Factors Associated with the Anxiety, Subjective Psychological Well-Being and Self-Esteem of Parents of Blind Children.

The objective was to examine the connection of the personal, social and family context, educational variables with the levels of anxiety, subjective psychological well-being and self-esteem in a sample of 61 parents of blind children. Results suggest that parents present less anxiety when they have only one child, possess a technical degree, receive remuneration for their work, their child's visual impairment is not progressive, their knowledge about their child's disability is appropriate, and their leisure and labour possibilities have not been affected. Their psychological well-being is higher when they are married in first nuptials and perceive that their health is good. Their well-being is negatively related to reduced leisure, and self-esteem is lower when labour possibilities have been affected. In order for these families to achieve a more pleasant life, with greater psychological well-being, lower anxiety and higher self-esteem, professionals should be aware of the aspects with a negative impact.

Language skills and nonverbal cognitive processes associated with reading comprehension in deaf children.

The main aim of this study was to examine the relationship between language skills (vocabulary knowledge and phonological awareness), nonverbal cognitive processes (attention, memory and executive functions) and reading comprehension in deaf children. Participants were thirty prelingually deaf children (10.7 ± 1.6 years old; 18 boys, 12 girls), who were classified as either good readers or poor readers by their scores on two reading comprehension tasks. The children were administered a rhyme judgment task and seven computerized neuropsychological tasks specifically designed and adapted for deaf children to evaluate vocabulary knowledge, attention, memory and executive functions in deaf children. A correlational approach was also used to assess the association between variables. Although the two groups did not show differences in phonological awareness, good readers showed better vocabulary and performed significantly better than poor readers on attention, memory and executive functions measures. Significant correlations were found between better scores in reading comprehension and better scores on tasks of vocabulary and non-verbal cognitive processes. The results suggest that in deaf children, vocabulary knowledge and nonverbal cognitive processes such as selective attention, visuo-spatial memory, abstract reasoning and sequential processing may be especially relevant for the development of reading comprehension.

Validez de la citología de impresión para neoplasias de la superficie ocular: resultados preliminares / Validation of impression cytology for ocular surface neoplasia: preliminary results

Objetivo: determinar la validez de la citología de impresión en lesiones conjuntivales clínicamente sospechosas de neoplasia comparada con la histopatología. Diseño: estudio de prueba diagnóstica. Métodos: pacientes que ingresaron a la Fundación Oftalmológica Nacional de Colombia con diagnóstico clínico de neoplasia de superficie ocular o lesión sospechosa de neoplasia quienes fueron sometidos a citología de impresión y posterior resección quirúrgica completa más estudio patológico de la lesión. Resultados: se examinaron 54 pacientes de los cuales 27 fueron mujeres y 27 hombres correspondiendo a 50% en cada grupo. La media de edad fue 52.3 años. La lesión más frecuente fue la neoplasia conjuntival escamosa intraepitelial (NIC) en los diagnósticos clínico, citológico y patológico. Se encontró que la sensibilidad de la citología de impresión fue de 92.86% y la especifi cidad de 50%. Con respecto al diagnóstico clínico relacionado con la patología se obtuvo una sensibilidad de 92.86% y una especificidad de 80.77%. Conclusiones: Se encontró que la citología de impresión es una prueba sensible mas no específica para el tamizaje de neoplasias de superficie ocular, sin embargo no muestra una superioridad frente a un buen diagnóstico clínico. Se debe aclarar que son observaciones preliminares de un estudio que se encuentra en curso.

Objective: to determine impression cytology validity for conjunctival malignant lesions compared to pathology. Design: diagnostic test study. Methods: patients admitted to Fundación Oftalmológica Nacional of Colombia with clinical diagnosis of ocular surface neoplasia or suspicious ocular surface neoplasia who underwent impression cytology before excisional surgery of the lesion and pathologic study. Results: fifty four patients were obtained for this initial analysis, 27 were of female sex and 27 males, each group corresponded to 50%. Mean age obtained was 52.3 years. The most frequent lesion found was ocular surface squamous cell neoplasia in the clinical diagnosis, impression cytology and pathology. Impression cytology sensitivity found is 92.86% and 50% of specificity. Clinical diagnosis was found to have 92.68% sensitivity and 80.77% Conclusions: impression cytology was found to be a sensitive test but not specific, which is adequate for a screening test, however it does not demonstrate to be superior to a clinical diagnosis made by a trained specialist. It must be clear that these are preliminary observations and calculations of a study that is still in course and the sample is incomplete.

