Longitudinal Associations Between Symptoms of ADHD and Life Success: From Emerging Adulthood to Early Middle Adulthood.

OBJECTIVE: To expand on current adult ADHD literature by investigating the stability of ADHD symptomatology (i.e., inattention and hyperactivity-impulsivity) across a 15-year period (from emerging adulthood to early middle adulthood) and the relative contributions of ADHD symptomatology to life success. METHOD: A sample of 320 post-secondary students was initially assessed for ADHD symptomatology using the Conners' Adult ADHD Rating Scale (CAARS). Fifteen years later, participants were re-assessed using the CAARS and several measures of life success (e.g., relationship satisfaction, career satisfaction, and stress levels). RESULTS: Inattention and hyperactivity-impulsivity symptoms showed strong stability across the 15-year period. Additionally, inattention symptoms during emerging adulthood and early middle adulthood were consistently associated with poorer life success (i.e., lower relationship and career satisfaction), particularly for men. Associations for hyperactivity-impulsivity symptoms were less consistent. CONCLUSION: ADHD symptomatology can be conceptualized as a stable, dimensional trait across adulthood, with important impacts on life success.

Balancing food production with climate change mitigation and biodiversity conservation in the Brazilian Amazon.

Climate change mitigation and biodiversity conservation are two major environmental actions that need to be effectively performed this century, alongside ensuring food supply for a growing global human population. These three issues are highly interlinked through land management systems. Thus, major global food production regions located in biodiversity hotpots and with potential for carbon sequestration face trade-offs between these valuable land-based ecosystem services. The state of Mato Grosso in Brazil is one such region, where private lands that have been illegally used for agriculture could be restored to natural vegetation - with potential benefits for climate change mitigation and biodiversity conservation, although with potentially negative effects on food production. To address this challenge, in this study we used a multicriteria nexus modeling approach that considers carbon stocks, priority areas for biodiversity conservation, and the opportunity for food production, to develop scenarios of land allocation that aim to balance the benefits and drawbacks of ecosystem restoration. Results show that forcing landowners to restore their individual lands compromises the potential for a "green land market" throughout the Amazon biome in which private landowners with lower food production capacities (e.g., less connected to markets and infrastructure) would benefit from restoration programs that compensate them for the inclusion of environmental restoration among their economic activities, instead of taking large economic risks to produce more food. We additionally highlight that strategic ecosystem restoration can achieve higher gains in biodiversity and carbon with lower costs of restoration actions and with minimal impacts on agriculture. Analyses like ours demonstrate how scenarios of land allocation that simultaneously address climate mitigation and biodiversity conservation through ecosystem restoration, while also minimizing possible impacts on food production, can be sought to move the world towards a sustainable future.

Complex relationships between soybean trade destination and tropical deforestation.

Over the last few years, understanding of the effects of increasingly interconnected global flows of agricultural commodities on coupled human and natural systems has significantly improved. However, many important factors in environmental change that are influenced by these commodity flows are still not well understood. Here, we present an empirical spatial modelling approach to assess how changes in forest cover are influenced by trade destination. Using data for soybean-producing municipalities in the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil, between 2004 and 2017, we evaluated the relationships between forest cover change and the annual soybean trade destination. Results show that although most of the soybean produced in Mato Grosso during the study period (60%) was destined for international markets, municipalities with greater and more consistent soybean production not destined for international markets during the study period were more strongly associated with deforestation. In these municipalities, soybean production was also significantly correlated with cattle and pasture expansion. These results have important implications for the sustainable management of natural resources in the face of an increasingly interconnected world, while also helping to identify the most suitable locations for implementing policies to reduce deforestation risks.

ADHD and Academic Success in University Students: The Important Role of Impaired Attention.

OBJECTIVE: To improve on several methodological issues regarding current literature investigating the relationship between ADHD symptomatology and academic success in adults and examine the relative contributions of specific dimensions of ADHD symptomatology (i.e., inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity) to post-secondary academic success. METHOD: A large sample of 3,688 post-secondary students were examined using a longitudinal design. The Conners' Adult ADHD Rating Scale (CAARS) was used to assess adult ADHD symptoms and academic success was assessed using students' official academic records (e.g., final GPAs and degree completion status). RESULTS: Students with greater inattention symptomatology at the start of their academic program showed consistently poorer long-term academic success (i.e., lower GPAs, higher dropout rates), regardless of gender. CONCLUSION: Inattention symptoms are the primary driver of the relationship between ADHD symptomatology and academic underachievement in adults. Post-secondary education institutions should target and prioritize educational programming for inattention symptoms of ADHD in at-risk post-secondary students.

