Dimensionality of the Chinese Version of the Cognitive Failures Questionnaire

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New trends In urban and regional governance in the Pearl River Region

Parallel Session 3: 3.1 UrbanizationThe impacts of globalization and the collapse of the global credit market, along with the shift in economic production, forced economic restructurings, are greatly affecting and stimulating the trajectories of China's economic developments. Under these circumstances, urban and regional governance is changing rapidly with complicated relations between government, the economy and the emerging civil society. The Outline of the Plan for the Reform and Development of the PRD 2008-2020 and other national plans for revitalizing key industries provide impetus for possible mid-term regional economic development and transformation in south China.published_or_final_versio

Cognitive and Neurological Sign Features of Intense Blinkers in Chronic Schizophrenia

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Psychological Distance of Semantic Categorization in Schizophrenia

Organized as a Joint Meeting with the German Society of Neuropsychology (GNP)This study aimed to examine the psychological distance of categorization in schizophrenia. A cross-sectional design was adopted with a total of 187 patients with schizophrenia and 98 normal controls. Participants were asked to generate as many exemplars from within a semantic category as they could in 3 minutes. The categories selected for this study were “Animal”, “Means of Transport”, “Food” and “Furniture”. Analysis using the Rasch Model was undertaken. The findings indicated that the psychological distance, in terms of logits unit, was not at an equal interval within each category across the 3-min interval in both patients and healthy controls. The psychological distances between different categories were also found to be inconsistent in both groups. These preliminary findings suggest that we should not simply equate different category scores when we study semantic categorization. Such a simple “count” of categories may not sufficiently reflect the actual psychological distance perceived by patients and healthy controls. Future study should further examine a more representative and accurate measurement of semantic categorization.published_or_final_versio

The application of 'dysexecutive syndrome' measures across cultures: Performance and checklist assessment in neurologically healthy and traumatically brain-injured Hong Kong Chinese volunteers

Deficits in planning, self-regulation and attention are a relatively common consequence of traumatic brain injury (TBI). Such “dysexecutive” deficits tend to be most exposed in complex, real world situations. Consequently, clinicians often have to rely on interviews, questionnaires and observation in their assessments. While there is little doubt that dysexecutive symptoms occur across different cultures, the expression of those symptoms, the way in which they are experienced by others, and the propensity of friends/relatives to report negative features may vary considerably. The cross-cultural use of standardized checklists and measures that have predominantly been studied with English speaking, Western groups therefore requires empirical support. Here a group of 68 healthy Chinese speaking volunteers were asked to complete translations of 2 UK developed questionnaires (the Dysexecutive Questionnaire and Cognitive Failures Questionnaire) measures and to perform 2 “executive” tasks (The Six Elements Test and the Tower of Hanoi). Their self ratings and the ratings of close relatives were very close to those seen in the original UK standardization samples—as was their performance on the 2 tasks. Accordingly, the conditions for assessing their clinical sensitivity were met. Comparison between 30 Chinese patients with TBI and matched controls showed that both questionnaires and tests were sensitive to the deficits in this group. (JINS, 2002, 8, 771–780.)published_or_final_versio

Cross-Cultural Validation of the Test of Everyday Test of Attention With Confirmatory Factor Analysis

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Comparison of Short-Term Clinical and Neurocognitive Outcome Between Atypical and Typical Antipsychotics in First Episode Schizophrenia

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A family study of endophenotypes for psychosis within an early intervention programme in Hong Kong: Rationale and preliminary findings

The study of endophenotypes may be a viable strategy to tackle the genetic complexity and phenotypic heterogeneity of psychosis, but this research direction is relatively under-developed in China as compared to Western countries. We have recently initiated one of the first family studies of endophenotypes for psychosis in China. Patients entering an established early psychosis intervention service are recruited into this research project for phenotyping, endophenotyping and genotyping. At the endophenotypic level, four domains (neurological soft signs, neurocognition of prospective memory, social cognition of facial emotion recognition, and affective cognition of anticipatory and consummatory pleasure) are studied in the sample of patients with psychosis and their unaffected siblings. This article illustrates the benefit of a research-oriented clinical programme and its findings based on the data collected as of early 2011. © 2011 Science China Press and Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.link_to_subscribed_fulltex

Attentional Profiles of Patients with Closed-Head Injury (Abstract)

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Verbal fluency norms in a community population in Hong Kong

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