Neuroarchitecture of musical emotions

La respuesta emocional ante la música, o emoción musical, es una respuesta universal que depende de diferentes procesos psicológicos y recluta una extensa red de estructuras neuronales. Mediante el empleo de técnicas como la electroencefalografía, la resonancia magnética funcional y los estudios con población clínica e individuos con formación musical previa, se ha empezado a dilucidar estos mecanismos cerebrales. El objetivo de este artículo es hacer una revisión de los trabajos más relevantes en los que se identifican los correlatos neuronales de la emoción musical, desde los procesos más automáticos hasta los más complejos, y comprender cómo interaccionan en el cerebro. En concreto, se describe cómo la presentación de música emocional está asociada a una respuesta rápida en estructuras talámicas y subtalámicas, acompañada por cambios electrodérmicos y endocrinos. También se explica que el procesamiento de la emoción musical implica la activación de la corteza auditiva y estructuras límbicas y paralímbicas, como la amígdala, la corteza cingulada anterior o el hipocampo, lo que demuestra la contribución del sistema límbico a la emoción musical. Asimismo, se detalla cómo la emoción musical depende de los significados semántico y sintáctico de la música, procesados en áreas temporales y parietofrontales, respectivamente. Además, se mencionan trabajos recientes que han demostrado cómo los mecanismos de simulación emocional también contribuyen a la emoción musical. Por último, se hace un resumen de estos trabajos, comentando sus limitaciones y ofreciendo alternativas para seguir avanzando en el estudio de la neuroarquitectura de la emoción musical

Fichte and Hegel on Recognition

In this paper I provide an interpretation of Hegel’s account of ‘recognition’ (Anerkennung) in the 1802-3 System of Ethical Life as a critique of Fichte’s account of recognition in the 1796-7 Foundations of Natural Right. In the first three sections of the paper I argue that Fichte’s account of recognition in the domain of right is not concerned with recognition as a moral attitude. I then turn, in section four, to a discussion of Hegel’s critique and transformation of Fichte’s conception of recognition. Hegel’s transformation consists, I argue, in the claim that a comprehensive account of recognition in the domain of right must be concerned with recognition as a moral attitude

Building social capital through breastfeeding peer support: Insights from an evaluation of a voluntary breastfeeding peer support service in North-West England

Background: Peer support is reported to be a key method to help build social capital in communities. To date there are no studies that describe how this can be achieved through a breastfeeding peer support service. In this paper we present findings from an evaluation of a voluntary model of breastfeeding peer support in North-West England to describe how the service was operationalized and embedded into the community. This study was undertaken from May, 2012 to May, 2013. Methods: Interviews (group or individual) were held with 87 participants: 24 breastfeeding women, 13 peer supporters and 50 health and community professionals. The data contained within 23 monthly monitoring reports (January, 2011 to February 2013) compiled by the voluntary peer support service were also extracted and analysed. Results: Thematic analysis was undertaken using social capital concepts as a theoretical lens. Key findings were identified to resonate with ’bonding’, ‘bridging’ and ‘linking’ forms of social capital. These insights illuminate how the peer support service facilitates ‘bonds’ with its members, and within and between women who access the service; how the service ‘bridges’ with individuals from different interests and backgrounds, and how ‘links’ were forged with those in authority to gain access and reach to women and to promote a breastfeeding culture. Some of the tensions highlighted within the social capital literature were also identified. Conclusions: Horizontal and vertical relationships forged between the peer support service and community members enabled peer support to be embedded into care pathways, helped to promote positive attitudes to breastfeeding and to disseminate knowledge and maximise reach for breastfeeding support across the community. Further effort to engage with those of different ethnic backgrounds and to resolve tensions between peer supporters and health professionals is warranted

Design of a 4D Trajectory Tracking Controller with Anti-Windup Protection for Fixed-Wing Aircraft

23rd International Conference on System Theory, Control and Computing, ICSTCC (2019: Sinaia; Romania)This work contains the design and test of a control scheme for a fixed-wing aircraft to track 4-dimensional waypoints. The controller scheme is a multi-loop design that consists of an inner controller synthesized with the h-infinity loop-shaping method and an outer controller synthesized with the PID method. Multiple inner-loop controllers are synthesized in a state-machine configuration as a measure against saturation windup. © 2019 IEEE

Increasing interhemispheric connectivity between human visual motion areas uncovers asymmetric sensitivity to horizontal motion

Our conscious perceptual experience relies on a hierarchical process involving integration of low-level sen-sory encoding and higher-order sensory selection.1 This hierarchical process may scale at different levels of brain functioning, including integration of information between the hemispheres.2-5 Here, we test this hypoth-esis for the perception of visual motion stimuli. Across 3 experiments, we manipulated the connectivity be-tween the left and right visual motion complexes (V5/MT+) responsible for horizontal motion perception2,3 by means of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS).4,5 We found that enhancing the strength of connections from the left to the right V5/MT+, by inducing spike-timing-dependent plasticity6 in this pathway, increased sensitivity to horizontal motion. These changes were present immediately and lasted at least 90 min after intervention. Notably, little perceptual changes were observed when strengthening connections from the right to the left V5/MT+. Furthermore, we found that this asymmetric modulation was mirrored by an asym-metric perceptual bias in the direction of the horizontal motion. Overall, observers were biased toward left-ward relative to rightward motion direction. Crucially, following the strengthening of the connections from right to left V5/MT+, this bias could be momentarily reversed. These results suggest that the projections con-necting left and right V5/MT+ in the human visual cortex are asymmetrical, subtending a hierarchical role of hemispheric specialization7-10 favoring left-to-right hemisphere processing for integrating local sensory input into coherent global motion perception

