Christine; Winkielman, Piotr; Paulus, Martin P.

2015-01-01

According to embodied cognition theories concepts are contextually-situated and grounded in neural systems that produce experiential states. This view predicts that processing mental state concepts recruits neural regions associated with different aspects of experience depending on the context in which people understand a concept. This neuroimaging study tested this prediction using a set of sentences that described emotional (e.g., fear, joy) and non-emotional (e.g., thinking, hunger) mental states with internal focus (i.e. focusing on bodily sensations and introspection) or external focus (i.e. focusing on expression and action). Consistent with our predictions, data suggested that the inferior frontal gyrus, a region associated with action representation, was engaged more by external than internal sentences. By contrast, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, a region associated with the generation of internal states, was engaged more by internal emotion sentences than external sentence categories. Similar patterns emerged when we examined the relationship between neural activity and independent ratings of sentence focus. Furthermore, ratings of emotion were associated with activation in the medial prefrontal cortex, whereas ratings of activity were associated with activation in the inferior frontal gyrus. These results suggest that mental state concepts are represented in a dynamic way, using context-relevant interoceptive and sensorimotor resources. PMID:25748274

Fast mental states decoding in mixed reality.

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Daniele eDe Massari

2014-11-01

Full Text Available The combination of Brain-Computer Interface technology, allowing online monitoring and decoding of brain activity, with virtual and mixed reality systems may help to shape and guide implicit and explicit learning using ecological scenarios. Real-time information of ongoing brain states acquired through BCI might be exploited for controlling data presentation in virtual environments. In this context, assessing to what extent brain states can be discriminated during mixed reality experience is critical for adapting specific data features to contingent brain activity. In this study we recorded EEG data while participants experienced a mixed reality scenario implemented through the eXperience Induction Machine (XIM. The XIM is a novel framework modeling the integration of a sensing system that evaluates and measures physiological and psychological states with a number of actuators and effectors that coherently reacts to the user's actions. We then assessed continuous EEG-based discrimination of spatial navigation, reading and calculation performed in mixed reality, using LDA and SVM classifiers. Dynamic single trial classification showed high accuracy of LDA and SVM classifiers in detecting multiple brain states as well as in differentiating between high and low mental workload, using a 5 s time-window shifting every 200 ms. Our results indicate overall better performance of LDA with respect to SVM and suggest applicability of our approach in a BCI-controlled mixed reality scenario. Ultimately, successful prediction of brain states might be used to drive adaptation of data representation in order to boost information processing in mixed reality.

Explanatory models of mental disorders and treatment practices ...

African Journals Online (AJOL)

Objective: Key Words: Explanatory models; Traditional healers; Mental illness; South AfricaIn many traditional belief systems in Africa, including South Africa, mental health problems may be attributed to the influence of ancestors or to bewitchment. Traditional healers are viewed as having the expertise to address these ...

Attributing illness to food

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Batz, M. B.; Doyle, M. P.; Morris, J. G.

2005-01-01

source responsible for illness. A wide variety of food attribution approaches and data are used around the world including the analysis of outbreak data, case-control studies, microbial subtyping and source tracking methods, and expert judgment, among others. The Food Safety Research Consortium sponsored......Identification and prioritization of effective food safety interventions require an understanding of the relationship between food and pathogen from farm to consumption. Critical to this cause is food attribution, the capacity to attribute cases of foodborne disease to the food vehicle or other...... the Food Attribution Data Workshop in October 2003 to discuss the virtues and limitations of these approaches and to identify future options for collecting food attribution data in the United States. We summarize workshop discussions and identify challenges that affect progress in this critical component...

Effect Of Single And Short-Term Aerobics On Selected Mental State Parametres In Adult Females

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Kyselovičová Oľga

2015-11-01

Full Text Available The aim of the study was to determine the degree of the influence of aerobic program on mental state of the trainees after a single and short-term application. We tried to find out the positive effects of an aerobics on the selected parameters of mental state of women that performed aerobics recreationally. Twenty-two healthy women (age 35 ± 5 years were involved in the specific aerobic program with mini trampolines (jumping over the period of 5 weeks. To measure the psychological parameters a modified questionnaire of type X-STAI was distributed before and after the single work out at the beginning of the study and after the 5 weeks period. Chi-quadrat analysis was used to evaluate the data. The greatest and statistically the most significant differences were recorded in the parameters ´enthusiastic´, ´boosted by energy´ and ´relaxed´, in comparison with the emotions at the beginning and at the end of the lesson in initial measuring. Comparison of changes after the 5 weeks period at the beginning and at the end of the lesson shows statistical significance in all parameters, except ´tired´. No statistical changes occurred at either the beginning or the end of the lesson comparing initial and final phases. Based on the results, we can conclude that specialized aerobic training provokes immediate changes in psychological state of the trainees via increase of their positive and decrease of negative emotions right after the lesson and when compared to its beginning. This leads to a better mental stability and a greater resistance to the influences of outer environment on mental state.

Public mental health: the time is ripe for translation of evidence into practice

OpenAIRE

Wahlbeck, Kristian

2015-01-01

Public mental health deals with mental health promotion, prevention of mental disorders and suicide, reducing mental health inequalities, and governance and organization of mental health service provision. The full impact of mental health is largely unrecognized within the public health sphere, despite the increasing burden of disease attributable to mental and behavioral disorders. Modern public mental health policies aim at improving psychosocial health by addressing determinants of mental ...

Rangelands Vegetation under Different Management Systems and Growth Stages in North Darfur State, Sudan (Range Attributes

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Mohamed AAMA Mohamed

2014-09-01

Full Text Available This study was conducted at Um Kaddada, North Darfur State, Sudan, at two sites (closed and open for two consecutive seasons 2008 and 2009 during flowering and seed setting stages to evaluate range attributes at the locality. A split plot design was used to study vegetation attributes. Factors studied were management systems (closed and open and growth stages (flowering and seed setting. Vegetation cover, plant density, carrying capacity, and biomass production were assessed. Chemical analyses were done for selected plants to determine their nutritive values. The results showed high significant differences in vegetation attributes (density, cover and biomass production between closed and open areas. Closed areas had higher carrying capacity compared to open rangelands. Crude protein (CP and ash contents of range vegetation were found to decrease while Crude fiber (CF and Dry matter yield (DM had increased with growth. The study concluded that closed rangelands are better than open rangelands because it fenced and protected. Erosion index and vegetation degradation rate were very high. Future research work is needed to assess rangelands characteristics and habitat condition across different ecological zones in North Darfur State, Sudan.DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3126/ije.v3i3.11093 International Journal of Environment Vol.3(3 2014: 332-343

Brain Responses Underlying Anthropomorphism, Agency, and Social Attribution in Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Science.gov (United States)

Ammons, Carla J; Doss, Constance F; Bala, David; Kana, Rajesh K

2018-01-01

Theory of Mind (ToM), the ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others, is frequently impaired in Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and may result from altered activation of social brain regions. Conversely, Typically Developing (TD) individuals overextend ToM and show a strong tendency to anthropomorphize and interpret biological motion in the environment. Less is known about how the degree of anthropomorphism influences intentional attribution and engagement of the social brain in ASD. This fMRI study examines the extent of anthropomorphism, its role in social attribution, and the underlying neural responses in ASD and TD using a series of human stick figures and geometrical shapes. 14 ASD and 14 TD adults watched videos of stick figures and triangles interacting in random or socially meaningful ways while in an fMRI scanner. In addition, they completed out-of-scanner measures of ToM skill and real-world social deficits. Whole brain statistical analysis was performed for regression and within and between group comparisons of all conditions using SPM12's implementation of the general linear model. ToM network regions were activated in response to social movement and human-like characters in ASD and TD. In addition, greater ToM ability was associated with increased TPJ and MPFC activity while watching stick figures; whereas more severe social symptoms were associated with reduced right TPJ activation in response to social movement. These results suggest that degree of anthropomorphism does not differentially affect social attribution in ASD and highlights the importance of TPJ in ToM and social attribution.

Workplace Health Promotion and Mental Health: Three-Year Findings from Partnering Healthy@Work.

Science.gov (United States)

Jarman, Lisa; Martin, Angela; Venn, Alison; Otahal, Petr; Blizzard, Leigh; Teale, Brook; Sanderson, Kristy

2016-01-01

This study aimed to investigate the association between mental health and comprehensive workplace health promotion (WHP) delivered to an entire state public service workforce (~28,000 employees) over a three-year period. Government departments in a state public service were supported to design and deliver a comprehensive, multi-component health promotion program, Healthy@Work, which targeted modifiable health risks including unhealthy lifestyles and stress. Repeated cross-sectional surveys compared self-reported psychological distress (Kessler-10; K10) at commencement (N = 3406) and after 3 years (N = 3228). WHP availability and participation over time was assessed, and associations between the K10 and exposure to programs estimated. Analyses were repeated for a cohort subgroup (N = 580). Data were weighted for non-response. Participation in any mental health and lifestyle programs approximately doubled after 3 years. Both male and female employees with poorer mental health participated more often over time. Women's psychological distress decreased over time but this change was only partially attributable to participation in WHP, and only to lifestyle interventions. Average psychological distress did not change over time for men. Unexpectedly, program components directly targeting mental health were not associated with distress for either men or women. Cohort results corroborated findings. Healthy@Work was successful in increasing participation across a range of program types, including for men and women with poorer mental health. A small positive association of participation in lifestyle programs with mental health was observed for women but not men. The lack of association of mental health programs may have reflected program quality, its universality of application or other contextual factors.

Recognition and Attribution of Beliefs in the Child

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Dante G. Duero

2010-02-01

Full Text Available Empirical evidence suggests that human beings develop the capacity to ascribe mental states (as false beliefs at the age of four or five years old. This has been demonstrated through the use of different tests (appearance – reality, representational change and false belief tests. Three year old infants commit serious mistakes in such tests. Perner (1994; 1995 suggests that such capacities depend on the metacognitive skills that permits the comprehension of the mind as a representational structure. But its are not developed until the age of four or five. Leslie (1987; 1988; 1994b sustains that such capacity depends on the ontogenetic development of a “paraintentional” modular structure in the brain. Leslie think that around the second year of life children express “mentalist” abilities. For Leslie, lack of executives capacities and lack of a mechanism responsible for coordination of inferences explain the difficulties of children in false belief tests. The objective of this work is to inquire why 3 years old children can not attribute false beliefs, in “false belief test”. The data shows that children are capable of solving problems that require mental adscription at 3 years old, as long as problems are simplified. This indicates that the reported low performance of 3 year old children can be explained in terms of general skills to compute information.

States Pass Diverse Slate of Mental Health Legislation in 2013. Mental Health: 2013 Legislative Session

Science.gov (United States)

Thomsen, Jennifer

2014-01-01

Recent violence in schools and on college campuses has brought into sharp focus the need to address mental health issues in educational settings. Getting students with mental health problems the help they need, without stigmatizing mental illness, may help prevent future tragedies. Children with mental health problems face a host of challenges,…

The double-edged sword of genetic accounts of criminality: causal attributions from genetic ascriptions affect legal decision making.

Science.gov (United States)

Cheung, Benjamin Y; Heine, Steven J

2015-12-01

Much debate exists surrounding the applicability of genetic information in the courtroom, making the psychological processes underlying how people consider this information important to explore. This article addresses how people think about different kinds of causal explanations in legal decision-making contexts. Three studies involving a total of 600 Mechanical Turk and university participants found that genetic, versus environmental, explanations of criminal behavior lead people to view the applicability of various defense claims differently, perceive the perpetrator's mental state differently, and draw different causal attributions. Moreover, mediation and path analyses highlight the double-edged nature of genetic attributions-they simultaneously reduce people's perception of the perpetrator's sense of control while increasing people's tendencies to attribute the cause to internal factors and to expect the perpetrator to reoffend. These countervailing relations, in turn, predict sentencing in opposite directions, although no overall differences in sentencing or ultimate verdicts were found. © 2015 by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Inc.

Individuals with currently untreated mental illness: causal beliefs and readiness to seek help.

Science.gov (United States)

Stolzenburg, S; Freitag, S; Evans-Lacko, S; Speerforck, S; Schmidt, S; Schomerus, G

2018-01-16

Many people with mental illness do not seek professional help. Beliefs about the causes of their current health problem seem relevant for initiating treatment. Our aim was to find out to what extent the perceived causes of current untreated mental health problems determine whether a person considers herself/himself as having a mental illness, perceives need for professional help and plans to seek help in the near future. In a cross-sectional study, we examined 207 untreated persons with a depressive syndrome, all fulfilling criteria for a current mental illness as confirmed with a structured diagnostic interview (Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview). The sample was recruited in the community using adverts, flyers and social media. We elicited causal explanations for the present problem, depression literacy, self-identification as having a mental illness, perceived need for professional help, help-seeking intentions, severity of depressive symptoms (Patient Health Questionnaire - Depression), and whether respondents had previously sought mental healthcare. Most participants fulfilled diagnostic criteria for a mood disorder (n = 181, 87.4%) and/or neurotic, stress-related and somatoform disorders (n = 120, 58.0%) according to the ICD-10. N = 94 (45.4%) participants had never received mental health treatment previously. Exploratory factor analysis of a list of 25 different causal explanations resulted in five factors: biomedical causes, person-related causes, childhood trauma, current stress and unhealthy behaviour. Attributing the present problem to biomedical causes, person-related causes, childhood trauma and stress were all associated with stronger self-identification as having a mental illness. In persons who had never received mental health treatment previously, attribution to biomedical causes was related to greater perceived need and stronger help-seeking intentions. In those with treatment experience, lower attribution to person-related causes and

Mental Health Service Use Among Immigrants in the United States: A Systematic Review

Science.gov (United States)

Derr, Amelia Seraphia

2016-01-01

Objective Immigrants face stressors unique to the experience of migration that may exacerbate or cause mental health problems but access care at rates far below the general population, leaving them at risk of untreated mental health conditions. This review synthesizes current findings on mental health service utilization among immigrants to inform future research efforts addressing disparities in access to care. Methods A systematic literature search of seven databases yielded 62 articles that met inclusion criteria: peer-reviewed reports of empirical studies based in the United States with an explicit focus on immigrant mental health service use. Each article was evaluated, and information was extracted by using a structured abstracting form. Results Studies have shown that immigrants from Asia, Latin America, and Africa use mental health services at lower rates than nonimmigrants, despite an equal or greater need. Lower usage has been found to be more pronounced among men, the uninsured, and the undocumented. Structural barriers to service use reported included lack of insurance, high cost, and language barriers. Studies have shown that social support is particularly important for immigrants and that those who seek help for mental health concerns tend to turn first to family, friends, or religious leaders. Conclusions Important areas for future research on disparities in mental health service use among immigrants include expanding research and analytic design to emphasize understudied groups and the heterogeneity of immigrant experiences over time, studying interventions that foster collaboration between formal and informal service sectors, and examining the role of social support in problem recognition and treatment initiation. PMID:26695493

Detection and attribution of streamflow timing changes to climate change in the Western United States

Science.gov (United States)

Hidalgo, H.G.; Das, T.; Dettinger, M.D.; Cayan, D.R.; Pierce, D.W.; Barnett, T.P.; Bala, G.; Mirin, A.; Wood, A.W.; Bonfils, Celine; Santer, B.D.; Nozawa, T.

2009-01-01

This article applies formal detection and attribution techniques to investigate the nature of observed shifts in the timing of streamflow in the western United States. Previous studies have shown that the snow hydrology of the western United States has changed in the second half of the twentieth century. Such changes manifest themselves in the form of more rain and less snow, in reductions in the snow water contents, and in earlier snowmelt and associated advances in streamflow "center" timing (the day in the "water-year" on average when half the water-year flow at a point has passed). However, with one exception over a more limited domain, no other study has attempted to formally attribute these changes to anthropogenic increases of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Using the observations together with a set of global climate model simulations and a hydrologic model (applied to three major hydrological regions of the western United States_the California region, the upper Colorado River basin, and the Columbia River basin), it is found that the observed trends toward earlier "center" timing of snowmelt-driven streamflows in the western United States since 1950 are detectably different from natural variability (significant at the p analysis, and it is the only basin that showed a detectable signal when the analysis was performed on individual basins. It should be noted that although climate change is an important signal, other climatic processes have also contributed to the hydrologic variability of large basins in the western United States. ?? 2009 American Meteorological Society.

Self-rated mental health and race/ethnicity in the United States: support for the epidemiological paradox

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Alexis R. Santos-Lozada

2016-09-01

Full Text Available This paper evaluates racial/ethnic differences in self-rated mental health for adults in the United States, while controlling for demographic and socioeconomic characteristics as well as length of stay in the country. Using data from the 2010 National Health Interview Survey Cancer Control Supplement (NHIS-CCS, binomial logistic regression models are fit to estimate the association between race/ethnicity and poor/fair self-reported mental health among US Adults. The size of the analytical sample was 22,844 persons. Overall prevalence of poor/fair self-rated mental health was 7.72%, with lower prevalence among Hispanics (6.93%. Non-Hispanic blacks had the highest prevalence (10.38%. After controls for socioeconomic characteristics are incorporated in the models, Hispanics were found to have a lower probability of reporting poor/fair self-rated mental health in comparison to non-Hispanic whites (OR = 0.70; 95% CI [0.55–0.90]. No difference was found for other minority groups when compared to the reference group in the final model. Contrary to global self-rated health, Hispanics were found to have a lower probability of reporting poor/fair self-rated mental health in comparison to non-Hispanic whites. No difference was found for non-Hispanic blacks when they were compared to non-Hispanic whites. Self-rated mental health is therefore one case of a self-rating of health in which evidence supporting the epidemiological paradox is found among adults in the United States.

Mental Health Stigma: Society, Individuals, and the Profession

OpenAIRE

Ahmedani, Brian K.

2011-01-01

Mental health stigma operates in society, is internalized by individuals, and is attributed by health professionals. This ethics-laden issue acts as a barrier to individuals who may seek or engage in treatment services. The dimensions, theory, and epistemology of mental health stigma have several implications for the social work profession.

The British welfare state and mental health problems: the continuing relevance of the work of Claus Offe.

Science.gov (United States)

Pilgrim, David

2012-09-01

It is now over thirty years since Claus Offe theorised the crisis tendencies of the welfare state in late capitalism. As part of that work he explored ongoing and irresolvable forms of crisis management in parliamentary democracies: capitalism cannot live with the welfare state but also cannot live without it. This article examines the continued relevance of this analysis by Offe, by applying its basic assumptions to the response of the British welfare state to mental health problems, at the turn of the twenty first century. His general theoretical abstractions are tested against the empirical picture of mental health service priorities, evident since the 1980s, in sections dealing with: re-commodification tendencies; the ambiguity of wage labour in the mental health workforce; the emergence of new social movements; and the limits of legalism. © 2012 The Author. Sociology of Health & Illness © 2012 Foundation for the Sociology of Health & Illness/Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Self-concept organisation and mental toughness in sport.

Science.gov (United States)

Meggs, Jennifer; Ditzfeld, Christopher; Golby, Jim

2014-01-01

The present study examines the relationship between individual differences in evaluative self-organisation and mental toughness in sport, proposing that motivation and emotional resiliency (facets of mental toughness) stem from differences in core self. A cross-sectional assessment of 105 athletes competing at a range of performance levels took part in an online study including measures of self-reported mental toughness (Sport Mental Toughness Questionnaire; Sheard, M., Golby, J., & van Wersch, A. (2009). Progress towards construct validation of the Sports Mental Toughness Questionnaire (SMTQ). European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 25(3), 186-193. doi:10.1027/1015-5759.25.3.186) and self-organisation (self-descriptive attribute task; Showers, C. J. (2002). Integration and compartmentalisation: A model of self-structure and self-change. In D. Cervone & W. Mischel (Eds.), Advances in personality science (pp. 271-291). New York, NY: Guilford Press). As predicted, global mental toughness was associated with self-concept positivity, which was particularly high in individuals with positive-integrative self-organisation (individuals who distribute positive and negative self-attributes evenly across multiple selves). Specifically, positive integration was associated with constancy (commitment to goal achievement despite obstacles and the potential for failure), which extends presumably from positive integratives' emotional stability and drive to resolve negative self-beliefs.

One-minute mental status examination for category fluency is more useful than mini-mental state examination to evaluate the reliability of insulin self-injection in elderly diabetic patients.

Science.gov (United States)

Yajima, Ken; Matsushita, Takaya; Sumitomo, Hidetaka; Sakurai, Hirofumi; Katayama, Takashi; Kanno, Kazuo; Sakai, Masashi; Shigeta, Masayuki; Shirabe, Shinichiro; Nakano, Tadasumi; Nishimura, Kazuhiro; Ueki, Akio; Kitaoka, Masafumi

2014-05-04

We investigated the factors associated with the reliability of insulin self-injection in elderly diabetic patients receiving insulin therapy. We enrolled diabetic patients aged ≥65 years and receiving insulin therapy, and assessed their cognitive function by the mini-mental state examination and 1-min mental status examination for category fluency. We also observed their technique of insulin self-injection, and evaluated whether or not patients were able to inject insulin by themselves according to nine defined details in terms of insulin self-injection. The predictive factors for the reliability of insulin self-injection were determined by univariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis. There were 278 participants (135 males, 143 females) enrolled in the present study. According to multivariate logistic regression analysis, only the 1-min mental status examination score was found to be a significant independent predictor of the reliability of insulin self-injection (odds ratio 0.75; 95% confidence interval 0.62-0.90; P = 0.002). The 1-min mental status examination for category fluency can be considered more useful than mini-mental state examination to evaluate the reliability of insulin self-injection in elderly diabetic patients receiving insulin therapy.

The reliability of assigning individuals to cognitive states using the Mini Mental-State Examination: a population-based prospective cohort study

OpenAIRE

Marioni, Riccardo E.; Chatfield, Mark; Brayne, Carol; Matthews, Fiona E.; Med Res Council

2011-01-01

Abstract Background Previous investigations of test re-test reliability of the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) have used correlations and statistics such as Cronbach's α to assess consistency. In practice, the MMSE is usually used to group individuals into cognitive states. The reliability of this grouping (state based approach) has not been fully explored. Methods MMSE data were collected on a subset of 2,275 older participants (≥ 65 years) from the population-based Medical Research Cou...

School-Based Mental Health Programs in the United States: Present Status and a Blueprint for the Future.

Science.gov (United States)

Pfeiffer, Steven I.; Reddy, Linda A.

1998-01-01

Provides overview of sociocultural and political factors in the United States that have influenced recent interest in school-based health and mental health programs. Describes four well-known programs and presents a new framework, the Tripartite Model of School-Based Mental Health Interventions, to stimulate thinking on future programs. Addresses…

De item-reeks van de cognitieve screening test vergeleken met die van de mini-mental state examination

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Schmand, B.; Deelman, B. G.; Hooijer, C.; Jonker, C.; Lindeboom, J.

1996-01-01

The items of the ¿mini-mental state examination' (MMSE) and a Dutch dementia screening instrument, the ¿cognitive screening test' (CST), as well as the ¿geriatric mental status schedule' (GMS) and the ¿Dutch adult reading test' (DART), were administered to 4051 elderly people aged 65 to 84 years.

Mental Health Stigma: Society, Individuals, and the Profession

Science.gov (United States)

Ahmedani, Brian K.

2011-01-01

Mental health stigma operates in society, is internalized by individuals, and is attributed by health professionals. This ethics-laden issue acts as a barrier to individuals who may seek or engage in treatment services. The dimensions, theory, and epistemology of mental health stigma have several implications for the social work profession. PMID:22211117

Maternal discussions of mental states and behaviors: relations to emotion situation knowledge in European American and immigrant Chinese children.

Science.gov (United States)

Doan, Stacey N; Wang, Qi

2010-01-01

This study examined in a cross-cultural context mothers' discussions of mental states and external behaviors in a story-telling task with their 3-year-old children and the relations of such discussions to children's emotion situation knowledge (ESK). The participants were 71 European American and 60 Chinese immigrant mother-child pairs in the United States. Mothers and children read a storybook together at home, and children's ESK was assessed. Results showed that European American mothers made more references to thoughts and emotions during storytelling than did Chinese mothers, who commented more frequently on behaviors. Regardless of culture, mothers' use of mental states language predicted children's ESK, whereas their references to behaviors were negatively related to children's ESK. Finally, mothers' emphasis on mental states over behaviors partially mediated cultural effects on children's ESK. © 2010 The Authors. Child Development © 2010 Society for Research in Child Development, Inc.

Investigating the relationship between organizational factors and mental health of the staff in state organizations of Lorestan province

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

2015-12-01

Full Text Available Background: Nowadays, despite the fact that a variety of factors contributing to the progress in technology has made people get things done faster the speed and accuracy in accomplishing affairs, as a result of which, this progress has brought about mankind obtain new achievements, has caused some diseases and mental disorders and undermined relations and human values. Thus, the target of this study is to investigate the relationship between organizational factors and mental health of the staffs in governmental organizations. Materials and Methods: The method of this descriptive and correlation study was carried out on 379 staff of state organizations of Lorestan province who selected using stratified proportional sampling. For data collecting, General Health Questionnaire (28-GHQ, Metzkas and Bardnez’s management style questionnaire, role ambiguity and role conflict scale of Jamshidinezhad, Deep and Sosman’s organizational climate, and a researcher-made questionnaire for measuring employees, attitudes and organizational factors associated with stress were used. For analyzing the data, SPSS software (version 19, descriptive indicators, Pearson correlation, stepwise regression, independent t-test and multivariate analysis were used. Results: The results showed that for predicting mental health of the staff of state organizations, working conditions, organizational climate, task-oriented style of manager and role ambiguity were significant. The results of independent t-test and multivariate analysis showed that there is no significant difference between male and female in general mental health scale and its components. Conclusion: The overall results of this study indicate the role of organizational variables in predicting mental health of the staff in state organizations of Lorestan state.

Comparing Strategies for Providing Child and Youth Mental Health Care Services in Canada, the United States, and The Netherlands.

Science.gov (United States)

Ronis, Scott T; Slaunwhite, Amanda K; Malcom, Kathryn E

2017-11-01

This paper reviews how child and youth mental health care services in Canada, the United States, and the Netherlands are organized and financed in order to identify systems and individual-level factors that may inhibit or discourage access to treatment for youth with mental health problems, such as public or private health insurance coverage, out-of-pocket expenses, and referral requirements for specialized mental health care services. Pathways to care for treatment of mental health problems among children and youth are conceptualized and discussed in reference to health insurance coverage and access to specialty services. We outline reforms to the organization of health care that have been introduced in recent years, and the basket of services covered by public and private insurance schemes. We conclude with a discussion of country-level opportunities to enhance access to child and youth mental health services using existing health policy levers in Canada, the United States and the Netherlands.

