IQ and mortality

A long-term study of more than 10,000 people by researchers at the University of Helsinki looked into the links between IQ and early mortality. The study found that people with a low IQ when they were 11 were more than twice as likely (3.4% vs 1.7%) to die as those with a high IQ. Socioeconomic status had only a minor role in explaining this but more influential were whether parents took an interest in their children's education (if they did this reduced early mortality) and childhood problem behaviour which increased the risk of an early death.

You can find out more about this research at

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE57D38H20090814?feedType=RSS&feedName=healthNews&sp=true

Fish consumption and dementia

A survey of 14,960 adults over the age of 65 in China, India, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, Peru and Venezuela has found that (apart from in India) higher fish consumption was associated with a lower risk of developing dementia. The protective effect of fish is thought to come from Omega-3 fats which protect nerve cells, limit inflammation and help prevent the build up of damaging amyloid protein. The link between fish and a lower dementia risk held true even when other factors such as income, education, smoking and fruit and vegetable consumption were taken into account. Higher meat consumption was associated with a somewhat higher prevalence of dementia. The research was led by Dr Emiliano Albanese of King's College London.

You can find out more about this study at

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE57D39Z20090814?feedType=RSS&feedName=healthNews&sp=true

Sleep patterns, depression and cortisol

Sleep patterns and levels of the stress hormone cortisol could be used to predict which adolescents develop depression. It is known that adults with depression start having REM (rapid-eye-movement) sleep earlier in the sleep cycle than adults without depression but it is not clear whether the same relationship exists in adolescents. Researchers at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center studied 96 adolescents over five years and found that those with a familial history of depression but without a depression diagnosis started REM sleep earlier. Those who started REM sleep earlier in the sleep cycle were more likely to develop depression by the end of the five-year study than those who started it later. The researchers also looked into the effects of the stress hormone cortisol. In adults increased cortisol levels are linked to depression and when people are treated for depression cortisol levels are seen to fall even before people's symptoms improve. The study found that the teenagers with the highest cortisol levels at the start of the study were also more likely to develop depression.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090813083335.htm

Seizures and Alzheimer's disease

Seizures are more common in people with Alzheimer's disease but still relatively infrequent. Researchers from Columbia University Medical Centre in New York tracked 453 patients with Alzheimer's over a number of years. During the follow-up period they found that 7 of them (1.5%) developed seizures. This was higher than the rate found among people of the same age without Alzheimer's but still only corresponds to 1 in 200 people with Alzheimer's over the course of a year. Only 'younger' age was associated with an increased risk of seizures.

You can find out more about this research at

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE57C55F20090813?feedType=RSS&feedName=healthNews

Marriage Helps Prevent Mental Deterioration - Guest Post by Emily Thomas

Couples who take the “in sickness and in health” vow can look forward to many more healthy days than their unwedded peers, according to a study published in the British Medical Journal last July. The research showed that those living with a partner when they were 50 years old were less likely to be afflicted by heart conditions or mental decline later in life. On the other hand, those without partners were three times more likely to suffer from age-related ailments two decades later.
Dementia, especially Alzheimer’s disease, usually affects people over 65, causing confusion, memory loss, and mood swings. As the disease progresses, symptoms become more severe and can lead to emotional outbursts and social withdrawal. More than 26.6 million people suffered from Alzheimer’s disease in 2006, and that number is expected to more than double in the next decade as the population ages. With slow advances in medicine to halt the disease, discovering the patterns in what causes Alzheimer’s is critical to prevention and knowledge.
Living and social conditions have long been explored as factors in the development of dementia. Those with an advanced education, hobbies, and healthy social lives were less likely to suffer from mental decline. Keeping the brain active is a key factor in holding off cognitive deterioration. In this sense, marriage could be providing the healthy mental stimulation aging minds need to stay fit by providing much-needed company.
Conversely, divorce and spouse death has the opposite effect on health. Those who experienced these events not only suffered from depression initially, but also were 20 percent more likely to develop heart disease, cancer, or diabetes decades later, compared to those still in a relationship, according to a study in last year’s Journal of Health and Social Behavior. Even individuals who remarried later were more at risk for developing chronic conditions than those who had never been divorced or widowed.
Until the next medical breakthrough for Alzheimer’s treatment arrives, preventing mental deterioration is the best strategy. Married couples can take solace in the fact that thanks to each other’s good company and devotion, they can look forward to many more healthy days together.
This post was contributed by Emily Thomas, who writes about the on line universities. She welcomes your feedback at Emily.Thomas31@ yahoo.com

