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PubMed1988

Cultural patterns and causal processes in adolescent drug use: the case of Greeks versus Americans.

Patterns of adolescent drug use in Greece (N = 174) and the United States (N = 2,610) are compared. The rates of self-reported lifetime alcohol and cigarette use are rather similar. For other drugs (marijuana, amphetamines, depressants, cocaine, LSD, PCP, and heroin) there is much more drug use in the United States. A causal model employing variables from social control and social learning theories is applied to drug use in both samples. We conclude that American theories of adolescent deviance assume certain cultural conditions, and therefore may need revision before they can be fruitfully applied to the behavior of young people in other cultures.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

Cardiac abnormalities and nonimmune hydrops fetalis: a coincidental, not causal, relationship.

Few conditions associated with nonimmune hydrops fetalis have had a demonstrable causal relationship. Congenital heart disease is often said to be a cause of nonimmune hydrops fetalis and antenatal closure of the foramen ovale is the cardiac abnormality most frequently reported in association with hydrops. In order to examine the role of congenital heart disease in hydrops, and, in particular, that of antenatal closure of the foramen ovale, we reviewed all autopsy cases with hydrops fetalis over an 11 year period and compared cardiac anomalies with those of nonhydropic controls. The incidence of various congenital heart malformations was not significantly different among these groups, suggesting that factors in addition to cardiac anomalies must be considered in the pathogenesis of nonimmune hydrops fetalis.

Abnormalities, Multiple↗
PubMed2006

Acute experimental mastitis is not causal toward the development of energy-related metabolic disorders in early postpartum dairy cows.

Twenty Holstein cows in early lactation (7 d in milk) were administered 100 microg of Escherichia coli lipopolysaccharide (LPS) dissolved in 10 mL of sterile 0.9% NaCl saline (treatment; TRT) or 10 mL of sterile saline (control) into both right mammary quarters to test the hypothesis that acute experimental mastitis would have negative impacts on aspects of energy metabolism that might lead to the development of metabolic disorders. A primed continuous intravenous infusion (14-micromol/kg of BW priming dose; 11.5-micromol/kg of BW per h continuous infusion) of 6,6-dideuterated glucose was used to determine pre- and posttreatment glucose kinetics using steady-state tracer methodologies. The LPS-treated cows displayed productive, clinical, and physiological signs of moderate to severe inflammation; control cows displayed no signs of immune activation. Pretreatment glucose rates of appearance (Ra) into plasma were similar (715 and 662 +/- 33 mmol/h for TRT and control, respectively) between treatment groups. Intramammary LPS infusion into TRT cows resulted in increased glucose Ra relative to control cows (mean glucose Ra from 150 through 270 min after intramammary infusion were 815 and 674 +/- 21 mmol/h for TRT and control cows, respectively). Furthermore, plasma concentrations of glucose increased, whereas plasma nonesterified fatty acids, glycerol, and beta-hydroxybutyrate concentrations decreased, in TRT relative to control cows. Interestingly, plasma insulin concentration increased dramatically in TRT cows and occurred prior to the small increase in plasma glucose concentration. Although these results only represent the early stages of inflammation, they are not consistent with a causal relationship between mastitis and energy-related metabolic disorders and instead suggest a coordinated protective effect by the immune system on metabolism during the early stages of mammary insult.

3-Hydroxybutyric Acid↗
PubMed2004

Subacute spinal subdural hematoma after spontaneous resolution of cranial subdural hematoma: causal relationship or coincidence? Case report.

The etiopathogenesis of traumatic spinal subdural hematoma (SSH) is uncertain. Unlike the supratentorial subdural space, no bridging veins traverse the spinal subdural space. The authors describe a case of subacute SSH that occurred after spontaneous resolution of traumatic intracranial SDH and suggest a causal relationship between the two. A 23-year-old woman suffered an acute intracranial SDH after a snowboarding accident. There was no clinical or radiological evidence of spine injury. Conservative management of the supratentorial SDH resulted in spontaneous radiologically documented resolution with redistribution of blood in the subdural space. Four days after the injury, the patient started noticing new onset of mild low-back pain. The pain progressively worsened. Magnetic resonance imaging of the lumbosacral spine 10 days after the original injury revealed a large L4-S2 SDH. Ten days after the original injury, bilateral L5-S1 laminotomy and drainage of the subacute spinal SDH were performed. The patient experienced immediate pain relief. The authors hypothesize that in some cases spinal SDH may be related to redistribution of blood from the supratentorial subdural space.

