Rearing styles and psychopathology in children and adolescents with intellectual disability from Chile and Spain

Los objetivos de nuestro estudio fueron: a) evaluar los estilos educativos en función de la presencia de discapacidad intelectual (DI) y de dos culturas, Chile y España; y b) valorar cómo estos aspectos se asocian con la psicopatología. Participaron 236 niños y adolescentes de 8 a 14 años de edad, que fueron clasificados en los siguientes tres grupos en función del tipo de DI: con síndrome de Down (SD), discapacidad intelectual idiopática (DII) o sin discapacidad. Los progenitores contestaron un cuestionario de estilo educativo y de psicopatología. Hallamos que en Chile el grupo con SD percibió menos sobreprotección. Las medidas clínicas de psicopatología se asociaron con sobreprotección, rechazo y la presencia de DI. Además los participantes chilenos informaron de mayor depresión y somatización que los participantes españoles. Esperamos que nuestros hallazgos sean un aporte para la prevención e intervención de los estilos educativos y la psicopatología en personas con DI.Los objetivos de nuestro estudio fueron: a) evaluar los estilos educativos en función de la presencia de discapacidad intelectual (DI) y de dos culturas, Chile y España; y b) valorar cómo estos aspectos se asocian con la psicopatología. Participaron 236 niños y adolescentes de 8 a 14 años de edad, que fueron clasificados en los siguientes tres grupos en función del tipo de DI: con síndrome de Down (SD), discapacidad intelectual idiopática (DII) o sin discapacidad. Los progenitores contestaron un cuestionario de estilo educativo y de psicopatología. Hallamos que en Chile el grupo con SD percibió menos sobreprotección. Las medidas clínicas de psicopatología se asociaron con sobreprotección, rechazo y la presencia de DI. Además los participantes chilenos informaron de mayor depresión y somatización que los participantes españoles. Esperamos que nuestros hallazgos sean un aporte para la prevención e intervención de los estilos educativos y la psicopatología en personas con DI.Los objetivos de nuestro estudio fueron: a) evaluar los estilos educativos en función de la presencia de discapacidad intelectual (DI) y de dos culturas, Chile y España; y b) valorar cómo estos aspectos se asocian con la psicopatología. Participaron 236 niños y adolescentes de 8 a 14 años de edad, que fueron clasificados en los siguientes tres grupos en función del tipo de DI: con síndrome de Down (SD), discapacidad intelectual idiopática (DII) o sin discapacidad. Los progenitores contestaron un cuestionario de estilo educativo y de psicopatología. Hallamos que en Chile el grupo con SD percibió menos sobreprotección. Las medidas clínicas de psicopatología se asociaron con sobreprotección, rechazo y la presencia de DI. Además los participantes chilenos informaron de mayor depresión y somatización que los participantes españoles. Esperamos que nuestros hallazgos sean un aporte para la prevención e intervención de los estilos educativos y la psicopatología en personas con DI.The aims of our study were: a) to evaluate how parenting styles vary according to the presence of intellectual disability (ID) and between two cultures – Chile and Spain –; and to value their association with psychopathology. Participants were 236 children and adolescents aged 8-14, who were classified in the following three groups according to the type of ID: with Down syndrome (DS), idiopathic intellectual disability (IID) or without disability. Parents answered a questionnaire on perceived rearing style and psychopathology. Our results showed that in Chile DS group perceived less overprotection. Clinical scores were associated with overprotection, rejection and the presence of ID. Moreover, the Chilean participants reported more depression and somatisation than the Spanish participants. We expect our findings will contribute to the prevention and intervention of unfavourable rearing styles and psychopathology in ID

A combined theoretical and experimental study of the low temperature properties of BaZrO3

Low temperature properties of BaZrO3 are revealed by combining experimental techniques (X-ray diffraction, neutron scattering and dielectric measurements) with theoretical first-principles-based methods (total energy and linear response calculations within density functional theory, and effective Hamiltonian approaches incorporating/neglecting zero-point phonon vibrations). Unlike most of the perovskite systems, BaZrO3 does not undergo any (long-range-order) structural phase transition and thus remains cubic and paraelectric down to 2 K, even when neglecting zero-point phonon vibrations. On the other hand, these latter pure quantum effects lead to a negligible thermal dependency of the cubic lattice parameter below ~ 40 K. They also affect the dielectricity of BaZrO3 by inducing an overall saturation of the real part of the dielectric response, for temperatures below ~ 40 K. Two fine structures in the real part, as well as in the imaginary part, of dielectric response are further observed around 50-65 K and 15 K, respectively. Microscopic origins (e.g., unavoidable defects and oxygen octahedra rotation occurring at a local scale) of such anomalies are suggested. Finally, possible reasons for the facts that some of these dielectric anomalies have not been previously reported in the better studied KTaO3 and SrTiO3 incipient ferroelectrics are also discussed.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, submitted to Physical Review

Subtidal macrozoobenthos communities from northern Chile during and post El Niño 1997–1998