Unequal ecosystems of global health authorial expertise: Decolonising noncommunicable disease.

The decolonisation agenda is gathering momentum in global health. Within this movement, one domain of analysis has been the ways in which the geographies of scholarly knowledge production (re)produce the inequities of coloniality. Drawing on the example of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs), here we deviate from this and instead examine the authorship of the key global documents that were used to ignite and mobilise the NCD advocacy agenda from 2000 to 2020. In doing so, we reflect on the changing ecosystems of authorial expertise. It shows that while the geographic distribution of expertise has broadened over time, the NCD domain remains a fairly tight and circumscribed network. Importantly this research also shows the complexities of ascribing location to expertise, a finding that speaks back to the decolonisation debate.

Transport cost to port though Brazilian federal roads network: Dataset for years 2000, 2005, 2010 and 2017.

Transport costs can play a significant role in agricultural exports and businesses profitability. It can also influence farmers' decisions regarding cropland expansion, intensification or land abandonment. Thus, transport is useful to take into account when modeling and evaluating land use and cover change related to agriculture production. The dataset described in this article represents the Infrastructure Capital in the work presented by Millington et al. (2021) [1], in which the CRAFTY-Brazil model is used to evaluate the impacts of changing global demand for agricultural products on land use and cover change. This modeling required a transport cost dataset that spanned the model calibration period, was consistent through time and covered the entire study area. The most recent federal road network (for year 2017) obtained in vector format (shapefile) was joined to road section surface status tables for past years (2000, 2005 and 2010) in order to reconstruct the historic road network. Export ports handling agricultural commodities, and their years of operation, were identified. Both datasets were used to derive the relative transport cost to the nearest port for Brazil, for years 2000, 2005, 2010 and 2017.

A bifactor analysis of the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale: Further support for a general alexithymia factor.

The 20-Item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) is the most widely used measure to assess the personality construct of alexithymia and is composed of three-factor analytically derived subscales. These subscales measure and represent three critical, theoretically based facets of alexithymia. The subscales are distinct, yet highly interrelated and only as a collective body do they reflect adequately the alexithymia construct. Although different studies using both university student and community samples suggest that TAS-20 total scores are largely reflective of variation on a single construct, and that subscale scores do not provide unique and reliable information beyond total scores, many users of the scale frequently continue to employ and even rely more heavily on subscale scores rather than total scale scores when interpreting research study outcomes. Our goal in this study is to provide clinicians and researchers with replicable psychometric information for the TAS-20 estimated from bifactor modeling in an attempt to provide further support for using total rather than subscale scores. In general, our findings were consistent with previous studies indicating that TAS-20 total scores can be considered indicative of a single construct. The replication of these earlier results from previous investigations provides additional support for the use of a total TAS-20 score and questions the utility of using TAS-20 subscale scores. Based on these results, we recommend that researchers and clinicians use a single total TAS-20 score and not subscale scores. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).

Stability and Change in Trait Emotional Intelligence in Emerging Adulthood: A Four-Year Population-Based Study.

Trait Emotional Intelligence (EI)-related competencies are in growing demand in educational and vocational settings. The present study assesses the developmental dynamics of trait EI in emerging adulthood by capitalizing on the inclusion of a measure of trait EI in the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (NLSCY) called the Emotional Quotient Inventory: Mini (EQ-i: Mini). A sample of 1064 young adults (50% female) from ages 20-21 to 24-25 years was used to assess 4-year rank-order stability and mean-level change of trait EI, as well as whether the EQ-i: Mini functions equivalently over time (longitudinal measurement invariance). Results revealed full configural, partial metric, and scalar invariance of the construct for this time period. The Stress Management subscale achieved invariance at the residual level. After controlling for partial non-invariance, moderate levels of rank-order stability coefficients were found, suggesting malleability of the construct during emerging adulthood. Consistent with the maturity principle, there was a moderate increase in trait EI (specifically in the Interpersonal and Adaptability subscales). The malleability of trait EI suggests opportunities for enhancing socioemotional competencies in emerging adults, such as through formal and continuing education programing, on-the-job training, and targeted employment interventions.

