Jokes as a projective technique: the humor of psychiatric patients

Jokes were obtained from psychiatric patients during the course of diagnostic testing and interviewing. The material was subjected to a content analysis which included the nature of the main characters and their relationships, the situations presented, and the major overt and concealed themes. This paper discusses and gives examples of the projective and psychodynamic value of humor in professional practice. The jokes helped in the understanding of diagnosis, symptoms, and basic conflicts. They provided guidelines for treatment and the treatment plan. They depicted the struggles of the participants to cope with relationships, problems, crises, and change. None of these struggles were unique to patients. Jokes cut through professional distinctions and diagnostic classifications, and present the person behind the label. They reflect the nature of the self especially in its more troubling and problematic aspects; yet they also reveal the healthy and intact part of the person. Jokes were valuable as a projective method because they constituted a non-threatening vehicle for revealing otherwise threatening and concealed truths about the person; they communicate those aspects of the human condition that are most anxiety provoking; and last, but not least, they end the interview on an enjoyable and positive note.     

Immunological and virological analyses of persons infected by human immunodeficiency virus type 1 while participating in trials of recombinant gp120 subunit vaccines

We have studied 18 participants in phase I/II clinical trials of recombinant gp120 (rgp120) subunit vaccines (MN and SF-2) who became infected with human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) during the course of the trials. Of the 18 individuals, 2 had received a placebo vaccine, 9 had been immunized with MN rgp120, and seven had been immunized with SF-2 rgp120. Thirteen of the 18 infected vaccinees had received three or four immunizations prior to becoming infected. Of these, two were placebo recipients, six had received MN rgp120, and five had received SF-2 rgp120. Only 1 of the 11 rgp120 recipients who had multiple immunizations failed to develop a strong immunoglobulin G antibody response to the immunogen. However, the antibody response to rgp120 was transient, typically having a half-life of 40 to 60 days. No significant neutralizing activity against the infecting strain was detected in any of the infected individuals at any time prior to infection. Antibody titers in subjects infected despite vaccination and in noninfected subjects were not significantly different. Envelope-specific cytotoxic T-lymphocyte responses measured after infection were infrequent and weak in the nine vaccinees who were tested. HIV-1 was isolated successfully from all 18 individuals. Sixteen of these strains had a non-syncytium-inducing (NSI) phenotype, while two had a syncytium-inducing (SI) phenotype. NSI strains used the CCR5 coreceptor to enter CD4+ cells, while an SI strain from one of the vaccinees also used CXCR4. Viruses isolated from the blood of rgp120 vaccinees were indistinguishable from viruses isolated from control individuals in terms of their inherent sensitivity to neutralization by specific monoclonal antibodies and their replication rates in vitro. Furthermore, genetic sequencing of the env genes of strains infecting the vaccinees did not reveal any features that clearly distinguished these viruses from contemporary clade B viruses circulating in the United States. Thus, despite rigorous genetic analyses, using various breakdowns of the data sets, we could find no evidence that rgp120 vaccination exerted selection pressure on the infecting HIV-1 strains. The viral burdens in the infected rgp120 vaccine recipients were also determined, and they were found to be not significantly different from those in cohorts of placebo-vaccinated and nonvaccinated individuals. In summary, we conclude that vaccination with rgp120 has had,to date, no obvious beneficial or adverse effects on the individuals we have studied.     

Oral topotecan given once or twice daily for ten days: a phase I pharmacology study in adult patients with solid tumors

The development of a highly sensitive method for detection of telomerase activity, telomeric repeat amplification protocol (TRAP), has provided knowledge on telomerase activity in normal and cancer tissues. Subsequent several modifications have been achieved, including an introduction of the internal standard and hybridization protection technique that leads to simplicity and improvement of reproducibility and linearity of this method, and application of TRAP to in situ analysis to identify the cells responsible for telomerase activity. As for measurement of telomere length, fluorescence in situ hybridization technique appeared to give an information of telomere length on an individual chromosome in contrast to analysis of terminal restriction fragment, a conventional method which can express mean telomere length of all chromosomes. Further methodological improvement in this field is ongoing and showing a new sight on cell mortality and immortality.     

Transforming growth factor-beta enhances the ultraviolet-mediated stress response in p53-/- keratinocytes

This review focuses on the contributions of modern mass spectrometry to neuropeptide research. An introduction to newer mass spectrometric techniques is provided. Also, the use of mass spectrometry in combination with high-resolution separation techniques for neuropeptide identification in biological samples is illustrated. The amino acid sequence information that is important for the identification and analysis of known, novel, or chemically modified neuropeptides may be obtained using mass spectrometric techniques. Because mass spectrometry techniques can be used to reflect the dynamic properties associated with neuropeptide processing in biological systems, they may be used in the future to monitor peptide profiles within organisms in response to environmental challenges such as disease and stress.     

Social encounters and their effect on subsequent reinforcement.

This experiment demonstrates that a variety of social encounters can affect the reinforcement value of a subsequent social reward, and therefore subsequent learning, when praise is used as the reinforcer for a correct response. By manipulating the social experience preceding the learning task, social isolation, negative or positive social encounters are shown to differentially influence S's behavior. Anxiety is postulated as the cause for the increase in the reinforcement value of the praise and for the subsequent superior performance of the social-isolation and negative-encounter groups. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)