Genotype, Childhood Maltreatment, and Their Interaction in the Etiology of Adult Antisocial Behaviors

BACKGROUND: Maltreatment by an adult or caregiver during childhood is a prevalent and important predictor of antisocial behaviors in adulthood. A functional promoter polymorphism in the monoamine oxidase A (MAOA) gene has been implicated as a moderating factor in the relationship between childhood maltreatment and antisocial behaviors. Although there have been numerous attempts at replicating this observation, results remain inconclusive. METHODS: We examined this gene-environment interaction hypothesis in a sample of 3356 white and 960 black men (aged 24-34) participating in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. RESULTS: Primary analysis indicated that childhood maltreatment was a significant risk factor for later behaviors that violate rules and the rights of others (p .05). Power analyses indicated that these results were not due to insufficient statistical power. CONCLUSIONS: We could not confirm the hypothesis that MAOA genotype moderates the relationship between childhood maltreatment and adult antisocial behaviors

Cultural Orientations of sport managers

Various interpretations of sport management are cultural constructs underpinned by core assumptions and values held by members of professional communities. Sport managers world wide share common problems, but differ in how they resolve them. These universal differences emerge from the relationships they form with other people, and their attitude to time, activities and the natural environment. This paper examines the role of sport managers’ cultural orientations in the interpretation and practice of sport management. Using a multiple dimension model (Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars, 2000) it sketches the cultural profiles of fifteen sport managers from seven countries. A combination of methods was employed including questionnaires, interviews and participant observation. It is contended that the culture of sport management concerns a social process by which managers get involved in reconciling seven fundamental cultural dilemmas in order to perform tasks and achieve certain ends. Thus, a knowledge of the cultural meaning of sport management in a particular country would equip sport managers with a valuable tool in managing both the cultural diversity of their own work forces and in developing appropriate cross-cultural skills needed for running international events, marketing campaigns, sponsorship deals and joint ventures

Ambicultural blending between Eastern and Western paradigms : fresh perspectives for international management research

East and Southeast Asian worldviews are distinctly different from those of the West. Westerners and Asians construct their environments differently, not least because they construct the notion of \u27self\u27 very differently. This paper describes and exemplifies distinctions in cognitive and linguistic styles between the East and the West and outlines the implications of these styles for environmental perspectives and research paradigms. Examples from Thailand illustrate the philosophical roots and practical implications of an indigenous Eastern perspective for local business interactions. We explore the privilege afforded in Western, Cartesian paradigms in (Asian) management research and stimulate debate on the benefits of promoting alternative Asian indigenous perspectives for both management research and management practice. We support the idea that Asian management discourse needs more self-confidence and deserves a more prominent place in international research, not least because international management research will greatly benefit from freshly \u27blended\u27 perspectives that incorporate Eastern and Western perspectives

Expanding the clinical spectrum of hereditary fibrosing poikiloderma with tendon contractures, myopathy and pulmonary fibrosis due to <i>FAM111B </i>mutations

BACKGROUND: Hereditary Fibrosing Poikiloderma (HFP) with tendon contractures, myopathy and pulmonary fibrosis (POIKTMP [MIM 615704]) is a very recently described entity of syndromic inherited poikiloderma. Previously by using whole exome sequencing in five families, we identified the causative gene, FAM111B (NM_198947.3), the function of which is still unknown. Our objective in this study was to better define the specific features of POIKTMP through a larger series of patients. METHODS: Clinical and molecular data of two families and eight independent sporadic cases, including six new cases, were collected. RESULTS: Key features consist of: (i) early-onset poikiloderma, hypotrichosis and hypohidrosis; (ii) multiple contractures, in particular triceps surae muscle contractures; (iii) diffuse progressive muscular weakness; (iv) pulmonary fibrosis in adulthood and (v) other features including exocrine pancreatic insufficiency, liver impairment and growth retardation. Muscle magnetic resonance imaging was informative and showed muscle atrophy and fatty infiltration. Histological examination of skeletal muscle revealed extensive fibroadipose tissue infiltration. Microscopy of the skin showed a scleroderma-like aspect with fibrosis and alterations of the elastic network. FAM111B gene analysis identified five different missense variants (two recurrent mutations were found respectively in three and four independent families). All the mutations were predicted to localize in the trypsin-like cysteine/serine peptidase domain of the protein. We suggest gain-of-function or dominant-negative mutations resulting in FAM111B enzymatic activity changes. CONCLUSIONS: HFP with tendon contractures, myopathy and pulmonary fibrosis, is a multisystemic disorder due to autosomal dominant FAM111B mutations. Future functional studies will help in understanding the specific pathological process of this fibrosing disorder

