Immunologically mediated abortion (IMA)

Roughly 20% of all clinical pregnancies evolve into "spontaneous abortions". The causes of spontaneous abortion have been determined in under 60% of the total and comprise genetic, infectious, hormonal and immunological factors. In some cases the immune tolerance mechanism may be impaired and the foetus immunologically rejected (IMA, immunologically mediated abortion). The immunological mechanism implicated depends on the time in which pregnancy loss takes place. During preimplantation and up to the end of implantation (13th day) the cell-mediated immune mechanism (potential alloimmune etiologies) is responsible for early abortion. This mechanism involves immunocompetent decidual cells (eGL, endometrial granulated lymphocytes) already present during pre-decidualization (late luteal phase) and their production of soluble factors or cytokines. Once the implantation process is over, after blastocyst penetration of the stroma and the decidual reaction of uterine tissue, IMA could be caused by cell-mediated and humoral mechanism (anti-paternal cytotoxic antibodies or autoantibody etiology), by the production of paternal anti major histocompatibility complex antibodies, or even by an autoimmune disorder leading to the production of autoantibodies (antiphospholipid antibodies, antinuclear antibodies or polyclonal B cell activation). The diagnostic work-up adopted to select IMA patients is crucial and includes primary (karyotype of both partners, toxo-test, hysterosalpingography, endometrial biopsy, thyroid function tests, serum hprolactin, luteal phase dating) and secondary (full hemochromocytometric test, search for LE cells, lupus anticoagulant, anticardiolipin, antinuclear antibodies, Rheumatoid factor, blood complement VDRL) investigations. Therapeutical approaches vary. If autoimmune disorders are demonstrated therapies with different combinations of corticosteroids, aspirin and heparin or intravenous immunoglobulin are administered. Otherwise, therapy with paternal or donor peripheral blood mononuclear cells should be instituted.     

Interview decisions as determined by competency and attitude similarity.

Asked 51 college students to assume that they worked for a large company and that the president had asked them to evaluate a candidate for a position as a vice president. The target's dossier and information concerning 10 of his attitudes were given to Ss as stimuli for the evaluation. 3 levels of the target's competency and 2 levels of attitude similarity between the S and the target were varied in a 3 * 2 design to examine their effects on subsequent job recommendations and suggested salaries. Similarity tended to influence the recommendation and significantly influenced salary. Competency significantly influenced both the recommendation and salary. Implications for industry are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Response to conflict as determined by prior exposure to conflict.

Clinical observations indicate that individuals who have been exposed to strong conflicts, as in their early life, tend to react in a conflictual way not only to the original stimulus situations, but to most situations, e.g., the obsessive-compulsive one, reflecting indecisiveness. To test the validity of this observation in human behavior sui generis, a laboratory situation was constructed wherein Ss were required to discriminate between 2 levels of illumination. This obligation to make a difficult discrimination (strong conflict) affected reaction to a subsequent relatively easier discrimination. Moreover, the greater the similarity regarding the relative difficulty of the discrimination tasks, the greater was the influence of the one on the other task. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Managers' attitudes toward how their pay is and should be determined.

Investigated, by questionnaire, the perceptions of 563 managers toward how their pay is determined and their attitudes toward how it should be determined. The results show that in general the managers' perceptions of how their pay was determined reflected the way in which it was determined. However, the way their pay was determined did not appear to influence strongly their attitudes toward how it should be determined, although there was general agreement that merit should be the most important determinant. However, attitudes toward what factors should be important in determining pay were shown to be related to the managers' perception of their relative standing on the various factors. There was a positive correlation between how well the managers felt they compared with other managers on each factor and how important they felt the factor should be. The data also showed that there was a tendency for lack of congruence between a manager's attitudes toward how his pay should be determined and how it is determined to be associated with high dissatisfaction with pay. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Occupational and occupationally determined diseases

Medical definitions of occupational and professionally conditioned pathology are given in the article together with relevant examples. With the view to account appropriately occupational pathology in accordance with its severity classification based on the degree of working capacity loss is presented. Notions of acute occupational disease (intoxication) and professional accident are determined. International list of occupational diseases is considered. Suggestions intended at promotion of safe working conditions are made on perfection of the Ukrainian list.     

Dimensions of psychiatric symptom ratings determined at thirteen timepoints from hospital admission.

Principal factor-varimax factor analyses of the Symptom Rating Scale (SRS) were performed at 13 timepoints over a 4-yr period, both in and out of the hospital, on pooled samples of predominantly chronic schizophrenic patients from 12 VA hospitals (N = 329-1274). 5 symptom factors were found: Uncooperative, Depression-Anxiety, Paranoid Hostility, Deteriorated Thinking, and Unmotivated. The high degree of factor similarity found over time, place (hospital or community), and rater (psychologist or social worker) makes longitudinal comparisons meaningful and makes it possible to use the Admission SRS analysis (N = 1274) as a basis for factor scoring throughout. The findings argue for the robustness of rated psychiatric symptom dimensions over changes in time and setting of the rating and in profession of the rater. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Upper limb asymmetries in the perception of proprioceptively determined dynamic position sense.

