Bayesian inference for orbital eccentricities

Highest posterior density intervals (HPDI's) are derived for the true eccentricities of spectroscopic binaries with measured values e ~ 0. These yield upper limits when e is below the detection threshold e_th and seamlessly transform to upper and lower bounds when e > e_th. In the main text, HPDI's are computed with an informative eccentricity prior representing orbital decay due to tidal dissipation. In an appendix, the corresponding HPDI's are computed with a uniform prior and are the basis for a revised version of the Lucy-Sweeney test, with the previous outcome e = 0 now replaced by an upper limit. Sampling experiments with known prior confirm the validity of the HPDI's.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures. Error in terminology corrected. Results unchanged. Accepted by Astronomy & Astrophysic

Interdisciplinary design of a pervasive fall handling system

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The role of impairments in self–other distinction in borderline personality disorder: a narrative review of recent evidence

Impairments in maintaining a differentiated sense of “self” and “other” are thought to be a central feature of borderline personality disorder (BPD). However, studies directly focusing on self–other distinction (SOD) in BPD are scarce, and these findings have not yet been integrated with novel insights into the neural mechanism involved in SOD. Here, we present a narrative review of recent behavioral and neuroimaging findings focusing on impairments in SOD in BPD. Behavioral findings of SOD at the embodied level provide preliminary evidence for impairments in multisensory integration in BPD. Furthermore, both behavioral and neuroscientific data converge to suggest that SOD impairments in BPD reflect an inability to shift between self and other representations according to task demands. Research also suggests that disruptions in infant–caregiver synchrony may play a role in the development of these impairments. Based on these findings, we present a new, integrative model linking impairments in SOD to reduced neural and behavioral synchrony in BPD. The implications of these findings for future research and clinical interventions are outlined

Mentalizing as a Mechanism of Change in the Treatment of Patients With Borderline Personality Disorder: A Parallel Process Growth Modeling Approach.

Although a number of effective psychotherapeutic treatments have been developed for borderline personality disorder (BPD), little is known about the mechanisms of change explaining the effects of these treatments. There is increasing evidence that impairments in mentalizing or reflective functioning-the capacity to reflect on the internal mental states of the self and others-are a central feature of BPD. To date, no study has directly investigated the core assumption of the mentalization-based approach to BPD, that changes in this capacity are associated with treatment outcome in BPD patients. This study is the first to directly investigate this assumption in a sample of 175 patients with BPD who received long-term hospitalization-based psychodynamic treatment. Using a parallel process growth modeling approach, this study investigated whether (a) treatment was related to changes in mentalizing capacity as measured with the Reflective Functioning Questionnaire; (b) these changes could be explained by pretreatment levels of mentalizing and/or symptomatic distress; and (c) changes in mentalizing capacity over time were associated with symptomatic improvement. Mentalizing and symptomatic distress were assessed at admission, 12 and 24 weeks into treatment, and at discharge. Results showed that treatment was associated with significant decreases in mentalizing impairments (i.e., uncertainty about mental states) and symptomatic distress. Pretreatment levels of mentalizing and symptomatic distress did not predict these changes. However, improvements in mentalizing were strongly associated with the rate of decrease in symptomatic distress over time (r = .89). These findings suggest that increases in mentalizing may indeed in part explain therapeutic change in the treatment of BPD, but more research is needed to further substantiate these conclusions. (PsycINFO Database Recor

Ethical climate in a Belgian psychiatric inpatient setting: relation with burnout and engagement in psychiatric nurses

Research suggests a relation between the ethical climate – that is, the organisational conditions and practices that affect the way ethical issues with regard to patient care are discussed and decided - and job satisfaction of nurses. Yet no study to date has investigated the relationship between ethical climate and job satisfaction in psychiatric nurses. This study aimed to address this critical gap in our knowledge by investigating the relationships among ethical climate and features of both burnout and engagement based on the Job Demands-Resources Model (JD - R model) in a large cross-sectional study of 265 nurses working in a large psychiatric inpatient hospital in Flanders, Belgium. Correlational and multiple hierarchical regression analyses were used to investigate the relationship between ethical climate, burnout and engagement. In addition, based on the JD-R model, we also investigated whether engagement mediated the relationship between ethical climate on the one hand and job satisfaction and turnover intention on the other and whether ethical climate moderated the relationship between emotional burden and burnout. Results showed that a positive ethical climate was related to lower levels of emotional exhaustion and distancing and higher levels of engagement and job satisfaction. Furthermore, although ethical climate did not buffer against the effects of emotional burden on burnout, higher levels of engagement explained in part the relationship between ethical climate and job satisfaction

