Gianmarco Altoè

An object for an action, the same object for other actions: effects on hand shaping.

Objects can be grasped in several ways due to their physical properties, the context surrounding the object, and the goal of the grasping agent. The aim of the present study was to investigate whether the prior-to-contact grasping kinematics of the same object vary as a result of different goals of the person grasping it. Subjects were requested to reach toward and grasp a bottle filled with water, and then complete one of the following tasks: (1) Grasp it without performing any subsequent action; (2) Lift and throw it; (3) Pour the water into a container; (4) Place it accurately on a target area; (5) Pass it to another person. We measured the angular excursions at both metacarpal-phalangeal (mcp) and proximal interphalangeal (pip) joints of all digits, and abduction angles of adjacent digit pairs by means of resistive sensors embedded in a glove. The results showed that the presence and the nature of the task to be performed following grasping affect the positioning of the fingers during the reaching phase. We contend that a one-to-one association between a sensory stimulus and a motor response does not capture all the aspects involved in grasping. The theoretical approach within which we frame our discussion considers internal models of anticipatory control which may provide a suitable explanation of our results.

Cognitive Abilities as Precursors of the Early Acquisition of Mathematical Skills During First Through Second Grades

The present longitudinal study was designed to investigate precursors of mathematics achievement in children. A total of 72 children were tested at both the beginning and end of first and second grades on measures of the following cognitive abilities: phonology, counting skills, short-term memory, working memory, and verbal and performance IQ. Path analysis models revealed differences in the variables predicting mathematics skills of first and second graders. Specifically, in first graders both short-term and working memory measures mediated the role of verbal IQ in predicting mathematics skills. Also, there was a direct relationship between performance IQ and mathematics at first grade. In contrast, in the longitudinal model, working memory measured both in first and second grades predicted mathematics achievement, whereas the relationship between performance IQ and mathematics disappeared. In conclusion, the results demonstrated that mathematics learning is predicted not by phonology or counting skills and that working memory is a plausible mediator in predicting mathematics achievement in primary school age children.

Listening comprehension in preschoolers: The role of memory

The current study analyzed the relationship between text comprehension and memory skills in preschoolers. We were interested in verifying the hypothesis that memory is a specific contributor to listening comprehension in preschool children after controlling for verbal abilities. We were also interested in analyzing the developmental path of the relationship between memory skills and listening comprehension in the age range considered. Forty-four, 4-year-olds (mean age = 4 years and 6 months, SD = 4 months) and 40, 5-year-olds (mean age = 5 years and 4 months, SD = 5 months) participated in the study. The children were administered measures to evaluate listening comprehension ability (story comprehension), short-term and working memory skills (forward and backward word span), verbal intelligence and receptive vocabulary. Results showed that both short-term and working memory predicted unique and independent variance in listening comprehension after controlling for verbal abilities, with working memory explaining additional variance over and above short-term memory. The predictive power of memory skills was stable in the age range considered. Results also confirm a strong relation between verbal abilities and listening comprehension in 4- and 5-year-old children.

The Italian version of the Obsessive Compulsive Inventory: Its psychometric properties on community and clinical samples

The aim of the study was to evaluate psychometric properties of the Obsessive Compulsive Inventory (OCI) on Italian community and clinical samples. The Italian version of the 42-item OCI was administered to a sample of 340 individuals belonging to the general population and to 88 patients with obsessive compulsive (OCD) or other anxiety disorders. Four different internal structures of the OCI were compared through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA): the figures for the model with six factors and 18 items (OCI-R) met the best criteria for adequacy of fit. The six scales showed on average a 10% of common variance in the community sample and 8% in the clinical sample. The OCI-R subscales showed good internal consistency and temporal stability, with the exception of washing and mental neutralizing subscales which showed a strong alpha coefficient only in the OCD sample. Psychometric data for the OCI-R were insensitive to age and sex, whereas an effect of education was found. Concurrent validity was demonstrated, since the OCI-R subscales showed a pattern of specific correlations with another conceptually related self-report measure. Moreover, although the OCI-R was positively correlated with measures of depression, anxiety, and worry, the correlations were weaker than those with the other measure of OCD symptoms. The OCI-R clearly differentiated OCD patients from non-OCD anxious patients and nonclinical controls with the exception of hoarding subscale. However, the hoarding scale discriminated OCD patients who presented hoarding symptoms from OCD counterparts without such symptoms. Thus, the OCI-R proved to be a reliable and valid measure of obsessive compulsive symptoms in the Italian context.