Identification of Candidate Genes for Dyslexia Susceptibility on Chromosome 18

Background: Six independent studies have identified linkage to chromosome 18 for developmental dyslexia or general reading ability. Until now, no candidate genes have been identified to explain this linkage. Here, we set out to identify the gene(s) conferring susceptibility by a two stage strategy of linkage and association analysis. Methodology/Principal Findings: Linkage analysis: 264 UK families and 155 US families each containing at least one child diagnosed with dyslexia were genotyped with a dense set of microsatellite markers on chromosome 18. Association analysis: Using a discovery sample of 187 UK families, nearly 3000 SNPs were genotyped across the chromosome 18 dyslexia susceptibility candidate region. Following association analysis, the top ranking SNPs were then genotyped in the remaining samples. The linkage analysis revealed a broad signal that spans approximately 40 Mb from 18p11.2 to 18q12.2. Following the association analysis and subsequent replication attempts, we observed consistent association with the same SNPs in three genes; melanocortin 5 receptor (MC5R), dymeclin (DYM) and neural precursor cell expressed, developmentally down-regulated 4-like (NEDD4L). Conclusions: Along with already published biological evidence, MC5R, DYM and NEDD4L make attractive candidates for dyslexia susceptibility genes. However, further replication and functional studies are still required.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Convergent genetic linkage and associations to language, speech and reading measures in families of probands with Specific Language Impairment

We analyzed genetic linkage and association of measures of language, speech and reading phenotypes to candidate regions in a single set of families ascertained for SLI. Sib-pair and family-based analyses were carried out for candidate gene loci for Reading Disability (RD) on chromosomes 1p36, 3p12-q13, 6p22, and 15q21, and the speech-language candidate region on 7q31 in a sample of 322 participants ascertained for Specific Language Impairment (SLI). Replication or suggestive replication of linkage was obtained in all of these regions, but the evidence suggests that the genetic influences may not be identical for the three domains. In particular, linkage analysis replicated the influence of genes on chromosome 6p for all three domains, but association analysis indicated that only one of the candidate genes for reading disability, KIAA0319, had a strong effect on language phenotypes. The findings are consistent with a multiple gene model of the comorbidity between language impairments and reading disability and have implications for neurocognitive developmental models and maturational processes

Integral Dynamics: Political Economy, Cultural Dynamics and the Future of the University