Food-induced Emotional Resonance Improves Emotion Recognition

The effect of food substances on emotional states has been widely investigated, showing, for example, that eating chocolate is able to reduce negative mood. Here, for the first time, we have shown that the consumption of specific food substances is not only able to induce particular emotional states, but more importantly, to facilitate recognition of corresponding emotional facial expressions in others. Participants were asked to perform an emotion recognition task before and after eating either a piece of chocolate or a small amount of fish sauce – which we expected to induce happiness or disgust, respectively. Our results showed that being in a specific emotional state improves recognition of the corresponding emotional facial expression. Indeed, eating chocolate improved recognition of happy faces, while disgusted expressions were more readily recognized after eating fish sauce. In line with the embodied account of emotion understanding, we suggest that people are better at inferring the emotional state of others when their own emotional state resonates with the observed one

The Achievement of a Decentralized Water Management Through Stakeholder Participation: An Example from the Drôme River Catchment Area in France (1981–2008)

International audienceDifferent water Acts (e.g., the European Water Framework Directive) and stakeholders involved in aquatic affairs have promoted integrated river basin management (IRBM) over recent decades. However, few studies have provided feedback on these policies. The aim of the current article is to fill this gap by exploring how local newspapers reflect the implementation of a broad public participation within a catchment of France known for its innovation with regard to this domain. The media coverage of a water management strategy in the Drôme watershed from 1981 to 2008 was investigated using a content analysis and a geographic information system (GIS). We sought to determine what public participation and decentralized decision-making can be in practice. The results showed that this policy was integrated because of its social perspective, the high number of involved stakeholders, the willingness to handle water issues, and the local scale suitable for participation. We emphasized the prominence of the watershed scale guaranteed by the local water authority. This area was also characterized by compromise, arrangements, and power dynamics on a fine scale. We examined the most politically engaged writings regarding water management, which topics each group emphasized, and how the groups agreed and disagreed on issues based on their values and context. The temporal pattern of participation implementation was progressive but worked by fits and starts

Effect of food concentration and type of diet on Acartia survival and naupliar development

We have performed life table experiments to investigate the effects of different food types and concentrations on the larval development and survival up to adulthood of Acartia tonsa. The food species offered comprised a wide taxonomic spectrum: the pigmented flagellates Isochrysis galbana, Emiliania huxleyi, Rhodomonas sp., Prorocentrum minimum, the diatom Thalassiosira weissflogii, grown on medium offering enriched macronutrient concentrations and the ciliate Euplotes sp. initially cultured on Rhodomonas. For the ciliate species, also the functional response was studied. In order to avoid limitation by mineral nutrients, food algae have been taken from the exponential growth phase of the nutrient replete cultures. The suitability of Rhodomonas as a food source throughout the entire life cycle was not a surprise. However, in contrast to much of the recent literature about the inadequacy or even toxicity of diatoms, we found that also Thalassiosira could support Acartia-development through the entire life cycle. On the other hand, Acartia could not complete its life cycle when fed with the other food items, Prorocentrum having adverse effects even when mixed with Rhodomonas and Thalassiosira. Isochrysis well supported naupliar survival and development, but was insufficient to support further development until reproduction. With Emiliania and Euplotes, nauplii died off before most of them could reach the first copepodite stages. Acartia-nauplii showed a behavioral preference for Euplotes-feeding over diatom feeding, but nevertheless Euplotes was an insufficient diet to complete development beyond the naupliar stages

Environmental cues and constraints affecting the seasonality of dominant calanoid copepods in brackish, coastal waters: a case study of Acartia, Temora and Eurytemora species in the south-west Baltic

Information on physiological rates and tolerances helps one gain a cause-and-effect understanding of the role that some environmental (bottom–up) factors play in regulating the seasonality and productivity of key species. We combined the results of laboratory experiments on reproductive success and field time series data on adult abundance to explore factors controlling the seasonality of Acartia spp., Eurytemora affinis and Temora longicornis, key copepods of brackish, coastal and temperate environments. Patterns in laboratory and field data were discussed using a metabolic framework that included the effects of ‘controlling’, ‘masking’ and ‘directive’ environmental factors. Over a 5-year period, changes in adult abundance within two south-west Baltic field sites (Kiel Fjord Pier, 54°19′89N, 10°09′06E, 12–21 psu, and North/Baltic Sea Canal NOK, 54°20′45N, 9°57′02E, 4–10 psu) were evaluated with respect to changes in temperature, salinity, day length and chlorophyll a concentration. Acartia spp. dominated the copepod assemblage at both sites (up to 16,764 and 21,771 females m−3 at NOK and Pier) and was 4 to 10 times more abundant than E. affinis (to 2,939 m−3 at NOK) and T. longicornis (to 1,959 m−3 at Pier), respectively. Species-specific salinity tolerance explains differences in adult abundance between sampling sites whereas phenological differences among species are best explained by the influence of species-specific thermal windows and prey requirements supporting survival and egg production. Multiple intrinsic and extrinsic (environmental) factors influence the production of different egg types (normal and resting), regulate life-history strategies and influence match–mismatch dynamics