Children's mental health and collective violence: a binational study on the United States-Mexico border Salud mental infantil y violencia colectiva: un estudio binacional en la frontera entre México y los Estados Unidos

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Marie Leiner

2012-05-01

Full Text Available OBJECTIVE: To investigate the risk effects of poverty and exposure to collective violence attributed to organized crime on the mental health of children living on the United States-Mexico border. METHODS: A repeated, cross-sectional study measured risk effects by comparing scores of psychosocial and behavioral problems among children and adolescents living on the border in the United States or Mexico in 2007 and 2010. Patients living in poverty who responded once to the Pictorial Child Behavior Checklist (P+CBCL in Spanish were randomly selected from clinics in El Paso, Texas, United States (poverty alone group, and Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico (poverty plus violence group. Only children of Hispanic origin (Mexican-American or Mexican living below the poverty level and presenting at the clinic for nonemergency visits with no history of diagnosed mental, neurological, or life-threatening disease or disability were included. RESULTS: Exposure to collective violence and poverty seemed to have an additive effect on children's mental health. Children exposed to both poverty and collective violence had higher problem scores, as measured by the P+CBCL, than those exposed to poverty alone. CONCLUSIONS: It is important to consider that children and adolescents exposed to collective violence and poverty also have fewer chances to receive treatment. Untreated mental health problems predict violence, antisocial behaviors, and delinquency and affect families, communities, and individuals. It is crucial to address the mental health of children on the border to counteract the devastating effects this setting will have in the short term and the near future.OBJETIVO: Investigar los efectos del riesgo de pobreza y la exposición a la violencia colectiva atribuida al crimen organizado sobre la salud mental de los niños que viven en la frontera entre México y los Estados Unidos. MÉTODOS: En este estudio transversal seriado se midieron los efectos del riesgo

Global burden of disease attributable to mental and substance use disorders: findings from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2010.

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Whiteford, Harvey A; Degenhardt, Louisa; Rehm, Jürgen; Baxter, Amanda J; Ferrari, Alize J; Erskine, Holly E; Charlson, Fiona J; Norman, Rosana E; Flaxman, Abraham D; Johns, Nicole; Burstein, Roy; Murray, Christopher J L; Vos, Theo

2013-11-09

We used data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study 2010 (GBD 2010) to estimate the burden of disease attributable to mental and substance use disorders in terms of disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), years of life lost to premature mortality (YLLs), and years lived with disability (YLDs). For each of the 20 mental and substance use disorders included in GBD 2010, we systematically reviewed epidemiological data and used a Bayesian meta-regression tool, DisMod-MR, to model prevalence by age, sex, country, region, and year. We obtained disability weights from representative community surveys and an internet-based survey to calculate YLDs. We calculated premature mortality as YLLs from cause of death estimates for 1980-2010 for 20 age groups, both sexes, and 187 countries. We derived DALYs from the sum of YLDs and YLLs. We adjusted burden estimates for comorbidity and present them with 95% uncertainty intervals. In 2010, mental and substance use disorders accounted for 183·9 million DALYs (95% UI 153·5 million-216·7 million), or 7·4% (6·2-8·6) of all DALYs worldwide. Such disorders accounted for 8·6 million YLLs (6·5 million-12·1 million; 0·5% [0·4-0·7] of all YLLs) and 175·3 million YLDs (144·5 million-207·8 million; 22·9% [18·6-27·2] of all YLDs). Mental and substance use disorders were the leading cause of YLDs worldwide. Depressive disorders accounted for 40·5% (31·7-49·2) of DALYs caused by mental and substance use disorders, with anxiety disorders accounting for 14·6% (11·2-18·4), illicit drug use disorders for 10·9% (8·9-13·2), alcohol use disorders for 9·6% (7·7-11·8), schizophrenia for 7·4% (5·0-9·8), bipolar disorder for 7·0% (4·4-10·3), pervasive developmental disorders for 4·2% (3·2-5·3), childhood behavioural disorders for 3·4% (2·2-4·7), and eating disorders for 1·2% (0·9-1·5). DALYs varied by age and sex, with the highest proportion of total DALYs occurring in people aged 10

Social workers' attributions towards individuals with dual diagnosis of intellectual disability and mental illness.

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Araten-Bergman, T; Werner, S

2017-02-01

The present study aimed to explore the applicability of the attribution model to social workers' attributions towards clients with dual diagnosis of intellectual disability and psychiatric illness. Specifically, the study examined the relations between social workers' attribution of responsibility, causality, stereotypes of dangerousness, their emotional reactions and behavioural reactions towards clients with dual diagnosis. Social workers (N = 279) completed questionnaires measuring attributions of responsibility, causation and dangerousness, and reported on their emotional and behavioural reactions to clients diagnosed with DD. Most social workers reported high levels of helping behaviours. The strongest predictor of discriminatory behaviours was the stereotype of dangerousness. Social workers who reported feeling less anger and more pity towards clients with DD tended to report higher levels of helping behaviour. But contrary to attribution theory, fear and anger did not predict discriminatory behaviours. The results are discussed in relation to the core values of social work and to professional identity. © 2016 MENCAP and International Association of the Scientific Study of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Functional capacity and mental state of patients undergoing cardiac surgery

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Bruna Corrêa

Full Text Available Abstract Introduction: Cardiovascular diseases are a serious public health problem in Brazil. Myocardial revascularization surgery (MRS as well as cardiac valve replacement and repair are procedures indicated to treat them. Thus, extracorporeal circulation (ECC is still widely used in these surgeries, in which patients with long ECC times may have greater neurological deficits. Neurological damage resulting from MRS can have devastating consequences such as loss of independence and worsening of quality of life. Objective: To assess the effect of cardiac surgery on a patient’s mental state and functional capacity in both the pre- and postoperative periods. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional study with convenience sampling of subjects undergoing MRS and valve replacement. Participants were administered the Mini-Mental State Exam (MMSE and the Duke Activity Status Index (DASI in the pre- and postoperative periods, as well as before their hospital discharge. Results: This study assessed nine patients (eight males aged 62.4 ± 6.3 years with a BMI of 29.5 ± 2.3 kg/m2. There was a significant decrease in DASI scores and VO2 from preoperative to postoperative status (p = 0.003 and p = 0.003, respectively. Conclusion: This study revealed a loss of cognitive and exercise capacity after cardiac surgery. A larger sample however is needed to consolidate these findings.

Towards a Computational Model of the Self-attribution of Agency

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hindriks, K.V.; Wiggers, P.; Jonker, C.M.; Haselager, W.F.G.; Mehrotra, K.G.; Mohan, C.K.; Oh, J.C.; Varshney, P.K.; Ali, M.

2011-01-01

In this paper, a first step towards a computational model of the self-attribution of agency is presented, based on Wegner’s theory of apparent mental causation. A model to compute a feeling of doing based on first-order Bayesian network theory is introduced that incorporates the main contributing

Towards a computational model of the self-attribution of agency

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Hindriks, K.V.; Wiggers, P.; Jonker, C.M.; Haselager, W.F.G.; Olivier, P.; Kray, C.

2007-01-01

In this paper, a first step towards a computational model of the self-attribution of agency is presented, based on Wegner’s theory of apparent mental causation. A model to compute a feeling of doing based on first-order Bayesian network theory is introduced that incorporates the main contributing

Digital mental health and intellectual disabilities: state of the evidence and future directions.

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Sheehan, Rory; Hassiotis, Angela

2017-11-01

The use of digital technologies in the management of mental illness, and more generally in the promotion of well-being and mental health, has received much recent attention and is a focus of current health policy. We conducted a narrative review to explore the opportunities and risks of digital technologies in mental healthcare specifically for people with intellectual disability, a sometimes marginalised and socially excluded group. The scope of digital mental health is vast and the promise of cheaper and more effective interventions delivered digitally is attractive. People with intellectual disability experience high rates of mental illness and could benefit from the development of novel therapies, yet seem to have been relatively neglected in the discourse around digital mental health and are often excluded from the development and implementation of new interventions. People with intellectual disability encounter several barriers to fully embracing digital technology, which may be overcome with appropriate support and adaptations. A small, but growing, literature attests to the value of incorporating digital technologies into the lives of people with intellectual disability, not only for promoting health but also for enhancing educational, vocational and leisure opportunities. Clearly further evidence is needed to establish the safety and clinical efficacy of digital mental health interventions for people with and without intellectual disability. A digital inclusion strategy that explicitly addresses the needs of people with intellectual disability would ensure that all can share the benefits of the digital world. © Article author(s) (or their employer(s) unless otherwise stated in the text of the article) 2017. All rights reserved. No commercial use is permitted unless otherwise expressly granted.

Effect of Mental State on the Rate of Identifying the Relevancy of Documents Retrieved in a Search

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Faezeh Farhoudi

2009-07-01

Full Text Available The present study investigates the link between various users’ mental state while searching information systems with the outcome of the resulting documents retrieved. Various factors such as user knowledge, search skills, motivation and aims influence the decisions and evaluation of users regarding documents retrieved. MMPI instrument was used to identify users’ mental states. The sample was drawn from female senior students of librarianship, using systematic random sampling. The findings indicated that anxiety and depression have significant inverse relationship to the rate of relevancy identification of the documents retrieved by the users.

ANALISIS PERSEPSI AUDITOR MENGENAI FAKTOR PENENTU AUDIT FEE BERDASARKAN CLIENT ATTRIBUTES, AUDITOR ATTRIBUTES, DAN ENGAGEMENT ATRTRIBUTES

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Aman Faturachman

2013-04-01

Full Text Available This research purposes to know how perception auditors about determining factors of audit fee based on Client Attributes, Auditor Attributes, and Engagement Attributes at The Public Accountant Firm residing in Bandung. In this research, the indicator that is used to characterize the Client Attributes are size, complexity, inherent risk, profitability, leverage and liquidity, and industry. While the indicator to characterize the Auditor Attributes are auditor’s specialization, audit tenure, and location. And the indicators to characterize the Engagement Attributes are audit problems, audit report lag, busy season, and number of reports. The Method that is used in this research is a descriptive method. The population in this research is a public accountant in Bandung. Based on sampling techniques that saturated and qualified then it take about 11 offices of public accountant. SmartPLS ver 2.0 M3 are used as a Statistical analysis. The result of this research with count the loading factor and bootstrapping method are, the first one that the perception of the auditor based on client attributes of audit fee determinants from which is very important to not important is size, complexity, profitability, inherent risk,  industry, and leverage & liquidty, the second states that perception based on auditor attributes audit fee determinants from which is very important to not important is audit tenure, location, and specialization. And the third states that the perception of auditor engagement attributes based determinants of audit fee which is very important to not important audit report lag, busy season, audit problems and number of reports.

Causation, constitution and context. Comment on "Seeing mental states: An experimental strategy for measuring the observability of other minds" by Cristina Becchio et al.

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Zahavi, Dan

2018-03-01

In their new article [1], Becchio and her colleagues argue that recent claims concerning the possibility of directly perceiving other people's mental states will remain speculative as long as one has failed to demonstrate the availability of mentalistic information in observable behavior [p. 4]. The ambitious goal of the authors is then to outline an experimental setup that will permit one to determine whether and to what extent a mental state is observable. Drawing on Becchio's previous work on how regularities in the kinematic patterns specify the mental states of the agent, the authors suggest that a similar approach can be adopted to probe the observability of any mental state instantiated in behavioral patterns [p. 19].

Incongruity, Incongruity Resolution, and Mental States: The Measure and Modification of Situational Awareness and Control

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Derks, Peter L.; Gillikin, Lynn S.

1997-01-01

Cognition and emotion combine to define mental states. Situational awareness depends on both knowledge of the environment and the mood of the individual. Cognitive scientists from William James and Sigmond Freud to contemporary theorists in artificial intelligence and neuropsychology have acknowledged the critical role of subjective state in determining the efficiency and flexibility of information processing. One of the most explicit computational models of mental states to incorporate both knowledge and arousal has been described. Knowledge is carried in a typical neural net with categorical nodes and probabilistic links. Arousal determines the focus among these nodes and links. High arousal results in a restricted range of activation. Low arousal causes a wider range of stimulation and a broader linking of categories or "ideas." From this model Gerlernter generates "creativity" in problem solving from a network that is widely active and the possibility of "fixation" from a highly aroused system.

Workplace Health Promotion and Mental Health: Three-Year Findings from Partnering Healthy@Work.

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Lisa Jarman

Full Text Available This study aimed to investigate the association between mental health and comprehensive workplace health promotion (WHP delivered to an entire state public service workforce (~28,000 employees over a three-year period. Government departments in a state public service were supported to design and deliver a comprehensive, multi-component health promotion program, Healthy@Work, which targeted modifiable health risks including unhealthy lifestyles and stress. Repeated cross-sectional surveys compared self-reported psychological distress (Kessler-10; K10 at commencement (N = 3406 and after 3 years (N = 3228. WHP availability and participation over time was assessed, and associations between the K10 and exposure to programs estimated. Analyses were repeated for a cohort subgroup (N = 580. Data were weighted for non-response. Participation in any mental health and lifestyle programs approximately doubled after 3 years. Both male and female employees with poorer mental health participated more often over time. Women's psychological distress decreased over time but this change was only partially attributable to participation in WHP, and only to lifestyle interventions. Average psychological distress did not change over time for men. Unexpectedly, program components directly targeting mental health were not associated with distress for either men or women. Cohort results corroborated findings. Healthy@Work was successful in increasing participation across a range of program types, including for men and women with poorer mental health. A small positive association of participation in lifestyle programs with mental health was observed for women but not men. The lack of association of mental health programs may have reflected program quality, its universality of application or other contextual factors.

Gender disparities in medical expenditures attributable to hypertension in the United States.

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Basu, Rituparna; Franzini, Luisa; Krueger, Patrick M; Lairson, David R

2010-01-01

We sought to examine and attempt to explain gender disparities in hypertension-attributable expenditure among noninstitutionalized individuals in the United States. Using the 2001-2004 Medical Expenditure Panel Survey and the Aday and Andersen health care use model, we estimated hypertension-attributable health care expenditures for inpatient stay, outpatient visits, prescription drugs, office visits, and emergency room (ER) visits among men and women by applying the method of recycled prediction. Hypertensive individuals were identified using International Classification of Diseases, 9th edition, codes or self-report of a diagnosis of hypertension. The adjusted mean hypertension-attributable expenditure per individual was significantly higher for women than for men for prescription drugs, inpatient stays, office visits, outpatient visits and ER visits expenditures. However, as age increased, the gender difference in adjusted mean expenditures became smaller and eventually reversed. This reversal occurred at different ages for different expenditures. For prescription drugs, office visits and outpatient expenditures, the reversal in expenditures occurred around age 50 to 59. The maximum difference was observed in outpatient expenditures, where women's average expenditure was $102 more than men's below age 45 but $103 less than men's above age 75. These differences remained significant even after controlling for predisposing, enabling, and need predictors of health care use. Our findings imply that there are gender disparities in hypertension-related expenditures, but that this disparity depends on age. These findings support recent findings on gender disparities in heart diseases and raise the question of physicians' bias in their diagnostic or prognostic approaches to hypertension in men and women. Copyright 2010 Jacobs Institute of Women's Health. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Let Me Relax: Toward Automated Sedentary State Recognition and Ubiquitous Mental Wellness Solutions

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Vijay Rajanna

2018-12-01

Full Text Available Advances in ubiquitous computing technology improve workplace productivity, reduce physical exertion, but ultimately result in a sedentary work style. Sedentary behavior is associated with an increased risk of stress, obesity, and other health complications. Let Me Relax is a fully automated sedentary-state recognition framework using a smartwatch and smartphone, which encourages mental wellness through interventions in the form of simple relaxation techniques. The system was evaluated through a comparative user study of 22 participants split into a test and a control group. An analysis of NASA Task Load Index pre- and post- study survey revealed that test subjects who followed relaxation methods, showed a trend of both increased activity as well as reduced mental stress. Reduced mental stress was found even in those test subjects that had increased inactivity. These results suggest that repeated interventions, driven by an intelligent activity recognition system, is an effective strategy for promoting healthy habits, which reduce stress, anxiety, and other health risks associated with sedentary workplaces.

Specific default mode subnetworks support mentalizing as revealed through opposing network recruitment by social and semantic FMRI tasks.

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Hyatt, Christopher J; Calhoun, Vince D; Pearlson, Godfrey D; Assaf, Michal

2015-08-01

The ability to attribute mental states to others, or "mentalizing," is posited to involve specific subnetworks within the overall default mode network (DMN), but this question needs clarification. To determine which default mode (DM) subnetworks are engaged by mentalizing processes, we assessed task-related recruitment of DM subnetworks. Spatial independent component analysis (sICA) applied to fMRI data using relatively high-order model (75 components). Healthy participants (n = 53, ages 17-60) performed two fMRI tasks: an interactive game involving mentalizing (Domino), a semantic memory task (SORT), and a resting state fMRI scan. sICA of the two tasks split the DMN into 10 subnetworks located in three core regions: medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC; five subnetworks), posterior cingulate/precuneus (PCC/PrC; three subnetworks), and bilateral temporoparietal junction (TPJ). Mentalizing events increased recruitment in five of 10 DM subnetworks, located in all three core DMN regions. In addition, three of these five DM subnetworks, one dmPFC subnetwork, one PCC/PrC subnetwork, and the right TPJ subnetwork, showed reduced recruitment by semantic memory task events. The opposing modulation by the two tasks suggests that these three DM subnetworks are specifically engaged in mentalizing. Our findings, therefore, suggest the unique involvement of mentalizing processes in only three of 10 DM subnetworks, and support the importance of the dmPFC, PCC/PrC, and right TPJ in mentalizing as described in prior studies. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Undergraduate Nursing Students' Attitudes toward Mental Illness and Mental Health Nursing

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Konzelman, Lois

2017-01-01

Historically, nurses have lacked recognition for the work they do, especially in the area of mental health. There is a shortage of qualified mental health nurses to meet the demand for services. Many rural areas in the United States have few or no mental health services to offer communities. Encouraging positive attitudes toward mental health…

A Longitudinal Investigation of the Dynamics of Mental State Talk in Families.

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Jenkins, Jennifer M.; Turrell, Sheri L.; Kogushi, Yuiko; Lollis, Susan; Ross, Hildy S.

2003-01-01

Observed home interaction between parents and 2- and 4-year-olds at Time 1 and 2 years later. Found that parent mental state talk to children varied by child's age, context of talk, and parent gender. Four-year-olds with older siblings produced and heard more cognitive talk and less desire talk than children without older siblings. Time 1 family…

Psychosis prediction in secondary mental health services. A broad, comprehensive approach to the "at risk mental state" syndrome.

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Francesconi, M; Minichino, A; Carrión, R E; Delle Chiaie, R; Bevilacqua, A; Parisi, M; Rullo, S; Bersani, F Saverio; Biondi, M; Cadenhead, K

2017-02-01

Accuracy of risk algorithms for psychosis prediction in "at risk mental state" (ARMS) samples may differ according to the recruitment setting. Standardized criteria used to detect ARMS individuals may lack specificity if the recruitment setting is a secondary mental health service. The authors tested a modified strategy to predict psychosis conversion in this setting by using a systematic selection of trait-markers of the psychosis prodrome in a sample with a heterogeneous ARMS status. 138 non-psychotic outpatients (aged 17-31) were consecutively recruited in secondary mental health services and followed-up for up to 3 years (mean follow-up time, 2.2 years; SD=0.9). Baseline ARMS status, clinical, demographic, cognitive, and neurological soft signs measures were collected. Cox regression was used to derive a risk index. 48% individuals met ARMS criteria (ARMS-Positive, ARMS+). Conversion rate to psychosis was 21% for the overall sample, 34% for ARMS+, and 9% for ARMS-Negative (ARMS-). The final predictor model with a positive predictive validity of 80% consisted of four variables: Disorder of Thought Content, visuospatial/constructional deficits, sensory-integration, and theory-of-mind abnormalities. Removing Disorder of Thought Content from the model only slightly modified the predictive accuracy (-6.2%), but increased the sensitivity (+9.5%). These results suggest that in a secondary mental health setting the use of trait-markers of the psychosis prodrome may predict psychosis conversion with great accuracy despite the heterogeneity of the ARMS status. The use of the proposed predictive algorithm may enable a selective recruitment, potentially reducing duration of untreated psychosis and improving prognostic outcomes. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

Young Children's Persuasion in Everyday Conversation: Tactics and Attunement to Others' Mental States

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Bartsch, Karen; Wright, Jennifer Cole; Estes, David

2010-01-01

Young children's persuasion tactics, and how these reflected attunement to others' mental states, were explored in archived longitudinal samples of transcribed at-home conversations of four children, three to five years old. Over 87,000 utterances were examined to identify conversation "chunks" involving persuasion; 1,307 chunks were then coded…

Health Care, Family, and Community Factors Associated with Mental, Behavioral, and Developmental Disorders in Early Childhood - United States, 2011-2012.

Science.gov (United States)

Bitsko, Rebecca H; Holbrook, Joseph R; Robinson, Lara R; Kaminski, Jennifer W; Ghandour, Reem; Smith, Camille; Peacock, Georgina

2016-03-11

Sociodemographic, health care, family, and community attributes have been associated with increased risk for mental, behavioral, and developmental disorders (MBDDs) in children (1,2). For example, poverty has been shown to have adverse effects on cognitive, socio-emotional, and physical development (1). A safe place to play is needed for gross motor development, and accessible health care is needed for preventive and illness health care (3). Positive parenting and quality preschool interventions have been shown to be associated with prosocial skills, better educational outcomes, and fewer health risk behaviors over time (2). Protective factors for MBDDs are often shared (4) and conditions often co-occur; therefore, CDC considered MBDDs together to facilitate the identification of factors that could inform collaborative, multidisciplinary prevention strategies. To identify specific factors associated with MBDDs among U.S. children aged 2-8 years, parent-reported data from the most recent (2011-2012) National Survey of Children's Health (NSCH) were analyzed. Factors associated with having any MBDD included inadequate insurance, lacking a medical home, fair or poor parental mental health, difficulties getting by on the family's income, employment difficulties because of child care issues, living in a neighborhood lacking support, living in a neighborhood lacking amenities (e.g., sidewalks, park, recreation center, and library), and living in a neighborhood in poor condition. In a multivariate analysis, fair or poor parental mental health and lacking a medical home were significantly associated with having an MBDD. There was significant variation in the prevalence of these and the other factors by state, suggesting that programs and policies might use collaborative efforts to focus on specific factors. Addressing identified factors might prevent the onset of MBDDs and improve outcomes among children who have one or more of these disorders.

Mental states as part of countertransference responses in psychotherapists facing reports of traumatic events of mourning and sexual violence.

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Goldfeld, Patricia; Terra, Luciana; Abuchaim, Claudio; Sordi, Anne; Wiethaeuper, Daniela; Bouchard, Marc-Andrè; Mardini, Victor; Baumgardt, Rosana; Lauerman, Marta; Ceitlin, Lúcia Helena

2008-09-01

The study aims to compare the mental states and countertransference responses of 92 psychodynamically oriented psychotherapists, male and female, experienced and inexperienced, facing written reports of real patients who experienced traumatic events. Two vignettes were presented: one of a sexual violence, the other the sudden death of a significant person. The Mental States Rating System (MSRS; Bouchard, Picard, Audet, Brisson, & Carrier, 1998), the MSRS Self-Report (Goldfeld & Bouchard, 2004), and the Inventory of Countertransference Behavior (ICB; Friedman & Gelso, 2000) were used. Results showed that the mourning vignette led to more reflective responses (MSRS) and the rape case was associated with more negative countertransference reactions (ICB). Female participants were more reflective (MSRS); male therapists used less mentalized states (MSRS Self-Report) and expressed more negative reactions (ICB) for both scenarios. Experienced therapists showed more positive reactions on the ICB. The construct validity of the instruments is discussed in relation to the findings.

Preschool-Aged Children's Understanding of Gratitude: Relations with Emotion and Mental State Knowledge

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Nelson, Jackie A.; de Lucca Freitas, Lia Beatriz; O'Brien, Marion; Calkins, Susan D.; Leerkes, Esther M.; Marcovitch, Stuart

2013-01-01

Developmental precursors to children's early understanding of gratitude were examined. A diverse group of 263 children was tested for emotion and mental state knowledge at ages 3 and 4, and their understanding of gratitude was measured at age 5. Children varied widely in their understanding of gratitude, but most understood some aspects of…

The organizational social context of mental health services and clinician attitudes toward evidence-based practice: a United States national study

Science.gov (United States)

2012-01-01

Background Evidence-based practices have not been routinely adopted in community mental health organizations despite the support of scientific evidence and in some cases even legislative or regulatory action. We examined the association of clinician attitudes toward evidence-based practice with organizational culture, climate, and other characteristics in a nationally representative sample of mental health organizations in the United States. Methods In-person, group-administered surveys were conducted with a sample of 1,112 mental health service providers in a nationwide sample of 100 mental health service institutions in 26 states in the United States. The study examines these associations with a two-level Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM) analysis of responses to the Evidence-Based Practice Attitude Scale (EBPAS) at the individual clinician level as a function of the Organizational Social Context (OSC) measure at the organizational level, controlling for other organization and clinician characteristics. Results We found that more proficient organizational cultures and more engaged and less stressful organizational climates were associated with positive clinician attitudes toward adopting evidence-based practice. Conclusions The findings suggest that organizational intervention strategies for improving the organizational social context of mental health services may contribute to the success of evidence-based practice dissemination and implementation efforts by influencing clinician attitudes. PMID:22726759

The organizational social context of mental health services and clinician attitudes toward evidence-based practice: a United States national study

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Aarons Gregory A

2012-06-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Evidence-based practices have not been routinely adopted in community mental health organizations despite the support of scientific evidence and in some cases even legislative or regulatory action. We examined the association of clinician attitudes toward evidence-based practice with organizational culture, climate, and other characteristics in a nationally representative sample of mental health organizations in the United States. Methods In-person, group-administered surveys were conducted with a sample of 1,112 mental health service providers in a nationwide sample of 100 mental health service institutions in 26 states in the United States. The study examines these associations with a two-level Hierarchical Linear Modeling (HLM analysis of responses to the Evidence-Based Practice Attitude Scale (EBPAS at the individual clinician level as a function of the Organizational Social Context (OSC measure at the organizational level, controlling for other organization and clinician characteristics. Results We found that more proficient organizational cultures and more engaged and less stressful organizational climates were associated with positive clinician attitudes toward adopting evidence-based practice. Conclusions The findings suggest that organizational intervention strategies for improving the organizational social context of mental health services may contribute to the success of evidence-based practice dissemination and implementation efforts by influencing clinician attitudes.

