Nicotine, Tobacco Use, and the 55th Nebraska Symposium on Motivation

Tobacco use is a worldwide health problem. As so well stated by Mackay and Ericksen (2002), “No other consumer product is as dangerous, or kills as many people. Tobacco kills more than AIDS, legal drugs, illegal drugs, road accidents, murder, and suicide combined” (p. 36). Imagine the lives saved, and the amount of pain, emotional suffering, and fiscal burden alleviated, if we could devise approaches that helped current tobacco users quit and remain abstinent, and prevented new smokers from emerging. Although these idealistic goals are worth pursuing, improving cessation rates by only a small fraction, or making small gains in preventing people from experimenting with tobacco, would nevertheless translate into significant improvement in the health and well-being of countless thousands worldwide as well as financial savings to employers, government institutions, and the heath care system. Even such small, incremental steps require a concerted and coordinated effort by basic scientists, clinical researchers and practitioners, and policy makers to discover the basis of tobacco dependence and apply that knowledge to the implementation of prevention policies and smoking cessation aids. This year\u27s Nebraska Symposium on Motivation was devoted to research on the drug that is widely believed to form the basis of tobacco use and dependence, nicotine

New tick from Mexico

3 p. : ill. ; 24 cm

Army-ant queen.

20 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.Includes bibliographical references (p. 20)

Discussions and Reviews : Toward an ethology of human conflict: a review

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/67149/2/10.1177_002200276701100310.pd

Phalangid fauna of Mexico.

17 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.Includes bibliographical references

Heterochrony and Cross-Species Intersensory Matching by Infant Vervet Monkeys

Understanding the evolutionary origins of a phenotype requires understanding the relationship between ontogenetic and phylogenetic processes. Human infants have been shown to undergo a process of perceptual narrowing during their first year of life, whereby their intersensory ability to match the faces and voices of another species declines as they get older. We investigated the evolutionary origins of this behavioral phenotype by examining whether or not this developmental process occurs in non-human primates as well.We tested the ability of infant vervet monkeys (Cercopithecus aethiops), ranging in age from 23 to 65 weeks, to match the faces and voices of another non-human primate species (the rhesus monkey, Macaca mulatta). Even though the vervets had no prior exposure to rhesus monkey faces and vocalizations, our findings show that infant vervets can, in fact, recognize the correspondence between rhesus monkey faces and voices (but indicate that they do so by looking at the non-matching face for a greater proportion of overall looking time), and can do so well beyond the age of perceptual narrowing in human infants. Our results further suggest that the pattern of matching by vervet monkeys is influenced by the emotional saliency of the Face+Voice combination. That is, although they looked at the non-matching screen for Face+Voice combinations, they switched to looking at the matching screen when the Voice was replaced with a complex tone of equal duration. Furthermore, an analysis of pupillary responses revealed that their pupils showed greater dilation when looking at the matching natural face/voice combination versus the face/tone combination.Because the infant vervets in the current study exhibited cross-species intersensory matching far later in development than do human infants, our findings suggest either that intersensory perceptual narrowing does not occur in Old World monkeys or that it occurs later in development. We argue that these findings reflect the faster rate of neural development in monkeys relative to humans and the resulting differential interaction of this factor with the effects of early experience

Recurrent, Robust and Scalable Patterns Underlie Human Approach and Avoidance

BACKGROUND. Approach and avoidance behavior provide a means for assessing the rewarding or aversive value of stimuli, and can be quantified by a keypress procedure whereby subjects work to increase (approach), decrease (avoid), or do nothing about time of exposure to a rewarding/aversive stimulus. To investigate whether approach/avoidance behavior might be governed by quantitative principles that meet engineering criteria for lawfulness and that encode known features of reward/aversion function, we evaluated whether keypress responses toward pictures with potential motivational value produced any regular patterns, such as a trade-off between approach and avoidance, or recurrent lawful patterns as observed with prospect theory. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS. Three sets of experiments employed this task with beautiful face images, a standardized set of affective photographs, and pictures of food during controlled states of hunger and satiety. An iterative modeling approach to data identified multiple law-like patterns, based on variables grounded in the individual. These patterns were consistent across stimulus types, robust to noise, describable by a simple power law, and scalable between individuals and groups. Patterns included: (i) a preference trade-off counterbalancing approach and avoidance, (ii) a value function linking preference intensity to uncertainty about preference, and (iii) a saturation function linking preference intensity to its standard deviation, thereby setting limits to both. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE. These law-like patterns were compatible with critical features of prospect theory, the matching law, and alliesthesia. Furthermore, they appeared consistent with both mean-variance and expected utility approaches to the assessment of risk. Ordering of responses across categories of stimuli demonstrated three properties thought to be relevant for preference-based choice, suggesting these patterns might be grouped together as a relative preference theory. Since variables in these patterns have been associated with reward circuitry structure and function, they may provide a method for quantitative phenotyping of normative and pathological function (e.g., psychiatric illness).National Institute on Drug Abuse (14118, 026002, 026104, DABK39-03-0098, DABK39-03-C-0098); The MGH Phenotype Genotype Project in Addiction and Mood Disorder from the Office of National Drug Control Policy - Counterdrug Technology Assessment Center; MGH Department of Radiology; the National Center for Research Resources (P41RR14075); National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (34189, 05236