Recent studies of position-related proprioceptive sense have provided evidence of a nonpreferred left arm advantage in right-handed individuals. The present study sought to determine whether similar asymmetries might exist in “dynamic position” sense. Thirteen healthy, right-handed adults were blindfolded and seated with arms placed on instrumented manipulanda. In Part 1, subjects performed dynamic position matching of 3 target elbow amplitudes determined with the preferred or nonpreferred arm, and then matched during movement of the same or opposite elbow. In Part 2, a similar paradigm was used, but with varying target determination speeds to account for the so called “tau effect.” Overall, it was found that errors were smaller when the matching phase involved the nonpreferred arm, especially for larger target amplitudes. This asymmetry was independent of the tau effect and likely reflects specialization of the right hemisphere/left arm for proprioceptive feedback processing that is either position- or dynamic position-related. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Global self-evaluation as determined by the desirability and controllability of trait adjectives.

164 undergraduates rated the degree to which various traits represented desirable characteristics and the degree to which it was possible for a person to exert control over each of these characteristics. From these initial ratings, 154 trait adjectives for which 4 levels of desirability were crossed with 2 levels of controllability were selected. 88 undergraduates then rated the degree to which each of these traits characterized the self and the average college student. Results support the prediction that self-ratings in relation to average college student ratings would be increasingly positive as traits increased in desirability and that in conditions of high desirability, self-ratings in relation to average college student ratings would be greater for high- than for low-controllable traits, whereas in conditions of low desirability the opposite would occur. Results are discussed in terms of the adaptive advantages of maintaining a global self-concept that implies that positive characteristics are under personal control and that negative characteristics are caused by factors outside of personal control. Mean preratings of desirability and controllability are appended. (29 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Prediction of sales success from factorially determined dimensions of personal background data.

A concurrent validity study was made of the scores of 210 salesmen and 16 district managers on 15 personal background dimensions, identified previously by factor analysis. Differences between factor-score means for the manager and sales groups and for the upper- and lower-rated sales groups were significant for the factors Financial Responsibility (001, 001), Early Family Responsibility (01, 01), and Stability (001, 05). Multiple-regression analyses of the factor scores against each of 5 criterion measures of on-the-job behavior yielded correlations of 42, 50 and 36 for the 3 major criteria of overall performance, and mean and maximum sales volume rank. The criteria route difficulty and tenure gave correlations of 27 and 30. Interpretation of the highest-weighted factors in these analyses indicates the logical, dynamic relationships between personal background and job behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Genetically determined chloride-sensitive hypertension and stroke

The stroke-prone spontaneously hypertensive rat (SHRSP) is a genetically determined model of "salt-sensitive" stroke and hypertension whose full phenotypic expression is said to require a diet high in Na+ and low in K+. We tested the hypothesis that dietary Cl- determines the phenotypic expression of the SHRSP. In the SHRSP fed a normal NaCl diet, supplementing dietary K+ with KCl exacerbated hypertension, whereas supplementing either KHCO3 or potassium citrate (KB/C) attenuated hypertension, when blood pressure (BP) was measured radiotelemetrically, directly and continually. Supplemental KCl, but not KB/C, induced strokes, which occurred in all and only those rats in the highest quartiles of both BP and plasma renin activity (PRA). PRA was higher with KCl than with KB/C. These observations demonstrate that with respect to both severity of hypertension and frequency of stroke the phenotypic expression of the SHRSP is (i) either increased or decreased, depending on whether the anionic component of the potassium salt supplemented is, or is not, Cl-; (ii) increased by supplementing Cl- without supplementing Na+, and despite supplementing K+; and hence (iii) both selectively Cl--sensitive and Cl--determined. The observations suggest that in the SHRSP selectively supplemented with Cl- the likelihood of stroke depends on the extent to which both BP and PRA increase.     

Mitral valve suturing technique. Needle grips of choice determined from a geometric basis

The paper aims at describing easy steps: asepsis and hygiene to prevent nosocomial infections within surgery unit in Hospitals with limited budget. Essential and compulsory they are: cleansing of the surgery unit before any disinfection, behaviour of the staff in relation to aerobic contamination, maintenance of equipment, prophylaxis applied to patients antibio-prophylaxis is also mentioned complementary to that steps. Possible strategies of fight and control are mentioned, including awareness and full participation of all.     

Misperceiving negotiation counterparts: When situationally determined bargaining behaviors are attributed to personality traits.

Several experiments provided evidence that negotiators make systematic errors in personality-trait attributions for the bargaining behaviors of their counterparts. Although basic negotiation behavior is highly determined by bargaining positions, negotiators primarily interpret their counterpart's behavior in terms of the counterpart's personality, such as his or her level of cooperativeness or agreeableness. Data support a model of 4 processes that contribute to misperceptions: (a) the primacy of situations in determining bargaining behavior, (b) the primacy of personality traits in attributions, (c) the lack of sufficient information about the other's situation to discount personality attributions, and (d) the potentially self-confirming consequences of personality attributions for subsequent interactions. The authors discuss implications for research areas such as social cognition in negotiation, accuracy in social perception, and dynamics of belief confirmation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The intensity of facial expression is determined by underlying affective state and social situation.

The present study concerned the influence of the presence of others on facial expressions of emotion. The proposition that facial expressive displays are better predicted by the social context than by emotional state (A. J. Fridlund, 1991) was tested in an experiment varying both the sociality of the context and the intensity of the emotion elicitor as well as the relationship between expressor and audience. The results indicate that the intensity of expressive displays cannot be satisfactorily predicted by either of these factors alone but is influenced by a complex interplay of all 3 factors. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)