Search Results (43)

The Entrapment Scale was developed to measure the feeling of being trapped by external situations or internal experiences (such as thoughts and emotions) without the possibility of escape. This perception, especially when combined with feelings of defeat, is central to integrated motivational–volitional (IMV) model of suicidal behavior. This study adapts the Entrapment Scale for Spanish adolescents and emerging adults, focusing on its internal structure, reliability, and criterion validity. We assessed 849 participants (48.1% male) aged 12 to 22 and compared three models: a correlated two-factor model, a second-order factor model, and a bifactor model. The bifactor model showed the best fit, indicating that a general entrapment factor influenced all items, while specific internal and external factors captured unique aspects. Importantly, distinguishing between internal and external entrapment can guide the development of more personalized and effective therapeutic strategies, as the relevance of each dimension may vary depending on the behaviors or symptoms present. This approach allows clinicians to target interventions more precisely to the individual’s needs. Theoretical and practical implications for understanding and addressing suicidal behavior are discussed. Full article

There has been an extensive search for efficient pharmacological treatment of female sexual interest/arousal disorder and other sexual dysfunctions. However, available treatments have met limited success, except for the drugs used for treating erectile deficiency. A possible reason for this may be that both the preclinical and clinical evaluation of treatment effects have been inadequate. The present literature review shows that the intensity of sexual approach behaviors in non-human animals appears to be predictive of clinical effect whereas the traditional studies of copulatory behaviors and associated motor patterns have questionable predictive power regarding effects on human sexual desire. In clinical studies, it is essential to include the unconscious components of sexual motivation in any approach to its quantification. This basic fact is incompatible with the use of self-reports for evaluating treatment effects on motivation. Genital responses to sexual incentives are automatic and therefore outside of volitional control and can, therefore, provide unbiased estimates of the intensity of sexual motivation. These responses may be objectively quantified. Tests for implicit sexual motivation must also be used for capturing unconscious mental components. Including the unconscious components of sexual motivation as well as of objective measures of genital responses in clinical studies may improve evaluations of the effectiveness of drug treatment of low sexual interest/arousal disorder. In preclinical studies, predictive validity can be improved by quantifying sexual approach behaviors rather than copulatory behavior. The paradigm shift suggested here may finally allow for the discovery of efficient treatments for some sexual dysfunctions. Full article

Within a stress-and-coping theory of forgiveness, two dimensions of forgiveness have been hypothesized—decisional forgiveness (DF) and emotional forgiveness (EF). Each is theorized to have different impacts on different dimensions of well-being—psychological, spiritual (or religious), social, volitional, and physical. A scoping review was performed to explore the associations of each dimension of forgiveness with each dimension of well-being. A total of k = 30 articles met the criteria for inclusion, and estimates of the association between DF and/or EF with one or more indicators of well-being were extracted. Both dimensions of forgiveness were positively linked to all dimensions of well-being, except that there were too few studies on physical well-being (e.g., self-rated physical health) to analyze. DF was generally more strongly related to indicators of spiritual well-being (e.g., faith maturity), psychological well-being (e.g., happiness), and volitional well-being (e.g., conciliatory behavior) than EF, whereas the inverse was observed for social well-being (e.g., marital satisfaction). However, because most studies were cross-sectional, firm conclusions about the associations of both DF and EF with well-being were limited by a paucity of robust studies. Suggestions to guide future research are provided, including the need for more rigorous longitudinal research and better evidence-based theorizing. Full article

