Social representations of HIV/AIDS in five Central European and Eastern European countries: A multidimensional analysis

Cognitive processing models of risky sexual behaviour have proliferated in the two decades since the first reporting of HIV/AIDS, but far less attention has been paid to individual and group representations of the epidemic and the relationship between these representations and reported sexual behaviours. In this study, 494 business people and medics from Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Poland and Russia sorted free associations around HIV/AIDS in a matrix completion task. Exploratory factor and multidimensional scaling analyses revealed two main dimensions (labelled ‘Sex’ and ‘Deadly disease’), with significant cultural and gender variations along both dimension scores. Possible explanations for these results are discussed in the light of growing concerns over the spread of the epidemic in this region

As representações sociais de mulheres portadoras de Hipertensão Arterial Las representaciones sociales de mujeres que tienen Hipertension Arterial Social representations of women who live with High Blood Pressure

A Hipertensão Arterial, grave problema de Saúde Pública, afeta grande parte da população mundial e apresenta dificuldades para seu controle. Este estudo teve como objetivo apreender as representações sociais de mulheres, sobre o "ser portadora da doença", no contexto familiar, explorando aspectos psicossociais relacionados a sentimentos e comportamentos capazes de influenciar práticas de tratamento e controle da doença. Realizado em Teresina-PI, com 25 mulheres assistidas num centro de saúde. As informações coletadas foram organizadas num "corpus" processado pelo software ALCESTE 4.5. Emergiram três unidades de contexto inicial (u.c.i.), apontando as manifestações / sentimentos / representações sociais das portadoras. Estas influenciam na produção e circulação de conhecimentos que orientam e definem comportamentos e condutas destas mulheres.<br>La hipertensión arterial, problema de salud pública serio que afecte la mayor parte de a población del mundo, requiere la búsqueda para dificultades. El actual estudio se ocupó apreender de las representaciones sociales de los portadores de las mujeres sobre como cuál es ser portadores del la enfermedad en el contexto de la familia, y explorando los aspectos sicosociales se relacionó con sus sensaciones y comportamiento que pudieron interferir en su tratamiento y control de la enfermedad. Realizado en Teresina con 25 mujeres registradas en un centro de la salud. La información fue organizada en una "recopilación" y sometida al software 4.5 de ALCESTE, procesó la "recopilación" integrada por 3 unidades iniciales del contexto, demostrar las manifestaciones explicativas de los portadores sobre el tratamiento y el control de la enfermedad. Las representaciones sociales influencian el proceso de la producción y de la circulación del conocimiento que dirigen y definen el comportamiento y las conductas del portador hipertenso de la enfermedad.<br>The Arterial Hypertension is considered as a serious Public Health problem that affects most of the world population and presents difficulties to control.This study dealt with the social representations of the women carriers of Arterial Hypertension about what it is like to be carriers of the disease in the family context, and the health services provided by the professionals that care for them and exploring the psychosocial aspects related to their feelings and behavior that might interfere in their treatment and control of the disease. It was performed in Teresina - PI with 25 women assisted in the Health Center. The data collected was organized in a "corpus" and submitted to the ALCESTE software 4.5, which produced three initial context units, showing the manifestations and feelings of the carriers. The social representations influence the process of knowledge production and circulation that guide and define the behavior and conducts of the hypertensive disease carrier

Role of the ubiquitin–proteasome system in nervous system function and disease : using C. elegans as a dissecting tool

In addition to its central roles in protein quality control, regulation of cell cycle, intracellular signaling, DNA damage response and transcription regulation, the ubiquitin– proteasome system (UPS) plays specific roles in the nervous system, where it contributes to precise connectivity through development, and later assures functionality by regulating a wide spectrum of neuron-specific cellular processes. Aberrations in this system have been implicated in the etiology of neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative diseases. In this review, we provide an updated view on the UPS and highlight recent findings concerning its role in normal and diseased nervous systems. We discuss the advantages of the model organism Caenorhabditis elegans as a tool to unravel the major unsolved questions concerning this biochemical pathway and its involvement in nervous system function and dysfunction, and expose the new possibilities, using state-ofthe- art techniques, to assess UPS function using this model system.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) - PTDC/SAU-GMG/ 101572/2008, PTDC/SAU-NMC/120144/2010, SFRH/BD/47963/200