Development and psychometric evaluation of an informant form of the 20-item Toronto alexithymia scale.

OBJECTIVE: The alexithymia personality construct encompasses difficulties identifying and describing feelings, restricted imaginal processes, and an externally oriented cognitive style. The construct was derived initially from observations of patients with classic psychosomatic diseases. The self-report 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) is the most frequently used measure to assess alexithymia. A concern associated with the TAS-20 is whether individuals can accurately self-report difficulties identifying and describing feelings if they are deficient in those abilities. To address this issue, we sought to develop and validate an informant form (version) of the TAS-20, the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale - Informant Form (TAS-20-IF). METHOD: We employed a three-phase methodological strategy. In the first phase, items from the TAS-20 were re-written into a third person version by a team of experts. In the second phase, the "traditional" three-factor structure was tested in the TAS-20-IF using confirmatory factor analysis in a large sample of young adults (N = 857). The third phase was conducted with another sample (N = 430) composed of "informants" (n = 215), who completed the TAS-20-IF, and "targets" (n = 215), who completed the TAS-20 (informants were nominated by the targets). RESULTS: The psychometric properties (items and scales) of both versions were adequate and the three-factor structure of the TAS-20-IF was supported; the correlation between the two versions was statistically significant and the factor structures were similar. CONCLUSION: Although further research is needed to replicate these findings, especially in clinical samples, the results support the reliability and validity of the TAS-20-IF.

Teaching emotional and social competencies: Efficacy of a work readiness program designed for vulnerable youth.

BACKGROUND: As emotional and social competency training proliferates within a work readiness context, concerns remain regarding their efficacy. Data on these programs tends to be scarce and outcome objectives are often poorly defined. OBJECTIVE: Authors developed and tested a work readiness emotional and social competency program specifically designed for at-risk young adults, tailored with best practices in mind. METHOD: 84 clients of a community organization that provides employment support to young adults with disabilities (48 men and 36 women) with a mean age of 28.17 years (SD = 11.64) completed measures of emotional intelligence and alexithymia on either side of the 4-week intervention. RESULTS: Men's interpersonal scores and women's adaptability scores showed significant improvement across the intervention. In addition, women's scores in both identifying and describing feelings improved significantly, as did men's scores in describing feelings. CONCLUSIONS: Within the context of work readiness, participants in an intervention to improve emotional and social competencies can see key improvements to competencies linked to occupational attainment.

Diamond nanopillar arrays for quantum microscopy of neuronal signals.

Significance: Wide-field measurement of cellular membrane dynamics with high spatiotemporal resolution can facilitate analysis of the computing properties of neuronal circuits. Quantum microscopy using a nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center is a promising technique to achieve this goal. Aim: We propose a proof-of-principle approach to NV-based neuron functional imaging. Approach: This goal is achieved by engineering NV quantum sensors in diamond nanopillar arrays and switching their sensing mode to detect the changes in the electric fields instead of the magnetic fields, which has the potential to greatly improve signal detection. Apart from containing the NV quantum sensors, nanopillars also function as waveguides, delivering the excitation/emission light to improve sensitivity. The nanopillars also improve the amplitude of the neuron electric field sensed by the NV by removing screening charges. When the nanopillar array is used as a cell niche, it acts as a cell scaffolds which makes the pillars function as biomechanical cues that facilitate the growth and formation of neuronal circuits. Based on these growth patterns, numerical modeling of the nanoelectromagnetics between the nanopillar and the neuron was also performed. Results: The growth study showed that nanopillars with a 2 - µ m pitch and a 200-nm diameter show ideal growth patterns for nanopillar sensing. The modeling showed an electric field amplitude as high as ≈ 1.02 × 10 10 mV / m at an NV 100 nm from the membrane, a value almost 10 times the minimum field that the NV can detect. Conclusion: This proof-of-concept study demonstrated unprecedented NV sensing potential for the functional imaging of mammalian neuron signals.

Twenty-five years with the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale.