One becomes rich by taking advantage of the many canals that irrigate and diversify knowledge and wisdom, and stimulate mutual discoveries and recognition. People themselves are the main means for making this synergy work : hence the importance of supporting dynamic processes that rehabilitate people in all their dimensions, and that also rehabilitate relationships between themselves and their surroundings. Emmanuel N’Donne Reinventing the Present : the Chodak in Senegal 1. Introduction : Political Economy, Cultural Dynamics and the Future of the University The Nature and Scope of Integral Dynamics Starting with the Integral in the Foreground and the Dynamic as Background As we listen to today’s news (December, 2011), hearing that the Fitch Credit rating agency is about to downgrade six European countries, we wonder what on earth the world is coming to? For we have reached a state where the state of the economy, of a particular society, or at least how it is perceived by such “rating agencies”, drives all else : nature, community, culture, spirituality, science, technology. No matter that Greece or Italy, for example, are the respective birthplaces of European civilization, both are now up for sale. The time has now come for us to reinvent ourselves, locally and globally, if the whole world is not to suffer the same fate. For such a process of re-invention, we need both a whole new field of activity, and a new kind of agency, or institution, to promote such. Our new discipline, and prospective area of practice, Integral Dynamics, is forged out of Political Economy, Business Administration, and, most distinctively, Cultural Dynamics. These are altogether geared toward the identification and development of a particular individual and community, enterprise and society. While such an Integral approach transcends a previously so called “westernized” one, in each individual, enterprise and societal case, the Dynamic orientation serves to recognize and release both individual and also collective genius. Integral Dynamics, a new discipline and a new agency as such, is premised on the belief that the development of individual leaders, or entrepreneurs, without the simultaneous development of particular institutions, and societies, in both theory and practice, is a futile exercise, analogous to fiddling while Rome or Rwanda or Russia burns! Why then more specifically, and for whom is this new academic discipline and institution, on both integral and also dynamic counts, being developed, at this particular time? We start with our practical intent, and focus on the need that integral dynamics - as opposed to, say, affirmation action (cultural dynamics), economic growth (political economy), leadership or entrepreneurship (business administration) - intends to fulfill. For, as of our writing toward 2012, and in the wake of the endemic financial and economic, social and environmental crises, facing us locally and globally, we seek a specific way forward for each society in turn. For the seriously concerned citizen then, in each, for the government policy maker, for the enlightened practitioner, for the university administrator as well as for the committed student and researcher into economics and enterprise, all of whom may sense that the way forward, into the future, needs to be fundamentally different from - even while drawing upon - the past, our individual and collective focus is on Integral Dynamics. Most specifically moreover, and in the final analysis, we are establishing a newly integral, and dynamic, academic discipline and institution for these who feel, individually and communally, organizationally and societally, that you have something unique and particular to contribute to the world, and that the world as a whole will benefit, integrally and dynamically from such. On the one hand, integrally then, it is becoming ever more apparent that business, and indeed economics, cannot be insulated from nature, technology or culture. After all, firstly, energy and the environment are becoming ever more pressing issues today. There is a vast and growing literature on such. Secondly, the interface between business and economics, and science and technology is there for all to see, especially in the case of energy and communications technology. Cultural issues, finally, underlying development in Europe (north and south, east and west), in Africa, in the Arab world, in India or in China, come ever more to the fore. Yet, except for generally superficial analyses, ranging from the German “well oiled machine” to Chinese “guanxi” (as if that is all these two great European and Asian civilizations have to contribute), the interaction between culture, economy and enterprise, especially from a dynamic and developmental perspective, gets short shrift. At the same time, over the course of the last century, as a result of research in anthropology, archaeology, macro-history, philosophy, and areas studies – Aboriginal, African, Latin American, Egyptian, Arab, Indian, Chinese and Japanese, European and American – and many other diverse cultures have been uncovered, through intense intellectual scholarship and also prolonged physical exploration. Yet such rich diversity has seldom been in evidence either in business administration, in economic analysis, or indeed in the establishment of academia as a whole. The one recent exception, business-wise, was