Growth in biomedical publications and scientific institutions in the Emirates (1998–2004): an Arabian renaissance?

OBJECTIVES: The United Arab Emirates is witnessing a rapid development in population and infrastructure, leading to an expansion in the educational field and the health care system, including universities, hospitals and research institutes. One potential outcome of this development is an increase in biomedical research publications. This was examined in this study. METHOD: Searches were made of three databases; PubMed, Current Contents and embase. All records from these databases related to the Emirates were downloaded and cross-referenced. Duplications were removed as well as erroneous records. A total of 1369 publications during 1998-2004 were obtained. RESULTS: Analysis of these records revealed that the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, located at the federal University, was responsible for 48% of all biomedical publications. All hospitals together accounted for 24%, while other universities and other research institutes accounted for 13 and 14% respectively. Further analysis revealed that there had been no further growth in the number of publications since 1998. This is in contrast to the increasing number of institutions that have been set up in the 1998-2004 period; from 29 to 112. CONCLUSION: The Emirates are witnessing a rapid development in universities, colleges, hospitals and research centres. The ratio of publications, as yet, has not kept up with this development. The enormous growth in institutes, however, may, in time, herald an Arabian renaissance in scientific activity and related publications.     

Continuing education module: finding the path

In this guest editorial, the challenges and pain of childbirth are presented as essential components of important life transitions. The role of pain in childbirth is explored. Childbirth is discussed as a "flow experience," and recommendations for assisting women to meet the challenges of labor and birth are presented.     

Temporal integration in Pavlovian appetitive conditioning in rats

We used an appetitive sensory preconditioning procedure to investigate temporal integration in rats in two experiments. In Phase 1, rats were presented with simultaneous compound trials on which a 10-sec conditioned stimulus (CS) X was embedded within a 60-sec CS A. In Group Early, CS X occurred during the early portion of CS A, whereas in Group Late, CS X occurred during the latter portion of CS A. In Phase 2, CS X was paired simultaneously with sucrose. On a subsequent test with CS A, the rate of magazine entries peaked during the early portions of the stimulus in Group Early and during the latter portions of the stimulus in Group Late (Experiments 1 and 2). Similar response peaks were not observed on tests with a control stimulus that had been presented in compound with a stimulus that did not signal reward (Experiment 2).     

WOMBAT A tool for mixed model analyses in quantitative genetics by restricted maximum likelihood （REML）

WOMBAT is a software package for quantitative genetic analyses of continuous traits, fitting a linear, mixed model; estimates of covariance components and the resulting genetic parameters are obtained by restricted maximum likelihood. A wide range of models, comprising numerous traits, multiple fixed and random effects, selected genetic covariance structures, random regression models and reduced rank estimation are accommodated. WOMBAT employs up-to-date numerical and computational methods. Together with the use of efficient compilers, this generates fast executable programs, suitable for large scale analyses. Use of WOMBAT is illustrated for a bivariate analysis. The package consists of the executable program, available for LINUX and WINDOWS environments, manual and a set of worked example, and can be downloaded free of charge from http://agbu. une.edu.au/~kmeyer/wombat.html     

QTL analysis for some quantitative traits in bread wheat

Quantitative trait loci (QTL) analysis was conducted in bread wheat for 14 important traits utilizing data from four different mapping populations involving different approaches of QTL analysis. Analysis for grain protein content (GPC) sug- gested that the major part of genetic variation for this trait is due to environmental interactions. In contrast, pre-harvest sprouting tolerance (PHST) was controlled mainly by main effect QTL (M-QTL) with very little genetic variation due to environmental interactions; a major QTL for PHST was detected on chromosome arm 3AL. For grain weight, one QTL each was detected on chromosome arms 1AS, 2BS and 7AS. QTL for 4 growth related traits taken together detected by different methods ranged from 37 to 40; nine QTL that were detected by single-locus as well as two-locus analyses were all M-QTL. Similarly, single-locus and two-locus QTL analyses for seven yield and yield contributing traits in two populations respectively allowed detection of 25 and 50 QTL by composite interval mapping (CIM), 16 and 25 QTL by multiple-trait composite interval mapping (MCIM) and 38 and 37 QTL by two-locus analyses. These studies should prove useful in QTL cloning and wheat improvement through marker aided selection.     