Preparedness of Lithuanian general practitioners to provide mental healthcare services

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jaruseviciene, Lina; Sauliune, Skirmante; Jarusevicius, Gediminas

2014-01-01

BACKGROUND: A large unmet need for mental healthcare in Lithuania is partially attributable to a lack of primary care providers with skills in this area. The aim of this study was to assess general practitioners' (GPs) experience in mental healthcare and their perceptions about how to increase th...

Mental Health of Survivors of the 2010 Haitian Earthquake Living in the United States

Centers for Disease Control (CDC) Podcasts

Thousands of survivors of the 2010 Haitian Earthquake are currently living in the United States. This podcast features a brief non-disease-specific interview with Dr. Marc Safran, CDC's longest serving psychiatrist, about a few of the mental health challenges such survivors may face.

Public green spaces and positive mental health - investigating the relationship between access, quantity and types of parks and mental wellbeing.

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Wood, Lisa; Hooper, Paula; Foster, Sarah; Bull, Fiona

2017-11-01

Associations between parks and mental health have typically been investigated in relation to the presence or absence of mental illness. This study uses a validated measure of positive mental health and data from RESIDential Environments (RESIDE) Project to investigate the association between the presence, amount and attributes of public green space in new greenfield neighbourhood developments and the mental health of local residents (n = 492). Both the overall number and total area of public green spaces were significantly associated with greater mental wellbeing, and findings support a dose-response relationship. Positive mental health was not only associated with parks with a nature focus, but also with green spaces characterised by recreational and sporting activity. The study demonstrates that adequate provision of public green space in local neighbourhoods and within walking distance is important for positive mental health. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Estimation of Subjective Mental Work Load Level with Heart Rate Variability by Tolerance to Driver's Mental Load

Science.gov (United States)

Yokoi, Toshiyuki; Itoh, Michimasa; Oguri, Koji

Most of the traffic accidents have been caused by inappropriate driver's mental state. Therefore, driver monitoring is one of the most important challenges to prevent traffic accidents. Some studies for evaluating the driver's mental state while driving have been reported; however driver's mental state should be estimated in real-time in the future. This paper proposes a way to estimate quantitatively driver's mental workload using heart rate variability. It is assumed that the tolerance to driver's mental workload is different depending on the individual. Therefore, we classify people based on their individual tolerance to mental workload. Our estimation method is multiple linear regression analysis, and we compare it to NASA-TLX which is used as the evaluation method of subjective mental workload. As a result, the coefficient of correlation improved from 0.83 to 0.91, and the standard deviation of error also improved. Therefore, our proposed method demonstrated the possibility to estimate mental workload.

Stepping Stones to Others' Minds: Maternal Talk Relates to Child Mental State Language and Emotion Understanding at 15, 24, and 33 Months

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Taumoepeau, Mele; Ruffman, Ted

2008-01-01

This continuation of a previous study (Taumoepeau & Ruffman, 2006) examined the longitudinal relation between maternal mental state talk to 15- and 24-month-olds and their later mental state language and emotion understanding (N = 74). The previous study found that maternal talk about the child's desires to 15-month-old children uniquely predicted…

Success/failure condition influences attribution of control, negative affect, and shame among patients with depression in Singapore.

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Yeo, Si-Ning; Zainal, Hani; Tang, Catherine S; Tong, Eddie M; Ho, Cyrus S; Ho, Roger C

2017-08-02

There remains a paucity of research on control attribution and depression within Asian populations. This study examines: (1) Success/Failure condition as a moderator between depression and negative affect or shame, and (2) differences in control attribution between patients with depression and healthy controls in Singapore. Seventy one patients with depression and 71 healthy controls went through a digit-span memory task where they were randomized into either the Success or Failure condition. Participants in the Success condition had to memorize and recall 5-digit strings, while participants in the Failure condition did the same for 12-digit strings. They then completed self-report measures of negative affect, shame, and attribution of control. One-way ANCOVA was performed to examine task condition as a moderator of association between mental health status and post-task negative affect or shame. Test of simple effects was carried out on significant interactions. Sign test and Mann-Whitney U test were employed to investigate differences in attribution of control. Mental health status and Success/Failure condition had significant effects on reported negative affect and shame. Healthy controls reported less post-task negative affect and shame in the Success than in the Failure condition while patients with depression reported similar levels of post-task negative affect and shame in both conditions. However, these differences were not significant in the test of simple effects. In addition, healthy controls felt a stronger sense of personal control in success than in failure and were more likely to blame external factors in failure than in success. Conversely, patients with depression were more inclined to credit external factors in success than in failure and ascribed greater personal control in failure than in success. The results suggest that successful conditions may not necessitate the reduction of negative affect in Asians with depression, indicating possible

Creativity as a distinct trainable mental state: An EEG study of musical improvisation.

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Lopata, Joel A; Nowicki, Elizabeth A; Joanisse, Marc F

2017-05-01

Alpha-band EEG was used to index how creative mental states relate to the creation of artistic works in skilled musicians. We contrasted differences in frontal upper alpha-band activity between tasks with high and low creativity demands by recording EEGs while skilled musicians listened to, played back, and improvised jazz melodies. Neural responses were compared for skilled musicians with training in musical improvisation versus those who had no formal improvisation training. Consistent with our hypotheses, individuals showed increased frontal upper alpha-band activity during more creative tasks (i.e., improvisation) compared to during less creative tasks (i.e., rote playback). Moreover, this effect was greatest for musicians with formal improvisation training. The strength of this effect also appeared to modulate the quality of these improvisations, as evidenced by significant correlations between upper alpha EEG power and objective post-hoc ratings of individuals' performances. These findings support a conceptualization of creativity as a distinct mental state and suggest spontaneous processing capacity is better nurtured through formal institutional training than informal. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Dissociation between mental fatigue and motivational state during prolonged mental activity.

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Gergelyfi, Mónika; Jacob, Benvenuto; Olivier, Etienne; Zénon, Alexandre

2015-01-01

Mental fatigue (MF) is commonly observed following prolonged cognitive activity and can have major repercussions on the daily life of patients as well as healthy individuals. Despite its important impact, the cognitive processes involved in MF remain largely unknown. An influential hypothesis states that MF does not arise from a disruption of overused neural processes but, rather, is caused by a progressive decrease in motivation-related task engagement. Here, to test this hypothesis, we measured various neural, autonomic, psychometric and behavioral signatures of MF and motivation (EEG, ECG, pupil size, eye blinks, Skin conductance responses (SCRs), questionnaires and performance in a working memory (WM) task) in healthy volunteers, while MF was induced by Sudoku tasks performed for 120 min. Moreover extrinsic motivation was manipulated by using different levels of monetary reward. We found that, during the course of the experiment, the participants' subjective feeling of fatigue increased and their performance worsened while their blink rate and heart rate variability (HRV) increased. Conversely, reward-induced EEG, pupillometric and skin conductance signal changes, regarded as indicators of task engagement, remained constant during the experiment, and failed to correlate with the indices of MF. In addition, MF did not affect a simple reaction time task, despite the strong influence of extrinsic motivation on this task. Finally, alterations of the motivational state through monetary incentives failed to compensate the effects of MF. These findings indicate that MF in healthy subjects is not caused by an alteration of task engagement but is likely to be the consequence of a decrease in the efficiency, or availability, of cognitive resources.

Dissociation between mental fatigue and motivational state during prolonged mental activity

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Monika eGergelyfi

2015-07-01

Full Text Available Mental fatigue (MF is commonly observed following prolonged cognitive activity and can have major repercussions on the daily life of patients as well as healthy individuals. Despite its important impact, the cognitive processes involved in MF remain largely unknown. An influential hypothesis states that MF does not arise from a disruption of overused neural processes but, rather, is caused by a progressive decrease in motivation-related task engagement.Here, to test this hypothesis, we measured various neural, autonomic, psychometric and behavioral signatures of MF and motivation (EEG, ECG, pupil size, eye blinks, skin conductance responses, questionnaires and performance in a working memory task in healthy volunteers, while MF was induced by Sudoku tasks performed for 120 minutes. Moreover extrinsic motivation was manipulated by using different levels of monetary reward. We found that, during the course of the experiment, the participants’ subjective feeling of fatigue increased and their performance worsened while their blink rate and heart rate variability increased. Conversely, reward-induced EEG, pupillometric and skin conductance signal changes, regarded as indicators of task engagement, remained constant during the experiment, and failed to correlate with the indices of MF. In addition, MF did not affect a simple reaction time task, despite the strong influence of extrinsic motivation on this task. Finally, alterations of the motivational state through monetary incentives failed to compensate the effects of MF. These findings indicate that MF in healthy subjects is not caused by an alteration of task engagement but is likely to be the consequence of a decrease in the efficiency, or availability, of cognitive resources.

State of science: mental workload in ergonomics.

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Young, Mark S; Brookhuis, Karel A; Wickens, Christopher D; Hancock, Peter A

2015-01-01

Mental workload (MWL) is one of the most widely used concepts in ergonomics and human factors and represents a topic of increasing importance. Since modern technology in many working environments imposes ever more cognitive demands upon operators while physical demands diminish, understanding how MWL impinges on performance is increasingly critical. Yet, MWL is also one of the most nebulous concepts, with numerous definitions and dimensions associated with it. Moreover, MWL research has had a tendency to focus on complex, often safety-critical systems (e.g. transport, process control). Here we provide a general overview of the current state of affairs regarding the understanding, measurement and application of MWL in the design of complex systems over the last three decades. We conclude by discussing contemporary challenges for applied research, such as the interaction between cognitive workload and physical workload, and the quantification of workload 'redlines' which specify when operators are approaching or exceeding their performance tolerances.

Sports talents: a study of personal attributes of the state of Paraná track and field athletes

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Lenamar Fiorese Vieira

2008-06-01

Full Text Available The aim of this study is to investigate which personal attributes are necessary for track and field athletes to be considered talents. It was based on Bronfenbrenner’s (1995 bioecological paradigm. The data were collected through informer’s dossiers, semi-structured interviews, research records and other documents. The subject sample was composed by fourteen talents, thirteen family members, seven coaches, three directors of Paraná Sports and one State Secretary of Sports. Content analysis was used to interpret the data. The results demonstrated that personal attributes, body type and interest were prominent in the beginning of track and field practice. On the other hand, search for activities, power of will, need of companionship were the attributes mostly evidenced by the talents in their specialization phase. It may be concluded that talent is a personal competence attained through a special atmosphere favoring sports activities and based on physical and psychological qualities that qualify the athletes for a good performance.

Are Mental Health Effects of Internet Use Attributable to the Web-Based Content or Perceived Consequences of Usage? A Longitudinal Study of European Adolescents.

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Hökby, Sebastian; Hadlaczky, Gergö; Westerlund, Joakim; Wasserman, Danuta; Balazs, Judit; Germanavicius, Arunas; Machín, Núria; Meszaros, Gergely; Sarchiapone, Marco; Värnik, Airi; Varnik, Peeter; Westerlund, Michael; Carli, Vladimir

2016-07-13

Adolescents and young adults are among the most frequent Internet users, and accumulating evidence suggests that their Internet behaviors might affect their mental health. Internet use may impact mental health because certain Web-based content could be distressing. It is also possible that excessive use, regardless of content, produces negative consequences, such as neglect of protective offline activities. The objective of this study was to assess how mental health is associated with (1) the time spent on the Internet, (2) the time spent on different Web-based activities (social media use, gaming, gambling, pornography use, school work, newsreading, and targeted information searches), and (3) the perceived consequences of engaging in those activities. A random sample of 2286 adolescents was recruited from state schools in Estonia, Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. Questionnaire data comprising Internet behaviors and mental health variables were collected and analyzed cross-sectionally and were followed up after 4 months. Cross-sectionally, both the time spent on the Internet and the relative time spent on various activities predicted mental health (Pengaging in those activities were more important predictors, explaining 11.1% variance. Only Web-based gaming, gambling, and targeted searches had mental health effects that were not fully accounted for by perceived consequences. The longitudinal analyses showed that sleep loss due to Internet use (ß=.12, 95% CI=0.05-0.19, P=.001) and withdrawal (negative mood) when Internet could not be accessed (ß=.09, 95% CI=0.03-0.16, Peffect on mental health in the long term. Perceived positive consequences of Internet use did not seem to be associated with mental health at all. The magnitude of Internet use is negatively associated with mental health in general, but specific Web-based activities differ in how consistently, how much, and in what direction they affect mental health. Consequences of

Priming the Mental Time Line

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Di Bono, Maria Grazia; Casarotti, Marco; Priftis, Konstantinos; Gava, Lucia; Umilta, Carlo; Zorzi, Marco

2012-01-01

Growing experimental evidence suggests that temporal events are represented on a mental time line, spatially oriented from left to right. Support for the spatial representation of time comes mostly from studies that have used spatially organized responses. Moreover, many of these studies did not avoid possible confounds attributable to target…

I've got a feeling: Urban and rural indigenous children's beliefs about early life mentality.

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Emmons, Natalie A; Kelemen, Deborah A

2015-10-01

This cross-cultural investigation explored children's reasoning about their mental capacities during the earliest period of human physical existence--the prenatal period. For comparison, children's reasoning about the observable period of infancy was also examined. A total of 283 5- to 12-year-olds from two distinct cultures (urban Ecuador and rural indigenous Shuar) participated. Across cultures, children distinguished the fetal period from infancy, attributing fewer capacities to fetuses. However, for both the infancy and fetal periods, children from both cultures privileged the functioning of emotions and desires over epistemic states (i.e., abilities for thought and memory). Children's justifications to questions about fetal mentality revealed that although epistemic states were generally regarded as requiring physical maturation to function, emotions and desires were seen as functioning as a de facto result of prenatal existence and in response to the prospect of future birth and being part of a social group. These results show that from early in development, children across cultures possess nuanced beliefs about the presence and functioning of mental capacities. Findings converge with recent results to suggest that there is an early arising bias to view emotions and desires as the essential inviolable core of human mentality. The current findings have implications for understanding the role that emerging cognitive biases play in shaping conceptions of human mentality across different cultures. They also speak to the cognitive foundations of moral beliefs about fetal rights. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Mental health professionals' attitudes towards mental illness: professional and cultural factors in the INTER NOS study.

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Del Olmo-Romero, Francisco; González-Blanco, María; Sarró, Salvador; Grácio, Jaime; Martín-Carrasco, Manuel; Martinez-Cabezón, Ana C; Perna, Giampaolo; Pomarol-Clotet, Edith; Varandas, Pedro; Ballesteros-Rodríguez, Javier; Rebolleda-Gil, Carlos; Vanni, Giovanna; González-Fraile, Eduardo

2018-01-20

Research shows that personnel working in mental health facilities may share some of the societal prejudices towards mental illness. This might result in stigmatizing behaviours towards people suffering from mental disorders, undermining the quality of their care. To describe and compare attitudes towards mental illness across a sample of professionals working in a wide range of mental health facilities in Spain, Portugal and Italy. We administered a survey to personnel including two questionnaires related to stigmatizing attitudes: The Community Attitudes toward the Mentally Ill (CAMI) and the Attribution Questionnaire (AQ-27). Data were compared according to professional category, work setting and country. 34.06% (1525) professionals of the surveyed population responded adequately. Psychologists and social therapists had the most positive attitudes, and nursing assistants the most negative, on most factors of CAMI and AQ-27. Community staff had more positive attitudes than hospital-based professionals in most factors on CAMI and in discriminatory responses on AQ-27. Globally, mental health professionals showed a positive attitude towards mental illness, but also a relative support to coercive treatments. There are differences in attitudes modulated by professional category and setting. Results can guide preventive strategies, particularly for the hospital-based and nursing staff.

Development and Validation of the Poverty Attributions Survey

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Bennett, Robert M.; Raiz, Lisa; Davis, Tamara S.

2016-01-01

This article describes the process of developing and testing the Poverty Attribution Survey (PAS), a measure of poverty attributions. The PAS is theory based and includes original items as well as items from previously tested poverty attribution instruments. The PAS was electronically administered to a sample of state-licensed professional social…

The characteristics of hospital emergency department visits made by people with mental health conditions who had dental problems.

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Nalliah, Romesh P; Da Silva, John D; Allareddy, Veerasathpurush

2013-06-01

There is a paucity of knowledge regarding nationally representative estimates of hospital-based emergency department (ED) visits for dental problems made by people with mental health conditions. The authors conducted a study to provide nationwide estimates of hospital-based ED visits attributed to dental caries, pulpal and periapical lesions, gingival and periodontal lesions and mouth cellulitis/abscess made by people with mental health conditions. The authors used the Nationwide Emergency Department Sample, which is a component of the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project sponsored by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. ED visits attributable to dental caries, pulpal and periapical lesions, gingival and periodontal lesions and mouth cellulitis/abscess were identified by the emergency care provider by using diagnostic codes in International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification. The authors examined outcomes, including hospital charges. They used simple descriptive statistics to summarize the data. In 2008, people with mental health conditions made 15,635,253 visits to hospital-based ED in the United States. A diagnosis of dental caries, pulpal and periapical lesions, gingival and periodontal lesions and mouth cellulitis/abscess represented 63,164 of these ED visits. The breakdown of the ED visits was 34,574 with dental caries, 25,352 with pulpal and periapical lesions, 9,657 with gingival and periodontal lesions, and 2,776 with mouth cellulitis/abscess. The total charge for ED visits in the United States was $55.46 million in 2008. In 2008, people with mental health conditions made 63,164 visits to hospital-based EDs and received a diagnosis of dental caries, pulpal and periapical lesions, gingival and periodontal lesions or mouth cellulitis/abscess. These ED visits incurred substantial hospital charges. Programs designed to reduce the number of ED visits made by this population for common dental problems could have a

Assessing Rangeland Attributes On Semi-Arid Zone Of North Darfur State Sudan

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Mohamed Almontasir A. M. Mohamed

2015-08-01

Full Text Available Abstract The study was conducted over a two years period of 2012 and 2013 at three sites of Alfashir locality Ummarahik 25km north of Alfashir Fashar in eastern part of Alfashir about 5km and Berka 30km west of Alfashir Western Sudan in semi-arid zone. The aim of this study was to assess rangeland attributes. Measurements of plant density vegetation cover range production and carrying capacity were assessed. Results showed that total forage production was low and inadequate to satisfy requirements of livestock for inhabiting the area average range production all over the area was found to be 50.68 kgha and 59.21 kgha for the seasons 2012 and 2013 respectively. The average ground cover was about 34.71 and 42.41 for two seasons. The average plant density for the first season was 27.1 plantm2 while the average plant density for the second season was 29.4 plantm2. The study concluded that unwise utilization and exploitation of the rangelands particularly by man causes range deterioration and serious reduction in range production in both quantity and quality so the study suggested that improvement and rehabilitation such lands rangelands should be done. Further research work is needed to assess rangeland attributes across different ecological zones in North Darfur State.

Moving science into state child and adolescent mental health systems: Illinois' evidence-informed practice initiative.

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Starin, Amy C; Atkins, Marc S; Wehrmann, Kathryn C; Mehta, Tara; Hesson-McInnis, Matthew S; Marinez-Lora, A; Mehlinger, Renee

2014-01-01

In 2005, the Illinois State Mental Health Authority embarked on an initiative to close the gap between research and practice in the children's mental health system. A stakeholder advisory council developed a plan to advance evidence informed practice through policy and program initiatives. A multilevel approach was developed to achieve this objective, which included policy change, stakeholder education, and clinician training. This article focuses on the evidence-informed training process designed following review of implementation research. The training involved in-person didactic sessions and twice-monthly telephone supervision across 6 cohorts of community based clinicians, each receiving 12 months of training. Training content initially included cognitive behavioral therapy and behavioral parent training and was adapted over the years to a practice model based on common element concepts. Evaluation based on provider and parent report indicated children treated by training clinicians generally showed superior outcomes versus both a treatment-as-usual comparison group for Cohorts 1 to 4 and the statewide child population as a whole after 90 days of care for Cohorts 5 to 6. The results indicated primarily moderate to strong effects for the evidence-based training groups. Moving a large public statewide child mental health system toward more effective services is a complex and lengthy process. These results indicate training of community mental health providers in Illinois in evidence-informed practice was moderately successful in positively impacting child-level functional outcomes. These findings also influenced state policy in committing resources to continuing the initiative, even in difficult economic times.

One‐minute mental status examination for category fluency is more useful than mini‐mental state examination to evaluate the reliability of insulin self‐injection in elderly diabetic patients

OpenAIRE

Yajima, Ken; Matsushita, Takaya; Sumitomo, Hidetaka; Sakurai, Hirofumi; Katayama, Takashi; Kanno, Kazuo; Sakai, Masashi; Shigeta, Masayuki; Shirabe, Shinichiro; Nakano, Tadasumi; Nishimura, Kazuhiro; Ueki, Akio; Kitaoka, Masafumi

2013-01-01

Abstract Aims/Introduction We investigated the factors associated with the reliability of insulin self‐injection in elderly diabetic patients receiving insulin therapy. Materials and Methods We enrolled diabetic patients aged ≥65 years and receiving insulin therapy, and assessed their cognitive function by the mini‐mental state examination and 1‐min mental status examination for category fluency. We also observed their technique of insulin self‐injection, and evaluated whether or not patients...

Desire-state attribution: Benefits of a novel paradigm using the food-sharing behavior of Eurasian jays (Garrulus glandarius).

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Ostojić, Ljerka; Cheke, Lucy G; Shaw, Rachael C; Legg, Edward W; Clayton, Nicola S

2016-01-01

In recent years, we have investigated the possibility that Eurasian jay food sharing might rely on desire-state attribution. The female's desire for a particular type of food can be decreased by sating her on it (specific satiety) and the food sharing paradigm can be used to test whether the male's sharing pattern reflects the female's current desire. Our previous findings show that the male shares the food that the female currently wants. Here, we consider 3 simpler mechanisms that might explain the male's behavior: behavior reading, lack of self-other differentiation and behavioral rules. We illustrate how we have already addressed these issues and how our food sharing paradigm can be further adapted to answer outstanding questions. The flexibility with which the food sharing paradigm can be applied to rule out alternative mechanisms makes it a useful tool to study desire-state attribution in jays and other species that share food.

Mental states and activities in Danish narratives: children with autism and children with language impairment

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Engberg-Pedersen, Elisabeth; Christensen, Rikke Vang

2017-01-01

This study focuses on the relationship between content elements and mental-state language in narratives from twenty-seven children with autism (ASD), twelve children with language impairment (LI), and thirty typically developing children (TD). The groups did not differ on chronological age...... (;–;) and non-verbal cognitive skills, and the groups with ASD and TD did not differ on language measures. The children with ASD and LI had fewer content elements of the storyline than the TD children. Compared with the TD children, the children with ASD used fewer subordinate clauses about the characters......’ thoughts, and preferred talking about mental states as reported speech, especially in the form of direct speech. The children with LI did not differ from the TD children on these measures. The results are discussed in the context of difficulties with socio-cognition in children with ASD and of language...

Mental Health Priorities: Stigma Elimination and Community Advocacy in College Settings

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Michaels, Patrick J.; Corrigan, Patrick W.; Kanodia, Nupur; Buchholz, Blythe; Abelson, Sara

2015-01-01

Low rates of psychological help-seeking among college students have been attributed to a lack of awareness about on-campus resources and to mental illness stigma. One mental health advocacy organization, Active Minds, collaborates with its university-recognized student-run on-campus chapters to promote service use and psychological healthy…

Triangles, tricks and tics: Hyper-mentalizing in response to animated shapes in Tourette syndrome.

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Eddy, Clare M; Cavanna, Andrea E

2015-10-01

Tourette syndrome (TS) can feature complex tics involving socially inappropriate behaviours. Adults with TS can also demonstrate differences to healthy controls when reasoning about mental states. This study investigated spontaneous mentalizing in TS. Twenty adults with TS and twenty healthy controls completed the animations task. Participants were asked to watch short ambiguous animations involving two triangles and describe what was happening. Some animations featured random movement of the triangles, while others depicted social interactions that were simple (e.g., dancing) or more complex (e.g., one triangle tricking the other). Measures were taken of executive functions, alexithymia and clinical symptoms. Individuals with TS responded similarly to controls when viewing animations featuring simple and complex interactions, demonstrating intact mentalizing ability. However, significant group differences were apparent for the random movement animations. TS was associated with a greater tendency to attribute mental states during this condition, and to describe random movements as motivated actions guided by the intentions of the triangles. There were no group differences for the alexithymia scale, but TS was associated with mild executive deficits. No relationships were apparent between animation responses and other measures. Our findings suggest that TS is associated with a propensity to adopt the intentional stance. Hyper-mentalizing in TS could be linked to both dopamine dysfunction and altered social behaviour, whereby amplified salience of social cues could contribute to the complex interplay between environmental context and tic expression. These observations may offer further insight into the potential effects of dopamine dysfunction on social cognition. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Mini-mental state exam for children (MMC) in children with hemiplegic cerebral palsy.

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Moura, Ricardo; Andrade, Peterson Marco Oliveira; Fontes, Patrícia Lemos Bueno; Ferreira, Fernanda Oliveira; Salvador, Larissa de Souza; Carvalho, Maria Raquel Santos; Haase, Vitor Geraldi

2017-01-01

Cognitive impairment is frequent in cerebral palsy (CP) and there is a lack of multiprofessional screening instruments. The aim of this study was to investigate the utility of the Mini-Mental State Examination for Children (MMC), an adapted version of the Mini-Mental State Examination, in screening for cognitive impairments in children with CP. We assessed 397 Brazilian children, 310 with typical development and 87 with CP (hemiplegic and quadriplegic forms), aged 5-16 years. Association between the MMC and general intelligence was assessed by the Colored Progressive Matrices instrument. Psychometric indexes for the MMC were adequate. ROC analyses revealed effective diagnostic accuracy in all ages assessed. Cut-off values are reported. Major difficulties on the MMC were observed in children with CP, particularly individuals with the quadriplegic form. Moreover, the MMC showed moderate correlation with the intelligence test, and was reliable in discriminating, among clinical cases, those with poorer cognitive abilities. The MMC could be useful as a multiprofessional screening instrument for cognitive impairment in children with hemiplegic CP. Results of the MMC in quadriplegic CP children should be interpreted with caution. Diagnosis should be confirmed by further psychological testing.