Japan, but now, as its economic miracle has faded, a predominantly Anglo-Saxon academic orientation to economics and enterprise once more rules the roost. It is with all that in mind that we perceive, on the one hand, the need for integral, that is trans-cultural and trans-disciplinary, studies, inclusive of, but extending beyond, economics and enterprise. Aligned with the Dynamic in the Foreground with Integral as Background On the other dynamic hand, secondly, in the last 150 years, nearly every natural, if not also social, science, has been transformed from an analytically based approach to the phenomena under investigation to a dynamic one. This occurred in astronomy with Laplace, in physics with Heisenberg, in chemistry with Prigogine, in logic with Hegel, in biology with Darwin, in psychology with Jung, and indeed in economics with Marx. Interestingly enough, such a dynamic approach has by and large not been incorporated into business studies, and as such business or public administration, the very term administration (business or public) being antithetical to such. Moreover, in economics Marx is the overwhelming exception to the otherwise generally analytical rule. However, much to the world’s cost, as we shall reveal, the dynamic economic baby, Marx’s “dialectical materialism”, and his unique understanding of capital flows, has been thrown out with the allegedly “Marxist” bathwater. In effect his alleged “socialism” has been deemed antithetical, ironically, to the prevailing “capitalist” establishment. The fact that Marx, by the way, brought with him a German historicist and holistic-rational, dynamic impulse, linked to bildung (cultivation), whereas Adam Smith had, comparatively, a more analytical- pragmatic British orientation, linked to efficient markets, seems to have passed conventional wisdom unwittingly by. That having been said, without some recognition of the particularities of kultur, to use the German speaking word, and the bildung (culture building) dynamic that goes with it, there is no transformative substance – our cultural dynamics as we shall see - with which to work. We are left with nothing other than the will of the individual entrepreneur, with all its positive and negative attributes, to provide such. Integral Dynamics, thereby, sets out with the intention of recognizing and releasing individual, organizational and societal substance, in a specific local context – naturally, culturally, technologically and economically - in close association with global others (in all of the above), over an extended period of time. Moreover, and in extending the notion of e-ducere, drawing out, from the individual to the organization and society, such dynamic development is enriched and extended, particularly to the extent that a new kind of institution can be co-evolves to establish such. Indeed, and to put all this into current perspective, as a close colleague and graduate of one of our transformation programs, Karen Michael, who is a social worker, financial services coordinator, and now union activist in the UK, mentioned in an e-mail communication to us, after a recent visit to Italy, toward the end of 2011 : I was just in Italy: it was gorgeous as ever, and showed a rather lovely pattern of economic activity in the "real" sense. Of course as the benighted "austerity" cuts begin, this will all change, and they will start spiraling into the maelstrom of demand failure and destruction of living standards. In other words, as the markets and the politicians hover over Italy, this “country” today means in essence “its economy”. As such, the particular natural and cultural heritage of this glorious birthplace of the European Renaissance, not to mention that of its ancient neighbor, today’s modern Greece, are both considered today like bonded slaves to the market. Economic and financial analysis, yes that matters a lot in Euroland, but dynamic culture, or nature, or even science, that’s another matter. And indeed thee is no particular agency, or set of agencies, that can serve to release a society’s; genius, not to mention an individual’s or organization’s. In response, integrally to begin with, we extend economics and enterprise to include, within and alongside it, underlying nature and community, science and technology, culture and spirituality. To that extent, Integral Dynamics aligns itself more closely with the Swedish interpretation of “business”, as naringslav, meaning the nourishment of life, than with the English meaning of “busy-ness”! Subsequently, dynamically, as per the African term ntu, meaning “vital force”, it seeks to recognize and release the vitality of each particular entity with which it is vitally concerned. To that extent, overall moreover, we draw on the German concept of bildung - education, development, cultivation - both individually and collectively. Ultimately, and institutionally moreover, we extend the French post-modern philosopher, Foucault’s notion of genealogy, to reflect a new kind of integral dynamic institution, as well as and alternative approach to history and philosophy. At the same time, as per Italy or Greece, the new discipline and activity, field and prospective agency, fully takes account of the fact that each culture, like each discipline, or indeed each person, is incomplete in itself, and therefore is in need, continually and reciprocally, of