380 research outputs found

    Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things : Threat Expectancy Induces the Illusory Perception of Increased Heartrate

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    The work was funded by Leverhulme Trust grant RPG-2019-248 to PB, and PhD studentship was awarded to EP from the Universities of Plymouth and Aberdeen. This work was also supported by the “Departments of Excellence 2023–2027” initiative of the Italian Ministry of University and Research for the Department of Neuroscience, Imaging and Clinical Sciences (DNISC) of the University of Chieti-Pescara, and by the “Search for Excellence” initiative of the University of Chieti-Pescar to FF. The research was also supported by EU - NextGenerationEU - MUR-Fondo Promozione e Sviluppo - DM 737/2021; Project: INTRIGUE, Interoception and Fatigue: predicting and treating pathological and transient fatigue to MC.Peer reviewedPostprin

    Information actors beyond modernity and coloniality in times of climate change:A comparative design ethnography on the making of monitors for sustainable futures in Curaçao and Amsterdam, between 2019-2022

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    In his dissertation, Mr. Goilo developed a cutting-edge theoretical framework for an Anthropology of Information. This study compares information in the context of modernity in Amsterdam and coloniality in Curaçao through the making process of monitors and develops five ways to understand how information can act towards sustainable futures. The research also discusses how the two contexts, that is modernity and coloniality, have been in informational symbiosis for centuries which is producing negative informational side effects within the age of the Anthropocene. By exploring the modernity-coloniality symbiosis of information, the author explains how scholars, policymakers, and data-analysts can act through historical and structural roots of contemporary global inequities related to the production and distribution of information. Ultimately, the five theses propose conditions towards the collective production of knowledge towards a more sustainable planet

    The 2023 wearable photoplethysmography roadmap

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    Photoplethysmography is a key sensing technology which is used in wearable devices such as smartwatches and fitness trackers. Currently, photoplethysmography sensors are used to monitor physiological parameters including heart rate and heart rhythm, and to track activities like sleep and exercise. Yet, wearable photoplethysmography has potential to provide much more information on health and wellbeing, which could inform clinical decision making. This Roadmap outlines directions for research and development to realise the full potential of wearable photoplethysmography. Experts discuss key topics within the areas of sensor design, signal processing, clinical applications, and research directions. Their perspectives provide valuable guidance to researchers developing wearable photoplethysmography technology

    Subjectivity, nature, existence: Foundational issues for enactive phenomenology

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    This thesis explores and discusses foundational issues concerning the relationship between phenomenological philosophy and the enactive approach to cognitive science, with the aim of clarifying, developing, and promoting the project of enactive phenomenology. This project is framed by three general ideas: 1) that the sciences of mind need a phenomenological grounding, 2) that the enactive approach is the currently most promising attempt to provide mind science with such a grounding, and 3) that this attempt involves both a naturalization of phenomenology and a phenomenologization of the concept of nature. More specifically, enactive phenomenology is the project of pursuing mutually illuminative exchanges between, on the one hand, phenomenological investigations of the structures of lived experience and embodied existence and, on the other, scientific accounts of mind and life – in particular those framed by theories of biological self-organization. The thesis consists of two parts. Part one is an introductory essay that seeks to clarify some of enactive phenomenology’s overarching philosophical commitments by tracing some of its historical roots. Part two is a compilation of four articles, each of which intervenes in a different contemporary debate relevant to the dissertation’s project

    Improving the security and cyber security of companies and individuals using behavioural sciences: a data-centric approach

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    While security and cyber security systems literature focus on how to detect threats at a logistics, software and hardware level, there is not enough work around how to improve the security by incorporating the understanding of the human behaviour for those individuals that form part of the system. The present dissertation focus in the latter problem and has it as main research question. To do so, we study three different security and cyber security problems. We study a problem of communication framing when training employees in cyber security by deploying a two-staged survey in a British financial institution to then analyse it with a behavioural segmentation model. We find that, depending on their risk-perception and risk-taking attitudes, employees can become better cyber security sensors when correctly framed. We also study a problem of illicit drugs distribution in England to understand the territorial logic of the operators. Using public data, we analyse the problem using Spatial Analysis models. We find that gangs avoid places with a high number of knife crime events and hospital admissions by misuse of drugs. Finally, we study the transition of companies to the “New Normal” when the pandemic started. Using a qualitative model to understand the cyber security culture within, we find that cyber security was not a priority of the narrative of big companies during the first months of 2020. The three essays contribute to the literature in behavioural sciences applied to security and cyber security by using modern tools and frameworks of statistical learning and Natural Language Processing. By incorporating these different resources, we show how to improve the efficiency of security and cyber security systems by analysing the behaviour data extracted from them

