Recognizing Your Hand and That of Your Romantic Partner.

Although the hand is an important organ in interpersonal interactions, focusing on this body part explicitly is less common in daily life compared with the face. We investigated (i) whether a person's recognition of their own hand is different from their recognition of another person's hand (i.e., self hand vs. other's hand) and (ii) whether a close social relationship affects hand recognition (i.e., a partner's hand vs. an unknown person's hand). For this aim, we ran an experiment in which participants took part in one of two discrimination tasks: (i) a self-others discrimination task or (ii) a partner/unknown opposite-sex person discrimination task. In these tasks, participants were presented with a hand image and asked to select one of two responses, self (partner) or other (unknown persons), as quickly and accurately as possible. We manipulated hand ownership (self (partner)/other(unknown person)), hand image laterality (right/left), and visual perspective of hand image (upright/upside-down). A main effect of hand ownership in both tasks (i.e., self vs. other and partner vs. unknown person) was found, indicating longer reaction times for self and partner images. The results suggest that close social relationships modulate hand recognition-namely, "self-expansion" to a romantic partner could occur at explicit visual hand recognition.

[Derogating victims and dehumanizing perpetrators: functions of two types of beliefs in a just world].

This study defined Belief in Just World (BJW) multidimensionally and investigated the effects of Belief in Immanent Justice (BIJ) and Belief in Ultimate Justice (BUJ) on victim derogation and draconian punishment of perpetrators. Study 1 tested the validity of the multidimensional structure of BJW and demonstrated relationships between BJW and other psychological variables. In Study 2, we measured the reactions to the victim and perpetrator in an injury case reported in a news.article, and evaluated the relationships of these reactions to BIJ and BUJ. The results revealed that BIJ was associated with a preference in draconian punishment of the perpetrator, while BUJ was associated with dissociation from the victim (a type of victim derogation). In addition, as hypothesized, we found that dehumanization of the perpetrator partially mediated the relationship between BIJ and victim derogation. We discussed relationships between the two types of BJW and just-world maintenance strategies in the situation where a victim and a perpetrator are both recognized.

Effect of decision confidence on the evaluation of conflicting decisions in a social context.

Conflicts with others about decisions are reflected in the medial frontal negativity (MFN), which is a component of the event-related brain potential (ERP). The present study examined how decision confidence in a perceptual decision task modulated the ERP components elicited by decision conflicts with others. In a motion discrimination task, participants were randomly assigned to an easy or a difficult group that differed in coherence levels of the moving dots. Participants were paired with a confederate and presented the confederate's decision about the motion direction of the moving dots, which was either congruent or incongruent with the participants' decision. MFN was elicited by the incongruent confederate's decision and its amplitude did not differ between groups. A larger P300 amplitude was elicited by incongruent decisions in the easy group, whereas the P300 amplitude did not differ between congruent and incongruent decisions in the difficult group. These results indicate the functional dissociation between MFN and P300 in the evaluation of social feedback. It is suggested that MFN might reflect automatic detection of conflicts about decisions, whereas the P300 might detect the deviation from internal expectations regarding other's decisions.

Seeking gene candidates responsible for developmental origins of health and disease.

Human epidemiological evidence has led scientists to theorize that undernutrition during gestation is an important early origin of adult diseases. Animal models have successfully demonstrated that maternal diet could contribute to some adult diseases. Undernutrition is perceived harmful in pregnant women, whereas calorie restriction is a strategy proven to extend healthy and maximum lifespan in adult. This diagrammatically opposite effect of nutritional condition might provide us with hints to search for genes underlying health conditions. Here, we have initiated a study examining the effect of undernutrition on maternal and fetal livers, utilizing high-throughput DNA microarray analysis for screening genome-wide changes in their transcriptomes. Briefly, pregnant mice were exposed to food deprivation (FD) on gestation day (GD) 17, and cesarean section was performed on GD18. Control mice were supplied with chow ad libitum until sacrifice. Total RNA extracted from mother and fetal livers for each control and treatment (FD) was analyzed with an Agilent mouse whole genome DNA chip. A total of 3058 and 3126 up- (>1.5-fold) and down- (<0.75-fold) regulated genes, and 1475 and 1225 up- (>1.5-fold) and down- (<0.75-fold) regulated genes showed differential expression at the mRNA level, in the maternal and fetal livers, respectively. Interestingly, 103 genes up-regulated in the mother were down-regulated in the fetus, whereas 108 down-regulated maternal genes were up-regulated in the fetus; these 211 genes are potential candidates related to longevity or health. The role of some of these genes, in context of the proposed mechanisms for developmental origins of health and disease is discussed.

Distribution of the longevity gene product, SIRT1, in developing mouse organs.

A longevity gene product, Sir2 (silent information regulator 2) is a NAD-dependent histone deacetylase involved in longevity in yeasts, worms and flies. The mammalian homolog of Sir2, SIRT1(sirtuin 1), has been shown to play important roles related to anti-aging effects (regulating apoptosis, stress tolerance, insulin resistance, and fat metabolism). Recently, SIRT1 expression has been demonstrated to occur at as early as embryonic day 10.5 in mice. SIRT1 during developing period may be involved in the mechanism of developmental origins of adult diseases, such as diabetes and cardiovascular disease. To investigate the contribution of SIRT1, it is important to reveal the distribution of this protein during development. In the present study, we demonstrated the distribution of immunoreactivity of SIRT1 in mouse organs during prenatal and neonatal development by staining a wide variety of serial sections. The SIRT1 immunoreactivity was strongly observed in the neuroepithelial layer, dorsal root ganglion, trigeminal ganglion, eyes, roots of whiskers, and internal organs, including the testis, liver, heart, kidney, and lung during the fetal period. Neurons which had finished migrating still showed relatively strong immunoreactivity. The immunoreactivity was completely absorbed by the blocking peptide in an absorption test. During the postnatal period, the immunoreactivities in most of these organs, except the heart and testis weakened, with the liver most dramatically affected. As SIRT1 expression was demonstrated in a wide variety of developing organs, further study to investigate prenatal factors which affect SIRT1 expression and its activity is important.