Facework,social politeness and the Alzheimer's patient

A recent paper by (Temple et al., 1999) investigating the politeness abilities of Alzheimer's sufferers has suggested that the sufferers they worked with were capable of employing politeness strategies towards their interlocutor. Given that politeness, according to (Brown and Levinson, 1987) revolves around face and that attending to another person's face requires the ability to take the other's role or perspective, Temple et al.'s findings would seem to contradict the findings of (Hamilton, 1988) who made the claim that Alzheimer's sufferers are unable to take the role of the other. Our proposal is that a more sophisticated view of politeness is required in identifying what the Alzheimer's patient is capable of. A refinement of the notion of politeness would also allow us to reconcile these two views. This refinement may be usefully achieved through employing the subdivision made by (Janney and Arndt, 1992) who propose that social politeness be distinguished from tact. In this approach, it is tact that involves facework while social politeness is more conventionalized or routinized. The distinction between tact and social politeness allows us to recognise certain politeness behaviours as not involving facework. Applying this distinction to our data, we find that our subject does engage in social politeness but, as one would expect from Hamilton's assumptions, she does not appear to be able to attend to the face of her interlocutors with much show of tact. However, in relation to facework, whilst she does not demonstrate much awareness of the need to protect the other's face, she does, in fact, engage with some sophistication in saving her own face. In this paper, we aim to examine not whether Alzheimer's Disease sufferers have the ability to be polite or not but which aspects of politeness remain after other aspects appear to have been lost.     

Paediatric Chromobacterium violaceum in Cambodia: the first documented case

Chromobacterium violaceum infection is rarely described in Southeast Asian children, which may be due partly to the lack of access to adequate microbiology facilities in many areas. This case report describes the first documented case to occur in a Cambodian child. An awareness of the disease and its manifestations is important as treatment can be difficult and may require prolonged courses of antimicrobials and surgery.     

Burkholderia pseudomallei detection in surface water in southern Laos using Moore's swabs

The causal agent of melioidosis, Burkholderia pseudomallei, has been cultured from paddy fields in the Lao PDR. We carried out a pilot study to examine the relationship between bacterial soil contamination and that of nearby surface waters in Saravane Province. Soil sampling was conducted at a depth of 30 cm (100 holes in a 45 × 45 m grid) at two sites, East and West Saravane. Moore's swabs were used for water sampling of paddy fields, lakes, rivers, boreholes, and storage tanks within 2 km of the two soil sampling sites. B. pseudomallei from soil and water were cultured on Ashdown's agar. Thirty-six percent and 6% of water samples collected around East and West Saravane, respectively, were culture positive for B. pseudomallei. Low pH and high turbidity were independently associated with culture of B. pseudomallei. Most positive water samples were from the Sedone River, downstream of the East Saravane site. Moore's swabs are simple and inexpensive tools for detecting B. pseudomallei in surface waters.     

Relationship between Assessed Emotion,Personality, Personality Disorder and Risk in Offenders with Intellectual Disability

In mainstream studies on offenders and on individuals with psychopathology, relationships have been found between personality characteristics, emotional problems and personality disorders. This study reviewed the relationships between the Emotional Problems Scale, two circumplex measures of personality, personality disorder assessments and risk assessments in 212 offenders with intellectual disability. Previous studies had established the reliability and validity of these measures with the client group. Strong relationships emerged between externalizing emotional problems and dominant and hostile personality dimensions with weaker but significant relationships between internalizing problems and submissive and hostile dimensions. Externalizing problems were strongly associated with risk for violence, while internalizing problems had a weaker but significant relationship with some historical and clinical risk scales. Dominant personality dimensions were associated with narcissistic personality disorder and nurturant personality dimensions negatively associated with anti-social personality disorder. It would seem that there are orderly, significant relationships among measures of personality, personality disorders, emotional problems and risk. We discuss the implications of emotional assessment for the evaluation of risk and prediction of treatment progress.     

