Need for cognitive closure modulates how perceptual decisions are affected by task difficulty and outcome relevance

The aim of this study was to assess the extent to which Need for Cognitive Closure (NCC), an individual-level epistemic motivation, can explain inter-individual variability in the cognitive effort invested on a perceptual decision making task (the random motion task). High levels of NCC are manifested in a preference for clarity, order and structure and a desire for firm and stable knowledge. The study evaluated how NCC moderates the impact of two variables known to increase the amount of cognitive effort invested on a task, namely task ambiguity (i.e., the difficulty of the perceptual discrimination) and outcome relevance (i.e., the monetary gain associated with a correct discrimination). Based on previous work and current design, we assumed that reaction times (RTs) on our motion discrimination task represent a valid index of effort investment. Task ambiguity was associated with increased cognitive effort in participants with low or medium NCC but, interestingly, it did not affect the RTs of participants with high NCC. A different pattern of association was observed for outcome relevance; high outcome relevance increased cognitive effort in participants with moderate or high NCC, but did not affect the performance of low NCC participants. In summary, the performance of individuals with low NCC was affected by task difficulty but not by outcome relevance, whereas individuals with high NCC were influenced by outcome relevance but not by task difficulty; only participants with medium NCC were affected by both task difficulty and outcome relevance. These results suggest that perceptual decision making is influenced by the interaction between context and NC

The neural bases for devaluing radical political statements revealed by penetrating traumatic brain injury

Given the determinant role of ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) in valuation, we examined whether vmPFC lesions also modulate how people scale political beliefs. Patients with penetrating traumatic brain injury (pTBI; N1/4102) and healthy controls (HCs; N1/431) were tested on the political belief task, where they rated 75 statements expressing political opinions concerned with welfare, economy, political involvement, civil rights, war and security. Each statement was rated for level of agreement and scaled along three dimensions: radicalism, individualism and conservatism. Voxel-based lesionsymptom mapping (VLSM) analysis showed that diminished scores for the radicalism dimension (i.e. statements were rated as less radical than the norms) were associated with lesions in bilateral vmPFC. After dividing the pTBI patients into three groups, according to lesion location (i.e. vmPFC, dorsolateral prefrontal cortex [dlPFC] and parietal cortex), we found that the vmPFC, but not the dlPFC, group had reduced radicalism scores compared with parietal and HC groups. These findings highlight the crucial role of the vmPFC in appropriately valuing political behaviors and may explain certain inappropriate social judgments observed in patients with vmPFC lesions

Clinical characteristics and molecular aspects of low-grade serous ovarian and peritoneal cancer: a multicenter, observational, retrospective analysis of MITO Group (MITO 22)

BACKGROUND: Low-grade serous ovarian and peritoneal cancer (LGSC) is a rare disease and few data on the clinical and genomic landscape have been published.METHODS: A retrospective analysis of patients diagnosed with LGSC between 1996 and 2019 was conducted in MITO centers. Objective Response Rate (ORR) to treatments, progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) were assessed. Additionally, the tumor molecular profile of 56 patients was evaluated using the Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) FoundationOne CDX (Foundation Medicine (R)).RESULTS: A total of 128 patients with complete clinical data and pathologically confirmed diagnosis of LGSC were identified. ORR to first and subsequent therapies were 23.7% and 33.7%, respectively. PFS was 43.9 months (95% CI:32.4-53.1) and OS was 105.4 months (95% CI: 82.7-not reached). The most common gene alterations were: KRAS (n = 12, 21%), CDKN2A/B (n = 11, 20%), NRAS (n = 8, 14%), FANCA (n = 8, 14%), NF1 (n = 7, 13%) and BRAF (n = 6, 11%). Unexpectedly, pathogenetic BRCA1 (n = 2, 4%), BRCA2 (n = 1, 2%) and PALB2 (n = 1, 2%) mutations were found.CONCLUSIONS: MITO 22 suggests that LGSC is an heterogenous disease for both its clinical behavior in response to standard therapies and its molecular alterations. Future prospective studies should test treatments according to biological and molecular tumor's characteristics

