Robust relation between temporal discounting rates and body mass

When given the choice between $100 today and$110 in 1 week, certain people are more likely to choose the immediate, yet smaller reward. The present study examined the relations between temporal discounting rate and body mass while accounting for important demographic variables, depressive symptoms, and behavioral inhibition and approach. After having their heights and weights measured, 100 healthy adults completed the Monetary Choice Questionnaire, the Beck Depression Inventory-II, and the Behavioral Inhibition Scale/Behavioral Approach Scale. Overweight and obese participants exhibited higher temporal discounting rates than underweight and healthy weight participants. Temporal discounting rates decreased as the magnitude of the delayed reward increased, even when other variables known to impact temporal discounting rate (i.e., age, education level, and annual household income) were used as covariates. A higher body mass was strongly related to choosing a more immediate monetary reward. Additional research is needed to determine whether consideration-of-future-consequences interventions, or perhaps cognitive control interventions, could be effective in obesity intervention or prevention programs

On distinguishing progressively increasing response requirements for reinforcement.

This is the published version, reproduced here with permission from the publisher. It is also available electronically from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22479130.Several different arrangements have been described for increasing the response requirements for reinforcement using the label progressive-ratio schedule. Under the original progressive-ratio schedule, the response requirement is increased after each reinforcer. Subsequently, arrangements have been used in which the number of required responses increases following multiple reinforcers at a single response requirement or between sessions. Following an assessment of the different types of contingencies that result from such progressive response requirements and the labels used to describe them, a set of descriptive labels is suggested for these different types of progressively increasing response requirement

Det heliga moderskapet: en kvalitativ studie av kvinnors upplevelser av MVC och BVC

The cutting-down on the medical care has a large affect on the prenatal care in Sweden. This creates a critical situation for both women in postpartum and the midwifes. The thesis aims to get a better understanding of women’s experience’s from and expectations on the prenatal care and nursing centers. The empirical material contains interviews with five women with experiences from the institutions. The field was defined in limited time with the midwife, the parents training, the normative childbirth, lack of following up. The result of this thesis is that the institutions in prenatal care and the nursing center need to become more coherent around postpartum depression and women’s health

A dual-process approach to exploring the role of delay discounting in obesity

Delay discounting of financial rewards has been related to overeating and obesity. Neuropsychological evidence supports a dual-system account of both discounting and overeating behaviour where the degree of impulsive decision making is determined by the relative strength of reward desire and executive control. A dual-parameter model of discounting behaviour is consistent with this theory. In this study, the fit of the commonly used one-parameter model was compared to a new dual-parameter model for the first time in a sample of adults with wide ranging BMI. Delay discounting data from 79 males and females (Males=26) across a wide age (M=28.44 years (SD=8.81)) and BMI range (M=25.42 (SD=5.16)) was analysed. A dual-parameter model (saturating-hyperbolic; Doya, 2008) was applied to the data and compared on model fit indices to the single-parameter model. Discounting was significantly greater in the overweight/obese participants using both models, however, the two parameter model showed a superior fit to data (p<.0001). The two parameters were shown to be related yet distinct measures consistent with a dual-system account of inter-temporal choice behaviour.The dual-parameter model showed superior fit to data and the two parameters were shown to be related yet distinct indices sensitive to differences between weight groups. Findings are discussed in terms of the impulsive reward and executive control systems that contribute to unhealthy food choice and within the context of obesity related research

Alcohol-Dependent Individuals Discount Sex at Higher Rates than Controls

Background Research on delay discounting has expanded our understanding of substance dependence in many ways. Recently, orderly discounting of sexual rewards has been demonstrated in both substance-dependent individuals, and healthy controls. Less clear, however, is if rates of sexual discounting are higher than controls in alcohol-dependent-individuals. Methods 20 Alcohol-dependent individuals and 21 healthy control participants completed two delay-discounting tasks. One task involved monetary rewards, whereas the other involved the discounting of sexual rewards (i.e., number of sex acts). Results Alcohol dependent individuals discounted sexual rewards at significantly higher rates than did controls. There was a trend towards, but not a similarly significant relation for the discounting of monetary rewards. Conclusions Rates of sexual discounting are elevated in alcohol dependent individuals. If this relation is replicated in other at risk populations, the rapid devaluation of sexual rewards may be a behavioral marker of impulsive sexual choices

Competing neurobehavioral decision systems and the neuroeconomics of craving in opioid addiction

Craving is typically thought of as a classically conditioned response characterized by an elevated mesolimbic dopamine response to drug-related stimuli. Although this definition has spurred considerable research, the clinical impact of the research conducted has been less robust. The current review takes a more contemporary approach by conceptualizing craving as the breakdown of executive function and relative strengthening of the limbic system, occurring in the presence of conditioned cues, leading to a maladaptive craving response (ie, an increased likelihood of drug consumption). Working from this framework, the present review focuses on four issues in drug craving research: pivotal findings and limitations of cue-reactivity and neurocognitive tasks; two main processes of craving that include self-control and reward-based explanations; integration of neuroeconomic approaches to craving; and the theoretical implications and future directions of drug craving research

A single-case multiple baseline design for treating insomnia in eating disorders: The TIRED study