Childhood adversity and depression

Adversity in childhood plays an important role in the development and course of depression and a number of studies have shown links between depression and people's memories of parental indifference, overcontrol and physical and sexual abuse. A team of American researchers led by Daniel N. Klein from Stony Brook University in New York looked into the links between childhood adversity, people's depression symptoms and how well they responded to treatment in a sample of 808 people with chronic major depression. They found that childhood adversity was associated with a longer-lasting illness, an earlier onset of depression, more incidents of depression, more severe symptoms, functional impairment, suicidal thoughts, anxiety, dysfunctional attitudes and a tendency to be self-critical. A history of maternal overcontrol, paternal abuse, paternal indifference and sexual abuse each predicted a lower probability of remission. In a 12-week trial of antidepressant treatment 44% of people without a history of childhood abuse got better compared to 32% of people with a history of childhood adversity.

Klein, Daniel N. ... [et al] - Early adversity in chronic depression: clinical correlates and response to pharmacotherapy Depression and Anxiety August 2009, 26(8), 701-710

In another study on the same theme researchers from the universities of Otago and Canterbury in New Zealand studied 195 people taking part in a clinical trial of the antidepressants fluoxetine and nortriptyline. They found that participants who reported low paternal care were less likely to finish the six-week trial of the drugs. Participants who said that they had had overprotective mothers had a worse response to treatment after six weeks and were less likely to show two-months of sustained recovery after the end of the trial. However, sexual, physical or psychological abuse did not seem to affect people's response to the treatment.

Johnstone, Jeannette M. ... [et al] - Childhood neglect and abuse as predictors of antidepressant response in adult depression Depression and Anxiety August 2009, 26(8), 711-717

Imaginary friends and creativity

In the past a child who had an imaginary friend could sometimes be seen as compensating for timidity and shyness. By some estimates nearly half of all younger children have an imaginary friend at some point and modern research has found that children with imaginary friends are just as sociable and popular as children without one. Researchers from Clark University in Massachusetts studied 48 mothers and their five-and-a-half-year-old children, 23 of whom had had or had an imaginary friend. The children with imaginary friends performed significantly better on a storytelling task than those without one but it is not known whether telling stories about an imaginary friend develops children's storytelling skills or whether children with good storytelling skills use their creativity to invent imaginary friends.

http://www.newsgator.com/ngs/subscriber/WebEd2.aspx#page=WebEdPosts&mode=folder&id=4531548&nodeId=17

Autism, motion and body language

Researchers from Durham University in the U.K. have been looking into the way people with autism perceive movement and body language. They showed adults with autism and an unaffected control group short video clips of body movement and the participants had to identify the emotions being displayed. The clips had no images of faces or sound. Autistic people had more trouble in identifying the emotions in the clips and also did poorly in a task in which they had to determine the direction of a group of dots on a computer screen. The study suggests that visual processing problems and a difficulty in perceiving or attending to motion could explain some of the problems autistic people have in interpreting body language.

http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=news&id=121114&cn=20

Why women sleep worse than men

Women tend to report more sleep problems than men. Researchers, led by David Maume from the University of Cincinatti, examined this issue in a study of 583 people, 62% of whom were women. The researchers found that gender differences in health status accounted for 27% of the gap between men and women's sleep as women were more likely to report that health problems disturbed their sleep. Women were also more likely to report trouble balancing work and family requirements than men and this accounted for 17% of the sleep gap. Having children was also a factor and this lay behind 5% of the gap. Women were more likely than men to report more sleep disruption when they were concerned about their marriages, worked unsociable hours and when work and family life negatively affected one another. Men whose wives worked full-time reported more sleep disruption as did men who saw their work/family roles as being on an equal footing with their partner.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090810162111.htm

