Don't leave me out in the cold:How peer experiences predict physical health in adolescence

Publieke samenvatting M de Bruine Don’t leave me out in the cold. Voor adolescenten is bij de groep horen belangrijk voor hun welbevinden. Wanneer ze gepest worden, of niet lekker in de groep van leeftijdsgenoten liggen (bijv. impopulair zijn) kan dit langdurige consequenties hebben voor hun gezondheid. Tot nu toe heeft onderzoek zich vooral gericht op hoe zulke ervaringen invloed kunnen hebben op de mentale gezondheid van adolescenten. Daarnaast heeft onderzoek ook laten zien dat negatieve ervaringen met leeftijdsgenoten invloed kunnen hebben op de fysieke gezondheid. Het is echter nog onduidelijk welke biologische processen hieraan ten grondslag liggen en welke ervaringen precies een rol spelen. Om hier meer inzicht in te krijgen kijkt dit proefschrift naar drie verschillende ervaringen, namelijk gepest worden, en twee vormen van status in de groep; populariteit en hoe (on)aardig adolescenten in de groep worden gevonden. Er wordt gekeken naar de mate waarin deze ervaringen bijdragen aan hoe fysiek gezond adolescenten zich voelen en het functioneren van hun immuunsysteem door te kijken naar ontstekingswaarden in het bloed. Daarvoor werden verscheidende groepen adolescenten over meerdere jaren gevolgd. Hieruit kwamen drie belangrijke bevindingen naar voren. Ten eerste zijn, naast andere vroege tegenslagen in het leven (bijv. een lage SES in kindertijd), negatieve ervaringen in de groep leeftijdsgenoten voorspellend voor de lichamelijke gezondheid van adolescenten. Ten tweede hebben ervaringen die ogenschijnlijk minder heftig zijn dan pesten, zoals de status van een adolescent in de groep, ook invloed op het functioneren van het immuunsysteem van adolescenten. Het is daarom belangrijk om niet alleen alert te zijn op duidelijke stressoren zoals gepest worden, maar ook op of een adolescent niet zo lekker in de groep ligt. Ten derde, leiden er meerdere wegen tot een slechtere lichamelijke gezondheid van adolescenten. De bevindingen in dit proefschrift suggereren dat gepest worden en de status in de groep leeftijdsgenoten de lichamelijke gezondheid van adolescenten zowel direct beïnvloeden als indirect door een vergrote kans op roken en een hoger BMI. Voor adolescenten die gepest worden of niet lekker in de groep liggen kunnen lichamelijke gezondheidssymptomen een psychosomatische oorzaak hebben. Voor artsen zou het de moeite waard kunnen zijn om ook naar de negatieve ervaringen met leeftijdsgenoten te vragen wanneer jongeren zich bij hun melden met gezondheidsklachten zonder aanwijsbare medische oorzaak

Discovery of prognostic markers in laryngeal cancer treated with radiotherapy

Head and neck cancer is the eighth most common cancer in the world with annually 890,000 new patients. Approximately 25% of all head and neck tumors are located in the larynx. In the Netherlands, 700 new patients are observed each year. A large proportion of the laryngeal cancers are treated with radiotherapy in order to preserve the larynx (important for voice, swallowing and breathing). Unfortunately, after radiotherapy in around 25% of patients the tumor recurs. In order to improve outcome for the individual patient with laryngeal cancer, it is necessary to select those patients that will benefit from radiotherapy. Therefore, Leonie Bruine de Bruin investigated several prognostic tumor markers during her PhD-study.Because a lack of oxygen in tumor tissue (tumor hypoxia) is associated with poor response to radiotherapy in head and neck tumors, she investigated whether a specific PET scan, 18F-FAZA-PET scan, could visualize tumor hypoxia in head and neck tumors. In patients with laryngeal cancer, the relationship between the findings on the 18F-FAZA-PET scan and immunohistochemical expression of classical hypoxic markers in the same tumor tissue was also examined.Furthermore, several tumor markers are investigated in relation to the response to radiotherapy in patients with laryngeal cancer. An association was found between high expression of 3 tumor markers (PTEN, pATM and DNMT1) and poor response to treatment. Based on her findings, in future studies the use of new innovative drugs that specifically inhibit the activity of these tumor markers, might be investigate to improve treatment of laryngeal cancer

