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Evidence for metabolite composition underlying consumer preference in Sub-Saharan African Musa spp.
Get PDFDoes Ipsilateral Remapping Following Hand Loss Impact Motor Control of the Intact Hand?
Get PDFWhat happens once a cortical territory becomes functionally redundant? We studied changes in brain function and behavior for the remaining hand in humans (male and female) with either a missing hand from birth (one-handers) or due to amputation. Previous studies reported that amputees, but not one-handers, show increased ipsilateral activity in the somatosensory territory of the missing hand (i.e., remapping). We used a complex finger task to explore whether this observed remapping in amputees involves recruiting more neural resources to support the intact hand to meet greater motor control demands. Using basic fMRI analysis, we found that only amputees had more ipsilateral activity when motor demand increased; however, this did not match any noticeable improvement in their behavioral task performance. More advanced multivariate fMRI analyses showed that amputees had stronger and more typical representation-relative to controls' contralateral hand representation-compared with one-handers. This suggests that in amputees, both hand areas work together more collaboratively, potentially reflecting the intact hand's efference copy. One-handers struggled to learn difficult finger configurations, but this did not translate to differences in univariate or multivariate activity relative to controls. Additional white matter analysis provided conclusive evidence that the structural connectivity between the two hand areas did not vary across groups. Together, our results suggest that enhanced activity in the missing hand territory may not reflect intact hand function. Instead, we suggest that plasticity is more restricted than generally assumed and may depend on the availability of homologous pathways acquired early in life.</p
Risk and protective factors for depression and anxiety in adolescence: friendships, family functioning and emotion regulation
Get PDFChapter I: Lay SummaryOverall, the thesis aimed to develop a greater understanding of the ways in which poorer family relationships link to adolescent anxiety and depression (together known as internalising difficulties).Systematic reviewThe systematic review aimed to explore the role family plays in the development of supportive friendships in adolescents. Adolescents spend an increasing amount of time with their friends (N. Butler et al., 2022), and these relationships are important in protecting against the development of mental health difficulties (Hall-Lande et al., 2007; Roach, 2018), however little is known about the factors which influence their development. The family environment influences many aspects of young people’s development, including their ability to establish friendships (Brown & Bakken, 2011). The review examined the relationship between whole system family functioning, defined as how well all family members interact with one another, and friendships.The review had two aims, firstly to examine relationship between better whole system family functioning and more supportive peer relationships, and secondly to compare and contrast associations across the different areas of family functioning. These areas mostly corresponded to Olson’s Circumplex model (2000), which proposes three important aspects: communication, cohesion (the degree of closeness and affection displayed between family members), and flexibility (adaptation to new stressors and challenges). The domain of conflict was also added given its importance in other models of family functioning (Bowen, 1976) and reported frequency within families of adolescents (Kiani et al., 2016).A systematic review was conducted using predefined criteria and search terms to explore and summarize the psychological research literature. Search terms were developed to find relevant articles. Several inclusion and exclusion criteria were also applied to make sure the final articles were focussed on the topic. Participants with and without major mental health difficulties were included.Two databases were searched, and 11 relevant articles were summarised. The majority of studies showed a link between better family functioning and more supportive friendships. When comparing the impact of different aspects of family functioning, good communication in the family was most consistently related to better peer relationships. Evidence was mixed for the importance of flexibility and cohesion. No evidence was found for the impact of family conflicton peer relationships. In samples of adolescents with mental health difficulties, no relationship was found between family functioning and friendships. Similarly, parents report of family functioning had little similarity with adolescents’, and only adolescent reported family functioning correlated with friendship supportiveness.The research was found to be of a generally high quality. However, the certainty of the findings was affected by measurement issues with the most frequently used measure of family functioning, The Family Adaptability and Cohesion Scale (D. H. Olson et al., 1986). Strengths and limitations of the literature and review process were discussed. The research is useful in developing more streamlined interventions for adolescents who are struggling with friendships, enabling clinicians to target the contributing family difficulties, such as communication.Research projectPoorer family functioning is known to increase the risk of developing internalising difficulties in adolescents (Scully et al., 2020a), however little research has examined the ways in which the variables are linked. Separate streams of literature suggest that more supportive peer relationships and the use of specific emotion regulation strategies are closely related to both family functioning and internalising difficulties (Delgado et al., 2022; Scully et al., 2020a).Emotion regulation can be conceptualised in terms of the employment of different strategies (Gross & Muñoz, 1995) that are categorised as helpful or unhelpful in relation to the long term outcomes associated with their use (Schäfer et al., 2017). The study focused on two unhelpful strategies shown to have the strongest relationship with internalising difficulties (Schäfer et al., 2017); rumination (having repetitive unhelpful thoughts which keep us stuck in negative emotions) and emotional acceptance (allowing one’s emotional response to pass without resistance). The hypothesis stated that poorer family functioning is related to increased rumination, decreased emotional acceptance and less supportive peer relationships, which are in turn related to increased internalising difficulties. The study also aimed to understand how different aspects of family functioning were related to internalising difficulties. Mediation analysis was completed, which is the consideration of how a third variable affects the relation between two other variables.A mostly female sample of 181 16–18-year-olds were recruited from five schools. The participants completed five measures