the other, if it is to develop and evolve, dynamically (transformatively) and integrally (analytically). That is where we are focused. Political Economy, Integral Dynamics and the Future of the University Ironically, as we shall soon see, the grounds for a more integral approach to enterprise and economics, encompassing many disciplines if not also, implicitly at least, diverse cultures, was laid out by Adam Smith and Karl Marx two and a half centuries ago, but, alas, that trans-disciplinary and trans-cultural impulse has been largely missed. In fact taking culture seriously, altogether, has been all too often hoist by the “essentialist” petard, especially in the wake of racism if not also fascism, and the horrendous negative stereotyping that has gone with both. While Adam Smith, as we shall discover, allegedly had the moral sentiment to reach out integrally and inclusively to the other, alongside his desire to advance the wealth of nations, the other formidable co-founder, so to speak, of political economy, Karl Marx, had an innate feel for the dynamic flow of capital. In fact the integral-dynamic complementarity between the two of them, not to mention their respectively Protestant/Western European, and Jewish/Eastern European heritages, has since been torn asunder, over two centuries, by mutually destructive ideological divides. Moreover, the fact that Marx established what we might call a social laboratory, apart from any particular university, is seldom acknowledged. Before we pursue the argument further, underlying the specific nature and scope of our proposed new academic discipline and institutional activity, that is Integral Dynamics as a composite discipline and “genealogical” – see the culminating chapter for a detailed exposition on such - institution, let us say something about, firstly, how and why a new discipline, generally, is born? As such, and as we will now see, we build, successively on the trans-formational and the trans-personal, the trans-cultural and the trans-disciplinary, altogether set within, not a pre-modern, modern or post-modern, but what has been called our trans-modern age, and indeed a trans-modern alternative to the modern university, which encompasses them all. The integral dynamic institution, as we shall see, will be a composite of community (Grounding), sanctuary (Emerging), university (Navigating) and laboratory (Effecting), with a view to thereby releasing GENE-ius. . Transformational to Transpersonal Why and how is a new discipline born : for example, chemistry out of alchemy, political economy out of moral philosophy, or indeed biotechnology out of biology and mechanical engineering? Generally speaking, there are four reasons. First because the world is forever changing and (wo)mankind has a need to understand what is going on around them, something new (for example chemistry) is invariably, especially when there is a deep spirit of curiosity, being trans-formatively created out of the old (in this case alchemy). Secondly, there are always new problems to be solved, which require freshly developed kinds of thinking as the world grows ever more complex. In the twentieth century, specifically for instance, the evolution of “general systems theory” marked out a newly trans-disciplinary territory, to deal with such. Indeed Political-Economy was an example of this, two centuries prior in the eighteenth century, as it emerged out of, as we shall see later, and duly extended and enriched, prior Moral-Philosophy. Thirdly and ever more as (wo)mankind’s thinking evolves, the “inner world” of subjectivity, the psyche and the spirit, combines transpersonally with the “outer world” of objectivity, of matter and energy, and vice versa. This is where and how, for example, the Swiss psycho-analyst C.G. Jung and the Austrian theoretical physicist Wolfgang Pauli came to realize in the mid twentieth century that they were kindred spirits, who could mutually benefit one another. Finally, new trans-disciplinary as well as now trans-cultural potential is opened up as diverse disciplines (for example bio-technology or social psychology) and now also diverse cultures (for instance Europe and the Arab world in the early Renaissance) come together. Interestingly enough, the same kind of overall logic applies to the establishment of a new institution, for example when the research university emerged, initially in Germany, out of the old universtas, that is community of scholars oriented toward disseminating and sharing knowledge, rather than generating new knowledge. So where does our so called Integral Dynamics compositely fit in? 2. Integral Dynamics and Trans-Modernity Trans-formational : Transformation of Local Identity into Global Integrity The “old” world on which Integral Dynamics firstly draws, naturally and culturally, technologically and economically, is in fact the oldest one, that of “indigenous” peoples around the globe, and their “ever present origins”. In fact, while they are increasingly coming to the fore, this is not yet in a way in which something indigenously-exogenously “new” is being created out of the indigenously “old”. So now we have locally “indigenous knowledge systems” to be set against globally “exogenous” ones, but seldom the twain do meet, either thematically or institutionally. As such, and in the latter respect, communities, whereby it takes a village to