0000000001316568
AUTHOR
Alba Moreno-giménez
Manipulating feedback on schizophrenia: Evidence from a Posner task.
Abstract Individuals with schizophrenia show difficulties in achieving vital objectives. Abnormal behavioral and emotional responses to environmental feedback may be some of the psychological mechanisms underlying this lack of goal attainment in schizophrenia. The present study aims to assess how different types of feedback may affect performance in a computerized affective Posner task (non-monetary vs. monetary rewards; contingent vs. non-contingent feedback). The sample was composed of 32 patients with schizophrenia and 35 controls. Reaction times and error rates were the behavioral measurements. The emotional experience was assessed through self-reported affective scales. The results ind…
Trajectories of stress biomarkers and anxious-depressive symptoms from pregnancy to postpartum period in women with a trauma history
Background: Cross-sectional studies have found that a trauma history can be associated with anxious-depressive symptomatology and physiological stress dysregulation in pregnant women. Methods: This prospective study examines the trajectories of both anxiety and depressive symptoms and salivary cortisol and alpha-amylase biomarkers from women with (n = 42) and without (n = 59) a trauma history at (i) 38th week of gestation (T1), (ii) 48 hours after birth (T2), and (iii) three months after birth (T3). Results: The quantile regression model showed that trauma history was associated with higher cortisol levels at T1 and this difference was sustained along T2 and T3. Conversely, there were no si…
Metabolomic Diversity of Human Milk Cells over the Course of Lactation—A Preliminary Study
Human milk (HM) is a complex biofluid containing a wide cell variety including epithelial cells and leukocytes. However, the cellular compositions and their phenotypic properties over the course of lactation are poorly understood. The aim of this preliminary study was to characterize the cellular metabolome of HM over the course of lactation. Cells were isolated via centrifugation and the cellular fraction was characterized via cytomorphology and immunocytochemical staining. Cell metabolites were extracted and analyzed using ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled to quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC–QqTOF-MS) in the positive and negative electrospray ionization mode…
Do children with overweight respond faster to food-related words?
Abstract Overweight in childhood is a risk factor in developing obesity as an adult, thus having severe consequences on the individuals’ physical health and psychological well-being. Therefore, studying the cognitive and emotional processes that sustain overweight is essential not only at a theoretical level but also to develop effective interventions. In the present experiment, we examined whether children with overweight respond faster to food-related than non-food-related words in a word recognition task: lexical decision. The participants were 24 children diagnosed with exogenous overweight and 24 children with a healthy weight. The stimulus list included positively valenced food-relate…
Attentional biases towards emotional scenes in autism spectrum condition: An eye-tracking study.
Abstract Background Different attentional processing of emotional information may underlie social impairments in Autism Spectrum Condition (ASC). It has been hypothesized that individuals with ASC show hypersensitivity to threat, which may be related to an avoidance behaviour. However, research on the attentional processing of emotional information in autism is inconclusive. Aim To examine the attentional processing biases of 27 children with ASC and 25 typically developed (TD) participants. Methods and procedures The initial orienting of attention, the attentional engagement, and the attentional maintenance to complex emotional scenes in competition (happy, neutral, threatening, sad) were …
Impact of maternal age on infants' emotional regulation and psychomotor development
AbstractBackgroundMaternal age has progressively increased in industrialized countries. Most studies focus on the consequences of delayed motherhood for women's physical and mental health, but little is known about potential effects on infants' neurodevelopment. This prospective study examines the association between maternal age and offspring neurodevelopment in terms of both psychomotor development (Ages & Stages Questionnaires-3) and emotional competences (Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire).MethodsWe evaluated a cohort of healthy pregnant women aged 20–41 years and their offspring, assessed at 38 weeks gestation (n= 131) and 24 months after birth (n= 101). Potential age-related …
The role of attentional biases to appetitive stimuli in childhood overweight
Overweight during childhood constitutes a high-risk factor for adult obesity. An abnormal attention to food stimuli (i.e., a bias) has been suggested as an underlying mechanism to the onset and/or maintenance of obesity. Previous literature supports the existence of a biased attention toward food stimuli in adults with obesity. However, it is unknown whether this attentional bias occurs in high-risk children for adult obesity. We aimed to examine attentional biases to food at different stages of attention processing in overweight children. A dot-probe task was applied to 25 children with overweight and 25 healthy-weight children (8-12 years old). Attentional preference to or avoidance of pl…
ATR-FTIR spectroscopy for the routine quality control of exosome isolations
Abstract Exosomes are nanosized vesicles containing specific cargos of DNA, RNA, proteins, metabolites, and intracellular and membrane lipids. Exosome isolation needs to be optimized carefully depending on the type of biofluid and tissue and the retrieved exosomes need to be characterized. The main objective of this study was to determine the feasibility of a multimodal analysis of Attenuated Total Reflectance – Fourier Transform Infrared (ATR-FTIR) spectroscopy and UPLC–QqTOF-MSMS for the development of a routine quality control tool of isolated exosomes and the rapid characterization of their lipid profiles and total protein content. Using human milk as model example, exosomes were isolat…
Trajectories of stress biomarkers and anxious-depressive symptoms from pregnancy to postpartum period in women with a trauma history
Background: Cross-sectional studies have found that a trauma history can be associated with anxious-depressive symptomatology and physiological stress dysregulation in pregnant women. Methods: This prospective study examines the trajectories of both anxiety and depressive symptoms and salivary cortisol and α-amylase biomarkers from women with (n = 42) and without (n = 59) a trauma history at (i) 38th week of gestation (T1), (ii) 48 hours after birth (T2), and (iii) three months after birth (T3). Results: The quantile regression model showed that trauma history was associated with higher cortisol levels at T1 and this difference was sustained along T2 and T3. Conversely, there were no signif…