Do my emotions show or not? Problems with transparency estimation in women with borderline personality disorder features

Transparency estimation, that is, estimating the extent to which one’s mental states are observable to others, requires the simultaneous representation of the self and of others’ perspective on the self. Individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD) have difficulty integrating multiple perspectives when mentalizing, which may be reflected in impaired transparency estimation. A total of 62 participants high and low in BPD features watched emotionally evocative video clips and estimated the transparency of their emotional experience while facial expression coding software (FaceReader) quantified their objective transparency. Individuals high in BPD features showed a larger discrepancy between estimated and objective transparency than individuals low in BPD features, showing that they both over- and underestimated their transparency. Indeed, estimated transparency positively predicted objective transparency in individuals low in BPD features, but not in individuals high in BPD features. Moreover, the ability to estimate intraindividual variability in one’s own objective transparency was moderated by self-reported arousal in the participants high in BPD features. Impairments in transparency estimation were correlated with self-report measures of borderline features, attachment, and mentalizing. In conclusion, we found that borderline features relate to a reduced capacity to estimate the extent to which one’s own emotional states are observable to others. Although replication in clinical samples of BPD patients is needed, the present study provides evidence for problems in mentalizing the (embodied) self from another person’s perspective in BPD

Self-Critical Perfectionism Predicts Lower Cortisol Response to Experimental Stress in Patients With Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

Previous studies have shown that self-critical perfectionism (SCP) is implicated in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS). However, to date, no studies exist that have examined whether SCP is related to a hypofunction of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, which has been shown to be a key factor in the pathophysiology of CFS. We conducted a quasi-experimental study to examine the effects of SCP (as measured with the Depressive Experiences Questionnaire) on stress reactivity in a sample of 41 female CFS patients. Participants were exposed to the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST). Both subjective stress and salivary cortisol levels were measured until 90 minutes after the TSST. We also examined the relationship between stress reactivity and illness characteristics (i.e. duration and severity of symptoms). The results showed that SCP was associated with increased subjective stress reactivity, but with decreased HPA-axis reactivity as indicated by a blunted cortisol response to the TSST. Reduced cortisol reactivity was associated with greater symptom severity. There was no relationship between cortisol reactivity and illness duration. Our findings suggest that SCP is associated with loss of resilience of the neurobiological stress response system in CFS

Self–other distinction and borderline personality disorder features: Evidence for egocentric and altercentric bias in a self–other facial morphing task

Self–other distinction (SOD) refers to the ability to distinguish one’s own body, actions, and mental representations from those of others. Problems with SOD are considered to be a key feature of borderline personality disorder (BPD). However, empirical studies on SOD in BPD are scarce. Here, we present a study providing preliminary support for the usefulness and validity of a self–other facial morphing task to capture the capacity for SOD in a sample of nonclinical participants high (n = 30) and low (n = 32) in BPD features. Participants had to watch a video sequence in which their own face was gradually morphed into the face of an unfamiliar other (self-to-other) or vice versa (other-to-self), requiring them to indicate at which point they judged the morph to look more like the target face than the starting face. Consistent with predictions, results showed that participants in the high-BPD group judged the morph to look like themselves for longer in the self-to-other direction (suggestive of egocentric bias), but only with a relatively more attractive target face. In the other-to-self direction, the high-BPD group had more difficulty recognizing their own face (i.e., an altercentric bias), but this time only with the relatively less attractive face. Further research is needed to replicate these findings in clinical samples, but overall they suggest that the current task might be suited to investigate SOD problems in BPD. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved