Integrating Intra- and Interindividual Phenomena in Psychological Theories.

Psychological science is divided into two distinct methodological traditions. One tradition seeks to understand how people function at the individual level, while the other seeks to understand how people differ from each other. Methodologies that have grown out of these traditions typically rely on different sources of data. While both use statistical models to understand the structure of the data, and these models are often similar, Molenaar (2004) showed that results from one type of analysis rarely transfer to the other, unless unrealistic assumptions hold. This raises the question how we may integrate these approaches. In this paper, we argue that formalized theories can be used to connect intra- and interindividual levels of analysis. This connection is indirect, in the sense that the relationship between theory and data is best understood through the intermediate level of phenomena: robust statistical patterns in empirical data. To illustrate this, we introduce a distinction between intra- and interindividual phenomena, and argue that many psychological theories will have implications for both types of phenomena. Formalization provides us with a methodological tool for investigating what kinds of intra- and interindividual phenomena we should expect to find if the theory under consideration were true.

Breakthrough-induced loop formation in evolving transport networks.

Transport networks, such as vasculature or river networks, provide key functions in organisms and the environment. They usually contain loops whose significance for the stability and robustness of the network is well documented. However, the dynamics of their formation is usually not considered. Such structures often grow in response to the gradient of an external field. During evolution, extending branches compete for the available flux of the field, which leads to effective repulsion between them and screening of the shorter ones. Yet, in remarkably diverse processes, from unstable fluid flows to the canal system of jellyfish, loops suddenly form near the breakthrough when the longest branch reaches the boundary of the system. We provide a physical explanation for this universal behavior. Using a 1D model, we explain that the appearance of effective attractive forces results from the field drop inside the leading finger as it approaches the outlet. Furthermore, we numerically study the interactions between two fingers, including screening in the system and its disappearance near the breakthrough. Finally, we perform simulations of the temporal evolution of the fingers to show how revival and attraction to the longest finger leads to dynamic loop formation. We compare the simulations to the experiments and find that the dynamics of the shorter finger are well reproduced. Our results demonstrate that reconnection is a prevalent phenomenon in systems driven by diffusive fluxes, occurring both when the ratio of the mobility inside the growing structure to the mobility outside is low and near the breakthrough.

Any better? A follow-up content analysis of adolescent sexual and reproductive health inclusion in Global Financing Facility country planning documents.

BACKGROUND: The Global Financing Facility (GFF) supports national reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, adolescent health, and nutrition needs. Previous analysis examined how adolescent sexual and reproductive health was represented in GFF national planning documents for 11 GFF partner countries. OBJECTIVES: This paper furthers that analysis for 16 GFF partner countries as part of a Special Series. METHODS: Content analysis was conducted on publicly available GFF planning documents for Afghanistan, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, CAR, Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea, Haiti, Indonesia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Tajikistan, Vietnam. Analysis considered adolescent health content (mindset), indicators (measure) and funding (money) relative to adolescent sexual and reproductive health needs, using a tracer indicator. RESULTS:  Countries with higher rates of adolescent pregnancy had more content relating to adolescent reproductive health, with exceptions in fragile contexts. Investment cases had more adolescent content than project appraisal documents. Content gradually weakened from mindset to measures to money. Related conditions, such as fistula, abortion, and mental health, were insufficiently addressed. Documents from Burkina Faso and Malawi demonstrated it is possible to include adolescent programming even within a context of shifting or selective priorities. CONCLUSION: Tracing prioritisation and translation of commitments into plans provides a foundation for discussing global funding for adolescents. We highlight positive aspects of programming and areas for strengthening and suggest broadening the perspective of adolescent health beyond the reproductive health to encompass issues, such as mental health. This paper forms part of a growing body of accountability literature, supporting advocacy work for adolescent programming and funding.