Background: Mental disorders are disturbances of brain functions that cause cognitive, affective, volitional, and behavioral functions to be disrupted to varying degrees. One of these disorders is depression, a significant factor contributing to the increase in suicide cases worldwide. Consequently, depression has become a significant public health issue globally. Electroencephalogram (EEG) data can be utilized to diagnose mild depression disorder (MDD), offering valuable insights into the pathophysiological mechanisms underlying mental disorders and enhancing the understanding of MDD. Methods: This survey emphasizes the critical role of EEG in advancing artificial intelligence (AI)-driven approaches for depression diagnosis. By focusing on studies that integrate EEG with machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL) techniques, we systematically analyze methods utilizing EEG signals to identify depression biomarkers. The survey highlights advancements in EEG preprocessing, feature extraction, and model development, showcasing how these approaches enhance the diagnostic precision, scalability, and automation of depression detection. Results: This survey is distinguished from prior reviews by addressing their limitations and providing researchers with valuable insights for future studies. It offers a comprehensive comparison of ML and DL approaches utilizing EEG and an overview of the five key steps in depression detection. The survey also presents existing datasets for depression diagnosis and critically analyzes their limitations. Furthermore, it explores future directions and challenges, such as enhancing diagnostic robustness with data augmentation techniques and optimizing EEG channel selection for improved accuracy. The potential of transfer learning and encoder-decoder architectures to leverage pre-trained models and enhance diagnostic performance is also discussed. Advancements in feature extraction methods for automated depression diagnosis are highlighted as avenues for improving ML and DL model performance. Additionally, integrating Internet of Things (IoT) devices with EEG for continuous mental health monitoring and distinguishing between different types of depression are identified as critical research areas. Finally, the review emphasizes improving the reliability and predictability of computational intelligence-based models to advance depression diagnosis. Conclusions: This study will serve as a well-organized and helpful reference for researchers working on detecting depression using EEG signals and provide insights into the future directions outlined above, guiding further advancements in the field. Full article

Suicide stands as one of the leading causes of non-accidental death among adolescents and young adults. The Integrated Motivational–Volitional Model (IMV) of suicidal behavior identifies feelings of defeat and entrapment as pivotal factors in the complex dynamics underlying suicidal behaviors. Additionally, depressive symptomatology plays a crucial role in the development of these behaviors. The aim of this work was to provide a systematic review of the scientific literature on the association of three risk factors—entrapment, defeat, and depressive symptomatology—with suicidal ideation in the adolescent and young adult population and to test a tentative theoretical model. The databases used were PubMed, Web of Science, and ProQuest. Primary studies were selected that examined the role of entrapment, defeat, and depressive symptomatology in suicidal ideation among adolescents and young adults (ages 10–35). Additionally, a model based on structural equation modeling was analyzed to assess the relationships between entrapment, defeat, and depressive symptomatology and suicidal ideation. Eleven studies met the established inclusion criteria. The results showed defeat and entrapment to be associated with depressive symptomatology and suicidal ideation, regardless of the country studied. Additionally, the model indicates that entrapment and defeat lead to depressive symptomatology, which in turn contributes to the occurrence of suicidal ideation. These findings suggest that defeat and entrapment could be universal factors in explaining suicidal behavior in adolescents and young adults. Consequently, the results of this work may contribute to the development of strategies for preventing suicidal ideation in this population. Full article

Telemetry techniques are important tools in freshwater fish ecology but are limited by the size of the fish in relation to the size of the electronic tags. The emergence of very small PIT tags (8 mm, mini PIT tags) opens the door to study the individual movement and behavior of small-sized fish species and life stages previously outside the scope of fish telemetry. Although high survival from mini PIT tags have been shown in some groups of fish, suitability assessments are lacking for many taxa, and potential behavioral effects have rarely been evaluated. Here, we evaluate the survival tagging effects in small-sized (35–76 mm) Padanian goby (Padogobius bonelli) implanted with mini PIT tags. PIT-tagging was associated with high survival and tag retention in the tagged fish. No effects of PIT-tagging on volitional swimming activity nor on maximum swimming speed were found. Similar results were obtained implanting larger tags (12 mm) in gobies down to 50 mm in length. Our results indicate that PIT telemetry—using mini PIT tags—is applicable for the study of behavior and movement in small-sized gobies. Full article

Background: Selective attention declines with age, due to age-related functional changes in dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC). Real-time functional magnetic resonance imaging (rtfMRI) neurofeedback has been used in young adults to train volitional control of brain activity, including in dACC. Methods: For the first time, this study used rtfMRI neurofeedback to train 19 young and 27 older adults in volitional up- or down-regulation of bilateral dACC during a selective attention task. Results: Older participants in the up-regulation condition (experimental group) showed greater reward points and dACC BOLD signal across training sessions, reflective of neurofeedback training success; and faster reaction time and better response accuracy, suggesting behavioral benefits on selective attention. These effects were not observed for older participants in the down-regulation condition (inverse condition control group), supporting specificity of volitional dACC up-regulation training in older adults. These effects were, unexpectedly, also not observed for young participants in the up-regulation condition (age control group), perhaps due to a lack of motivation to continue the training. Conclusions: These findings provide promising first evidence of functional plasticity in dACC in late life via rtfMRI neurofeedback up-regulation training, enhancing selective attention, and demonstrate proof of concept of rtfMRI neurofeedback training in cognitive aging. Full article

