Aminoglycosides, their ototoxic effect

Traffic safety researchers have long known that the majority of fatal crashes occur on rural roads, but it is not clear whether these crashes involve people who live in rural areas or residents of urban areas traveling on rural roads. 'Geodemographic' market-research tools allow determination of the urbanization of drivers' residence locations from their postal 'zip code.' Using data from the 1988-1992 files of the Fatal Accident Reporting System (FARS) maintained by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), this study determined the residence location of several subgroups of drivers involved in fatal crashes. Not only did the majority of fatal crashes occur in rural areas, but the majority of fatal crashes involved rural and small-town residents and the majority of the rural and small-town residents involved in fatal crashes were traveling on rural roads.     

The effect of nickel,chromium, and primary

Elevated temperature creep tests were performed on Ti 6242Si deformed to small (<0.002) plastic strains using a highly aligned creep testing apparatus. Specimens were solution annealed at various temperatures below the beta transus(T _β - 6 °C toT _β − 52 °C) which controlled the volume fraction of primary alpha. Decreases in the amount of primary alpha are associated with decreased primary and steady-state creep rates. The effects of trace levels of the elements Ni and Cr on the creep properties of Ti 6242Si were also studied. Relatively small additions of Ni (0.075 to 0.093 wt pct), which appeared to segregate to the bcc beta phase, substantially in- creased the creep rates of this alloy, while additions of Cr up to 0.278 wt pct had little, if any, effect on the creep rates.     

Reward, distraction, and the overjustification effect.

A number of experiments have recently demonstrated that extrinsic constraints and rewards can produce lower levels of intrinsic interest in subsequent free-choice situations. This effect has been considered to be the result of a shift in the self-perceived locus of motivation from intrinsic to extrinsic but has also been explained as resulting from the distracting qualities of reward procedures. The latter hypothesis implies that reward and nonreward distractors will produce decreases in intrinsic interest and that these decreases will dissipate over multiple-trial procedures as a result of adaptation. On the other hand, the attribution explanation predicts that rewards or other extrinsic constraints will produce decreases in interest that are stable or strengthened over time. The present experiment, using 132 male and female undergraduates, involved manipulation of 3 levels of the reward/distraction variable (reward, nonreward/distraction, and a nonreward/no-distraction control) crossed with 3 levels of initial trial participation (10, 25, or 50 trials). The results indicate that rewards produced a constant decrease in interest over trials, consistent with the attribution explanation. While there was some evidence for a temporary disruption in intrinsic interest due to nonreward distraction, no support was obtained for a distraction interpretation of the effects of rewards on free-choice behavior. (16 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Faces, vases, subjective contours, and the McCollough effect

A version of the face-vase pattern was constructed with the use of subject contours. The McCollough effect was viewed on this pattern and it was found that perceptual alteration (face to vase) does not weaken the strength of the effect's hues while a complete perceptual rearrangement (faces/vases to concentric rectangles) does.     

Contextual neglect, self-evaluation, and the frog-pond effect.

Social comparisons entail not only information about one’s standing in a social group (intragroup or local comparison) but also information about the standing of the group in comparison to other groups (intergroup or general comparison). In Studies 1–3, the authors explored the relative impact of intergroup and intragroup comparisons on self-evaluations and affect. While intragroup comparison feedback consistently impacted self-evaluations and affect, intergroup comparison information exerted a significant impact only when intragroup comparison information was unavailable. The authors refer to this general tendency as contextual neglect. Studies 4 and 5 showed that contextual neglect is due primarily to the fact that low-level, local comparison information displaces or supersedes the effect of higher level, general comparison data and that people clearly recognize the superior diagnosticity of higher level comparisons while continuing to rely on small, haphazard sample data to evaluate their ability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personal contact, individuation, and the better-than-average effect.

Research in which people compare themselves with an average peer has consistently shown that people evaluate themselves more favorably than they evaluate others. Seven studies were conducted to demonstrate that the magnitude of this better-than-average effect depends on the level of abstraction in the comparison. These studies showed that people were less biased when they compared themselves with an individuated target than when they compared themselves with a nonindividuated target, namely, the average college student. The better-than-average effect was reduced more when the observer had personal contact with the comparison target than when no personal contact was established. Differences in the magnitude of the better-than-average effect could not be attributed to the contemporaneous nature of the target's presentation, communication from the target, perceptual vividness, implied evaluation, or perceptions of similarity. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Depression, social comparison, and the false-consensus effect.

