Depressive symptoms and academic self-image in adolescence.

The aim of this paper was to specifically analyse the relationship between the different components of academic self-image, defined as the way adolescents represent themselves as students, and self-reported depressive symptoms, assessed with the Children's Depression Inventory (CDI), in a non-clinical sample of 298 adolescents. We considered both adolescents' beliefs about their own cognitive functioning in academic performance and beliefs about their emotional attitude in achievement situations. Our data indicate that the pattern of correlation between emotional beliefs about schooling and learning are significantly related to CDI scores, but this correlation is not evident for the cognitive beliefs. This pattern of correlation is affected by actual school functioning, because correlation between CDI and beliefs is much more significant in subjects without school failure. Differences between gender in CDI scores, beliefs about schooling and learning, and pattern of correlation are considered. These results can enable to focus supporting psychological interventions on more specific targets.

Depression and school functioning in non-referred adolescents: a pilot study.

Self-image and self-perceived competencies have been considered to be related to depression in childhood and adolescence. Data from literature points to school functioning as one of the most important factors in self-esteem and self-worth during adolescence. Academic self image, defined as the way adolescents represent themselves as students, directly affects the global self-image; for this reason it has important psychopathological implications. The major aim of this preliminary report is to specifically analyze the relationship between academic self-image (assessed with a specific questionnaire), and self-reported depressive symptoms (assessed with the Children's Depression Inventory) in a school sample 150 adolescents. Our data indicate that the emotional beliefs about schooling and learning were significantly related to depressive symptomatology. Females scored higher in CDI and school anxiety. A real school failure did not affect the academic self image. These data seem to suggest that different components of the academic self-image can be differently associated with depressive feelings.

[Missed diagnosis: a case of congenital hypothyroidism treated after three years]. / Una diagnosi mancata: un caso di ipotiroidismo congenito trattato a 3 anni.

Congenital hypothyroidism (CH) is the most common cause of preventable mental retardation. Thyroid hormone deficiency in utero and in the first neonatal months is responsible for permanent damage. While foetal hypothyroidism is at present unavoidable, earlier diagnosis and initiation of treatment in neonates with CH is important and highly recommended. At the moment, the Italian screening program for CH allows diagnosis and treatment within the first month of life. In Italy, screening programs became obligatory only a short time ago. In some regions, they started a few years ago, whereas in others they have been carried out only in an irregular way and only a part of the population has been investigated. Therefore CH was diagnosed just on the basis of clinical signs, with a consequent delay in the initiation of substitutive therapy. We describe the case of a little girl with CH diagnosed when she was three years old. We report the results of this case follow-up study and we describe the features of her neuropsychological development to point out her improvement and permanent disorders. The little girl was clearly hypothyroid with delayed achievement at three, but with pharmacological treatment she showed a dramatic amelioration in growth, language, motor skills and cognitive performances.

Mild iodine deficiency during fetal/neonatal life and neuropsychological impairment in Tuscany.

The neuropsychological performance of schoolchildren living in areas with present and past iodine deficiency in Tuscany was investigated. Children were submitted to: a) block design subtest of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R) and a modified version of the WISC-R coding subtest which evaluate the general neuropsychological and cognitive performance, independently from familial cultural background; b) simple reaction time (RT) session which evaluates the efficiency of the whole information processing and nervous transmission mechanisms. Neuropsychological performance was tested in 107 children living in Borgo a Mozzano, an area of mild iodine deficiency (IDA) with a median urinary iodine excretion (UIE) of 64 micrograms/L (mean +/- SD: 80.1 +/- 57). One hundred and six sex and age-matched children living in Marina di Pisa, an iodine sufficient coastal village of Tuscany (ISA) with a median UIE of 142 micrograms/L (mean +/- SD: 173 +/- 95) were used as controls. Tests for neuropsychological performance were performed in 57 children living in the village of Vagli, an area with past iodine deficiency (PIDA): 30 children born before iodine prophylaxis (Group 1), when the median UIE was 32 micrograms/L (mean +/- SD: 47 +/- 22), 27 children born after the institution of iodine prophylaxis (Group 2), when the median UIE was 109 micrograms/L (mean +/- SD: 130 +/- 73). Sex and age-matched ISA-children were used as controls for each group. RTs were significantly delayed (p < 0.05) in IDA than in ISA children, while block design and coding subtests showed no significant difference.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Is interhemispheric transfer time related to age? A developmental study.

In simple visuomotor reaction time tasks, the difference between reaction time (RT) in the uncrossed hand/hemifield condition from RT in the crossed hand/hemifield, known as CUD (crossed-uncrossed difference), has been interpreted as reflecting interhemispheric transmission time (IHTT). Several studies in normal adults have found a CUD of a few milliseconds (3-4), while an abnormally long CUD has been reported in patients who underwent a surgical section of the corpus callosum or in congenital acallosal subjects. The corpus callosum, which is the most important structure for interhemispheric transfer of information, completes its myelination approximately by age ten. It has been hypothesized that the functional maturity of the corpus callosum coincides with the termination of the myelination cycle. No developmental study has focused on the development of IHTT, in relation to callosal maturation. The purpose of our study has been to investigate the development of interhemispheric transfer of visuomotor information in children aged seven to eleven, using a simple RT task with lateralized visual stimuli. The results indicate an age-related decrease of CUD, which we interpret as reflecting the maturation of the corpus callosum during childhood years.

Processing capacity limitations in pictorial and spatial representations in the totally congenitally blind.

The study of visuo-spatial imagery abilities in totally congenitally blind people may be instrumental in understanding the contribution of visual experience to imagery processes. In the present paper visuo-spatial imagery capacity was explored through a task devised by Kerr (1987) and adapted for presentation to the blind, in which subjects were asked to imagine either two- or three-dimensional matrices of different complexity and to follow a mental pathway. The first experiment showed that blind people have difficulty with three-dimensional matrices which are within the reach of sighted people, and that their performance is affected by the processing rate. In the second experiment the spatial and pictorial components of visual imagery were analyzed by way of the same spatial task and of a pictorial-tactual task in which subjects had to match a mental representation of a pathway to a tactually explored wire silhouette. On the latter task, blind people did not meet any particular difficulty, probably because they could form representations using other sensory modalities and because they were skillful in tactual exploration. These data suggest that research on the blind cannot easily contribute to the distinction between the spatial and pictorial components of visual imagery.