Despite a large amount of climatic and oceanographic information dealing with the recurring climate phenomenon El Niño (EN) and its well known impact on diversity of marine benthic communities, most published data are rather descriptive and consequently our understanding of the underlying mechanisms and processes that drive community structure during EN are still very scarce. In this study, we address two questions on the effects of EN on macrozoobenthic communities: (1) how does EN affect species diversity of the communities in northern Chile? and (2) is EN a phenomenon that restarts community assembling processes by affecting species interactions in northern Chile? To answer these questions, we compared species diversity and co-occurrence patterns of soft-bottoms macrozoobenthos communities from the continental shelf off northern Chile during (March 1998) and after (September 1998) the strong EN event 1997–1998. The methods used varied from species diversity and species co-occurrence analyses to multivariate ordination methods. Our results indicate that EN positively affects diversity of macrozoobenthos communities in the study area, increasing the species richness and diversity and decreasing the species dominance. EN represents a strong disturbance that affects species interactions that rule the species assembling processes in shallow-water, sea-bottom environments

A new perspective of the climatological features of upper-level cut-off lows in the Southern Hemisphere

This study presents a detailed view of the seasonal variability of upper-level cut-off lows (COLs) in the Southern Hemisphere. The COLs are identified and tracked using data from a 36-year period of the European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecast reanalysis (ERA-Interim). The objective identification of the COLs uses a new approach, which is based on 300 hPa relative vorticity minima, and three restrictive criteria of the presence of a cold-core, stratospheric potential vorticity intrusion, and cut-off cyclonic circulation. The highest COL activity is in agreement with previous studies, located near three main continental areas (Australia, South America, and Africa), with maximum frequencies usually observed in the austral autumn. The COL mean intensity values show a marked seasonal and spatial variation, with maximum (minimum) values during the austral winter (summer), a unique feature that has not been observed previously in studies based on the geopotential. The link between intensity and lysis is examined, and finds that weaker systems are more susceptible to lysis in the vicinity of the Andes Cordillera, associated with the topographic Rossby wave. Lysis and genesis regions are close to each other, confirming that COLs are quasi-stationary systems. Also, COLs tend to move eastward and are faster over the higher latitudes. The mean growth/decay rates coincide with the major genesis and lysis density regions, such as the significant decay values across the Andes all year. As a consequence of using vorticity for the tracking method a longer lifetime of COLs is detected than in other studies, but this does not affect the total frequency of occurrence. Comparisons with other studies suggest that the differences in seasonality are due to uncertainties in the reanalyses and the methods used to identify COLs

New insights into the nature of the Cibacron brilliant red 3B-A – Chitosan interaction

Cibacron brilliant red 3B-A (CBR) has been introduced to determine chitosan (CS) concentrations in solution, and several studies applied it to measure chitosan content in pharmaceutical formulations. So far, studies have relied on the absorbance band shift to 570 nm to determine the extent of the CBR – CS interaction. In this study, we show that CBR forms micro- to nanometer sized aggregates with CS, depending on their charge ratio and that other photophysical changes in CBR are induced by this interaction. We found that, besides the bathochromic band shift, aggregation induces emission at 600 nm and emission quenching at 360 nm. We compared changes CS induced in absorbance and fluorescence emission of CBR with the CS monomer glucosamine and poly(allylamine) hydrochloride, which both contain amino groups, and found that similar but less intense photophysical changes also occur. Furthermore, CS-induced circular dichroism in CBR suggests a twisted, chiral structure of these aggregates that should match with the previously published in silico simulations of the structure of CS in solution. The low linear charge density of CS and its chiral conformation are considered responsible for the enhanced photophysical response of CBR interacting with the polycation

Stochastic simulation of multiscale complex systems with PISKaS: A rule-based approach

Computational simulation is a widely employed methodology to study the dynamic behavior of complex systems. Although common approaches are based either on ordinary differential equations or stochastic differential equations, these techniques make several assumptions which, when it comes to biological processes, could often lead to unrealistic models. Among others, model approaches based on differential equations entangle kinetics and causality, failing when complexity increases, separating knowledge from models, and assuming that the average behavior of the population encompasses any individual deviation. To overcome these limitations, simulations based on the Stochastic Simulation Algorithm (SSA) appear as a suitable approach to model complex biological systems. In this work, we review three different models executed in PISKaS: a rule-based framework to produce multiscale stochastic simulations of complex systems. These models span multiple time and spatial scales ranging from gene regulation up to Game Theory. In the first example, we describe a model of the core regulatory network of gene expression in Escherichia coli highlighting the continuous model improvement capacities of PISKaS. The second example describes a hypothetical outbreak of the Ebola virus occurring in a compartmentalized environment resembling cities and highways. Finally, in the last example, we illustrate a stochastic model for the prisoner's dilemma; a common approach from social sciences describing complex interactions involving trust within human populations. As whole, these models demonstrate the capabilities of PISKaS providing fertile scenarios where to explore the dynamics of complex systems