Attitudes towards mental illness in Malawi: a cross-sectional survey

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Crabb Jim

2012-07-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Stigma and discrimination associated with mental illness are strongly linked to suffering, disability and poverty. In order to protect the rights of those with mental disorders and to sensitively develop services, it is vital to gain a more accurate understanding of the frequency and nature of stigma against people with mental illness. Little research about this issue has been conducted in Sub- Saharan Africa. Our study aimed to describe levels of stigma in Malawi. Methods A cross-sectional survey of patients and carers attending mental health and non-mental health related clinics in a general hospital in Blantyre, Malawi. Participants were interviewed using an adapted version of the questionnaire developed for the “World Psychiatric Association Program to Reduce Stigma and Discrimination Because of Schizophrenia”. Results 210 participants participated in our study. Most attributed mental disorder to alcohol and illicit drug abuse (95.7%. This was closely followed by brain disease (92.8%, spirit possession (82.8% and psychological trauma (76.1%. There were some associations found between demographic variables and single question responses, however no consistent trends were observed in stigmatising beliefs. These results should be interpreted with caution and in the context of existing research. Contrary to the international literature, having direct personal experience of mental illness seemed to have no positive effect on stigmatising beliefs in our sample. Conclusions Our study contributes to an emerging picture that individuals in Sub-Saharan Africa most commonly attribute mental illness to alcohol/ illicit drug use and spirit possession. Our work adds weight to the argument that stigma towards mental illness is an important global health and human rights issue.

Trends in state prison admission of offenders with serious mental illness.

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Bradley-Engen, Mindy S; Cuddeback, Gary S; Gayman, Mathew D; Morrissey, Joseph P; Mancuso, David

2010-12-01

This study examined whether the proportion as well as the number of prisoners with behavioral health disorders have increased in recent years. Among 41,440 persons admitted to Washington State prisons from 1998 through 2006, this study estimated numbers and proportions of behavioral health disorders diagnosed while persons were in the community or in prison. There was a 44% increase in persons admitted with a diagnosed co-occurring substance use disorder between 1998 (N=477) and 2005 (N=686); this increase dropped to 27% by 2006 (N=604). Ratewise, increases in the annual proportion of persons admitted with co-occurring disorders were much smaller, ranging from approximately .2% to 2.6%. The growth in the numbers of prisoners with serious mental illness and co-occurring substance use disorders was not due primarily to increases in admission base rates. Nevertheless, more treatment resources will be needed in prisons to meet growing mental health care needs, and more community-based resources will be needed to ensure continuity of treatment and successful community reentry.

An fMRI study on the comparison of different types of false belief reasoning: False belief-based emotion and behavior attribution.

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Döhnel, Katrin; Schuwerk, Tobias; Sodian, Beate; Hajak, Göran; Rupprecht, Rainer; Sommer, Monika

2017-12-01

False belief (FB) reasoning is a key Theory of Mind (ToM) competence. By 4 years of age, children understand that a person's behavior can be based on a FB about reality. Children cannot understand that a person's emotion can also be based on a FB before the age of six. In order to generate hypothesis on basic processes distinguishing these two types of belief reasoning, the present functional magnetic resonance imaging study in adults directly compares functional activity associated with these two FB tasks. Both tasks were associated with activity in the ToM network including the medial prefrontal cortex and the left temporo-parietal junction. Differential activity was observed in the anterior dorsolateral prefrontal cortex for FB-based emotion relative to behavior attribution. Contrary to FB behavior attribution, FB-based emotion attribution requires the processing of two different mental states: a belief and an emotion and their relation to each other. The activity pattern may reflect the differential demands on cognitive processes associated with the two different belief-based attribution processes. These results shed new light on the still ongoing debate about the nature of the developmental lag between the two FB tasks.

Peer interaction does not always improve children's mental state talk production in oral narratives. A study in six- to ten-year-old Italian children.

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Giuliana Pinto

2016-10-01

Full Text Available Joint narratives are a mean through which children develop and practice their Theory of Mind, thus they represent an ideal means to explore children’s use and development of mental state talk. However, creating a learning environment for storytelling based on peer interaction, does not necessarily mean that students will automatically exploit it by engaging in productive collaboration, thus it is important to explore under what conditions peer interaction promotes children’s ToM. This study extends our understanding of social aspects of ToM, focusing on the effect of joint narratives on school-age children’s mental state talk. Fifty-six Italian primary school children participated in the study (19 females and 37 males. Children created a story in two different experimental conditions (individually and with a partner randomly assigned. Each story told by the children, as well as their dialogues were recorded and transcribed. Transcriptions of narratives were coded in terms of text quality and mental state talk, whereas transcriptions of dialogues were coded in terms of quality of interaction. The results from this study confirmed that peer interaction does not always improve children’s mental state talk performances in oral narratives, but certain conditions need to be satisfied. Peer interaction was more effective on mental state talk with lower individual levels and productive interactions, particularly in terms of capacity to regulate the interactions. When children were able to focus on the interaction, as well as the product, they were also exposed to each other’s reasoning behind their viewpoint. This level of intersubjectivity, in turn, allowed them to take more in consideration the contribution of mental states to the narrative.

Personality traits and mental health states of methamphetamine-dependent and methamphetamine non-using MSM.

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Solomon, Todd M; Kiang, Mathew V; Halkitis, Perry N; Moeller, Robert W; Pappas, Molly K

2010-02-01

This analysis considers the relation between personality traits, mental health states and methamphetamine (MA) use in 60 men who have sex with men (MSM). Thirty MA-dependent and 30 MA non-using MSM were assessed on the Neo Five Factor Inventory, the Brief Symptom Inventory, the Perceived Stress Scale, and the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Checklist-Civilian Version tests. Our results indicate differences between groups on a variety of measures of personality traits and mental states. Specifically, MA-dependent participants were found to be more Neurotic, less Open, less Agreeable, and less Conscientious. Further, MA-dependent participants were found to have higher levels of Paranoid Ideation and higher levels of Interpersonal Sensitivity. Given the high prevalence of MA use in the MSM community and the association between MA use and sexual risk taking, our findings provided a clearer understanding of how individual personality traits may be a factor in the continued use of this drug among MSM. Further research should seek to incorporate individual personality traits into the development of efficacious MA-specific treatment interventions.

Characteristic differences in the mini-mental state examination used in Asian countries

OpenAIRE

Shim, Yong S.; Yang, Dong Won; Kim, Hee-Jin; Park, Young Ho; Kim, SangYun

2017-01-01

Background The mini-mental state examination (MMSE) was adapted by individual countries according to their languages and cultures, though it has not been systematically compared. The objective of this study was to compare the linguistic and cultural variations of the MMSE used in various Asian countries. With this, we can analyze the strengths and weaknesses of the MMSE and consider using a common version in future international clinical studies in Asia. Methods We collected the MMSEs used in...

Psychiatric Boarding in Washington State and the Inadequacy of Mental Health Resources.

Science.gov (United States)

Bloom, Joseph D

2015-06-01

Psychiatric boarding is a term derived from emergency medicine that describes the holding of patients deemed in need of hospitalization in emergency departments for extended periods because psychiatric beds are not available. Such boarding has occurred for many years in the shadows of mental health care as both inpatient beds and community services have decreased. This article focuses on a 2014 Washington State Supreme Court decision that examined the interpretation of certain sections of the Washington state civil commitment statute that had been used to justify the extended boarding of detained psychiatric patients in general hospital emergency departments. The impact of this decision on the state of Washington should be significant and could spark a national debate about the negative impacts of psychiatric boarding on patients and on the nation's general hospital emergency services. © 2015 American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law.

Stigmatization of people with mental illness among inhabitants of a rural community in northern Nigeria.

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Audu, Ishaq A; Idris, Suleiman H; Olisah, Victor O; Sheikh, Taiwo L

2013-02-01

Despite the fact that mental illness is a common problem in society, people's perception of the mentally ill and community attitude towards them is still rather poor, making their rehabilitation and reintegration into society an uphill task. To examine the stigmatization of people with mental illness within a rural community and identify the socio-demographic variables involved. A cross-sectional descriptive study using a multi-stage random sampling technique to obtain data through an interviewer-administered questionnaire to 325 adult inhabitants of a rural community in Nigeria. The results showed widespread ignorance about causation, mode of transmission and remedies available for mental illness, with only 0.9% of respondents attributing mental illness to brain disease. The others attributed it to spiritual attack, punishment for evil doing and illicit psychoactive substance use, among other things. Negative views about the mentally ill were also widely expressed resulting in discriminatory practices. Stigmatization of people with mental illness is still rampant in our community. There is a need for adequate public education about the causes and mode of transmission of mental illness and the treatment options available in the community.

Training Nurses in Cognitive Assessment: Uses and Misuses of the Mini-Mental State Examination

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Koder, Deborah-Anne; Klahr, Amanda

2010-01-01

The Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) is one of the most commonly used instruments to screen for cognitive deficits within the hospital setting. However training in how to administer this widely used tool is scarce with little, if any, formal training for nursing staff. Scores are also often misused with over reliance on results and cut-offs to…

Intersections of discrimination due to unemployment and mental health problems: the role of double stigma for job- and help-seeking behaviors.

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Staiger, Tobias; Waldmann, Tamara; Oexle, Nathalie; Wigand, Moritz; Rüsch, Nicolas

2018-05-21

The everyday lives of unemployed people with mental health problems can be affected by multiple discrimination, but studies about double stigma-an overlap of identities and experiences of discrimination-in this group are lacking. We therefore studied multiple discrimination among unemployed people with mental health problems and its consequences for job- and help-seeking behaviors. Everyday discrimination and attributions of discrimination to unemployment and/or to mental health problems were examined among 301 unemployed individuals with mental health problems. Job search self-efficacy, barriers to care, and perceived need for treatment were compared among four subgroups, depending on attributions of experienced discrimination to unemployment and to mental health problems (group i); neither to unemployment nor to mental health problems (group ii); mainly to unemployment (group iii); or mainly to mental health problems (group iv). In multiple regressions among all participants, higher levels of discrimination predicted reduced job search self-efficacy and higher barriers to care; and attributions of discrimination to unemployment were associated with increased barriers to care. In ANOVAs for subgroup comparisons, group i participants, who attributed discrimination to both unemployment and mental health problems, reported lower job search self-efficacy, more perceived stigma-related barriers to care and more need for treatment than group iii participants, as well as more stigma-related barriers to care than group iv. Multiple discrimination may affect job search and help-seeking among unemployed individuals with mental health problems. Interventions to reduce public stigma and to improve coping with multiple discrimination for this group should be developed.

Lumber attributes, characteristics, and species preferences as indicated by secondary wood products firms in the continental United States.

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David L. Nicholls; Joseph. Roos

2006-01-01

The purpose of this research was to evaluate selected lumber attributes, species preferences, and lumber use properties among secondary wood manufacturers in the United States. Our sample included producers of kitchen cabinets, furniture, doors, windows, and molded products who attended regional and national wood manufacturing events. More than 51% of respondents had...

Teen Mothers' Mental Health.

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SmithBattle, Lee; Freed, Patricia

2016-01-01

Psychological distress is common in teen mothers. High rates of distress are attributed to teen mothers' childhood adversities and the challenges of parenting in the context of chronic stress, cumulative disadvantage, and limited social support. We describe the prevalence of psychological distress in teen mothers; what is known about its origins and impact on mothers and children; factors that promote teen mothers' mental health and resilience; and the many barriers that make it difficult to obtain traditional mental healthcare. We also briefly review the few studies that test interventions to improve teen mothers' mental health. Because barriers to traditional mental health treatment are ubiquitous and difficult to remedy, the second article in this two-part series calls for nurses in healthcare settings, schools, and home visiting programs to screen pregnant and parenting teens for adverse childhood experiences and psychological distress, and to integrate strength-based and trauma-based principles into their practice. Creating a supportive setting where past traumas and psychological distress are addressed with skill and sensitivity builds upon teen mothers' strengths and their aspirations to be the best parents they can be. These approaches facilitate the long-term health and development of mother and child.

Situation and person attributions under spontaneous and intentional instructions: an fMRI study.

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Kestemont, Jenny; Vandekerckhove, Marie; Ma, Ning; Van Hoeck, Nicole; Van Overwalle, Frank

2013-06-01

This functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) research explores how observers make causal beliefs about an event in terms of the person or situation. Thirty-four participants read various short descriptions of social events that implied either the person or the situation as the cause. Half of them were explicitly instructed to judge whether the event was caused by something about the person or the situation (intentional inferences), whereas the other half was instructed simply to read the material carefully (spontaneous inferences). The results showed common activation in areas related to mentalizing, across all types of causes or instructions (posterior superior temporal sulcus, temporo-parietal junction, precuneus). However, the medial prefrontal cortex was activated only under spontaneous instructions, but not under intentional instruction. This suggests a bias toward person attributions (e.g. fundamental attribution bias). Complementary to this, intentional situation attributions activated a stronger and more extended network compared to intentional person attributions, suggesting that situation attributions require more controlled, extended and broader processing of the information.

Intersystem return on investment in public mental health: Positive externality of public mental health expenditure for the jail system in the U.S.

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Yoon, Jangho; Luck, Jeff

2016-12-01

This study examines the extent to which increased public mental health expenditures lead to a reduction in jail populations and computes the associated intersystem return on investment (ROI). We analyze unique panel data on 44 U.S. states and D.C. for years 2001-2009. To isolate the intersystem spillover effect, we exploit variations across states and over time within states in per capita public mental health expenditures and average daily jail inmates. Regression models control for a comprehensive set of determinants of jail incarcerations as well as unobserved determinants specific to state and year. Findings show a positive spillover benefit of increased public mental health spending on the jail system: a 10% increase in per capita public inpatient mental health expenditure on average leads to a 1.5% reduction in jail inmates. We also find that the positive intersystem externality of increased public inpatient mental health expenditure is greater when the level of community mental health spending is lower. Similarly, the intersystem spillover effect of community mental health expenditure is larger when inpatient mental health spending is lower. We compute that overall an extra dollar in public inpatient mental health expenditure by a state would yield an intersystem ROI of a quarter dollar for the jail system. There is significant cross-state variation in the intersystem ROI in both public inpatient and community mental health expenditures, and the ROI overall is greater for inpatient mental health spending than for community mental health spending. Copyright © 2016. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Discrimination, Mental Health, and Substance Use Disorders Among Sexual Minority Populations

OpenAIRE

Lee, Ji Hyun; Gamarel, Kristi E.; Bryant, Kendall J.; Zaller, Nickolas D.; Operario, Don

2016-01-01

Purpose: Sexual minority (lesbian, gay, bisexual) populations have a higher prevalence of mental health and substance use disorders compared to their heterosexual counterparts. Such disparities have been attributed, in part, to minority stressors, including distal stressors such as discrimination. However, few studies have examined associations between discrimination, mental health, and substance use disorders by gender among sexual minority populations.

Infant-Mother Attachment and Children's Friendship Quality: Maternal Mental-State Talk as an Intervening Mechanism

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McElwain, Nancy L.; Booth-Laforce, Cathryn; Wu, Xiaoying

2011-01-01

Utilizing data from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development's Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development, we investigated mothers' talk about mental states during play with their 24-month-old children as a mechanism though which infant-mother attachment was associated with children's later…

Amicus Curiae Brief for the United States Supreme Court on Mental Health Issues Associated with "Physician-Assisted Suicide"

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Werth, James L., Jr.; Gordon, Judith R.

2002-01-01

After providing background material related to the Supreme Court cases on "physician-assisted suicide" (Washington v. Glucksberg, 1997, and Vacco v. Quill, 1997), this article presents the amicus curiae brief that was submitted to the United States Supreme Court by 2 national mental health organizations, a state psychological association, and an…

Consumption of alcohol in mental health services in Rio Grande do Sul state, Brazil

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Luciane Prado Kantorski

2014-08-01

Full Text Available Introduction: Alcoholism has been a major concern of public health worldwide. According to the World Health Organization (WHO, approximately 76.3 million people presented problems of alcohol abuse in 2004. Therefore, the risks arising from the association of psychiatric disorders with alcohol consumption should also be considered in the context of mental health services. Objective: This study aimed to analyze alcohol consumption by the users of Therapeutic Residential Services- SRT and Psychosocial Care Centers- CAPS in five municipalities in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. Methodology: The present study is part of a research entitled Rehabilitation Networks - REDESUL, carried out from September to December 2009 in five municipalities of the aforementioned Brazilian state. The total sample comprised 392 users: 143 from the SRT and 270 from the CAPS services, with intersection of 21 members. Results: The results showed that of the 392 care service users, only 29 had consumed alcohol during the four weeks prior to the survey. The majority of these 29 users were between 31 and 59 years old, male, single, and only n = 13 (48.28% reported being aware of their psychiatric disorders, with prevalence of schizophrenia n = 7 (24.13% followed by bipolar disorders n = 3 (10.34%. Conclusion: It is necessary that the mental health teams are also trained to work with alcohol users, regardless of the type of mental health service they work for, and that they develop actions in relation to guidance on alcohol consumption, treatment adherence, rehabilitation, and integration of users to the community.

What makes generalist mental health professionals effective when working with people with an intellectual disability? A family member and support person perspective.

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Weise, Janelle; Fisher, Karen R; Trollor, Julian N

2018-05-01

Generalist mental health professionals are inadequately equipped to meet the rights of people with intellectual disability. A better understanding of the attributes of effective professionals may assist in the development of workforce capacity in this area. Twenty-eight family/support persons of people with intellectual disability participated in four focus groups. Thematic analysis was undertaken applying the Intellectual Disability Mental Health Core Competencies Framework. Participants described attributes that aligned with current professional expectations such as working together and new attributes such as differentiating between behaviour and mental health. An unexpected finding was the need for professionals to be able to infer meaning by interpreting multiple sources of information. Participants also wanted professionals to acknowledge their professional limitations and seek professional support. Family/support persons identified a range of attributes of effective mental health professionals to support people with intellectual disability. Further research is necessary, particularly from the perspective of people with intellectual disability. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Formal Analysis of Self-Efficacy in Job Interviewee’s Mental State Model

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Ajoge, N. S.; Aziz, A. A.; Yusof, S. A. Mohd

2017-08-01

This paper presents a formal analysis approach for self-efficacy model of interviewee’s mental state during a job interview session. Self-efficacy is a construct that has been hypothesised to combine with motivation and interviewee anxiety to define state influence of interviewees. The conceptual model was built based on psychological theories and models related to self-efficacy. A number of well-known relations between events and the course of self-efficacy are summarized from the literature and it is shown that the proposed model exhibits those patterns. In addition, this formal model has been mathematically analysed to find out which stable situations exist. Finally, it is pointed out how this model can be used in a software agent or robot-based platform. Such platform can provide an interview coaching approach where support to the user is provided based on their individual metal state during interview sessions.

In psychopathic patients emotion attribution modulates activity in outcome-related brain areas.

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Sommer, Monika; Sodian, Beate; Döhnel, Katrin; Schwerdtner, Johannes; Meinhardt, Jörg; Hajak, Göran

2010-05-30

The understanding that other people's emotional states depend on the fulfilment of their intention is fundamentally important for responding adequately to others. Psychopathic patients show severe deficits in responding adequately to other people's emotion. The present study explored whether these impairments are associated with deficits in the ability to infer others' emotional states. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), identical cartoon stories, depicting a subject whose intention was fulfilled or not fulfilled, were presented to 14 psychopathic patients and 14 non-psychopathic patients. The participants should indicate the protagonist's emotional state. Additionally, a non-mentalizing control condition was presented. The two groups showed no behavioural differences. But in non-psychopathic patients emotion attribution was associated with increased activity of the mirror neuron system, the bilateral supramarginal gyrus and the superior frontal gyrus. In contrast psychopathic patients showed increased activation of regions associated with outcome monitoring and attention, such as the orbitofrontal cortex, the medial frontal cortex and temporo-parietal areas. The results emphasize that although psychopathic patients show no deficits in reasoning about other people's emotion if an explicit evaluation is demanded, they use divergent neural processing strategies that are related to more rational, outcome-oriented processes. Copyright (c) 2010 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Surveys of medical seeking preference, mental health literacy, and attitudes toward mental illness in Taiwan, 1990-2000.

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Wu, Chia-Yi; Liu, Shen-Ing; Chang, Shu-Sen; Sun, Fang-Ju

2014-01-01

Mental health promotion campaigns require a good understanding of public attitudes and mental health literacy. Few studies have investigated changes in these two aspects over time. We aimed to examine such changes and their associations with help-seeking preference in Taiwan. Data were extracted from the Taiwan Social Change Survey (1990, 1995, and 2000) based on national representative samples. Each wave of the surveys included four questions about attitudes toward severe mental illness, a case vignette describing depressive and anxiety symptoms to evaluate respondents' mental health literacy, and their preference of medical and/or informal help-seeking if they develop such symptoms. Mental and physical health statuses measured using the Chinese Health Questionnaire and self-reported chronic physical illnesses were included as covariates. There were 2531, 2075, and 1892 respondents in the three waves of the surveys, respectively. During the 1990 s, approximately one in four to five Taiwanese held some misconceptions toward mental illness. The attitudes toward mental illness were generally not associated with medical or informal help-seeking preference after statistical adjustment. However, respondents viewing symptoms in the vignette as physical or mental in origin were more willing to seek help than those who saw these symptoms as not being an illness. Attribution of depressive and anxiety symptoms appeared to be more likely to influence help-seeking behaviors than attitudes toward mental illness. Enhancing public mental health literacy toward depression may help facilitate help-seeking in response to potential mental illness. Copyright © 2013. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Sometimes we can see some mental states. Comment on "Seeing mental states: An experimental strategy for measuring the observability of other minds" by Cristina Becchio, Atesh Koul, Caterina Asuini, Cesare Bertone, and Andrew Cavallo

Science.gov (United States)

Tversky, Barbara

2018-03-01

Seeing mental states[1] poses an ambitious question: Is it possible to perceive the mental states of others? According to the authors, the answer is yes. To that end, they overview some 15 studies showing that observers of a reaching arm can discern the intentions of the reaching, specifically, whether to grasp, to place, to pass, or to pour. The judgments are made before the hand arrives at the glass so the act that observers are predicting is never seen. In addition, they show how the kinematics of the reaching differ for each case, allowing the perceivers judgments. These findings are remarkable given that the kinematic differences among the actions are subtle. The overview cogently, elegantly, and convincingly summarizes the findings and in doing so, addresses criticisms that have been directed at the methods and conclusions. It is impressive how much can be reliably inferred just from the kinematics of a reaching arm. This is a significant set of findings and it is good to have them in one place.

The Preservation of Cued Recall in the Acute Mentally Fatigued State: A Randomised Crossover Study.

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Flindall, Ian Richard; Leff, Daniel Richard; Pucks, Neysan; Sugden, Colin; Darzi, Ara

2016-01-01

The objective of this study is to investigate the impact of acute mental fatigue on the recall of clinical information in the non-sleep-deprived state. Acute mental fatigue in the non-sleep-deprived subject is rarely studied in the medical workforce. Patient handover has been highlighted as an area of high risk especially in fatigued subjects. This study evaluates the deterioration in recall of clinical information over 2 h with cognitively demanding work in non-sleep-deprived subjects. A randomised crossover study involving twenty medical students assessed free (presentation) and cued (MCQ) recall of clinical case histories at 0 and 2 h under low and high cognitive load using the N-Back task. Acute mental fatigue was assessed through the Visual Analogue Scale, Stanford Scale and NASA-TLX Mental Workload Rating Scale. Free recall is significantly impaired by increased cognitive load (p cued recall under high and low cognitive load conditions (p = 1). This study demonstrates the loss of clinical information over a short time period involving a mentally fatiguing, high cognitive load task. Free recall for the handover of clinical information is unreliable. Memory cues maintain recall of clinical information. This study provides evidence towards the requirement for standardisation of a structured patient handover. The use of memory cues (involving recognition memory and cued recall methodology) would be beneficial in a handover checklist to aid recall of clinical information and supports evidence for their adoption into clinical practice.

Range and nummer-of-levels effects in derived and stated attribute importances

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Verlegh, P.W.J.; Schifferstein, H.N.J.; Wittink, D.R.

2002-01-01

We study how the range of variation and the number of ttribute levels affect five measures of attribute importance: full profile conjoint estimates, ranges in attribute level attractiveness ratings. regression coefficients. graded paired comparisons. and self-reported ratings, We find that all

THE MEANINGS OF DWELLING ATTRIBUTES FOR TEMPORARY RESIDENTS FROM DIFFERENT CULTURES: THE CASE OF KOREAN TEMPORARY RESIDENTS IN THE UNITED STATES

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Eunsil Lee

2010-03-01

Full Text Available The cross-cultural temporary resident population is one of the fastest growing cultural groups in the United States. However, their housing experiences in the new environment have not been extensively studied. Thus, the current study sought to examine meanings of dwelling attributes for cross-cultural temporary residents in the host country. In order to obtain insights into not only functional meanings but also underlying values, a conceptual framework was developed based primarily on Gutman’s (1982 means-end theory and Rapoport’s (1988 three levels of meaning. A case study was conducted using indepth laddering interviews with ten Korean temporary residents in the Lansing, Michigan, area. Seven dwelling attributes emerged from interviews: two satisfactory attributes (i.e., surrounding natural environment and architecture and five unsatisfactory attributes (i.e., carpeted floor, interior lighting, acoustics, bathroom, and entryway. Data were analyzed utilizing the measurement of means-end chain (Gutman, 1982, identifying the lower-level, everyday meanings as well as middle-level, latent meanings of dwelling attributes. A hierarchical value map was used to illustrate the interrelationships among the attributes, consequences, and values. Results revealed that dwelling attributes in participants’ current housing did not effectively satisfy their fundamental needs. In particular, carpeted floor was linked to the greatest number of negative meanings. Moreover, the cultural aspects of Korean housing affected the meanings of dwelling attributes in participants’ current homes. Findings suggest design professionals, facility managers, and policymakers must understand how people from other cultures attach different meanings to the dwelling attributes in their homes and provide more culturally responsive residential environments.

Atheist horns and religious halos: Mental representations of atheists and theists.

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Brown-Iannuzzi, Jazmin L; McKee, Stephanie; Gervais, Will M

2018-02-01

Theists often receive the benefit of being stereotyped as trustworthy and moral, whereas atheists are viewed as untrustworthy and immoral. The extreme divergence between the stereotypes of theists and atheists suggests that mental images of the two groups may also diverge. We investigated whether people have biased mental images of theists and atheists. The results suggest that mental images of theists are associated with more positive attributes than images of atheists (Study 1), and these mental images influence who is believed to behave morally and immorally (Study 2). Together the findings suggest that mental images may represent a subtle mechanism reinforcing group-based prejudices. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

Effects of Exercise in Immersive Virtual Environments on Cortical Neural Oscillations and Mental State

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Tobias Vogt

2015-01-01

Full Text Available Virtual reality environments are increasingly being used to encourage individuals to exercise more regularly, including as part of treatment those with mental health or neurological disorders. The success of virtual environments likely depends on whether a sense of presence can be established, where participants become fully immersed in the virtual environment. Exposure to virtual environments is associated with physiological responses, including cortical activation changes. Whether the addition of a real exercise within a virtual environment alters sense of presence perception, or the accompanying physiological changes, is not known. In a randomized and controlled study design, moderate-intensity Exercise (i.e., self-paced cycling and No-Exercise (i.e., automatic propulsion trials were performed within three levels of virtual environment exposure. Each trial was 5 minutes in duration and was followed by posttrial assessments of heart rate, perceived sense of presence, EEG, and mental state. Changes in psychological strain and physical state were generally mirrored by neural activation patterns. Furthermore, these changes indicated that exercise augments the demands of virtual environment exposures and this likely contributed to an enhanced sense of presence.