OBJECTIVE: Twenty-five years ago, this journal published two articles reporting the development and initial validation of the 20-Item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20). Since then the literature on alexithymia has burgeoned with the vast majority of this research using the TAS-20, including multiple language translations of the scale. METHOD: In this article we review the psychometric literature evaluating various aspects of the reliability and validity of the TAS-20 and examine some of the controversies surrounding the scale and the construct it assesses. We reflect on the ways in which the TAS-20 has advanced the measurement of the construct and theory of alexithymia. We also discuss recent developments and some future directions for the measurement of alexithymia. RESULTS: Although not without some controversy, the preponderance of the accumulated evidence over a 25-year period supports various aspects of the reliability and validity of the TAS-20, including findings from confirmatory factor analytic and convergent and discriminant validity studies which are consistent with Nemiah et al.'s (Nemiah et al., 1976 [3]) and Taylor and colleagues (Taylor et al., 1997 [9]) theoretical formulations and definition of the alexithymia construct. CONCLUSIONS: Based on the accumulated empirical evidence of 25 years, we conclude that the TAS-20 is a reliable and valid instrument and accurately reflects and measures the construct as it was originally defined by Nemiah et al. Nemiah et al. (1976) [3] as composed of deficits in affect awareness and expression and pensée opératoire (operational thinking). Clinicians and researchers can use the TAS-20 to confidently measure alexithymia, the roots of which have foundations in psychosomatic medicine.

Predicting the Pursuit of Post-Secondary Education: Role of Trait Emotional Intelligence in a Longitudinal Study.

Trait Emotional Intelligence (EI) is a constellation of emotional self-perceptions and dispositions related to perceiving, understanding, using, and managing emotions of self and others. Although higher trait EI has been implicated in post-secondary success among university students. There is lack of evidence for whether it predicts the pursuit of post-secondary education (PSE) in emerging adulthood. This was the first study to investigate the role of trait EI in PSE pursuit using a large, nationally-representative sample of Canadian young adults who participated in the National Longitudinal Survey for Children and Youth (NLSCY). Participants in this dataset reported on their PSE status at three biennial waves (age 20-21, 22-23, and 24-25), and completed a four-factor self-report scale for trait EI (Emotional Quotient Inventory: Mini) at ages 20-21 and 24-25. Higher trait EI subscale scores were significantly associated with greater likelihood of PSE participation both concurrently, and at 2- and 4-year follow-ups. Overall, these associations were larger for men than women. The finding that these links persisted over a multi-year period is particularly promising, as it represents an important validation step toward further investment in socioemotional competencies as part of youth development interventions.

Taxometric Analysis of the Toronto Structured Interview for Alexithymia: Further Evidence That Alexithymia Is a Dimensional Construct.

Alexithymia is a clinically relevant personality construct characterized by difficulties identifying and describing feelings, externally oriented thinking, and impoverished imaginal processes. Previous taxometric investigations provided evidence that alexithymia is best conceptualized as a continuous dimension rather than a discrete type, at least when assessed with the self-report 20-Item Toronto Alexithymia Scale. The aim of the current study was to test the categorical versus dimensional structure of alexithymia using the recently developed Toronto Structured Interview for Alexithymia. Three nonredundant taxometric procedures (MAXCOV, MAMBAC, and L-Mode) were performed on the Toronto Structured Interview for Alexithymia subscale scores from a multinational sample of 842 adults. All taxometric procedures produced unambiguously dimensional solutions, providing further evidence that the core alexithymia features are continuously distributed in the population. Discussion focuses on the theoretical, assessment, and clinical implications of these findings for the alexithymia construct.

Quantum probe hyperpolarisation of molecular nuclear spins.

Hyperpolarisation of nuclear spins is important in overcoming sensitivity and resolution limitations of magnetic resonance imaging and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. Current hyperpolarisation techniques require high magnetic fields, low temperatures, or catalysts. Alternatively, the emergence of room temperature spin qubits has opened new pathways to achieve direct nuclear spin hyperpolarisation. Employing a microwave-free cross-relaxation induced polarisation protocol applied to a nitrogen vacancy qubit, we demonstrate quantum probe hyperpolarisation of external molecular nuclear spins to ~50% under ambient conditions, showing a single qubit increasing the polarisation of ~106 nuclear spins by six orders of magnitude over the thermal background. Results are verified against a detailed theoretical treatment, which also describes how the system can be scaled up to a universal quantum hyperpolarisation platform for macroscopic samples. Our results demonstrate the prospects for this approach to nuclear spin hyperpolarisation for molecular imaging and spectroscopy and its potential to extend beyond into other scientific areas.

