Lucia Jerg-Bretzke

The effect of forced choice on facial emotion recognition: a comparison to open verbal classification of emotion labels

Objective: This article includes the examination of potential methodological problems of the application of a forced choice response format in facial emotion recognition. Methodology: 33 subjects were presented with validated facial stimuli. The task was to make a decision about which emotion was shown. In addition, the subjective certainty concerning the decision was recorded. Results: The detection rates are 68% for fear, 81% for sadness, 85% for anger, 87% for surprise, 88% for disgust, and 94% for happiness, and are thus well above the random probability. Conclusion: This study refutes the concern that the use of forced choice formats may not adequately reflect actual recognition performance. The use of standardized tests to examine emotion recognition ability leads to valid results and can be used in different contexts. For example, the images presented here appear suitable for diagnosing deficits in emotion recognition in the context of psychological disorders and for mapping treatment progress.

Where have they gone? - a discussion on the balancing act of female doctors between work and family.

Goals: The increasing number of vacant positions for doctors increasingly puts the issue of reconciling work and family into the spotlight in companies, hospitals and universities, as increased expectations of a better work-life balance are seen as one of the reasons for these vacancies. Highly qualified professionals are trained, but not available to the labour market. The aim is to summarise what difficulties doctors who want to have a family and their potential employers must face. Methods: The following articles show the current state of research and potential starting points for an optimisation of the medical profession from a family-friendly perspective and intend to stimulate debate. Results: Some basic steps towards better work-life balance have already been taken, such as the provision of childcare places and the increasing availability of more flexible working patterns. But it seems that these measures, since they have been implemented neither sufficiently nor universally, do not suffice to secure the next generation of staff. Especially women in leadership positions are still rare to find. Conclusions: Both male and female doctors want better quality of life by achieving a better work-life balance. The expansion of family-friendly services is seen as a necessary step to allow female doctors to successfully combine work and family.

The influence of neuroticism and psychological symptoms on the assessment of images in three-dimensional emotion space.

Objective: The present study investigated the influence of neuroticism (NEO Five-Factor Inventory (NEO-FFI)) and psychological symptoms (Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI)) on pleasure, arousal, and dominance (PAD) ratings of the International Affective Picture System (IAPS). Methods: The subjects (N=131) were presented with images from the IAPS (30 images) and new images (30 images). The influence of neuroticism and BSI (median split: high vs. low) on the assessment of pleasure, arousal and dominance of the images was examined. Correlations of pleasure, arousal and dominance were presented in a 3-D video animation. Results: Subjects with high scores (compared to subjects with low scores by median split) of neuroticism and psychological symptoms of the BSI rated the presented emotional images more negative in the valence dimension (pleasure), higher in arousal and less dominant. Conclusion: Neuroticism and psychological symptoms influence the subjective emotional evaluation of emotional images. Therefore the location in the three-dimensional emotion space depends on individual differences. Such differences must be kept in mind, if correlations between emotion ratings and other variables like psychobiological measures are analyzed.

Emotional ambivalence and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in soldiers during military operations.

Objective: This pilot study examined the extent to which a specific mechanism of emotion regulation – namely, ambivalence concerning the expressiveness of German soldiers’ emotions – affects the severity of PTSD symptoms after a military operation. Methodology: A survey was conducted at three points in time among 66 soldiers deployed on military crisis operations. The Harvard Trauma Questionaire (HTQ), the Ambivalence over Emotional Expressiveness Questionnaire (AEQ-G18), and a questionnaire on the particular stress of German soldiers during military operations were used. Results: The study showed a significant correlation between emotional ambivalence and traumatization. Furthermore, it was shown that the subjective stress of soldiers leading up to deployment is more pronounced when emotional ambivalence is stronger in the context of military operations. This particular stress is greater before and during the military operation than after. Compared to a male control sample, the average AEQ-G18 scores of the soldier sample examined here are considerably lower. Conclusion: This pilot study clearly indicates that the AEQ-G18 could be a suitable predictor of the psychological burden on soldiers. The correlations between emotional ambivalence on the one hand and the particular and post-traumatic stressors on the other hand are not only statistically significant in the present pilot study, but may also be relevant as risk factors. It is, therefore, necessary to conduct more extensive studies on soldiers participating in military operations to verify the results of this pilot study.

Effort-reward imbalance among medical students and physicians

Materials and methods The questionnaire used for the practicing medics was the effort-reward-imbalance (ERI) model of Siegrist et al. The questionnaire used for the students survey was the effort-reward-imbalance (ERI) model for school and student settings. The ERI scores on a 5 point Likert scale. In total, N = 716 medical students completed the questionnaire (65.4% female, 34.6% male). 61% of the students were in their pre-clinical term, 39% in their clinical term. The practicing medics sample had a total of N = 120 (60.2% female, 39.8% male).

