Reduced face identity aftereffects in relatives of children with autism.

Autism is a pervasive developmental condition with complex aetiology. To aid the discovery of genetic mechanisms, researchers have turned towards identifying potential endophenotypes - subtle neurobiological or neurocognitive traits present in individuals with autism and their "unaffected" relatives. Previous research has shown that relatives of individuals with autism exhibit face processing atypicalities, which are similar in nature albeit of lesser degree, to those found in children and adults with autism. Yet very few studies have examined the underlying mechanisms responsible for such atypicalities. Here, we investigated whether atypicalities in adaptive norm-based coding of faces are present in relatives of children with autism, similar to those previously reported in children with autism. To test this possibility, we administered a face identity aftereffect task in which adaptation to a particular face biases perception towards the opposite identity, so that a previously neutral face (i.e., the average face) takes on the computationally opposite identity. Parents and siblings of individuals with autism showed smaller aftereffects compared to parents and siblings of typically developing children, especially so when the adapting stimuli were located further away from the average face. In addition, both groups showed stronger aftereffects for adaptors far from the average than for adaptors closer to the average. These results suggest that, in relatives of children with autism, face-coding mechanism are similar (i.e., norm-based) but less efficient than in relatives of typical children. This finding points towards the possibility that diminished adaptive mechanisms might represent a neurocognitive endophenotype for autism

Agire formativo e sviluppo della capacitazione negli interconnessi ecosistemi formativi

The topic of the promotion and enhancement of the necessary skills in a Lifelong, Life-wide and Life-deep Learning perspective is among the most urgent and relevant issues discussed by the major national and international organizations and it has made even more complex and difficult due to the spread of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. We have discovered, at the same time, personal and social fragility and, even more, the global dimension and interconnectedness. The need to fill gaps and imbalances, on a global level, starting from basic skills and the increasing demand for high skills, including soft and digital skills, is increasingly mandatory. Educational and training institutions are called upon to fulfil this unstoppable duty as an element of conjunction between the human being and the environment that surrounds him, creating a virtuous and sustainable  ecosystem, in which capacity and agency represent goals to be implemented. This article reports some results from an exploratory research project developed to understand the levels of knowledge regarding the implicit experiences that university students in the educational-pedagogical field live in their formal study path in order to increase awareness about the acquired skills.l tema della promozione e potenziamento delle competenze necessarie in una prospettiva di Lifelong, Lifewide e Lifedeep Learning è tra le questioni più urgenti e rilevanti discusse dai maggiori organismi nazionali e internazionali, reso ancora più complesso e difficile a causa della diffusione della perdurante pandemia da Covid-19. Abbiamo scoperto, al contempo, la fragilità personale e sociale e, ancora di più, la dimensione e interconnessione globale. La necessità di colmare i gaps e gli squilibri, a livello mondiale, a partire dalle competenze di base e la sempre maggiore richiesta di competenze elevate, tra cui le competenze trasversali e digitali, è sempre più cogente. Le istituzioni educative e formative sono chiamate a assolvere tale dovere improcrastinabile in quanto elemento di congiunzione tra l’essere umano e l’ambiente che lo circonda, creando un ecosistema virtuoso e sostenibile, in cui la capacitazione e l’agency ne rappresentano fini da implementare

LA CLASSE PLURILINGUE: NEOPLURILINGUISMO, AUTOVALUTAZIONE E VALORIZZAZIONE

Il contributo descrive il progetto “La classe plurilingue. Ricerca sulla complessità linguistica per una didattica inclusiva”, attualmente in corso presso il Dipartimento di Filologia Classica e Italianistica dell’Università di Bologna (2018-2020), presentandone le finalità, la metodologia adottata e i primi risultati raggiunti. Il fine ultimo del progetto è indagare le pratiche del plurilinguismo nella scuola primaria, con un duplice obiettivo: (i) sensibilizzare allievi, genitori e docenti sugli effetti positivi del plurilinguismo, attraverso interventi didattici mirati e attività di formazione sul tema; (ii) fornire ai docenti strumenti di supporto per trasformare la situazione di plurilinguismo in classe in una situazione di arricchimento e crescita culturale per tutti.   The multilingual class: neomultiilingualism, self-evaluation and valorization The article describes the project “The multilingual class. Research on linguistic complexity for inclusive teaching”, currently underway at the Department of Classical and Italianistic Philology of the University of Bologna (2018-2020), presenting its aims, the methodology adopted and the initial results. The ultimate aim of the project is to investigate the practices of multilingualism in primary school, with a twofold objective: (i) to make pupils, parents and teachers aware of the positive effects of multilingualism, through targeted educational interventions and training activities on the subject; (ii) to provide teachers with support tools to transform the multilingualism in the classroom into a source of enrichment and cultural growth for all

Importance of the Inverted Control in Measuring Holistic Face Processing with the Composite Effect and Part-Whole Effect