Accidents↗
PubMed2002

Transfer of control between causal predictive judgments and instrumental responding.

Four experiments were conducted to explore outcome-specific transfer from causal predictive judgments to instrumental responding. A video game was designed in which participants had to defend Andalusia from navy and air force attacks. First, they learned the relationship between two instrumental responses (two key on a standard keyboard) and two different outcomes (destruction of the ships or destruction of the planes). Then they learned to predict which of two different stimuli predicted which outcome. Finally, they had the opportunity of making either of the two instrumental responses in the presence of either stimulus. Transfer was shown as a preference for the response that shared an outcome with the current stimulus. The presentation of the stimulus during the test produced a decrease in the overall rate of response. Responding to a neutral stimulus in Experiments 2 and 3 suggested that this overall decrease in responding was due to a combination of the time needed to process the meaning of the stimulus and the activation of the representation of the outcome in the presence of the stimulus during the test. Transfer between predictive judgments and instrumental responding mirrors the outcome-specific Pavlovian instrumental transfer observed in conditioning studies with rats.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2003

Effects of wording and stimulus format on the use of contingency information in causal judgment.

There are four kinds of contingency information: occurrences and nonoccurrences of an effect in the presence and in the absence of a cause. Previous studies have shown that these four kinds are not given equal weight in causal judgment. The present research was designed to test two hypotheses about this unequal weighting: that weightings are influenced by the form of the question and other features of the stimulus materials and that unequal weightings occur, in part, because individual differences in the use of contingency information are not evenly distributed across the four kinds of information. Support was found for both hypotheses. However, the effects of question wording were not always as had been predicted, indicating that more needs to be learned about how people interpret the task, instructions, and materials they are given.

Humans↗
PubMed2005

Chronometric evidence for memory retrieval in causal conditional reasoning: the case of the association strength effect.

According to many models of conditional reasoning, correct responses to the uncertain forms affirmation of consequent (AC) and denial of antecedent (DA) rely on the retrieval of an alternative antecedent from semantic memory. The main prediction issuing from this hypothesis of online retrieval is that the associative strength of the relevant information in long-term memory affects the latency of its retrieval and then of the correct response of uncertainty to AC and DA. This prediction was tested in 64 adults who performed a syllogism evaluation task with familiar causal conditional premises. As predicted, correct responses of uncertainty to AC and DA were not only more frequent but also faster when the antecedent term was weakly rather than strongly associated with the consequent. In line with the semantic framework, we also observed that this strength effect in response times was reversed for incorrect responses of certainty to AC.

Adult↗
PubMed2004

Causal judgment from contingency information: a systematic test of the pCI rule.

Contingency information is information about the occurrence or nonoccurrence of an effect when a possible cause is present or absent. Under the evidential evaluation model, instances of contingency information are transformed into evidence and causal judgment is based on the proportion of relevant instances evaluated as confirmatory for the candidate cause. In this article, two experiments are reported that were designed to test systematic manipulations of the proportion of confirming instances in relation to other variables: the proportion of instances on which the candidate cause is present, the proportion of instances in which the effect occurs when the cause is present, and the objective contingency. Results showed that both unweighted and weighted versions of the proportion-of-confirmatory-instances rule successfully predicted the main features of the results, with the weighted version proving more successful. Other models, including the power PC theory, failed to predict the results.

Decision Making↗
PubMed1996

An information processing view of framing effects: the role of causal schemas in decision making.

People prefer a sure gain to a probable larger gain when the two choices are presented from a gain perspective, but a probable larger loss to a sure loss when the objectively identical choices are presented from a loss perspective. Such reversals of preference due to the context of the problem are known as framing effects. In the present study, schema activation and subjects' interpretations of the problems were examined as sources of the framing effects. Results showed that such effects could be eliminated by introducing into a problem a causal schema that provided a rationale for the reciprocal relationship between the gains and the losses. Moreover, when subjects were freed from framing they were consistently risk seeking in decisions about human life, but risk averse in decisions about property. Irrationality in choice behaviors and the ecological implication of framing effects are discussed.

Adult↗
PubMed1975

Rodent systems (Plasmodium berghei-Anopheles Stephensi) for screening compounds for potential causal prophylaxis.

