Relation between birth weight and placenta weight.

With the goal to establish a model that relates birth weight to placenta weight, adjusted for the most documented predictors of birth weight, 300 live newborns were studied, all were products of single gestation. Inclusion criteria were newborns with gestational age of 37 weeks or older according to the date of last menstruation, whose mothers did not have diabetes mellitus, high blood pressure, pre-eclampsia, or eclampsia. The weight of the newborn was identified from the anthropometry data collected by previously trained nursing personnel in each of the participating hospitals. Immediately after delivery, the placenta was weighed. Multiple linear regression was used to see the effect of placenta weight and each variable on birth weight. The mean of birth weight was 3,369 g with a standard deviation (SD) of 445 g. Placenta weight had a mean of 537 g (SD: 96 g). The relation between the weight of the placenta and the birth weight was significant, and we found that for each gram increase in placenta weight, birth weight is increased by 1.98 g (SE = 0.25, p < 0.01) and this relation is not linear, since the quadratic term is significant. Placenta weight has a nonlinear relation to the birth weight and is an important predictor of birth weight. Together with the gestational age and the maternal age and size, it explains 32% of the variability of birth weight. Placenta weight can be a 'sentinel' indicator of nutritional and/or environmental problems.

Priority issues in Latino mental health services research.

This paper identifies issues and trends affecting the quality and comprehensiveness of Latino mental health research and services. These issues include current patterns of need and services use, rapid expansion of the Latino population, extraordinary rates of uninsured, social and language barriers to care, transformation in treatment science and technology, and the sheer complexity and rapid changes in the delivery system. Progress in the field requires coordination and investments from both public and private sectors. Scientific journals should provide assistance for creating a high quality knowledge base and rapidly disseminating this information to students, practitioners, and policy makers. Vigorous activity is needed to (1) augment the supply of people entering the "pipeline" for researcher and practitioner training, and (2) support research in priority areas such as outcome studies for diverse treatments and different sectors of care, cultural competence, treatment models for youth and aging populations, quality of care, and barriers to mental health care.

A comparison of psychiatric symptoms between Anglo-Americans and Mexican-Americans with schizophrenia.

Culture is widely thought to influence the form, content, and extent of symptoms experienced and expressed by the mentally ill. However, little is known about how specific cultural groups differ in their symptomatic presentation of mental illness. Using data derived from the Present State Exam, the current study compared 63 Anglo-American and 53 Mexican-American patients with schizophrenia on ten psychiatric symptoms. A series of logistic regressions offered several interesting findings. For instance, as hypothesized, Mexican-American patients were more likely to report physical symptoms than their Anglo-American counterparts. Also in line with expectations, Anglo-American patients reported experiencing a greater frequency of several psychiatric symptoms such as persecutory delusions, nervous tension, and blunted affect. Results from this study suggest that the presentation of even a very biologically determined disorder such as schizophrenia can be shaped by sociocultural factors. Specific aspects of Anglo-American and Latino cultures that may influence symptom patterns in patients suffering from schizophrenia are discussed.

Latina mothers' attributions, emotions, and reactions to the problem behaviors of their children with developmental disabilities.

We examined the applicability of attribution theory to mothers' perceptions and reactions to their child's problem behavior. Participants were 149 Latina mothers of children with developmental disabilities who were interviewed regarding specific incidents in which their child exhibited a behavior problem. The findings indicate that most mothers viewed their child as not being responsible for the behavior problem. Furthermore, as predicted by attribution theory, mothers who ascribed relatively high responsibility to the child were significantly more likely to report negative emotions (anger and frustration) and aggressive/harsh behavioral reactions than mothers who ascribed low responsibility. Also. mothers were more likely to ascribe high responsibility to the child when the problem was characterized as a behavioral excess than as a behavioral deficit. The results provide support for the applicability of an attributional framework and may have important implications for helping parents in addressing the problem behaviors of their children with developmental disabilities.

Cultural psychopathology: uncovering the social world of mental illness.

We review cultural psychopathology research since Kleinman's (1988) important review with the goals of updating past reviews, evaluating current conceptualizations and methods, and identifying emerging substantive trends. Conceptual advances are noted, particularly developments in the definition of culture and the examination of both culture-specific and cultural-general processes. The contributions of the Culture and Diagnosis Task Force for DSM-IV and the World Mental Health Report are reviewed and contrasted. Selected research on anxiety, schizophrenia, and childhood disorders is examined, with particular attention given to the study of ataque de nervios, social factors affecting the course of schizophrenia, and cross-national differences in internalizing and externalizing problems in children. Within the last ten years, cultural psychopathology research has become a significant force. Its focus on the social world holds promise to make significant inroads in reducing suffering and improving people's everyday lives.

Attributions and affective reactions of family members and course of schizophrenia.

The authors tested an attribution-affect model of schizophrenic relapse attending to the role of families' positive affect (warmth) and negative affect (criticism). Coders listened to interviews of 40 family members taken from C. E. Vaughn, K. S. Synder, S. Jones, W. B. Freeman, and I. R. Falloon (1984) and rated their attributions of controllability for the symptoms and behaviors of their relatives with schizophrenia. For family members not designated as emotionally overinvolved, perceptions that their ill relatives' symptoms and behaviors were under the patients' control were related to family members' warmth and criticism and to patients' clinical outcomes. Of the affective reactions, only criticism predicted outcome. In addition, patients' use of street drugs was related to attributions, criticism, and outcome. Together these findings suggest that families' attributions and criticism are important in understanding the relationship between family factors and course of illness.