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) has been widely used to study the mechanisms that underlie motor output. Yet, the extent to which TMS acts upon the cortical neurons implicated in volitional motor commands and the focal limitations of TMS remain subject to debate. Previous research links TMS to improved subject performance in behavioral tasks, including a bias in phoneme discrimination. Our study replicates this result, which implies a causal relationship between electro-magnetic stimulation and psychomotor activity, and tests whether TMS-facilitated psychomotor activity recorded via electroencephalography (EEG) may thus serve as a superior input for neural decoding. First, we illustrate that site-specific TMS elicits a double dissociation in discrimination ability for two phoneme categories. Next, we perform a classification analysis on the EEG signals recorded during TMS and find a dissociation between the stimulation site and decoding accuracy that parallels the behavioral results. We observe weak to moderate evidence for the alternative hypothesis in a Bayesian analysis of group means, with more robust results upon stimulation to a brain region governing multiple phoneme features. Overall, task accuracy was a significant predictor of decoding accuracy for phoneme categories (F(1,135) = 11.51, p < 0.0009) and individual phonemes (F(1,119) = 13.56, p < 0.0003), providing new evidence for a causal link between TMS, neural function, and behavior. Full article

Introduction: Adherence to mesalamine therapy in ulcerative colitis is often inadequate. This affects long-term remission and to some extent the risk of colon cancer. Means for assessing non-adherent behavior are cumbersome, expensive, and/or time consuming. Unless multiple tools are used in association, a proportion of patients with volitional and non-volitional non-adherence is nonetheless undetected. The study was aimed at evaluating to which extent rephrasing a single question on adherence to mesalamine therapy may help identifying patients who are not compliant with medication prescription. Methods: One-hundred and seventy-four inflammatory bowel disease outpatients were asked in two consecutive visits, in random order, if they “regularly assumed the prescribed dose of mesalamine” (adherence-centered question—AQ) or “how often they skipped mesalamine pills” (non-adherence centered question—NQ). Answer concordance was evaluated in relation to clinical and demographic variables. Results: The concordance between AQ and NQ was low (K = 0.22). Lower compliance to therapy was admitted in 37.4% more patients following NQ than AQ. The reported adherence to AQ was invariably higher than that of NQ, irrespective of the variable taken into consideration. The likelihood of non-concordant answers was non-significantly higher in CD patients than in UC and in patients with shorter disease duration than in those with longstanding disease, but the logistic regression model did not identify individual variables responsible for the different answers. Conclusions: Being simple and not requiring additional time expense, centering the question on medication non-adherence identifies a large proportion of patients who would not admit non-adherence or underestimate the number of skipped doses of medication, when directly asked if they are compliant to therapy. Full article

In a unique case-study approach in which I served as both the research participant and the experimenter, I wore eye-tracking glasses while teaching a brief music lesson to two university students learning trumpet, then approximately two weeks later, I watched a video of the lesson and tracked my gaze again. To investigate unconscious perceptual processes engaged during music teaching, I compared my attention allocation while teaching to my attention allocation during selfobservation. My gaze behavior while teaching revealed a high level of automaticity regarding lesson sequencing and allocation of attention. Strategic moment-to-moment shifts in attention between the two students occurred entirely below my conscious awareness, yet post hoc analyses revealed precisely timed changes that were related to momentary goals. While watching the video, absent the demands of behavioral interaction and momentary decision-making, I directed more sustained attention to both students than I had while teaching. These results reveal important features of “teacher thinking” that are not directly observable or typically construed as conscious behavior. That this component of teaching practice does not involve volitional control suggests that teachers’ descriptions of their thinking may not reveal to novices important elements of pedagogical expertise. Full article

This study investigates coordinated behaviors and the underlying collective intelligence in biological groups, particularly those led by informed leaders. By establishing new convergence condition based on experiments involving real biological groups, this research introduces the concept of a volitional term and heterogeneous networks, constructing a coupled-force Cucker–Smale model with informed leaders. Incorporating informed leaders into the leader-follower group model enables a more accurate representation of biological group behaviors. The paper then extracts the Flock Leadership Hierarchy Network (FLH), a model reflecting real biological interactions. Employing time slicing and rolling time windows, the study methodically analyzes group behavior stages, using volatility and convergence time as metrics to examine the relationship between group consistency and interactions. Comparative experiments show the FLH network’s superior performance. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test demonstrates that the FLH network conforms to a power-law distribution, a prevalent law in nature. This result further illuminates the crucial role that power-law distribution plays in the evolutionary processes of biological communities. This study offers new perspectives on the evolution of biological groups, contributing to our understanding of the behaviors of both natural and artificial systems, such as animal migration and autonomous drone operations. Full article