    Music and musicality in brain surgery:The effect on delirium and language

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    Delirium is a neuropsychiatric clinical syndrome with overlapping symptoms withthe neurologic primary disease. This is why delirium is such a difficult and underexposedtopic in neurosurgical literature. Delirium is a complication which mightaffect recovery after brain surgery, hence we describe in Chapter 2 a systematicreview which focuses on how delirium is defined in the neurosurgical literature.We included twenty-four studies (5589 patients) and found no validation studiesof screening instruments in neurosurgical papers. Delirium screening instruments,validated in other cohorts, were used in 70% of the studies, consisting of theConfusion Assessment Method (- Intensive Care Unit) (45%), Delirium ObservationScreening Scale (5%), Intensive Care Delirium Screening Checklist (10%), Neelonand Champagne Confusion Scale (5%), and Nursing Delirium Screening Scale (5%).Incidence of post-operative delirium after intracranial surgery was 19%, ranging from12 – 26% caused by variation in clinical features and delirium assessment methods.Our review highlighted the need of future research on delirium in neurosurgery,which should focus on optimizing diagnosis, and assessing prognostic significanceand management.It is unclear what the impact of delirium is on the recovery after brain surgery,as delirium is often a self-limiting and temporary complication. In Chapter 3 wetherefore investigated the impact of delirium, by means of incidence and healthoutcomes, and identified independent risk factors by including 2901 intracranialsurgical procedures. We found that delirium was present in 19.4% with an averageonset (mean/SD) within 2.62/1.22 days and associated with more Intensive CareUnit (ICU) admissions and more discharge towards residential care. These numbersconfirm the impact of delirium with its incidence rates, which were in line with ourprevious systematic review, and significant health-related outcomes. We identifiedseveral independent non-modifiable risk factors such as age, pre-existing memoryproblems, emergency operations, and modifiable risk factors such as low preoperativepotassium and opioid and dexamethasone administration, which shed lighton the pathophysiologic mechanisms of POD in this cohort and could be targetedfor future intervention studies.10As listening to recorded music has been proven to lower delirium-eliciting factors inthe surgical population, such as pain, we were interested in the size of analgesic effectand its underlying mechanism before applying this into our clinical setting. In Chapter4 we describe the results of a two-armed experimental randomized controlled trial inwhich 70 participants received increasing electric stimuli through their non-dominantindex finger. This study was conducted within a unique pain model as participantswere blinded for the outcome. Participants in the music group received a 20-minutemusic intervention and participants in the control group a 20-minute resting period.Although the effect of the music intervention on pain endurance was not statisticallysignificant in our intention-to-treat analysis (p = 0.482, CI -0.85; 1.79), the subgroupanalyses revealed an increase in pain endurance in the music group after correcting fortechnical uncertainties (p = 0.013, CI 0.35; 2.85). This effect on pain endurance couldbe attributed to increased parasympathetic activation, as an increased Heart RateVariability (HRV) was observed in the music vs. the control group (p=0.008;0.032).As our prior chapters increased our knowledge on the significance of delirium on thepost-operative recovery after brain surgery and the possible beneficial effects of music,we decided to design a randomized controlled trial. In Chapter 5 we describe theprotocol and in Chapter 6 we describe the results of this single-centered randomizedcontrolled trial. In this trial we included 189 patients undergoing craniotomy andcompared the effects of music administered before, during and after craniotomy withstandard of clinical care. The primary endpoint delirium was assessed by the deliriumobservation screening scale (DOSS) and confirmed by a psychiatrist accordingto DSM-5 criteria. A variety of secondary outcomes were assessed to substantiatethe effects of music on delirium and its clinical implications. Our results supportthe efficacy of music in preventing delirium after craniotomy, as found with DOSS(OR:0.49, p=0.048) but not after DSM-5 confirmation (OR:0.47, p=0.342). Thispossible beneficial effect is substantiated by the effect of music on pre-operativeautonomic tone, measured with HRV (p=0.021;0.025), and depth of anesthesia(p=&lt;0.001;0.022). Our results fit well within the current literature and support theimplementation of music for the prevention of delirium within the neurosurgicalpopulation. However, delirium screening tools should be validated and the long-termimplications should be evaluated after craniotomy to assess the true impact of musicafter brain surgery.Musicality and language in awake brain surgeryIn the second part of this thesis, the focus swifts towards maintaining musicality andlanguage functions around awake craniotomy. Intra-operative mapping of languagedoes not ensure complete maintenance which mostly deteriorates after tumor resection.Most patients recover to their baseline whereas other remain to suffer from aphasiaaffecting their quality of life. The level of musical training might affect the speed andextend of postoperative language recovery, as increased white matter connectivity inthe corpus callosum is described in musicians compared to non-musicians. Hence,in Chapter 7 we evaluate the effect of musicality on language recovery after awakeglioma surgery in a cohort study of forty-six patients. We divided the patients intothree groups based on the musicality and compared the language scores between thesegroups. With the first study on this topic, we support that musicality protects againstlanguage decline after awake glioma surgery, as a trend towards less deterioration oflanguage was observed within the first three months on the phonological domain (p= 0.04). This seemed plausible as phonology shares a common hierarchical structurebetween language and singing. Moreover, our results support the hypothesis ofmusicality induced contralateral compensation in the (sub-) acute phase through thecorpus callosum as the largest difference of size was found in the anterior corpuscallosum in non- musicians compared to trained musicians (p = 0.02).In Chapter 8 we addressed musicality as a sole brain function and whether it canbe protected during awake craniotomy in a systematic review consisting of tenstudies and fourteen patients. Isolated music disruption, defined as disruption duringmusic tasks with intact language/speech and/or motor functions, was identified intwo patients in the right superior temporal gyrus, one patient in the right and onepatient in the left middle frontal gyrus and one patient in the left medial temporalgyrus. Pre-operative functional MRI confirmed these localizations in three patients.Assessment of post-operative musical function, only conducted in seven patients bymeans of standardized (57%) and non-standardized (43%) tools, report no loss ofmusical function. With these results we concluded that mapping music is feasibleduring awake craniotomy. Moreover, we identified certain brain regions relevant formusic production and detected no decline during follow-up, suggesting an addedvalue of mapping musicality during awake craniotomy. A systematic approach to mapmusicality should be implemented, to improve current knowledge on the added valueof mapping musicality during awake craniotomy.<br/

