The development and validation of the Videogaming Motives Questionnaire (VMQ)

Gaming motives are important factors for explaining individual differences in videogame-related behaviors. The aim of the present study was to develop a new comprehensive but brief instrument–the Videogaming Motives Questionnaire (VMQ)–which embraces some of the most relevant gaming motives. In a first study, a pilot exploratory factor analysis (EFA) with data from 140 undergraduates was performed on items from twelve potential motives. This identified eight main factors: recreation, social interaction, coping, violent reward, fantasy, cognitive development, customization, and competition. In Studies 2 and 3, an EFA and a confirmatory factor analysis were performed on two independent samples of 407 adolescents and 260 young adults, respectively. The VMQ presented a robust eight-factor structure, with all scales showing adequate reliability indices. In reference to criterion validity, all motives presented specific associations with hours spent playing videogames, disordered gaming, and game genre preferences. More specifically, and in both adolescents and young adults, social interaction was the main motive related to time spent gaming, whereas disordered gaming was related to both coping and social interaction motives. Based on these findings, it is concluded that the VMQ is a brief and psychometrically appropriate tool for assessing the most relevant videogaming motives

The role of gender and personality in adolescent gaming: disordered use and gaming genre preferences.

English: Playing video games is one of the world’s most popular leisure activities, especially for teenagers. The main aim of the present study was to examine additive and moderation effects of gender and personality to explain individual differences in problematic gaming and video game genre preferences in adolescence. 776 Spanish high school students (mean age = 14.29 years, SD = 1.59, 50.64% girls) completed the questionnaires of the Five-Factor Model of personality, frequency of video gaming, disordered use, and the video games they mostly played. Gender differences were observed for gaming behaviors: boys played more and presented much more disordered gaming than girls. Boys preferred competitive genres; for example, action-shooters, sport, fight and strategy games. Girls preferred nonviolent and ocasional game genres; for example, social simulation, and brain and skill games. Gender moderated the association between personality and disordered gaming: disordered gaming was associated with low agreeableness and low conscientiousness in boys, and with low extraversion and low conscientiousness in girls. Low consciousnness moderated the association between gaming frequency and problematic use of video games: playing more video games led to disordered gaming, mainly in irresponsible and impulsive individuals. Though small, significant associations were found among all of the personality domains and video game genre preferences. These findings highlight the relevance of gender and personality for gaming behaviors in adolescence, and suggest paying more attention to gender-dependent differences and person-environment transactional processes when studying gaming-related behaviors. Spanish: Jugar a videojuegos es una de las actividades de ocio más populares en adolescentes. El principal objetivo de este estudio fue examinar los efectos aditivos y de moderación del género y la personalidad en el juego problemático y en la preferencia en géneros de videojuegos durante la adolescencia. 776 estudiantes españoles (media de edad = 14,29; DT = 1,59; 50,64% chicas) cumplimentaron cuestionarios del Modelo de los cinco grandes de personalidad y de conductas relacionadas con videojuegos. Se observaron diferencias de género en conductas relacionadas con videojuegos: los chicos jugaban más y presentaron mucho más uso problemático que las chicas. Ellos prefirieron géneros competitivos; por ejemplo, juegos de acción-shooters, deportes, lucha y estrategia. Las chicas prefirieron géneros no violentos y ocasionales; por ejemplo, simulación social, y juegos de habilidad y lógica. El género moderó las asociaciones entre personalidad y juego problemático: el juego problemático se asoció a baja amabilidad y baja responsabilidad en chicos, y a baja extraversión y baja responsabilidad en chicas. La baja responsabilidad moderó las asociaciones entre frecuencia de juego y uso problemático: jugar más a videojuegos conducía a un uso problemático de éstos, principalmente en individuos irresponsables e impulsivos. Se encontraron asociaciones pequeñas pero significativas entre la personalidad y preferencias en géneros de videojuegos. Estos hallazgos destacan la relevancia del género y la personalidad en las conductas relacionadas con videojuegos durante la adolescencia, y animan a prestar más atención a las diferencias dependientes del género y a las transacciones persona-ambiente al estudiar estas conductas

ProTISA: a comprehensive resource for translation initiation site annotation in prokaryotic genomes

Correct annotation of translation initiation site (TIS) is essential for both experiments and bioinformatics studies of prokaryotic translation initiation mechanism as well as understanding of gene regulation and gene structure. Here we describe a comprehensive database ProTISA, which collects TIS confirmed through a variety of available evidences for prokaryotic genomes, including Swiss-Prot experiments record, literature, conserved domain hits and sequence alignment between orthologous genes. Moreover, by combining the predictions from our recently developed TIS post-processor, ProTISA provides a refined annotation for the public database RefSeq. Furthermore, the database annotates the potential regulatory signals associated with translation initiation at the TIS upstream region. As of July 2007, ProTISA includes 440 microbial genomes with more than 390 000 confirmed TISs. The database is available at http://mech.ctb.pku.edu.cn/protis