In self-report questionnaires, men report higher scores than women on variables such as desire for sex, frequency of sexual thoughts, number of sex partners, etc. Based on this, men are considered to have a higher level of sexual motivation than women. However, retrospective self-reports may be unsuitable for estimations of the inherent level of sexual motivation. We review data on automatic (unconsciously controlled) responses and measures of implicit motivation during exposure to sexual stimuli. These responses and measures are inaccessible to willful manipulations and make it possible to determine whether the sex difference in answers to questionnaires is replicated when volitional response manipulations are unlikely. We complement the human data with observations from some rodent and non-human primate species. The attentional resources allotted to stimuli with sexual relevance as well as genital responses to such stimuli are similar in men and women. Measures of implicit motivation also fail to detect any sex difference. Finally, the frequency of masturbation is superior in female infants before the age at which social expectations begin to determine behavior. Neither in rodents nor in non-human primates is there any clear-cut evidence for sex differences in motivation. It seems that males and females are similar with regard to the intensity of sexual motivation. The responses to questionnaires may be affected by social learning of sexual scripts and/or the inferior quality of sexual experiences in women, among other things. Full article

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a distinctive impact on Hong Kong, especially given the city’s prior experience with the SARS outbreak. The resulting psychological distress has been exacerbated by Hong Kong’s extreme density and compactness, which places residents in proximity on the streets searching for outdoor activities. Streets are a precious source of space for social interactions, but, unfortunately, the pandemic has forced them to empty, leading to increased distress and challenging the psychological well-being of the urban population. In this study, we explore street vibrancy patterns in terms of outdoor activities, here addressed through a decision-making psychological perspective as volitional behaviors determined by psychological factors and essential for well-being, in one of the densest neighborhoods in Hong Kong. We statistically analyzed behavioral monitoring data in relation to spatial and morphological characteristics of their environments under COVID-19 psychological distress. The results highlighted the relevance of specific parcels of the streets acting as clusters and vibrancy initiators, stressing their significance in terms of affective and cognitive inputs determining context-based outdoor activities. The decision-making psychological perspective adopted here to address outdoor activities has relevant implications for design and planning strategies for post-pandemic scenarios, for psychological well-being, and for the future of urban density. Full article

Water scarcity in the United States needs to be addressed with demand- and supply-side initiatives. Yet, water is often provided for a low cost to households in residential areas that have the potential to reduce water consumption. The theory of planned behavior (TpB) is a social science theory used to understand why volitional conservation behaviors, including water conservation, are performed by consumers. Additional predictors are included in TpB in water literature, and motivations for behavioral actions may help further explain residential water conservation behavior. This study sought to determine whether TpB and motivation predicted residential water conservation behavior. Data were collected with an online survey (n = 907) in September 2022 from residents of Florida, Georgia, and Alabama using non-probability opt-in quota sampling. The data were analyzed in R using the lavaan package. The results indicate that there was a significant direct effect of attitude and subjective norms on intention. There was a significant direct effect of intention on behavior. There was a significant negative direct effect of extrinsic motivation on behavior. Mediation was present in the model with intrinsic motivation. Perhaps the respondents had not thought about rewards or punishments in the context of water conservation because of the availability of water at a low cost and therefore were not extrinsically motivated to conserve water. Full article

Germanium (Ge) as an important strategic metal is widely used in many modern-technology fields such as optical fiber and thermal solar cells. In this study, the volatilization behavior of Ge from low-grade germanium-bearing lignite was investigated in detail through reductive volatilization. The results indicated that temperature and air flow rate in the semi-closed roasting system played a significant role in the process. The optimal volitation efficiency of Ge reached 98% at 1100 °C for 2 h with air flow rate of 0.7 L/min in a maffle furnace, respectively. Under optimal conditions, the contents of Ge lowered to 30 ppm in the roasting residue. Analysis of the enriched ash yielded 71,600 ppm for Ge. Chemical phase analysis of the Ge in the enrichment ash showed that soluble Ge accounted for 82.18% of the total Ge, which could be viewed as an excellent material for Ge extraction by chlorinated distillation. Full article