5 research outputs found
Genome structure and diversity among Cynanchum wilfordii accessions
Abstract
Background
Cynanchum wilfordii (Cw) and Cynanchum auriculatum (Ca) have long been used in traditional medicine and as functional food in Korea and China, respectively. They have diverse medicinal functions, and many studies have been conducted, including pharmaceutical efficiency and metabolites. Especially, Cw is regarded as the most famous medicinal herb in Korea due to its menopausal symptoms relieving effect. Despite the high demand for Cw in the market, both species are cultivated using wild resources with rare genomic information.
Results
We collected 160 Cw germplasm from local areas of Korea and analyzed their morphological diversity. Five Cw and one Ca of them, which were morphologically diverse, were sequenced, and nuclear ribosomal DNA (nrDNA) and complete plastid genome (plastome) sequences were assembled and annotated. We investigated the genomic characteristics of Cw as well as the genetic diversity of plastomes and nrDNA of Cw and Ca. The Cw haploid nuclear genome was approximately 178 Mbp. Karyotyping revealed the juxtaposition of 45S and 5S nrDNA on one of 11 chromosomes. Plastome sequences revealed 1226 interspecies polymorphisms and 11 Cw intraspecies polymorphisms. The 160 Cw accessions were grouped into 21 haplotypes based on seven plastome markers and into 108 haplotypes based on seven nuclear markers. Nuclear genotypes did not coincide with plastome haplotypes that reflect the frequent natural outcrossing events.
Conclusions
Cw germplasm had a huge morphological diversity, and their wide range of genetic diversity was revealed through the investigation with 14 molecular markers. The morphological and genomic diversity, chromosome structure, and genome size provide fundamental genomic information for breeding of undomesticated Cw plants
Emotional experiences and psychological well-being in 51 countries during the COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic presents challenges to psychological well-being, but how can we predict when people suffer or cope during sustained stress? Here, we test the prediction that specific types of momentary emotional experiences are differently linked to psychological well-being during the pandemic. Study 1 used survey data collected from 24,221 participants in 51 countries during the COVID-19 outbreak. We show that, across countries, wellbeing is linked to individuals’ recent emotional experiences, including calm, hope, anxiety, loneliness, and sadness. Consistent results are found in two age, sex, and ethnicity-representative samples in the United Kingdom (n = 971) and the United States (n = 961) with preregistered analyses (Study 2). A prospective 30-day daily diary study conducted in the United Kingdom (n = 110) confirms the key role of these five emotions and demonstrates that emotional experiences precede changes in well-being (Study 3). Our findings highlight differential relationships between specific types of momentary emotional experiences and well-being and point to the cultivation of calm and hope as candidate routes for well-being interventions during periods of sustained stress
Emotional experiences and psychological well-being in 51 countries during the covid-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic presents challenges to psychological well-being, but how can we predict when people suffer or cope during sustained stress? Here, we test the prediction that specific types of momentary emotional experiences are differently linked to psychological well-being during the pandemic. Study 1 used survey data collected
from 24,221 participants in 51 countries during the COVID-19 outbreak. We show that, across countries, well-being is linked to individuals’ recent emotional experiences, including calm, hope, anxiety, loneliness, and sadness.
Consistent results are found in two age, sex, and ethnicity-representative samples in the United Kingdom (n = 971)
and the United States (n = 961) with preregistered analyses (Study 2). A prospective 30-day daily diary study conducted in the United Kingdom (n = 110) confirms the key role of these five emotions and demonstrates that emotional experiences precede changes in well-being (Study 3). Our findings highlight differential relationships
between specific types of momentary emotional experiences and well-being and point to the cultivation of calm
and hope as candidate routes for well-being interventions during periods of sustained stress
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American Idle: An examination of leisure guilt, time use, and well-being
“We’re becoming vacation-phobic” (Lipman, 2018). According to research from the U.S. Travel Association, more than half of residents in the United States did not use all of their vacation days, amounting to 768 million unused vacation days in 2017 (U.S. Travel Association, 2018). A more recent survey showed that only about a quarter (27%) of employees in the United States used all of their paid vacation time last year, and nearly half of them (49%) responded that they worked at least an hour a day during their vacation (Qualtrics, 2022). People are hesitant to take their time off and many report feeling worried and bad about themselves during vacation and have trouble fully ‘unplugging’ themselves from work (Wong, 2020). It would seem that for many, time away from work is distressing, even stressful. Why? Across five studies, I propose and test the psychological sequelae of a novel psychological construct: leisure guilt, defined as an experience or state of feeling guilty, distressed, or bad about spending time leisurely over productively. I focus my examination on how leisure guilt may shape everyday leisure experiences and time use. First, in Studies 1a and 1b, I used Natural Language Processing techniques and examined what leisure activities make people feel happy and guilty, respectively. Unexpectedly, there was a significant overlap between activities that make people happy and guilty (e.g., watching TV, playing games), suggesting that activities that people enjoy may also be their source of guilt for wasting time. In addition, findings show that people with high tendencies to feel leisure guilt were more likely to report an overlap between happy and guilty leisure activities––indicating that when people with high leisure guilt engage in enjoyable, pleasant activities, they tend to feel guilt more.
Next, in Study 2a, I developed a Leisure Guilt Scale to assess individual propensities to experience guilt, distress, or anxiety when engaging in leisure. Results indicate that people high in leisure guilt were willing to spend more time on work and less time on leisure than they currently do. With the Leisure Guilt scale, in Study 2b, I further tested and found that people who show high levels of leisure guilt reported less enjoyment from their last leisure activities and greater tendencies to avoid having leisure time. These results did not substantially change controlling for theoretically relevant variables, such as guilt-proneness, leisure ethic, or protestant work ethic––confirming the discriminant validity and predictive power of leisure guilt. Furthermore, I investigated potential antecedents and consequences of leisure guilt. Findings reveal that people who are anxious about their socioeconomic standing in society report greater leisure guilt, which in turn was associated with various adverse psychological and health outcomes (i.e., subjective well-being, stress, anxiety, self-rated health).
Lastly, in Study 3, I used an Experience Sampling Method to investigate how leisure guilt plays out in everyday life. Replicating findings from Studies 2a and 2b, experiencing guilt when engaged in leisure was linked to lower enjoyment of leisurely moments, greater negative emotions about oneself and current time use, and more willingness to subsequently spend time productively. Furthermore, confirming Studies 2a and 2b results, people who are high in leisure guilt (trait) spent less time leisurely and more time productively. When people high in leisure guilt were spending time leisurely, they were more likely to feel leisure guilt, feel worse about themselves and their current time use, and greater willingness to spend subsequent time productively. In light of these findings, I then tested whether spending time productively would make individuals high in leisure guilt feel better about themselves and the current time use. Findings indicated that when people high in leisure guilt were engaging in productive activities, they still reported negative feelings about the current time use––effects that held significant when controlling for relevant covariates. This pattern did not differ whether the current productive time was by “working” or other productive activities (e.g., household work). Interestingly, however, currently spending time productively was not associated with willingness and the actual likelihood of spending subsequent time productively, suggesting that being productive at the moment seems to assuage the preoccupations that they should spend time productively next.
According to a recent survey, while Americans’ commitment to various traditional values is in decline (e.g., patriotism, religion), “hard work” remains among the utmost cherished values (Waldman, 2023). The findings from the current investigation suggest that this cultural ideology of moralizing hard work may actually create a psychological obstacle to a good life by making people feel guilty about their everyday leisurely moments