Identification of patients at risk for nonresponse and negative outcome in psychotherapy.

This study evaluated the use of pretherapy patient variables as correlates of 3 categorical types of outcome: negative response (negative change of more than 1 normative SEest on depression measure): nonresponse (change within?±?1 SEest on depression measure); and positive response (positive change of more than 1 SEest on depression measure) to psychotherapy among 62 patients with major depressive disorder. By using 4 scales from the Brief Symptom Inventory, the Inventory of Interpersonal Problems, age, and sex, 75.8% of the Ss were correctly classified into the 3 groups. Negative responders were characterized by high levels of interpersonal difficulty and low levels of subjective distress. Nonresponders displayed moderate levels of both interpersonal difficulties and subjective distress. Positive responders displayed high levels of both interpersonal difficulties and subjective distress. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dementia and the older driver.

The association between dementia and driving errors in older adults has been anecdotally noted by clinicians and caregivers. However, until recently, little empirical documentation of this association existed. This paper provides a critical review of available research on dementia and driving and discusses issues that must be considered in attempting to apply this developing body of research to practical problems, such as the relicensing process for selected drivers. This is followed by a discussion of recent research relevant to the development of potential procedures for screening patients with dementing illness--particularly Alzheimer's disease--for probable driving risk.     

Amnesia as a consequence of male rape: A case report.

A male patient suffering from a generalized functional retrograde amnesia, for all autobiographical information, was admitted to a psychiatric inpatient facility. Psychological testing indicated possible sexual assault. Following five hypnotic sessions, the patient regained his memory, and a violent sexual attack by two males was validated. The amnesia is discussed in terms of the constructs of implicit versus explicit memory, and reasons why a male rape victim might suffer such an extreme reaction. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Contributions of frontal system dysfunction to memory and perceptual abilities in Parkinson's disease.

Tested (1) the hypothesis that Parkinson's disease (PD), thought to result in disturbed neuronal outflow from the striatum, leads to circumscribed deficits in cognitive functions presumed to be dependent on the functional integrity of the frontal lobes and (2) whether such deficits could account for previously reported memory and visuoperceptual difficulties in PD. 19 nondemented PD patients were demographically matched to 19 normal elderly control Ss. Three categories of tests were given: (1) tests sensitive to frontal system dysfunction, (2) tests of learning and memory, and (3) tests of visuoperceptual and visuoconstructive skills. Nondemented PD patients demonstrated selective deficits on frontal system tasks; tests of learning and memory and of visuoperceptual and visuoconstructive skill were not significantly impaired once performance on the frontal related tasks was statistically covaried. Results are consistent with the striatofrontal outflow model of neuropsychological impairment in nondemented PD patients. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Source memory: Extending the boundaries of age-related deficits.

Previous research has established that elderly adults can exhibit impaired memory for the source of newly acquired facts even when levels of fact recall in old and young do not differ. However, source memory impairments have been observed only under conditions of many-to-one mapping: A large number of facts are related to either of 2 sources. It is thus possible that apparent source memory impairments reflect a more general age-related problem in handling many-to-one mappings. Two experiments provide evidence against this possibility by demonstrating age-related source memory deficits with one-to-one mapping between facts and sources. The data also indicate that source memory deficits are observed across encoding tasks that manipulate the allocation of attention to the source or to the fact. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Runaway chemical reaction exposes community to highly toxic chemicals

The U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB) conducted a comprehensive investigation of a runaway chemical reaction at MFG Chemical (MFG) in Dalton, Georgia on April 12, 2004 that resulted in the uncontrolled release of a large quantity of highly toxic and flammable allyl alcohol and allyl chloride into the community. Five people were hospitalized and 154 people required decontamination and treatment for exposure to the chemicals. This included police officers attempting to evacuate the community and ambulance personnel who responded to 911 calls from residents exposed to the chemicals. This paper presents the findings of the CSB report (U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board (CSB), Investigation Report: Toxic Chemical Vapor Cloud Release, Report No. 2004-09-I-GA, Washington DC, April 2006) including a discussion on tolling practices; scale-up of batch reaction processes; Process Safety Management (PSM) and Risk Management Plan (RMP) implementation; emergency planning by the company, county and the city; and emergency response and mitigation actions taken during the incident. The reactive chemical testing and atmospheric dispersion modeling conducted by CSB after the incident and recommendations adopted by the Board are also discussed.     

The episodic–semantic memory distinction and paired associate learning.

39 senile dementia patients (mean age 69.1 yrs) completed the Associate Learning subtest of the Wechsler Memory Scale, and orthogonal measures of episodic and semantic memory were developed through factor analysis. As predicted, scores on the semantic factor were related only to learning high-associate word pairs; scores on the episodic factor were related to both high- and low-associate learning. Findings provide an interpretive framework for the Associate Learning subtest and support E. Tulving's (1972) 2-store model of long-term memory. (9 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Recency discrimination deficits in frontal lobe patients.

Damage to the frontal lobes appears to cause a deficit in the temporal organization of memory. M. P. McAndrews and B. Milner (see record 1992-16996-001) found that S-performed tasks (SPTs), which involve the performance of actions with common objects, allowed frontal-lobe-damaged patients to circumvent this deficit and perform normally on recency judgments. The present investigation of the critical properties of SPTs compared the performance of frontal-lobe-damaged patients and healthy controls on recency judgments under 5 encoding conditions: SPT, naming, visual imagery, experimenter-performed tasks, and verbal elaboration. Patients' performance varied across encoding conditions, but controls' did not. Post hoc comparisons confirmed that patients performed significantly worse than controls across all encoding tasks except SPT. The findings help elucidate the nature of both SPTs and memory for temporal order. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"Awareness of subtle emotional feelings: A comparison of long-term meditators and nonmeditators": Correction to Nielsen and Kaszniak (2006).

Reports an error in "Awareness of Subtle Emotional Feelings: A Comparison of Long-Term Meditators and Nonmeditators" by Lisbeth Nielsen and Alfred W. Kaszniak (Emotion, 2006[Aug], Vol 6[3], 392-405). The copyright attribution is incorrect. The article is in the public domain. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2006-10747-005.) The authors explored whether meditation training to enhance emotional awareness improves discrimination of subtle emotional feelings hypothesized to guide decision-making. Long-term meditators and nonmeditators were compared on measures of self-reported valence and arousal, skin conductance response (SCR), and facial electromyography (EMG) to masked and nonmasked emotional pictures, and on measures of heartbeat detection and self-reported emotional awareness. Groups responded similarly to nonmasked pictures. In the masked condition, only controls showed discrimination in valence self-reports. However, meditators reported greater emotional clarity than controls, and meditators with higher clarity had reduced arousal and improved valence discrimination in the masked condition. These findings provide qualified support for the somatic marker hypothesis and suggest that meditation may influence how emotionally ambiguous information is processed, regulated, and represented in conscious awareness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)