Cerebellar Disorders in Childhood: Cognitive Problems

Over the last decade, increasing evidence of cognitive functions of the cerebellum during development and learning processes could be ascertained. Posterior fossa malformations such as cerebellar hypoplasia or Joubert syndrome are known to be related to developmental problems in a marked to moderate extent. More detailed analyses reveal special deficits in attention, processing speed, visuospatial functions, and language. A study about Dandy Walker syndrome states a relationship of abnormalities in vermis lobulation with developmental problems. Further lobulation or volume abnormalities of the cerebellum and/or vermis can be detected in disorders as fragile X syndrome, Downs's syndrome, William's syndrome, and autism. Neuropsychological studies reveal a relation of dyslexia and attention deficit disorder with cerebellar functions. These functional studies are supported by structural abnormalities in neuroimaging in these disorders. Acquired cerebellar or vermis atrophy was found in groups of children with developmental problems such as prenatal alcohol exposure or extreme prematurity. Also, focal lesions during childhood or adolescence such as cerebellar tumor or stroke are related with neuropsychological abnormalities, which are most pronounced in visuospatial, language, and memory functions. In addition, cerebellar atrophy was shown to be a bad prognostic factor considering cognitive outcome in children after brain trauma and leukemia. In ataxia teleangiectasia, a neurodegenerative disorder affecting primarily the cerebellar cortex, a reduced verbal intelligence quotient and problems of judgment of duration are a hint of the importance of the cerebellum in cognition. In conclusion, the cerebellum seems to play an important role in many higher cognitive functions, especially in learning. There is a suggestion that the earlier the incorrect influence, the more pronounced the problem

Estrategia de implementación del sistema de costos ABC en las empresas latinoamericanas a partir del año 2000 al 2017. Revisión de la literatura

Los costos juegan un papel predominante en la rentabilidad económica financiera de las empresas latinoamericanas por ello es considerada un eje primordial en la gestión de cualquier tipo de empresa (industrial, comercial y de servicios); la presente investigación tiene por objetivo realizar una revisión sistemática de las estrategias de implementación del sistema de costos ABC en las empresas latinoamericanas, publicados en revistas peruanas y no peruanas, en español y portugués, entre los años 2000 al 2017. La búsqueda se realizó en las bases de datos: Dialnet, Doaj.org, Scopus, PubMed, Scielo, Redalyc y google académico utilizando las combinación de palabras costos ABC y(o) empresas. La unidad de análisis estuvo construida por 16 artículos científicos .En el estudio destaca la correcta identificación de actividades como principal estrategia al momento de implementar un sistema de costos ABC .Debido a ello, se puede afirmar que los estudios coinciden con la estrategia mencionad

Distinct profiles of reactive and proactive aggression in adolescents : associations with cognitive and affective empathy

Background: Aggression comprises a heterogeneous set of behavioral patterns that aim to harm and hurt others. Empathy represents a potential mechanism that inhibits aggressive conduct and enhances prosocial behavior. Nevertheless, research results on the relationship between empathy and aggression are mixed. Subtypes of aggressive behavior, such as reactive and proactive aggression might be differently related to empathy. The aim of the present study was to investigate the interrelations of cognitive and affective empathy with reactive and proactive aggression. Methods: We recruited a sample of 177 (33% female, M age 15.6) adolescents from socio-educational and juvenile justice institutions and a community sample of 77 (36% female, M age 13.1) adolescents from secondary schools. Using bivariate correlation analysis and hierarchical multiple regression analysis, we firstly investigated associations between cognitive and affective empathy and reactive and proactive aggression. Subsequently, we performed cluster analysis to identify clusters of adolescents with meaningful profiles of aggressive behavior and compared derived clusters on measures of empathy. We applied the Basic Empathy Scale and the Reactive-Proactive Aggression Questionnaire. Results: Bivariate analysis and hierarchical regression analysis showed that cognitive and affective empathy were negatively associated with proactive aggression, but not with reactive aggression. Cluster-analysis revealed three clusters of adolescents with distinct aggression profiles: a cluster with elevated scores on reactive and proactive aggression, a clusters with high scores on reactive aggression only, and a low aggression cluster. Cluster comparisons revealed that the reactive-proactive aggression cluster showed significantly lower scores on cognitive and affective empathy than both other clusters. Results further indicated that within the reactive-proactive aggression cluster, girls did not differ significantly from boys in empath Conclusions: The present study extends previously published findings, and possibly explains conflicting results in prior research. Our results indicated that cognitive and affective empathy are reduced in adolescents with high levels of reactive and proactive aggression. Our study may contribute to the development of tailored clinical interventions for different aggression clusters

