Thickening descriptions with views from pragmatism and anthropology

How can we as biological systems that are self-organizing and constantly adapting make sense of our surroundings? How can the rich connections between organisms and environment lead to our particular lifeworlds, lifeworlds that allow individual experiences and that are themselves constantly changing in reaction to them? This commentary suggests, extending the framework provided by Scott Jordan and Brian Day, an integration of recent neuroscientific evidence with perspectives from pragmatism, anthropology, and phenomenological thought. Much experimental evidence demonstrates that human beings are systems comprised of a brain as part of a body and an environment, which is constantly regulating and adapting. This evidence resonates with reasoning from pragmatism and anthropology that describe the continuous, dynamic interaction of mind, body, and world. Employing those various perspectives leads to a dense description of human experience and cognition that specifies details and patterns, which considers contextual factors that allow us to enrich human self-understanding, and which aids attempts to answer the questions raised at the beginning of this pape

Thickening descriptions with views from pragmatism and anthropology : a commentary on J. Scott & Brian Day

How can we as biological systems that are self-organizing and constantly adapting make sense of our surroundings? How can the rich connections between organisms and environment lead to our particular lifeworlds, lifeworlds that allow individual experiences and that are themselves constantly changing in reaction to them? This commentary suggests, extending the framework provided by Scott Jordan and Brian Day, an integration of recent neuroscientific evidence with perspectives from pragmatism, anthropology, and phenomenological thought. Much experimental evidence demonstrates that human beings are systems comprised of a brain as part of a body and an environment, which is constantly regulating and adapting. This evidence resonates with reasoning from pragmatism and anthropology that describe the continuous, dynamic interaction of mind, body, and world. Employing those various perspectives leads to a dense description of human experience and cognition that specifies details and patterns, which considers contextual factors that allow us to enrich human self-understanding, and which aids attempts to answer the questions raised at the beginning of this paper

Representing Human Cultural and Biological Diversity in Neuropsychiatry: Why and How

Over the past decade, findings from cultural neuroscience have demonstrated that functional neural processes vary significantly across populations. These findings add a new dimension to the well-established literature describing cultural differences in human behavior. Although these findings are informative for understanding complex relationships between social and neurobiological processes, they also have significant implications for psychiatric research. Neuropsychiatry already co-considers the relationship between brain and social world; however, its research findings notoriously underrepresent diverse cultural, ethnic, and gender groups. Considering that psychiatric patients across cultures exhibit different behavioral presentations and symptom distributions, they may exhibit equally different functional neural processes as well. Increasing representation of diverse patient groups in neuropsychiatric research would allow potential differences to be investigated and understood. Although cross-cultural comparisons may be the most direct means of accomplishing this goal, such studies must be carefully constructed to avoid reinforcing stigmas or stereotypes when working with sensitive patient populations. For example, hypotheses and inclusion criteria must avoid reliance on stereotypes or conflation of geographic boundaries with cultural boundaries. These pitfalls point to deeper problems with current approaches to culture-brain research, which lack operational definitions of ‘culture’ more generally. After outlining these issues, solutions to these methodological problems will be presented and an operational definition of culture for neuropsychiatry will be proposed

Sensory Augmentation for the Blind

Common navigational aids used by blind travelers during large-scale navigation divert attention away from important cues of the immediate environment (i.e., approaching vehicles). Sensory augmentation devices, relying on principles similar to those at work in sensory substitution, can potentially bypass the bottleneck of attention through sub-cognitive implementation of a set of rules coupling motor actions with sensory stimulation. We provide a late blind subject with a vibrotactile belt that continually signals the direction of magnetic north. The subject completed a set of behavioral tests before and after an extended training period. The tests were complemented by questionnaires and interviews. This newly supplied information improved performance on different time scales. In a pointing task we demonstrate an instant improvement of performance based on the signal provided by the device. Furthermore, the signal was helpful in relevant daily tasks, often complicated for the blind, such as keeping a direction over longer distances or taking shortcuts in familiar environments. A homing task with an additional attentional load demonstrated a significant improvement after training. The subject found the directional information highly expedient for the adjustment of his inner maps of familiar environments and describes an increase in his feeling of security when exploring unfamiliar environments with the belt. The results give evidence for a firm integration of the newly supplied signals into the behavior of this late blind subject with better navigational performance and more courageous behavior in unfamiliar environments. Most importantly, the complementary information provided by the belt lead to a positive emotional impact with enhanced feeling of security. The present experimental approach demonstrates the positive potential of sensory augmentation devices for the help of handicapped people

