Political, Economic and Social Dominance of Major Cities in East Asia During the Twentieth Century

One of the greatest shift in human societies has been the change from dispersed settlement patterns toward a complex urban pattern. Prior to the industrialization there were only a few urban places scattered throughout the world and none could compare with numerous cities of today with respect to size and complexity. In recent decades the growth of cities in Asia has been particularly remarkable as there has been an increase in the number of medium sized cities and the growth of a number of mega cities. This urbanization of the worlds population has corresponded with other fundamental changes in human society although the relationship between urbanization and other social changes differ for time periods and regions of the world. Among the other changes were the transition from an agricultural toward a diverse economic structure and tremendous increases in population size along with declines in birth and death rates. Many researchers view these changes as being interlocked in a complex set of reciprocal causal relationship. This paper reviews explanations of urbanization with a focus on the emergence of mega cities and their relationship to smaller cities and to national levels of economic development. Special attention is given to literature on primate cities and to whether such cities hinder economic development for Asian societies

Regional Cultures, Persistence and Change: A Case Study of the Mormon Culture Region

There are at least two gaps in the literature on culture regions: (1) little research on regions other than the South, and (2) a lack of examination of regional distinctiveness across time. In addition, existing research provides contradictory conclusions regarding the perpetuation of culture regions; some results suggest modernization forces are obliterating regional distinctiveness, while other studies point to the endurance of differences. Making use of data reflecting 24 socioeconomic characteristics across the period 1950–1990, we find that the Mormon Culture Region (MCR) remained distinct from the United States as a whole, and was even more distinct in 1990 than in 1950. We believe our socioeconomic indicators represent important dimensions of regions, and are linked to the subjective identities that tend to be the focal point in analyses of culture regions. Additional research on other regions is needed to fully explain regional differences, as well as to adequately interpret results obtained when regional indicators are incorporated into empirical social research

Oxytocin and the development of a preference for the mother in lambs

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Observation of high ice particule concentrations in convective cells and cloud glaciation evolution

International audienc

Tricyclic antidepressant pharmacology and therapeutic drug interactions updated

New data on the pharmacology of tricyclic antidepressants (TCAs), their affinities for human cloned CNS receptors and their cytochrome P450 enzyme inhibition profiles, allow improved deductions concerning their effects and interactions and indicate which of the TCAs are the most useful. The relative toxicity of TCAs continues to be more precisely defined, as do TCA interactions with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). TCA interactions with monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs) have been, historically, an uncertain and difficult question, but are now well understood, although this is not reflected in the literature. The data indicate that nortriptyline and desipramine have the most pharmacologically desirable characteristics as noradrenaline reuptake inhibitors (NRIs), and as drugs with few interactions that are also safe when coadministered with either MAOIs or SSRIs. Clomipramine is the only available antidepressant drug that has good evidence of clinically relevant serotonin and noradrenaline reuptake inhibition (SNRI). These data assist drug selection for monotherapy and combination therapy and predict reliably how and why pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic interactions occur. In comparison, two newer drugs proposed to have SNRI properties, duloxetine and venlafaxine, may have insufficient NRI potency to be effective SNRIs. Combinations such as sertraline and nortriptyline may therefore offer advantages over drugs like venlafaxine that have fixed ratios of SRI/NRI effects that are not ideal. However, no TCA/SSRI combination is sufficiently safe to be universally applicable without expert knowledge. Standard texts (e.g. the British National Formulary) and treatment guidelines would benefit by taking account of these new data and understandings