Attending to the reasons for attribute non-attendance in choice experiments

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Alemu, Mohammed Hussen; Mørkbak, Morten Raun; Olsen, Søren Bøye

2013-01-01

This paper focuses on behavioural reasons underlying stated attribute non-attendance in choice experiments. In order to identify and incorporate procedures for dealing with heterogeneous attribute processing strategies, we ask respondents follow-up questions regarding their reasons for ignoring...... not affect their utility. Excluding these genuine zero preferences, as the standard approach essentially does, might bias results. Other respondents claim to have ignored attributes to simplify choices. However, we find that these respondents have actually not completely ignored attributes. We argue along...... the rationally adaptive behavioural model that valid preference information may indeed be elicited in these cases, and we illustrate how recoding of non-attendance statements conditional on stated reasons may be a more appropriate solution than the current standard way of taking stated non...

Interplay between marital attributions and conflict behavior in predicting depressive symptoms.

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Ellison, Jenna K; Kouros, Chrystyna D; Papp, Lauren M; Cummings, E Mark

2016-03-01

Marital attributions-that is, causal inferences and explanations spouses make about their partners' behavior-have been implicated as predictors of relationship functioning. Extending previous work, we examined marital attributions as a moderator of the link between marital conflict and depressive symptoms 1 year later. Participants were 284 couples who reported on marital attributions and depressive symptoms. Couples also engaged in a videotaped marital conflict interaction, which was later coded for specific conflict behaviors. The results showed that husbands' and wives' marital attributions about their partner moderated relations between marital conflict behavior and later depressive symptoms, controlling for global marital sentiments. For husbands, positive behavior and affect during marital conflict predicted a decrease in depressive symptoms, but only for husbands' who made low levels of responsibility and causal attributions about their wives. Wives' causal attributions about their partner also moderated relations between positive behavior and affect during marital conflict and husbands' later depressive symptoms. Reflecting an unexpected finding, negative behavior and affect during marital conflict predicted increases in wives' depressive symptoms, but only for wives who made low levels of responsibility attributions about their partner. The findings suggest that, for husbands, low levels of negative marital attributions for spouses may be protective, strengthening the positive effect of constructive conflict behaviors for their mental health, whereas for wives low levels of responsibility attributions about their spouse may be a risk factor, exacerbating the negative effect of negative marital conflict behaviors on their later depressive symptoms. (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).

A comparative study of job satisfaction among nurses, psychologists/psychotherapists and social workers working in Quebec mental health teams.

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Fleury, Marie-Josée; Grenier, Guy; Bamvita, Jean-Marie

2017-01-01

This study identified multiple socio-professional and team effectiveness variables, based on the Input-Mediator-Output-Input (IMOI) model, and tested their associations with job satisfaction for three categories of mental health professionals (nurses, psychologists/psychotherapists, and social workers). Job satisfaction was assessed with the Job Satisfaction Survey. Independent variables were classified into four categories: 1) Socio-professional Characteristics; 2) Team Attributes; 3) Team Processes; and 4) Team Emergent States. Variables were entered successively, by category, into a hierarchical regression model. Team Processes contributed the greatest number of variables to job satisfaction among all professional groups, including team support which was the only significant variable common to all three types of professionals. Greater involvement in the decision-making process, and lower levels of team conflict (Team Processes) were associated with job satisfaction among nurses and social workers. Lower seniority on team (Socio-professional Characteristics), and team collaboration (Team Processes) were associated with job satisfaction among nurses, as was belief in the advantages of interdisciplinary collaboration (Team Emergent States) among psychologists. Knowledge sharing (Team Processes) and affective commitment to the team (Team Emergent States) were associated with job satisfaction among social workers. Results suggest the need for mental health decision-makers and team managers to offer adequate support to mental health professionals, to involve nurses and social workers in the decision-making process, and implement procedures and mechanisms favourable to the prevention or resolution of team conflict with a view toward increasing job satisfaction among mental health professionals.

Natural disaster and mental health in Asia.

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Kokai, Masahiro; Fujii, Senta; Shinfuku, Naotaka; Edwards, Glen

2004-04-01

The purpose of the present article was to review the literature on disaster mental health in relation to natural disasters such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, typhoons and cyclones throughout Asia. Articles reviewed show that disaster psychiatry in Asia is beginning to emerge from and leave behind the stigma attached to mental health. The emergence of the acceptance of disaster mental health throughout Asia can be attributed in part to the acceptance of the notion of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). This has allowed greater involvement of mental health professionals in providing ongoing support to survivors of natural disasters as well as providing greater opportunities for further research. Also, articles reviewed in the present paper commonly suggested the need for using standardized diagnostic tools for PTSD to appropriately interpret the discrepancy of results among studies. The importance of post-disaster support services and cultural differences is highlighted.

Neurophysiological Correlates of Various Mental Perspectives

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Thilo eHinterberger

2014-08-01

Full Text Available A common view of consciousness is that our mind presents emotions, experiences and images in an internal mental (re-presentation space which in a state of wakefulness is triggered by the world outside. Consciousness can be defined as the observation of this inner mental space. We propose a new model, in which the state of the conscious observer is defined by the observer’s mental position and focus of attention. The mental position of the observer can either be within the mental self (intrapersonal space, in the mental outer world (extrapersonal space or in an empathic connection, i.e. within the intrapersonal space of another person (perspective taking. The focus of attention can be directed towards the self or towards the outside world. This mental space model can help us to understand the patterns of relationships and interactions with other persons as they occur in social life.To investigate the neurophysiological correlates and discriminability of the different mental states, we conducted an EEG experiment measuring the brain activity of 16 subjects via 64 electrodes while they engaged in different mental positions (intrapersonal, extrapersonal, perspective taking with different attentional foci (self, object. Compared to external mental locations, internal ones showed significantly increased alpha2 power, especially when the observer was focusing on an object. Alpha2 and beta2 were increased in the empathic condition compared to the extrapersonal perspective. Delta power was significantly higher when the attentional focus was directed towards an object in comparison to the participant’s own self. This exploratory study demonstrates highly significant differences between various mental locations and foci, suggesting that the proposed categories of mental location and intra- and interpersonal attentional foci are not only helpful theoretical concepts but are also physiologically relevant and therefore may relate to basic brain processing

Examining Cognitive Status of Elderly Iranians: Farsi Version of the Modified Mini-Mental State Examination.

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Gharaeipour, Manouchehr; Andrew, Melissa K

2013-02-27

The Modified Mini-Mental State Examination (3MS) is an expanded and modified version of the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). Research demonstrates that the reliability, validity, specificity, and sensitivity of the 3MS are superior to that of the MMSE in detecting cognitive impairment. The Farsi version of the 3MS (F-3MS) was examined as a screening tool for dementia among elderly Iranians. The F-3MS and the Clock Drawing Test (CDT) were administered to 58 patients with dementia and 145 control subjects with normal cognition, aged 60 to 85 years. The difference between groups on the mean total scores of the F-3MS was statistically significant (dementia = 60.65 ± 9.89, control = 80.73 ± 8.26; df = 201, t = 14.75, p validity of the F-3MS. The F-3MS can be used as a valid and reliable measure for dementia screening among elderly Iranians.

Authenticity, creativity and a love of the job: experiences of grassroots leaders of mental health nursing in queensland.

Science.gov (United States)

McAllister, Margaret; Happell, Brenda; Bradshaw, Julie

2013-09-01

The strength of mental health nursing and its potential contribution to improved consumer outcomes depends upon strong and clearly articulated leadership. However, studies of leadership have tended to focus on nurses holding senior positions rather than exploring the leadership embedded in clinical work. A qualitative exploratory study was undertaken with identified mental health nurse leaders in one Australian state, in order to explore their experiences and what they found to be most meaningful in their work. This article reports the findings from this study. The data was analysed thematically to yield insights significant to mental health nursing and identity. The findings suggest these leaders find intrinsic rewards in the role; aspire to making authentic connections with consumers; appreciate the position of trust that they hold in bearing witness to individuals' distress; and use creative means to solve problems and achieve therapeutic outcomes. Sharing these themes builds knowledge on values that are embedded in mental health nursing practice and offers scope for integrating leadership attributes into the education, supervision and development of all mental health nurses. These findings also reveal the complexity of mental health nursing as a profession and the difficulties that might be encountered in attempts to define it in terms of its component tasks and functions.

Common Mental Disorders in Public Transportation Drivers in Lima, Peru

OpenAIRE

Ruiz-Grosso, Paulo; Ramos, Mariana; Samalvides, Frine; Vega-Dienstmaier, Johann; Kruger, Hever

2014-01-01

BACKGROUND: Traffic related injuries are leading contributors to burden of disease worldwide. In developing countries a high proportion of them can be attributed to public transportation vehicles. Several mental disorders including alcohol and drug abuse, psychotic disorders, mental stress, productivity pressure, and low monetary income were found predictors of high rates of traffic related injuries in public transportation drivers. The goal of this study was to estimate the prevalence of com...

Mental health in low- and middle-income countries.

Science.gov (United States)

Patel, Vikram

2007-01-01

Mental disorders in low- and middle-income countries (LAMIC) do not attract global health policy attention. This article is based on a selective review of research on mental disorders in adults in LAMIC since 2001 and recent analyses of disease burden in developing countries. Mental disorders account for 11.1% of the total burden of disease in LAMIC. Unipolar depressive disorder is the single leading neuropsychiatric cause of disease burden. Alcohol use disorders account for nearly 4% of the attributable disease burden in LAMIC. Mental disorders are closely associated with other public health concerns such as maternal and child health and HIV/AIDS. Poverty, low education, social exclusion, gender disadvantage, conflict and disasters are the major social determinants of mental disorders. Clinical trials demonstrate that locally available, affordable interventions in community and primary care settings are effective for the management of mental disorders. Mental health resources are very scarce and investment in mental health is < 1% of the health budget in many countries. The majority of people with mental disorders do not receive evidence-based care, leading to chronicity, suffering and increased costs of care. Strengthening care and services for people with mental disorders is a priority; this will need additional investment in human resources and piggy backing on existing public health programmes. Campaigns to increase mental health literacy are needed at all levels of the health system.

What Should Be the Roles of Conscious States and Brain States in Theories of Mental Activity?**

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Dulany, Donelson E.

2011-01-01

Answers to the title’s question have been influenced by a history in which an early science of consciousness was rejected by behaviourists on the argument that this entails commitment to ontological dualism and “free will” in the sense of indeterminism. This is, however, a confusion of theoretical assertions with metaphysical assertions. Nevertheless, a legacy within computational and information-processing views of mind rejects or de-emphasises a role for consciousness. This paper sketches a mentalistic metatheory in which conscious states are the sole carriers of symbolic representations, and thus have a central role in the explanation of mental activity and action-while specifying determinism and materialism as useful working assumptions. A mentalistic theory of causal learning, experimentally examined with phenomenal reports, is followed by examination of these questions: Are there common roles for phenomenal reports and brain imaging? Is there defensible evidence for unconscious brain states carrying symbolic representations? Are there interesting dissociations within consciousness? PMID:21694964

Mental Health Insurance Parity and Provider Wages.

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Golberstein, Ezra; Busch, Susan H

2017-06-01

Policymakers frequently mandate that employers or insurers provide insurance benefits deemed to be critical to individuals' well-being. However, in the presence of private market imperfections, mandates that increase demand for a service can lead to price increases for that service, without necessarily affecting the quantity being supplied. We test this idea empirically by looking at mental health parity mandates. This study evaluated whether implementation of parity laws was associated with changes in mental health provider wages. Quasi-experimental analysis of average wages by state and year for six mental health care-related occupations were considered: Clinical, Counseling, and School Psychologists; Substance Abuse and Behavioral Disorder Counselors; Marriage and Family Therapists; Mental Health Counselors; Mental Health and Substance Abuse Social Workers; and Psychiatrists. Data from 1999-2013 were used to estimate the association between the implementation of state mental health parity laws and the Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act and average mental health provider wages. Mental health parity laws were associated with a significant increase in mental health care provider wages controlling for changes in mental health provider wages in states not exposed to parity (3.5 percent [95% CI: 0.3%, 6.6%]; pwages. Health insurance benefit expansions may lead to increased prices for health services when the private market that supplies the service is imperfect or constrained. In the context of mental health parity, this work suggests that part of the value of expanding insurance benefits for mental health coverage was captured by providers. Given historically low wage levels of mental health providers, this increase may be a first step in bringing mental health provider wages in line with parallel health professions, potentially reducing turnover rates and improving treatment quality.

Innovations in disaster mental health services and evaluation: national, state, and local responses to Hurricane Katrina (introduction to the special issue).

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Norris, Fran H; Rosen, Craig S

2009-05-01

The severe consequences of Hurricane Katrina on mental health have sparked tremendous interest in improving the quality of mental health care for disaster victims. In this special issue, we seek to illustrate the breadth of work emerging in this area. The five empirical examples each reflect innovation, either in the nature of the services being provided or in the evaluation approach. Most importantly, they portray the variability of post-Katrina mental health programs, which ranged from national to state to local in scope and from educational to clinical in intensity. As a set, these papers address the fundamental question of whether it is useful and feasible to provide different intensities of mental health care to different populations according to presumed need. The issue concludes with recommendations for future disaster mental health service delivery and evaluation.

Situation and person attributions under spontaneous and intentional instructions: an fMRI study

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Kestemont, Jenny; Vandekerckhove, Marie; Ma, Ning; Van Hoeck, Nicole

2013-01-01

This functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) research explores how observers make causal beliefs about an event in terms of the person or situation. Thirty-four participants read various short descriptions of social events that implied either the person or the situation as the cause. Half of them were explicitly instructed to judge whether the event was caused by something about the person or the situation (intentional inferences), whereas the other half was instructed simply to read the material carefully (spontaneous inferences). The results showed common activation in areas related to mentalizing, across all types of causes or instructions (posterior superior temporal sulcus, temporo-parietal junction, precuneus). However, the medial prefrontal cortex was activated only under spontaneous instructions, but not under intentional instruction. This suggests a bias toward person attributions (e.g. fundamental attribution bias). Complementary to this, intentional situation attributions activated a stronger and more extended network compared to intentional person attributions, suggesting that situation attributions require more controlled, extended and broader processing of the information. PMID:22345370

Innocent or Intentional?: Interpreting Oppositional Defiant Disorder in a Preschool Mental Health Clinic.

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El Ouardani, Christine N

2017-03-01

Based on 9 months of ethnographic fieldwork in a U.S. mental health clinic focused on the treatment of preschool-aged children who exhibited extremely disruptive behavior, this article examines the contradictions clinicians faced when trying to identify and attribute "intentionality" to very young children. Disruptive, aggressive behavior is one of the central symptoms involved in a wide-range of childhood psychopathology and the number one reason young children are referred to mental health clinics in the United States. In the clinic where I conducted my research, clinicians were especially interested in diagnosing these children with oppositional defiant disorder (ODD), in order to identify those at risk for more serious mental illness later in the lifecourse. In this article, I look at the different strategies clinicians used in interpreting whether aggressive, defiant behavior was a part of the child's "self," a biologically driven symptom of a disease, or a legitimate reaction to problematic social environments. I argue that conceptualizing intentionality as a developmental, interpersonal process may help to make sense of the multiple discourses and practices clinicians used to try to reconcile the contradictions inherent in diagnosing ODD.

Fatal flaws in a recent meta-analysis on abortion and mental health

OpenAIRE

Steinberg, Julia R.; Trussell, James; Hall, Kelli; Guthrie, Kate

2012-01-01

Similar to other reviews within the last 4 years, a thorough review by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, published in December 2011, found that compared to delivery of an unintended pregnancy, abortion does not increase women’s risk of mental health problems. In contrast, a meta-analysis published in September 2011 concluded that abortion increases women’s risk of mental health problems by 81% and that 10% of mental health problems are attributable to abortions. Like others, we strongly que...

Orthognathic surgery for mentally retarded patients

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Becking, A. G.; Tuinzing, D. B.

1991-01-01

The surgical treatment of mentally retarded children for esthetic reasons is discussed. In mentally retarded adults a facial deformity can give rise to functional problems; in some cases a facial deformity can stigmatize the mental state. In selected cases orthognathic surgery may offer a solution

[Mentalization and theory of mind].

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Wyl, Agnes

2014-01-01

Both concepts, mentalization and the theory of mind, describe metacognitive processes. Mentalization mainly concerns the reflection of affective mental states. In contrast, theory of mind focuses on epistemic states such as beliefs, intentions and persuasions. Gender differences have proved to be relevant for both, the development of mentalization and the theory of mind. However, there are few studies and findings are inconsistent. In an own study, we investigated the relationship between early competences in metacognition (tested in a false-belief-task second order) and narrative skills of kindergarten children. Results show that children who had successfully passed the theory of mind test tended to face conflicts more directly in the stories. In consequence, these children showed less narrative avoidance. However, differences were only found in girls and not in boys. The precise understanding of developmental differences in metacognition between girls and boys may be an important aspect with regards to improving mentalization based therapy of children.

Specialized mechanisms for theory of mind: are mental representations special because they are mental or because they are representations?

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Cohen, Adam S; Sasaki, Joni Y; German, Tamsin C

2015-03-01

Does theory of mind depend on a capacity to reason about representations generally or on mechanisms selective for the processing of mental state representations? In four experiments, participants reasoned about beliefs (mental representations) and notes (non-mental, linguistic representations), which according to two prominent theories are closely matched representations because both are represented propositionally. Reaction times were faster and accuracies higher when participants endorsed or rejected statements about false beliefs than about false notes (Experiment 1), even when statements emphasized representational format (Experiment 2), which should have favored the activation of representation concepts. Experiments 3 and 4 ruled out a counterhypothesis that differences in task demands were responsible for the advantage in belief processing. These results demonstrate for the first time that understanding of mental and linguistic representations can be dissociated even though both may carry propositional content, supporting the theory that mechanisms governing theory of mind reasoning are narrowly specialized to process mental states, not representations more broadly. Extending this theory, we discuss whether less efficient processing of non-mental representations may be a by-product of mechanisms specialized for processing mental states. Crown Copyright © 2014. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Mental incapacity and criminal liability: Redrawing the fault lines?

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Peay, Jill

2015-01-01

The proper boundaries of criminal liability with respect to those with questionable mental capacity are currently under review. In its deliberations in the areas of unfitness to plead, automatism and the special verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity the Law Commission for England and Wales have been cognizant of particular difficulties in fairly attributing criminal responsibility to those whose mental capacities may or may not have impinged on their decisions, either at the time of the offence or at trial. And they have referenced the potential breaches of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) posed by the state of our current laws. However, in their efforts to remedy these potential deficiencies is the Law Commission heading in a direction that is fundamentally incompatible with the direction embodied by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (CRPD)? Whether one must cede sensibly to the other, or whether some compromise might emerge, perhaps through an extension of supportive services or through the development of disability-neutral criminal law, forms the subject of this paper. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Racial and Mental Illness Stereotypes and Discrimination: An Identity-Based Analysis of the Virginia Tech and Columbine Shootings

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Chen, Charlene Y.; Purdie-Vaughns, Valerie; Phelan, Jo C.; Yu, Gary; Yang, Lawrence H.

2015-01-01

The Virginia Tech and Columbine High shootings are 2 of the deadliest school massacres in the United States. The present study investigates in a nationally representative sample how White Americans’ causal attributions of these shooting moderate their attitudes toward the shooter’s race. White Americans shown a vignette based on the Virginia Tech shooting were more likely to espouse negative beliefs about Korean American men and distance themselves from this group the more they believed that the shooter’s race caused the shooting. Among those who were shown a vignette based on the Columbine High shooting, believing that mental illness caused the shooting was associated with weaker negative beliefs about White American men. White Americans in a third condition who were given the Virginia Tech vignette and prompted to subtype the shooter according to his race were less likely to possess negative beliefs about Korean American men the more they believed that mental illness caused the shooting. There was no evidence for the ultimate attribution error. Theoretical accounts based on the stereotype and in-group-out-group bias literature are presented. The current findings have important implications for media depictions of minority group behavior and intergroup relations. PMID:25198415

Mental Disorders and Socioeconomic Status: Impact on Population Risk of Attempted Suicide in Australia

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Page, Andrew; Taylor, Richard; Hall, Wayne; Carter, Gregory

2009-01-01

The population attributable risk (PAR) of mental disorders compared to indicators of socioeconomic status (SES) for attempted suicide was estimated for Australia. For mental disorders, the highest PAR% for attempted suicide was for anxiety disorders (males 28%; females 36%). For SES, the highest PAR% for attempted suicide in males was for…

Autistic Traits Affect P300 Response to Unexpected Events, regardless of Mental State Inferences

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Mitsuhiko Ishikawa

2017-01-01

Full Text Available Limited use of contextual information has been suggested as a way of understanding cognition in people with autism spectrum disorder (ASD. However, it has also been argued that individuals with ASD may have difficulties inferring others’ mental states. Here, we examined how individuals with different levels of autistic traits respond to contextual deviations by measuring event-related potentials that reflect context usage. The Autism Spectrum Quotient (AQ was used to quantify autistic-like traits in 28 university students, and 19 participants were defined as Low or High AQ groups. To additionally examine inferences about mental state, two belief conditions (with or without false belief were included. Participants read short stories in which the final sentence included either an expected or an unexpected word and rated the word’s degree of deviation from expectation. P300 waveform analysis revealed that unexpected words were associated with larger P300 waveforms for the Low AQ group, but smaller P300 responses in the High AQ group. Additionally, AQ social skill subscores were positively correlated with evaluation times in the Unexpected condition, whether a character’s belief was false or not. This suggests that autistic traits can affect responses to unexpected events, possibly because of decreased availability of context information.

THE AUSTRALASIAN APPROACH TO THE DEFINITION OF MENTAL DISORDER IN A MENTAL HEALTH ACT.

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Dawson, John B

2017-12-27

How should the mental element be defined in the legal standards governing a person's 'sectioning' or placement under the Mental Health Act (MHA)? This article considers how this mental element is defined in many MHAs in Australasia: via a statutory list of disorders of mental function said to 'characterise' the necessary state of mind. This article assesses the assumptions behind the adoption of this approach. It discusses the views of several English law reform committees that have explored how the mental element should be defined. It examines the philosophy of psychiatry, expounded clearly by Aubrey Lewis, that lies behind the Australasian approach, one that emphasises the need to identify mental disturbance by reference to disorders of 'part-function of the mind', not by reference to behaviour alone. It considers how the Australasian statutes address the question of personality disorder's covered by the Act. In conclusion, it endorses cautiously the Australasian approach, principally on the ground that it may contribute positively to the conduct of review proceedings for compulsory patients under the Act. It may concentrate the attention of tribunals on particular features of the patient's mental state, on how those features are linked to associated dangers or risks, and on how the presence of those features may justify placing decisions about the patient's treatment in others' hands. Throughout, comparisons are made with the manner in which the mental element has been defined in mental health legislation for England and Wales. © The Author 2017. Published by Oxford University Press; all rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

The leadership role of nurse educators in mental health nursing.

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Sayers, Jan; Lopez, Violeta; Howard, Patricia B; Escott, Phil; Cleary, Michelle

2015-01-01

Leadership behaviors and actions influence others to act, and leadership in clinical practice is an important mediator influencing patient outcomes and staff satisfaction. Indeed, positive clinical leadership has been positioned as a crucial element for transformation of health care services and has led to the development of the Practice Doctorate Movement in the United States. Nurse educators in health care have a vital leadership role as clinical experts, role models, mentors, change agents, and supporters of quality projects. By enacting these leadership attributes, nurse educators ensure a skilled and confident workforce that is focused on optimizing opportunities for students and graduates to integrate theory and practice in the workplace as well as developing more holistic models of care for the consumer. Nurse educators need to be active in supporting staff and students in health care environments and be visible leaders who can drive policy and practice changes and engage in professional forums, research, and scholarship. Although nurse educators have always been a feature of the nursing workplace, there is a paucity of literature on the role of nurse educators as clinical leaders. This discursive article describes the role and attributes of nurse educators with a focus on their role as leaders in mental health nursing. We argue that embracing the leadership role is fundamental to nurse educators and to influencing consumer-focused care in mental health. We also make recommendations for developing the leadership role of nurse educators and provide considerations for further research such as examining the impact of clinical leaders on client, staff, and organizational outcomes.

Development of Mental Health Indicators in Korea

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Han, Hyeree; Ahn, Dong Hyun; Song, Jinhee; Hwang, Tae Yeon

2012-01-01

Objective Promoting mental health and preventing mental health problems are important tasks for international organizations and nations. Such goals entail the establishment of active information networks and effective systems and indicators to assess the mental health of populations. This being said, there is a need in Korea develop ways to measure the state of mental health in Korea. Methods This paper reviews the mental health indicator development policies and practices of seven organizations, countries, and regions: WHO, OECD, EU, United States, Australia, UK, and Scotland. Using Delphi method, we conducted two surveys of mental health indicators for experts in the field of mental health. The survey questionnaire included 5 domains: mental health status, mental health factor, mental health system, mental health service, and quality of mental health services. We considered 124 potential mental health indicators out of more than 600 from indicators of international organizations and foreign countries. Results We obtained the top 30 mental health indicators from the surveys. Among them, 10 indicators belong to the mental health system. The most important five mental health indicators are suicide rate, rate of increase in mental disorder treatment, burden caused by mental disorders, adequacy of identifying problems of mental health projects and deriving solutions, and annual prevalence of mental disorders. Conclusion Our study provides information about the process for indicator development and the use of survey results to measure the mental health status of the Korean population. The aim of mental health indicator development is to improve the mental health system by better grasping the current situation. We suggest these mental health indicators can monitor progress in efforts to implement reform policies, provide community services, and involve users, families and other stakeholders in mental health promotion, prevention, care and rehabilitation. PMID:23251193

The Saint Louis University Mental Status Examination Is Better than the Mini-Mental State Examination to Determine the Cognitive Impairment in Turkish Elderly People.