Development of attention networks in deaf children: support for the integrative hypothesis.

Early auditory deprivation is known to affect visual attention, yet the early effects of auditory deprivation on visual attention cannot be described simply as deficiencies or enhancements, because selected aspects of visual attention could be modified in various ways along the developmental trajectory. However, few studies have explored the development of these various aspects of visual attention in deaf children. In this paper we study the developmental trajectory of three aspects of visual attention (alerting, orienting and executive control attention networks) in a group of deaf children between 6 and 12 years of age. We used the attention network test to explore the development of the three attention networks and a child-friendly version of the cost-benefit paradigm to characterize the development of the basic operations of orienting. Our results showed a pattern of specific but varied outcomes with respect to the effects of auditory deprivation on these attention networks. First, auditory deprivation can impair development of the alerting network. Second, auditory deprivation can enhance two elementary operations of orienting: moving and engaging. Third, the executive control network showed a developmental trajectory that was neither deficient nor enhanced, but rather similar to that observed with hearing children. Taken together, these results are consistent with the integrative hypothesis of the effects of auditory deprivation on visual attention.

Anxiety, psychological well-being and self-esteem in Spanish families with blind children. A change in psychological adjustment?

In this study, the relation between levels of anxiety, self-esteem and subjective psychological well-being is analyzed in a Spanish sample of 28 fathers and 33 mothers of blind children. The results reveal a positive correlation between subjective psychological well-being and self-esteem, and a negative correlation between anxiety and subjective psychological well-being, and between anxiety and self-esteem. In comparison with the general population, no statistically significant differences were found in anxiety and subjective psychological well-being; however, levels of self-esteem were significantly higher in families with blind children. These results suggest that the process of adaptation described in previous research may be changing, as having a blind child does not necessarily lead to parents' maladjustment.

Visual working memory in deaf children with diverse communication modes: improvement by differential outcomes.

Although visual functions have been proposed to be enhanced in deaf individuals, empirical studies have not yet established clear evidence on this issue. The present study aimed to determine whether deaf children with diverse communication modes had superior visual memory and whether their performance was improved by the use of differential outcomes. Severely or profoundly deaf children who employed spoken Spanish, Spanish Sign Language (SSL), and both spoken Spanish and SSL modes of communication were tested in a delayed matching-to-sample task for visual working memory assessment. Hearing controls were used to compare performance. Participants were tested in two conditions, differential outcome and non-differential outcome conditions. Deaf groups with either oral or SSL modes of communication completed the task with less accuracy than bilingual and control hearing children. In addition, the performances of all groups improved through the use of differential outcomes.

Negative semantic priming from consciously vs. unconsciously perceived single words

El presente estudio investiga si la obtención depriming semántico negativo ante una única palabra ignorada depende delnivel de conciencia de dicha palabra. En cada ensayo aparecía brevementeuna palabra previa seguida inmediatamente o tras un intervalo de demora,por una máscara de patrón. A continuación aparecía una palabra objetivoante la que los participantes debían realizar una tarea de categorizaciónsemántica o una tarea de identificación de elección forzada. Se instruyó alos sujetos a que atendieran la palabra objetivo e ignoraran la palabra previa,considerándola como un distractor. Las palabras previa y objetivopertenecían a la misma categoría semántica en la mitad de los ensayos, y adistintas categorías en los ensayos restantes. Los resultados mostraron unpatrón diferencial de efectos de priming semántico en función del tipo deenmascaramiento: Priming negativo con la máscara demorada, y facilitacióncon la máscara inmediata. Estos resultados demuestran que el tipo deenmascaramiento, que supuestamente afecta a la percepción consciente vs.no consciente de la palabra previa, constituiría una variable crítica paraobtener priming semántico negativo ante una única palabra. También sonconsistentes con la idea de que la percepción con y sin conciencia produceconsecuencias comportamentales cualitativamente diferentes, que reflejan lacontribución de procesos controlados y automáticos, respectivamente(AU)

