Some determinants of the motivational properties of ethanol in the rat: Concurrent administration of food or social stimuli

1985 ◽  
Vol 87 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert B. Stewart ◽  
Larry A. Grupp

2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (10) ◽  
pp. 3349-3363
Author(s):  
Naomi H. Rodgers ◽  
Jennifer Y. F. Lau ◽  
Patricia M. Zebrowski

Purpose The purpose of this study was to examine group and individual differences in attentional bias toward and away from socially threatening facial stimuli among adolescents who stutter and age- and sex-matched typically fluent controls. Method Participants included 86 adolescents (43 stuttering, 43 controls) ranging in age from 13 to 19 years. They completed a computerized dot-probe task, which was modified to allow for separate measurement of attentional engagement with and attentional disengagement from facial stimuli (angry, fearful, neutral expressions). Their response time on this task was the dependent variable. Participants also completed the Social Anxiety Scale for Adolescents (SAS-A) and provided a speech sample for analysis of stuttering-like behaviors. Results The adolescents who stutter were more likely to engage quickly with threatening faces than to maintain attention on neutral faces, and they were also more likely to disengage quickly from threatening faces than to maintain attention on those faces. The typically fluent controls did not show any attentional preference for the threatening faces over the neutral faces in either the engagement or disengagement conditions. The two groups demonstrated equivalent levels of social anxiety that were both, on average, very close to the clinical cutoff score for high social anxiety, although degree of social anxiety did not influence performance in either condition. Stuttering severity did not influence performance among the adolescents who stutter. Conclusion This study provides preliminary evidence for a vigilance–avoidance pattern of attentional allocation to threatening social stimuli among adolescents who stutter.



2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Mow ◽  
Arti Gandhi ◽  
Daniel Fulford

Decreased social functioning and high levels of loneliness and social isolation are common in schizophrenia spectrum disorders (SSD), contributing to reduced quality of life. One key contributor to social impairment is low social motivation, which may stem from aberrant neural processing of socially rewarding or punishing stimuli. To summarize research on the neurobiology of social motivation in SSD, we performed a systematic literature review of neuroimaging studies involving the presentation of social stimuli intended to elicit feelings of reward and/or punishment. Across 11 studies meeting criteria, people with SSD demonstrated weaker modulation of brain activity in regions within a proposed social interaction network, including prefrontal, cingulate, and striatal regions, as well as the amygdala and insula. Firm conclusions regarding neural differences in SSD in these regions, as well as connections within networks, are limited due to conceptual and methodological inconsistencies across the available studies. We conclude by making recommendations for the study of social reward and punishment processing in SSD in future research.



Author(s):  
Arundhati Bhattacharyya ◽  
M Bajpai

Ketoconazole is an imidazole antifungal drug belonging to the class II of Biopharmaceutic Classification System. Maintenance of gastric acidity is essential for adequate dissolution and absorption of ketoconazole. Concurrent administration of antacid and antiulcer preparations decreases the oral absorption of ketoconazole often causing therapeutic failure.  The aim of this study was to evaluate whether a self-emulsifying formulation of ketoconazole would be able to overcome the pH dependent dissolution and oral bioavailability. Self-emulsifying drug delivery system (SEDDS) was prepared after selecting the oil, surfactant and co-surfactant by solubility analysis. Optimum ratio of the components was finalized on the basis of drug content, self-emulsification and mean droplet diameter. The effect of pH on dissolution was studied in comparison to the pure drug. Oral bioavailability was determined in comparison to aqueous suspension in rats and the effect of co-administration of ranitidine hydrochloride solution and a commercially available liquid antacid preparation was studied. The optimized formulation containing 20% Capryol 90 and 40% each of Carbitol and Tween 80, exhibited 100% drug release regardless of the pH whereas the pure drug exhibited a highly pH dependent dissolution. The AUC0-24 resulted with oral administration of the SEDDS formulation was about 34%, 43% and 60% higher compared to the aqueous suspension when administered alone, administered with ranitidine and administered with antacid respectively. The results of the present study demonstrate that self-emulsifying formulations can be utilized for oral delivery of weakly basic drugs like ketoconazole which exhibit pH dependent dissolution.



2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Chih-Hung Chen ◽  
Ting-Ju Lin ◽  
Chih-Yu Chen

Based on the assumption that human behaviours are mainly affected by physical and animate environments, this empirical research takes the changeful and complex historical district in Tainan to observe wayfinding behaviours. An a priori analysis of the isovist fields is conducted to identify spatial characteristics. Three measures, the relative area, convexity, and circularity, are applied to scrutinize the possible stopping points, change of speed, and route choices. Accordingly, an experiment is carried out to observe spatial behaviours and different influences of social stimuli. Results show that social interactions afford groups and pairs to perform better than individual observers in wayfinding.© 2016. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies, Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, MalaysiaKeywords: wayfinding; isovist; spatial perception and social stimuli; historic quarter



Author(s):  
Clare M. Eddy

AbstractNarcissistic Personality Disorder is characterised by inflated self-importance, an excessive need for admiration, and a lack of empathy. The interpersonal difficulties associated with narcissistic personality may be becoming more widespread given its increasing prevalence within the general population. This systematic review investigated the relationship between narcissistic personality traits and social cognition (i.e. theory of mind; emotion recognition; empathy; emotional intelligence) in clinical and non-clinical samples. Cognitive empathy (i.e. perspective taking) appears unlikely to be impaired, while affective empathy (relating to another’s emotion state) may be reduced in association with narcissism. Those with grandiose narcissism rate their empathic skills more highly than those with vulnerable narcissism, but concurrent administration of objective measures is rare, limiting insight into the validity of self-ratings. Rather than deficits in aspects of social cognition, the overall pattern could reflect motivation, or advantageous use of social cognitive skills to serve the self. Indeed, interpersonal strategies associated with narcissism (e.g. deception; manipulation) suggest the application of understanding another’s beliefs or desires in the context of low empathy. Further research should seek to explore performance on a wider range of emotion recognition and theory of mind tasks, and whether characteristics such as excessive jealousy and paranoia could reflect hyper-mentalizing.





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