Worldwide trends in underweight and obesity from 1990 to 2022: a pooled analysis of 3663 population-representative studies with 222 million children, adolescents, and adults

Background Underweight and obesity are associated with adverse health outcomes throughout the life course. We estimated the individual and combined prevalence of underweight or thinness and obesity, and their changes, from 1990 to 2022 for adults and school-aged children and adolescents in 200 countries and territories. Methods We used data from 3663 population-based studies with 222 million participants that measured height and weight in representative samples of the general population. We used a Bayesian hierarchical model to estimate trends in the prevalence of different BMI categories, separately for adults (age ≥20 years) and school-aged children and adolescents (age 5–19 years), from 1990 to 2022 for 200 countries and territories. For adults, we report the individual and combined prevalence of underweight (BMI <18·5 kg/m2) and obesity (BMI ≥30 kg/m2). For schoolaged children and adolescents, we report thinness (BMI <2 SD below the median of the WHO growth reference) and obesity (BMI >2 SD above the median). Findings From 1990 to 2022, the combined prevalence of underweight and obesity in adults decreased in 11 countries (6%) for women and 17 (9%) for men with a posterior probability of at least 0·80 that the observed changes were true decreases. The combined prevalence increased in 162 countries (81%) for women and 140 countries (70%) for men with a posterior probability of at least 0·80. In 2022, the combined prevalence of underweight and obesity was highest in island nations in the Caribbean and Polynesia and Micronesia, and countries in the Middle East and north Africa. Obesity prevalence was higher than underweight with posterior probability of at least 0·80 in 177 countries (89%) for women and 145 (73%) for men in 2022, whereas the converse was true in 16 countries (8%) for women, and 39 (20%) for men. From 1990 to 2022, the combined prevalence of thinness and obesity decreased among girls in five countries (3%) and among boys in 15 countries (8%) with a posterior probability of at least 0·80, and increased among girls in 140 countries (70%) and boys in 137 countries (69%) with a posterior probability of at least 0·80. The countries with highest combined prevalence of thinness and obesity in school-aged children and adolescents in 2022 were in Polynesia and Micronesia and the Caribbean for both sexes, and Chile and Qatar for boys. Combined prevalence was also high in some countries in south Asia, such as India and Pakistan, where thinness remained prevalent despite having declined. In 2022, obesity in school-aged children and adolescents was more prevalent than thinness with a posterior probability of at least 0·80 among girls in 133 countries (67%) and boys in 125 countries (63%), whereas the converse was true in 35 countries (18%) and 42 countries (21%), respectively. In almost all countries for both adults and school-aged children and adolescents, the increases in double burden were driven by increases in obesity, and decreases in double burden by declining underweight or thinness. Interpretation The combined burden of underweight and obesity has increased in most countries, driven by an increase in obesity, while underweight and thinness remain prevalent in south Asia and parts of Africa. A healthy nutrition transition that enhances access to nutritious foods is needed to address the remaining burden of underweight while curbing and reversing the increase in obesit

Learning new sensorimotor contingencies:Effects of long-term use of sensory augmentation on the brain and conscious perception

Theories of embodied cognition propose that perception is shaped by sensory stimuli and by the actions of the organism. Following sensorimotor contingency theory, the mastery of lawful relations between own behavior and resulting changes in sensory signals, called sensorimotor contingencies, is constitutive of conscious perception. Sensorimotor contingency theory predicts that, after training, knowledge relating to new sensorimotor contingencies develops, leading to changes in the activation of sensorimotor systems, and concomitant changes in perception. In the present study, we spell out this hypothesis in detail and investigate whether it is possible to learn new sensorimotor contingencies by sensory augmentation. Specifically, we designed an fMRI compatible sensory augmentation device, the feelSpace belt, which gives orientation information about the direction of magnetic north via vibrotactile stimulation on the waist of participants. In a longitudinal study, participants trained with this belt for seven weeks in natural environment. Our EEG results indicate that training with the belt leads to changes in sleep architecture early in the training phase, compatible with the consolidation of procedural learning as well as increased sensorimotor processing and motor programming. The fMRI results suggest that training entails activity in sensory as well as higher motor centers and brain areas known to be involved in navigation. These neural changes are accompanied with changes in how space and the belt signal are perceived, as well as with increased trust in navigational ability. Thus, our data on physiological processes and subjective experiences are compatible with the hypothesis that new sensorimotor contingencies can be acquired using sensory augmentation