Main findings: Adolescent health content is inconsistently included in the Global Financing Facility country documents, and despite strong or positive examples, the content is stronger in investment cases than project appraisal documents, and diminishes when comparing content, indicators and financing.Added knowledge: Although adolescent health content is generally strongest in countries with the highest proportion of births before age 18, there are exceptions in fragile contexts and gaps in addressing important issues related to adolescent health.Global health impact for policy and action: Adolescent health programming supported by the Global Financing Facility should build on examples of strong country plans, be more consistent in addressing adolescent health, and be accompanied by public transparency to facilitate accountability work such as this.

The joint effects of local, climatic, and spatial variables determine soil oribatid mite community assembly along a temperate forest elevational gradient.

Numerous factors influence mountain biodiversity variation across elevational gradients and recognizing the relative importance is vital for understanding species distribution mechanisms. We examined oribatid mites at nine elevations (from 600 to 2200 m a.s.l) and four vegetation types from mixed coniferous and broad-leaved forests to alpine tundra on Changbai Mountain. We assessed the contribution of environmental factors (climatic and local factors) and spatial processes (geographic or elevation distances) to oribatid mite community assembly and identified 59 oribatid mite species from 38 families and 51 genera. With increasing elevation, species richness and the Shannon index declined significantly, whereas abundance followed a hump-shaped trend. Soil TP, NH4 +-N, MAT, MAP, and elevation were the critical variables shaping oribatid mite communities based on random forest analysis. Moreover, environmental and spatial factors, and oribatid mite communities were significantly correlated based on Mantel and partial Mantel tests. Local characteristics (3.9%), climatic factors (1.9%), and spatial filtering (8.8%) played crucial roles in determining oribatid mite communities across nine elevational bands (based on variation partitioning analyses of abundance data). Within the same vegetation types, spatial processes had relatively little effects, with local characteristics the dominant drivers of oribatid mite community variation. Environmental and spatial filters together shape oribatid mite community assembly and their relative roles varied with elevation and vegetation type. These findings are crucial for the conservation, restoration, and management of Changbai mountain ecosystems in the context of climate change, along with the prediction of future vertical biotic gradient pattern evolution.

Chickpea aquafaba: a systematic review of the different processes for obtaining and their nutritional and technological characteristics.

Aquafaba is the residual water from cooking chickpea in water. It has a high gelling ability, allowing it to create stable gels. However, those functional properties depend on the legume composition, genotype, cooking time, pressure, and temperature. This study aimed to evaluate the different processes for obtaining aquafaba and compare their nutritional composition and technological characteristics using a systematic review. The authors performed the systematic review by performing specific search strategies for Scopus, Web of Science, Pubmed, Lilacs, Google Scholar, and ProQuest. A total of 17 studies were analyzed. Of them, 17.64% (n = 3) used the wastewater from canned chickpeas, 17.64% (n = 3) compared the wastewater of canned chickpeas and dry grains, and 58.82% (n = 10) used dry chickpeas. Studies used different methods to analyze the protein content. The most used (n = 5) was the Association of Official Analytical Chemists (AOAC). The aquafaba presented carbohydrates at 2.03-2.59 g/100ml; protein at 0.0.8-2.8 g/100ml; and fat at 0.07-0.1 g/100ml. In general, preparing aquafaba followed: soaking (8-10 h at 4 °C-1 chickpea: 4 water), pressure cooking (30 min-2 chickpea: 3 water), and refrigerating (24h/4 °C). In general, the results showed the following steps to prepare aquafaba: soaking for 8-10 h at 4 °C at the proportion of 1:4 (chickpea:water), pressure cooking for 30 min in the proportion of 2:3 (chickpea: water), and refrigerating 24 h/4 °C. These procedures in a homemade aquafaba presented the best results, considering foam development and higher stability. The aquafaba from canned chickpeas has a higher foam-ability and lower emulsion properties than homemade cooking aquafaba. Supplementary Information: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13197-023-05920-y.

Microbially Driven Iron Cycling Facilitates Organic Carbon Accrual in Decadal Biochar-Amended Soil.

