1,720,981 research outputs found
The Meditative Mind: A Comprehensive Meta-Analysis of MRI Studies
Full text linkin particular, the physiological mechanisms underlying the beneficial effects observed in meditators have been investigated.
Neuroimaging studies have studied the effects of meditation on brain structure and function and findings have helped clarify the
biological underpinnings of the positive effects of meditation practice and the possible integration of this technique in standard therapy. The large amount of data collected thus far allows drawing some conclusions about the neural effects of meditation
practice. In the present study we used activation likelihood estimation (ALE) analysis to make a coordinate-based meta-analysis
of neuroimaging data on the effects of meditation on brain structure and function. Results indicate that meditation yields
to activation in brain areas involved in processing self-relevant information, self-regulation, focused problem-solving, adaptive
behavior, and interoception. Results also show that meditation practice induces functional and structural brain modifications in
expert meditators, especially in areas involved in self-referential processes such as self-awareness and self-regulation.These results
demonstrate that a biological substrate underlies the positive pervasive effect of meditation practice and suggest that meditation techniques could be adopted in clinical populations and to prevent disease
Bisecting or Not Bisecting: This Is the Neglect Question. Line Bisection Performance in the Diagnosis of Neglect in Right Brain-Damaged Patients
No full textIn the present study we analysed the bisecting behaviour of 287 chronic right brain-damaged patients by taking into
account the presence and severity of extrapersonal and/or personal neglect diagnosed with the hemineglect battery. We
also analysed right brain-damaged patients who had (or did not have) neglect according to their line bisection performance.
Our results showed that performance of the line bisection task correlates with performance of cancellation tasks, reading
and perceptual tasks, but not with the presence of personal neglect. Personal neglect seems to be unrelated to line
bisection behaviour. Indeed, patients affected by extrapersonal and personal neglect do not show more severe neglect in
line bisection than patients with only extrapersonal neglect. Furthermore, we observed that 20.56% of the patients were
considered affected or not by neglect on the line bisection task compared with the other spatial tasks of the hemineglect
battery. We conclude that using a battery with multiple tests is the only way to guarantee a reliable diagnosis and
effectively plan for rehabilitative training
The role of emotional landmarks in embodied and not-embodied tasks
Full text linkThe role of emotional landmarks in navigation has been scarcely studied. Previous findings showed that valence and arousal of landmarks increase landmark’s salience and improve performance in navigational memory tasks. However, no study has directly explored the interplay between valence and arousal of emotionally laden landmarks in embodied and not-embodied navigational tasks. At the aim, 115 college students have been subdivided in five groups according to the landmarks they were exposed (High Positive Landmarks HPL; Low Positive Landmarks LPL; High Negative Landmarks HNL; Low Negative Landmarks LNL and Neutral Landmarks NeuL). In the embodied tasks participants were asked to learn a path in a first-person perspective and to recall it after five minutes, whereas in the not-embodied tasks participants were asked to track the learned path on a silent map and to recognize landmarks among distractors. Results highlighted firstly the key role of valence in the embodied task related to the immediate learning, but not to the delayed recall of the path, probably because of the short retention interval used. Secondly, results showed the importance of the interplay between valence and arousal in the non-embodied tasks, specifically, neutral and high negative emotional landmarks yielded the lowest performance probably because of the avoidance learning effect. Implications for future research directions are discussed
The Effect of Sadness on Visual Artistic Creativity in Non-Artists
Full text linkThe study of the relationships between mood and creativity is long-standing. In this study, the effects of mood states on artistic creativity were investigated in ninety non-artist participants. Mood states were induced by instructing participants to listen to self-selected happy, sad, or neutral music for ten minutes. Then, all participants were asked to make two artistic drawings. To check for mood manipulation, the Profile of Mood States (POMS) was administered before and after listening to the self-selected music. After the mood induction, the negative group reported higher scores than the other two groups in the ‘depression’ subscale and lower scores than the other two groups in the ‘vigour’ subscale of the POMS; the positive mood group showed more vigour than the negative mood group. Yet, three independent judges assigned higher ratings of creativity and emotionality to the drawings produced by participants in the negative mood group than drawings produced by participants in the other two groups. These results confirmed that specific negative mood states (e.g., sadness) positively affect artistic creativity, probably because participants are more likely to engage in mood-repairing. Limitations and future research directions are presented
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
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