The Manifestation of Depressed Mood in Student-Athletes and Their Attitudes Toward, Barriers to, and Preferences for Seeking Professional Psychological Help

Student-athletes are thought to be at greater risk for some psychopathologies while underutilizing mental health services. Few studies have explored depression in student-athletes or the reasons behind the resistance to seeking psychological help. The goals of this study were to examine in a nationwide sample of NCAA D-IA and D-IAA student-athletes the (a) manifestation of depressed mood as it relates to gender, injury, injury characteristics (i.e., perceived impact, time in treatment, chronicity), and student-athlete role behaviors (e.g., frequency of skipping events, role strain, self-destructive behaviors) and (b) examine their treatment resistance, perceived barriers to seeking help, and counselor preference should they choose to seek psychological help. Using a web-survey format, student-athletes were presented survey materials and the Personality Assessment Inventory (Morey, 1991) Depression and Treatment Rejection scales. Results indicated student-athletes reported moderately low depression scores. Depression was not impacted by gender or the occurrence of injury; however, for those who were injured, only the perceived impact of their injury accounted for variance in depression scores. Strong relationships between role behaviors and depression indicated possible outward expressions of depression. Additionally, student-athletes reported moderately high treatment rejection scores indicating little desire or perceived need to change and little motivation for entering into counseling. Access to services, privacy issues, stigmatization, and the fear of not being understood acted as barriers to seeking help. Lastly, student-athletes indicated clear preferences for counselor type and practitioner’s location, familiarity with sport, gender, racial similarity, and age. Results highlighted a need for education, awareness, promotion of mental health services, and increased accessibility to services for student-athletes. Recommendations were put forth for university counseling centers as well as athletic department staff members

Parenting Types

In this paper we measure parenting behavior through unsupervised machine learning in a panel following children from age 5 to 29 months. The algorithm classifies parents into two distinct behavioral types: "active" and "laissez-faire". Parents of the active type tend to respond to their children's expressions and describe to children features of their environment, while parents of the laissez-faire type are less likely to engage with their children. We find that parents' types are persistent over time and are systematically related to socio-economic characteristics. More-over, children of active parents see their human capital improve relative to children of parents of the laissez-faire type

It takes a village to break up a match: a systemic analysis of formal youth mentoring relationship endings

BACKGROUND Although early closure of formal youth mentoring relationships has recently begun to receive some attention, more information about factors that contribute to premature endings, and how those factors interact, is needed so that empirically-based program practices can be developed and disseminated to prevent such endings and to ensure that youth reap the benefits mentoring can provide. OBJECTIVE This qualitative interview study applies a systemic model of youth mentoring relationships (Keller in J Prim Prev 26:169–188, 2005a) to the study of mentoring relationship endings in community-based mentoring matches to understand why these matches ended. METHOD Mentors, parents/guardians and program staff associated with 36 mentoring matches that had ended were interviewed about their experiences of these relationships and their understanding of why they had ended. Thematic analysis of the interview transcripts and mentoring program case notes for each match followed by systemic modeling of the relationships yielded three major findings. RESULTS A strong mentor–youth relationship is necessary but not sufficient for match longevity. The mentor–youth relationship, even when relatively strong, is unlikely to withstand disruptions in other relationships in the system. Agency contextual factors, such as program practices and policies and staffing patterns, have a critical role to play in sustaining mentoring matches, as they directly influence all of the relationships in the mentoring system. CONCLUSION These findings highlight the importance of considering not just the mentoring dyad but also the parent/guardian and program context when trying to prevent match closures. They also point to several program practices that may support longer mentoring relationships.Accepted manuscrip

Hyperglycemia and Hyperlipidemia Act Synergistically to Induce Renal Disease in LDL Receptor-Deficient BALB Mice

