Does Child Likeability Mediate the Link Between Academic Competence and Depressive Symptoms in Early Elementary School?

The present study investigated the role of teacher-rated likeability as a mediator of the relation between low academic competence and depressive symptoms in elementary-aged children. Analyses focused on a sample of children at risk for child maltreatment living in Hawaii (n = 380). Structural equation modeling supported the hypothesized negative relations between academic competence in first grade and depressive symptoms in third grade controlling for correlated constructs (e.g., baseline social avoidance, parenting stress, externalizing problems, and internalizing symptoms). Teacher-rated likeability in second grade negatively mediated the effect of academic competence on depressive symptoms. Implications for understanding the role of early academic skill deficits and social judgments on risk for depressive symptoms as well as recommendations for interventions and prevention strategies are discussed.

Teacher-rated school readiness items in a kindergarten sample: Outcomes in first grade.

The purpose of the study was to investigate the effectiveness of a brief and feasible universal screener for kindergarten readiness for predicting follow-up outcomes in first grade. Participants included kindergarten and first-grade teachers and students from 6 urban elementary schools. Students included slightly more males than females (54%; 46%), the race/ethnicity of the students was predominantly African American (74%) or White (23%), and 36% of students qualified for free or reduced lunch. Data included in this study were collected for children in the fall (October) of their kindergarten year and the Spring (April) of their first-grade year. Kindergarten teachers completed single-item ratings of student readiness as well as full-scale ratings of student behaviors and academic competence. Students also completed a standardized academic achievement test. Main findings from this study include that the single-item screener continued to predict negative academic and social behavior outcomes at a follow-up 18 months later. The percentage of unique variance explained by the readiness items was significant and, in the majority of cases, remained significant even after the baseline variables were entered into the analyses. Children rated poor in their academic readiness were over 9-10 times as likely to have low reading performance at the end of their first-grade year. Furthermore, children rated as poor in their behavior readiness were at over 6 times greater risk for low prosocial and high disruptive behavior teacher ratings in first grade. The screener could be used to screen for children low in readiness in order to provide supports and monitoring for early intervention. Kindergarten entry is a critical time to screen children and support them in developing skills to ameliorate deficits and build essential early academic and social behavior skills. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).

Manipulation under anaesthetic following total knee arthroplasty: Predicting stiffness and outcome.

PURPOSE: A stiff total knee replacement can severely limit a patient's post-operative function, but there remain few prospective trials identifying those patients at risk, nor the efficacy of manipulation. We analysed our prospectively collected database to assess predictors of stiffness and outcomes following manipulation. METHODS: Using prospectively collected knee arthroplasty data, including preoperative and post-operative range of knee movement, SF-12 (physical and mental) and The Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Arthritis Index (WOMAC) scores, patients requiring manipulation were compared to a matched group of patients not requiring manipulation, with a detailed statistical analysis undertaken to assess potential risk factors and the post-manipulation outcome. RESULTS: Of the 1313 arthroplasty patients, 69 required manipulation. Patients with less than 80° of flexion at discharge, diabetes or on warfarin were more likely to require manipulation, but flexion at discharge was the overwhelming predictive factor for stiffness. Forty per cent of the range of movement gained during manipulation was maintained at 1 year, with earlier manipulation deriving greater improvements. While the WOMAC scores improved post-manipulation, there was no significant difference in either of the SF12 scores. CONCLUSION: Flexion at discharge is the overwhelming predictive factor for the requirement for manipulation.

Bullying involvement, teacher-student relationships, and psychosocial outcomes.

Students involved in bullying experience mental health issues and negative psychosocial outcomes. Few studies have investigated how teacher-student relationships (TSRs) may buffer the negative outcomes experienced by students involved in bullying. To investigate the moderating role of TSRs with bullying involvement status and psychosocial outcomes, we used data from 691 middle school students, 85 teachers, and 6 schools in one urban district. We used both student- and teacher-reported outcomes and regression models included baseline measures (i.e., depression, concentration problems, emotional regulation problems, behavioral engagement) taken 8 months earlier. Regardless of bullying involvement, student-reported TSR had a beneficial association for all outcomes controlling for baseline measures and student demographic variables. However, bully/victims with low TSRs experienced a heightened risk for depressive symptoms suggesting increased attention to this subgroup of students. (PsycINFO Database Record

