Navigating Cultures, Forming Identities

This paper recounts the personal history of the Ang Family, focusing especially on three generations of women, starting with the family’s matriarch Carmen Davenport Barraca Ang, to her daughter Teresita Ang See, and lastly to Carmalea Yinching Ang See. Each life account brings out stories of bravery, creativity, and perseverance amidst hardships and challenges in a difficult environment. Carmen, for instance, was a Filipina married to a Chinese, who lived in China and then in Binondo. She endeared herself to her husband’s Chinese family by learning how to speak Hokkien fluently. Teresita Ang See attended conservative Chinese schools in Binondo but used her experience as a student of political science at the University of the Philippines in helping her late husband Chinben See found in the early 1970s Pagkakaisa Sa Pag-unlad; this was a non-government organization which fought anti-Chinese racism in the country. The story ends with Teresita’s children, Carmelea Yinching and Sean Benson, and how they were raised to be comfortable as Filipinos foremost, with the primary identity as Filipino and yet take pride in and promote the duality of their heritage. Through the narratives, the authors aim to give a glimpse of the complexity of identities and identity-formation, shaped as they were by the objective environment and the necessities of the times

Extinction-Dependent Alterations in Corticostriatal mGluR2/3 and mGluR7 Receptors following Chronic Methamphetamine Self-Administration in Rats

Methamphetamine (meth) is a highly addictive and widely abused psychostimulant. Repeated use of meth can quickly lead to dependence, and may be accompanied by a variety of persistent psychiatric symptoms and cognitive impairments. The neuroadaptations underlying motivational and cognitive deficits produced by chronic meth intake remain poorly understood. Altered glutamate neurotransmission within the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and striatum has been linked to both persistent drug-seeking and cognitive dysfunction. Therefore, the current study investigated changes in presynaptic mGluR receptors within corticostriatal circuitry after extended meth self-administration. Rats self-administered meth (or received yoked-saline) in 1 hr/day sessions for 7 days (short-access) followed by 14 days of 6 hrs/day (long-access). Rats displayed a progressive escalation of daily meth intake up to 6 mg/kg per day. After cessation of meth self-administration, rats underwent daily extinction or abstinence without extinction training for 14 days before being euthanized. Synaptosomes from the medial PFC, nucleus accumbens (NAc), and the dorsal striatum (dSTR) were isolated and labeled with membraneimpermeable biotin in order to measure surface mGluR2/3 and mGluR7 receptors. Extended access to meth selfadministration followed by abstinence decreased surface and total levels of mGluR2/3 receptors in the NAc and dSTR, while in the PFC, only a loss of surface mGluR2/3 and mGluR7 receptors was detected. Daily extinction trials reversed the downregulation of mGluR2/3 receptors in the NAc and dSTR and mGluR7 in the PFC, but downregulation of surfac

Analysis of mGluR2/3 and mGluR7 surface vs. intracellular distribution in rat brain synaptosomes.

<p>(A) Rat brain atlas coordinates (adapted from <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0034299#pone.0034299-Paxinos1" target="_blank">[77]</a>) used for tissue dissection and synaptosome preparation. (B) Representative immunoblots showing surface vs. intracellular distribution of mGluR2/3 and mGluR7 receptors (as well as marker proteins: calnexin, ERK1/2 and RasD1/AGS1) in synaptosomal fraction prepared from the dSTR. P2* - synaptosomal fraction resolved under strongly reducing conditions (100 mM DTT); T – total synaptosomal fraction after biotinylation resolved under weakly reducing conditions (>10 mM DTT); NB – non-biotinylated (intracellular) proteins; B – biotinylated (surface) proteins isolated by precipitation with streptavidin-agarose beads.</p

Extended access to intravenous meth followed by extinction results in decreased surface expression of mGluR2/3 in the PFC.