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Kaya, Derya; Isik, Ahmet Turan; Usarel, Cansu; Soysal, Pinar; Ellidokuz, Hulya; Grossberg, George T

2016-04-01

Presence of detailed screening instruments to detect cognitive impairment in the older adults' culture and language is very essential. The Saint Louis University Mental Status Examination (SLUMS) is one of cognitive screening scales used. The aim of the study was to establish the validity and reliability of the Turkish version of SLUMS (SLUMS-T). Two hundred seventy-four participants aged 60 years and older admitted to our geriatric clinic were screened for cognitive impairment using SLUMS-T and Mini-Mental State Examination. Internal consistency was analyzed with Cronbach α test. Area under curves of receiver operating characteristic analyses were used to test the predictive accuracy of the SLUMS-T for detecting amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) and Alzheimer disease (AD) to set an appropriate cut-off point. The SLUMS-T scores were positively correlated with the Mini-Mental State Examination scores of the patients with aMCI and patients with AD and controls (r = 0.687, P < .001; r = 0.880, P < .001; respectively). Internal consistency of the SLUMS-T was Cronbach α = 0.85. It was found that SLUMS-T with a cut-off point of 23 had a sensitivity of 66.6% and a specificity of 72.3% for the diagnosis of aMCI, and with a cut-off point of 20 had a sensitivity of 83.8% and a specificity of 87.3% for the diagnosis of AD. SLUMS-T was demonstrated to have sufficient validity and reliability to evaluate cognitive impairment including MCI among Turkish elderly people. Copyright © 2016 AMDA – The Society for Post-Acute and Long-Term Care Medicine. All rights reserved.

Acculturation and Self-Rated Mental Health Among Latino and Asian Immigrants in the United States: A Latent Class Analysis.

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Bulut, Elif; Gayman, Matthew D

2016-08-01

This study assesses variations in acculturation experiences by identifying distinct acculturation classes, and investigates the role of these acculturation classes for self-rated mental health among Latino and Asian immigrants in the United States. Using 2002-2003 the National Latino and Asian American Study, Latent Class Analysis is used to capture variations in immigrant classes (recent arrivals, separated, bicultural and assimilated), and OLS regressions are used to assess the link between acculturation classes and self-rated mental health. For both Latinos and Asians, bicultural immigrants reported the best mental health, and separated immigrants and recent arrivals reported the worst mental health. The findings also reveal group differences in acculturation classes, whereby Latino immigrants were more likely to be in the separated class and recent arrivals class relative to Asian immigrants. While there was not a significant group difference in self-rated mental health at the bivariate level, controlling for acculturation classes revealed that Latinos report better self-rated mental health than Asians. Thus, Latino immigrants would actually have better self-rated mental health than their Asian counterparts if they were not more likely to be represented in less acculturated classes (separated class and recent arrivals) and/or as likely to be in the bicultural class as their Asian counterparts. Together the findings underscore the nuanced and complex nature of the acculturation process, highlighting the importance of race differences in this process, and demonstrate the role of acculturation classes for immigrant group differences in self-rated mental health.

Language Learner Beliefs from an Attributional Perspective

OpenAIRE

Gabillon, Zehra

2013-01-01

International audience; This qualitative study, aimed to analyze eight French-speaking learners' beliefs about English and English language learning. The data were obtained via semi-structured interviews. The study drew on Weiner's attribution theory of achievement motivation and Bandura's self-efficacy theory. The novelty about this research is the employment of an attributional analysis framework to study and explain the learners' stated beliefs about English and English language learning.

Abortion and mental health disorders: evidence from a 30-year longitudinal study.

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Fergusson, David M; Horwood, L John; Boden, Joseph M

2008-12-01

Research on the links between abortion and mental health has been limited by design problems and relatively weak evidence. To examine the links between pregnancy outcomes and mental health outcomes. Data were gathered on the pregnancy and mental health history of a birth cohort of over 500 women studied to the age of 30. After adjustment for confounding, abortion was associated with a small increase in the risk of mental disorders; women who had had abortions had rates of mental disorder that were about 30% higher. There were no consistent associations between other pregnancy outcomes and mental health. Estimates of attributable risk indicated that exposure to abortion accounted for 1.5% to 5.5% of the overall rate of mental disorders. The evidence is consistent with the view that abortion may be associated with a small increase in risk of mental disorders. Other pregnancy outcomes were not related to increased risk of mental health problems.

Biomass and carbon attributes of downed woody materials in forests of the United States

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C.W. Woodall; B.F. Walters; S.N. Oswalt; G.M. Domke; C. Toney; A.N. Gray

2013-01-01

Due to burgeoning interest in the biomass/carbon attributes of forest downed and dead woody materials (DWMs) attributable to its fundamental role in the carbon cycle, stand structure/diversity, bioenergy resources, and fuel loadings, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has conducted a nationwide field-based inventory of DWM. Using the national DWM inventory, attributes...

Predictive value of the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale and the Mini-Mental State Examination for neurologic outcome after coronary artery bypass graft surgery.

Science.gov (United States)

Nussmeier, Nancy A; Miao, Yinghui; Roach, Gary W; Wolman, Richard L; Mora-Mangano, Christina; Fox, Mark; Szekely, Andrea; Tommasino, Concezione; Schwann, Nanette M; Mangano, Dennis T

2010-04-01

We intended to define the role of the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale and the Mini-Mental State Examination in identifying adverse neurologic outcomes in a large international sample of patients undergoing cardiac surgery. We evaluated 4707 patients undergoing cardiac surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass at 72 centers in 17 countries between November 1996 and June 2000. Prespecified overt neurologic outcomes were categorized as type I (clinically diagnosed stroke, transient ischemic attack, encephalopathy, or coma) or type II (deterioration of intellectual function). The National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale and Mini-Mental State Examination were administered preoperatively and on postoperative day 3, 4, or 5. Receiver operating characteristic curves were plotted to determine the predictive value of worsening in National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale and Mini-Mental State Examination scores with respect to type I and II outcomes. The receiver operating characteristic area under the curve for changes in National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale score (n = 4620) was 0.89 for type I outcomes and 0.66 for type II outcomes. A 1-point worsening in National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale score provided excellent discrimination (86% specificity; 84% sensitivity) of type I outcomes. The receiver operating characteristic area under the curve for changes in Mini-Mental State Examination score (n = 4707) was 0.75 for type I outcomes and 0.71 for type II outcomes. A 2-point worsening in Mini-Mental State Examination score provided only fair discrimination (73% specificity; 62% sensitivity) of type II outcomes. We used baseline controls and postoperative worsening in National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale and Mini-Mental State Examination scores to predict both serious adverse neurologic outcome and deterioration of intellectual function. Our findings provide the only reference for evaluating these tests that are used in cardiac surgical clinical

Geneticization of deviant behavior and consequences for stigma: the case of mental illness.

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Phelan, Jo C

2005-12-01

One likely consequence of the genetics revolution is an increased tendency to understand human behavior in genetic terms. How might this "geneticization" affect stigma? Attribution theory predicts a reduction in stigma via reduced blame, anger, and punishment and increased sympathy and help. According to "genetic essentialist" thinking, genes are the basis of human identity and strongly deterministic of behavior. If such ideas are commonly accepted, geneticization should exacerbate stigma by increasing perceptions of differentness, persistence, seriousness, and transmissibility, which in turn should increase social distance and reproductive restrictiveness. I test these predictions using the case of mental illness and a vignette experiment embedded in a nationally representative survey. There was little support for attribution theory predictions. Consistent with genetic essentialism, genetic attributions increased the perceived seriousness and persistence of the mental illness and the belief that siblings and children would develop the same problem. Genetic attribution did not affect reproductive restrictiveness or social distance from the ill person but did increase social distance from the person's sibling, particularly regarding intimate forms of contact involving dating, marriage, and having children.

State propaganda and mental disorders: the issue of psychiatric casualties among Japanese soldiers during the Asia-Pacific War.

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Matsumura, Janice

2004-01-01

This article explores the politics of Japanese wartime medical policy, demonstrating how state propaganda about the people and their armed forces influenced authoritative views on health and what might endanger it. By focusing on the obstacles faced by psychiatrists trying to promote more official concern for mental health issues, it challenges the validity of figures indicating a low incidence of psychological trauma among the country's soldiers. Civilian psychiatrists had to contend with the threat of censorship and arrest for even discussing war-induced mental disorders; at the same time, army psychiatrists as military insiders were pressured to convince their patients that their conditions were not serious and did not merit compensation. While discussing the neglected topic of Japanese psychiatric casualties, an attempt is made to provide a comparative approach by referring to the state of military psychiatry in other national settings.

Effect of fasting during Ramadan on serum lithium level and mental state in bipolar affective disorder.

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Farooq, Saeed; Nazar, Zahid; Akhtar, Javaid; Akhter, Javed; Irfan, Muhammad; Irafn, Mohammad; Subhan, Fazal; Ahmed, Zia; Khan, Ejaz Hassan; Khatak, Ijaz Hassan; Naeem, Farooq

2010-11-01

The Muslims fast every year during the month of Ramadan. A fasting day can last 12-17 h. The effects of fasting on serum lithium levels and the mood changes in patients suffering from bipolar affective disorder during Ramadan are not well studied. We aimed to compare the serum lithium levels, side effects, toxicity and mental state in patients suffering from bipolar affective disorder and on prophylactic lithium therapy before, during and after Ramadan. Sixty-two patients meeting the International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision, Research Diagnostic Criteria of bipolar affective disorder receiving lithium treatment for prophylaxis were recruited in a tertiary care teaching hospital in Peshawar, Pakistan. Serum lithium, electrolytes, Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) and Young Mania Rating Scale (YMRS) were assessed at three points, 1 week before Ramadan, midRamadan and 1 week after Ramadan. The side effects and toxicity were measured by a symptoms and signs checklist. There was no significant difference in mean serum lithium levels at three time points (preRamadan=0.45±0.21, midRamadan=0.51±0.20 and postRamadan=0.44±0.23 milli equivalents/litre, P=0.116). The scores on HDRS and YMRS showed significant decrease during Ramadan (F=34.12, P=0.00, for HDRS and F=15.6, P=0.000 for YMRS). The side effects and toxicity also did not differ significantly at three points. In conclusion, the patients who have stable mental state and lithium levels before Ramadan can be maintained on lithium during Ramadan. Fasting in an average temperature of 28°C for up to 12 h per day did not result in elevated serum lithium levels or more side effects and did not have adverse effects on mental state of patients suffering from bipolar affective disorder.

Psycho-Pedagogical Research of Emotional and Estimative Mental States of Students Who Are Prone to Addictions

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Gryaznov, Alexey N.; Gruzkova, Svetlana U.; Sharafiev, Eduard S.; Cheverikina, Elena A.; Muhametzyanova, Larisa Yu.; Kamaleeva, Alsu R.; Gilmeeva, Rimma Kh.

2016-01-01

The relevance of the investigated problem is conditioned by the fact that one of the negative factors, which prevent favorable socialization and successful personal-professional development of students, is the tendency of youth to be prone to addiction the formation of which is affected by various mental states. The paper is aimed to explore the…

Interaction between demand-control and social support in the occurrence of common mental disorders

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Amália Ivine Santana Mattos

Full Text Available ABSTRACT OBJECTIVE To analyze the interaction between the psychosocial aspects of work and the occurrence of common mental disorders among health workers. METHODS This is a cross-sectional study conducted with a representative sample of workers of the primary health care of five municipalities of the State of Bahia, Brazil, in 2012. The variable of outcome were the common mental disorders evaluated by the SRQ-20, and the variables of exposure were high demand (high psychological demand and low control over the work and low social support in the workplace. Interaction was checked by the deviation of the additivity of the effects for the factors studied from the calculation of excess risk from interaction, proportion of cases attributed to interaction, and the synergy index. RESULTS The global prevalence of common mental disorders was 21%. The group of combined exposure has shown higher magnitude (high demand and low social support, reaching 28% when compared to the 17% in the situation of no exposure (low demand and high social support. CONCLUSIONS The results strengthen the hypothesis of interaction between the factors investigated, directing to the synergy of the effects.

Employee decision-making about disclosure of a mental disorder at work.

Science.gov (United States)

Toth, Kate E; Dewa, Carolyn S

2014-12-01

Fear of stigma may lead employees to choose not to disclose a mental disorder in the workplace, thereby limiting help-seeking through workplace accommodation. Research suggests that various factors are considered in making decisions related to disclosure of concealable stigmatizing attributes, yet limited literature explores such decision-making in the context of mental disorder and work. The purpose of this grounded theory study was to develop a model of disclosure specific to mental health issues in a work context. In-depth interviews were conducted with 13 employees of a post-secondary educational institution in Canada. Data were analyzed according to grounded theory methods through processes of open, selective, and theoretical coding. Findings indicated that employees begin from a default position of nondisclosure that is attributable to fear of being stigmatized in the workplace as a result of the mental disorder. In order to move from the default position, employees need a reason to disclose. The decision-making process itself is a risk-benefit analysis, during which employees weigh risks and benefits within the existing context as they assess it. The model identifies that fear of stigmatization is one of the problems with disclosure at work and describes the disclosure decision-making process. Understanding of how employees make decisions about disclosure in the workplace may inform organizational policies, practices, and programs to improve the experiences of individuals diagnosed with a mental disorder at work. The findings suggest possible intervention strategies in education, policy, and culture for reducing stigma of mental disorders in the workplace.

Mental health of refugees following state-sponsored repatriation from Germany

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Elbert Thomas

2008-11-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background In recent years, Voluntary Assisted Return Programmes (VARPs have received increasing funding as a potential way of reducing the number of refugees in EU member states. A number of factors may affect the mental well-being of returnees. These include adjustment to the home country following return, difficult living conditions, and long-term effects resulting from the severe traumatic stress that had originally driven the affected out of their homes. Little is known about the extent to which these and other factors may promote or inhibit the willingness of refugees to return to their country of origin. The present pilot study investigated refugees who returned to their country of origin after having lived in exile in Germany for some 13 years. Methods Forty-seven VARP participants were interviewed concerning their present living conditions, their views of their native country, and their attitudes towards a potential return prior to actually returning. 33 participants were interviewed nine months after returning to their country of origin. Mental health and well-being were assessed using the questionnaires Posttraumatic Stress Diagnostic Scale (PDS and EUROHIS and the structured Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview (M.I.N.I.. Our objectives were to examine the mental health status of refugees returning to their home country following an extended period of exile. We also aimed to assess the circumstances under which people decided to return, the current living conditions in their home country, and retrospective returnee evaluations of their decision to accept assisted return. Results Prior to returning to their home country, participants showed a prevalence rate of 53% for psychiatric disorders. After returning, this rate increased to a sizeable 88%. Substantial correlations were found between the living situation in Germany, the disposition to return, and mental health. For two thirds of the participants, the decision

Mental health of refugees following state-sponsored repatriation from Germany.

Science.gov (United States)

von Lersner, Ulrike; Elbert, Thomas; Neuner, Frank

2008-11-10

In recent years, Voluntary Assisted Return Programmes (VARPs) have received increasing funding as a potential way of reducing the number of refugees in EU member states. A number of factors may affect the mental well-being of returnees. These include adjustment to the home country following return, difficult living conditions, and long-term effects resulting from the severe traumatic stress that had originally driven the affected out of their homes. Little is known about the extent to which these and other factors may promote or inhibit the willingness of refugees to return to their country of origin. The present pilot study investigated refugees who returned to their country of origin after having lived in exile in Germany for some 13 years. Forty-seven VARP participants were interviewed concerning their present living conditions, their views of their native country, and their attitudes towards a potential return prior to actually returning. 33 participants were interviewed nine months after returning to their country of origin. Mental health and well-being were assessed using the questionnaires Posttraumatic Stress Diagnostic Scale (PDS) and EUROHIS and the structured Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview (M.I.N.I.).Our objectives were to examine the mental health status of refugees returning to their home country following an extended period of exile. We also aimed to assess the circumstances under which people decided to return, the current living conditions in their home country, and retrospective returnee evaluations of their decision to accept assisted return. Prior to returning to their home country, participants showed a prevalence rate of 53% for psychiatric disorders. After returning, this rate increased to a sizeable 88%. Substantial correlations were found between the living situation in Germany, the disposition to return, and mental health. For two thirds of the participants, the decision to return was not voluntary. Psychological strain among

Variables associated with work performance in multidisciplinary mental health teams.

Science.gov (United States)

Fleury, Marie-Josée; Grenier, Guy; Bamvita, Jean-Marie; Chiocchio, François

2017-01-01

This study investigates work performance among 79 mental health teams in Quebec (Canada). We hypothesized that work performance was positively associated with the use of standardized clinical tools and clinical approaches, integration strategies, "clan culture," and mental health funding per capita. Work performance was measured using an adapted version of the Work Role Questionnaire. Variables were organized into four key areas: (1) team attributes, (2) organizational culture, (3) inter-organizational interactions, and (4) external environment. Work performance was associated with two types of organizational culture (clan and hierarchy) and with two team attributes (use of standardized clinical tools and approaches). This study was innovative in identifying associations between work performance and best practices, justifying their implementation. Recommendations are provided to develop organizational cultures promoting a greater focus on the external environment and integration strategies that strengthen external focus, service effectiveness, and innovation.

The conception of disability and mental illness in advanced welfare states

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ringø, Pia; Høgsbro, Kjeld

2017-01-01

The chapter presents historical developments in the conception of disability and services for people with disability and mental illness. It identifies the social, political and technological movements, which have led to the epistemologies that exist in this field today. The diverse understandings...... of mental problems and vulnerability have all through history motivated different guidelines for social work practice when it comes to people with cognitive and mental deficits and in the final section of the chapter, we discuss how current sociological, neurological, and psychiatric perspectives...... in research as well as clinical experiences from advanced welfare services might support a new model for understanding mental vulnerability....

Mental state decoding impairment in major depression and borderline personality disorder: meta-analysis.

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Richman, Mara J; Unoka, Zsolt

2015-12-01

Patients with major depression and borderline personality disorder are characterised by a distorted perception of other people's intentions. Deficits in mental state decoding are thought to be the underlying cause of this clinical feature. To examine, using meta-analysis, whether mental state decoding abilities in patients with major depression and borderline personality disorder differ from those of healthy controls. A systematic review of 13 cross-sectional studies comparing Reading in the Mind of the Eyes Test (RMET) accuracy performance of patients with major depression or borderline personality disorder and healthy age-matched controls (n = 976). Valence scores, where reported, were also assessed. Large significant deficits were seen for global RMET performance in patients with major depression (d = -0.751). The positive RMET valence scores of patients with depression were significantly worse; patients with borderline personality disorder had worse neutral scores. Both groups were worse than controls. Moderator analysis revealed that individuals with comorbid borderline personality disorder and major depression did better than those with borderline personality disorder alone on accuracy. Those with comorbid borderline personality disorder and any cluster B or C personality disorder did worse than borderline personality disorder alone. Individuals with both borderline personality disorder and major depression performed better then those with borderline personality disorder without major depression for positive valence. These findings highlight the relevance of RMET performance in patients with borderline personality disorder and major depression, and the importance of considering comorbidity in future analysis. © The Royal College of Psychiatrists 2015.

Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) for the detection of dementia in clinically unevaluated people aged 65 and over in community and primary care populations

OpenAIRE

Creavin, Sam T; Wisniewski, Susanna; Noel-Storr, Anna H; Trevelyan, Clare M; Hampton, Thomas; Rayment, Dane; Thom, Victoria M; Nash, Kirsty J E; Elhamoui, Hosam; Milligan, Rowena; Patel, Anish S; Tsivos, Demitra V; Wing, Tracey; Phillips, Emma; Kellman, Sophie M

2016-01-01

BACKGROUND: The Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) is a cognitive test that is commonly used as part of the evaluation for possible dementia.OBJECTIVES: To determine the diagnostic accuracy of the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) at various cut points for dementia in people aged 65 years and over in community and primary care settings who had not undergone prior testing for dementia.SEARCH METHODS: We searched the specialised register of the Cochrane Dementia and Cognitive Improvement G...

Technical attributes, health attribute, consumer attributes and their roles in adoption intention of healthcare wearable technology.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Min; Luo, Meifen; Nie, Rui; Zhang, Yan

2017-12-01

This paper aims to explore factors influencing the healthcare wearable technology adoption intention from perspectives of technical attributes (perceived convenience, perceived irreplaceability, perceived credibility and perceived usefulness), health attribute (health belief) and consumer attributes (consumer innovativeness, conspicuous consumption, informational reference group influence and gender difference). By integrating technology acceptance model, health belief model, snob effect and conformity and reference group theory, hypotheses and research model are proposed. The empirical investigation (N=436) collects research data through questionnaire. Results show that the adoption intention of healthcare wearable technology is influenced by technical attributes, health attribute and consumer attributes simultaneously. For technical attributes, perceived convenience and perceived credibility both positively affect perceived usefulness, and perceived usefulness influences adoption intention. The relation between perceived irreplaceability and perceived usefulness is only supported by males. For health attribute, health belief affects perceived usefulness for females. For consumer attributes, conspicuous consumption and informational reference group influence can significantly moderate the relation between perceived usefulness and adoption intention and the relation between consumer innovativeness and adoption intention respectively. What's more, consumer innovativeness significantly affects adoption intention for males. This paper aims to discuss technical attributes, health attribute and consumer attributes and their roles in the adoption intention of healthcare wearable technology. Findings may provide enlightenment to differentiate product developing and marketing strategies and provide some implications for clinical medicine. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Public stigma of mental illness in the United States: a systematic literature review.

Science.gov (United States)

Parcesepe, Angela M; Cabassa, Leopoldo J

2013-09-01

Public stigma is a pervasive barrier that prevents many individuals in the U.S. from engaging in mental health care. This systematic literature review aims to: (1) evaluate methods used to study the public's stigma toward mental disorders, (2) summarize stigma findings focused on the public's stigmatizing beliefs and actions and attitudes toward mental health treatment for children and adults with mental illness, and (3) draw recommendations for reducing stigma towards individuals with mental disorders and advance research in this area. Public stigma of mental illness in the U.S. was widespread. Findings can inform interventions to reduce the public's stigma of mental illness.

The effectiveness of using non-traditional teaching methods to prepare student health care professionals for the delivery of mental state examination: a systematic review.

Science.gov (United States)

Xie, Huiting; Liu, Lei; Wang, Jia; Joon, Kum Eng; Parasuram, Rajni; Gunasekaran, Jamuna; Poh, Chee Lien

2015-08-14

With the evolution of education, there has been a shift from the use of traditional teaching methods, such as didactic or rote teaching, towards non-traditional teaching methods, such as viewing of role plays, simulation, live interviews and the use of virtual environments. Mental state examination is an essential competency for all student healthcare professionals. If mental state examination is not taught in the most effective manner so learners can comprehend its concepts and interpret the findings correctly, it could lead to serious repercussions and subsequently impact on clinical care provided for patients with mental health conditions, such as incorrect assessment of suicidal ideation. However, the methods for teaching mental state examination vary widely between countries, academic institutions and clinical settings. This systematic review aimed to identify and synthesize the best available evidence of effective teaching methods used to prepare student health care professionals for the delivery of mental state examination. This review considered evidence from primary quantitative studies which address the effectiveness of a chosen method used for the teaching of mental state examination published in English, including studies that measure learner outcomes, i.e. improved knowledge and skills, self-confidence and learners' satisfaction. A three-step search strategy was undertaken in this review to search for articles published in English from the inception of the database to December 2014. An initial search of MEDLINE and CINAHL was undertaken to identify keywords. Secondly, the keywords identified were used to search electronic databases, namely, CINAHL, Medline, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Ovid, PsycINFO and, ProQuest Dissertations & Theses. Thirdly, reference lists of the articles identified in the second stage were searched for other relevant studies. Studies selected were assessed by two independent reviewers for methodological

WYOMING MENTAL ABILITY SURVEY, 1957-58.

Science.gov (United States)

LINFORD, VELMA

A STATEWIDE PROGRAM WAS INITIATED IN WYOMING FOR THE PURPOSES OF DISCOVERING THE EXTENT OF MENTAL RETARDATION AMONG ELEMENTARY AND SECONDARY STUDENTS IN THE STATE, DETERMINING WHERE THE MENTALLY RETARDED ARE FOUND, AND PLANNING AN EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM FOR THEM. GROUP MENTAL TESTS WERE APPLIED TO 67,620 CHILDREN WHICH REPRESENTED 91.8 PERCENT OF THE…

Do US Medical Licensing Applications Treat Mental and Physical Illness Equivalently?

Science.gov (United States)

Gold, Katherine J; Shih, Elizabeth R; Goldman, Edward B; Schwenk, Thomas L

2017-06-01

State medical licensing boards are responsible for evaluating physician impairment. Given the stigma generated by mental health issues among physicians and in the medical training culture, we were interested in whether states asked about mental and physical health conditions differently and whether questions focused on current impairment. Two authors reviewed physician medical licensing applications for US physicians seeking first-time licensing in 2013 in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Questions about physical and mental health, as well as substance abuse, were identified and coded as to whether or not they asked about diagnosis and/or treatment or limited the questions to conditions causing physician impairment. Forty-three (84%) states asked questions about mental health conditions, 43 (84%) about physical health conditions, and 47 (92%) about substance use. States were more likely to ask for history of treatment and prior hospitalization for mental health and substance use, compared with physical health disorders. Among states asking about mental health, just 23 (53%) limited all questions to disorders causing functional impairment and just 6 (14%) limited to current problems. While most state medical licensing boards ask about mental health conditions or treatment, only half limited queries to disorders causing impairment. Differences in how state licensing boards assess mental health raise important ethical and legal questions about assessing physician ability to practice and may discourage treatment for physicians who might otherwise benefit from appropriate care.

Snapshot from Superstorm Sandy: American Red Cross mental health risk surveillance in lower New York State.

Science.gov (United States)

Schreiber, Merritt D; Yin, Rob; Omaish, Mostafa; Broderick, Joan E

2014-07-01

Disasters often cause psychological injury, as well as dramatic physical damage. Epidemiologic research has identified a set of disaster experiences and predisposing characteristics that place survivors at risk for post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, and anxiety. Rapid triage of at-risk survivors could have benefits for individual and population-level outcomes. We examine American Red Cross mental health risk surveillance data collected from October 29 to November 20, 2012, immediately after Hurricane Sandy in 8 lower New York State counties to evaluate the feasibility and utility of collecting these data. PsySTART, an evidence-based disaster mental health triage tool, was used to record survivor-reported risk factors after each survivor contact. Red Cross disaster mental health volunteers interfaced with survivors at disaster operation sites, including shelters, emergency aid stations, and mobile feeding and community outreach centers. Risk data were called into the operations center each day and reported by county. PsySTART risk surveillance data for 18,823 disaster mental health contacts are presented for adults and children. A total of 17,979 risk factors were reported. Overall levels of risk per contact were statistically different (χ(2)(1, N=6,045)=248.1; PSuperstorm Sandy indicate substantial population-level impact suggestive of risk for disorders that may persist chronically without treatment. Mental health triage has the potential to improve care of individual disaster survivors, as well as inform disaster management, local health providers, and public health officials. Copyright © 2013 American College of Emergency Physicians. Published by Mosby, Inc. All rights reserved.

