Comparing the emerging psychological meaning of tattoos in drug-addicted and not drug-addicted adults: A look inside health risks

Although tattoos have been historically characteristic of criminals and drug addicts therefore carrying negative associations, it is now an accepted and appreciated form of body modification. Tattoos could be considered as a projective psychological test, most people use their body as blackboard to represent the most varied meanings related to the way they perceive themselves. It is also true that tattoos can assume the role of diagnostic indicators for a possible abuse of psychoactive substances, as well as their aggregating and communicative functions within the group of drug addicts. The aim of this cross-sectional study was to explore the relation among personality traits, self-efficacy, locus of control and motivations for tattooing. The sample consisted of 150 subjects, 50 tattooed adults, 50 tattooed drug addicted adults, and 50 non-tattooed adults. Data were collected by using the Big Five Questionnaire (BFQ), the Perceived Self- efficacy Test, the Mini Locus of Control scale and a Tattoos Inventory. Results of the present study contribute to a deeper understanding of the new meaning of tattoos, they no longer represent personality traits, they rather have the function of reinforcing beliefs about how to perceive oneself, this happens especially in drug addicts in which the presence of tattoos reinforces the illusory belief of self-esteem and internal locus of control. Given the rising presence of tattoos today, this could be useful to get a better understanding of the existential unease of certain populations

The Italian validation of OSCI : the Organizational and Safety Climate Inventory

Although safety climate has been the object of multiple studies in the last thirty years, the relationship between safety climate and organizational climate has been scarcely investigated. The Organizational and Safety Climate Inventory (OSCI) was the first and only validated instrument to allow the assessment of organizational and safety climates simultaneously and by using the same theoretical framework. The present work investigated the psychometric properties of OSCI in an Italian sample at the group level; study 1 (N = 745) examined the factor structure of the scale by using confirmatory factor analyses. Study 2 (N = 471) advanced the original Portuguese validation by testing its measurement equivalence across gender and company sector through multiple-group confirmatory factor analyses. Results confirmed one higher-order factor structure with four first-order factors for both Organizational Climate and Safety Climate, with Organizational Climate predicting Safety Climate. Moreover, the scale was found to be invariant between men and women and between different types of company. Reliability, discriminant, and criterion validities of the scale showed very good values. Overall, the findings strengthened the original claim of the OSCI to be a valid and innovative instrument, which allows the identification of specific dimensions of safety climate, starting from a more general model of organizational climate

A comparison of sacral neuromodulation vs. transvaginal electrical stimulation for the treatment of refractory overactive bladder: The impact on quality of life, body image, sexual function, and emotional well-being

Overactive bladder syndrome (OAB) is defined by the presence of urinary urgency, with or without urge incontinence, usually accompanied by an increase in urinary frequency and nocturia in the absence of urinary tract infections (UTI) or other diseases. The overall prevalence of OAB symptoms in the female population is reported to be 16.6% and increases with advancing age and menopause. The aetiology of OAB is not fully understood and is likely to affect a heterogeneous population of patients due to changes to their central and peripheral nervous systems. Although OAB is frequently associated with female sexual dysfunction (FSD), its real impact on sexual function in women has been evaluated only in a few studies. The first line of treatment for OAB includes behavioural modification and physical therapy, either as monotherapies or in combination. Many patients who have not had success in managing their symptoms with more conservative therapies may decide to resort to third-line treatments for refractory OAB. These treatments include neuromodulation therapies, particularly transvaginal electrical stimulation (TES) and sacral neuromodulation (SN). The aim of this short commentary is to provide an overview of the effectiveness of these treatments and of their impact on quality of life, body image, sexual function, and emotional well-being

Factors Associated with Adherence to the Mediterranean Diet among Adolescents Living in Sicily, Southern Italy

The present study aimed to examine the factors associated with increased Mediterranean diet (MD) adherence among a sample of Italian adolescents. A cross-sectional survey was conducted on 1135 students (13–16 years) attending 13 secondary schools of Sicily, southern Italy. Validated instruments were used for dietary assessment and the KIDMED score to assess adolescents’ adherence to the MD. A higher adherence to the MD was associated with high socioeconomic status (Odds Ratio [OR] 1.53, 95% Confidence Interval [CI]: 1.03–2.26) and high physical activity (OR 1.19, 95% CI: 1.02–1.70), whereas lower adherence was associated with living in an urban environment (OR 0.65, 95% CI: 0.44–0.97) and being obese (OR 0.59, 95% CI: 0.37–0.94). The adolescents’ KIDMED scores were inversely associated with adolescents’ intake of sweets, fast foods, fried foods, and sugary drinks, and directly with fruit, vegetables, pasta, fish, and cheese intakes. Urban-living adolescents were less likely to eat fruit and more prone to consume meat, sugary drinks, and fast food than rural-living adolescents. The latter were more likely to eat sweets and snacks. A general poor quality of food consumption in Italian adolescents away from the MD was reported, especially among those living in urban areas