during a single lesson using an online platform. The results showed the unique role of the family’s strength in supporting each other and adapting to challenges and internalising difficulties. The relationship between this aspect of family functioning and internalising difficulties was partially explained through using the emotion regulation strategy rumination, but not by supportive peer relationships or the use of the emotion regulation strategy of emotional acceptance.The results highlight the importance of assessing the role of family difficulties and the use of rumination in adolescent internalising difficulties. The current gold-standard treatments for adolescents with anxiety or depression treat the individual (NICE, 2023), but family members could helpfully be involved more in sessions, with a focus on the ways in which they support each other and adapt to stressors.Integration, impact and dissemination plan.The systemic review and empirical project overlapped in helpful ways. The relationship between family functioning and supportive peer relationships was explored in the systematic review, and the significant correlation between the two formed the conceptual basis exploring for the mediating role of supportive peer relationships in the empirical project. The systematic review highlighted several limitations in the research literature, such as poor ethnic and gender diversity of young people within samples and a reliance on research at a single point in time with only adolescents completing questionnaires. The empirical project was able to address some of these concerns, for example by including a more ethnically diverse sample, however further limitations around the sample and design were not possible to address due to practical and time constraints.The impact of the results in the context of current government policies and clinical guidelines were explored. The importance of family dynamics in relation to adolescent internalising difficulties contradict current guidelines which promote individual approaches to treating internalising difficulties. The impact on myself as a researcher and participants was also explored.The research will be disseminated back to the participants through a vlog and to other clinical psychologists and researchers through social media, conferences (such as the Association for Family Therapy and Systemic Practice) and publications (in journals such as The Journal of Family Therapy)
An Exploration of Service Users’ Experiences with Synthetic Cannabinoids in a Forensic Inpatient Setting
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The Shifting Canon of Constitutional Equality
Get PDFEquality as an ideal, a principle, a value, and a right permeates the canons of contemporary constitutionalism. The recognition of individuals as persons of equal worth and liberty (moral equality) is the working premise of a liberal constitutional democracy. At the same time, the constitutional mandate to advance or promote the conditions of a particular disadvantaged social group (or individuals belonging to it) violates the principle of equal treatment. The constitutional canon on equality has long been shaped by such inherent tensions. The new global wave of autocratization brought restrictions on the rights of women and sexual and religious minorities, highlighting the continuing relevance of debates that are often older than written constitutions. The chapter traces the shifting canon of constitutional equality across three scenarios that provide comparative insights into the canon and the counter-canon of equality and non-discrimination jurisprudence. The cases focus on the constitutional justification of the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’, disability rights, and gender citizenship, also introducing the challenge of intersectionality and affirmative action
Freedom and Anti-Humanism in Jacques Lacan and Gilles Deleuze
Get PDFThis thesis aims to confer coherent philosophical status on the notion of anti-humanist freedom using the work of Jacques Lacan and Gilles Deleuze. It argues, against critics of structuralism-aligned anti-humanist thought who claim that we must choose either freedom and a meaningful ethics or anti-humanism and structuralist determinism, that Lacan and Deleuze offer compatibilist anti-humanist concepts of freedom which make freedom and determinism consistent and expand our very conception of the ethical. In doing so, it shows that the cause of freedom is not diminished by anti-humanism but advanced by it. By bringing these thinkers together around the concept of freedom, this thesis also aims to further problematise the orthodox narrative of their relation in which they are portrayed as shibboleths to each other in late 20th century debates within continental philosophy, with Lacan presented as the high priest of structuralism, negativity and lack, and Deleuze as the vitalist philosopher of difference, positivity and immanence. It concludes that in the final analysis Lacan’s anti-humanism is tempered by a residual humanism in his thought, and that Deleuze offers the more profound and successful version of anti-humanist freedom
Newly emerged bumblebees are highly susceptible to gut parasite infection
Get PDFOne factor that can affect infection susceptibility is host age, the effects of which vary in a range of ways. For example, susceptibility may increase with age, due to senescence or decrease with age as a result of maturation of the immune system. If certain ages are more susceptible to infection, populations with contrasting demographics, such as same-age cohorts versus a mixture of ages, will exhibit differing disease prevalence. We use the bumblebee, Bombus terrestris, and its interaction with the gut trypanosome Crithidia sp. as a model system to investigate age-related susceptibility in a social insect. Crithidia sp. are widespread and prevalent parasites of bumblebees that are spread between colonies via faeces on flowers when foraging, and within colonies via contact with infected bees and contaminated surfaces and resources. In the field, Bombus spp. live for approximately three weeks. Here, we inoculated bumblebees at 0, 7, 14 and 21 days of age and measured their infection after one week. We also measured the level of gene expression of two antimicrobial peptides important in the defence against Crithidia bombi in bumblebees. We found that younger bumblebees are more susceptible to infection by Crithidia sp. than their older siblings. Specifically, individuals inoculated on their first day of emergence had infection intensities seven days later that were four-fold higher than bees inoculated at 21 days of age. In contrast, the gene expression of two AMPs known to protect against the trypanosome, abaecin and defensin, did not significantly vary with age. These results suggest that age does affect susceptibility to Crithidia sp. infection in B. terrestris. The higher susceptibility of callows may have implications for the susceptibility of colonies at different stages of their lifecycle, due to the contrasting age demography of workers in the colony
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