Holistic coding for faces is shown in several illusions that demonstrate integration of the percept across the entire face. The illusions occur upright but, crucially, not inverted. Converting the illusions into experimental tasks that measure their strength - and thus index degree of holistic coding - is often considered straightforward yet in fact relies on a hidden assumption, namely that there is no contribution to the experimental measure from secondary cognitive factors. For the composite effect, a relevant secondary factor is size of the "spotlight" of visuospatial attention. The composite task assumes this spotlight can be easily restricted to the target half (e.g., top-half) of the compound face stimulus. Yet, if this assumption were not true then a large spotlight, in the absence of holistic perception, could produce a false composite effect, present even for inverted faces and contributing partially to the score for upright faces. We review evidence that various factors can influence spotlight size: race/culture (Asians often prefer a more global distribution of attention than Caucasians); sex (females can be more global); appearance of the join or gap between face halves; and location of the eyes, which typically attract attention. Results from five experiments then show inverted faces can sometimes produce large false composite effects, and imply that whether this happens or not depends on complex interactions between causal factors. We also report, for both identity and expression, that only top-half face targets (containing eyes) produce valid composite measures. A sixth experiment demonstrates an example of a false inverted part-whole effect, where encoding-specificity is the secondary cognitive factor. We conclude the inverted face control should be tested in all composite and part-whole studies, and an effect for upright faces should be interpreted as a pure measure of holistic processing only when the experimental design produces no effect inverted.Australian Research Council DP0984558 to Elinor McKone; Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders (project number CE110001021); Kate Crookes salary supported by Hong Kong Research Grants Council grant (HKU744911) to William Hayward

Prospective associations between childhood social communication processes and adolescent eating disorder symptoms in an epidemiological sample

Deficits in social cognition and communication, the processes associated with human social behavior and interaction, have been described in individuals with eating disorder psychopathology. The current study examined whether social communication characteristics present in middle childhood (ages 8–14) were associated with eating disorder behaviors, cognitions, and diagnoses across adolescence (ages 14–18) in a large, population-based sample. Participants (N = 4864) were children enrolled in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC), a population-based, prospective study of women and their children. Regression methods tested prospective associations between social functioning using a facial emotion recognition task and parentally reported social communication symptoms (or difficulties), measured by the Social Communication Disorder Checklist (SCDC), with eating disorder symptoms and diagnoses. Misattribution of faces as sad or angry at age 8.5 was associated with purging and anorexia nervosa diagnosis at age 14, respectively, among girls. Furthermore, autistic-like social communication difficulties during middle childhood were associated with bulimia nervosa symptoms during adolescence among both girls and boys. Results did not support global associations between measured social communication deficits and eating disorder risk in this sample, but specific difficulties with facial emotion recognition and social communication may enhance the risk for disordered eating behaviors

Premessa

Questo volume è dedicato agli insegnanti delle scuole italiane, che ogni giorno entrano in classe disposti a cogliere le sfide e le opportunità rappresentate dalla presenza sempre più sensibile di allievi plurilingui. I contributi qui raccolti hanno lo scopo di aiutare gli insegnanti a valorizzare le lingue degli allievi di cittadinanza non italiana (sia quelli di recente migrazione, sia quelli nati in Italia), fornendo spunti per includere aspetti relativi al plurilinguismo nelle attività didattiche. Il volume contiene una serie di brevi capitoli mirati a descrivere le lingue straniere maggior- mente presenti nelle scuole italiane, in modo che gli insegnanti possano approfondire la conoscen- za dei principali aspetti storico-culturali e strutturali di queste lingue, e trovare in questa conoscenza spunto per percorsi di insegnamento che coinvolgano l’intera classe

Case of bullous pemphigoid in a 28-year-old woman affected by tuberous sclerosis complex

[No abstract available

Surgical management and oncological follow-up of cutaneous squamous cell carcinomas arising in epidermolysis bullosa patients

Background Hereditary epidermolysis bullosa (EB) is a rare genodermatosis characterized by skin fragility and blistering of the skin and mucous membranes in reaction to minimal traumas. The development of cutaneous squamous cell carcinomas (cSCCs) is one of the most common medical complications in junctional and dystrophic forms of the disease. Complete surgical excision of cutaneous tumors represents the gold standard of treatment. However, not only recognition of cSCCs can be challenging in the affected skin but also wound closure after surgical excision poses a great therapeutic challenge in EB patients. The aim of our study was to analyze the postoperative outcomes of such patients in order to have a better knowledge of the main critical issues in their surgical management and oncological follow-up. Methods We retrospectively identified a cohort of five EB patients treated at Modena University Hospital. Collected data included patient age and sex, date of cSCC diagnosis, relapses/recurrences, site of the neoplasm, number of surgical interventions, use of dermal substitutes, and postoperative infections. Results A total of 26 cSCCs were detected in our cohort. Forty-one surgical interventions were necessary to achieve excision of cSCCs with clear margins, varying from 1 to 4 surgical sessions per cSCC. Dermal substitutes were used in most cases but carried a higher infectious risk. Conclusions EB patients tend to develop numerous cSCCs that often relapse even after complete excision with clear margins. These results stress the importance of early cSCC diagnosis and strict postsurgical follow-up

Reprint of “Investigating ensemble perception of emotions in autistic and typical children and adolescents”

Ensemble perception, the ability to assess automatically the summary of large amounts of information presented in visual scenes, is available early in typical development. This ability might be compromised in autistic children, who are thought to present limitations in maintaining summary statistics representations for the recent history of sensory input. Here we examined ensemble perception of facial emotional expressions in 35 autistic children, 30 age- and ability-matched typical children and 25 typical adults. Participants received three tasks: a) an ‘ensemble’ emotion discrimination task; b) a baseline (single-face) emotion discrimination task; and c) a facial expression identification task. Children performed worse than adults on all three tasks. Unexpectedly, autistic and typical children were, on average, indistinguishable in their precision and accuracy on all three tasks. Computational modelling suggested that, on average, autistic and typical children used ensemble-encoding strategies to a similar extent; but ensemble perception was related to non-verbal reasoning abilities in autistic but not in typical children. Eye-movement data also showed no group differences in the way children attended to the stimuli. Our combined findings suggest that the abilities of autistic and typical children for ensemble perception of emotions are comparable on average. Keywords: Ensemble perception, Autism, Summary statistics, Facial expressions, Emotion