Lincoln da Silva Gimenes

Development of the Behavioral Assessment and Research System (BARS) to detect and characterize neurotoxicity in humans

The Behavioral Assessment and Research System (BARS) is a computer-based testing system designed to assess neurobehavioral function in humans. It was developed to provide a series or battery of neurobehavioral tests optimized for the detection of neurotoxicity in non-mainstream human populations, specifically people with limited education or literacy. Key to meeting this goal were simply-stated instructions divided into an elemental series of steps, a 9BUTTON response unit to replace the computer keyboard for responding, and spoken instructions. Modifications all underwent serial testing in target populations to successively hone the changes to be more effective. A similar process was followed when developing adjustable parameters, test reliability assessments, and when implementing these tests with populations from different cultural groups and children. The principles and experiences that guided the development of BARS should inform the development of future testing systems to ensure that the new tests can be used with non-mainstream populations, which may be increasingly subject to neurotoxic exposures.

Efeitos da radiação ionizante sobre comportamentos mantidos por contingências operantes

Pesquisas de laboratorio com animais sao tentativas para suprimir lacunas deixadas pelas metodologias utilizadas nos estudos com humanos sobre os fenomenos comportamentais que acompanham uma exposicao a radiacao. Neste trabalho,tratamos de estudos sobre comportamentos mantidos por diferentes tipos de contingencias operantes e de variaveis radiogenicascomo a dosagem de radiacao. Os efeitos observados com esquemas simples de reforcamento mostram reducao nas taxas de resposta. Esses efeitos sao dose-dependentes e interagem com outras variaveis tais como o tipo de linha de base, taxa de respostas na linha de base e tipo de estimulo reforcador. Alem disso, em esquemas concorrentes os efeitos sao seletivos,segundo os componentes do esquema. Dados obtidos em procedimentos de aquisicao repetida indicam uma interacao da radiacao com o tipo de tarefa em execucao. As implicacoes dos estudos com animais para a compreensao das manifestacoescomportamentais observadas em individuos expostos a eventos radioativos sao discutidas.

Reatividade ao Automonitoramento em uma Portadora da Síndrome do Intestino Irritável

Self-monitoring (SM) is used for observation, assessment and intervention in behavioral and health problems. In this study SM was used in the behavior assessment of a 44 year old female with an irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). During a period of 19 weeks this patient filled in daily SM forms related to general activities, bowel functioning and food intake, A not foreseen improvement of the symptoms was observed, which can be explained as a reactivity effect to SM. Initially, the activities of the participant occurred in a uninterruptedly manner and were associated with bowel constipation; with the SM recording the participant learned to interrupt her activities as response to signals of bowel movements, increasing, therefore, the frequency of defecation.