    Complexity Science in Human Change

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    This reprint encompasses fourteen contributions that offer avenues towards a better understanding of complex systems in human behavior. The phenomena studied here are generally pattern formation processes that originate in social interaction and psychotherapy. Several accounts are also given of the coordination in body movements and in physiological, neuronal and linguistic processes. A common denominator of such pattern formation is that complexity and entropy of the respective systems become reduced spontaneously, which is the hallmark of self-organization. The various methodological approaches of how to model such processes are presented in some detail. Results from the various methods are systematically compared and discussed. Among these approaches are algorithms for the quantification of synchrony by cross-correlational statistics, surrogate control procedures, recurrence mapping and network models.This volume offers an informative and sophisticated resource for scholars of human change, and as well for students at advanced levels, from graduate to post-doctoral. The reprint is multidisciplinary in nature, binding together the fields of medicine, psychology, physics, and neuroscience

    “You drowned me in tears, where did you go?” Narratives of Reproductive Loss and Grief in Middle-Class India

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    This study is an analysis of middle-class couples’ experiences of reproductive loss, the ensuing grief, and their relentless struggles in order to achieve reproductive success in Kolkata, India. Based on ethnographic engagements, the study explains how the increasingly biomedicalised setting and middle-class ethos of 21st century, urban India shape such profoundly disruptive reproductive experiences. In doing so, the study illustrates how the couple’s experiences of loss and grief were constituted by multiple and intricately entangled enactments of gender roles, gendered emotions, entities, and normative concepts. Finally, the study pays attention to the processual utilisation of constrained agency by the actors, particularly, by the women, in order to show how they coped with their loss as well as their disrupted conjugal lives

    Affective reactions towards socially interactive agents and their computational modeling