Soil organic carbon (SOC) is pivotal for both agricultural activities and climate change mitigation, and biochar stands as a promising tool for bolstering SOC and curtailing soil carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. However, the involvement of biochar in SOC dynamics and the underlying interactions among biochar, soil microbes, iron minerals, and fresh organic matter (FOM, such as plant debris) remain largely unknown, especially in agricultural soils after long-term biochar amendment. We therefore introduced FOM to soils with and without a decade-long history of biochar amendment, performed soil microcosm incubations, and evaluated carbon and iron dynamics as well as microbial properties. Biochar amendment resulted in 2-fold SOC accrual over a decade and attenuated FOM-induced CO2 emissions by approximately 11% during a 56-day incubation through diverse pathways. Notably, biochar facilitated microbially driven iron reduction and subsequent Fenton-like reactions, potentially having enhanced microbial extracellular electron transfer and the carbon use efficiency in the long run. Throughout iron cycling processes, physical protection by minerals could contribute to both microbial carbon accumulation and plant debris preservation, alongside direct adsorption and occlusion of SOC by biochar particles. Furthermore, soil slurry experiments, with sterilization and ferrous iron stimulation controls, confirmed the role of microbes in hydroxyl radical generation and biotic carbon sequestration in biochar-amended soils. Overall, our study sheds light on the intricate biotic and abiotic mechanisms governing carbon dynamics in long-term biochar-amended upland soils.

Unraveling the mesoscale organization induced by network-driven processes.

Complex systems are characterized by emergent patterns created by the nontrivial interplay between dynamical processes and the networks of interactions on which these processes unfold. Topological or dynamical descriptors alone are not enough to fully embrace this interplay in all its complexity, and many times one has to resort to dynamics-specific approaches that limit a comprehension of general principles. To address this challenge, we employ a metric-that we name Jacobian distance-which captures the spatiotemporal spreading of perturbations, enabling us to uncover the latent geometry inherent in network-driven processes. We compute the Jacobian distance for a broad set of nonlinear dynamical models on synthetic and real-world networks of high interest for applications from biological to ecological and social contexts. We show, analytically and computationally, that the process-driven latent geometry of a complex network is sensitive to both the specific features of the dynamics and the topological properties of the network. This translates into potential mismatches between the functional and the topological mesoscale organization, which we explain by means of the spectrum of the Jacobian matrix. Finally, we demonstrate that the Jacobian distance offers a clear advantage with respect to traditional methods when studying human brain networks. In particular, we show that it outperforms classical network communication models in explaining functional communities from structural data, therefore highlighting its potential in linking structure and function in the brain.

A soluble model for synchronized rhythmic activity in ant colonies.

Synchronization is one of the most striking instances of collective behavior, occurring in many natural phenomena. For example, in some ant species, ants are inactive within the nest most of the time, but their bursts of activity are highly synchronized and involve the entire nest population. Here we revisit a simulation model that generates this synchronized rhythmic activity through autocatalytic behavior, i.e., active ants can activate inactive ants, followed by a period of rest. We derive a set of delay differential equations that provide an accurate description of the simulations for large ant colonies. Analysis of the fixed-point solutions, complemented by numerical integration of the equations, indicates the existence of stable limit-cycle solutions when the rest period is greater than a threshold and the event of spontaneous activation of inactive ants is very unlikely, so that most of the arousal of ants is done by active ants. Furthermore, we argue that the persistent oscillations observed in the simulations for colonies of finite size are due to resonant amplification of demographic noise.

Glycerol-slaved 1H-1H NMR cross-relaxation in quasi-native lysozyme.