The Impact of Gender and Sexual Hormones on Automated Psychobiological Emotion Classification

It is a challenge to make cognitive technical systems more empathet- ic for user emotions and dispositions. Among channels like facial behavior and nonverbal cues, psychobiological patterns of emotional or dispositional beha- vior contain rich information, which is continuously available and hardly wil- lingly controlled. However, within this area of research, gender differences or even hormonal cycle effects as potential factors in influencing the classification of psychophysiological patterns of emotions have rarely been analyzed so far. In our study, emotions were induced with a blocked presentation of pictures from the International Affective Picture System (IAPS) and Ulm pictures. For the automated emotion classification in a first step 5 features from the heart rate signal were calculated and in a second step combined with two features of the facial EMG. The study focused mainly on gender differences in automated emotion classification and to a lesser degree on classification accuracy with Support Vector Machine (SVM) per se. We got diminished classification results for a gender mixed population and also we got diminished results for mixing young females with their hormonal cycle phases. Thus, we could show an im- provement of the accuracy rates when subdividing the population according to their gender, which is discussed as a possibility of incrementing automated classification results.

Das Trauma vergeht — die Schmerzen bleiben

Psychische und körperliche Traumata und Gewalterfahrungen bewirken bei vielen Betroffenen anhaltende Belastungsstörungen und körperliche Symptome, die die Opfer oft ein Leben lang beeinträchtigen. Das häufigste körperliche Symptom nach extremer Traumatisierung sind chronische Schmerzen. Interdisziplinäre schmerztherapeutische Interventionen können dieses Leiden lindern.Psychische und korperliche Traumata und Gewalterfahrungen bewirken bei vielen Betroffenen anhaltende Belastungsstorungen und korperliche Symptome, die die Opfer oft ein Leben lang beeintrachtigen. Das haufigste korperliche Symptom nach extremer Traumatisierung sind chronische Schmerzen. Interdisziplinare schmerztherapeutische Interventionen konnen dieses Leiden lindern.

Das Trauma vergeht — die Schmerzen bleiben@@@Long-term consequences of physical and psychological trauma exposition

Psychische und körperliche Traumata und Gewalterfahrungen bewirken bei vielen Betroffenen anhaltende Belastungsstörungen und körperliche Symptome, die die Opfer oft ein Leben lang beeinträchtigen. Das häufigste körperliche Symptom nach extremer Traumatisierung sind chronische Schmerzen. Interdisziplinäre schmerztherapeutische Interventionen können dieses Leiden lindern.Psychische und korperliche Traumata und Gewalterfahrungen bewirken bei vielen Betroffenen anhaltende Belastungsstorungen und korperliche Symptome, die die Opfer oft ein Leben lang beeintrachtigen. Das haufigste korperliche Symptom nach extremer Traumatisierung sind chronische Schmerzen. Interdisziplinare schmerztherapeutische Interventionen konnen dieses Leiden lindern.

The FAMULATUR PLUS as an innovative approach for teaching physical examination skills

The FAMULATUR PLUS is an innovative approach to teaching physical examination skills. The concept is aimed at medical students during the clinical part of their studies and includes a clinical traineeship (English for “Famulatur”) extended to include various courses (“PLUS”). The courses are divided into clinical examination courses and problembased-learning (PBL) seminars. The concept’s special feature is the full integration of these courses into a 30-day hospital traineeship. The aim is to facilitate the transfer of knowledge from the courses into daily practice. Each week of the FAMULATUR PLUS is structured in line with the courses and focuses on a particular part of the body (e.g., abdomen). A physical examination course under the supervision of a physician is offered at the beginning of the week. Here, medical students learn the relevant examination techniques by practicing on each other (partner exercises). Subsequently, the techniques taught are applied independently during everyday work on the ward, corrected by the supervisor, if necessary, and thereby reinforced. The final POL seminar takes place towards the end of the week. Possible differential diagnoses are developed based on a clinical case study. The goal is to check these by taking a fictitious medical history and performing a physical examination, as well as to make a preliminary diagnosis. Finally, during the PBL seminar, medical students will be shown how physical examination techniques can be efficiently applied in the diagnosis of common cardinal symptoms (e.g., abdominal pain). The initial implementation of the FAMULATUR PLUS proved the practical feasibility of the concept. In addition, the accompanying evaluation showed that the participants of the pilot project improved with regard to their practical physical examination skills.