ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Gong's nonverbal intelligence test(GNIT) is a nonverbal and cross-cultural test of intelligence designed primarily to suit the use in the minority groups and those with linguistic difficulties by Professor Gong Yao-xian. At present 5 unified norms of the minority groups as well as norms of Chinese Han children and adult aged below 55 years have been developed, but the norms for the elderly above 56 years of age are not available. Nonverbal intelligence test is especially suitable for the elderly and has therefore wide applications.OBJECTIVE: To establish regional norms of the GNIT for healthy elderly people above 56 to enable the completion of nonverbal intelligence test norms suitable for each age groups.DESIGN: A controlled study with stratified sampling of healthy elderly retirees over 56 years of age in the community.SETTING: Department of Physiology in Medical College of Henan University of Science and Technology; Center for Psychology, Xiangya Second Hospital,Central South University.PARTICIPANTS: Healthy elderly retirees above 56 years of age in Luoyang cityor the counties were selected on a voluntary basis with stratified sampling according to the proportion of each region. The selected subjects aged between 56 and 101 years, and 8 age groups were divided at the interval of 5 years(about 200 people in each age group). Totally 1 460 subjects were selected, including 679 male and 781 female subjects.METHODS: With the instruments and manual of GNIT, the subjects were tested for color identification, classification, blank-filling with numbers or graphs, characters and encoding tests. The results were original scores, scale scores and intelligence quotient.MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The norms of GNIT for the elderly above 56 years of age.RESULTS: The norms included three scores, namely the original scores, scale scores and standard deviation scores. To test of reliability and validity of the norms, retest was performed in 40 1 or 2 weeks after the initial test, resulting in the test-retest reliability coefficient ranging from 0.59 to 0. 89, with the total test-retest reliability coefficient of 0.83. The correlation coefficients the original scores between the subtests ranged from 0. 35 to 0. 63, and the correlation coefficients between the standard deviation scores of the verbal intelligence quotient(VIQ), performance intelligence quotient(PIQ) and full intelligence quotient(FIQ) of Wechster intelligence scale for children(WAIC-RC) were 0.43,0.51 and 0.54 respectiyely, based on a study of a sample of 50 elderly subjects.CONCLUSION: Primary regional norms of GNIT for elderly subjects above 56 years of age have been established to measure mainly the perception and reasoning factors loaded with also visual motor psychological factors and abstract summary factors, with satisfactory reliability and validity equivalent to similar tests.
ABSTRACT
Objective: To study the correlation between subjective well- being and stress level of elderly. Method:346 urban elderly (male aged over 60, female aged over 55) were sampled by group. Subjective well - being was indexed by positive factor, negative factor, total score of MUNSH, and total life satisfaction which was the mean of the satisfactions in 6 life domains. Stress level was indicated by somatization, depression, anxiety and hostility of SCL- 90. Stress was distin guished by ” recent” and ” ordinarily” . Results: Bivariate correlation suggested that most indices of subjective well - being correlated to stress, the absolute coefficients were between 0. 1 to 0.6 (p ＜ 0.05), except the ” hostility at ordinary time”to positive factor (p＞0.05) . Multi- variate step- wise regression indicated that subjective well- being correlated negatively to depression first, secondly to anxiety and hostility. Depression could explain 25% total score variance, 36% negative factor, less than 10% positive factor and satisfaction. Anxiety could explain less than 2％ of total score and positive factor variance, hostility had similar powerin explaining satisfaction variance. Conclusion: Subjective well- being correlated negatively with bad mood, especially depression.
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Objective: To compare the results of Gong's Nonverbal Intelligence Test between urban and rural children.Methods: A total of 134 male and 129 fema le rural children of 8～12 years were tested with the Gong's Nonverbal Intellige nce Test. Results: The rural children ob tained significantly l ower scores (P<0.05) on all sub-tests except for Digit Symbol of the test, a s co mpared to urban children matched for age and sex.Conclusion: There was significant difference betwe en rural and urban children in intelligence as assessed by the Gong's Nonverbal Intelligence Test.
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Objective This study was to compare the effects of chronic experimental stress and aging on insulin sensitivity at insulin receptor of liver plasma membranes and its autophosphorylation in the aged mice compared with those in the young and the adult diabetes-susceptible mice. Methods Diabetes-susceptible mice was induced by streptozotocin in 40 1.5-month-old mice (young mice), 40 15-month-old mice (adult mice) and 40 20-month-old mice (aged mice). These mice were randomly divided into the stress groups and control groups, respectively. Each group contained 20 mice. Stress groups were exposed to multiple stressors (restrain, rotation, crowding) for 6 weeks. The levels of fasting blood glucose (FBG) and fasting plasma insulin (FIns) were measured. The index of insulin sensitivity (ISI) was calculated. The numbers (R_~1 , R_~2 , R) and affinity (K_~1 , K_~2 , K) of insulin receptors on liver plasma membranes were investigated by using Scatchard analysis. The numbers of insulin-stimulated (10~-7 mol/L) phosphorylated insulin receptor (PINSR) on liver plasma membranes was assayed by ELISA. Results After 6-week stress, FBG levels were significantly higher with aging 〔young mice: (10.3?6.2)mol/L, adult mice: (15.2?3.6)mol/L, aged mice: (18.9?2.9)mol/L, P
ABSTRACT
Objective:To explore the neuropsychological deficiency in patients with liver cirrhosis.Method:Sixty-nine patients with liver cirrhosis but no history of hepatic encephalopathy were tested with the neuropsychological test battery.Sixty-two normal controls were also tested with the same battery.Result:There was significant influence of age and education on the result of neuropsychological tests.Digit Symbol and Trailmaking test were the best tests discriminating patients and normal controls.When mean?2SD was defined as abonormal,34 8% patients were abnormal in Trailmaking and 14 3% in Digit Symbol.Conclusion:The neuropsychological tests may be a predictive tool for encephalopathy in patients with liver cirrhosis.