1H-1H nuclear cross-relaxation experiments have been carried out with lysozyme in variable glycerol viscosity to study intramolecular motion, self-diffusion, and isotropic rigid-body rotational tumbling at 298 K, pH 3.8. Dynamics of intramolecular 1H-1H cross-relaxation rates, the increase in internuclear spatial distances, and lateral and rotational diffusion coefficients all show fractional viscosity dependence with a power law exponent κ in the 0.17-0.83 range. The diffusion coefficient of glycerol Ds with the bulk viscosity itself is non-Stokesian, having a fractional viscosity dependence on the medium viscosity (Ds âˆ¼ Î·-κ, κ ≈ 0.71). The concurrence and close similarity of the fractional viscosity dependence of glycerol diffusion on the one hand, and diffusion and intramolecular cross-relaxation rates of the protein on the other lead to infer that relaxation of glycerol slaves protein relaxations. Glycerol-transformed native lysozyme to a quasi-native state does not affect the conclusion that both global and internal fluctuations are slaved to glycerol relaxation.

Development of a group-based behaviour change intervention for people with severe obesity informed by the social identity approach to health.

INTRODUCTION: Interventions to support behaviour change in people living with chronic health conditions increasingly use patient groups as the mode of delivery, but these are often designed without consideration of the group processes that can shape intervention outcomes. This article outlines a new approach to designing group-based behaviour change interventions that prioritizes recipients' shared social identity as group members in facilitating the adoption of established behaviour change techniques (BCTs). The approach is illustrated through an example drawn from research focused on people living with severe obesity. METHODS: A prioritization process was undertaken in collaboration with stakeholders, including behaviour change experts, clinicians, and a former patient to develop an evidence-based, group intervention informed by the social identity approach to health. Three phases of development are reported: (1) identification of the health problem; (2) delineation of intervention mechanisms and operationalization of BCTs for group delivery and (3) intervention manualization. The fourth phase, intervention testing and optimization, is reported elsewhere. RESULTS: A group-based behaviour change intervention was developed, consisting of 12 group sessions and 3 one-to-one consultations. The intervention aimed to support the development of shared social identity among recipients, alongside the delivery of evidence-based BCTs, to improve the likelihood of successful intervention and health outcomes among people living with severe obesity. CONCLUSIONS: A manualized intervention, informed by the social identity approach to health, was systematically designed with input from stakeholders. The development approach employed can inform the design of behavioural interventions in other health contexts where group-based delivery is planned.

FeCo@hydrochar nanocomposites as efficient peroxymonosulfate activator for organic pollutant degradation.

Sulfate radical-based advanced oxidation processes (SR-AOPs) are renowned for their exceptional capacity to degrade refractory organic pollutants due to their wide applicability, cost-effectiveness, and swift mineralization and oxidation rates. The primary sources of radicals in AOPs are persulfate (PS) and peroxymonosulfate (PMS) ions, sparking significant interest in their mechanistic and catalytic aspects. To develop a novel nanocatalyst for SR-AOPs, particularly for PMS activation, we synthesized carbon-coated FeCo nanoparticles (NPs) using solvothermal methods based on the polyol approach. Various synthesis conditions were investigated, and the NPs were thoroughly characterized regarding their structure, morphology, magnetic properties, and catalytic efficiency. The FeCo phase was primarily obtained at [OH-] / [Metal] = 26 and [Fe] / [Co] = 2 ratios. Moreover, as the [Fe]/[Co] ratio increased, the degree of xylose carbonization to form a carbon coating (hydrochar) on the NPs also increased. The NPs exhibited a spherical morphology with agglomerates of varying sizes. Vibrating-sample magnetometer analysis (VSM) indicated that a higher proportion of iron resulted in NPs with higher saturation magnetization (up to 167.8 emu g-1), attributed to a larger proportion of FeCo bcc phase in the nanocomposite. The best catalytic conditions for degrading 100 ppm Rhodamine B (RhB) included 0.05 g L-1 of NPs, 2 mM PMS, pH 7.0, and a 20-min reaction at 25 °C. Notably, singlet oxygen was the predominant specie formed in the experiments in the SR-AOP, followed by sulfate and hydroxyl radicals. The catalyst could be reused for up to five cycles, retaining over 98% RhB degradation, albeit with increased metal leaching. Even in the first use, dissolved Fe and Co concentrations were 0.8 ± 0.3 and 4.0 ± 0.5 mg L-1, respectively. The FeCo catalyst proved to be effective in dye degradation and offers the potential for further refinement to minimize Co2+ leaching.

