Refine
Document Type
- Article (7)
Language
- English (7)
Has Fulltext
- yes (7)
Is part of the Bibliography
- no (7)
Keywords
- mental health (2)
- Cognitive impairment (1)
- Human behaviour (1)
- Mental health disorders (1)
- NMDA IgA/IgM antibodies (1)
- NMDA antibody (1)
- PRG-1 (1)
- Parkinson disease (1)
- Physical activity (1)
- Physical fitness (1)
Institute
- Medizin (5)
- Psychologie und Sportwissenschaften (3)
- Psychologie (1)
Previous research has demonstrated the efficacy of psychological interventions to foster resilience. However, little is known about whether the cultural context in which resilience interventions are implemented affects their efficacy on mental health. Studies performed in Western (k = 175) and Eastern countries (k = 46) regarding different aspects of interventions (setting, mode of delivery, target population, underlying theoretical approach, duration, control group design) and their efficacy on resilience, anxiety, depressive symptoms, quality of life, perceived stress, and social support were compared. Interventions in Eastern countries were longer in duration and tended to be more often conducted in group settings with a focus on family caregivers. We found evidence for larger effect sizes of resilience interventions in Eastern countries for improving resilience (standardized mean difference [SMD] = 0.48, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.28 to 0.67; p < 0.0001; 43 studies; 6248 participants; I2 = 97.4%). Intercultural differences should receive more attention in resilience intervention research. Future studies could directly compare interventions in different cultural contexts to explain possible underlying causes for differences in their efficacy on mental health outcomes.
Substantial evidence shows that physical activity and fitness play a protective role in the development of stress related disorders. However, the beneficial effects of fitness for resilience to modern life stress are not fully understood. Potentially protective effects may be attributed to enhanced resilience via underlying psychosocial mechanisms such as self-efficacy expectations. This study investigated whether physical activity and fitness contribute to prospectively measured resilience and examined the mediating effect of general self-efficacy. 431 initially healthy adults participated in fitness assessments as part of a longitudinal-prospective study, designed to identify mechanisms of resilience. Self-efficacy and habitual activity were assessed in parallel to cardiorespiratory and muscular fitness, which were determined by a submaximal step-test, hand strength and standing long jump test. Resilience was indexed by stressor reactivity: mental health problems in relation to reported life events and daily hassles, monitored quarterly for nine months. Hierarchical linear regression models and bootstrapped mediation analyses were applied. We could show that muscular and self-perceived fitness were positively associated with stress resilience. Extending this finding, the muscular fitness–resilience relationship was partly mediated by self-efficacy expectations. In this context, self-efficacy expectations may act as one underlying psychological mechanism, with complementary benefits for the promotion of mental health. While physical activity and cardiorespiratory fitness did not predict resilience prospectively, we found muscular and self-perceived fitness to be significant prognostic parameters for stress resilience. Although there is still more need to identify specific fitness parameters in light of stress resilience, our study underscores the general relevance of fitness for stress-related disorders prevention.
Resilience has been defined as the maintenance or quick recovery of mental health during and after times of adversity. How to operationalize resilience and to determine the factors and processes that lead to good long-term mental health outcomes in stressor-exposed individuals is a matter of ongoing debate and of critical importance for the advancement of the field. One of the biggest challenges for implementing an outcome-based definition of resilience in longitudinal observational study designs lies in the fact that real-life adversity is usually unpredictable and that its substantial qualitative as well as temporal variability between subjects often precludes defining circumscribed time windows of inter-individually comparable stressor exposure relative to which the maintenance or recovery of mental health can be determined. To address this pertinent issue, we propose to frequently and regularly monitor stressor exposure (E) and mental health problems (P) throughout a study's observation period [Frequent Stressor and Mental Health Monitoring (FRESHMO)-paradigm]. On this basis, a subject's deviation at any single monitoring time point from the study sample's normative E–P relationship (the regression residual) can be used to calculate that subject's current mental health reactivity to stressor exposure (“stressor reactivity,” SR). The SR score takes into account the individual extent of experienced adversity and is comparable between and within subjects. Individual SR time courses across monitoring time points reflect intra-individual temporal variability in SR, where periods of under-reactivity (negative SR score) are associated with accumulation of fewer mental health problems than is normal for the sample. If FRESHMO is accompanied by regular measurement of potential resilience factors, temporal changes in resilience factors can be used to predict SR time courses. An increase in a resilience factor measurement explaining a lagged decrease in SR can then be considered to index a process of adaptation to stressor exposure that promotes a resilient outcome (an allostatic resilience process). This design principle allows resilience research to move beyond merely determining baseline predictors of resilience outcomes, which cannot inform about how individuals successfully adjust and adapt when confronted with adversity. Hence, FRESHMO plus regular resilience factor monitoring incorporates a dynamic-systems perspective into resilience research.