Monitoring and predicting the risk of violence in residential facilities. No difference between patients with history or with no history of violence

none34noopende Girolamo, Giovanni; Buizza, Chiara; Sisti, Davide; Ferrari, Clarissa; Bulgari, Viola; Iozzino, Laura; Boero, Maria Elena; Cristiano, Giuseppe; De Francesco, Alessandra; Giobbio, Gian Marco; Maggi, Paolo; Rossi, Giuseppe; Segalini, Beatrice; Candini, Valentina; Andreose, Suor; Basso, Pasquale; Beneduce, Rossella; Bertolotti, Pietro; Braida, Vanda; Bonelli, Marina; Bongiorno, Fanny; Bussi, Riccardo; Castagno, Elisa; Dominicis, Fabio; Ghersi, Loredana; Greppo, Stefania; Sodano, Alessandro Jaretti; Leporatti, Massimo; Presti, Eleonora Lo; Milone, Valeria; Panigada, Fausto; Pasquadibisceglie, Livia; Rigamonti, Danilo; Rillosi, Lucianade Girolamo, Giovanni; Buizza, Chiara; Sisti, Davide; Ferrari, Clarissa; Bulgari, Viola; Iozzino, Laura; Boero, Maria Elena; Cristiano, Giuseppe; De Francesco, Alessandra; Giobbio, Gian Marco; Maggi, Paolo; Rossi, Giuseppe; Segalini, Beatrice; Candini, Valentina; Andreose, Suor; Basso, Pasquale; Beneduce, Rossella; Bertolotti, Pietro; Braida, Vanda; Bonelli, Marina; Bongiorno, Fanny; Bussi, Riccardo; Castagno, Elisa; Dominicis, Fabio; Ghersi, Loredana; Greppo, Stefania; Sodano, Alessandro Jaretti; Leporatti, Massimo; Presti, Eleonora Lo; Milone, Valeria; Panigada, Fausto; Pasquadibisceglie, Livia; Rigamonti, Danilo; Rillosi, Lucian

Routes of motivation: Stable psychological dispositions are associated with dynamic changes in cortico-cortical functional connectivity

The present study provides a neurobiological framework to the theory of epistemic motivation that has been extensively studied for the last three decades in the domain of social cognition. Epistemic motivations affect the way people generate and validate hypotheses, and ultimately form and modify knowledge. Strong dispositional measures such as need for cognitive closure (NCC), the desire for a quick firm answer (any answer) to a question, show gross and stable inter-individual differences. The cognitive mechanisms and neural underpinnings of such differences, however, remain largely unexplored. Here we show that high (compared to low) levels of NCC, measured with need for cognitive closure scale, are associated with reduced online adjustment in cognitive control, as indexed by behavioral conflict adaptation. This behavioral effect is mediated by dynamic changes in cortico-cortical functional connectivity between prefrontal regions involved in conflict monitoring and implementation of cognitive control. In particular, these regions show increased functional connectivity after exposure to conflict in low but not high NCC individuals. These results demonstrate that the level of flexibility of functional cortico-cortical connections can mediate stable psychological dispositions

Weighing the stigma of weight: An fMRI study of neural reactivity to the pain of obese individuals

Explicit negative attitudes and blameful beliefs (e.g. poor diet, laziness) towards obese individuals are well documented and are pervasive even among health professionals. Here we sought to determine whether obesity stigma is reflected in a fundamental feature of intersubjectivity namely the automatic neural resonance with others' affective experiences. During fMRI, normal-weight female participants observed short clips depicting normal-weight (NW) and obese (Ob) models experiencing pain. Importantly, participants believed that half of the Ob were overweight due to a hormonal disorder (HormOb) and ignored the cause of obesity of the remaining models (Unknown obese models; UnkOb). Analyses of hemodynamic responses showed reduced activity to the pain of Ob compared to that of NW in areas associated with pain processing and early visual processing. The comparison between the two Ob conditions revealed a further decrease of activity to HormOb's pain compared to UnkOb's (and NW) pain in the right inferior frontal gyrus, an area associated with emotional resonance. Our study demonstrates that stigma for obese individuals can be observed at implicit levels, and that it is modulated by knowledge concerning the etiology of obesity, with the seemingly surprising result that obesity due to disease may result in greater stigmatization. Moreover, the perceived similarity with the models and the ambivalent emotion of pity may index biased brain responses to obese individuals' pain. The study highlights a possibly important neural link between resonance with the pain of others and obesity stigma. © 2013 Elsevier Inc.Explicit negative attitudes and blameful beliefs (e.g. poor diet, laziness) towards obese individuals are well documented and are pervasive even among health professionals. Here we sought to determine whether obesity stigma is reflected in a fundamental feature of intersubjectivity namely the automatic neural resonance with others' affective experiences. During fMRI, normal-weight female participants observed short clips depicting normal-weight (NW) and obese (Ob) models experiencing pain. Importantly, participants believed that half of the Ob were overweight due to a hormonal disorder (HormOb) and ignored the cause of obesity of the remaining models (Unknown obese models; UnkOb). Analyses of hemodynamic responses showed reduced activity to the pain of Ob compared to that of NW in areas associated with pain processing and early visual processing

