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Biomedical subjects

S Morley

Publications and source records attributed to S Morley.

8 recordsLinked to original sources

Paranoia and the defensive attributional style: deluded and depressed patients' attributions about their own attributions.

A data set of Attributional Style Questionnaire responses collected by Kaney & Bentall (1989) from persecutory deluded, normal and depressed subjects was added to a similar data set collected by the first author. The attributions made for hypothetical positive and negative events by the combined pool of subjects were then blind rated for internality by five independent judges. Whereas the internality ratings made by the subjects for their own attributions showed evidence of an exaggerated self-serving bias in the case of the deluded subjects, and an absence of such a bias in the case of the depressed subjects, the independent ratings showed no such group differences. These findings suggest that the differences in internality for positive and negative events observed on the ASQ between deluded, normal and depressed subjects may not reflect differences in the types of causal statements made by these subjects but differences in their attributions about their attributions. The relevance of this observation for attribution theory in general and attributional accounts of psychopathology in particular are discussed.

Adult

Graphical analysis of single-case time series data.

This article outlines the major principles for constructing good graphs and visual displays. Several methods for exploring time series data with graphical techniques are given: these include procedures for summarizing the central tendency of data, plotting linear and non-linear trend, and displaying variability and change in variability over time. We emphasize the need to explore single-case data thoroughly in order to highlight various components. Graphical analysis should be conducted in tandem with statistical analysis.

Data Display

Relationship between radiological classification and the serological and haematological features of untreated pulmonary tuberculosis in Indonesia.

Immunological and metabolic responses were studied in 110 patients with newly diagnosed pulmonary tuberculosis and 32 healthy controls from similar socioeconomic backgrounds. The severity of lung involvement was assessed radiologically, but this was not related to the current features of cell mediated immunity or to those of many aspects of the serological response to Mycobacterium tuberculosis. However, the patients with more extensive pulmonary tuberculosis showed higher titres of IgG2 antibody to whole killed M. tuberculosis and to the ML34 epitope shared by many species of mycobacteria. The patients with more extensive pulmonary tuberculosis showed a more marked metabolic response to infection as manifested by changes in serum levels of acute phase reactant proteins. Accordingly, the metabolic responses are considered to be more likely to prove of value in clinical monitoring of patients for severity of infection, or of reactivation of infection with M. tuberculosis, than immunological responses.

Acute-Phase Proteins

Receptors for neuropeptides are induced by exogenous poly(A)+ RNA in oocytes from Xenopus laevis.

Receptors for the hormones vasopressin, angiotensin II, and thyrotropin-releasing hormone have been studied electrophysiologically in Xenopus laevis oocytes previously injected with poly(A)+ RNA from the respective receptor-containing tissues. The injected oocytes responded to the hormones by demonstrating oscillations in membrane currents as recorded by the voltage-clamp method. The response was dependent on the hormone concentrations and detectable between 5 and 1000 nM concentrations. Size fractionation of poly(A)+ RNA from the respective tissues showed that the mRNAs encoding the three hormone receptors were larger than 18S rRNA, suggesting a length of at least 2 kilobases. When vasopressin was added to the oocyte bath, an inward membrane current was generated in oocytes injected with rat poly(A)+ RNA from liver but not from kidney. This suggests that the V1-type (liver), not the V2-type (kidney), vasopressin receptor can be expressed and electrophysiologically identified in the oocyte. A V1-specific, but not a V2-specific, antagonist suppressed the vasopressin-dependent effect. Application of angiotensin II to liver poly(A)+ RNA-injected oocytes elicited oscillations in membrane current, indicating that these oocytes also expressed receptors for angiotension II; the antagonist [Sar1, O-methionyl-Tyr4]angiotensin II blocked this effect. Poly(A)+ RNA from tumor-derived GH3B6 cells, known to contain receptors for thyrotropin-releasing hormone, injected into oocytes induced receptors responding to thyrotropin-releasing hormone; the drug chlordiazepoxide suppressed the thyrotropin-releasing hormone response.

Action Potentials

Partial reinforcement in human biofeedback learning.

This paper reviews the evidence for the efficacy of partial reinforcement in producing resistance to extinction in human biofeedback experiments. The methodological criteria necessary to demonstrate such effects are discussed, as is the status of the analogy of reinforcement and information feedback. It is suggested that the problem of maintaining responding in the absence of feedback should be tackled empirically rather than assuming the validity of findings from other areas of learning theory.

Biofeedback, Psychology