Defining Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) structure by confirmatory factor analysis: a contribution to validation for oncological settings

BACKGROUND Despite its popularity, not a definitive word has yet been said about the latent structure of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS). The present work is a contribution to this issue: statistically identifying the best tool structure helps in understanding which constructs the tool actually detects. PARTICIPANTS AND METHODS Five hundred and twelve Italian consecutive hospitalized cancer patients completed the HADS together with a form for the collection of personal and clinical data. Two confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) were carried out to test the validity of both two- and one-factor models, whereas qualitative and quantitative (i.e. Akaike information criterion) indices were used to assess which model among them would fit better with the observed data. Finally, two multigroup CFAs were carried out to test the factorial invariance across gender and disease phase (diagnostic, therapeutic) of the best-fitting model. RESULTS Although both considered models provide a good fit to the observed data, the two-factor model is more adequate; it is invariant across gender and disease phase. CONCLUSIONS The present study gives evidence for using HADS to detect anxious and depressive states separately as originally suggested by its authors. Given that this work involved only Italian cancer inpatients, replications in different cultural/national contexts are recommended.

The Italian version of the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21: Factor structure and psychometric properties on community and clinical samples

OBJECTIVE The Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 (DASS-21) is the short version of a self-report measure that was originally developed to provide maximum differentiation between depressive and anxious symptoms. Despite encouraging evidence, the factor structure and other features of the DASS-21 are yet to be firmly established. METHOD A community sample of 417 participants and two clinical groups (32 depressive patients and 25 anxious patients) completed the Italian version of the DASS-21 along with several measures of psychopathology. RESULTS Confirmatory factor analyses suggested that the DASS-21 is a measure of general distress plus three additional orthogonal dimensions (anxiety, depression, and stress). The internal consistency and temporal stability of the measure were good; each DASS-21 scale correlated more strongly with a measure of a similar construct, demonstrating good convergent and divergent validity. Lastly, the DASS-21 demonstrated good criterion-oriented validity. CONCLUSION The validity of the Italian DASS-21 and its utility, both for community and clinical individuals, are supported.

A pattern of cerebral perfusion anomalies between Major Depressive Disorder and Hashimoto Thyroiditis

BackgroundThis study aims to evaluate relationship between three different clinical conditions: Major Depressive Disorders (MDD), Hashimoto Thyroiditis (HT) and reduction in regional Cerebral Blood Flow (rCBF) in order to explore the possibility that patients with HT and MDD have specific pattern(s) of cerebral perfusion.MethodsDesign: Analysis of data derived from two separate data banks.Sample: 54 subjects, 32 with HT (29 women, mean age 38.8 ± 13.9); 22 without HT (19 women, mean age 36.5 ± 12.25).Assessment: Psychiatric diagnosis was carried out by Simplified Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDIS) using DSM-IV categories; cerebral perfusion was measured by 99 mTc-ECD SPECT. Statistical analysis was done through logistic regression.ResultsMDD appears to be associated with left frontal hypoperfusion, left temporal hypoperfusion, diffuse hypoperfusion and parietal perfusion asymmetry. A statistically significant association between parietal perfusion asymmetry and MDD was found only in the HT group.ConclusionIn HT, MDD is characterized by a parietal flow asymmetry. However, the specificity of rCBF in MDD with HT should be confirmed in a control sample with consideration for other health conditions. Moreover, this should be investigated with a longitudinally designed study in order to determine a possible pathogenic cause. Future studies with a much larger sample size should clarify whether a particular perfusion pattern is associated with a specific course or symptom cluster of MDD.