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    Over the past 30 years, researchers have studied human reactions towards machines applying the Computers Are Social Actors paradigm, which contrasts reactions towards computers with reactions towards humans. The last 30 years have also seen improvements in technology that have led to tremendous changes in computer interfaces and the development of Socially Interactive Agents. This raises the question of how humans react to Socially Interactive Agents. To answer these questions, knowledge from several disciplines is required, which is why this interdisciplinary dissertation is positioned within psychology and computer science. It aims to investigate affective reactions to Socially Interactive Agents and how these can be modeled computationally. Therefore, after a general introduction and background, this thesis first provides an overview of the Socially Interactive Agent system used in this work. Second, it presents a study comparing a human and a virtual job interviewer, which shows that both interviewers induce shame in participants to the same extent. Thirdly, it reports on a study investigating obedience towards Socially Interactive Agents. The results indicate that participants obey human and virtual instructors in similar ways. Furthermore, both types of instructors evoke feelings of stress and shame to the same extent. Fourth, a stress management training using biofeedback with a Socially Interactive Agent is presented. The study shows that a virtual trainer can teach coping techniques for emotionally challenging social situations. Fifth, it introduces MARSSI, a computational model of user affect. The evaluation of the model shows that it is possible to relate sequences of social signals to affective reactions, taking into account emotion regulation processes. Finally, the Deep method is proposed as a starting point for deeper computational modeling of internal emotions. The method combines social signals, verbalized introspection information, context information, and theory-driven knowledge. An exemplary application to the emotion shame and a schematic dynamic Bayesian network for its modeling are illustrated. Overall, this thesis provides evidence that human reactions towards Socially Interactive Agents are very similar to those towards humans, and that it is possible to model these reactions computationally.In den letzten 30 Jahren haben Forschende menschliche Reaktionen auf Maschinen untersucht und dabei das “Computer sind soziale Akteure”-Paradigma genutzt, in dem Reaktionen auf Computer mit denen auf Menschen verglichen werden. In den letzten 30 Jahren hat sich ebenfalls die Technologie weiterentwickelt, was zu einer enormen Veränderung der Computerschnittstellen und der Entwicklung von sozial interaktiven Agenten geführt hat. Dies wirft Fragen zu menschlichen Reaktionen auf sozial interaktive Agenten auf. Um diese Fragen zu beantworten, ist Wissen aus mehreren Disziplinen erforderlich, weshalb diese interdisziplinäre Dissertation innerhalb der Psychologie und Informatik angesiedelt ist. Sie zielt darauf ab, affektive Reaktionen auf sozial interaktive Agenten zu untersuchen und zu erforschen, wie diese computational modelliert werden können. Nach einer allgemeinen Einführung in das Thema gibt diese Arbeit daher, erstens, einen Überblick über das Agentensystem, das in der Arbeit verwendet wird. Zweitens wird eine Studie vorgestellt, in der eine menschliche und eine virtuelle Jobinterviewerin miteinander verglichen werden, wobei sich zeigt, dass beide Interviewerinnen bei den Versuchsteilnehmenden Schamgefühle in gleichem Maße auslösen. Drittens wird eine Studie berichtet, in der Gehorsam gegenüber sozial interaktiven Agenten untersucht wird. Die Ergebnisse deuten darauf hin, dass Versuchsteilnehmende sowohl menschlichen als auch virtuellen Anleiterinnen ähnlich gehorchen. Darüber hinaus werden durch beide Instruktorinnen gleiche Maße von Stress und Scham hervorgerufen. Viertens wird ein Biofeedback-Stressmanagementtraining mit einer sozial interaktiven Agentin vorgestellt. Die Studie zeigt, dass die virtuelle Trainerin Techniken zur Bewältigung von emotional herausfordernden sozialen Situationen vermitteln kann. Fünftens wird MARSSI, ein computergestütztes Modell des Nutzeraffekts, vorgestellt. Die Evaluation des Modells zeigt, dass es möglich ist, Sequenzen von sozialen Signalen mit affektiven Reaktionen unter Berücksichtigung von Emotionsregulationsprozessen in Beziehung zu setzen. Als letztes wird die Deep-Methode als Ausgangspunkt für eine tiefer gehende computergestützte Modellierung von internen Emotionen vorgestellt. Die Methode kombiniert soziale Signale, verbalisierte Introspektion, Kontextinformationen und theoriegeleitetes Wissen. Eine beispielhafte Anwendung auf die Emotion Scham und ein schematisches dynamisches Bayes’sches Netz zu deren Modellierung werden dargestellt. Insgesamt liefert diese Arbeit Hinweise darauf, dass menschliche Reaktionen auf sozial interaktive Agenten den Reaktionen auf Menschen sehr ähnlich sind und dass es möglich ist diese menschlichen Reaktion computational zu modellieren.Deutsche Forschungsgesellschaf

    Introduction to Human Biology

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    This OER is intended as a textbook for a one semester introductory course in Human Anatomy and Physiology for non-science majors. It covers the major topics typically covered in A&P, but in a simplified, easier to understand manner. This textbook aims to educate students interested in lower-level health careers and non-science majors without the intimidating detail found in current textbooks. Text and images were created to be more accessible for these student populations
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