What counts as an abortion?

It is a historical coincidence that the term 'abortion' stands for the undoing of even the most early involuntary conception. Originally an abortion was an unwanted miscarriage. As a derivative, late nineteenth-century physicians introduced the expression of 'provoked abortion' for the age-old operation ending a wanted pregnancy to save a woman's life. Hence, this expression was unrelated to the even older attempts to 'induce one's period' with herbs or 'invoke a miscarriage' at a woman's own initiative. This article summarizes the twentieth-century developments leading to the use of 'abortion' mostly for the latter practices. As an unfortunate consequence, misoprostol created in the 1980s acquired the morally loaden name 'abortion pill'. Yet, it may as well be seen as the long-searched 'herb' providing sexually active women with a safe, efficient and inexpensive means to keep one's period going regardless of their eggcell being fertilized or not.</p

What counts as an abortion?

It is a historical coincidence that the term 'abortion' stands for the undoing of even the most early involuntary conception. Originally an abortion was an unwanted miscarriage. As a derivative, late nineteenth-century physicians introduced the expression of 'provoked abortion' for the age-old operation ending a wanted pregnancy to save a woman's life. Hence, this expression was unrelated to the even older attempts to 'induce one's period' with herbs or 'invoke a miscarriage' at a woman's own initiative. This article summarizes the twentieth-century developments leading to the use of 'abortion' mostly for the latter practices. As an unfortunate consequence, misoprostol created in the 1980s acquired the morally loaden name 'abortion pill'. Yet, it may as well be seen as the long-searched 'herb' providing sexually active women with a safe, efficient and inexpensive means to keep one's period going regardless of their eggcell being fertilized or not.</p

What counts as an abortion?

It is a historical coincidence that the term 'abortion' stands for the undoing of even the most early involuntary conception. Originally an abortion was an unwanted miscarriage. As a derivative, late nineteenth-century physicians introduced the expression of 'provoked abortion' for the age-old operation ending a wanted pregnancy to save a woman's life. Hence, this expression was unrelated to the even older attempts to 'induce one's period' with herbs or 'invoke a miscarriage' at a woman's own initiative. This article summarizes the twentieth-century developments leading to the use of 'abortion' mostly for the latter practices. As an unfortunate consequence, misoprostol created in the 1980s acquired the morally loaden name 'abortion pill'. Yet, it may as well be seen as the long-searched 'herb' providing sexually active women with a safe, efficient and inexpensive means to keep one's period going regardless of their eggcell being fertilized or not.</p

Cyberbullying and traditional bullying in relation with adolescents’ perception of parenting

This study investigates the relation between parenting and involvement in cyberbullying. We predicted that cyberbullies and cyberbully-victims report less responsiveness and de manding reactions from their parents than victims and youthswho are not involved in cyberbullying. Furthermore, we predicted that youths with neglectful parents cyberbully the most often and youth with authoritative parents cyberbully the least. The same differences were predicted for traditional bullying. behavio and for youth involved in both forms of bullying behavior. Participants were made up to 1200 youths from 10-14 years old. They responded to a survey measuring cyberbullying and traditional bullying with questions based on the sub-scales from the Bully?Victim Questionnaire, and parenting with an adjusated version of the Parenting Style Questionnaire. Most results confirm out predictions. Results on authoritative, autoritarian, permissive and neglectful parenting styles suggest that for bullies, demanding actions are an important dimension of thier behavior and for victims, responsiveness is an important dimension of their behavior

Low- and intermediate-temperature ammonia/hydrogen oxidation in a flow reactor: Experiments and a wide-range kinetic modeling

Understanding the chemistry behind the oxidation of ammonia/hydrogen mixtures is crucial for ensuring the flexible use of such mixtures in several applications, related to propulsion systems and power generation. In this work, the oxidation of ammonia/hydrogen blends was investigated through an experimental and kinetic-modeling study, where the low- and intermediate-temperature conditions were considered. An experimental campaign was performed in a flow reactor, at stoichiometric conditions and near-atmospheric pressure (126.7 kPa). The mole fraction of fuels, oxidizer and final products was measured. At the same time, a comprehensive kinetic model was set up, following a modular and hierarchical approach, and implementing the recently-available elementary rates. Such a model was used to interpret the experimental results, and to extend the analysis to literature data, covering several oxidation features. The reactivity boost provided by H2 addition was found to be approximately linear with its mole fraction in both flow- and jet-stirred-reactor conditions (except for the smallest H2 amounts in the flow reactor), in contrast with the more-than-linear increase in the laminar flame speed. The key role of HO2 in regulating fuel conversion and autoignition at low temperature was confirmed for binary mixtures, with H2NO being the bottleneck to the low-temperature oxidation of NH3-rich blends. On the other hand, the nitrogen fate was found to be mostly regulated by NHx + NO propagation and termination channels

Emotion-Focused Coping Worsens Depressive Feelings and Health Complaints in Cyberbullied Children

Coping may explain why being cyberbullied affects children’s well-being differently, though previous studies are inconclusive. This survey among 325 children focused on the role coping strategies may play in the relationship between cyberbullying and depressive feelings and health complaints. Being cyberbullied was measured with the Cyberbullying Questionnaire, general coping with the Utrecht Coping List, and cyberbullying-specific coping with a questionnaire developed for this study. Health complaints were measured with the Short Questionnaire for Experienced Health and depressive feelings with the shortened Children’s Depression Inventory. The results showed that 18.8% of the children were bullied by mobile phone and 24.1% through the internet. Correlation analyses showed strong relationships between victimization, coping, depressive feelings, and health complaints. In the regression analyses conducted in all children, victimization, general emotion-focused, and problem-focused copings had main effects on depressive feelings and health complaints; emotion-focused coping interacted with victimization in health complaints. Simple slope analyses of children with high scores on emotion-focused general coping showed a stronger positive relationship between victimization and health complaints. Regression analyses of only cyberbullied children showed that only emotion-focused cyber-specific coping was associated with more health complaints and depressive feelings

ADHD and brain anatomy:What do academic textbooks used in the Netherlands tell students?

Studies of brain size of children classified with ADHD appear to reveal smaller brains when compared to ‘normal’ children. Yet, what does this mean? Even with the use of rigorously screened case and control groups, these studies show only small, average group differences between children with and without an ADHD classification. However, academic textbooks used in the Netherlands often portray individual children with an ADHD classification as having a different, malfunctioning brain that necessitates medical intervention. This conceptualisation of ADHD might serve professional interests, but not necessarily the interests of children

The Future of Psychopharmacological Enhancements: Expectations and Policies

The hopes and fears expressed in the debate on human enhancement are not always based on a realistic assessment of the expected possibilities. Discussions about extreme scenarios may at times obscure the ethical and policy issues that are relevant today. This paper aims to contribute to an adequate and ethically sound societal response to actual current developments. After a brief outline of the ethical debate concerning neuro-enhancement, it describes the current state of the art in psychopharmacological science and current uses of psychopharmacological enhancement, as well as the prospects for the near future. It then identifies ethical issues regarding psychopharmacological enhancements that require attention from policymakers, both on the professional and on the governmental level. These concern enhancement research, the gradual expansion of medical categories, off-label prescription and responsibility of doctors, and accessibility of enhancers on the Internet. It is concluded that further discussion on the advantages and drawbacks of enhancers on a collective social level is still needed