Aging and Competence in Decision Making

Around the world, average life expectancy is increasing. Adults of all ages face important decisions that affect their life outcomes and overall well-being. This paper reviews recent developments in research on age differences in decision-making competence. The measurement of age differences in decision-making competence is grounded in normative theories of decision making, which posit how people should be making decisions, as well as descriptive research, which aims to examine how people actually make decisions. Studies on age differences in decision making have shown mixed patterns of results, perhaps because of having included a wide range of decision-making competence tasks. Each decision task may rely on a different combination of skills, with some showing age-related declines and others showing no change or improvements with age. Here, I discuss the potential skills that may contribute to making good decisions, including cognitive deliberation, experience, emotions, and motivation. Although fluid cognitive abilities that underlie cognitive deliberation are known to decline with age, the others show different developments with age. I also discuss potential interventions that aim to target cognitive deliberation, experience, emotions, and motivation, so as to promote better decisions and associated life outcomes across the life span

The reward value of infant facial cuteness tracks within-subject changes in women’s salivary testosterone

“Baby schema” refers to infant characteristics, such as facial cues, that positively influence cuteness perceptions and trigger caregiving and protective behaviors in adults. Current models of hormonal regulation of parenting behaviors address how hormones may modulate protective behaviors and nurturance, but not how hormones may modulate responses to infant cuteness. To explore this issue, we investigated possible relationships between the reward value of infant facial cuteness and within-woman changes in testosterone, estradiol, and progesterone levels. Multilevel modeling of these data showed that infant cuteness was more rewarding when women’s salivary testosterone levels were high. Moreover, this within-woman effect of testosterone was independent of the possible effects of estradiol and progesterone and was not simply a consequence of changes in women’s cuteness perceptions. These results suggest that testosterone may modulate differential responses to infant facial cuteness, potentially revealing a new route through which testosterone shapes selective allocation of parental resources

Capitalizing on order effects in the bids of peer-reviewed conferences to secure reviews by expert referees

International audiencePeer review supports scientific conferences in selecting high quality papers for publication. Referees are expected to evaluate submissions equitably according to objective criteria (e.g., originality of the contribution, soundness of the theory, validity of the experiments). We argue that the submission date of papers is a subjective factor playing a role in the way they are evaluated. Indeed, program committee (PC) chairs and referees process submission lists that are usually sorted by paperIDs. This order conveys chronological information, as papers are numbered sequentially upon reception.We show that order effects lead to unconsciously favor early-submitted papers to the detriment of later-submitted papers. Our point is supported by a study of 42 peer-reviewed conferences in Computer Science showing a decrease in the number of bids placed on submissions with higher paperIDs. It is advised to counterbalance order effects during the bidding phase of peer review by promoting the submissions with fewer bids to potential referees. This manipulation intends to better share bids out among submissions in order to attract qualified referees for all submissions. This would secure reviews from confident referees, who are keen on voicing sharp opinions and recommendations (acceptance or rejection) about submissions. This work contributes to the integrity of peer review, which is mandatory to maintain public trust in science

Improving survey measures of household inflation expectations

Expectations about future inflation are generally thought to play an important role in households’ decisions about spending and saving. They are also of great interest to central bankers, who take them into account when determining policy or assessing the effectiveness of communications with the public. To help improve existing survey measures of inflation expectations, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York recently joined with other institutions and academic consultants to develop a set of survey questions that will yield more reliable information on households’ inflation expectations, inflation uncertainty, and expectations about future wage changes.Inflation (Finance) ; Households - Economic aspects ; Economic surveys ; Federal Reserve Bank of New York ; Economic forecasting

Public priorities and expectation of climate change impacts in the United Kingdom

Irrespective of the success of climate mitigation efforts, societies worldwide face the challenge of adapting to a changing climate. In this paper, we examine UK residents’ expectations of future threats and opportunities associated with climate change impacts, along with willingness to prioritise different climate change impacts for investment. Using a national survey (n = 2007), we report on three main findings. First, UK residents tend to expect threats related to flooding and wet weather to be more likely and concerning than heat extremes or opportunities. Second, UK residents’ expectations of climate change impacts do not align with expert assessments, especially showing lower estimates of heat-related threats as compared to experts. Third, willingness to allocate resources to potential climate change impacts tends to be more strongly associated with anticipated concern should they occur than climate change belief or the expected likelihood of them occurring. We discuss the implications of our findings for policies and communications about climate change adaptation in the UK and elsewhere