The present research explores whether obtaining semantic negative primingfrom a single ignored word depends on whether that word is eitherconsciously or unconsciously perceived. On each trial a prime word wasbriefly displayed and followed either immediately or after a delay by apattern mask. The mask offset was followed by a probe display containing asingle target word that participants were required to either categorize oridentify. Participants were instructed to attend to the target while ignoringthe prime word. On half of trials the prime-target pairs were highlyassociated words belonging to the same semantic category, whereas on theremaining half they belonged to different semantic categories. A differentialpriming pattern as a function of the masking condition was found: Semanticnegative priming when the mask presentation was delayed, and positivepriming when the prime word was immediately masked, thus preventing itsconscious identification. These results suggest that masking type, whichsupposedly affects prime awareness, would be a critical factor to obtainnegative semantic priming from single words. They also provide evidencethat perceiving a stimulus with or without awareness can lead toqualitatively different behavioral consequences, which reflect thecontribution of controlled and automatic components, respectively(AU)

Semantic priming effects with and without perceptual awareness

Elpresente trabajo pretende replicar y extender los resultados de algunosestudios previos que demuestran que la percepción consciente vs. noconscientede palabras puede producir efectos comportamentales diferentes.Los participantes realizaban una tarea de categorización semántica sobre unapalabra objetivo que era precedida por una palabra previa que podíapertenecer o a la misma categoría (20% de los ensayos) o a una categoríasemántica diferente (80%). La palabra previa se presentaba brevemente y eraseguida inmediatamente o tras una demora por una máscara visual. Adiferencia de trabajos previos, el tipo de máscara variaba de forma aleatoriade ensayo a ensayo. En los ensayos con la máscara inmediata se encontró unefecto facilitatorio de priming semántico. Con la máscara demorada (quepermitía la identificación consciente de la palabra previa) se encontró unefecto opuesto (negativo) de priming. Estos resultados proporcionan pruebasadicionales de que la percepción con y sin conciencia produceconsecuencias comportamentales cualitativamente diferentes, las cualesreflejan la contribución de procesos controlados (estratégicos) yautomáticos, respectivamente

The present research was aimed to reply and extend several recent findingsshowing qualitatively different behavioral effects produced by wordsperceived with vs. without awareness. Participants made a semanticcategorization task on a target that was preceded by a prime word belongingeither to the same (20% of trials) or to a different category (80%). The primewas always presented briefly and followed either immediately or after adelay by a pattern mask. In contrast to prior studies, the masking type variedrandomly from trial to trial. For trials with an immediate mask (whichavoided conscious identification of the prime), a significant facilitatorysemantic priming was found. For trials with a delayed mask (on whichparticipants were able to identify the prime), a significant “reversed”semantic priming was observed. The present findings provide furtherevidence that perceiving a stimulus with or without awareness can lead toqualitatively different behavioral consequences, which reflect thecontribution of strategy-based (controlled) and automatic components,respectively

Semantic activation in the absence of perceptual awareness.

Participants performed a semantic categorization task on a target that was preceded by a prime word belonging either to the same category (20% of trials) or to a different category (80% of trials). The prime was presented for 33 msec and followed either immediately or after a delay by a pattern mask. With the immediate mask, reaction times (RTs) were shorter on related than on unrelated trials. This facilitatory priming reached significance at prime-target stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) of 400 msec or less and remained unaffected by task practice. With the delayed mask, RTs were longer on related than on unrelated trials. This reversed (strategic) semantic priming proved to be significant (1) only at a prime-target SOA of 400 msec or longer and (2) after the participants had some practice with the task. The present findings provide further evidence that perceiving a stimulus with and without phenomenological awareness can lead to qualitatively different behavioral consequences.