Recognition of facial expressions of mixed emotions in school-age children exposed to terrorism.

This exploratory study aims at investigating the effects of terrorism on childrens ability to recognize emotions. A sample of 101 exposed and 102 nonexposed children (mean age = 11 years), balanced for age and gender, were assessed 20 months after a terrorist attack in Beslan, Russia. Two trials controlled for childrens ability to match a facial emotional stimulus with an emotional label and their ability to match an emotional label with an emotional context. The experimental trial evaluated the relation between exposure to terrorism and childrens free labeling of mixed emotion facial stimuli created by morphing between 2 prototypical emotions. Repeated measures analyses of covariance revealed that exposed children correctly recognized pure emotions. Four log-linear models were performed to explore the association between exposure group and category of answer given in response to different mixed emotion facial stimuli. Model parameters indicated that, compared with nonexposed children, exposed children (a) labeled facial expressions containing anger and sadness significantly more often than expected as anger, and (b) produced fewer correct answers in response to stimuli containing sadness as a target emotion.

Functional hemispheric asymmetries in humans: electrophysiological evidence from preterm infants.

In recent years, magnetic resonance imaging has allowed researchers to individuate the earlier morphological development of the right hemisphere compared with the left hemisphere during late‐gestational development. Anatomical asymmetry, however, does not necessarily mean functional asymmetry, and whether the anatomical differences between hemispheres at this early age are paralleled by functional specialisations remains unknown. In this study, the presence of lateralised electrical brain activity related to both pitch detection and discrimination was investigated in 34 prematurely‐born infants [24–34 gestational weeks (GWs)] all tested at the same post‐conceptional age of 35 weeks. By means of a frequency–change oddball experimental paradigm, with ‘standard’ tones at 1000 Hz (P = 90%) and ‘deviant’ tones at 2000 Hz (P = 10%), we were able to record higher right event‐related potential activity in the interval windows between 350 and 650 ms after stimulus onset. An explorative hierarchical cluster analysis confirmed the different distribution of the hemispheric asymmetry score in newborns < 30 weeks old. Here, we show electrophysiological evidence of the early functional right lateralisation for pitch processing (detection and discrimination) arising by 30 GWs, but not before, in preterm newborns despite the longer environmental sensorial experience of newborns < 30 GWs. Generally, these findings suggest that the earlier right structural maturation in foetal epochs seems to be paralleled by a right functional development.

Parental perceptions of health-related quality of life in children with leukemia in the second week after the diagnosis: a quantitative model

PurposeThe focus is on describing the child’s health-related quality of life (HRQL) at the time of diagnosis as perceived by parents, by using an empirical model of their psychosocial context.Patients and methodsPatients were 128 leukemic children and their families recruited at the Haematology–Oncology Clinic of the Department of Pediatrics, University of Padova. The families were interviewed by a clinical psychologist during the first hospitalization of their children using the Ecocultural Family Interview—Cancer (EFI-C). This interview aimed at understanding the family daily routines as it relates to the child with cancer and the meaning and experience of the situation. Demographic data about children and their families also were collected.ResultsThe EFI-C interviews were read for content and then coded; these items were grouped into 11 major dimensions, three dealing with the child in the hospital and eight concerning the family. An empirical model of path analysis was estimated to evaluate perceived child’s HRQL at the second week from the diagnosis inside the psychosocial context. This model shows that perceived child’s HRQL is predicted by parental trust in the medical staff, perceived child coping, and perceived child adaptability. These last two predictors are in turn moderated by the fixed factor child age and mediated by parenting.ConclusionA better knowledge of parents’ views and expectations regarding their children’s HRQL during the first treatments for pediatric leukemia may facilitate the communication processes in the hospital and may help to provide improved psychosocial care for the child during the first treatments for leukemia.