Comparable activity levels in developmentally deprived and non-deprived layer IV cortical columns of the adult rat primary somatosensory cortex.

It has been suggested that evoked neural activity levels promote the selective construction of the primary somatosensory cortex (S1) neuropil. Sensory deprivation after S1 formation has, however, no effects on its postnatal growth. This indicates that S1 neuropil elaboration is independent from the ongoing levels of evoked cortical activity, and/or that sensory deprivation does not reduce overall levels of S1 evoked activity. We thus indirectly evaluated chronic and acute levels of neural activity in the developmentally, sensory deprived adult S1. Relative succinic dehydrogenase activity and 3H2-deoxyglucose uptake were comparable in control and deprived barrels. Our observations support the idea that normal levels of evoked neural activity prevent atrophic changes in the developmentally deprived adult S1. They can not rule out, however, that early selective S1 neuropil construction occurs independent from evoked neural activity levels.

Family values, religiosity, and emotional reactions to schizophrenia in Mexican and Anglo-American cultures.

This study was designed to test whether two sociocultural variables, family cohesion and religiosity, related to affective reactions toward schizophrenia. It was hypothesized that increasing perceptions of one's family as cohesive and religious would be associated with the expression of more favorable and less unfavorable emotions toward patients with the disorder. Eight-eight Anglo-American undergraduates from Los Angeles and 88 Mexican undergraduates from Guadalajara read vignettes of a hypothetical family member described as meeting DSM-IV criteria for schizophrenia. Results of this study suggest that perceptions of family unity may be one important factor underlying emotional reactions toward schizophrenia. As expected, increasing perceptions of family cohesion were associated with greater reports of favorable emotion and decreased reports of unfavorable emotion toward the patient. However, after controlling for social desirability, family cohesion no longer significantly predicted unfavorable affect. Contrary to expectations, religiosity was not found to predict unfavorable or favorable emotions. However, religiosity was found to covary with nationality. Mexicans, compared to Anglos, reported greater moral-religious values in their families. No national differences were found with respect to family cohesion. Implications of this study are discussed along with suggested directions for future research.

An attributional analysis of expressed emotion in Mexican-American families with schizophrenia.

In this study we tested an attributional model of expressed emotion (EE) among Mexican-American families. A sample of 46 key family members of schizophrenic patients were measured on three dimensions: affect toward patient, controllability attributions, and level of EE. Consistent with an attributional model, we found that high EE families (defined on the basis of critical comments) viewed the illness and associated symptoms as residing within the patient's personal control, more so than did low EE families. We also found that attributions held by family members are related to their affective reactions. Specifically, family members who perceived the patient as having control over the symptoms of schizophrenia tended to express greater negative emotions such as anger and annoyance toward the patient than did family members who viewed the symptoms as beyond the patient's personal control. An examination of the types of affects found and their relationship to EE status is discussed, along with implications for this research.

Dose- and age-dependent effects of prenatal ethanol exposure on hippocampal metabotropic-glutamate receptor-stimulated phosphoinositide hydrolysis.

Prenatal ethanol exposure reduces the density of the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor agonist binding sites and decreases the capacity to elicit long-term potentiation (LTP) in hippocampal formation of 45-day-old rat offspring. We hypothesized that prenatal ethanol exposure would reduce metabotropic-glutamate receptor (mGluR)-activated phosphoinositide hydrolysis also. Sprague-Dawley rat dams were fed a liquid diet containing either 3.35% (v/v) ethanol or 5.0% ethanol throughout gestation. Control groups were pair-fed either isocalorically matched 0% ethanol liquid diets or lab chow ad libitum. (1S,3R)-1-aminocyclopentane-1,3-dicarboxylic acid (trans-ACPD) stimulated inositol-1-phosphate (IP1) accumulation via activation of the mGluR in offspring whose mothers consumed the 3.35% ethanol liquid diet was not different compared with the control groups. Furthermore, trans-ACPD stimulated IP1 accumulation in 10- to 13-day-old offspring of the 5.0% ethanol diet group was not different compared with the control groups. However, trans-ACPD stimulated IP1 accumulation was reduced significantly in 56- to 82-day-old offspring of dams fed the 5.0% ethanol liquid diet compared with the control groups. In contrast, bethanechol stimulated IP1 accumulation, mediated via activation of muscarinic cholinergic receptors, was not affected by maternal consumption of either ethanol liquid diet. These results suggest both dose- and age-dependent effects of prenatal ethanol exposure on hippocampal responsiveness to trans-ACPD-activated phosphoinositide hydrolysis. Furthermore, the ability of the 3.35% ethanol diet to alter hippocampal NMDA receptors without altering the mGluR response suggests a differential sensitivity to the effects of ethanol exposure in utero among hippocampal glutamate receptor subtypes.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Patient variable biases in clinical judgment: conceptual overview and methodological considerations.

Specific conceptual factors are presented as having contributed to the negative findings of past psychotherapy bias research. Among these factors are the restrictive nature of both the definition of bias and the model of the biased clinician. A review of published studies of several patient variable biases (e.g., gender, race/ethnicity, and age) indicated that bias may best be defined in broader terms and that its occurrence may be more circumscribed than originally conceived. In addition, the lack of a theoretical perspective in this area of research is noted and the applicability of some social cognitive processes is discussed. Methodological factors are also considered, and recommendations for future research are offered.