Experimental design and behavioral data.

<p><b>A:</b> Schematic representation of the Eriksen Flanker task. The letter strings represent examples of consecutive trials. <b>B:</b> Distribution of NCC scores in 373 volunteers. The gray scale indicates the three sub-groups with low, high and medium levels of NCC: pearl gray corresponds to the first quartile (low NCC), middle grey to the second and third quartile (medium NCC), and dark grey to the fourth quartile (high-NCC). <b>C:</b> Congruence effect on current trial (RTs on Incongruent–Congruent trials) as a function of congruence in previous trial and NCC level (low and high NCC). The asterisk represents a significant reduction of the congruence effect following an incongruent trial.</p

fMRI data.

<p><b>A:</b> Brain regions showing differential BOLD responses to incongruent vs. congruent trials. Activations are rendered onto the PALS atlas. Arrows indicate the connections between rACC and DLPFC and between DLPFC and IFG, showing near-significant and significant gPPI, respectively. <b>B:</b> Congruence effect on the rACC-DLPFC and DLPFC-IFG gPPI, as a function of congruence in previous trial. Data are presented as in <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0098010#pone-0098010-g001" target="_blank">Figure 1C</a>. <b>C:</b> Hypothesized mediational model linking NCC to the behavioral and gPPI CSE indices.</p

Genetic determinants of cognitive responses to caffeine drinking identified from a double-blind, randomized, controlled trial

The widely observed between-subject variability in cognitive responses to coffee may have a genetic basis.We evaluated cognitive responses to caffeine throughout three complex cognitive tasks assessing different subdomains of attention, namely Alerting and Orienting (Categorical Search Task) and Executive Control (Stroop Task and Eriksen Flanker Task). We explored whether they are influenced by gene variants affecting adenosine metabolism or catecholamine receptors.We recruited 106 healthy male subjects who were administered, in a double-blind design, 40. mL of either a decaffeinated coffee preparation plus 3. mg/kg caffeine (caf) or the corresponding vehicle (decaf). The protocol was repeated 24. h later with the alternative preparation. Cognitive tasks were performed between 30. min and 2. h after caf or decaf administration. Each subject underwent ambulatory blood pressure monitoring for 2. h. Blood samples were collected for genetic evaluations and for plasma caffeine and catecholamines measures.We found a significant reduction of reaction times in two of the cognitive tasks (Categorical Search Task and Stroop Task) after caf compared with decaf, indicating that caffeine, on average, improved the attention level in the domains under investigation. We also found, however, a great inter-individual variability in the cognitive performance responses to caffeine. In exploring genetic sources for such variability, we found a relation between polymorphisms of adenosine A2A and the caffeine effects on the attentional domains of Orienting and Executive control.In conclusion, variability in the attentional response to coffee may be partly explained by genetic polymorphisms of adenosine and adrenergic receptor

Psychophysical calibration session.

<p>The graphs illustrate the selection of motion coherence levels yielding a rightwards response in 25% (low ambiguity), 50% (high ambiguity) and 75% (low ambiguity) of cases. The solid curve represents the best-fitting psychometric function for a representative subject, and describes the probability of a rightwards response as a function of the motion coherence of the RDM stimulus. The scatter plot shows the raw data from which the estimate was computed.</p