An in vivo screening system is described in which drugs administered to rats or mice and challenged with sporozoites are evaluated for their antimalarial properties (causal prophylaxis, suppression, therapy) by the presence or absence of exoerythrocytic forms and parasitemia. The system is composed of A/J mice, Sprague-Dawley rats, Plasmodium berghei, and Anopheles stephensi. Good correlation has been found between test results and practical application.

Animals↗
PubMed1994

Evaluation of WR250417 (a proguanil analog) for causal prophylactic activity in the Plasmodium cynomolgi-Macaca mulatta model.

The Plasmodium cynomolgi-Macaca mulatta model has been used to test the antimalarial activity of new drugs for both radical cure and casual prophylaxis. The proguanil analog WR250417 (also known as PS-15) was evaluated for causal prophylactic activity in rhesus monkeys infected with P. cynomolgi bastianelli. Four monkeys were orally dosed with 40 mg/kg/day of WR250417 over three days (-1, 0, and +1). Sporozoite-induced infection of P. cynomolgi was initiated on day 0 with 1 x 10(6) sporozoites to each monkey. Compound WR250417 extended the prepatent period from an average of 8.5 days for controls (n = 2) to a mean of 18.3 days (range 18-19 days, n = 4) for drug-treated monkeys. Analysis of plasma drug concentrations by high-performance liquid chromatography showed that the monkeys converted the WR250417 to its putative principal active metabolite WR99210 (a dihydrotriazine). These findings demonstrate that WR250417 and its principal metabolite do not prevent primary infection by P. cynomolgi.

Administration, Oral↗
PubMed2000

[Causal models of achievement motive, goal orientation, intrinsic interest, and academic achievement in classroom].

This study investigated the effect of achievement motive on goal orientation, and that of goal orientation on intrinsic interest in learning and academic achievement, based on the model proposed by Elliot and Church (1997). A sample of 222 fifth and sixth grade students of an elementary school, and another of 307 seventh, eighth and ninth grade students of a junior high school participated in the study. The approach-avoidance framework of Elliot and Harackiewicz (1996) was used to classify goal orientations. With multiple-sample structural equation modeling, the paths in two causal models, one for each of the elementary and junior high school samples, were compared. A path was found from hope for success to mastery orientation, from both hope for success and fear of failure to performance-approach orientation, and from fear of failure to performance-avoidance orientation. Mastery and performance-approach orientations each had a positive effect on intrinsic interest in learning. For elementary school children, performance-approach orientation enhanced academic achievement, and for junior high school students, mastery orientation mainly facilitated it. Performance-avoidance orientation had a negative effect on both intrinsic interest and academic achievement.

Achievement↗
PubMed2004

[Causal attribution and conflict resolution in the Japanese language instruction setting].

Conflicts sometimes arise between the language teachers and foreign students in the Japanese language instruction setting. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship of causal attribution and selection of conflict resolution strategies in such conflicts, and to explicate the characteristics of intercultural conflicts resolution strategies, especially paying attention to the teacher expectation of student strategy to resolve a conflict. A questionnaire was administered to 84 Japanese teachers, 214 Chinese students, and 154 Korean students. Results indicated that when students attributed the conflict to the teachers, they chose assertive strategies, and that when attributed to themselves, compromising strategies were used. Moreover, while Chinese students tended to use such compromising strategies as cooperation and obedience when they attributed the conflict to cultural differences, Korean students did not tend to use non-confrontational strategies. The teachers did not expect their students to use assertive strategies, and the large gap between teacher and student perception of assertive strategies could be one of reasons for difficulties that arise in such intercultural conflict resolution.

Adult↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Possible causal association of idiopathic inflammatory bowel disease with thrombocytopenia in the dog.

Extraintestinal manifestations of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are commonly observed in humans but are poorly documented in companion animals. Thrombocytopenia is an uncommon but well-documented extraintestinal hematological abnormality in humans; however, there are no previous reports of IBD and concurrent thrombocytopenia in the veterinary literature. Seven dogs having idiopathic IBD and concurrent thrombocytopenia were identified and evaluated retrospectively (this represents an incidence of 2.5% in the authors' IBD population). Obvious known causes for thrombocytopenia were eliminated by diagnostic testing as deemed appropriate by the clinician of record. Thrombocytopenia resolved with treatment for the IBD in some but not all patients. This is similar to reports in humans. Thrombocytopenia typically appears to be subclinical, and the severity does not correlate with the degree of intestinal inflammation defined histopathologically. However, quantitative platelet counts should be monitored during IBD therapy, as additional immunosuppression may be required to treat thrombocytopenia, despite resolution of gastrointestinal signs. It is speculated that thrombocytopenia may be causally associated with canine IBD, possibly secondary to immune stimulation from lumenal bacterial antigens, altered immunological regulation, or both.

