Search results for " SCC"
showing 10 items of 638 documents
Le goût sucré, de l’enfance… à la dépendance ?
2013
Summary: Can one talk about addiction to sugar? Sugar is an important part of our diet, and an important source of pleasure, as of a young age. The definition of addiction involves that addictive substances act on the reward circuit, and lead to two symptoms, withdrawal and tolerance. Is it the case with sugar? According to the literature, brain activations in regions involved in the reward circuit are observed in response to “sugar”, and they differ according to the type of sugar (caloric carbohydrates, sweet or not; sweeteners). Besides, withdrawal and tolerance symptoms are not well characterized: food cravings often concern sweet foods, but there is a decrease with age of the preference…
The changes in age of peak swim speed for elite male and female Swiss freestyle swimmers between 1994 and 2012
2014
This study determined the age and its changes across years of peak swimming performance from 50 to 1,500 m freestyle. Data of 70,059 Swiss freestyle swimmers (33,725 women and 36,334 men) aged 10-40 years and competing from 50 to 1,500 m were analysed. The association between age and swimming speed of the annual ten fastest swimmers was investigated using single and multi-level hierarchical regression analyses. For women, age of peak swimming speed increased in 50 m from 18.9 (s = 2.3) to 20.4 (s = 4.2) years but decreased in 1,500 m from 25.0 (s = 13.1) (1996) to 18.1 (s = 3.7) years. For 100-800 m, age remained at 19.1 (s = 1.1), 19.3 (s = 1.1), 18.7 (s = 1.5) and 18.5 (s = 1.3) years, re…
Differences in Participation and Performance Trends in Age Group Half and Full Marathoners
2014
International audience; Recent studies investigated participation and performance trends in age group half marathoners and full marathoners for a single event. The present study investigated participation and performance trends in age group athletes in all half marathons and full marathons held in a single country during a given period of time. Changes in running performance and age of 226,754 half marathoners and 86,419 full marathoners competing in Switzerland between 2000 and 2010 were analyzed using linear regression analyses. The number of half marathoners increased (P < 0.01) from 2000 to 2010 for both men (+231%) and women (+299%). In contrast, the number of male and female full mara…
Best performances by men and women open-water swimmers during the ‘English Channel Swim’ from 1900 to 2010
2012
Eichenberger, Evelyn | Knechtle, Beat | Knechtle, Patrizia | Ruest, Christoph Alexander | Rosemann, Thomas | Lepers, Romuald; International audience; ''Little research has examined ultra-endurance swimming performances. The 'English Channel Swim', where swimmers have to cover a distance of 32 km between England and France represents a unique long-distance, open-water, sea-swimming challenge, and each year swimmers from all over the world try to succeed in this challenge. The best times in minutes and the nationality of successful men and women swimmers were analysed from 1900 to 2010. A total of 1,533 swimmers (455 women and 1,078 men) from more than 40 countries have successfully completed…
Women reduced the sex difference in open-water ultra-distance swimming - La Traversee Internationale du Lac St-Jean, 1955-2012
2014
In La Traversée Internationale du Lac St-Jean, held between 1955 and 2012 in Canada, the fastest women (r2 = 0.61, p < 0.0001) and men (r2 = 0.66, p < 0.0001) improved swimming speed over the years but the sex difference remained unchanged at 8.8% ± 5.6% (r2 = 0.069, p = 0.065). Annually, for the 3 fastest swimmers, both women (r2 = 0.53, p < 0.0001) and men (r2 = 0.71, p < 0.0001) improved swimming speed between 1973 and 2012 and the sex difference decreased (r2 = 0.29, p = 0.0016) from 14.4% ± 11.0% (1973) to 3.7% ± 1.4% (2012).
The Effect of Course Length on Individual Medley Swimming Performance in National and International Athletes
2014
Abstract Effects of course length (25 m versus 50 m) and advances in performance of individual medley swimming were examined for men and women in Swiss national competitions and FINA World Championships during 2000-2011. Linear regression and analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used to analyse 200 m and 400 m race results for 26,081 swims on the Swiss high score list and 382 FINA finalists. Swiss and FINA swimmers of both sexes were, on average, 4.3±3.2% faster on short courses for both race distances. Sex-related differences in swim speed were significantly greater for FINA swimmers competing in short-course events than in long-course events (10.3±0.2% versus 9.7±0.3%, p<0.01), but did no…
Combining gestures and vocalizations to imitate sounds
2015
International audience; Communicating about sounds is a difficult task without a technical language, and naïve speakers often rely on different kinds of non-linguistic vocalizations and body gestures (Lemaitre et al. 2014). Previous work has independently studied how effectively people describe sounds with gestures or vocalizations (Caramiaux, 2014, Lemaitre and Rocchesso, 2014). However, speech communication studies suggest a more intimate link between the two processes (Kendon, 2004). Our study thus focused on the combination of manual gestures and non-speech vocalizations in the communication of sounds. We first collected a large database of vocal and gestural imitations of a variety of …
Comparing identification of vocal imitations and computational sketches of everyday sounds
2016
International audience; Sounds are notably difficult to describe. It is thus not surprising that human speakers often use many imitative vocalizations to communicate about sounds. In practice,vocal imitations of non-speech everyday sounds (e.g. the sound of a car passing by) arevery effective: listeners identify sounds better with vocal imitations than with verbal descriptions, despite the fact that vocal imitations are often inaccurate, constrained by the human vocal apparatus. The present study investigated the semantic representations evoked by vocal imitations by experimentally quantifying how well listeners could match sounds to category labels. Itcompared two different types of sounds…
Specific transfer effects following variable priority dual-task training in older adults
2016
International audience; Purpose: Past divided attention training studies in older adults have suggested that variable priority training (VPT) tends to show larger improvement than fixed priority training (FPT). However, it remains unclear whether VPT leads to larger transfer effects. Methods: In this study, eighty-three older adults aged between 55 and 65 received five 1-hour sessions of VPT, FPT or of an active placebo. VPT and FPT subjects trained on a complex dual-task condition with variable stimulus timings in order to promote more flexible and self-guided strategies with regard to attentional priority devoted to the concurrent tasks. Real-time individualized feedback was provided to e…
Covert digital manipulation of vocal emotion alter speakers' emotional states in a congruent direction
2016
International audience; Research has shown that people often exert control over their emotions. By modulating expressions, reappraising feelings, and redirecting attention, they can regulate their emotional experience. These findings have contributed to a blurring of the traditional boundaries between cognitive and emotional processes, and it has been suggested that emotional signals are produced in a goal-directed way and monitored for errors like other intentional actions. However, this interesting possibility has never been experimentally tested. To this end, we created a digital audio platform to covertly modify the emotional tone of participants' voices while they talked in the directi…