Effects of stimulant medication on neuropsychological functioning in young adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

OBJECTIVE: The main goal of this study was to evaluate the impact of stimulant medication on executive function deficits in a group of adolescents and young adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD; DSM-III-R criteria). METHOD: Male and female subjects aged 15 to 25 years were divided into 3 groups: subjects with ADHD treated with stimulants who took their medication at the time of testing (ADHD active stimulant treatment: N = 26), subjects with ADHD who had not taken stimulant medication in the past month (ADHD no stimulant treatment: N = 94), and non-ADHD control subjects (controls: N = 133). The neuropsychological battery assessed domains of cognitive functioning known to be relevant in ADHD, including tests of executive functions and learning and memory. Data were collected from July 1998 to April 2003. RESULTS: The ADHD no stimulant treatment group had significantly lower aggregate scores compared with the controls for the total aggregate, working memory, interference control, processing speed, sustained attention, and verbal learning domains (all p < .001). The ADHD active stimulant treatment group had significantly poorer scores on the total aggregate (p = .002), interference control (p < .001), and processing speed (p = .003) domains compared with the controls. The ADHD active stimulant treatment subjects scored significantly higher on the domains of sustained attention (p = .04) and verbal learning (p = .03) compared with the ADHD no stimulant treatment subjects. CONCLUSIONS: Our study showed that subjects with ADHD who took stimulant medication had higher neuropsychological measures of attention compared with subjects with ADHD who did not take stimulant medication, but differences were not found for other measures of executive function.

Neutralization of cytokine activity at the receptor level improves sperm motility in men with spinal cord injuries.

Men with spinal cord injury (SCI) have a unique semen profile characterized by normal sperm concentrations but abnormally low sperm motility. Previous studies showed that elevated concentrations of cytokines in the seminal plasma of these men contribute to this condition. For example, when elevated concentrations of interlekin-1beta (IL-1beta), IL-6, and tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha) were immunoneutralized in the semen of men with SCI, sperm motility improved. The present study investigated if these cytokines act on sperm cell receptors to inhibit sperm motility. Semen was collected from men with SCI and from healthy non-SCI men. Sperm were separated from the seminal plasma by centrifugation. Eight identical aliquots of 5,000 sperm suspended in 50 microL of seminal plasma were prepared for each subject. Agents were added to the aliquots in order to neutralize IL-1beta, IL-6, and TNF-alpha at the receptor level. In SCI subjects, sperm motility improved in each treatment group compared with the untreated group, but statistical significance was reached only when neutralizing agents to all 3 cytokines were added. Improvement was less pronounced in subjects with close to normal semen cytokine concentrations or close to normal pretreatment sperm motility. In control subjects, IL-1beta, IL-6, and TNF-alpha were within normal values, and addition of receptor blockers to semen had no effect on sperm motility. These data support the hypothesis that cytokines act at the level of the sperm receptor to inhibit sperm motility. These data further support the notion that inactivating semen cytokines leads to improved sperm motility in SCI men. Our goal is to develop this finding into a treatment for low sperm motility in men with SCI.

Sperm motility in men with spinal cord injuries is enhanced by inactivating cytokines in the seminal plasma.

The goal of this study was to determine whether inactivating specific cytokines in seminal plasma improves sperm motility in men affected by spinal cord injury (SCI). For this purpose, we used monoclonal antibodies to interleukin 6 (IL6), interleukin 1 beta (IL1-beta), and tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-alpha), all 3 cytokines having been previously detected at high concentrations in the seminal plasma of patients with SCI. In a group of 17 SCI men with low sperm motility (mean +/- SE, 20.1% +/- 3.1%), treatment with the 3 monoclonal antibodies at the median neutralization dose concentrations for 1.0 to 1.5 hours improved sperm motility in all cases. Effectiveness was higher in those specimens with a pretreatment sperm motility between 11% and 30% (from 19.3% +/- 1.4% to 41.9% +/- 4.9%, P < .0002), suggesting that pretreatment sperm motility might represent an indicator of cell damage and, therefore, a factor that influences monoclonal antibody effectiveness. To the best of our knowledge, these results represent the first rational treatment for improving low sperm motility in these severely affected patients.