Use of secondary forests by understory birds in a fragmented landscape in central Amazonia

Rates of deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon have increased since 1991 and forecasts are not optimistic about the slowing of this process. Some authors believe that the Amazon may be experiencing a massive process of species extinction. However, the deforestation is accompanied by the expansion of secondary forests that are established in the abandoned areas. The trend is an increase in secondary forests cover, resulting in a mosaic of primary forest (FP) and fragments separated by an array of secondary forests (FS). In this scenario, the prediction of a massive extinction could be wrong if many species could survive in the secondary forests. To assess the importance of FS for the understory birds we sampled areas in regeneration and a continuous forest of a fragmented landscape. We conducted mist netting (24 nets/day) for six consecutive days/month, for 8 months (May-November) in 2009. Some forest species as do not seem to be adapted to the secondary forest environment and their occurrences are restricted to continuous forest environments. But most focal species showed no significant difference in apparent survival rates between the enviroments, suggesting that these species inhabit the secondary forest and the primary forest similarly. Because most of the matrix in fragmented landscapes are composed by secondary forests, such results highlights the conservation value that these habitats present in the long term. Thus, FS should be regarded as dynamic matrix that not only allows the movement of individuals but also function as habitat for many species typical of FP.Na Amazônia, as taxas de desmatamento crescem desde 1991 e as previsões não são otimistas quanto à desaceleração desse processo. A devastação da floresta é acompanhada de uma expansão de florestas secundárias (FS) que se estabelecem nas áreas abandonadas. A tendência é um aumento de florestas secundárias, resultando num mosaico de floresta contínua e fragmentos separados por uma matriz de FS. Nesse cenário, autores acreditam que a Amazônia pode passar por um processo massivo de extinção de espécies. Por outro lado, a previsão de um processo massivo de extinção pode ser equivocada, pois muitas espécies florestais poderiam sobreviver nas florestas secundárias. Para avaliar o valor das florestas secundárias para espécies florestais amostramos por oito meses com redes de neblina uma capoeira (FS) em regeneração e uma floresta primária (FP) de uma paisagem fragmentada. Algumas espécies não foram capturadas na capoeira e aparentemente evitam esse tipo de hábitat. No entanto, a maioria das espécies do grupo focal não apresentou diferença na sobrevivência aparente entre os ambientes, o que nos indica que estão habitando a capoeira e a floresta primária da mesma forma. Na realidade amazônica, onde grande parte da matriz é composta por floresta secundária, a matriz tem valor para conservação e deve ser analisada como um elemento dinâmico que não apenas permite a movimentação de indivíduos, mas também serve de hábitat para muitas espécies de floresta primária. Mas ressaltamos que é fundamental a preservação de áreas de floresta primária que servirão de fonte às florestas secundárias adjacentes

Architecture, Space and Information in Constructions Built by Humans and Social Insects: a Conceptual Review

The similarities between the structures built by social insects and by humans have led to a convergence of interests between biologists and architects. This new, de facto interdisciplinary community of scholars needs a common terminology and theoretical framework in which to ground its work. In this conceptually oriented review paper, we review the terms “information”, “space” and “architecture” to provide definitions that span biology and architecture. A framework is proposed on which interdisciplinary exchange may be better served, with the view that this will aid better cross fertilisation between disciplines, working in the areas of collective behaviour and analysis of the structures and edifices constructed by non-humans; and to facilitate how this area of study may better contribute to the field of architecture. We then use these definitions to discuss the informational content of constructions built by organisms and the influence these have on behaviour, and vice versa. We review how spatial constraints inform and influence interaction between an organism and its environment, and examine the reciprocity of space and information on construction and the behaviour of humans and social insects