Parenting Attributions and Attitudes in Cross-Cultural Perspective

Science.gov (United States)

Bornstein, Marc H.; Putnick, Diane L.; Lansford, Jennifer E.

2011-01-01

SYNOPSIS Objective This article used the Parenting Across Cultures Project to evaluate similarities and differences in mean levels and relative agreement between mothers’ and fathers’ attributions and attitudes in parenting in 9 countries. Design Mothers and fathers reported their perceptions of causes of successes and failures in caregiving and their progressive versus authoritarian childrearing attitudes. Gender and cultural similarities and differences in parents’ attributions and attitudes in 9 countries were analyzed: China, Colombia, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, the Philippines, Sweden, Thailand, or the United States. Results Although mothers and fathers did not differ in any attribution, mothers reported more progressive parenting attitudes and modernity of childrearing attitudes than did fathers, and fathers reported more authoritarian attitudes than did mothers. Country differences also emerged in all attributions and attitudes that were examined. Mothers’ and fathers’ attributions and their attitudes were moderately correlated, but parenting attitudes were more highly correlated in parents than were attributions. Conclusions We draw connections among the findings across the 9 countries and outline implications for understanding similarities and differences in mothers’ and fathers’ parenting attributions and attitudes. PMID:21927591

Biogenetic models of psychopathology, implicit guilt, and mental illness stigma.

Science.gov (United States)

Rüsch, Nicolas; Todd, Andrew R; Bodenhausen, Galen V; Corrigan, Patrick W

2010-10-30

Whereas some research suggests that acknowledgment of the role of biogenetic factors in mental illness could reduce mental illness stigma by diminishing perceived responsibility, other research has cautioned that emphasizing biogenetic aspects of mental illness could produce the impression that mental illness is a stable, intrinsic aspect of a person ("genetic essentialism"), increasing the desire for social distance. We assessed genetic and neurobiological causal attributions about mental illness among 85 people with serious mental illness and 50 members of the public. The perceived responsibility of persons with mental illness for their condition, as well as fear and social distance, was assessed by self-report. Automatic associations between Mental Illness and Guilt and between Self and Guilt were measured by the Brief Implicit Association Test. Among the general public, endorsement of biogenetic models was associated with not only less perceived responsibility, but also greater social distance. Among people with mental illness, endorsement of genetic models had only negative correlates: greater explicit fear and stronger implicit self-guilt associations. Genetic models may have unexpected negative consequences for implicit self-concept and explicit attitudes of people with serious mental illness. An exclusive focus on genetic models may therefore be problematic for clinical practice and anti-stigma initiatives. Copyright © 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The state of the art in European research on reducing social exclusion and stigma related to mental health : A systematic mapping of the literature

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Evans-Lacko, S.; Courtin, E.; Fiorillo, A.; Knapp, M.; Luciano, M.; Park, A. -L.; Brunn, M.; Byford, S.; Chevreul, K.; Forsman, A. K.; Gulacsi, L.; Haro, J. M.; Kennelly, B.; Knappe, S.; Lai, T.; Lasalvia, A.; Miret, M.; O'Sullivan, C.; Obradors-Tarrago, C.; Ruesch, N.; Sartorius, N.; Svab, V.; van Weeghel, J.; Van Audenhove, C.; Wahlbeck, K.; Zlati, A.; McDaid, D.; Thornicroft, G.

2014-01-01

Stigma and social exclusion related to mental health are of substantial public health importance for Europe. As part of ROAMER (ROAdmap for MEntal health Research in Europe), we used systematic mapping techniques to describe the current state of research on stigma and social exclusion across Europe.

No sympathy for the devil: attributing psychopathic traits to capital murderers also predicts support for executing them.

Science.gov (United States)

Edens, John F; Davis, Karen M; Fernandez Smith, Krissie; Guy, Laura S

2013-04-01

Mental health evidence concerning antisocial and psychopathic traits appears to be introduced frequently in capital murder trials in the United States to argue that defendants are a "continuing threat" to society and thus worthy of execution. Using a simulation design, the present research examined how layperson perceptions of the psychopathic traits exhibited by a capital defendant would impact their attitudes about whether he should receive a death sentence. Across three studies (total N = 362), ratings of a defendant's perceived level of psychopathy strongly predicted support for executing him. The vast majority of the predictive utility was attributable to interpersonal and affective traits historically associated with psychopathy rather than traits associated with a criminal and socially deviant lifestyle. A defendant's perceived lack of remorse in particular was influential, although perceptions of grandiose self-worth and a manipulative interpersonal style also contributed incrementally to support for a death sentence. These results highlight how attributions regarding socially undesirable personality traits can have a pronounced negative impact on layperson attitudes toward persons who are perceived to exhibit these characteristics. PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved.

Prevalence and determinants of common mental illness among adult residents of Harari Regional State, Eastern Ethiopia

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Hunduma, Gari; Girma, Mulugeta; Digaffe, Tesfaye; Weldegebreal, Fitsum; Tola, Assefa

2017-01-01

Introduction Common mental disorders include depression, anxiety and somatoform disorders are a public health problem in developed as well as developing countries. It represents a psychiatric morbidity with significant prevalence, affecting all stages of life and cause suffering to the individuals, their family and communities. Despite this fact, little information about the prevalence of common mental illness is available from low and middle-income countries including Ethiopia. The aim of this study was to determine the magnitude of common mental disorders and its associated factors among adult residents of Harari Region. Methods Comparative cross-sectional, quantitative community-based survey was conducted From February 1, 2016 to March 30, 2016 in Harari Regional State using multi-stage sampling technique. A total of 968 residents was selected using two stage sampling technique. Of this 901 were participated in the study. Validated and Pretested Self reported questionnaire (SQR_20) was used to determine the maginitude of common mental disorders. Data was entered and analyzed using Epi-info version 3.5.1 and SPSS-17 for windows statistical packages. Univirate, Bi-variate and multivariate logistic regression analysis with 95% CI was employed in order to infer associations. Results The prevalence of common mental illnesses among adults in our study area was 14.9%. The most common neurotic symptoms in this study were often head ache (23.2%), sleep badly (16%) and poor appetite (13.8%). Substance use like Khat chewing (48.2%), tobacco use (38.2%) and alcohol use (10.5%) was highly prevalent health problem among study participant. In multivariate logistic regression analysis, respondents age between 25-34 years, 35-44 years, 45-54 years and above 55years were 6.4 times (AOR 6.377; 95% CI: 2.280-17.835), 5.9 times (AOR 5.900; 95% CI: 2.243-14.859), 5.6 times (AOR 5.648; 95% CI: 2.200-14.50) and 4.1 times (AOR 4.110; 95% CI: 1.363-12.393) more likely having common

40 CFR 51.305 - Monitoring for reasonably attributable visibility impairment.

Science.gov (United States)

2010-07-01

... visibility impairment. 51.305 Section 51.305 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY... Protection of Visibility § 51.305 Monitoring for reasonably attributable visibility impairment. (a) For the purposes of addressing reasonably attributable visibility impairment, each State containing a mandatory...

A multinational study of mental disorders, marriage, and divorce.

Science.gov (United States)

Breslau, J; Miller, E; Jin, R; Sampson, N A; Alonso, J; Andrade, L H; Bromet, E J; de Girolamo, G; Demyttenaere, K; Fayyad, J; Fukao, A; Gălăon, M; Gureje, O; He, Y; Hinkov, H R; Hu, C; Kovess-Masfety, V; Matschinger, H; Medina-Mora, M E; Ormel, J; Posada-Villa, J; Sagar, R; Scott, K M; Kessler, R C

2011-12-01

Estimate predictive associations of mental disorders with marriage and divorce in a cross-national sample. Population surveys of mental disorders included assessment of age at first marriage in 19 countries (n = 46,128) and age at first divorce in a subset of 12 countries (n = 30,729). Associations between mental disorders and subsequent marriage and divorce were estimated in discrete time survival models. Fourteen of 18 premarital mental disorders are associated with lower likelihood of ever marrying (odds ratios ranging from 0.6 to 0.9), but these associations vary across ages of marriage. Associations between premarital mental disorders and marriage are generally null for early marriage (age 17 or younger), but negative associations come to predominate at later ages. All 18 mental disorders are positively associated with divorce (odds ratios ranging from 1.2 to 1.8). Three disorders, specific phobia, major depression, and alcohol abuse, are associated with the largest population attributable risk proportions for both marriage and divorce. This evidence adds to research demonstrating adverse effects of mental disorders on life course altering events across a diverse range of socioeconomic and cultural settings. These effects should be included in considerations of public health investments in preventing and treating mental disorders. © 2011 John Wiley & Sons A/S.

A multinational study of mental disorders, marriage, and divorce

Science.gov (United States)

Breslau, J.; Miller, E.; Jin, R.; Sampson, N. A.; Alonso, J.; Andrade, L. H.; Bromet, E. J.; de Girolamo, G.; Demyttenaere, K.; Fayyad, J.; Fukao, A.; Gălăon, M.; Gureje, O.; He, Y.; Hinkov, H. R.; Hu, C.; Kovess-Masfety, V.; Matschinger, H.; Medina-Mora, M. E.; Ormel, J.; Posada-Villa, J.; Sagar, R.; Scott, K. M.; Kessler, R. C.

2014-01-01

Objective Estimate predictive associations of mental disorders with marriage and divorce in a cross-national sample. Method Population surveys of mental disorders included assessment of age at first marriage in 19 countries (n = 46 128) and age at first divorce in a subset of 12 countries (n = 30 729). Associations between mental disorders and subsequent marriage and divorce were estimated in discrete time survival models. Results Fourteen of 18 premarital mental disorders are associated with lower likelihood of ever marrying (odds ratios ranging from 0.6 to 0.9), but these associations vary across ages of marriage. Associations between premarital mental disorders and marriage are generally null for early marriage (age 17 or younger), but negative associations come to predominate at later ages. All 18 mental disorders are positively associated with divorce (odds ratios ranging from 1.2 to 1.8). Three disorders, specific phobia, major depression, and alcohol abuse, are associated with the largest population attributable risk proportions for both marriage and divorce. Conclusion This evidence adds to research demonstrating adverse effects of mental disorders on life course altering events across a diverse range of socioeconomic and cultural settings. These effects should be included in considerations of public health investments in preventing and treating mental disorders. PMID:21534936

Improving somatic health of outpatients with severe mental illness

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Van Hasselt, Fenneke M.; Oud, Marian J. T.; Krabbe, Paul F. M.; Postma, Maarten J.; Loonen, A.J.M.

2014-01-01

Background: Patients with severe mental illness (SMI) experience a 13-to 30-year reduction in life expectancy compared with the general population. The majority of these deaths can be attributed to somatic health problems. The risk on somatic health problems is partly increased due to a reduced

Smoking and mental illness: results from population surveys in Australia and the United States

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Mitrou Francis

2009-08-01

Full Text Available Abstract Background Smoking has been associated with a range of mental disorders including schizophrenia, anxiety disorders and depression. People with mental illness have high rates of morbidity and mortality from smoking related illnesses such as cardiovascular disease, respiratory diseases and cancer. As many people who meet diagnostic criteria for mental disorders do not seek treatment for these conditions, we sought to investigate the relationship between mental illness and smoking in recent population-wide surveys. Methods Survey data from the US National Comorbidity Survey-Replication conducted in 2001–2003, the 2007 Australian Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing, and the 2007 US National Health Interview Survey were used to investigate the relationship between current smoking, ICD-10 mental disorders and non-specific psychological distress. Population weighted estimates of smoking rates by disorder, and mental disorder rates by smoking status were calculated. Results In both the US and Australia, adults who met ICD-10 criteria for mental disorders in the 12 months prior to the survey smoked at almost twice the rate of adults without mental disorders. While approximately 20% of the adult population had 12-month mental disorders, among adult smokers approximately one-third had a 12-month mental disorder – 31.7% in the US (95% CI: 29.5%–33.8% and 32.4% in Australia (95% CI: 29.5%–35.3%. Female smokers had higher rates of mental disorders than male smokers, and younger smokers had considerably higher rates than older smokers. The majority of mentally ill smokers were not in contact with mental health services, but their rate of smoking was not different from that of mentally ill smokers who had accessed services for their mental health problem. Smokers with high levels of psychological distress smoked a higher average number of cigarettes per day. Conclusion Mental illness is associated with both higher rates of smoking and higher

Integrating physical and mental health promotion strategies

OpenAIRE

Palma, Jessica Anne

2010-01-01

While health is defined as ‘a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being’, physical and mental health have traditionally been separated. This paper explores the question: How can physical and mental health promotion strategies be integrated and addressed simultaneously? A literature review on why physical and mental health are separated and why these two areas need to be integrated was conducted. A conceptual framework for how to integrate physical and mental health promotion st...

[Comorbid antisocial and borderline personality disorders: mentalization-based treatment].

Science.gov (United States)

Bateman, Anthony; Fonagy, Peter

2010-01-01

Mentalization is the process by which we implicitly and explicitly interpret the actions of ourselves and others as meaningful based on intentional mental states (e.g., desires, needs, feelings, beliefs, and reasons). This process is disrupted in individuals with comorbid antisocial (ASPD) and borderline personality disorder (BPD), who tend to misinterpret others' motives. Antisocial characteristics stabilize mentalizing by rigidifying relationships within prementalistic ways of functioning. However, loss of flexibility makes the person vulnerable to sudden collapse when the schematic representation is challenged. This exposes feelings of humiliation, which can only be avoided by violence and control of the other person. The common path to violence is via a momentary inhibition of the capacity for mentalization. In this article, the authors outline their current understanding of mentalizing and its relation to antisocial characteristics and violence. This is illustrated by a clinical account of mentalization-based treatment adapted for antisocial personality disorder. Treatment combines group and individual therapy. The focus is on helping patients maintain mentalizing about their own mental states when their personal integrity is challenged. A patient with ASPD does not have mental pain associated with another's state of mind; thus, to generate conflict in ASPD by thinking about the victim will typically be ineffective in inducing behavior change.

Comorbid antisocial and borderline personality disorders: mentalization-based treatment.

Science.gov (United States)

Bateman, Anthony; Fonagy, Peter

2008-02-01

Mentalization is the process by which we implicitly and explicitly interpret the actions of ourselves and others as meaningful based on intentional mental states (e.g., desires, needs, feelings, beliefs, and reasons). This process is disrupted in individuals with comorbid antisocial (ASPD) and borderline personality disorder (BPD), who tend to misinterpret others' motives. Antisocial characteristics stabilize mentalizing by rigidifying relationships within prementalistic ways of functioning. However, loss of flexibility makes the person vulnerable to sudden collapse when the schematic representation is challenged. This exposes feelings of humiliation, which can only be avoided by violence and control of the other person. The common path to violence is via a momentary inhibition of the capacity for mentalization. In this article, the authors outline their current understanding of mentalizing and its relation to antisocial characteristics and violence. This is illustrated by a clinical account of mentalization-based treatment adapted for antisocial personality disorder. Treatment combines group and individual therapy. The focus is on helping patients maintain mentalizing about their own mental states when their personal integrity is challenged. A patient with ASPD does not have mental pain associated with another's state of mind; thus, to generate conflict in ASPD by thinking about the victim will typically be ineffective in inducing behavior change. 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc

Mental health trajectories and their embeddedness in work and family circumstances: a latent state-trait approach to life-course trajectories.

Science.gov (United States)

Cullati, Stéphane; Courvoisier, Delphine S; Burton-Jeangros, Claudine

2014-09-01

Mental health trajectories are known to be influenced by work and family circumstances. However, few studies have examined both of these influences simultaneously in a longitudinal manner. The life-course perspective stresses the importance of examining trajectories in terms of both stable and dynamic components. In this article we use structural equation models (latent state-trait, LST) to distinguish the stable and situational components of mental health trajectories and hypothesise that situational mental health is influenced by satisfaction with work and family, and this effect differs by gender. An analysis of data from a nationally representative sample of 1616 working Swiss residents (2000-2006) shows that mental health trajectories are mostly stable and only slightly sensitive to situational influences. However, situational influences in a given wave do predict situational influences in the next wave. Satisfaction with work and family influences situational mental health in both genders, but the impact is greater for men. In conclusion, the LST approach allows for the examination of mental health trajectories from a life-course perspective by distinguishing stable and situational components. Mental health trajectories are more stable and constant than they are dependent on work and family circumstances, and men are more sensitive to family circumstances than women. © 2014 The Authors. Sociology of Health & Illness © 2014 Foundation for the Sociology of Health & Illness/John Wiley & Sons.

Evaluation of service users' experiences of participating in an exercise programme at the Western Australian State Forensic Mental Health Services.

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Wynaden, Dianne; Barr, Lesley; Omari, Omar; Fulton, Anthony

2012-06-01

Approximately 210 patients are admitted each year to the Western Australian State Forensic Mental Health Service, and most present with psychotic illness, along with other physical and mental comorbidities. In 2010, a healthy lifestyle programme, which included a formal exercise programme coordinated by an exercise physiologist, was introduced at the service. A self-report questionnaire was developed to obtain feedback on the programme, and 56 patients completed the questionnaire during the 6-month evaluation period. As well as providing patients with access to regular physical activity, the programme also supports the recovery philosophy, where patients work in partnership with forensic mental health staff. Overall, patients reported that the programme assisted them to manage their psychiatric symptoms, as well as improving their level of fitness, confidence, and self-esteem. In addition, patients received education about the importance of regular exercise to their mental health, and the role exercise plays in preventing chronic illness and obesity. While the benefits of exercise on mental health outcomes for people with depression and anxiety are well established, this evaluation adds to the evidence that such programmes provide similar benefits to people who have a psychotic illness and are hospitalized in an acute secure setting. © 2012 The Authors. International Journal of Mental Health Nursing © 2012 Australian College of Mental Health Nurses Inc.

The StreamCat Dataset: Accumulated Attributes for NHDPlusV2 Catchments (Version 2.1) for the Conterminous United States: Base Flow Index

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This dataset represents the base flow index values within individual, local NHDPlusV2 catchments and upstream, contributing watersheds. Attributes of the landscape layer were calculated for every local NHDPlusV2 catchment and accumulated to provide watershed-level metrics. (See Supplementary Info for Glossary of Terms) The base-flow index (BFI) grid for the conterminous United States was developed to estimate (1) BFI values for ungaged streams, and (2) ground-water recharge throughout the conterminous United States (see Source_Information). Estimates of BFI values at ungaged streams and BFI-based ground-water recharge estimates are useful for interpreting relations between land use and water quality in surface and ground water. The bfi (%) was summarized by local catchment and by watershed to produce local catchment-level and watershed-level metrics as a continuous data type (see Data Structure and Attribute Information for a description).

Obsessive-compulsive disorder and the risk of subsequent mental disorders: A community study of adolescents and young adults.

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Hofer, Patrizia D; Wahl, Karina; Meyer, Andrea H; Miché, Marcel; Beesdo-Baum, Katja; Wong, Shiu F; Grisham, Jessica R; Wittchen, Hans-Ulrich; Lieb, Roselind

2018-04-01

Comorbidity of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) with other mental disorders has been demonstrated repeatedly. Few longitudinal studies, however, have evaluated the temporal association of prior OCD and subsequent mental disorders across the age period of highest risk for first onset of mental disorders. We examined associations between prior OCD and a broad range of subsequent mental disorders and simulated proportions of new onsets of mental disorders that could potentially be attributed to prior OCD, assuming a causal relationship. Data from 3,021 14- to 24-year-old community subjects were prospectively collected for up to 10 years. DSM-IV OCD and other DSM-IV mental disorders were assessed with the Munich-Composite International Diagnostic Interview. We used adjusted time-dependent proportional hazard models to estimate the temporal associations of prior OCD with subsequent mental disorders. Prior OCD was associated with an increased risk of bipolar disorders (BIP; [hazard ratio, HR = 6.9, 95% confidence interval, CI, (2.8,17.3)], bulimia nervosa [HR = 6.8 (1.3,36.6)], dysthymia [HR = 4.4 (2.1,9.0)], generalized anxiety disorder (GAD; [HR = 3.4 (1.1,10.9)], and social phobia [HR = 2.9 (1.1,7.7)]). Of these outcome disorders, between 65 and 85% could be attributed to OCD in the exposed group, whereas between 1.5 and 7.7% could be attributed to OCD in the total sample. This study provides strong evidence that prior OCD is associated with an increased risk of subsequent onset of BIP, bulimia nervosa, dysthymia, GAD, and social phobia among adolescents and young adults. Future studies should evaluate if early treatment of OCD can prevent the onset of these subsequent mental disorders. © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Somali Refugees' Perceptions of Mental Illness.

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Bettmann, Joanna E; Penney, Deb; Clarkson Freeman, Pamela; Lecy, Natalie

2015-01-01

Nearly 13% of the U.S. population is comprised of foreign-born individuals, with Somalis constituting one of the largest resettled groups. Research suggests that, among Somali refugees, rates of mental illness are high. Yet research shows Somalis underutilize mental health services. Understanding their perceptions of mental illness and its cures may help practitioners to design more effective treatments for this population. Thus, this pilot study investigated Somali refugees' perceptions of mental illness and its treatments. Using purposive sampling, this qualitative study interviewed 20 Somali refugees using a semi-structured interview guide. Qualitative analysis yielded participants' perceptions of mental illness through their descriptions of physical symptoms accompanying mental illness, the stigma of mental illness, causes of mental illness, medical and non-medical treatments for mental illness, spirit possession causing mental illness, and the Qur'an as treatment for mental illness. Such information may help practitioners in the United States approach Somali clients in the most culturally coherent manner.

Modeling Psychological Attributes in Psychology – An Epistemological Discussion: Network Analysis vs. Latent Variables

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Guyon, Hervé; Falissard, Bruno; Kop, Jean-Luc

2017-01-01

Network Analysis is considered as a new method that challenges Latent Variable models in inferring psychological attributes. With Network Analysis, psychological attributes are derived from a complex system of components without the need to call on any latent variables. But the ontological status of psychological attributes is not adequately defined with Network Analysis, because a psychological attribute is both a complex system and a property emerging from this complex system. The aim of this article is to reappraise the legitimacy of latent variable models by engaging in an ontological and epistemological discussion on psychological attributes. Psychological attributes relate to the mental equilibrium of individuals embedded in their social interactions, as robust attractors within complex dynamic processes with emergent properties, distinct from physical entities located in precise areas of the brain. Latent variables thus possess legitimacy, because the emergent properties can be conceptualized and analyzed on the sole basis of their manifestations, without exploring the upstream complex system. However, in opposition with the usual Latent Variable models, this article is in favor of the integration of a dynamic system of manifestations. Latent Variables models and Network Analysis thus appear as complementary approaches. New approaches combining Latent Network Models and Network Residuals are certainly a promising new way to infer psychological attributes, placing psychological attributes in an inter-subjective dynamic approach. Pragmatism-realism appears as the epistemological framework required if we are to use latent variables as representations of psychological attributes. PMID:28572780

Public Stigma of Mental Illness in the United States: A Systematic Literature Review

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Parcesepe, Angela M.; Cabassa, Leopoldo J.

2013-01-01

Public stigma is a pervasive barrier that prevents many individuals in the U.S. from engaging in mental health care. This systematic literature review aims to: (1) evaluate methods used to study the public’s stigma toward mental disorders, (2) summarize stigma findings focused on the public’s stigmatizing beliefs and actions and attitudes toward mental health treatment for children and adults with mental illness, and (3) draw recommendations for reducing stigma towards individuals with mental...

Mental Health Stigma about Serious Mental Illness among MSW Students: Social Contact and Attitude

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Covarrubias, Irene; Han, Meekyung

2011-01-01

In this study, the attitudes toward and beliefs about serious mental illness (SMI) held by a group of graduate social work students in the northwestern United States were examined. Mental health stigma was examined with relation to the following factors: participants' level of social contact with SMI populations, adherence to stereotypes about SMI…

Subclinical psychotic experiences and subsequent contact with mental health services.

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Bhavsar, Vishal; Maccabe, James H; Hatch, Stephani L; Hotopf, Matthew; Boydell, Jane; McGuire, Philip

2017-03-01

Although psychotic experiences in people without diagnosed mental health problems are associated with mental health service use, few studies have assessed this prospectively or measured service use by real-world clinical data. To describe and investigate the association between psychotic experiences and later mental health service use, and to assess the role of symptoms of common mental health disorders in this association. We linked a representative survey of south-east London (SELCoH-1, n =1698) with health records from the local mental healthcare provider. Cox regression estimated the association of PEs with rate of mental health service use. After adjustments, psychotic experiences were associated with a 1.75-fold increase in the rate of subsequent mental health service use (hazard ratio (HR) 1.75, 95% CI 1.03-2.97) compared with those without PEs. Participants with PEs experienced longer care episodes compared with those without. Psychotic experiences in the general population are important predictors of public mental health need, aside from their relevance for psychoses. We found psychotic experiences to be associated with later mental health service use, after accounting for sociodemographic confounders and concurrent psychopathology. None. © The Royal College of Psychiatrists 2017. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license.

Public mental health: the time is ripe for translation of evidence into practice.

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Wahlbeck, Kristian

2015-02-01

Public mental health deals with mental health promotion, prevention of mental disorders and suicide, reducing mental health inequalities, and governance and organization of mental health service provision. The full impact of mental health is largely unrecognized within the public health sphere, despite the increasing burden of disease attributable to mental and behavioral disorders. Modern public mental health policies aim at improving psychosocial health by addressing determinants of mental health in all public policy areas. Stigmatization of mental disorders is a widespread phenomenon that constitutes a barrier for help-seeking and for the development of health care services, and is thus a core issue in public mental health actions. Lately, there has been heightened interest in the promotion of positive mental health and wellbeing. Effective programmes have been developed for promoting mental health in everyday settings such as families, schools and workplaces. New evidence indicates that many mental disorders and suicides are preventable by public mental health interventions. Available evidence favours the population approach over high-risk approaches. Public mental health emphasizes the role of primary care in the provision of mental health services to the population. The convincing evidence base for population-based mental health interventions asks for actions for putting evidence into practice. © 2015 World Psychiatric Association.

