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Biomedical subjects

B S McCann

Publications and source records attributed to B S McCann.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
PubMed1990

Absence of behavioral differences in young normotensive adults as a function of parental history of hypertension.

It has been previously demonstrated that mildly hypertensive subjects show deficits in their performance on various sensory-perceptual, cognitive, and psychomotor tests relative to matched normotensive control subjects, and that these behavioral deficits are reversible following treatment with antihypertensive medication. To examine whether these deficits are an outcome of elevated blood pressure, rather than preceding the hypertensive state, normotensive offspring of hypertensives and normotensives were administered a test battery. Results showed that with minor exceptions, offspring of hypertensives and offspring of normotensives performed similarly on the tests. These results suggest that the behavioral deficits seen in hypertensives arise subsequent to the onset of elevated blood pressure.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1990

Promoting adherence to low-fat, low-cholesterol diets: review and recommendations.

Evidence that lowering blood cholesterol levels reduces risk of coronary heart disease has prompted widespread recommendations that hyperlipidemic individuals undergo dietary therapy. However, the extent to which people can adopt and maintain diets to lower lipids is unclear. In our article, we review what is currently known regarding adherence to low-fat diets and present an approach to dietary counseling for lowering cholesterol that incorporates elements of behavioral self-management and social learning theory. We discuss specific recommendations for counseling hyperlipidemic patients based on the Dietary Alternatives Study. Recommendations include providing patients with an adequate knowledge base to make dietary changes, using goal setting and self-monitoring to help patients initiate dietary changes, enlisting support from the patient's family, and enhancing self-efficacy to promote long-term dietary maintenance.

Cholesterol, Dietary↗
PubMed1987

Gender differences in the relationship between hostility and the type A behavior pattern.

A group of 97 male and 111 female undergraduates completed the Jenkins Activity Survey, the Framingham Type A Scale, the Adjective Checklist Type A Scale, the Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, and the Buss-Durkee Hostility Inventory. A factor analysis revealed three dimensions: Anger-Emotionality, Anger-Aggression, and Residual Pattern A. All Type A measures loaded highly on the Type A factor, with the Jenkins Activity Survey loading the highest. The Framingham Type A Scale was related to Anger-Emotionality, the Adjective Checklist Type A Scale was related to Anger-Aggression, and the Jenkins Activity Survey was related to neither of the anger dimensions. Women scored higher than men on Anger-Emotionality and the Guilt, Resentment, and Irritability subscales and lower than men on the Assaultiveness subscale. Women showed higher correlations between Type A and the Guilt subscale, and men between Type A and the Suspiciousness subscale. We conclude that Type A is a multidimensional construct that manifests itself differently in men and women.

Adult↗
PubMed1984

Effect of meditation training on aspects of coronary-prone behavior.

52 undergraduates who had volunteered to receive meditation training were placed into either high or low time-urgency groups based on their scores on Factor S of the Jenkins Activity Survey. Subjects then either received training in Clinically Standardized Meditation followed by 3 1/2-wk. of practice or waited for training during that period. Analyses of scores on a time-estimation task and of self-reported hostility during an enforced waiting task indicated that meditation significantly altered subjects' perceptions of the passage of time and reduced impatience and hostility resulting from enforced waiting.

Behavior↗
PubMed1982

Anagram solution time and effects of distraction, sex differences, and anxiety.

A single-solution anagram task was administered to high and low test-anxious 32 male and 32 female undergraduates under conditions of high and low external distraction. No significant main effects were found linking solution times to either test-anxiety level or the presence or absence of distracting stimuli. Following a planned post hoc analysis which assigned the anagrams into 'hard' or 'easy' categories, a significant main effect for level of test anxiety was found for the 'hard' anagrams, indicating that test anxiety debilitates performance only when the criterion task is especially difficult. Difficulty of anagrams also significantly interacted with subjects' sex, test anxiety, and distraction. The results are discussed in terms of the hypotheses that distracting stimuli may produce increases in arousal during difficult tasks and that these increments may either compromise or improve performance, depending upon the level of test anxiety which is viewed as a determinant of the initial arousal level of the subject.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

In vivo distraction-coping in the treatment of test anxiety.

Two groups (N = 19) of clinically test anxious college students received a common core treatment program of cognitive behavior therapy, progressive muscular relaxation training, and thermal biofeedback assisted relaxation training. The experimental group received an additional treatment component that consisted of in vivo distraction-coping training designed to facilitate focusing attentional processes onto task relevant variables and away from external distractors and dysfunctional self-statements. The overall efficacy of the program was demonstrated with reductions in test, trait and state anxiety, and increases in the rationality of personal belief systems. Performance on an anagram solution task conducted under highly distracting conditions and evaluative interactions was improved significantly, as was motoric performance on a manual dexterity task. In vivo distraction-coping was not found to result in more efficacious treatment as measured by self-report and performance variables.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1981

Hemispheric asymmetries and early infantile autism.

