Together alone: Social dysfunction in neuropsychiatric disorders

In chapter 2, we examined social functioning among 2952 NESDA-participants (healthy controls N=650, individuals remitted from anxiety and/or depressive disorder N=621, patients with anxiety disorder only N=540, depressive disorder only N=393 or comorbid anxiety and depressive disorders N=748) using affective and behavioral indicators. We found significant social dysfunction in patients with anxiety disorders, and to an even higher degree in those with depressive disorders, and most prominently in patients with comorbid anxiety and depressive disorders. In addition, our study also showed that both affective and behavioral aspects of social dysfunction were compromised, with affective aspects being the more severely impaired in all groups as compared to healthy controls. The affective indicators loneliness and perceived social disability, in addition to the behavioral indicator social network size, showed the largest effect sizes for the patients with comorbid anxiety and depression, as compared to healthy controls (Cohen’s d ranging from 0.81- 1.76). We also described that even after remission of affective psychopathology, residual impairments in social functioning tended to remain in social network size, social support, loneliness, and perceived social disability. Importantly, we also established that perceived social disability among patients is predictive of a depressive and/or anxiety diagnosis as much as two years later. Chapter 3 describes social dysfunction in schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s disease patients (N=164) using behavioral and affective indicators of social dysfunction. Building on the findings of the NESDA study described above, we used perceived social disability and loneliness as affective indicators of social dysfunction, and we added a rater-perceived social disability questionnaire. The individual subscales of the Social Functioning Scale and its total score were used as behavioral indicators of social dysfunction. In this PRISM sample, both SZ (N=56) and AD (N=50) patients exhibited more social dysfunction when compared with age- and sex matched HC participants (HC younger N=29; HC older N=28). As compared to HC, both behavioral and affective social functioning were poorer in SZ patients (Cohens d’s 0.81-1.69), whereas AD patients exhibited poorer behavioral social function (Cohen’s d’s 0.65-1.14). Comparing the patient groups exclusively, we found that the behavioral aspects of social functioning were fairly similar, with the affective indices being less favorable for the SZ patients, who were found to have greater feelings of loneliness and perceived social disability than did the AD patients. Chapter 4 examines whether DMN connectional integrity among MDD patients (N=74) covaries with individual scores on an integrated social dysfunction composite, composed of behavioral and affective features. Building on findings described above, we used the network size as behavioral indicator and we used perceived social disability and loneliness as our affective indicators of social dysfunction. The analyses cautiously linked greater social dysfunction among MDD patients to diminished DMN connectivity, specifically within the rostromedial prefrontal cortex and posterior superior frontal gyrus. These effects were most prominent when high and low social dysfunctioning MDD groups were compared, with the dimensional effects being more subtle. In chapter 5, we explored DMN integrity as a function of social dysfunction among SZ (N=48) and AD (N=47) patients, as well as age-matched healthy controls (HC; N=55). Social dysfunction was operationalized using the SFS as behavioral indicator of social dysfunction and loneliness as an affective indicator. Our analyses interestingly showed that affective and behavioral indicators of social dysfunction are independently associated with diminished DMN connectional integrity, specifically within rostromedial prefrontal subterritories of the DMN. The combined average effect of these indicators on diminished DMN connectivity was even more pronounced (both spatially and statistically), comprising large sections of rostromedial and dorsomedial prefrontal cortex

Translation Invariance and Finite Additivity in a Probability Measure on the Natural Numbers

Inspired by the two envelopes exchange paradox, a finitely additive probability measure m on the natural numbers is introduced. The measure is uniform in the sense that m ((i))=m ((j)) for all i, j∈□. The measure is shown to be translation invariant and has such desirable properties as m ((i∈□| i=0 (mod2)))=1/2. For any r∈ [0, 1], a set A is constructed such that m (A)=r; however, m is not defined on the power set of □. Finally, a resolution to the two envelopes exchange paradox is presented in terms of m

Predatory open access journals in a performance-based funding model: common journals in Bealls list and in the VABB-SHW

This report gives the results of the comparison of Beall’s list of predatory open access journals with the VABB-SHW lists of journals – including all journals that are being or have been indexed in the Web of Science – as of July 2013. The report may facilitate the GP’s decision making. More generally, the report may raise awareness on the prevalence of predatory open access publishing in the social sciences and humanities in Flanders. The number of articles in predatory open access journals submitted to ECOOM-UAntwerpen by the universities in view of inclusion in the VABB-SHW is increasing in recent years. Whereas no publications in predatory open access journals appeared in 2000-2002, the yearly number remained below 5 in the period 2003-2009. In 2010 the number rose to 5, and then jumped to 15 in 2011 and 24 in 2012. This illustrates that in Flanders too predatory open access publishing is gaining ground. Nonetheless, the percentage of publications in predatory open access journals remains very small thus far (0.20%, the largest proportion for any year thus far, in 2012)