Applying Emmert’s Law to the Poggendorff Illusion

The Poggendorff illusion was approached with a novel perspective, that of applying Emmert’s Law to the situation. The extensities between the verticals and the transversals happen to be absolutely equal in retinal image size, whereas the registered distance for the verticals must be smaller than that of the transversals due to the fact that the former is assumed to occlude the latter. This combination of facts calls for the operation of Emmert’s Law, which results in the shrinkage of the occluding space between the verticals. Since the retinal image shows the transversals to be in contact with the verticals, the shrinkage must drag the transversals inwards in the cortical representation in order to eliminate the gaps. Such dragging of the transversals produces the illusory misalignment, which is a dictation of geometry. Some of the consequences of this new explanation were tested in four different experiments. In Experiment 1, a new illusion, the tilting of an occluded continuation of an oblique line, was predicted and achieved. In Experiments 2 and 3, perceived nearness of the occluding entity was manipulated via texture density variations and the predicted misalignment variations were confirmed by using a between-subjects and within-subjects designs, respectively. In Experiment 4, tilting of the occluded segment of the transversal was found to vary in the predicted direction as a result of being accompanied by the same texture cues used in Experiments 2 and 3. Keywords: Poggendorff illusion, Emmert’s Law, geometric illusions, occlusion illusion, collinearit

Response bias in numerosity perception at early judgments and systematic underestimation

Mental number representation relies on mapping numerosity based on nonsymbolic stimuli to symbolic magnitudes. It is known that mental number representation builds on a logarithmic scale, and thus numerosity decisions result in underestimation. In the current study, we investigated the temporal dynamics of numerosity perception in four experiments by employing the response-deadline SAT procedure. We presented random number of dots and required participants to make a numerosity judgment by comparing the perceived number of dots to 50. Using temporal dynamics in numerosity perception allowed us to observe a response bias at early decisions and a systematic underestimation at late decisions. In all three experiments, providing feedback diminished the magnitude of underestimation, whereas in Experiment 3 the absence of feedback resulted in greater underestimation errors. These results were in accordance with the findings that suggested feedback is necessary for the calibration of the mental number representation

Awareness Of Hepatitis B Virus Reactivation Among Physicians Administering Immunosuppressive Treatment And Related Clinical Practices

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the awareness and knowledge levels of all physicians administering immunosuppressive treatment concerning hepatitis B virus (HBV) reactivation, and draw attention to the importance of the subject through evaluation. Methods: The study was carried out by infectious diseases and clinical microbiology specialists in 37 health centers, and it was performed in Turkey between January and March 2017. All specialists providing a written consent and working in the departments of Medical Oncology, Hematology, Dermatology and Venereology, Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, and Rheumatology of each study center were included in the study. Results: A total of 430 physicians participated in the study. Their mean age was 39.87 +/- 7.42 years, and 47.9% of them were males. During their career, 39.3% of these physicians had encountered patients developing HBV reactivation while receiving immunosuppressive treatment. The rate of encountering patients who died due to HBV reactivation was 6.5%. 97% of physicians who participated, considered the risk of HBV reactivation to be important. 70.2% of physicians stated that guidelines related to HBV reactivation and antiviral treatment for these patients were discussed in the congresses they participated, regarding their specialties. The rate of performing hepatitis screening among physicians whose patients developed HBV reactivation was statistically significantly higher than those physicians who had no patients with HBV reactivation (p<0.05). Physicians who used the guidelines related to HBV reactivation in their specialties performed screening for the HBV infection much more often than physicians who did not use the guidelines (p=0.002). Conclusions: According to the results obtained in our study, the rates of conducting screening and awareness of HBV reactivation among physicians administering immunosuppressive treatment were higher compared with similar studies; however, their awareness that HBV DNA and anti-HBc should be utilized much more frequently among the serological tests they use for screening of HBV infection, should be increased.WoSScopu

Repetition or alternation of context influences sequential congruency effect depending on the presence of contingency

The sequential congruency effect (SCE) is defined as the decrease in the congruency effect following incongruent trials compared to congruent trials. The effect of context repetition on the SCE was investigated in four experiments. In all the experiments, dynamic visual white noise was used as the contextual feature, and the number of congruent and incongruent trials was equal. In Experiments 1 and 2, by using eight-value Flanker and Stroop tasks, and excluding stimulus- and response-feature repetitions from the analysis, a SCE was observed in both context repetition and alternation conditions. In Experiment 3, using a two-value Flanker task, all trials consisted of stimulus- and response-feature repetitions, and a SCE was only observed in the context repetition condition. In Experiment 4, we used a four-value Flanker task, which enabled half of the trials to be partial/complete repetitions and the other half to be complete alternations. A SCE was observed in both context repetition and alternation conditions irrespective of the stimulus- and response-feature repetitions. This pattern of results suggested that the effects of context repetition on the SCE are subject to a number of factors including stimulus- and response-feature repetitions and contingency biases. When contingency information exists, the presence of stimulus- and response-feature repetitions was no longer effective in yielding effects of context repetition on the SCE. These findings suggest that the usage of information registered in episodic event representations including stimulus-, response- and contextual-features, control parameters and contingency biases results from interactions of a complex pattern of mechanisms, yet to be further explored

Picturing asthma in Turkey: results from the Turkish adult asthma registry

Introduction: National data on asthma characteristics and the factors associated with uncontrolled asthma seem to be necessary for every country. For this purpose, we developed the Turkish Adult Asthma Registry for patients with asthma aiming to take a snapshot of our patients, thereby assigning the unmet needs and niche areas of intervention. Methods: Case entries were performed between March 2018 and March 2022. A web-based application was used to record data. Study outcomes were demographic features, disease characteristics, asthma control levels, and phenotypes. Results: The registry included 2053 patients from 36 study centers in Turkey. Female subjects dominated the group (n = 1535, 74.8%). The majority of the patients had allergic (n = 1158, 65.3%) and eosinophilic (n = 1174, 57.2%) asthma. Six hundred nineteen (32.2%) of the patients had obese asthma. Severe asthma existed in 670 (32.6%) patients. Majority of cases were on step 3–5 treatment (n: 1525; 88.1%). Uncontrolled asthma was associated with low educational level, severe asthma attacks in the last year, low FEV1, existence of chronic rhinosinusitis and living in particular regions. Conclusion: The picture of this registry showed a dominancy of middle-aged obese women with moderate-to-severe asthma. We also determined particular strategic targets such as low educational level, severe asthma attacks, low FEV1, and chronic rhinosinusitis to decrease uncontrolled asthma in our country. Moreover, some regional strategies may also be needed as uncontrolled asthma is higher in certain regions. We believe that these data will guide authorities to reestablish national asthma programs to improve asthma service delivery