Cognitive reserve and Alzheimer's disease

People with severe brain pathology can show almost no signs of Alzheimer's disease while others with only mild brain lesions exhibit a considerable degree of clinical symptoms. Researchers put this down to cognitive reserve - the amount of spare capacity in the brain which can be used when other parts are damaged. Researchers from Munich Technical University scanned the brains of 270 people with Alzheimer's disease and found that people who had had more years of formal education showed less loss of cognition even when their brains had obviously lost volume. The results of the study took into account other factors such as genetic characteristics, age, gender and brain infarction.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090811161339.htm

Psychosocial therapy for stroke victims

A third of people who have had a stroke develop clinical depression. This can hinder their recovery, worsen cognitive functioning and impair social functioning. Researchers at the University of Washington in Seattle studied 101 people who had had a stroke and been diagnosed with clinical depression. Some received a combination of psychosocial therapy and antidepressants while others received 'treatment-as-usual' which included antidepressants. After eight weeks those participants receiving the psychosocial therapy - nine one-to-one sessions with a nurse covering topics such as how to increase pleasant events, problem-solving and identifying and modifying negative thoughts - showed a 47% reduction in their depression 'scores' compared to a 32% reduction in the treatment-as-usual group.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=news&id=121148&cn=5

Even the word 'smile' can make you do it

Psychological research has shown that simply seeing a smile or a frown can activate the muscles in the face that make that expression whether we are aware of it or not. Researchers from the universities of Amsterdam and Utrecht decided to try and see whether words would have the same effect. They asked participants to read a series of verbs and adjectives on a monitor while they measured activity in muscles responsible for smiling and frowning. They found that verbs produced activity in the relevant muscles - e.g. 'smile' produced activity in the 'smile' muscles - but that this effect was much weaker for adjectives such as 'funny' or 'frustrating.' In another experiment the participants watched a series of cartoons and were subliminally shown 'smiling' or 'frowning' words after each one. Those participants who saw 'smiling' words after being shown the cartoons rated them as funnier than those who saw 'frowning' ones. However, in those participants who were prevented from smiling (by being made to hold a pen in their teeth) being shown the 'smiling' word after the cartoon had no effect on how funny they felt the cartoon to be.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090807103923.htm

Narcissism in the workplace

Researchers from Florida State University have been looking into the effects of narcissism in the workplace. They asked more than 1,200 people about their managers and found that

• 31% said that their boss exaggerated their accomplishments to look good in front of others
• 27% said that their boss bragged to other people to get praise
• 25% said that their boss had an inflated view of himself or herself
• 24% said that their boss was self-centred
• 20% said that their boss would only do a favour if they were guaranteed one in return

Those people with a narcissistic boss had lower levels of job satisfaction, higher stress, were less appreciative of their work and organization, reported lower levels of effort and performance and were more prone to sadness and frustration at work. Narcissists can often end up in managerial roles as they are seen as outgoing and confident.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090807120948.htm

Working memory and distractions

Working memory is the kind of memory we use in everyday life to remember things such as phone numbers on a short-term basis and is different to our long-term memories of facts, knowledge and events in our life. Researchers at the University of Oregon looked into the effects of people's working-memory capacity on their attention and found that the more working memory they had the less easily they were distracted. The researchers monitored the participants' brain activity as they studied images on a computer screen, recognizing a shape with a missing component and then identifying the object as it moved to a different location. As the task went on the participants were increasingly distracted by split-second flashes of light. As the distractions mounted some participants were able to maintain their performance while others slipped. People who can focus more intently tend to have higher 'fluid intelligence'; they score more highly on achievement tests, do better in maths and tend to learn second languages more easily. The researchers are currently looking into whether easily-distracted people might be more creative and imaginative.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090806141712.htm

Cheating in the classroom - why too many exams may make things worse

Cheating in schools and exams has always gone on but it seems to be a growing problem. 80% of 'high-achieving' high-school students and 75% of college students admit to cheating - a percentage that has been rising for the last 50 years. Eric Anderman from Ohio State University spoke about this issue at the recent annual meeting of the American Psychological Association. He said that boys are more likely to cheat than girls. Also more likely to cheat are children with competitive 'type A' personalities and those with impulsive tendencies. Children became more likely to cheat as they moved through school and were subject to more frequent and 'high-stakes' testing. The more importance that was attached to passing exams the more likely children were to cheat. Children were less likely to cheat when the emphasis of teaching was on learning and understanding what was being taught, an approach which has also been found to help students learn better and remember things for longer.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090810025249.htm

Was Larkin right? Up to a point ...