This is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Christensen, KA, Forbush, KT, Elliott, BT, Jarmolowicz, DP. A single-case multiple baseline design for treating insomnia in eating disorders: The TIRED study. Int J Eat Disord. 2021; 54: 652– 659. https://doi.org/10.1002/eat.23450, which has been published in final form at https://doi.org/10.1002/eat.23450. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Use of Self-Archived Versions. This article may not be enhanced, enriched or otherwise transformed into a derivative work, without express permission from Wiley or by statutory rights under applicable legislation. Copyright notices must not be removed, obscured or modified. The article must be linked to Wiley’s version of record on Wiley Online Library and any embedding, framing or otherwise making available the article or pages thereof by third parties from platforms, services and websites other than Wiley Online Library must be prohibited.Objective The purpose of this trial is to evaluate the novel use of an empirically supported treatment for sleep problems for people with residual insomnia disorder following ED treatment. Method Participants (N = 6) will complete a single-case multiple baseline study using Brief Behavioral Treatment for Insomnia (Buysse et al., Archives of Internal Medicine, 171, 2011, 887–895; Troxel et al., Behavioral Sleep Medicine, 10, 2012, 266–279). Participants will complete pre- and post-treatment evaluations of insomnia severity, sleep efficiency, daytime fatigue, ED symptoms, depressive symptoms, and anxiety symptoms. Throughout treatment, participants will complete daily diaries of sleep indices (sleep latency, wake after sleep onset, total sleep time, and sleep efficiency). Results The primary outcome will be treatment effects on insomnia severity, measured by the Insomnia Severity Index. Secondary outcomes include sleep efficiency and daytime fatigue. Exploratory outcomes include ED-related impairment and symptoms, anxiety symptoms, and depression symptoms. We will provide subject-level graphs of sleep indices and ED symptoms throughout treatment. Additionally, treatment effects will be examined at one- and three-month follow-up. Discussion Although insomnia treatments have been evaluated in other psychiatric disorders, there has yet to be a study examining behavioral interventions for insomnia in EDs. Results of this study will inform the development and application of interventions for residual insomnia symptoms in this population

Effects of dietary baker’s yeast extract on the growth, blood indices and histology of Nile tilapia ( Oreochromis niloticus L.) fingerlings

Nile tilapia, Oreochromis niloticus (average initial weight, 5.91 ± 0.04 g), were fed four isonitrogenous and isolipidic diets for 84 days. The diets contained four levels of yeast extract (CW‐I) rich in nucleotides and β‐glucan: 0 (control), 5, 10 and 15 g/kg diet. Weight gain increased linearly, whereas the feed conversion ratio decreased linearly with increasing levels of yeast extract. The diet containing 15 g/kg yeast extract resulted in significantly better (p 0.05) differences were found in dry matter, protein, lipid or ash contents or in haematocrit, haemoglobin or total protein contents among the treatment groups. Blood sample profiles showed an increase in white and red blood cells in fish fed 15 g/kg yeast extract in comparison with the other treatment groups. The fish fed the diets with 10 and 15 g/kg yeast extract had significantly higher albumin and globulin levels than the control group, whereas decreased levels of cholesterol and triglycerides, aspartate aminotransferase and alanine aminotransferase were noted in fish fed the diet with 15 g/kg yeast extract. Histological analysis of the liver and intestine in fish fed the control diet showed a slightly abnormal structure in these organs. Only in fish fed diets supplemented with the highest amount of yeast extract was the structure of the hepatocytes and villi almost unchanged, which indicated that the yeast nucleotides could improve hepatic function and promote liver and gut restoration

Sunk costs, psychological symptomology, and help seeking

Individuals often allow prior investments of time, money or effort to influence their current behavior. A tendency to allow previous investments to impact further investment, referred to as the sunk-cost fallacy, may be related to adverse psychological health. Unfortunately, little is known about the relation between the sunk-cost fallacy and psychological symptoms or help seeking. The current study used a relatively novel approach (i.e., Amazon.com’s Mechanical Turk crowdsourcing [AMT] service) to examine various aspects of psychological health in internet users (n = 1053) that did and did not commit the sunk-cost fallacy. In this observational study, individuals logged on to AMT, selected the “decision making survey” amongst the array of currently available tasks, and completed the approximately 200-question survey (which included a two-trial sunk cost task, the brief symptom inventory 18, the Binge Eating Scale, portions of the SF-8 health survey, and other questions about treatment utilization). Individuals that committed the fallacy reported a greater number of symptoms related to Binge Eating Disorder and Depression, being bothered more by emotional problems, yet waited longer to seek assistance when feeling ill. The current findings are discussed in relation to promoting help-seeking behavior amongst individuals that commit this logical fallacy

Using Crowdsourcing to Examine Relations Between Delay and Probability Discounting

This is the author's accepted manuscript. The original is available at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0376635712001891Although the extensive lines of research on delay and/or probability discounting have greatly expanded our understanding of human decision-making processes, the relation between these two phenomena remains unclear. For example, some studies have reported robust associations between delay and probability discounting, whereas others have failed to demonstrate a consistent relation between the two. The current study sought to clarify this relation by examining the relation between delay and probability discounting in a large sample of internet users (n= 904) using the Amazon Mechanical Turk (AMT) crowdsourcing service. Because AMT is a novel data collection platform, the findings were validated through the replication of a number of previously established relations (e.g., relations between delay discounting and cigarette smoking status). A small but highly significant positive correlation between delay and probability discounting rates was obtained, and principal component analysis suggested that two (rather than one) components were preferable to account for the variance in both delay and probability discounting. Taken together, these findings suggest that delay and probability discounting may be related, but are not manifestations of a single component (e.g., impulsivity)