The observation that language disorders constitute a major symptom of early infantile autism has led some researchers to speculate that the autistic syndrome may be a result of brain damage to the left hemisphere. Such speculation has fostered a number of studies in which attempts have been made to link autism with ostensibly positive signs of left hemisphere damage, such as left-handedness and preferences for "right hemisphere" functional and cognitive activities. In the present review, contributions to this area are systematically reviewed. Studies attempting to demonstrate that an unusually high incidence of left-handedness occurs in autistic samples are examined. Functional and morphological studies examining patterns of asymmetry in autistic samples are reviewed. It is shown that most studies on handedness fail to account adequately for the role that age of subjects may play in the manifestation of left-handedness. A simple cause-and-effect model of abnormal cerebral asymmetry and autism is rejected in favor of a more integrative yet parsimonious model that specifically attempts to explain the language disorder common to autism.

Adolescent↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Familial aggregation of blood pressure and heart rate responses during behavioral stress.

Parent-offspring and sibling resemblances in blood pressure and heart rate responses to behavioral stress were evaluated in a sample of 142 families residing in an upper-middle-class community in the Pittsburgh metropolitan area between 1983 and 1985. The sample consisted of 121 daughters and 96 sons ranging in age from 7 to 18 years, and 141 mothers and 119 fathers ranging in age from 31 to 62 years. Three stressors were presented to all participants: serial subtraction, mirror image tracing, and isometric handgrip exercise. Multivariate analyses of the stress responses were based on maximum likelihood estimations of the magnitude of association, which provided collective significance tests, and were adjusted for familial resemblance of resting pressure and heart rate as well as body mass index. These analyses showed significant parent-offspring and sibling associations in resting blood pressure and body mass index, which replicate those found in previous epidemiological investigations. The novel findings in this study were the sibling similarities in heart rate responses to mirror image tracing and in systolic blood pressure responses to isometric handgrip exercise. An analysis of a subset of the sample--only those nonmedicated parents compliant with instructions not to smoke or drink caffeinated or alcoholic beverages for 3 hr prior to testing and their children--showed a parent-offspring resemblance in systolic blood pressure responses to isometric exercise. This analysis, along with the significant sibling association from the full sample, suggests that systolic blood pressure responses to static exercise might aggregate in the family. The results are discussed in light of previous twin data. The relative paucity of significant parent-offspring associations of physiological parameters during serial subtraction and mirror image tracing tasks implies that non-familial influences are most important in determining cardiovascular responses to psychological stress.

Adolescent↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Changes in plasma lipids and dietary intake accompanying shifts in perceived workload and stress.

Plasma lipids, dietary intake, and self-reported stress and workload were assessed in 14 employees twice before major work deadlines (high workload), and once during a comparatively quiescent period of work (low workload). Increases in self-reported stress and workload between the high and low workload periods were significantly positively associated with increases in plasma total cholesterol, although lipid levels were not increased in the group as a whole during the high workload periods. Dietary intake of calories, total fat, and percentage of calories from fat were significantly higher during high workload during a period of high workload is associated with elevated total cholesterol and that dietary intake of foods which raise cholesterol levels is also increased. Further studies of larger groups of subjects may be required to show a frank increase in cholesterol with increased workload.

Adult↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Psychosocial factors associated with cardiovascular reactivity in older adults.

This study examined associations of psychosocial factors with cardiovascular reactivity in two groups of men and women--spouse caregivers of individuals with Alzheimer's disease (M age = 69.4 N = 82) and controls (M age = 68.5, N = 78) group-matched for age and gender. Cardiovascular responses to an emotional task (speech sample about one's spouse) yielded higher systolic and diastolic blood pressures (SBP, DBP) than a spoken cognitive task, which in turn yielded higher BPs and heart rate (HR) than the baseline rest period. HR was greater in response to the two tasks than in response to the baseline period, but it did not differ across tasks. Regression models of SBP, DBP, and HR reactivity in response to the two tasks demonstrated that after controlling for hypertension and gender, combinations of hostility, anger expression, avoidance coping, Type A behavior and Expressed Emotion (criticism) explained more reactivity in response to the emotional (8-12%) than the cognitive task (4-7%). Caregivers were more reactive than controls only if they were hypertensive. Psychosocial factors may be as important in explaining reactivity in older adults as in younger adults.

Adaptation, Psychological↗