The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting measures can be regarded as a global stressor. Cross-sectional studies showed rather negative impacts on people’s mental health, while longitudinal studies considering pre-lockdown data are still scarce. The present study investigated the impact of COVID-19 related lockdown measures in a longitudinal German sample, assessed since 2017. During lockdown, 523 participants completed additional weekly online questionnaires on e.g., mental health, COVID-19-related and general stressor exposure. Predictors for and distinct trajectories of mental health outcomes were determined, using multilevel models and latent growth mixture models, respectively. Positive pandemic appraisal, social support, and adaptive cognitive emotion regulation were positively, whereas perceived stress, daily hassles, and feeling lonely negatively related to mental health outcomes in the entire sample. Three subgroups (“recovered,” 9.0%; “resilient,” 82.6%; “delayed dysfunction,” 8.4%) with different mental health responses to initial lockdown measures were identified. Subgroups differed in perceived stress and COVID-19-specific positive appraisal. Although most participants remained mentally healthy, as observed in the resilient group, we also observed inter-individual differences. Participants’ psychological state deteriorated over time in the delayed dysfunction group, putting them at risk for mental disorder development. Consequently, health services should especially identify and allocate resources to vulnerable individuals.
No association between Parkinson disease and autoantibodies against NMDA-type glutamate receptors
(2019)
Background: IgG-class autoantibodies to N-Methyl-D-Aspartate (NMDA)-type glutamate receptors define a novel entity of autoimmune encephalitis. Studies examining the prevalence of NMDA IgA/IgM antibodies in patients with Parkinson disease with/without dementia produced conflicting results. We measured NMDA antibodies in a large, well phenotyped sample of Parkinson patients without and with cognitive impairment (n = 296) and controls (n = 295) free of neuropsychiatric disease. Detailed phenotyping and large numbers allowed statistically meaningful correlation of antibody status with diagnostic subgroups as well as quantitative indicators of disease severity and cognitive impairment.
Methods: NMDA antibodies were analysed in the serum of patients and controls using well established validated assays. We used anti-NMDA antibody positivity as the main independent variable and correlated it with disease status and phenotypic characteristics.
Results: The frequency of NMDA IgA/IgM antibodies was lower in Parkinson patients (13%) than in controls (22%) and higher than in previous studies in both groups. NMDA IgA/IgM antibodies were neither significantly associated with diagnostic subclasses of Parkinson disease according to cognitive impairment, nor with quantitative indicators of disease severity and cognitive impairment. A positive NMDA antibody status was positively correlated with age in controls but not in Parkinson patients.
Conclusion: It is unlikely albeit not impossible that NMDA antibodies play a significant role in the pathogenesis or progression of Parkinson disease e.g. to Parkinson disease with dementia, while NMDA IgG antibodies define a separate disease of its own.
Cultural and biographical influences on the expression of emotions manifest themselves in so-called “display rules.” These rules determine the time, intensity, and situations in which an emotion is expressed. To date, only a small number of empirical studies deal with this transformation of how migrants, who are faced with a new culture, may change their emotional expression. The present, cross-sectional study focuses on changes in anger expression as part of a complex acculturation process among Iranian migrants. To this end, Iranian citizens in Iran (n = 61), German citizens (n = 61), and Iranian migrants in Germany (n = 60) were compared in terms of anger expression behavior and acculturation strategy (assimilation, separation, integration, marginalization) was assessed among the migrants, using the Frankfurt Acculturation Scale (FRACC). A questionnaire developed in a preliminary study was used to measure anger expression via subjective anger experience and anger expression within 16 hypothetical situations. Multivariate Analyses of Variance (MANOVA) revealed that Iranians and Iranian migrants reported higher anger experience ratings than Germans and directed their anger more often inward (anger-in). Further findings suggest that transformation processes may have affected Iranian migrants in terms of suppressed anger (anger-in): Iranian migrants with a higher orientation toward German culture reported lower average anger-in scores. These results suggest that there was different emotional expression among Iranian migrants, depending on their acculturation. The results provide new insight into socio-cultural and individual adjustment processes.
Molecular cause and functional impact of altered synaptic lipid signaling due to a prg‐1 gene SNP
(2015)
Loss of plasticity-related gene 1 (PRG-1), which regulates synaptic phospholipid signaling, leads to hyperexcitability via increased glutamate release altering excitation/inhibition (E/I) balance in cortical networks. A recently reported SNP in prg-1 (R345T/mutPRG-1) affects ~5 million European and US citizens in a monoallelic variant. Our studies show that this mutation leads to a loss-of-PRG-1 function at the synapse due to its inability to control lysophosphatidic acid (LPA) levels via a cellular uptake mechanism which appears to depend on proper glycosylation altered by this SNP. PRG-1(+/-) mice, which are animal correlates of human PRG-1(+/mut) carriers, showed an altered cortical network function and stress-related behavioral changes indicating altered resilience against psychiatric disorders. These could be reversed by modulation of phospholipid signaling via pharmacological inhibition of the LPA-synthesizing molecule autotaxin. In line, EEG recordings in a human population-based cohort revealed an E/I balance shift in monoallelic mutPRG-1 carriers and an impaired sensory gating, which is regarded as an endophenotype of stress-related mental disorders. Intervention into bioactive lipid signaling is thus a promising strategy to interfere with glutamate-dependent symptoms in psychiatric diseases.