Refers to the fact that in general, people perceive high consensus for their own attributes—the "false-consensus effect." 20 depressed and 20 nondepressed undergraduates (10 men and 10 women in each group) were asked about the extent to which depression-relevant and depression-irrelevant attributes were true of themselves and true of the "average college student." Ss were also asked questions assessing the accuracy of their perceptions of others. Depressed Ss showed less false consensus than nondepressed Ss. Although depressives characterized themselves as dissimilar to others, they showed no consistent bias to deprecate themselves relative to others. Nondepressives consistently enhanced themselves relative to others, although the magnitude of their self–other differences was smaller than that of depressives. The tendency to deprecate oneself relative to others on negative depression-relevant items was a better predictor of severity of depression than self-perceptions or other perceptions alone. Findings regarding the accuracy of perceptions of others were mixed. The discussion includes implications for the false-consensus effect, depressive attributional style, nondepressive self-serving biases, and therapy for depression. (1? p ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personality, problem solving, and the Einstellung effect.

2 hypotheses were raised in this experiment: (a) Ss who show antiscientific or nondynamic tendencies in their perceptions of behavior are more subject to the Einstellung effect; and (b) when achievement anxiety is aroused this relationship is more pronounced. 2 groups of 31 Ss each were given 2 Einstellung-test problem series. For one group standard testing conditions were employed; for the other, achievement anxiety was aroused. Ss were evaluated for dynamic-nondynamic perceptions of others, a measure derived from a modification of Kelly's Role Construct Repertory Test. This measure was not found to be related to Einstellung-test scores, but a significant relationship to achievement anxiety was obtained. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Astigmatism, accommodation, the oblique effect and meridional amblyopia

Agonist binding to GABAB receptors modulates the activity of the guanine nucleotide binding proteins, Go and Gi. These G proteins are ADP-ribosylated by pertussis toxin and this prevents them from coupling to the GABAB receptor resulting in a reduction in high-affinity GABAB binding. GTP, which binds to a different site on the G protein alpha subunit, also reduces the affinity of the receptor for the G protein, and this can be used as a "marker" for G protein-GABAB receptor linkage. We have examined GABAB binding site distribution in rat brain after unilateral intrahippocampal pertussis toxin injection in vivo, and after incubating brain slices in pertussis toxin in vitro, using the technique of receptor autoradiography. The effect of pertussis toxin was compared with that of GTP gamma S on GABAB binding. Intrahippocampal pertussis toxin administration reduced GABAB but not GABAA receptor binding and the effects appeared to be limited by pertussis toxin diffusion. More widespread reductions in GABAB binding were seen after incubation of brain slices in vitro but the extent varied in different brain regions. No reduction was detected in the corpus striatum. GABAB binding was also reduced in membranes prepared from cerebral cortex, hippocampus and cerebellum but there was no significant reduction in the corpus striatum after pertussis toxin treatment. GTP gamma S reduced GABAB binding to a similar extent in all areas studied irrespective of their sensitivity to pertussis toxin suggesting that while GABAB binding sites are linked to G proteins throughout the rat brain, those in the corpus striatum may be predominantly pertussis toxin insensitive.     

Reinforcement, behavior constraint, and the overjustification effect.

Assessed the reinforcement–overjustification effect relationship in 48 4th and 5th graders. Four levels of the behavior constraint–reinforcement variable were manipulated: attractive reward, unattractive reward, request to perform, and a no-reward, no-request control. Only the unattractive reward and request groups showed the performance decrements that suggest the overjustification effect. The attractive reward group was significantly different from these 2 groups on this measure. It is concluded that reinforcement does not cause the overjustification effect. It is suggested that the behavior constraining aspect of a contingency produced the effect, whereas the reinforcement, or reward value aspect, led to the opposite effect—an increase in interest and postcontingency performance. (32 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Postantibiotic effect and postantibiotic sub-MIC effect of levofloxacin compared to those of ofloxacin, ciprofloxacin, erythromycin, azithromycin, and clarithromycin against 20 pneumococci

The postantibiotic effect (PAE) (10 times the MIC of quinolones, 5 times the MIC of macrolides) and postantibiotic sub-MIC effect (PAE-SME) at 0.125, 0.25, and 0.5 times the MIC were determined for levofloxacin, ciprofloxacin, ofloxacin, erythromycin, azithromycin, and clarithromycin against 20 pneumococci. Quinolone PAEs ranged between 0.5 and 6.5 h, and macrolide PAEs ranged between 1 and 6 h. Measurable PAE-SMEs (in hours) at the three concentrations were 1 to 5, 1 to 8, and 1 to 8, respectively, for quinolones and 1 to 8, 1 to 8, and 1 to 6, respectively, for macrolides.     