Violent aggression predicted by multiple pre-adult environmental hits

Early exposure to negative environmental impact shapes individual behavior and potentially contributes to any mental disease. We reported previously that accumulated environmental risk markedly decreases age at schizophrenia onset. Follow-up of matched extreme group individuals (≤1 vs. ≥3 risks) unexpectedly revealed that high-risk subjects had >5 times greater probability of forensic hospitalization. In line with longstanding sociological theories, we hypothesized that risk accumulation before adulthood induces violent aggression and criminal conduct, independent of mental illness. We determined in 6 independent cohorts (4 schizophrenia and 2 general population samples) pre-adult risk exposure, comprising urbanicity, migration, physical and sexual abuse as primary, and cannabis or alcohol as secondary hits. All single hits by themselves were marginally associated with higher violent aggression. Most strikingly, however, their accumulation strongly predicted violent aggression (odds ratio 10.5). An epigenome-wide association scan to detect differential methylation of blood-derived DNA of selected extreme group individuals yielded overall negative results. Conversely, determination in peripheral blood mononuclear cells of histone-deacetylase1 mRNA as 'umbrella mediator' of epigenetic processes revealed an increase in the high-risk group, suggesting lasting epigenetic alterations. Together, we provide sound evidence of a disease-independent unfortunate relationship between well-defined pre-adult environmental hits and violent aggression, calling for more efficient prevention

Variable Copy Number, Intra-Genomic Heterogeneities and Lateral Transfers of the 16S rRNA Gene in Pseudomonas

Even though the 16S rRNA gene is the most commonly used taxonomic marker in microbial ecology, its poor resolution is still not fully understood at the intra-genus level. In this work, the number of rRNA gene operons, intra-genomic heterogeneities and lateral transfers were investigated at a fine-scale resolution, throughout the Pseudomonas genus. In addition to nineteen sequenced Pseudomonas strains, we determined the 16S rRNA copy number in four other Pseudomonas strains by Southern hybridization and Pulsed-Field Gel Electrophoresis, and studied the intra-genomic heterogeneities by Denaturing Gradient Gel Electrophoresis and sequencing. Although the variable copy number (from four to seven) seems to be correlated with the evolutionary distance, some close strains in the P. fluorescens lineage showed a different number of 16S rRNA genes, whereas all the strains in the P. aeruginosa lineage displayed the same number of genes (four copies). Further study of the intra-genomic heterogeneities revealed that most of the Pseudomonas strains (15 out of 19 strains) had at least two different 16S rRNA alleles. A great difference (5 or 19 nucleotides, essentially grouped near the V1 hypervariable region) was observed only in two sequenced strains. In one of our strains studied (MFY30 strain), we found a difference of 12 nucleotides (grouped in the V3 hypervariable region) between copies of the 16S rRNA gene. Finally, occurrence of partial lateral transfers of the 16S rRNA gene was further investigated in 1803 full-length sequences of Pseudomonas available in the databases. Remarkably, we found that the two most variable regions (the V1 and V3 hypervariable regions) had probably been laterally transferred from another evolutionary distant Pseudomonas strain for at least 48.3 and 41.6% of the 16S rRNA sequences, respectively. In conclusion, we strongly recommend removing these regions of the 16S rRNA gene during the intra-genus diversity studies

The Cyst-Dividing Bacterium Ramlibacter tataouinensis TTB310 Genome Reveals a Well-Stocked Toolbox for Adaptation to a Desert Environment

Ramlibacter tataouinensis TTB310T (strain TTB310), a betaproteobacterium isolated from a semi-arid region of South Tunisia (Tataouine), is characterized by the presence of both spherical and rod-shaped cells in pure culture. Cell division of strain TTB310 occurs by the binary fission of spherical “cyst-like” cells (“cyst-cyst” division). The rod-shaped cells formed at the periphery of a colony (consisting mainly of cysts) are highly motile and colonize a new environment, where they form a new colony by reversion to cyst-like cells. This unique cell cycle of strain TTB310, with desiccation tolerant cyst-like cells capable of division and desiccation sensitive motile rods capable of dissemination, appears to be a novel adaptation for life in a hot and dry desert environment. In order to gain insights into strain TTB310's underlying genetic repertoire and possible mechanisms responsible for its unusual lifestyle, the genome of strain TTB310 was completely sequenced and subsequently annotated. The complete genome consists of a single circular chromosome of 4,070,194 bp with an average G+C content of 70.0%, the highest among the Betaproteobacteria sequenced to date, with total of 3,899 predicted coding sequences covering 92% of the genome. We found that strain TTB310 has developed a highly complex network of two-component systems, which may utilize responses to light and perhaps a rudimentary circadian hourglass to anticipate water availability at the dew time in the middle/end of the desert winter nights and thus direct the growth window to cyclic water availability times. Other interesting features of the strain TTB310 genome that appear to be important for desiccation tolerance, including intermediary metabolism compounds such as trehalose or polyhydroxyalkanoate, and signal transduction pathways, are presented and discussed

Structure, Function, and Evolution of the Thiomonas spp. Genome

Bacteria of the Thiomonas genus are ubiquitous in extreme environments, such as arsenic-rich acid mine drainage (AMD). The genome of one of these strains, Thiomonas sp. 3As, was sequenced, annotated, and examined, revealing specific adaptations allowing this bacterium to survive and grow in its highly toxic environment. In order to explore genomic diversity as well as genetic evolution in Thiomonas spp., a comparative genomic hybridization (CGH) approach was used on eight different strains of the Thiomonas genus, including five strains of the same species. Our results suggest that the Thiomonas genome has evolved through the gain or loss of genomic islands and that this evolution is influenced by the specific environmental conditions in which the strains live