Improving the Objective Measurement of Alexithymia Using a Computer-Scored Alexithymia Provoked Response Questionnaire with an Online Sample.

The study and measurement of alexithymia - a trait marked by difficulty identifying and describing feelings - can be improved by incorporating objective measures to supplement self-report scales. The Alexithymia Provoked Response Questionnaire (APRQ) is an observer-rated alexithymia tool that shows promise yet can be time-consuming to administer. The present study aimed to assess the feasibility of computer administration and scoring of the APRQ. Further, the APRQ's association with verbal IQ and emotional vocabulary use was examined, as was the relationship between the APRQ and the self-report Bermond-Vorst Alexithymia Questionnaire-B (BVAQ-B). Adult participants (n = 366), including a proportion gathered through purposive sampling, participated in an online study. Inter-rater reliability measures indicated that computerized scoring of the APRQ is as reliable as human scoring, making the measure scalable for use with large samples. Alexithymia levels were independent of two measures of verbal IQ. Correlational analyses indicated overlap in alexithymia as measured by the APRQ and most of the subscales of the BVAQ-B. The APRQ, as an objective measure, may capture deficits in emotional awareness independent of self-insight.

A Review of Wearable Solutions for Physiological and Emotional Monitoring for Use by People with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Their Caregivers.

The goal of real-time feedback on physiological changes, stress monitoring and even emotion detection is becoming a technological reality. People in their daily life experience varying emotional states, some of which are negative and which can lead to decreased attention, decreased productivity and ultimately, reduced quality of life. Therefore, having a solution that continuously monitors the physiological signals of the person and assesses his or her emotional well-being could be a very valuable tool. This paper aims to review existing physiological and motional monitoring devices, highlight their features and compare their sensing capabilities. Such technology would be particularly useful for certain populations who experience rapidly changing emotional states such as people with autism spectrum disorder and people with intellectual disabilities. Wearable sensing devices present a potential solution that can support and complement existing behavioral interventions. This paper presents a review of existing and emerging products in the market. It reviews the literature on state-of-the-art prototypes and analyzes their usefulness, clinical validity, and discusses clinical perspectives. A small number of products offer reliable physiological internal state monitoring and may be suitable for people with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). It is likely that more promising solutions will be available in the near future. Therefore, caregivers should be careful in their selection of devices that meet the care-receiver's personal needs and have strong research support for reliability and validity.

Whoever shouts the loudest: Listening to parents of children with disabilities.

BACKGROUND: Elevated stress is common among parents of children with disabilities. The parents' perspective and evaluation of services have a significant impact on their well-being and adaptation to their child's disability and is a source of information for service improvements. This study explores parental perceptions of communication and collaboration between parents and health and education staff in the context of an imminent reconfiguration of disability services. METHODS: A qualitative study was conducted using four focus groups with parents (n = 24) of children with disabilities who attend various educational and health services. RESULTS: Thematic analysis revealed five key themes: Us versus them, lack of child/family centeredness, resources, keyworker and uncertain access to a complex system. CONCLUSIONS: Parents want greater collaboration between parents and professionals. They identified a keyworker as a potential solution to the current system that is not child-centred. This would also lessen the burden associated with high levels of advocacy.

Deliberate and Self-Conscious Adaptation of Eye-Contact by Autistic Adults.

Eye gaze is widely recognised as an important element in managing social interactions, receiving information from others and communicating information about ourselves. Atypical eye gaze is one of the characteristic hallmarks of autism. Experimental research has contributed significantly to our knowledge of eye-gaze in autism, however, there is a lack of research exploring how autistic individuals describe and understand the phenomenological experience of eye-gaze and eye-contact. The current study explores the subjective experience of deliberate and self-conscious adaptation of eye-contact by autistic adults. Nine autistic adults were interviewed individually about their experiences of eye-contact. Audio recordings were transcribed, and analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). Themes included gaining awareness of eye contact differences through feedback from others, the interaction of motivation to make eye-contact with a sense of autistic identity, difficulties listening when making eye contact, the importance of familiarity of conversational partners, and strategies to make eye-contact. This study makes an important and novel contribution to understanding the experience of eye-contact differences from the perspective of autistic adults themselves, highlighting the phenomenology of eye-contact as potentially aversive and the social pressure to engage in it, and exploring factors influencing effective eye-contact, with implications for psychological intervention.

Microplastics in the Indian and South Atlantic oceans translocate to gills, digestive glands, and muscle of the chokka squid Loligo reynaudii.

Comparative microplastic (MP) data for cephalopods between oceans is scarce. Our aim was to quantify, characterise, and compare MPs in gills, digestive gland, and mantle of chokka squid from the South Atlantic Ocean (SAO) and Indian Ocean (IO) off the coast of South Africa. South African squid had more MPs compared with other studies (means = 2.0 and 0.4 in SAO and IO squid mantle, respectively). Blue fibres were dominant. Identifiable MPs were polyethylene. Despite IO water having higher MP concentrations than the SAO, SAO squid had higher MP concentrations. Dilution by growth is the likely reason for the lower MP concentrations. Fibres were shorter in SAO than IO squid. However, we could not explain why fibre and mantle lengths from both oceans were positively correlated. Squid may not be the best indicator of marine MPs. The characteristics of MPs in squid can be used to track stocks and migrations.