Connecting Earth observation to high-throughput biodiversity data.

Understandably, given the fast pace of biodiversity loss, there is much interest in using Earth observation technology to track biodiversity, ecosystem functions and ecosystem services. However, because most biodiversity is invisible to Earth observation, indicators based on Earth observation could be misleading and reduce the effectiveness of nature conservation and even unintentionally decrease conservation effort. We describe an approach that combines automated recording devices, high-throughput DNA sequencing and modern ecological modelling to extract much more of the information available in Earth observation data. This approach is achievable now, offering efficient and near-real-time monitoring of management impacts on biodiversity and its functions and services.

Microwave-free nuclear magnetic resonance at molecular scales.

The implementation of nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) at the nanoscale is a major challenge, as the resolution of conventional methods is limited to mesoscopic scales. Approaches based on quantum spin probes, such as the nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centre in diamond, have achieved nano-NMR under ambient conditions. However, the measurement protocols require application of complex microwave pulse sequences of high precision and relatively high power, placing limitations on the design and scalability of these techniques. Here we demonstrate NMR on a nanoscale organic environment of proton spins using the NV centre while eliminating the need for microwave manipulation of either the NV or the environmental spin states. We also show that the sensitivity of our significantly simplified approach matches that of existing techniques using the NV centre. Removing the requirement for coherent manipulation while maintaining measurement sensitivity represents a significant step towards the development of robust, non-invasive nanoscale NMR probes.

Environmentally Mediated Coherent Control of a Spin Qubit in Diamond.

The coherent control of spin qubits forms the basis of many applications in quantum information processing and nanoscale sensing, imaging, and spectroscopy. Such control is conventionally achieved by direct driving of the qubit transition with a resonant global field, typically at microwave frequencies. Here we introduce an approach that relies on the resonant driving of nearby environment spins, whose localized magnetic field in turn drives the qubit when the environmental spin Rabi frequency matches the qubit resonance. This concept of environmentally mediated resonance (EMR) is explored experimentally using a qubit based on a single nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center in diamond, with nearby electronic spins serving as the environmental mediators. We demonstrate EMR driven coherent control of the NV spin state, including the observation of Rabi oscillations, free induction decay, and spin echo. This technique also provides a way to probe the nanoscale environment of spin qubits, which we illustrate by acquisition of electron spin resonance spectra from single NV centers in various settings.

What's in the name 'alexithymia'? A commentary on "Affective agnosia: Expansion of the alexithymia construct and a new opportunity to integrate and extend Freud's legacy.".

The recent proposal of a new type of agnosia termed 'affective agnosia' extends Freud's legacy and captures the concept of not knowing one's own emotions. This concept links well with the theory of levels of emotional awareness and maps onto a hierarchical model of neural substrates of emotional experience, but does not encompass the pensée opératoire component of the alexithymia construct. Moreover, identifying agnosia and anomia subtypes, which connotes a categorical conceptualization of alexithymia, is inconsistent with the dimensional nature of the construct. We describe a more widely accepted definition of alexithymia, and argue that although aptly descriptive, the concept of affective agnosia does not advance the theory, measurement, and treatment of alexithymia. A review of alexithymia literature indicates that impairment in the mental representation of emotions has been a central aspect of alexithymia theory since the concept was introduced, and guided the development of the Toronto Alexithymia Scale and other measures of the construct. Moreover, techniques to enhance mentalization of emotions have been used by psychotherapists for several decades.

A Tutorial on RxODE: Simulating Differential Equation Pharmacometric Models in R.

This tutorial presents the application of an R package, RxODE, that facilitates quick, efficient simulations of ordinary differential equation models completely within R. Its application is illustrated through simulation of design decision effects on an adaptive dosing regimen. The package provides an efficient, versatile way to specify dosing scenarios and to perform simulation with variability with minimal custom coding. Models can be directly translated to Rshiny applications to facilitate interactive, real-time evaluation/iteration on simulation scenarios.