Man hands on misery to man
It deepens like a coastal shelf
So get out early while you can
And don't have any kids yourself

That was Philip Larkin's rather gloomy view on parenting but was he right? Researchers at Ohio State University looked at how often parents in the 1990s spanked, read to and showed affection to their children and compared that to how the parents were treated by their own mothers. They found that while mothers tended to follow the same practices their own mothers did fathers were much less influenced by their mothers' parenting in how they brought up their own children. However, the study also showed significant changes in parenting between the generations with increases in the amount of reading and affection shown to children and decreases in the amount of spanking. Mothers who were spanked at least once a week were 50% more likely to spank their own children than mothers who weren't spanked at all whereas fathers who were spanked as kids were less likely to spank their own children. More mothers (43%) than fathers (28%) spanked their children. Interestingly, fathers who spanked their children also showed the highest levels of affection perhaps feeling that being a strict disciplinarian was part of their love for their children.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090810024827.htm

Antidepressants and suicide risk

In 2003 research found that antidepressants increased the risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviour in people under 18. In February 2005 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a 'black-box' warning on the use of all antidepressants for people under 18 and in May 2007 it extended this warning to people between 18 and 24. Many psychiatrists have criticised these warnings saying that they scare people away from getting treatment and pointing to an 8% rise in suicides among young people in 2004. The FDA have now reviewed the results of 372 clinical trials of the drugs involving nearly 100,000 people. They found that antidepressants did increase the risk of suicide among people under 25. They made no difference to suicide risk in people between 25 and 64 and lowered the risk in people aged 65 and over. Sertraline halved the risk of suicide while citalopram and escitalopram increased the risk.

You can find out more about this research at

http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE57A6B520090811?feedType=RSS&feedName=healthNews&sp=true

Age, class and cognitive decline

Researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles have been looking into the links between socio-economic status and cognitive decline in older people. They studied 6,476 adults born before 1924. The participants were tested five times between 1993 and 2002 on various memory and cognition tests. There was a link between higher socio-economic status and better education and higher scores on the initial test but as time went on the rate of decline was similar across all demographic groups. People who were older at the start of the study, whose partner had died or who had never married declined more quickly over the course of the study.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090807154408.htm

Happiness classes in school. Do they really work?

There are a number of different programmes for school children aimed at teaching them resilience, positive thinking and a sense of purpose. The Penn Resiliency Program (PRP) was designed to prevent depression. It aims to increase students' ability to handle day-to-day stress and problems that are common for adolescents. It promotes optimism by teaching students to think more realistically and flexibly about the problems they encounter and teaches assertiveness, decision-making, relaxation and other coping skills. Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania reviewed 19 studies into the effectiveness of PRP which included more than 2,000 8-15-year-olds. The review found that PRP increased optimism and reduced depressive symptoms for up to a year and reduced hopelessness and clinical levels of depression and anxiety. The researchers also looked into the effectiveness of the Positive Psychology Program (PPP). The programme seeks to help children identify their signature character strengths (e.g. kindness, courage, wisdom, perseverance) and incorporate these strengths into their day-to-day life. In a study of 347 high-school students those who took the programme reported more enjoyment of, and engagement in, school. The teachers reported that the children who took the programme were more curious about what they were doing, loved learning and showed more creativity. The children in the PPP group also had more self-control and empathy and a greater desire to co-operate with others and assert themselves.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090807135054.htm

Self-harm in Northern Ireland

Researchers from Queen's University and the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland have been asking 941 sixteen-year-olds about self-harm. One in ten had self-harmed in the past year and another 14% had thought about it but had not done so. Girls were much more likely than boys to say that they had thought about harming themselves (18% vs 7%) or had actually done so (13% vs 5%). There were strong links between self-harm and high levels of stress, high expectations the youngsters felt they could not fulfil and experiences of bullying in school. 25% of the sample said that they had suffered from serious mental and emotional health problems in the past year for which they felt they needed professional help although only 9% had actually asked for it. Youngsters from less well-off backgrounds were significantly more likely to be affected by mental-health issues and to have self-harmed or considered self-harming.

You can find out more about this research at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090730073921.htm