Identification of Latent Subgroups of Obese Adolescents Enrolled in a Healthy Weight Management Program

In obesity research, it is assumed that the population is homogeneous. While this approach has yielded important insights, testing this supposition might reveal information that could impact our understanding of the phenomena and its treatment. In this study, data from obese teenagers (N = 248, Mean BMI percentile = 99%; Mean age = 13.9, SD = 1.8) who were predominantly minority (n = 182), female (n = 169), and enrolled in a weight loss intervention were analyzed. Latent profile analysis (LPA) was used to segment patients into groups based on their scores on PedsQL 4.0 scales (physical-, emotional-, social-, and school functioning) and the Coopersmith Self-Esteem Scale. A 3-class solution was parsimonious and demonstrated the best statistical fit (Bayesian information criterion = 10596.96; Lo-Mendell-Rubin-adjusted likelihood ratio test = 73.020, p \u3c .05). The 3 groups were ordinal and composed of respondents with high- (HF; n = 72, 29%), medium- (MF; n = 110, 44%), and low functioning (LF; n = 66, 27%). Further analyses (chi squares and linear regressions) showed that the LF group had a significantly higher proportion of Caucasians and males compared to the HF (referent) group. Also, when controlling for demographics and weight, the LF group had significantly higher blood pressure (diastolic and systolic), lower self-reported physical activity (on two different measures), and a higher total score on a scale of depressed mood. Four groups of ordinal regressions (since the pair of self-reported exercise variables and blood pressure variables were correlated, only one from each pair was included in each set) consistently found that self-reported physical activity and blood pressure improved significantly from the LF to HF groups. However, when depressed mood was included, it became the only significant variable. These findings suggest that LF group members are demographically and clinically distinct and that depressed mood may be the critical factor connecting self-report and metabolic dysfunction. Theory suggests depressed mood is both associated with cognitive schemas that affect responses on self-report measures; skewing them negative, and is also manifested metabolically

Television Center: a Division of UND Continuing Education

This departmental history was written on the occasion of the UND Quasquicentennial in 2008.https://commons.und.edu/departmental-histories/1107/thumbnail.jp

Pride of Place: Interethnic Relations and Urban Space in Riga 1918-1939

This dissertation examines the physical and symbolic transformation of the city of Riga, Latvia during the period 1918-1940. The creation of an independent Latvian state triggered processes of ethnic reversal in politics, economics, culture, and civil society that manifested themselves in and through urban public spaces in the capital of the new Republic of Latvia. What was already a profoundly multi-ethnic and cosmopolitan Northern European trading city in 1914 was “given a Latvian face” by national activists over the course of two decades. This process was shaped by, and often contested between, the ethnic Latvian majority and the city’s ethnic minority populations, with urban spaces figuring prominently in the political discourse of the period as bargaining chips and symbolic battlefields. The dissertation engages with questions of spatial belonging, collective memory, and urban ethnicity that remain crucial in contemporary Europe. The dissertation argues that rather than merely being an arena in which an already-achieved ethnic coup belatedly manifested itself, the unique historical and ethno-symbolic qualities of various prominent urban spaces in Riga dictated the course taken by the decades-long process of ethnic reversal. In analyzing the role of spaces and their attendant institutions in shaping interethnic relations in interwar Riga, the dissertation also highlights the persistence of pre-WWI traditions of peaceful cultural competition (in theater, architecture, and city government) into the interwar period. This illustrates the extent to which the new national states of 1918 disrupted previously developed paradigms for ethnic coexistence, ones which took multi-ethnicity as a permanent state of affairs. In focusing on the role of urban spaces in shaping new ethnic hierarchies, the dissertation both illuminates the functional mechanics of ethnic reversal in East Central Europe after the First World War and highlights previously understudied instances of interethnic cooperation, presenting a more nuanced picture that complicates more simplistic narratives of ethnic antagonism in the interwar period

Predictors of Binge Eating among Bariatric Surgery Candidates: Disinhibition as a Mediator of the Relationship Between Depressive Symptoms and Binge Eating

Background—Current and lifetime psychopathology is common in adult patients seeking bariatric surgery, with major depressive disorder and binge eating disorder affecting a higher proportion of this group than the general population. While depressive symptoms have been previously associated with eating pathology, potential mediators of this relationship are not well understood. Methods—This study used a naturalistic, retrospective design to investigate cognitive and behavioral aspects of eating behavior (cognitive restraint, disinhibition, and hunger) as potential mediators of the relationship between depressive symptoms and binge eating within a sample of 119 adult patients (82.4% female; 96.6% white; mean age = 47 years) seeking bariatric surgery (Rouxen-Y and sleeve gastrectomy) at a large university medical center. Patients completed a standardized presurgical psychological evaluation to determine appropriateness for bariatric surgery as part of routine clinical practice. Binge eating was assessed via clinician rating (number of binge eating episodes per week) based on DSM-IV diagnostic criteria and self-report measures (Binge Eating Scale) in order to account for potential methodological differences. Depressive symptoms were assessed using the Beck Depression Inventory. Results—Depressive symptoms were a significant predictor of binge eating, disinhibition, and hunger. However, only disinhibition emerged as a significant mediator of the relationship between depressive symptoms and binge eating. Conclusions—Behavioral disinhibition, or a tendency toward overconsumption of food and challenges restraining impulses associated with a loss of control eating, may represent an important variable in determining the relation between depressive symptoms and binge eating, in bariatric surgery patients

Conductometric titration method for determination of naftidrofuryl oxalate, propafenone HCl and sotalol HCl using silver nitrate

A simple, precise, rapid, and low-cost conductometric method for determination of naftidrofuryl oxalate, propafenone HCl and sotalol HCl in pure form and in pharmaceutical formulations using silver nitrate has been described. The method is based on the precipitation of oxalate or chloride ions coming from the cited drugs with silver ions, yielding silver oxalate or silver chloride and the conductance of the solution is measured as a function of the volume of titrant. The studied drugs were evaluated in double distilled water in the range of 1-15 mg. Various experimental conditions were established and results obtained showed good recoveries with relative standard deviation of 0.909, 0.955 and 0.983 for naftidrofuryl, propafenone and sotalol, respectively. The proposed procedures were applied successfully to the analysis of these drugs in their pharmaceutical formulations. Results were favorably comparable to the official or reference methods