George G. Woodworth

Equal justice and the death penalty : a legal and empirical analysis

This bibliography was prepared by the Reference Staff of the University of Iowa Law Library and contains all published works within the following categories: Books and Monographs; Chapters in Books; Articles in Law Reviews and Other Scholarly Journals; Book Reviews; Statutory Drafting; Reports to Governmental Bodies and Professional Associations. Insofar as possible an effort has been made to consolidate all works that have been reprinted or substantially reprinted under the first published appearance of that work. This bibliography does not contain works in progress or works that have been accepted for publication but have not yet been published. This bibliography is intended to be current as of June 1, 2011.

Multivariate Predictors of Audiological Success with Multichannel Cochlear Implants

To predict the audiological outcomes of 2 multichannel cochlear implants, a preoperative battery of historical, audiological, electrophysiologic, and psychologic variables from 48 postlingually deafened adults was tested in a prospective randomized clinical trial. Multivariate analyses were used to select and combine these preoperative variables in a predictive index that was significantly related to audiological outcome at 9 months. The preoperative variables included in the predictive index were duration of profound deafness, speech reading ability, residual hearing, cognitive ability, measures of compliance and engagement with treatment, and use of nonverbal communication strategies. The preoperative predictive index had correlations of .81 with the Iowa Sentences Test, and .78 with the NU6 word understanding scores, both obtained in a sound-only test Probability and percentile curves generated from these data offer considerable optimism in forecasting the range of likely audiological outcomes that would be realized by postlingually deafened adult candidates for multichannel cochlear implants.

Recognition of familiar melodies by adult cochlear implant recipients and normal‐hearing adults

Abstract The purpose of this study was to compare melody recognition and pitch perception of adult cochlear implant recipients and normal-hearing adults and to identify factors that influence the ability of implant users to recognize familiar melodies. Forty-nine experienced cochlear implant recipients and 18 normal-hearing adults were tested on familiar melody recognition. The normal-hearing adults were significantly (p < 0.0001) more accurate than implant recipients. Implant recipients showed considerable variability in perception of complex tones and pure tones. There were significant negative correlations between melody recognition, age at the time of testing, length of profound deafness and complex-tone perception, and significant positive relations between melody recognition and speech recognition scores.

Effects of Frequency, Instrumental Family, and Cochlear Implant Type on Timbre Recognition and Appraisal:

The purpose of this study was to compare postlingually deafened cochlear implant recipients and normal-hearing adults on timbre (tone quality) recognition and appraisal of 8 musical instruments representing 3 frequency ranges and 4 instrumental families. The implant recipients were significantly less accurate than the normal-hearing adults on timbre recognition. The implant recipients gave significantly poorer ratings than did the normal-hearing adults to those instruments played in the higher frequency range and to those from the string family. The timbre measures were weakly correlated with speech perception measures, but were significantly correlated with 3 cognitive measures of sequential processing.

Performance over time of adult patients using the Ineraid or nucleus cochlear implant.

This study examined the average and individual performance over time of 49 adult cochlear implant subjects. Subjects were randomly assigned to receive either the Ineraid cochlear implant, with analog processing, or the Nucleus cochlear implant, with feature-extraction processing. All subjects had postlingual profound bilateral sensorineural hearing loss and received no significant benefit from hearing aids before implantation. Group data were examined in two ways. First, only subjects who had complete data over the test period were examined. Second, an analysis of all available data was carried out by mixed linear-model analysis. In this analysis, to account for missed follow-ups at the planned intervals, data consisting of the observations closest in time to the planned test times were modeled by natural splines with knots at the planned follow-up times. Contrasts between all pairs of planned follow-up times for each device were tested, as were contrasts between devices at each planned follow-up time. Results indicated little difference between the performance of the Ineraid and Nucleus subjects in their level of performance or their rate of learning. Postimplantation performance was typically superior to preimplantation performance within 9 months, and continued to improve up to 18-30 months depending on the speech perception measure. In some subjects, improvements in speech perception measures were observed up to four or five years postimplantation. There was also evidence that three subjects had a decrement in overall speech perception performance, although their postimplantation scores were always higher than their preimplantation scores. In at least one subjects this was likely a result of age-related cognition decrements.

