"A Daily Born and Dying": Dynamics of Affective-Semiotic Self-Regulation Involved in Early Intervention Practices with Children with Congenital Zika Virus Syndrome.

From 2015 to 2016, an epidemic of births of children with Congenital Zika Virus Syndrome emerged in Brazil, and the state of Bahia concentrated the highest incidence of cases. The official health guidelines recommended that the affected children and their families should be supported by interdisciplinary teams of early intervention. This paper aims to deepen the comprehension of regulation and affective-semiotic mediation processes involved in the early intervention with children with Congenital Zika Virus Syndrome and their families. It focus on the experiences of a professional interviewed in a public health service in Salvador, Bahia - Brazil, through narrative analysis and the theoretical-methodological foundations of Cultural Psychology of the Semiotic Dynamics. These approaches allowed the understanding of the processes of construction of meanings, symbolic action and affective-semiotic regulation. The care of Congenital Zika Virus Syndrome children by professionals relates to disquieting experiences, inter subjectivity, meaning construction, affections and symbolic actions. These dynamic processes allowed the professional to better adapt to regulation and affective-semiotic mediation, as well as her own performance in face of children and their families. This analysis emphasizes the reflections of health care practices and their repercussions in the quality of the assistance.

Care Practices Between Generations: Ambivalence and Meaning-making Process.

Relationships of exchange and mutual help between family generations are the main factor of survival at older ages, especially in developing countries. However, the demand for care for older parents is primarily attributed to daughters. In addition to the emergence of intergenerational solidarity to carry out this care task, the fulfillment of this personal-collective expectation of care is permeated by many tensions, conflicts, and ambivalences. Thus, we propose to discuss the ambivalence in care practices and the constructions of meaning related to this field, focusing on daughters who assumed the role of caregivers for their older parents. To understand how women deal with this complex situation of multiple demands, two narrative interviews will be analyzed in the light of the theoretical perspective of Semiotic Cultural Psychology. To guide and structure the data analysis, the Trajectory Equifinality Model (TEM) was used, taking the decision to care for older parents as the point of equifinality of the trajectories. The synthesized personal orientation by the daughters towards caring for their parents was characterized by a pendulum movement of dialogical oscillation between traditional and postmodern values, leading to qualitative intergenerational transformations.

Transição para a maternidade na trajetória acadêmica: estratégias de reparação dinâmica do self e de resistência no campo social de jovens universitárias / Transition to motherhood in the academic trajectory: strategies of dynamic self-repair and resistance in the social field of young university students

O presente estudo pretende analisar as estratégias de reparação dinâmica do self e de resistência no campo social construídas por jovens universitárias que inesperadamente engravidaram durante suas trajetórias acadêmicas. A partir da perspectiva da Psicologia Cultural Semiótica, será apresentado um estudo de caso construído por entrevista narrativa. A análise do caso revela que a gravidez não planejada foi experienciada pela jovem entrevistada como um evento disruptivo que, junto a um restrito apoio social e institucional, implicou em significativos desafios para conciliar distintas demandas, colocando em risco a sua saúde mental. Nesse cenário de complexas demandas desenvolvimentais, intensos deverão ser os esforços com o intuito de reparação dinâmica do self e de resistência para a permanência na universidade.

This study aims to analyze the strategies of dynamic self-repair and resistance in the social field built by young university students who unexpectedly became pregnant during their academic formation. From the perspective of Semiotic Cultural Psychology, a case study built in a narrative interview situation will be presented. The case analysis reveals that the unplanned pregnancy was experienced by the young woman as a disruptive event, which, together with a restricted social and institutional support, resulted in significant challenges to reconcile different demands, putting her mental health at risk. In this scenario of complex developmental demands, intense efforts should be made with the purpose of dynamic self-repair and resistance to remain in the university.

Disquieting Experiences of Ruptures in the Life Trajectory: Challenges to Dynamic Self-Repair.

This paper aims to deepen the understanding on how people face experiences of significant ruptures in their life trajectories, in articulation with and in the light of the notion of disquieting experience. Since the semiotic-cultural constructivist perspective in psychology, the empirical corpus that will be taken for analysis, based on this circumstantial nature experience, refers to women's narratives whose life trajectories were marked by repeated gestational losses. The experience of a gestational loss can be perceived and felt by a woman as an unexpected event, which challenges personal and socio-cultural expectations of what was about to happen - becoming a mother and the birth of a baby. Gaps established between the imagined expectations and perceived reality, produce a non-sense field, experienced by the person as disquieting. In order to reduce the experienced psychological tension and integrate non-sense field in cognitive-affective base pre-existing, new symbolic actions are required to subject in the construction of reorganizers meanings from personal experience - what we denominate semiotic strategies of dynamic self-repair. With this, this paper aimed to shed light on the dynamic and complex aspects of human life related to the psychological processes involved in self repair, due to disruptive events.

Neurostimulation Combined With Cognitive Intervention in Alzheimer's Disease (NeuroAD): Study Protocol of Double-Blind, Randomized, Factorial Clinical Trial.

Despite advances in the treatment of Alzheimer's disease (AD), there is currently no prospect of a cure, and evidence shows that multifactorial interventions can benefit patients. A promising therapeutic alternative is the use of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) simultaneously with cognitive intervention. The combination of these non-pharmacological techniques is apparently a safe and accessible approach. This study protocol aims to compare the efficacy of tDCS and cognitive intervention in a double-blind, randomized and factorial clinical trial. One hundred participants diagnosed with mild-stage AD will be randomized to receive both tDCS and cognitive intervention, tDCS, cognitive intervention, or placebo. The treatment will last 8 weeks, with a 12-month follow-up. The primary outcome will be the improvement of global cognitive functions, evaluated by the AD Assessment Scale, cognitive subscale (ADAS-Cog). The secondary outcomes will include measures of functional, affective, and behavioral components, as well as a neurophysiological marker (Brain-derived neurotrophic factor, BDNF). This study will enable us to assess, both in the short and long term, whether tDCS is more effective than the placebo and to examine the effects of combined therapy (tDCS and cognitive intervention) and isolated treatments (tDCS vs. cognitive intervention) on patients with AD. Clinical Trial Registration: www.ClinicalTrials.gov, identifier NCT02772185-May 5, 2016.