[Impact of coaching on resilience and propension to "action" or "evaluation". Pilot experimental study conducted on a population of 176 adults.] / Impatto del coaching su resilienza e propensione ad "azione" o "valutazione". Studio sperimentale pilota condotto su una popolazione di 176 adulti.

INTRODUCTION: An experimental study conducted between October 2020 and July 2021 is presented. The study involved two groups: an experimental group consisting of 89 people and a control group consisting of 87 people, all operating within various organizations. The aim of the study was to measure the effects of coaching through: 1) the comparison between the test/re-test variation of resilience and locomotion and assessment regulatory modes, between the experimental and control groups; 2) the comparison between the test/re-test variation within the experimental group alone. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The 176 study participants were divided into two groups: an experimental group that received individual coaching sessions and a control group that received general coaching information fortnightly. At the beginning and at the end of the study period, the members of both groups received two questionnaires, both validated by the International Scientific Community. A questionnaire for the measurement of resilience, the Connor Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC-Version validated for Italy) and a questionnaire for the measurement of regulatory modes, the Regulatory Mode Questionnaire of Pierro and Kruglanski (RMQ-Version validated for Italy). The individual coaching process, conducted by 52 coaches holding credentials (ACC, PCC, MCC) issued by ICF (International Coaching Federation), had a total duration of 9 hours distributed over 4-6 months. RESULTS: In the test phase, i.e. the first administration of the questionnaires, the experimental and control groups average results did not differ significantly from each other. After the coaching engagement, a significant increase, +7.5%, in resilience values was recorded in the experimental group. For the assessment, a ratio was obtained between cases of increase in equilibrium and reduction in the experimental group greater than the control group equal to 20.1%. For the locomotion, a ratio 30.6% was obtained. CONCLUSIONS: The scientific value of this study lies in having obtained results by comparing the effects of coaching in the pre and post testing of an experimental group towards control.

The right temporoparietal junction plays a causal role in maintaining the internal representation of verticality.

Perception of the visual vertical is strongly based on our ability to match visual inflow with vestibular, proprioceptive, tactile, and even visceral information that contributes to maintaining an internal representation of the vertical. An important cortical region implicated in multisensory integration is the right temporoparietal junction (rTPJ), which also is involved in higher order forms of body- and space-related cognition. To test whether this region integrates body-related multisensory information necessary for establishing the subjective visual vertical, we combined a psychophysical task (the rod-and-frame test) with transient inhibition of the rTPJ via continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS). A Gabor patch visual detection task was used as a control visual task. cTBS of early visual cortex (V1-V3) was used to test whether early visual cortices played any role in verticality estimation. We show that inhibition of rTPJ activity selectively impairs the ability to evaluate the rod's verticality when no contextual visual information, such as a frame surrounding the rod, is provided. Conversely, transient inhibition of V1-V3 selectively disrupts the ability to visually detect Gabor patch orientation. This anatomofunctional dissociation supports the idea that the rTPJ plays a causal role in integrating egocentric sensory information encoded in different reference systems (i.e., vestibular and somatic) to maintain an internal representation of verticality.

Subliminal perception of others' physical pain and pleasure.

Studies indicate that explicit and implicit processing of affectively charged stimuli may be reflected in specific behavioral markers and physiological signatures. This study investigated whether the pleasantness ratings of a neutral target were affected by subliminal perception of pleasant and painful facial expressions. Participants were presented images depicting face of non-famous models being slapped (painful condition), caressed (pleasant condition) or touched (neutral condition) by the right hand of another individual. In particular, we combined the continuous flash suppression technique with the affective misattribution procedure (AMP) to explore subliminal empathic processing. Measures of pupil reactivity along with empathy traits were also collected. Results showed that participants rated the neutral target as less or more likeable congruently with the painful or pleasant facial expression presented, respectively. Pupil dilation was associated both with the implicit attitudes (AMP score) and with empathic concern. Thus, the results provide behavioral and physiological evidence that state-related empathic reactivity can occur at an entirely subliminal level and that it is linked to autonomic responses and empathic traits.