Disgusted by Sexual Abuse: Exploring the Association Between Disgust Sensitivity and Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms Among Mothers of Sexually Abused Children

Nonoffending mothers of sexually abused children often exhibit high levels of posttraumatic stress (PTS) symptoms. Emerging evidence suggests that trait‐like individual differences in sensitivity to disgust play a role in the development of PTS symptoms. One such individual difference, disgust sensitivity, has not been examined as far as we are aware among victims of secondary traumatic stress. The current study examined associations between disgust sensitivity and PTS symptoms among mothers of sexually abused children (N = 72). Mothers completed the Impact of Event Scale‐Revised and the Three Domain Disgust Scale (Tybur, Lieberman, & Griskevicius, 2009). More than one third of mothers scored above a suggested cutoff (mean score = 1.5) for high levels of PTS symptoms. Hierarchical linear regression analysis results indicated that sexual disgust sensitivity (β = .39, p = .002) was associated with PTS symptoms (R² = .18). An interaction analysis showed that sexual disgust sensitivity was associated with maternal PTS symptoms only when the perpetrator was not biologically related to the child (β = ?.32, p = .047; R² = .28). Our findings suggested that sexual disgust sensitivity may be a risk factor for developing PTS symptoms among mothers of sexually abused children.     

Effects of Expanded Cardiac Rehabilitation on Psychosocial Status in Coronary Artery Disease with Focus on Type D Characteristics

Type D personality has been shown to increase the risk for cardiovascular events in patients with coronary artery disease (CAD). We investigated the effects of expanded cardiac rehabilitation on type D score and psychosocial characteristics in 224 CAD patients randomised to either expanded cardiac rehabilitation (stress management, increased physical training, stay at a “Patient Hotel” after discharge and cooking sessions), or routine rehabilitation. Follow-up was 1 year. At baseline patients with a high type D score [patients in the upper quartile of type D score (Q4) i.e., type D patients] had a lower sense of coherence (p < 0.001), a lower quality of life (p < 0.001), more depressive symptoms (p < 0.001) and increased anxiety (p < 0.001) as compared to patients with a low type D score (Q1). During follow-up, type D patients (Q4) randomised to intervention had significant decrements in type D-score (p < 0.01), depression and anxiety (p < 0.05) and an increment in quality of life scores (p < 0.001). Quality of life was also improved in control type D patients (Q4; p < 0.01) but no significant changes were seen in type D score, depression or anxiety. Expanded cardiac rehabilitation reduces type D score, anxiety and depressive symptoms, and improves the quality of life in type D patients.     

Practical approach for estimation of subcutaneous and visceral adipose tissue

OBJECTIVES: The first objective was to investigate the correlations between anthropometrical measurements and visceral adipose tissue (VAT) and subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT) in two cohorts differing in age using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) as reference. A second objective was to investigate the potential usage of abdominal diameters in practical estimation of adipose tissue compartments using these cohorts. METHODS: Measurements of body mass index, waist circumference, sagittal abdominal diameter (sagittal AD) and transverse abdominal diameter (transverse AD) were obtained from 336 volunteers of age 14-70 years. Manual measurements of VAT and SAT from single slice MRI at the L4-L5 level were used as reference. The abdominal diameters were measured from the MR images. Linear correlations between the anthropometrical measurements and the reference were studied. RESULTS: Sagittal AD showed the strongest correlation to VAT (r >or= 0 x 780, P<0 x 0001) and transverse AD was found to give information about the amount of SAT (r >or= 0 x 866, P<0 x 0001). The ellipse spanned by the sagittal AD and the transverse AD was strongly correlated to the total amount of adipose tissue (r >or= 0 x 962, P<0 x 0001). CONCLUSION: Strong correlations were found between sagittal and transverse abdominal diameters, assessed using MRI, and VAT and SAT, respectively. These results suggest the use of abdominal diameters in practical estimations of VAT and SAT depots.