Slope protection effect of typical vegetation in the Three Gorges reservoir area under extreme rainfall.

In recent years, vegetation plays a key role in landslide stability under extreme rainfall in the Three Gorges Reservoir area, so it is very important to identify the mechanism of vegetation slope protection. This study takes wildcat landslide in Three Gorges Reservoir area as the research object, using indoor landslide model test and building monitoring systems such as stress field, displacement field, and soil erosion, to illustrate the protective effect of typical vegetation. Furthermore, Bermuda cover effectively reduces pore water pressure, pore soil pressure, displacement, and turbidity. In particular, the three stages of interception and buffering of rainfall by stems and leaves, infiltration and absorption of rainfall by the root system, and the reinforcement of the slope against sliding forces by the root system have been divided. Moreover, these findings offer valuable preliminary insights for guiding landslide mitigation strategies in the Three Gorges Reservoir area.

A Diffusion-Based Approach for Simulating Forward-in-Time State-Dependent Speciation and Extinction Dynamics.

We establish a general framework using a diffusion approximation to simulate forward-in-time state counts or frequencies for cladogenetic state-dependent speciation-extinction (ClaSSE) models. We apply the framework to various two- and three-region geographic-state speciation-extinction (GeoSSE) models. We show that the species range state dynamics simulated under tree-based and diffusion-based processes are comparable. We derive a method to infer rate parameters that are compatible with given observed stationary state frequencies and obtain an analytical result to compute stationary state frequencies for a given set of rate parameters. We also describe a procedure to find the time to reach the stationary frequencies of a ClaSSE model using our diffusion-based approach, which we demonstrate using a worked example for a two-region GeoSSE model. Finally, we discuss how the diffusion framework can be applied to formalize relationships between evolutionary patterns and processes under state-dependent diversification scenarios.

Explicit and implicit cognitive processes of the public towards people who stutter.

PURPOSE: The Public Opinion Survey of Human Attributes - Stuttering (POSHA-S, St. Louis, 2013) was developed as a standard measure of public attitudes about people who stutter. As with any survey-based methods, threats to validity may occur because of social desirability bias. Using computer mouse-tracking, we were interested in observing changes in cognition that are manifested in intentionality through action by evaluating underlying cognitive processes that drive social judgments of people who stutter. METHODS: Twenty-two women, 1 non-binary person, and 47 men reported using a computer mouse to complete an online, remote, and modified version of the POSHA-S. Responses were categorized as correct/helpful or incorrect/unhelpful relative to each component of the POSHA-S and were used as measures of explicit cognitive processes. Computer-mouse trajectory metrics, including area under the curve (AUC) and reaction time (RT), were used to measure implicit cognitive processes. RESULTS: Although participants' explicit responses were significantly more likely to be correct/helpful than incorrect/unhelpful, with endorsement of correct/helpful prompts 77 % of the time, participants also endorsed incorrect/unhelpful prompts more than half (i.e., 52 %) of the time. Familiarity with people who stutter was associated with disagreeing with incorrect/unhelpful prompts. As indicated by greater AUC, participants exhibited significantly more implicit cognitive processes indicating competition when responding "disagree" compared to "agree", regardless of whether the prompts were correct/helpful or incorrect/unhelpful. Similarly, participants took significantly longer to respond to prompts with "disagree" rather than "agree". CONCLUSION: The findings of this study offer evidence of participants reporting cognitive processes that are overall more correct/helpful than incorrect/unhelpful, in their explicit responses to the dichotomous response tasks of the POSHA-S. However, these findings are tempered by evidence of a tendency to agree with statements in the measure and suggest the need for further research to increase understanding of how to measure and improve explicit and implicit cognitive processes related to people who stutter.