Eliciting Expressions of Emotion: An Exploratory Analysis of Alexithymia in Adults with Autism Utilising the APRQ.

This study examined alternative methods for detecting alexithymia to the Toronto Alexithymia Scale-20 (TAS-20) by comparing the emotional linguistic performance of ASD and NT samples (n = 32 in each) on the Alexithymia Provoked Responses Questionnaire (APRQ). We utilised both the LIWC and tidytext approaches to linguistic analysis. The results indicate the ASD sample used significantly fewer affective words in response to emotionally stimulating scenarios and had less emotional granularity. Affective word use was correlated with ASD symptomatology but not with TAS-20 scores, suggesting that some elements of alexithymia are not well detected by the TAS-20 alone. The APRQ, in combination with the tidytext package, offers significant potential for sophisticated exploration of emotional expression in ASD.

Interactive network pharmacology and electrochemical analysis reveals electron transport-mediating characteristics of Chinese medicine formula Jing Guan Fang.

Background: Jing Guan Fang (JGF) is an anti-COVID-19 Chinese Medicine decoction comprised of five medicinal herbs to possess anti-inflammatory and antiviral properties for treatment. This study aims to electrochemically decipher the anti-coronavirus activity of JGF and show that microbial fuel cells may serve as a platform for screening efficacious herbal medicines and providing scientific bases for the mechanism of action (MOA) of TCMs. Methods: Electrochemical techniques (e.g., cyclic voltammetry) and MFCs were adopted as the bioenergy-based platforms to assess the bioenergy-stimulating characteristics of JGF. Phytochemical analysis correlated polyphenolic and flavonoid content with antioxidant activity and bioenergy-stimulating properties. Network pharmacology on the active compounds was employed to identify anti-inflammatory and anti-COVID-19 protein targets, and molecular docking validated in silico results. Significant findings: This first-attempt results show that JGF possesses significant reversible bioenergy-stimulation (amplification 2.02 ± 0.04) properties suggesting that its antiviral efficacy is both bioenergy-steered and electron mediated. Major flavonoids and flavone glycosides identified by HPLC (e.g., baicalein and baicalin, respectively) possess electron-shuttling (ES) characteristics that allow herbal medicines to treat COVID-19 via (1) reversible scavenging of ROS to lessen inflammation; (2) inhibition of viral proteins; and (3) targeting of immunomodulatory pathways to stimulate the immune response according to network pharmacology.

Drug Repurposing Using Gene Co-Expression and Module Preservation Analysis in Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS), Systemic Inflammatory Response Syndrome (SIRS), Sepsis, and COVID-19.

SARS-CoV-2 infections are highly correlated with the overexpression of pro-inflammatory cytokines in what is known as a cytokine storm, leading to high fatality rates. Such infections are accompanied by SIRS, ARDS, and sepsis, suggesting a potential link between the three phenotypes. Currently, little is known about the transcriptional similarity between these conditions. Herein, weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) clustering was applied to RNA-seq datasets (GSE147902, GSE66890, GSE74224, GSE177477) to identify modules of highly co-expressed and correlated genes, cross referenced with dataset GSE160163, across the samples. To assess the transcriptome similarities between the conditions, module preservation analysis was performed and functional enrichment was analyzed in DAVID webserver. The hub genes of significantly preserved modules were identified, classified into upregulated or downregulated, and used to screen candidate drugs using Connectivity Map (CMap) to identify repurposed drugs. Results show that several immune pathways (chemokine signaling, NOD-like signaling, and Th1 and Th2 cell differentiation) are conserved across the four diseases. Hub genes screened using intramodular connectivity show significant relevance with the pathogenesis of cytokine storms. Transcriptomic-driven drug repurposing identified seven candidate drugs (SB-202190, eicosatetraenoic-acid, loratadine, TPCA-1, pinocembrin, mepacrine, and CAY-10470) that targeted several immune-related processes. These identified drugs warrant further study into their efficacy for treating cytokine storms, and in vitro and in vivo experiments are recommended to confirm the findings of this study.

Objective and Subjective Measurement of Alexithymia in Adults with Autism.

High rates of alexithymia, a condition characterised by difficulties identifying and describing emotions, are frequently reported in both children and adults with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, the dilemma of measuring alexithymia via self-report has rarely been addressed. In this study, we compared objective and subjective measures of alexithymia in adults with ASD and typically developing adults. We found significantly higher levels of alexithymia in the ASD sample as measured by both self-report on the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and by the observer rated Alexithymia Provoked Response Scale (APRQ). However, the two measures did not correlate with each other. We explore the different facets of the alexithymia construct that these two measures may be distinguishing.

Brief Report: Analysis of Dental Treatment Provided Under General Anaesthesia for Children and Young Adults with Autistic Spectrum Disorder and Identification of Challenges for Dental Services.