<p><i>Top panels:</i> Representative immunoblots show levels of mGluR2/3 and mGluR7 protein in total (T) and surface (B, biotinylated) synaptosomal fractions isolated from the PFC (A), NAc (B), and dSTR (C) following meth self-administration and 14 days of extinction. <i>Lower panels:</i> Quantitative analyses of immunoblots revealed significant decreases in surface mGluR2/3 levels in the PFC (A). Integrated density of each band was analyzed by one-way ANOVA and expressed as the percentage of the saline-treated animals. Data shown as mean ± S.E.M.; n = 8 samples per group. *p<0.05 vs. Sal.</p

Extended access to intravenous meth results in robust self-administration and escalation of meth intake.

<p>(A) Timeline of the experiment as described in detail in the <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0034299#s2" target="_blank">Materials and Methods</a> section. Animals underwent 21 days of meth self-administration (or received yoked-saline) followed by 14 days of home cage abstinence or 14 daily extinction sessions. Tissues were collected at the end of the experiment. (B) Daily lever responding for meth and yoked-sal animals during self-administration (left graph) and extinction (right graph). (C) Escalation of daily meth intake during short (1 hr) and long (6 hr) self-administration sessions as detected in abstinent and extinction animals. Mean daily meth intake over the course of the first three days vs. last three days of short- and long-access self-administration was analyzed by one-way ANOVA and expressed as mg/kg/day of meth. (D) Total meth intake (mg/kg) in abstinent vs. extinction animals. Data shown as mean ± S.E.M.; n = 8–11 samples per group. **p<0.01 L12–L14 vs. L1–L3.</p

Extended access to intravenous meth followed by abstinence results in decreased surface and/or total expression of mGluR2/3 in the PFC and striatal subregions and decreased surface expression of mGluR7 in the PFC.

<p><i>Top panels:</i> Representative immunoblots show levels of mGluR2/3 and mGluR7 protein in total (T) and surface (B, biotinylated) synaptosomal fractions isolated from the PFC (A), NAc (B), and dSTR (C), following meth self-administration and 14 days of abstinence. <i>Lower panels:</i> Quantitative analyses of immunoblots revealed significant decreases in total mGluR2/3 levels (B, C), surface mGluR2/3 levels (A, B, C) and surface mGluR7 levels (A) in meth vs. saline rats. Integrated density of each band was analyzed by one-way ANOVA and expressed as the percentage of the saline-treated animals. Data shown as mean ± S.E.M.; n = 11 samples per group. *p<0.05, **p<0.01 vs. Sal.</p

A study on the relationship of employees\u27 demographics and their usages of Social Networking Sites (SNSs) in Paragon International Customer Care Ltd.

The study focuses on determining whether there is a relationship between employee demographics and usages of social networking sites in the business process outsourcing industry. Aside from the main objective, the researchers also desire to know the demographic profile of employees in terms of gender, age, position, and employment status. Furthermore, they want to determine the top social networking sites used by the employees and the frequency of usage. The respondents of this study come from Paragon International Customer Care Ltd. The researchers used chi-square test in PHStat2 for the data gathered in order to determine if there is a relationship between employee demographics and usages of social networking sites. A test of independence was also used for non-binary data such as the age. Moreover, hypotheses were posed and through the analysis of data, the researchers were able to see which variables are related with each other. Gender and usages of social networking sites for entertaining one’s self and receiving emotional rewards are related to each other. Also in employee position and usages of social networking sites for sharing information and improving connectivity, there is a relationship seen. For the employment status, the results show that there exists relationship between employment status and usages of social networking sites for sharing information, developing employability, and improving connectivity. However, there is no relationship between age and the different usages of social networking sites. With the findings, the researchers would like to recommend Paragon International Customer Care Ltd to use a professional social networking site used in other business process outsourcing companies in other countries such as BPO voice. It is also suggested that the company allow up to three hours of free access to social networking sites per shift for their employees which is found out to be the average length of usage among the respondents of the study