Humor Improves Women's but Impairs Men's Iowa Gambling Task Performance.

The Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) is a popular method for examining real-life decision-making. Research has shown gender related differences in performance, in that men consistently outperform women. It has been suggested that these performance differences are related to decreased emotional control in women compared to men. Given the likely role of emotion in these gender differences, in the present study, we examine the effect of a humor induction on IGT performance and whether the effect of humor is moderated by gender. IGT performance and parameters from the Expectancy Valence Model (EVM) were measured in 68 university students (34 men; mean age 22.02, SD = 4.3 and 34 women; mean age 22.3, SD = 4.1) during a 100 trial-IGT task. Participants were exposed to a brief video before each of the IGT decisions available; one half of the samples (17 men and 17 women) was exposed to 100 humor videos, while the other half was exposed to 100 non-humor videos during the task. We observed a significant interaction between gender and humor, such that under humor, women's performance during the last block (trials 80-100) improved (compared to women under non-humor), whereas men's performance during the last block was worse (compared to men under non-humor). Consistent with previous work, under non-humor, men outperformed women in the last block. Lastly, our EVM results show that humor impacts the learning mechanisms of decision-making differently in men and women. Humor impaired men's ability to acquire knowledge about the payoff structure of the decks, and as a consequence, they were stuck in suboptimal performance. On the other hand, humor facilitated women's ability to explore and to learn from experience, improving performance. These findings deepen our understanding of the mechanisms underlying IGT decision-making and differential effects of humor in men and women.

Acute effects of testosterone on intracellular Ca2+ kinetics in rat coronary endothelial cells are exerted via aromatization to estrogens.

The objective of this work was to evaluate the effects of testosterone (T) and 17beta-estradiol (E(2)) on coronary microvascular endothelial cells (CMECs) of male and female rats. To analyze the short-term effects of such sex steroid hormones on intracellular Ca(2+) concentration ([Ca(2+)](i)) kinetics, we used the chelating agent fura-2 acetoxymethyl ester. We also explored the possibility of testosterone aromatization by using selective inhibitors of the aromatase enzyme cytochrome P-450 aromatase (P450(arom)), aminoglutethimide (4 microM), and 4-hydroxyandrostenedione (4 microM). The presence of P450(arom) was investigated by immunocytochemical and immunoblot assays using peptide-generated polyclonal antibodies raised against a 20-amino acid synthetic fragment of rat P450(arom) and by in situ hybridization to locate the aromatase mRNA in such cells. The activity of P450(arom) was demonstrated by the stereospecific loss of the tritium atom of [1beta-(3)H]androstenedione. Our results indicate that both T and E(2) induced a rapid increase in [Ca(2+)](i). The fact that the effects of E(2) and T were carried out within milliseconds suggests that they were exerted at the membrane level and not through intracellular receptors. The possibility of involvement of PLC-beta in these effects is suggested because U-73122 (a PLC inhibitor) blocked the effects of both T and E(2). Immunocytochemical assays indicated the expression of androgenic and estrogenic receptors in these cells. The effects of T were blocked by the selective aromatase inhibitors. We also demonstrated membrane association of P450(arom), expression of the ovary-specific mRNA after in situ hybridization, and E(2) formation resulting from a significant activity of P450(arom) in CMECs. There were no gender-based differences.

Técnicas participativas en la educación sexual y cambios de conducta en adolescentes / Participative techniques in sexual education and behaviour changes in adolescents

De acuerdo con el conocimiento que posea de la sexualidad será la conducta en este aspecto. Es importante mejorar el conocimiento sexual, especialmente durante la formación de criterios como es la adolescencia. La finalidad del presente trabajo fue conocer la información en los adolescentes sobre sexualidad y los cambios de conocimientos luego de un programa educativo sobre el tema a través de técnicas participativas. Es un estudio descriptivo aplicado y de campo, realizado en el Liceo Simón Bolívar de San Cristóbal, estado Táchira, con 300 adolescentes entre 13 y 18 años, de tercer año (general) y de primer año de ciencias, que representan el 65 por ciento de la población. Se aplicó una encuesta con 30 preguntas de respuestas cerradas y directas. Se tomó al azar una sección de tercer año (general) y de primer año de ciencias para realizar 10 talleres sobre la sexualidad del adolescentes. Antes y después de cada taller se realizó un pre - post- test, teniendo como resultados que en 7 de los 10 talleres hay significación estadística, es decir, que los conocimientos analizados en los talleres modificaron y mejoraron los conceptos y criterios sobre sexualidad. Tres meses después de los talleres se aplicó una nueva encuesta con 37 preguntas de respuestas cerradas y directas, observando un resultado no estadísticamente significativo, es decir, que los conceptos se mantienen estables tres meses después de los talleres