Animals↗
PubMed2005

Diversity of endophytic fungal community of cacao (Theobroma cacao L.) and biological control of Crinipellis perniciosa, causal agent of Witches' Broom Disease.

The basidiomycete fungus Crinipellis perniciosa (Stahel) Singer is the causal agent of Witches' Broom Disease of Cacao (Theobromacacao L.) which is the main factor limiting cacao production in the Americas. Pod losses of up to 90% are experienced in affected areas as evidenced by the 50% drop in production in Bahia province, Brazil following the arrival of the C. perniciosa in the area in 1989. The disease has proven particularly difficult to control and many farmers in affected areas have given up cacao cultivation. In order to evaluate the potential of endophytes as a biological control agent of this phytopathogen, the endophytic fungal community of resistant and susceptible cacao plants as well as affected branches was studied between 2001 and 2002. The fungal community was identified by morphological traits and rDNA sequencing as belonging to the genera Acremonium, Blastomyces, Botryosphaeria, Cladosporium, Colletotrichum, Cordyceps, Diaporthe, Fusarium, Geotrichum, Gibberella, Gliocladium, Lasiodiplodia, Monilochoetes, Nectria, Pestalotiopsis, Phomopsis, Pleurotus, Pseudofusarium, Rhizopycnis, Syncephalastrum, Trichoderma, Verticillium and Xylaria. These fungi were evaluated both in vitro and in vivo by their ability to inhibit C. perniciosa. Among these, some were identified as potential antagonists, but only one fungus (Gliocladium catenulatum) reduced the incidence of Witches' Broom Disease in cacao seedlings to 70%.

Agaricales↗
PubMed1997

Estimating causal effects from large data sets using propensity scores.

The aim of many analyses of large databases is to draw causal inferences about the effects of actions, treatments, or interventions. Examples include the effects of various options available to a physician for treating a particular patient, the relative efficacies of various health care providers, and the consequences of implementing a new national health care policy. A complication of using large databases to achieve such aims is that their data are almost always observational rather than experimental. That is, the data in most large data sets are not based on the results of carefully conducted randomized clinical trials, but rather represent data collected through the observation of systems as they operate in normal practice without any interventions implemented by randomized assignment rules. Such data are relatively inexpensive to obtain, however, and often do represent the spectrum of medical practice better than the settings of randomized experiments. Consequently, it is sensible to try to estimate the effects of treatments from such large data sets, even if only to help design a new randomized experiment or shed light on the generalizability of results from existing randomized experiments. However, standard methods of analysis using available statistical software (such as linear or logistic regression) can be deceptive for these objectives because they provide no warnings about their propriety. Propensity score methods are more reliable tools for addressing such objectives because the assumptions needed to make their answers appropriate are more assessable and transparent to the investigator.

Breast Neoplasms↗
PubMed1999

An inquiry into the causal relationship among leisure vacation, depression, and absence from work.

Depression is one of the most prevalent psychological health problems in occupational settings. Through literature review and the experience of previous investigations, it is now presumed that depression could mediate the association between workload and absence from work. In order to examine the above relationship, a follow-up investigation was conducted using male white-collar employees. The authors have been examining the association between work-related factors and employee health for some years, and vacation has become recognized as one of the important candidates for alleviating psychological problems in the workplace. In July 1996, the chance of leisure vacations within the past year and the presence of depression were examined by a self-administrated questionnaire. The subjects were followed-up for the rest of the year and absence from work was monitored. By analyzing 357 eligible subjects aged 20-59 years, the causal association between leisure vacation, depression, and absence from work was examined. Through correlation and log-linear analysis, the following findings were explored: The decrease of leisure vacation chances was correlated with the presence of depression, and depression contributed to an increase in the absence from work after adjustment was made for possible confounding factors. Leisure vacation could be independent of other work-related factors such as working hours, and it seemed to be significant to investigate positive effects of leisure vacation on psychological well-being in the workplace.

Absenteeism↗