Vocational identity and psychological adjustment: a study in French adolescents and emerging adults.

The aim of the present research was to study vocational identity in French adolescent and emerging adult students by using a French adaptation of the Vocational Identity Status Assessment (VISA), and to analyze the links between vocational identity formation and negative and positive psychological adjustment. Participants were 1077 French students who completed self-report scales about vocational identity, depression and satisfaction with life. The French version of the VISA showed good psychometric properties and six identity statuses were derived by means of cluster analysis: achievement, foreclosure, moratorium, searching moratorium, diffused diffusion and carefree diffusion. The main findings show that diffused diffusion and moratorium represent the dark sides of identity because of their negative psychological adjustment, and that the two processes of reconsideration of commitment were differently associated with psychological adjustment. These findings demonstrate that clinical interventions should be adapted to the individual's identity profile.

Cross-platform evaluation of commercial real-time SYBR green RT-PCR kits for sensitive and rapid detection of European bat Lyssavirus type 1.

This study evaluates the performance of five two-step SYBR Green RT-qPCR kits and five one-step SYBR Green qRT-PCR kits using real-time PCR assays. Two real-time thermocyclers showing different throughput capacities were used. The analysed performance evaluation criteria included the generation of standard curve, reaction efficiency, analytical sensitivity, intra- and interassay repeatability as well as the costs and the practicability of kits, and thermocycling times. We found that the optimised one-step PCR assays had a higher detection sensitivity than the optimised two-step assays regardless of the machine used, while no difference was detected in reaction efficiency, R (2) values, and intra- and interreproducibility between the two methods. The limit of detection at the 95% confidence level varied between 15 to 981 copies/µL and 41 to 171 for one-step kits and two-step kits, respectively. Of the ten kits tested, the most efficient kit was the Quantitect SYBR Green qRT-PCR with a limit of detection at 95% of confidence of 20 and 22 copies/µL on the thermocyclers Rotor gene Q MDx and MX3005P, respectively. The study demonstrated the pivotal influence of the thermocycler on PCR performance for the detection of rabies RNA, as well as that of the master mixes.