Neural correlates of motor imagery and execution in real-world dynamic behavior: evidence for similarities and differences.

A large body of evidence shows that motor imagery and action execution behaviors result from overlapping neural substrates, even in the absence of overt movement during motor imagery. To date it is unclear how neural activations in motor imagery and execution compare for naturalistic whole-body movements, such as walking. Neuroimaging studies have not directly compared imagery and execution during dynamic walking movements. Here we recorded brain activation with mobile EEG during walking compared to during imagery of walking, with mental counting as a control condition. We asked 24 healthy participants to either walk six steps on a path, imagine taking six steps, or mentally count from one to six. We found beta and alpha power modulation during motor imagery resembling action execution patterns; a correspondence not found performing the control task of mental counting. Neural overlap occurred early in the execution and imagery walking actions, suggesting activation of shared action representations. Remarkably, a distinctive walking-related beta rebound occurred both during action execution and imagery at the end of the action suggesting that, like actual walking, motor imagery involves resetting or inhibition of motor processes. However, we also found that motor imagery elicits a distinct pattern of more distributed beta activity, especially at the beginning of the task. These results indicate that motor imagery and execution of naturalistic walking involve shared motor-cognitive activations, but that motor imagery requires additional cortical resources.

Changes in groundwater and surface water bacterial communities under disinfection processes: Chlorination, ozonization, photo-fenton and ultraviolet radiation.

Pathogenic bacteria, introduced in water sources through faecal contamination, have traditionally been investigated as individual species, leading to the establishment of microbial, sanitary, and environmental quality indicators. Recent advancements in our understanding of the microbiome and its intricate interactions within the human-microbiome-environment network advocate for a broader evaluation of the impact of disinfection on the entire microbial community. In this study, we conducted a comprehensive screening experiment involving four disinfection processes; ozone, ultraviolet radiation with wavelengths between 200 - 280 nm (UV-C), photo-Fenton, and chlorination, applied to two distinct water sources; surface (SW) and groundwater (GW). The cells that remained viable after treatment were recovered using Brain Heart Infusion (BHI) broth, and 16S rRNA gene sequencing was used for their identification. Our findings confirmed the presence of faecal contamination in the water sources and revealed distinct effects of each treatment on the recovered bacterial populations. The chlorination of groundwater samples likely had a greater impact on bacteria in a vegetative state than on spores. Consequently, this led to a higher abundance in the BHI cultures of sporulating bacteria such as Bacillus (increasing from 0.36 to 93.62 %), while ozonation led to an elevated recovery of Pseudomonas (increasing from 45.2 to 69.9 %). Conversely, in surface water, calcium hypochlorite and ozone treatments favored the selection of Staphylococcus and Bacillus, whose relative abundance in the cultures increased from 0 to 39.22 % and from 0.35 to 96.6 %, respectively. In groundwater, Pseudomonas was resistant to UV-C radiation and their relative abundance increased from 45.2 % to 93.56 %, while photo-Fenton was effective against this bacterial group decreasing its relative abundance to 0.46 %. However, other genera such as Bacteroides, Aeromonas, and Citrobacter seemed to be less injured by this disinfection process. BHI broth was successful in recovering various bacterial groups that exhibited resistance to sublethal water disinfection.

Current status of advancement in remediation technologies for the toxic metal mercury in the environment: A critical review.