Bouncing and emergent cosmologies from Arnowitt-Deser-Misner RG flows

Asymptotically safe gravity provides a framework for the description of gravity from the trans-Planckian regime to cosmological scales. According to this scenario, the cosmological constant and Newton’s coupling are functions of the energy scale whose evolution is dictated by the renormalization group (RG) equations. The formulation of the RG equations on foliated spacetimes, based on the Arnowitt-Deser-Misner (ADM) formalism, furnishes a natural way to construct the RG energy scale from the spectrum of the Laplacian operator on the spatial slices. Combining this idea with an RG improvement procedure, in this work we study quantum gravitational corrections to the Einstein-Hilbert action on Friedmann-Lemaître-Robertson-Walker backgrounds. The resulting quantum-corrected Friedmann equations can give rise to both bouncing cosmologies and emergent Universe solutions. Our bouncing models do not require the presence of exotic matter and emergent Universe solutions can be constructed for any allowed topology of the spatial slices

A polarized synchrotron template for CMBP experiments after WMAP data

We build template maps for the polarized Galactic--synchrotron emission on large angular scales (FWHM =~7$^\circ$), in the 20-90 GHz microwave range, by using WMAP data. The method, presented in a recent work, requires a synchrotron total intensity survey and the {\it polarization horizon} to model the polarized intensity and a starlight polarization map to model polarization angles. The basic template is obtained directly at 23 GHz with about 94% sky--coverage by using the synchrotron map released by the WMAP team. Extrapolations to 32, 60 and 90 GHz are performed by computing a synchrotron spectral index map, which strongly reduces previous uncertainties in passing from low (1.4 GHz) to microwave frequencies. Differing from low frequency data, none of our templates presents relevant structures out of the Galactic Plane. Our map at 90 GHz suggests that the synchrotron emission at high Galactic latitudes is low enough to allow a robust detection of the $E$--mode component of the cosmological signal on large--scale, even in models with low--reionization ($\tau = 0.05$). Detection of the weaker $B$--mode on the largest scales ($\ell < 10$) might be jeopardized unless the value $\tau = 0.17$ found by WMAP is confirmed, and $T/S > 0.1$. For lower levels of the gravitational--wave background the $B$--mode seems to be accessible only at the $\ell \sim 100$ peak and in selected low--synchrotron emission areas.Comment: 13 pages, 14 figures, accepted for pubblications by MNRAS. For a version with full resolution color figures see http://sp0rt.bo.iasf.cnr.it:8080/Docs/Public/papers.ph

Two ways to be endemic. Alps and Apennines are different functional refugia during climatic cycles

Endemics co-occur because they evolved in situ and persist regionally or because they evolved ex situ and later dispersed to shared habitats, generating evolutionary or ecological endemicity centres, respectively. We investigate whether different endemicity centres can intertwine in the region ranging from Alps to Sicily, by studying their butterfly fauna. We gathered an extensive occurrence data set for butterflies of the study area (27,123 records, 269 species, in cells of 0.5&nbsp;×&nbsp;0.5 degrees of latitude-longitude). We applied molecular-based delimitation methods (GMYC model) to 26,557 cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (COI) sequences of Western Palearctic butterflies. We identified entities based on molecular delimitations and/or the checklist of European butterflies and objectively attributed occurrences to their most probable entity. We obtained a zoogeographic regionalisation based on the 69 endemics of the area. Using phylogenetic ANOVA we tested if endemics from different centres differ from each other and from nonendemics for key ecological traits and divergence time. Endemicity showed high incidence in the Alps and Southern Italy. The regionalisation separated the Alps from the Italian Peninsula and Sicily. The endemics of different centres showed a high turnover and differed in phylogenetic distances, phenology and distribution traits. Endemics are on average younger than nonendemics and the Peninsula-Sicily endemics also have lower variance in divergence than those from the Alps. The observed variation identifies Alpine endemics as paleoendemics, now occupying an ecological centre, and the Peninsula-Sicily ones as neoendemics, that diverged in the region since the Pleistocene. The results challenge the common view of the Alpine-Apennine area as a single “Italian refugium”

A network study to differentiate suicide attempt risk profiles in male and female patients with major depressive disorder

Suicide attempts are a possible consequence of Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), although their prevalence varies across different epidemiological studies. Suicide attempt is a significant predictor of death by suicide, highlighting its importance in understanding and preventing tragic outcomes. Researchers are increasingly recognizing the need to study the differences between males and females, as several distinctions emerge in terms of the characteristics, types and motivations of suicide attempts. These differences emphasize the importance of considering gender-specific factors in the study of suicide attempts and developing tailored prevention strategies. We conducted a network analysis to represent and investigate which among multiple neurocognitive, psychosocial, demographic and affective variables may prove to be a reliable predictor for identifying the 'suicide attempt risk' (SAR) in a sample of 81 adults who met DSM-5 criteria for MDD. Network analysis resulted in differences between males and females regarding the variables that were going to interact and predict the SAR; in particular, for males, there is a stronger link toward psychosocial aspects, while for females, the neurocognitive domain is more relevant in its mnestic subcomponents. Network analysis allowed us to describe otherwise less obvious differences in the risk profiles of males and females that attempted to take their own lives. Different neurocognitive and psychosocial variables and different interactions between them predict the probability of suicide attempt unique to male and female patients