Maternal and infant touching behaviours during perturbed interactions: Associations with maternal depressive symptomatology and infant crying.

Touch is an important means through which mothers and infants co-regulate during periods of stress or perturbation. The present study examined the synchrony of maternal and infant touching behaviours among 41 mother-infant dyads, some of whom were deemed at-risk due to maternal depressive symptomatology. Mothers and their 4-month-old infants participated in the Still-Face (maternal emotional unavailability; SF) and Separation (maternal physical unavailability; SP) procedures. Infant crying was examined across procedures and investigated as a brief period of perturbation. Results revealed that mothers and infants displayed a positive pattern of tactile synchrony (coordinated, analogous changes in touch) during infant crying episodes. However, dyads in the high depression group displayed significantly less affectionate touch during instances of infant crying. Furthermore, more depressive symptoms were associated with less maternal and infant touch and lower rates of infant crying. This group of dyads may be less expressive via touch, be less affected by disruptions in their interactions, have impaired regulatory abilities, or simply require minimal amounts of touch to mutually regulate following social stressors and during brief perturbation periods. These findings enrich our limited knowledge about the dynamic interplay of maternal and infant touch and inform preventative intervention programs for at-risk groups.

Assessment of the environmental hazard from municipal and industrial wastewater treatment sludge by employing chemical and biological methods.

Chemical analyses and toxicity testing were employed in conjunction to evaluate the environmental hazard from the wasted sludge generated during the biological treatment of urban and industrial wastewaters. Chemical analyses included determination of seven polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), 13 polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), total organic carbon (TOC), and seven heavy metals (As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Pb, Mn, and Zn) in sludge and sludge leachates deriving from two standard leaching procedures: (a) the mild leaching test EN-12457-2 proposed by EC and (b) the relatively aggressive toxicity characteristic leaching procedure (TCLP) leaching test proposed by US EPA. Acute toxicity measurements were performed in aqueous sludge elutriates and leachates by using bioluminescence bacteria. The urban sludge was found to be more enriched with PAHs than the industrial sludge, however, at levels below the EU limits for sludge application. The total PCB content (Sigma7PCBs) in both sludges, particularly in the industrial sludge, exceeded the proposed European limit for sludge use as soil amendment. With regards to their heavy metal content, both sludges met the requirements for use in agriculture. The urban sludge exhibited high ecotoxicity, while the industrial sludge with almost two times lower toxicity was classified as not toxic to slightly toxic. The EN and the TCLP leaching procedures resulted in different sludge characterizations both from chemical and from ecotoxicological points of view. The EN procedure appeared to be more sensitive to the potential environmental risk from sludge disposal. The results of the study revealed the necessity for combining chemical with ecotoxicological criteria for integrated characterization of wasted sludge and the need for harmonization of the methods employed for waste classification.