Long-term follow-up after stroke in childhood

Over the last few years, the importance of paediatric stroke has become more and more evident; however, there is still little known about long-term neurological and especially neuropsychological outcome of these children. By retrospective chart review, questionnaire and clinical examination with structured interview, we analysed initial presentation, aetiology and long-term outcome of children suffering ischaemic childhood stroke between 1985 and 1999. A total of 20 children (13 boys) suffered acute arterial ischaemic events. Aetiology was detected in 14, and suspected in another five. Follow-up after 1-15 years (mean 7 years) was possible for 16 children; two had died and two were lost to follow-up. Only two were completely healthy, five suffered mild, six moderate, and three severe handicap. Eleven children presented with combined neurological and neuropsychological problems. Neurological problems were mild to moderate hemisyndrome in 11, dysphasia, epilepsy and other in six each. Mild to severe neuropsychological problems were detected in 13 children, school problems in eight, attention deficits in nine and behaviour problems in seven, increased fatigability and headache in six each. Recurrence was observed in three children, all due to progressive underlying disease. Outcome was most affected by the presence of combined cortical/subcortical and least affected by subcortical infarction. Epilepsy affected neuropsychological outcome. Conclusion: although prognosis of paediatric stroke is better than for adult stroke, neurological and especially neuropsychological long-term problems significantly influence the lives of these children. Careful long-term follow-up to support these children in their school career and integration into professional life is necessary. Future studies should evaluate whether specific treatments during the acute episode could improve outcome for these childre

FDTB1: Repérage des connecteurs de discours dans un corpus français

International audienceCet article présente le repérage des connecteurs de discours dans le corpus FTB (French Tree-bank) déjà annoté pour la morpho-syntaxe. C'est la première étape dans l'annotation discursive complète de ce corpus. Il s'agit de projeter sur le corpus les éléments répertoriés dans LexConn, lexique des connecteurs du français, et de filtrer les occurrences de ces éléments qui n'ont pas un emploi discursif mais par exemple un emploi d'adverbe de manière ou de préposition introduisant un complément sous-catégorisé. Plus de 10 000 connecteurs ont été identifiés. Abstract. This paper presents the identification of discourse connectives in the corpus FTB (French Tree-bank) already annotated for morpho-syntax. This is the first step in the full discursive annotation of this corpus. The method consists in projecting on the corpus the items that are listed in Lex-Conn, a lexicon of French connectives, and then filtering the occurrences of these elements that do not have a discursive use, but for example are used as an adverb of manner or a preposition introducing a subcategorized complement. More than 10K connectives have been identified. Mots-clés : connecteurs de discours, annotation discursive de corpus, grammaire et discours

Helvetas : vers des technologies participatives

Les TIC, nouvelles perspectives pour le développement Au départ, les technologies de l’information et de la communication (TIC) ont servi de terrain d’expérimentation à des pionniers pleins d’imagination, qui allaient les introduire ainsi que leurs applications dans le champ de la coopération au développement. Dans les années 1990, les grands acteurs (organisations internationales de l’ONU, agences bilatérales comme l’USAID) ont les premiers abordé la question des TIC dans les débats sur le d..