Currently, pollution due to heavy metals, in particular dissolved mercury, is a major concern for society and the environment. This work aims to evaluate the current scenario regarding the removal/elimination of mercury. Mercury removal through adsorption is mainly done through artificial resins and metallic-organic frameworks. In the case of the zinc organic framework, it was able to adsorb Hg2+, reaching an adsorption capacity of 802 mg g-1. As for the Hg(0) the coconut husk was found to have the lowest equilibrium time, 30 min, and the highest adsorption capacity of 956.2 mg g-1. Experimental reports and molecular simulation indicate that the adsorption of mercury and other chemical forms occurs due to electrostatic interactions, ion exchange, precipitation, complexation, chelation, and covalent bonds, according to the material nature. The reported thermodynamic results show that, in most cases, the mercury adsorption has an endothermic nature with enthalpy levels below 40 kJ mol-1. Thermal and chemical regeneration methods lead to a similar number of 5 cycles for different materials. The presence of other ions, in particular cadmium, lead, and copper, generates an antagonistic effect for mercury adsorption. Regarding the other current technologies, it was found that mercury removal is feasible through precipitation, phytoremediation, and marine microalgae; all these methods require constant chemicals or a slow rate of removal according to the conditions. Advanced oxidative processes have noteworthy removal of Hg(0); however, Fenton processes lead to mineralization, which leads to Fe2+ and Fe3+ in solution; sonochemical processes are impossible to scale up at the current technology level; and electrochemical processes consume more energy and require constant changes of the anode and cathode. Overall, it is possible to conclude that the adsorption process remains a more friendly, economical, and greener process in comparison with other processes.

Cortico-striatal white-matter connectivity underlies the ability to exert goal-directed control.

The balance between goal-directed and habitual control has been proposed to determine the flexibility of instrumental behaviour, in both humans and animals. This view is supported by neuroscientific studies that have implicated dissociable neural pathways in the ability to flexibly adjust behaviour when outcome values change. A previous Diffusion Tensor Imaging study provided preliminary evidence that flexible instrumental performance depends on the strength of parallel cortico-striatal white-matter pathways previously implicated in goal-directed and habitual control. Specifically, estimated white-matter strength between caudate and ventromedial prefrontal cortex correlated positively with behavioural flexibility, and posterior putamen-premotor cortex connectivity correlated negatively, in line with the notion that these pathways compete for control. However, the sample size of the original study was limited, and so far, there have been no attempts to replicate these findings. In the present study, we aimed to conceptually replicate these findings by testing a large sample of 205 young adults to relate cortico-striatal connectivity to performance on the slips-of-action task. In short, we found only positive neural correlates of goal-directed performance, including striatal connectivity (caudate and anterior putamen) with the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. However, we failed to provide converging evidence for the existence of a neural habit system that puts limits on the capacity for flexible, goal-directed action. We discuss the implications of our findings for dual-process theories of instrumental action.

ADOLESCENT ORAL OXYCODONE SELF-ADMINISTRATION DISRUPTS NEUROBEHAVIORAL AND NEUROCOGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT.

Nonmedical use of prescription opioids peaks during late adolescence, a developmental period associated with the maturation of higher-order cognitive processes. To date, however, how chronic adolescent oxycodone (OXY) self-administration alters neurobehavioral (i.e., locomotion, startle reactivity) and/or neurocognitive (i.e., preattentive processes, intrasession habituation, stimulus-reinforcement learning, sustained attention) function has not yet been systematically evaluated. Hence, the rationale was built for establishing the dose-dependency of adolescent OXY self-administration on the trajectory of neurobehavioral and neurocognitive development. From postnatal day (PD) 35 to PD 105, an age in rats that corresponds to the adolescent and young adult period in humans, male and female F344/N rats received access to either oral OXY (0, 2, 5, or 10 mg/kg) or water under a two-bottle choice experimental paradigm. Independent of biological sex or dose, rodents voluntarily escalated their OXY intake across ten weeks. A longitudinal experimental design revealed prominent OXY-induced impairments in neurobehavioral development, characterized by dose-dependent increases in locomotion and sex-dependent increases in startle response. Systematic manipulation of the interstimulus interval in prepulse inhibition supports an OXY-induced impairment in preattentive processes. Despite the long-term cessation of OXY intake, rodents with a history of chronic adolescent oral OXY self-administration exhibited deficits in sustained attention; albeit no alterations in stimulus-reinforcement learning were observed. Taken together, adolescent oral OXY self-administration induces selective long-term alterations in neurobehavioral and neurocognitive development enjoining the implementation of safer prescribing guidelines for this population.