Perception of rhythmic and sequential pitch patterns by normally hearing adults and adult cochlear implant users

Objective: This study compares the musical perception of 17 adult recipients of the Nucleus cochlear implant using two different format extraction processing strategies (F0F1F2 and MPEAK). Design: Over a 12 mo period, participants were alternately switched between two strategies every 3 mo. Performance was evaluated using three measures of rhythmic and sequential pitch perception. Results: Three individuals performed significantly better with the MPEAK strategy on one particular rhythm task, 11 participants performed better with the MPEAK strategy on another rhythm task, and no significant differences were found between the two strategies on a sequential pitch pattern task. Conclusions: Neither strategy seems clearly superior for perception of either sequential pitch or rhythmic patterns.

Genetic and environmental factors in adoptee antisocial personality

SummaryIn a sample of 286 adult male adoptees 44 met criteria for antisocial personality (ASP). Two types of biologic parent background were associated with increased incidence of ASP in offspring: those with alcohol problem and those with a criminal conviction or adjudged delinquency. ASP adoptees were also significantly more likely to be alcoholic. Log linear modeling showed that alcohol problems in a biologic parent predicted increased alcohol abuse in the adoptee and that criminality/delinquency in a biologic parent predicted adult adoptee ASP. In the log-linear model two environmental factors significantly increased adoptee ASP: (1) placement in an adoptive home where there was an alcohol problem or antisocial behavior; and (2) placement in a lower socioeconomic home when the adoptee came from a background of criminality/delinquency in a biologic parent. When the adoptee did not have this biologic background socioeconomic level appeared to have little effect on ASP incidence. The results suggest the importance of genetic-environmental interaction in the genesis of adult ASP disorder.

Electrically evoked compound action potentials of guinea pig and cat: responses to monopolar, monophasic stimulation.

We recorded electrically evoked compound action potentials (EAPs) from guinea pigs and cats using monophasic current pulses delivered by a monopolar intracochlear electrode. By using simple stimuli, we sought results that could shed light on basic excitation properties of the auditory nerve. In these acute experiments, the recording electrode was placed directly on the auditory nerve. Responses to anodic and cathodic stimulus pulses were recorded separately to evaluate stimulus polarity effects. Several polarity-dependent properties were observed. Both EAP morphology and latency were polarity-dependent, with greater latencies for cathodic stimulation. Threshold stimulus level was also polarity-dependent, but in different directions in the two species: cats had lower cathodic thresholds while guinea pigs had lower anodic thresholds. We also observed that the slopes of the EAP amplitude-level functions depended upon stimulus polarity. In most cases where EAP saturation amplitude could be measured, that amplitude was similar for anodic and cathodic stimuli, suggesting that either stimulus polarity can recruit all fibers, or at least a comparable numbers of fibers. The common findings (e.g., EAP morphology and polarity-dependent latency) observed in these two species suggest results that can be extrapolated to responses obtained in humans, while the species-specific findings (e.g., dependence of threshold on polarity) may point to underlying anatomical differences that caution against overgeneralization across species. Some of our observations also bear upon hypotheses of how electrical stimuli may excite different sites on auditory nerve fibers.

An adoption study of drug abuse/dependency in females.

In a sample of 102 women who had been adopted at birth, drug abuse/dependency was found by log-linear analyses to have a major pathway of genetic etiology that started with a biologic parent with antisocial personality and led to an adoptee with conduct disorder and then through aggressivity to drug abuse/dependency, as well as from conduct disorder directly to drug abuse. This result was similar to findings from a male sample collected from the same agencies and at the same time, wherein antisocial biologic parents produced aggressive and conduct-disordered off-spring, who in turn became drug abusers/dependents as adults. Results are compatible with family studies demonstrating that female drug abusers stem from deviant families and themselves demonstrate socially deviant behavior early in life. The present study shows that one element of familial factors is genetic, and that, in addition, the family environment directly affects behavior (aggressivity) that leads to drug abuse/dependency.

Psychological predictors of audiological outcomes of multichannel cochlear implants : preliminary findings

The purpose of this research was to determine whether psychological variables were associated with the variability that characterizes the audiological performance of recipients of multichannel cochlear implants. Twenty-nine consecutive recipients of multichannel implants participated in a preoperative psychological assessment and audiological follow-up assessments after 18 months of implant use. Experimental cognitive measures that assess an ability to rapidly detect and respond to features imbedded in sequentially arrayed information accounted for up to 30% of the variance in implant outcome, suggesting the importance of cognitive abilities in implant outcome. Standardized measures of intellectual ability, however, were not predictive of outcome. The Health Opinion Survey, a measure of participatory engagement, was also a significant predictor of audiological outcome. Overall, the results implicated the importance of several specific psychological factors in the audiological outcome of cochlear implants in postlingually deafened adult recipients.