educate a child, as the African saying goes, remains disconnected from formal schooling or university. Whereas in the arts, whether in fine art or architecture, dance or in music, tradition (community oriented) and modernity (university based) are continually being juxtaposed together, anew, this is seldom the case in either the natural or social sciences. However, when alchemy becomes chemistry, such a transformation indeed takes place. How does this arise? In our particular, dynamic case, such a transformation is instigated, in fact, when out of prior, original grounds, a fusion takes place, thereafter (see for example Sekem, in Egypt, chapter 19), between the local and the global, rather than, as is more conventionally so, as in our final Zimbabwean case (chapter 20), the one (global) dominating, or indeed colonizing the other (local). Subsequent to such, should further transformation ensue, a newly global idea, or institution, arises, out of what has emerged before, which is then, ultimately, globally-locally applied. A good example of all of such, in the business world, is the practice of Kaizen, born out of large-scale Japanese manufacturing industry, which we align, as we shall see, with GENE-ius . Grounded in “Zen” Buddhism, locally unique to Japan, Kai-Zen linked locally-globally together “Zen” perfectionism with “Kai” continuous improvement, Emerging through a meeting between “Japanese Spirit and Western Technique” (1). And that was not the end of the story. Because kaizen, writ large as per what we term Navigation, became conceptualized, and indeed institutionalized, through Lean Thinking (2), a freshly created mode of production, institutionally involving a newly integrated value chain, from supplier to distributor, serving to avoid waste (muda in Japanese) in production along the way. As such a now newly conceived global production process was applied, conceptually and institutionally, in America and Europe, in Brazil and South Africa, where global-local adaptations were Effected. While then, in the specific case of Japanese large-scale manufacturing, this case is well known, it has not been turned into a generalized principle of transformation, in academic theory or institutional practice. Why is this? Prevailing approaches to dynamics, and to transformation, generally draw upon two approaches, which are both prolific but also mutually exclusive. The first “outer directed” one is derived from Complexity Theory associated with academe, usually drawn from the natural sciences, the most oft quoted source being that of the Belgian-Russian Nobel Prize winning chemist Ilya Prigogine (3). In his Order out of Chaos, he talks of “dissipative structures” in dynamic, natural systems, characterized by “bifurcations” where new order may, or may not, emerge out of old chaos. Marx’s analysis of capitalist dynamics, as we shall see later (chapter 17) is in line with such. Another such leading authority is Sally Goerner (4), in the U.S, who has written along these transformative lines in her Emerging Culture and Science of the Integral Society. Goerner has been inspired, in turn, by the Austrian polymath, Rudolf Steiner, of whom we shall hear much more later. Such an ensuing transformation is necessarily “bottom-up’, and renders life-like phenomena inherently uncertain. We align such, as do many others, with the phenomenon of Emergence. The second prevailing approach, which is more “inner directed” is characterized by a raising of consciousness, spiritually and psychologically, from lower to higher levels of consciousness, generally associated with “eastern” esoteric philosophy and practical spirituality. The best known “north-western” philosophical authorities on such are two : the Austrian anthropologist Jean Gebser (5), and his Ever Present Origins already mentioned is one; the even better known, natural as well as social scientist and Eastern Philosopher, Ken Wilber (6), with his Integral Spirituality, is the second. Whereas for Gebser, “ever present” archaic origins continually crop us as civilizations mutate through “magical” and “mythical”, “mental” and ultimately integral levels, for Wilber consciousness evolves, progressively, if transformation is to ensue, from “ego-centric” and “ethnocentric” to ultimately “world-centric”. While Wilber then, adopts a universally linear mode of progression-transformation, as most “eastern” models of consciousness raising do, Gebser mixes such with “ever-present origins”. However, none of the leading thinkers, including innumerable Indian “gurus” on the subject, deal with the dynamics of particular societies. Rather they are, overall, universalists, on the one hand, and almost all deal with consciousness raising of and for individuals, on the other. A such, the outer directed orientation of a Prigogine or a Goerner, societally speaking, is all too seldom linked with Ken Wilber’s inner directed one, individually speaking. An exception to this rule is Don Beck (7), again in the U.S., co-founder of the National Values Center in Denton, Texas, who has developed his approach to what he now terms Spiral Dynamics Integral, recently in association with Ken Wilber. In fact they have used the term, together “Integral Spiral Dynamics”. Beck also has a “levels of consciousness” model, or “cultural memes”, as he sometimes calls them, which evolve from “beige” (survivalist, instincti