Dental treatment provided under general anaesthesia (DGA) is an expectation for many children and young adults (CYA) diagnosed with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Planning and delivery of DGA requires consideration of morbidity and mortality risks and implications for families and healthcare services. One hundred patient records of CYA with special healthcare needs were analysed to examine characteristics and experience of DGA revealing that 79% of CYA had a diagnosis of ASD. Forty-seven percent of CYA diagnosed with ASD had at least one previous hospital admission for DGA. For 24% of this repeat DGA group, the previous DGA was within a two-year period. Results highlight a high rate of DGA and need to investigate more effective primary dental care strategies.

British outpatient norms for the Brief Symptom Inventory.

BACKGROUND: The Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI) is a popular measure of psychopathology frequently used as an outcome measure, but clinicians and researchers have had to rely on normative data based on US samples which may not be appropriate for the British population. OBJECTIVES: The aim was to develop culturally relevant outpatient norms for the BSI that would reflect hypothesized differences between US and UK population in responding to items on the BSI. METHOD: BSI and demographic data were collected for 378 patients referred to clinical psychology services in the Midlands, England, during routine practice. RESULTS: Significantly higher rates of psychopathology were reported by the UK sample than for the normative group reported in the US. CONCLUSION: Outpatient normative data for British participants are presented. The study examines the impact of occupational status, age and gender differences on the level of reported distress.

Judgments of Nonverbal Behaviour by Children with High-Functioning Autism Spectrum Disorder: Can they Detect Signs of Winning and Losing from Brief Video Clips?

Typically developing children are able to judge who is winning or losing from very short clips of video footage of behaviour between active match play across a number of sports. Inferences from "thin slices" (short video clips) allow participants to make complex judgments about the meaning of posture, gesture and body language. This study extends the use of the thin slice research paradigm to children with high-functioning autism spectrum disorder (ASD). We tested 38 children with ASD, in two age groups: 15 participants aged 5-8 years and 23 participants aged 9-13 years. We found that the children with ASD had a rate of accuracy similar to that of typically developing peers tested in a previous study.

Brief Report: Seeing the Man in the Moon: Do Children with Autism Perceive Pareidolic Faces? A Pilot Study.

Faces are one of the most socially significant visual stimuli encountered in the environment, whereas pareidolias are illusions of faces arising from ambiguous stimuli in the environment. Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterised by deficits in response to social stimuli. We found that children with ASD (n = 60) identify significantly fewer pareidolic faces in a sequence of ambiguous stimuli than typically developing peers. The two groups did not differ in the number of objects identified, indicating that the children with ASD had a specific lack of attention to faces. Pareidolia have considerable potential as naturalistic and easy-to-create materials for the investigation of spontaneous attention to social stimuli in children with ASD.

Teaching emotion recognition skills to children with autism.

Autism is associated with difficulty interacting with others and an impaired ability to recognize facial expressions of emotion. Previous teaching programmes have not addressed weak central coherence. Emotion recognition training focused on components of facial expressions. The training was administered in small groups ranging from 4 to 7 children. Improvements were significantly better for the training group (n = 20, mean age 9 years, 3 months) than a waiting list control group (n = 10, mean age 10 years, 7 months). Pre and post measures revealed an effect size of the training of Cohen's d = 1.42. The impact of the training was highly significant. There was evidence of some generalisation of the emotion recognition and improvements at follow-up.

Adenocarcinoma cells exposed in vitro to Navelbine or Taxol increase Ep-CAM expression through a novel mechanism.

Ep-CAM antigen expression was shown to vary by phase across the cell cycle. Following pretreatment of various adenocarcinoma cells in culture with clinically relevant concentrations of vinorelbine tartrate (Navelbine) or paclitaxel (Taxol), cell surface expression of Ep-CAM antigen increased by two- to ten-fold compared to that of untreated control cells and was associated with arrest of cell cycle progression and accumulation of cells in the S and G2/M phases. We demonstrated that increases in cell surface antigen expression resulted in improved biological effectiveness of the targeting antibody as measured in vitro by antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity and in vivo by enhanced antibody targeting to Ep-CAM-expressing xenografts in mice pretreated with Navelbine. No effect on cell cycle progression or Ep-CAM antigen expression was seen with human interferon-alpha and interferon-gamma, agents that increase gene expression of various tumor and normal antigens and may upregulate some antigens. Thus, the upregulation of cell surface Ep-CAM expression following pretreatment with G2/M blockers is through a novel mechanism involving residence time of the antigen on the cell surface. This significant increase in Ep-CAM expression appears to be tumor-specific since we saw no increase in antigen expression on normal epithelial cells. Studies to reveal relative internalization rates suggest that the increase in cell surface expression of Ep-CAM following pretreatment with G2/M blockers is a consequence of an inhibition of normal cycles of antigen endocytosis and expression on the cell surface. The present work provides a mechanism for the improved clinical efficacy of therapeutic antibodies used in combination with traditional cell cycle-specific chemotherapeutic drugs.