Size effect,internal stress,and diffusion driven boundary motion

Diffusion driven boundary motion (DDBM) was studied in the iron-zinc system using thicker iron sheets (127 μm) than in previous work, to check the effect of restraint on the thin DDBM produced surface layer. The sheets were exposed to zinc vapor at 600 °C for varying times. The DDBM layer formed through the nucleation of many small grains on the surface which then grew down to a depth of roughly 20 μm and spread to cover the surface in four hours. Samples of iron several millimeters thick developed no such DDBM layer after exposure to the same atmosphere for eight days. It is suggested that the volume change accompanying DDBM is accommodated by plastic strain of the core of the 127 μm iron, but the thicker sample constrains such nucleation growth. The solid solution layer thickens with time at roughly constant rate, while its zinc content rises toward that of the equilibrium surface layer. This strongly suggested repeated sweeping of the layer by DDBM driven motion of boundaries in the layer. Formerly at The Ohio State University, Columbus, has now returned to Peking Institute of Iron and Steel Technology, Peking, People’s Republic of China.     

Elaboration, organization, and the self-reference effect in memory.

Conducted 5 experiments with 272 undergraduates that challenged the interpretation of the self-reference effect that proposes that self-reference produces a more elaborate memory trace than semantic encoding by demonstrating that self-referent and semantic encodings produce virtually identical free recall levels if they are first equated for the amount of organization they encourage. Exp I attempted to replicate the findings of T. B. Rogers et al (see record 1979-25246-001) by comparing self-referent, semantic, and structural encoding tasks and examining cluster differences between these encoding tasks during free recall. The experiments that followed orthogonally varied organization and the encoding task. Overall results lead to the following conclusions: Organization, not elaboration, is responsible for the superior recall performance obtained when information is encoded self-referentially. Organization is not a necessary component of self-referent encoding and can be orthogonally varied within self-referent and semantic encoding tasks. How a single-factor theory based on organization can account for many of the self-referent recall findings reported in the literature is discussed. (92 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Strategy compatibility, scale compatibility, and the prominence effect.

Ss expressed preferences between pairs of decision alternatives characterized by 2 attributes (e.g., price and quality). They were more likely to prefer the alternative that was superior with respect to the most important attribute when making choices and strength-of-preference judgments than when making matching and monetary-equivalent value judgments. Rating scale judgments fell between these 2 extremes. These findings extend the previously established choice vs matching prominence effect (A. Tversky et al, 1988) to a more general qualitative vs quantitative task prominence effect. The data support the strategy-compatibility interpretation of the prominence effect. They also show that in riskless decision making, the generalized prominence effect is much stronger than simple scale-compatibility effects. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Calculated magneto-optical Kerr effect in Fe, Co, and Ni

To examine whether GH and IGF-I participate in the regulation of obese (ob) mRNA expression we determined ob mRNA levels in epididydimal fat pads of hypophysectomised (hypox) rats, hypox rats treated with recombinant human (rh) GH or rhIGF-I and normal, weight-matched controls. We found that 1. ob mRNA was markedly suppressed after hypophysectomy (37 +/- 25% of controls), 2. GH infusion had no effect on ob mRNA, but stimulated IGF-I mRNA in fat pads, 3. IGF-I treatment further suppressed ob mRNA (3.5% +/- 0.6% of controls) and 4. serum insulin levels were decreased in all hypox groups (11.2 to 15.9% of controls). In conclusion, exogenous and GH-induced IGF-I differ in their effects on ob mRNA expression and GH is unable to restore ob mRNA towards normal at low insulin levels.     

Capuchin monkeys, inequity aversion, and the frustration effect.

Each of 4 female capuchin monkeys ("model") was paired with another female capuchin ("witness") in an adjacent cage. In Phases 1 and 3, a model could remove a grape from the experimenter's hand while the witness watched. The witness was then offered a slice of cucumber, a less preferred food. Trials alternated between subjects 50 times, defining a session. In Phases 2 and 4, both were offered cucumber. Witness rejections of cucumber were infrequent and were not dependent on whether models received grape or cucumber. When models were offered cucumber, they rejected it at higher rates than did witnesses. These results fail to support findings of Brosnan and de Waal. An account based on the frustration effect accommodates these results and those of Brosnan and de Waal. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)