Diabetic nephropathy is the leading cause of end-stage renal disease in Western countries, but only a portion of diabetic patients develop diabetic nephropathy. Dyslipidemia represents an important aspect of the metabolic imbalance in diabetic patients. In this study, we addressed the impact of combined hyperlipidemia and hyperglycemia on renal pathology. Kidneys from wildtype (WT) or LDL receptor-deficient BALB/cBy mice (BALB. LDLR -/-) were examined at 22 weeks of age. Diabetes was induced by administration of streptozotocin and mice were randomly assigned to either standard chow or Western diet. Chow fed BALB. LDLR -/- mice did not demonstrate renal abnormalities, whereas BALB. LDLR -/- mice fed a Western diet showed occasional glomerular and tubulointerstitial foam cells. Diabetic WT mice had modestly increased glomerular cellularity and extracellular matrix. Hyperlipidemic and diabetic BALB. LDLR -/- mice exhibited an increase in glomerular cellularity and extracellular matrix, accumulation of glomerular and tubulointerstitial foam cells and mesangial lipid deposits. The tubular epithelium demonstrated pronounced lipid induced tubular degeneration with increased tubular epithelial cell turnover. Hyperlipidemia and hyperglycemia seem to act synergistically in inducing renal injury in the BALB. LDLR-/- mouse. This model of diabetic nephropathy is unique in its development of tubular lesions and may represent a good model for hyperlipidemia-exacerbated diabetic nephropathy. Copyright (C) 2004 S. Karger AG, Basel

Establishing the Breeding Provenance of a Temperate-Wintering North American Passerine, the Golden-Crowned Sparrow, Using Light-Level Geolocation

The migratory biology and connectivity of passerines remains poorly known, even for those that move primarily within the temperate zone. We used light-level geolocators to describe the migratory geography of a North American temperate migrant passerine. From February to March of 2010, we attached geolocator tags to 33 Golden-crowned Sparrows (Zonotrichia atricapilla) wintering on the central coast of California, USA, and recovered four tags the following winter (October to December 2010). We used a Bayesian state-space model to estimate the most likely breeding locations. All four birds spent the breeding season on the coast of the Gulf of Alaska. These locations spanned approximately 1200 kilometers, and none of the individuals bred in the same location. Speed of migration was nearly twice as fast during spring than fall. The return rate of birds tagged the previous season (33%) was similar to that of control birds (39%), but comparing return rates was complicated because 7 of 11 returning birds had lost their tags. For birds that we recaptured before spring migration, we found no significant difference in mass change between tagged and control birds. Our results provide insight into the previously-unknown breeding provenance of a wintering population of Golden-crowned Sparrows and provide more evidence of the contributions that light-level geolocation can make to our understanding of the migratory geography of small passerines

Inhibition of nitric oxide synthase (NOS) reduces the effect of stress hormone signalling in breast cancer

Expression of nitric oxide synthase (NOS) has been found to correlate with tumour progression in breast cancer, indicating that NO activity may drive malignant growth. Previously we have shown that the stress hormone cortisol acts through a nitric oxide synthase (NOS) mediated pathway to induce production of nitric oxide (NO), and can induce DNA damage in breast cancer. Breast cancer cell lines MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231 as well as the mouse mammary tumour cell line 66CL4 were exposed to cortisol and levels of intracellular NO were measured using composite electrochemical sensors. DNA damage was quantified using immunofluorescence and expression of iNOS and metastatic markers VEGF and TWIST were examined using qPCR. An in vivo syngeneic breast cancer model was also used to examine the effect of L-NAME, a NOS inhibitor, on tumour aggressiveness and metastasis in conjunction with daily restraint stress (2hrs) (n=4/group repeated in duplicate). Cortisol significantly increased the expression of iNOS, the generation of NO and DNA damage in breast cancer cells and this was blocked by the NOS inhibitor L-NAME. A significant increase in VEGF and TWIST expression was also observed in response to cortisol. Furthermore, L-NAME also significantly reduced primary tumour growth in stressed mice and reduced the number of metastatic sites/mouse. Tumour microvasculature (as evidenced by CD31 expression) was significantly increased in stressed mice and this was reduced with L-NAME treatment. We demonstrated that L-NAME through inhibition of NO signalling is effective in reducing primary tumour formation and metastatic potential in stressed mice. This data may have impact for patients with breast cancer experiencing extreme stress and further genomic analysis are ongoing