Comorbidity of psychiatric and communication disorders in children

The co-occurrence of psychiatric and communication disorders in children is considerable. Many children who are treated by mental health professionals are also in need of speech and language services. This article discusses comorbidity and outlines communication problems that accompany a variety of childhood psychiatric conditions. Empiric studies and clinical impressions of these co-occurring problems are described.     

On False Premises and the Hypnotic Enhancement Effect: Reply to Schnall (2004).

Replies to the comments by E. Schnall (see record 2004-13299-016) on the current author's original article (see record 2003-05896-014), which examined whether adding hypnosis enhances cognitive-behavioral pain treatments. Here, the author addresses Schnall's critique point-by-point, and concludes that--Schnall aside--a a voluminous body of research has clearly established that both hypnosis and cognitive-behavioral treatments are useful for reducing pain, and all evidence from a small but growing literature currently suggests that there is no benefit in adding one procedure to the other. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Static Charge and Spin Inhomogeneity in La2 ? xSrxCuO4 by NMR

NMR experiments on La_{2 – x} Sr _x CuO₄ are shown that characterize the nature of static spatial inhomogeneities in this material. Large amplitude charge density variations are found that are correlated with spin density variations. While the amplitude of the charge variation is temperature-independent, the spin variation increases Curie-like as the temperature varies and shifts toward local antiferromagnetism up to optimal doping. For x = 0.2 the correlation is independent on temperature and agrees with local incommensurability found in neutron scattering. Relations to possible scenarios are discussed.     

The predictive utility of hypnotizability: The change in suggestibility produced by hypnosis.

Objective: The predictive utility of hypnotizability, conceptualized as the change in suggestibility produced by a hypnotic induction, was investigated in the suggested reduction of experimental pain. Method: One hundred and seventy-three participants were assessed for nonhypnotic imaginative suggestibility. Thereafter, participants experienced hypnotic and nonhypnotic imaginative analgesia suggestions, counterbalanced for order. Hypnotic suggestibility was then assessed. Results: Hypnotizability, operationalized as hypnotic suggestibility with imaginative suggestibility statistically controlled (Braffman & Kirsch, 1999), predicted intraindividual differences in responding to the hypnotic and imaginative analgesia suggestions. Higher hypnotizability was associated with relatively greater response to the hypnotic analgesia suggestion than to the imaginative analgesia suggestion. Conclusions: Operationalized in this way, hypnotizability may be a useful predictor of the effect of adding a hypnotic induction to a specific imaginative suggestion. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

NMR Evidence for Spatial Modulations in the Cuprates

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) data on Cu, apical and planar O in La_1.85Sr_0.15CuO₄ are presented. Spin echo double resonance shows that the large Cu magnetic shift distribution is of short-length scale. Analysis of the O data reveals static modulations of the spin susceptibility with a spin–spin correlation function near zero. The Cu shift distribution is found to be of orbital origin. The full planar oxygen spectra show a correlated modulation of the electric field gradient with the spin susceptibility. Similar results on other cuprates indicate universality of these phenomena.     

From waste to value – a system dynamics model for strategic decision-making in closed-loop supply chains

Although the field of closed-loop supply chain management has attracted a lot of attention in recent years and the management of reverse logistics processes has become a major field of supply chain management, there is still a lack of research conducting analyses using a comprehensive approach that takes the complexity of problems of reverse logistics processes into account. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to develop a model that allows an original equipment manufacturer in the electronics industry to test different value recovery strategies for business-to-business products in a closed-loop supply chain setting. For this purpose system dynamics is used because this approach enables one to capture the high complexity of reverse logistics processes and is suitable, contrary to traditional optimisation approaches, for analysing the dynamic behaviour of closed-loop supply chains comprehensively. The simulation analysis identifies leverage points for the improvement of decisions concerning reverse logistics. In particular, the simulation runs conducted highlight the high complexity and connectivity inherited with various value recovery processes. The paper contributes to a better understanding of supply chain dynamics, the impact of product backflow, and reverse logistics.     

The use of wood in practice – a hygienic risk?

The survival of bacteria on wood was investigated in laboratory experiments using naturally occurring and hygienically relevant bacteria and in a trial performed in a meat factory. Different types of wood dust (pine, larch, maple) and polyethylene chips were inoculated with chicken manure to study the interactions of bacteria and wood. The survival of the different bacteria from chicken manure was followed by plating on selective media. In addition, denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) of PCR-amplified 16S rDNA fragments from directly extracted DNA was used to precisely analyze changes in the relative abundance and composition of the manure-derived bacterial community on wood and plastic. Bands of DGGE-community profiles which reflected changes in the composition of the bacterial community on wood and plastic were excised, re-amplified, cloned and analyzed by sequencing. A rapid decrease of CFU of manure-derived bacteria was observed on pine-wood which correlated with the decreased amount of DNA extracted from pine-wood. Bacteria applied on larch, maple and plastic survived longer than on pine. Investigations have shown that some bacterial groups, e.g. enterobacteria, are more affected by wood and plastic than other bacteria. Furthermore, our results indicated that extractives from different wood types influenced the survival of bacterial species differently. Better hygienic characteristics of pine-wood compared to plastic as a material for transportation pallets were also observed in preliminary tests under practice conditions during a 4-week test in a meat processing factory.     

Hypnotic enhancement of cognitive-behavioral interventions for pain: An analogue treatment study.

Recent meta-analyses have shown that adding hypnosis enhances the effectiveness of cognitive behavioral psychotherapy. This hypnotic enhancement effect was evaluated in the analogue treatment of pain. Individuals scoring in the high (n=135) and low (n=150) ranges of hypnotic suggestibility were randomly assigned to 1 of 6 conditions: Stress Inoculation Training, the same treatment provided hypnotically, nonhypnotic analgesia suggestions, hypnotic analgesia suggestions, a hypnotic induction treatment, or a control condition. The 5 analogue treatments reduced experimental pain more than the control condition, but were not different from one another. Under circumstances optimized to detect an enhancement effect, neither Stress Inoculation Training nor analgesia suggestions produced more relief when delivered in a hypnotic context than identical treatments provided nonhypnotically. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mediation and moderation of psychological pain treatments: Response expectancies and hypnotic suggestibility.

The mediator role of response expectancies and the moderator role of hypnotic suggestibility were evaluated in the analogue treatment of pain. Approximately 1,000 participants were assessed for hypnotic suggestibility. Later, as part of a seemingly unrelated experiment, 188 of these individuals were randomly assigned to distraction, cognitive-behavioral package, hypnotic cognitive-behavioral package, hypnotic analgesia suggestion, placebo control, or no-treatment control conditions. Response expectancies partially mediated the effects of treatment on pain. Hypnotic suggestibility moderated treatment and was associated with the relief produced only by the hypnotic interventions. The results suggest that response expectancies are an important mechanism of hypnotic and cognitive-behavioral pain treatments and that hypnotic suggestibility is a trait variable that predicts hypnotic responding across situations, including hypnosis-based pain interventions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Microbiological quality of foods packaged under modified atmospheres

The microbiological quality of various sandwiches and meats packaged under modified atmosphere was evaluated. Samples were analyzed both on the day of manufacture and at the end of shelf life. On day 0, around 60% of products examined contained ≤10⁵ total aerobic counts g⁻¹, while at the end of the shelf life approximately 63·3% of samples contained ≥10⁷ cfu g⁻¹.Listeria spp. were found in eight of the 58 lots examined, withL. monocytogenes being present in five of the eight samples. One lot was found to containAeromonas hydrophila, while another one containedStaphylococcus aureus. Clostridium botulinum andSalmonella spp. were not found in any of the samples.