Teachers' education, classroom quality, and young children's academic skills: results from seven studies of preschool programs

In an effort to provide high-quality preschool education, policymakers are increasingly requiring public preschool teachers to have at least a Bachelor's degree, preferably in early childhood education. Seven major studies of early care and education were used to predict classroom quality and children's academic outcomes from the educational attainment and major of teachers of 4-year-olds. The findings indicate largely null or contradictory associations, indicating that policies focused solely on increasing teachers' education will not suffice for improving classroom quality or maximizing children's academic gains. Instead, raising the effectiveness of early childhood education likely will require a broad range of professional development activities and supports targeted toward teachers' interactions with children.     

Subtypes, severity, and structural stability of peer victimization: what does latent class analysis say?

This study uses latent class analysis (LCA) to empirically identify victimization groups during middle school. Approximately 2,000 urban, public middle school students (mean age in sixth grade = 11.57) reported on their peer victimization during the Fall and Spring semesters of their sixth, seventh, and eighth grades. Independent LCA analyses at each semester yielded 3 victim classes based on victimization degree rather than type (e.g., physical vs. relational). The most victimized class always represented the smallest proportion of the sample, decreasing from 20% in sixth grade to 6% by the end of eighth grade. This victimized class also always reported feeling less safe at school concurrently and more depressed than others 1 semester later, illustrating the validity of the LCA approach.     

Fetal heart rate and variability: stability and prediction to developmental outcomes in early childhood

Stability in cardiac indicators before birth and their utility in predicting variation in postnatal development were examined. Fetal heart rate and variability were measured longitudinally from 20 through 38 weeks gestation (n = 137) and again at age 2 (n = 79). Significant within-individual stability during the prenatal period and into childhood was demonstrated. Fetal heart rate variability at or after 28 weeks gestation and steeper developmental trajectories were significantly associated with mental and psychomotor development at 2 years (n = 82) and language ability at 2.5 years (n = 61). These data suggest that the foundations of individual differences in autonomic control originate during gestation and the developmental momentum of the fetal period continues after birth.     

Children with autism illuminate the role of social intention in word learning

To what extent do children with autism (AD) versus typically developing children (TD) rely on attentional and intentional cues to learn words? Four experiments compared 17 AD children (M age=5.08 years) with 17 language- and 17 mental-age-matched TD children (M ages=2.57 and 3.12 years, respectively) on nonverbal enactment and word-learning tasks. Results revealed variability in all groups, but particularly within the AD group. Performance on intention tasks was the most powerful predictor of vocabulary in the AD group but not in the TD groups. These findings suggest that word learning cannot be explained exclusively by either attentional or intentional processes, and they provide evidence of a special role for intentional understanding in the vocabulary development of AD children.     

Cognitive processes associated with child neglect

OBJECTIVE: To compare neglectful and non-neglectful mothers on information processing tasks related to child emotions, behaviors, the caregiving relationship, and recall of child-related information. METHOD: A natural group design was used. Neglectful mothers (N=34) were chosen from active, chronic caseloads; non-neglectful comparison mothers (N=33) were obtained from community agencies serving families. Participants were administered the IFEEL Picture task to assess maternal perceptions of infant emotions, eight vignettes of young children's behavior to assess attributions for child behavior across different scenarios, and a passage recall task to assess information processing problems. A measure of depression was used as a covariate to control for this variable. RESULTS: Neglectful mothers were significantly less likely to recognize infants' feelings of interest, more likely to see sadness and shame, more inaccurate at labeling infants' emotions, and had a more limited emotion vocabulary. They also made more internal and stable attributions for children's behaviors in situations where it was not clear whether a child was at risk of harm, and had poor recall of information. Depressive symptoms had little effect on these findings with the exception of information recall. CONCLUSIONS: Neglectful mothers show significant problems in information processing concerning their child's emotions and behaviors, which may affect their childrearing behavior. Cognitive-behavioral interventions to improve parents' abilities to recognize their child's emotions and to address maladaptive attributions may be of value.