Sustainable Urban Development? Exploring the Locational Attributes of LEED-ND Projects in the United States through a GIS Analysis of Light Intensity and Land Use

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Russell M. Smith

2016-06-01

Full Text Available LEED®-ND™ is the latest attempt to develop more sustainable urban environs in the United States. The LEED®-ND™ program was created to provide a green rating system that would improve the quality of life for all people through the inclusion of sustainable development practices. To achieve this, a premium is placed on the locational attributes of proposed projects under the “Smart Location and Linkages” credit category. The purpose of this paper is to explore the locational attributes of LEED®-ND™ projects in the United States to determine if projects are being located in areas that will result in achieving the program’s stated objectives. Specifically, this paper will examine two locational variables (i.e., night-time light intensity and land use cover through the use of GIS to determine the effectiveness of these criteria.

The Effects of Romantic Love on Mentalizing Abilities

OpenAIRE

Wlodarski, Rafael; Dunbar, Robin I. M.

2014-01-01

The effects of the human pair-bonded state of “romantic love” on cognitive function remain relatively unexplored. Theories on cognitive priming suggest that a state of love may activate love-relevant schemas, such as mentalizing about the beliefs of another individual, and may thus improve mentalizing abilities. On the other hand, recent functional MRI (fMRI) research on individuals who are in love suggests that several brain regions associated with mentalizing may be “deactivated” during the...

Public attitudes toward mental illness in Africa and North America.

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St Louis, K O; Roberts, P M

2013-03-01

Public attitudes toward mental illness in two widely disparate cultures, Canada and Cameroon, were compared using an experimental version of a survey instrument, the Public Opinion Survey of Human Attributes-Mental Illness or POSHA-MI(e). 120 respondents rated POSHA-MI(e) items relating to mental illness on 1-9 equal appearing interval scales: 30 in English and 30 in French in both Cameroon and Canada. Additionally, 30 matched, monolingual English, American respondents were included as a comparison group. In Canada (and in the USA), attitudes were generally more positive and less socially stigmatizing toward mental illness than in Cameroon. Differences between countries were much larger than differences between language groups. Consistent with other research, beliefs and reactions of the public regarding mental illness reflect stigma, especially in Cameroon. Cultural influences on these public attitudes are more likely important than language influences. Results of this field test of the POSHA-MI(e), documenting differences in public attitudes toward mental illness in two divergent cultures, support its further development.

Population attributable fractions of psychopathology and suicidal behaviour associated with childhood adversities in Northern Ireland.

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McLafferty, Margaret; O'Neill, Siobhan; Murphy, Sam; Armour, Cherie; Bunting, Brendan

2018-03-01

Childhood adversities are strong predictors of psychopathology and suicidality. However, specific adversities are associated with different outcomes, with cross-national variations reported. The current study examined rates of adversities reported in Northern Ireland (NI), and associations between adverse childhood experiences and psychopathology and suicidal behaviour were explored. Data was obtained from the Northern Ireland Study of Health and Stress (NISHS), conducted as part of the World Mental Health (WMH) survey initiative (2004-2008); response rate 68.4% (n = 1,986). The on-line survey used, the WHO Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI) to examine psychopathology and associated risk factors in the NI population. Prevalence rates of retrospectively reported childhood adversities were calculated, with gender and age variations explored. Females were more likely to experience sexual abuse. Individuals who grew up during the worst years of the civil conflict in NI experienced elevated levels of childhood adversities. Participants who endured childhood adversities were more likely to have mental health problems but variations in risk factors were found for different disorders. Parental mental illness was associated with all disorders however, with ORs ranging from 2.20 for mood disorders to 4.07 for anxiety disorders. Population attributable fractions (PAF) estimated the reduction in psychopathology and suicidal behaviour in the population if exposure to adverse childhood events had not occurred. The highest PAF values were revealed for parental mental illness and sexual abuse. The findings indicate that a substantial proportion of psychopathology and suicide risk in NI are attributable to childhood adversities, providing support for early intervention and prevention initiatives. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Comparison of mental health, happiness, and emotion control with adolescents’ residential centers of state welfare organization and family reared adolescents

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Laila Bawi

2016-03-01

Full Text Available Background and Objective: Many research indicated that adolescents’ residential centers have the high possibility to diagnose with psychological disorders. Therefore, the aim of this study was investigated the mental health, happiness and emotion control among adolescents’ residential centers of state welfare organization.Materials and Methods: This research is a causal –comparative research. The 80 adolescents’ residential centers were chosen through available sampling and 80 adolescents of schools of Alborz city were selected through cluster method. Statistical analysis was conducted by using the independent t-test. The research instruments were Emotion Control Questionnaire (ECQ, General Health Questionnaire (GHQ, Goldenberg, and Oxford Happiness Inventory (OHI.Results: The significantly different was observed in mental health, happiness and emotion control between two adolescents groups (p<0.05.Conclusion: The results indicate that the institutional-reared decrease the level of mental health, happiness and emotion control in adolescents. Thus, counselors should be considered these factors in therapeutic intervention to enhancing the mental health of adolescents’ residential centers.

Prevalence of mental disorders among prisoners in the state of Sao Paulo, Brazil.

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Sergio Baxter Andreoli

Full Text Available OBJECTIVE: To determine the prevalence of psychiatric disorders in the prison population in the State of São Paulo, Brazil. METHODS: Through stratified random sampling, 1.192 men and 617 women prisoners were evaluated for the presence of psychiatric disorders by the Composite International Diagnostic Interview, 2.1 version, according to definitions and criteria of International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10. The prevalence estimates of mental disorders and their respective 95% confidence intervals were calculated and adjusted for sample design through complex sample analysis. RESULTS: Lifetime and 12-month prevalence rates differed between genders. Lifetime and 12-month prevalence of any mental disorder was, respectively, 68.9% and 39.2% among women, and 56.1% and 22.1% among men. Lifetime and 12-month prevalence of anxious-phobic disorders was, respectively, 50% and 27.7% among women and 35.3% and 13.6% among men, of affective disorders was 40% and 21% among women and 20.8% and 9.9% among men, and of drug-related disorders was 25.2% and 1.6% among women and 26.5% and 1.3% among men. For severe mental disorders (psychotic, bipolar disorders, and severe depression, the lifetime and 12-month prevalence rates were, respectively, 25.8% and 14.7% among women, and 12.3% and 6.3% among men. CONCLUSIONS: This is the first large-scale epidemiological study performed with the prison population in Brazil, revealed high rates of psychiatric disorders among men and women. Many similarities, as well as some differences, were found between our results and those of studies conducted in other countries. The differences observed are more likely due to the peculiarities of the prison systems in each country than to the diagnostic criteria adopted in the studies. This fact reinforces the importance of conducting such studies as part of planning and development of appropriate policies for the particular mental health needs of specific prison populations.

Racial and mental illness stereotypes and discrimination: an identity-based analysis of the Virginia Tech and Columbine shootings.

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Chen, Charlene Y; Purdie-Vaughns, Valerie; Phelan, Jo C; Yu, Gary; Yang, Lawrence H

2015-04-01

The Virginia Tech and Columbine High shootings are 2 of the deadliest school massacres in the United States. The present study investigates in a nationally representative sample how White Americans' causal attributions of these shooting moderate their attitudes toward the shooter's race. White Americans shown a vignette based on the Virginia Tech shooting were more likely to espouse negative beliefs about Korean American men and distance themselves from this group the more they believed that the shooter's race caused the shooting. Among those who were shown a vignette based on the Columbine High shooting, believing that mental illness caused the shooting was associated with weaker negative beliefs about White American men. White Americans in a third condition who were given the Virginia Tech vignette and prompted to subtype the shooter according to his race were less likely to possess negative beliefs about Korean American men the more they believed that mental illness caused the shooting. There was no evidence for the ultimate attribution error. Theoretical accounts based on the stereotype and in-group-out-group bias literature are presented. The current findings have important implications for media depictions of minority group behavior and intergroup relations. (c) 2015 APA, all rights reserved).

Development of Mentalizing and Communication: From Viewpoint of Developmental Cybernetics and Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience

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Itakura, Shoji

The ability to mentalize is essential for human socialization. Such ability is strongly related to communication. In this paper, I discuss the development of mentalizing and communication from the perspectives of a new idea, Developmental Cybernetics, and developmental cognitive neuroscience. Children only attributed intention to a robot when they saw it behaving as a human and displaying social signals such as eye gaze. The emergence of powerful new methods and tools, such as neuroimaging, now allows questions about mentalizing to resolved more directly than before.

Right to property, inheritance, and contract and persons with mental illness.

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Bhugra, Dinesh; Pathare, Soumitra; Joshi, Rajlaxmi; Nardodkar, Renuka; Torales, Julio; Tolentino, Edgardo Juan L; Dantas, Rubens; Ventriglio, Antonio

2016-08-01

Discrimination against people with mental illness is rife across the globe. Among different types of discrimination is the policy in many countries where persons with mental illness are forbidden to inherit property, and they are not able to enter into a contract in a large number of countries. Using various databases, legislations dealing with law of contract, law of succession/inheritance, and law relating to testamentary capacity (wills) of all UN Member states (193 countries) were studied. With respect to federal countries, the laws of the most populous state as a representative state in the respective country were studied. Only 40 Member States (21%) recognize/allow persons with mental health problems to enter into contracts. Of these, however, only 16 Member States (9%) recognize the right of persons with mental health problems to enter into a contract without any restrictions. The remaining 24 Member States (12%) allow a contract entered into by a person with mental health problems to be invalidated under certain conditions. These countries also make the validity of the contract subject to the capacity to consent or based on the level of understanding of the person with mental health problems. They may allow persons with mental health problems to enter into contracts only for transactions of an insignificant nature or of personal rights. Only 9% of the countries allow people with mental illness to enter into contracts in an unrestricted way. Furthermore, there remain variations between high income and low income states. In spite of international laws in many countries, laws remain discriminatory.

A content analysis of depression-related discourses on Sina Weibo: attribution, efficacy, and information sources.

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Pan, Jiabao; Liu, Bingjie; Kreps, Gary L

2018-06-20

Depression is a mood disorder that may lead to severe outcomes including mental breakdown, self-injury, and suicide. Potential causes of depression include genetic, sociocultural, and individual-level factors. However, public understandings of depression guided by a complex interplay of media and other societal discourses might not be congruent with the scientific knowledge. Misunderstandings of depression can lead to under-treatment and stigmatization of depression. Against this backdrop, this study aims to achieve a holistic understanding of the patterns and dynamics in discourses about depression from various information sources in China by looking at related posts on social media. A content analysis was conducted with 902 posts about depression randomly selected within a three-year period (2014 to 2016) on the mainstream social media platform in China, Sina Weibo. Posts were analyzed with a focus on attributions of and solutions to depression, attitudes towards depression, and efficacy indicated by the posts across various information sources. Results suggested that depression was most often attributed to individual-level factors. Across all the sources, individual-level attributions were often adopted by state-owned media whereas health and academic experts and organizations most often mentioned biological causes of depression. Citizen journalists and unofficial social groups tended to make societal-level attributions. Overall, traditional media posts suggested the lowest efficacy in coping with depression and the most severe negative outcomes as compared with other sources. The dominance of individual-level attributions and solutions regarding depression on Chinese social media on one hand manifests the public's limited understanding of depression and on the other hand, may further constrain adoption of scientific explanations about depression and exacerbate stigmatization towards depressed individuals. Mass media's posts centered on description of severe

Weakly supervised visual dictionary learning by harnessing image attributes.

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Gao, Yue; Ji, Rongrong; Liu, Wei; Dai, Qionghai; Hua, Gang

2014-12-01

Bag-of-features (BoFs) representation has been extensively applied to deal with various computer vision applications. To extract discriminative and descriptive BoF, one important step is to learn a good dictionary to minimize the quantization loss between local features and codewords. While most existing visual dictionary learning approaches are engaged with unsupervised feature quantization, the latest trend has turned to supervised learning by harnessing the semantic labels of images or regions. However, such labels are typically too expensive to acquire, which restricts the scalability of supervised dictionary learning approaches. In this paper, we propose to leverage image attributes to weakly supervise the dictionary learning procedure without requiring any actual labels. As a key contribution, our approach establishes a generative hidden Markov random field (HMRF), which models the quantized codewords as the observed states and the image attributes as the hidden states, respectively. Dictionary learning is then performed by supervised grouping the observed states, where the supervised information is stemmed from the hidden states of the HMRF. In such a way, the proposed dictionary learning approach incorporates the image attributes to learn a semantic-preserving BoF representation without any genuine supervision. Experiments in large-scale image retrieval and classification tasks corroborate that our approach significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art unsupervised dictionary learning approaches.

How Do Use and Comprehension of Mental-State Language Relate to Theory of Mind in Middle Childhood?

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Grazzani, Ilaria; Ornaghi, Veronica

2012-01-01

This study investigates the relationship between mental-state language and theory of mind in primary school children. The participants were 110 primary school students (mean age = 9 years and 7 months; SD = 12.7 months). They were evenly divided by gender and belonged to two age groups (8- and 10-year-olds). Linguistic, metacognitive and cognitive…

Heterogeneous Face Attribute Estimation: A Deep Multi-Task Learning Approach.

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Han, Hu; K Jain, Anil; Shan, Shiguang; Chen, Xilin

2017-08-10

Face attribute estimation has many potential applications in video surveillance, face retrieval, and social media. While a number of methods have been proposed for face attribute estimation, most of them did not explicitly consider the attribute correlation and heterogeneity (e.g., ordinal vs. nominal and holistic vs. local) during feature representation learning. In this paper, we present a Deep Multi-Task Learning (DMTL) approach to jointly estimate multiple heterogeneous attributes from a single face image. In DMTL, we tackle attribute correlation and heterogeneity with convolutional neural networks (CNNs) consisting of shared feature learning for all the attributes, and category-specific feature learning for heterogeneous attributes. We also introduce an unconstrained face database (LFW+), an extension of public-domain LFW, with heterogeneous demographic attributes (age, gender, and race) obtained via crowdsourcing. Experimental results on benchmarks with multiple face attributes (MORPH II, LFW+, CelebA, LFWA, and FotW) show that the proposed approach has superior performance compared to state of the art. Finally, evaluations on a public-domain face database (LAP) with a single attribute show that the proposed approach has excellent generalization ability.

Wearable physiological sensors reflect mental stress state in office-like situations

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Wijsman, J.L.P; Grundlehner, Bernard; Liu, Hao; Penders, Julien; Hermens, Hermanus J.

Timely mental stress detection can help to prevent stress-related health problems. The aim of this study was to identify those physiological signals and features suitable for detecting mental stress in office-like situations. Electrocardiogram (ECG), respiration, skin conductance and surface

Social attribution in anorexia nervosa.

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Oldershaw, Anna; DeJong, Hannah; Hambrook, David; Schmidt, Ulrike

2018-05-01

People with anorexia nervosa (AN) report socioemotional difficulties; however, measurement has been criticised for lacking ecological validity and the state or trait nature of difficulties remains unclear. Participants (n = 122) were recruited across 3 groups: people who are currently ill with AN (n = 40); people who recovered (RecAN, n = 18); healthy-control participants (n = 64). Participants completed clinical questionnaires and the Social Attribution Task. The Social Attribution Task involves describing an animation of moving shapes, scored for number of propositions offered, accuracy, and social relevance. Groups were compared cross-sectionally. Those with current AN were assessed prepsychological and postpsychological treatments. People with AN provided fewer propositions than other groups and fewer salient social attributions than healthy-control participants. Those who recovered scored intermediately and not significantly different from either group. Following treatment, people with AN demonstrated (nonsignificant) improvements, and no significance between group differences were observed. Findings suggest difficulties for people with AN in providing spontaneous social narrative and in identifying social salience. Copyright © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and Eating Disorders Association.

Attribution of climate extreme events

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Trenberth, Kevin E.; Fasullo, John T.; Shepherd, Theodore G.

2015-08-01

There is a tremendous desire to attribute causes to weather and climate events that is often challenging from a physical standpoint. Headlines attributing an event solely to either human-induced climate change or natural variability can be misleading when both are invariably in play. The conventional attribution framework struggles with dynamically driven extremes because of the small signal-to-noise ratios and often uncertain nature of the forced changes. Here, we suggest that a different framing is desirable, which asks why such extremes unfold the way they do. Specifically, we suggest that it is more useful to regard the extreme circulation regime or weather event as being largely unaffected by climate change, and question whether known changes in the climate system's thermodynamic state affected the impact of the particular event. Some examples briefly illustrated include 'snowmaggedon' in February 2010, superstorm Sandy in October 2012 and supertyphoon Haiyan in November 2013, and, in more detail, the Boulder floods of September 2013, all of which were influenced by high sea surface temperatures that had a discernible human component.

The Consequences of Official Labels: An Examination of the Rights Lost by the Mentally Ill and Mentally Incompetent Since 1989.

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Walker, Andrea M; Klein, Michael S; Hemmens, Craig; Stohr, Mary K; Burton, Velmer S

2016-04-01

This study presents a survey of state statutes which restrict the civil rights of persons with a mental illness or who have been declared mentally incompetent. Five civil rights (voting, holding public office, jury service, parenting, and marriage) are examined. The results of this study are compared with the results of studies conducted in 1989 and 1999 to determine what changes have occurred over time in the restriction of civil rights of those suffering from mental health problems. This comparison reveals that states continue to restrict the rights of the mentally ill and incompetent, and that there is a trend towards increased restriction of political rights, including the right to vote and hold public office.

A model to investigate intention understanding in autism?. Comment on "Seeing mental states: An experimental strategy for measuring the observability of other minds" by Cristina Becchio et al.

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Forbes, Paul A. G.; Hamilton, Antonia F. de C.

2018-03-01

Becchio et al. [2] specify the conditions under which mental states are observable in the kinematics of other agents. Given that autistic people display differences in their understanding of other's mental states [1] and show an insensitivity to the kinematics of co-actors' movements [5,10], what are the implications of Becchio et al.'s strategy for the study of autism?

Criticism and Depression among the Caregivers of At-Risk Mental State and First-Episode Psychosis Patients.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Yumiko Hamaie

Full Text Available Expressed emotion (EE, especially criticism, is an important predictor of outcomes for the patient for a wide range of mental health problems. To understand complex links between EE and various relevant variables in early phase psychosis, this study examined criticism, distress of caregivers, other patients', and caregivers' variables, and links between criticism and these variables in those with at-risk mental state (ARMS for psychosis and first-episode psychosis (FEP. The participants were 56 patients (mean age 18.8 ± 4.2 years with ARMS and their caregivers (49.4 ± 5.8 years and 43 patients (21.7 ± 5.2 years with FEP and their caregivers (49.3 ± 7.4 years. We investigated criticisms made by caregivers using the Japanese version of the Family Attitude Scale and caregiver depressive symptoms via the self-report Beck Depression Inventory. We also assessed psychiatric symptoms and functioning of the patients. Approximately one-third of caregivers of patients with ARMS or FEP had depressive symptoms, predominately with mild-to-moderate symptom levels, whereas only a small portion exhibited high criticism. The level of criticism and depression were comparable between ARMS and FEP caregivers. The link between criticism, caregivers' depression, and patients' symptoms were observed in FEP but not in ARMS caregivers. These findings imply that the interaction between criticism and caregivers' and patients' mental states may develop during or after the onset of established psychosis and interventions for the caregivers should be tailored to the patient's specific stage of illness. Interventions for FEP caregivers should target their emotional distress and include education about patient's general symptoms.

Correlation between the Mini Mental State Examination-Korean version and the Measurement of Quality of the Environment in the institutionalized elderly.

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Kim, Myoung-Kwon; Kim, Tae Hoon; Kim, Seong-Gil

2015-11-01

[Purpose] This study aimed to investigate the correlation between the cognitive level of the elderly and their attitude towards the living environment. [Subjects and Methods] A total of 80 elderly people hospitalized in a nursing home in K city, South Korea, participated in this study. Pearson correlation analysis was used to test the relationships between scores on the Mini Mental State Examination-Korean Version and Measurement of Quality of the Environment (facilitators and obstacles). [Results] A positive and moderately strong correlation (r = 0.462) was found between scores on the Mini Mental State Examination and the Measurement of Quality of the Environment (obstacle). [Conclusion] In a nursing home, patients with relatively higher cognitive levels can perceive more obstacles in the surrounding environment.

The state of the art in European research on reducing social exclusion and stigma related to mental health: a systematic mapping of the literature.

Science.gov (United States)

Evans-Lacko, S; Courtin, E; Fiorillo, A; Knapp, M; Luciano, M; Park, A-L; Brunn, M; Byford, S; Chevreul, K; Forsman, A K; Gulacsi, L; Haro, J M; Kennelly, B; Knappe, S; Lai, T; Lasalvia, A; Miret, M; O'Sullivan, C; Obradors-Tarragó, C; Rüsch, N; Sartorius, N; Svab, V; van Weeghel, J; Van Audenhove, C; Wahlbeck, K; Zlati, A; McDaid, D; Thornicroft, G

2014-08-01

Stigma and social exclusion related to mental health are of substantial public health importance for Europe. As part of ROAMER (ROAdmap for MEntal health Research in Europe), we used systematic mapping techniques to describe the current state of research on stigma and social exclusion across Europe. Findings demonstrate growing interest in this field between 2007 and 2012. Most studies were descriptive (60%), focused on adults of working age (60%) and were performed in Northwest Europe-primarily in the UK (32%), Finland (8%), Sweden (8%) and Germany (7%). In terms of mental health characteristics, the largest proportion of studies investigated general mental health (20%), common mental disorders (16%), schizophrenia (16%) or depression (14%). There is a paucity of research looking at mechanisms to reduce stigma and promote social inclusion, or at factors that might promote resilience or protect against stigma/social exclusion across the life course. Evidence is also limited in relation to evaluations of interventions. Increasing incentives for cross-country research collaborations, especially with new EU Member States and collaboration across European professional organizations and disciplines, could improve understanding of the range of underpinning social and cultural factors which promote inclusion or contribute toward lower levels of stigma, especially during times of hardship. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.

[Comparison of mental health state and psychological capacities between college students with and without siblings].

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Xiao-yuan; Yu, Shou-yi; Zhao, Jiu-bo; Li, Jian-ming; Xiao, Rong

2007-04-01

To compare the differences in mental health state and psychological capacities between Chinese college students with and without siblings. The psychological status and capacities were evaluated with SCL-90, the Self-Esteem Scale, Spheres of Control Scale, Security Questionnaire and Cattell 16-PF Questionnaire in 427 college students, and among the students who presented valid responses, 139 with and 139 without siblings were selected for this comparative study. The total score and average score of SCL-90 in college students without siblings were significantly lower than those in students with siblings (Psiblings (Pmental health state and some of the psychological capacities are generally better in college students with siblings than in those without siblings.

Range and number-of-levels effects in derived and stated measures of attribute importance

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Verlegh, PWJ; Schifferstein, HNJ; Wittink, DR

We study how the range of variation and the number of ttribute levels affect five measures of attribute importance: full profile conjoint estimates, ranges in attribute level attractiveness ratings. regression coefficients. graded paired comparisons. and self-reported ratings, We find that all

Applying the World Health Organization Mental Health Action Plan to evaluate policy on addressing co-occurrence of physical and mental illnesses in Australia.

Science.gov (United States)

Happell, Brenda; Platania-Phung, Chris; Webster, Stephanie; McKenna, Brian; Millar, Freyja; Stanton, Robert; Galletly, Cherrie; Castle, David; Furness, Trentham; Liu, Dennis; Scott, David

2015-09-01

The aim of the present study was to document Australian policies on the physical health of people with mental illness and evaluate the capacity of policy to support health needs. A search of state and federal policies on mental and physical illness was conducted, as well as detailed analysis of policy content and the relationships between policies, by applying the World Health Organization Mental Health Action Plan 2013-2020 as an evaluative framework. National policy attention to the physical health of people with mental illness has grown, but there is little interconnection at the national and state levels. State policies across the country are inconsistent, and there is little evidence of consistent policy implementation. A coherent national health policy framework on addressing co-occurring physical and mental illnesses that includes healthcare system reforms and ensuring the interconnectedness of other relevant services should be prioritised.

Abortion and mental health: quantitative synthesis and analysis of research published 1995-2009.

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Coleman, Priscilla K

2011-09-01

Given the methodological limitations of recently published qualitative reviews of abortion and mental health, a quantitative synthesis was deemed necessary to represent more accurately the published literature and to provide clarity to clinicians. To measure the association between abortion and indicators of adverse mental health, with subgroup effects calculated based on comparison groups (no abortion, unintended pregnancy delivered, pregnancy delivered) and particular outcomes. A secondary objective was to calculate population-attributable risk (PAR) statistics for each outcome. After the application of methodologically based selection criteria and extraction rules to minimise bias, the sample comprised 22 studies, 36 measures of effect and 877 181 participants (163 831 experienced an abortion). Random effects pooled odds ratios were computed using adjusted odds ratios from the original studies and PAR statistics were derived from the pooled odds ratios. Women who had undergone an abortion experienced an 81% increased risk of mental health problems, and nearly 10% of the incidence of mental health problems was shown to be attributable to abortion. The strongest subgroup estimates of increased risk occurred when abortion was compared with term pregnancy and when the outcomes pertained to substance use and suicidal behaviour. This review offers the largest quantitative estimate of mental health risks associated with abortion available in the world literature. Calling into question the conclusions from traditional reviews, the results revealed a moderate to highly increased risk of mental health problems after abortion. Consistent with the tenets of evidence-based medicine, this information should inform the delivery of abortion services.

Consumer perspectives and mental health reform movements in the United States: 30 years of first-person accounts.

Science.gov (United States)

Gumber, Shinakee; Stein, Catherine H

2013-09-01

The present qualitative study examined 69 published first-person accounts written by adults diagnosed with schizophrenia from 1979-2010 within the historical context of the four major mental health movements in the United States. Content analysis techniques were used to identify major topics and overarching content categories in the first-person accounts written over the 30-year period. The frequency of topics in each content category was examined as a function of the decade and corresponding mental health movement in which accounts were published. Five overarching content categories emerged reflecting authors' conceptualizations of schizophrenia, their experiences with psychiatric hospitalization, medications, coping with social stigma, and achieving and maintaining valued social roles. Two summary categories emerged reflecting authors explicit views about what helped and what did not help in their experience of living with schizophrenia. With the exception of social stigma, frequency of topics within content categories did not change as a function of decade and corresponding mental health movement. Despite changes in mental health policies, treatment, and systems of care, the overall lack of significant differences in the content of first-person accounts across the 30-year period suggests an enduring nature to the experiences of individuals coping with schizophrenia. Implications of present findings for research and practice are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2013 APA, all rights reserved).