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Biomedical subjects

M E Bates

Publications and source records attributed to M E Bates.

43 records · Page 3Linked to original sources
PubMed1991

Personality stability and adolescent substance use behaviors.

Several personality needs have consistently been identified as placing adolescents at heightened risk for the relatively intensive use of alcohol and other drugs. At the same time, little is known about the natural history of personality change during adolescence as it relates to substance use behaviors. Yet, this question is of clear importance to our understanding of personality risk factors for substance use because personality needs appear less temporally stable during adolescence than later in the life span. In this study, we use prospective longitudinal data to investigate the relation of high-risk personality needs to substance use in two groups of adolescents: those who maintained a temporally stable personality need structure across 3 years and those who showed considerable changes in personality needs during the same time interval. Subjects were 12, 15, or 18 years old at the first test time and 15, 18, or 21 years old, respectively, at the second test time. For subjects of both sexes, only those who maintained a temporally stable, low-risk personality profile showed quite conservative substance use patterns across time compared with all others. Generalized personality changes were linked to more intensive substance use behaviors in males, especially among those who had high levels of risky personality needs at the first test time. In contrast, personality change, per se, did not appear as relevant to females' alcohol and other drug use behaviors until combined with information regarding their level of high-risk personality needs. The results are discussed in terms of their implications for prevention and future research.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1990

Cognitive functioning in young "social drinkers": is there impairment to detect?

Literature on the cognitive effects of nonexcessive alcohol use suggests that relatively high-quantity-per-occasion use may be related to subsequent decreases in sober-state abstracting skills in adults, but provides no clear prediction for youth. The need to identify persistent alcohol-intake effects on cognition is particularly acute for the period of adolescence and young adulthood because even slight damage may impair developmentally significant skills. We examine the relation between multiple measures of neuropsychological status and both continuous and categorical measures of alcohol-use patterns in an age- and sex-stratified sample of 1,308 18-, 21-, and 24-year-olds. The results of correlational and hierarchial regression analyses suggest that cognitive performance bears little direct relation to drinking behaviors in young nonclinical males and females. Although the data provide no strong support for the hypothesis of a causal relationship between alcohol use and cognitive functioning, there is a slight suggestion that frequent high-quantity consumption may become a salient parameter of use as subjects age. Prospective longitudinal data are needed to explore the directional causality of effects.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

The effect of repeated occasions of alcohol intoxication on two processes involved in the visual discrimination of movement.

The focus of this study was the effect of repeated episodes of alcohol intoxication on two processes involved in visual movement discrimination: visual sensitivity and decision-making. Four female subjects were asked to discriminate between a stationary light signal and one that changed position in the center of a dark visual field. Prior to each of 15 alcohol testing sessions, a dose of .66 ml of 95% USP ethanol per kg body weight was administered to each subject and BAL was sampled frequently within sessions. Differences in subjects' pre- and postalcohol performance were evaluated within the framework of a psychophysical model that mathematically characterizes the problem of movement discrimination and yields independent estimates of visual sensitivity and decisional aspects of subjects' performance. Evidence for specificity in the development of sensory versus decisional process tolerance to intoxication effects was found. The major result was that each subject made large and statistically reliable shifts in decisional criteria during the time course of the blood alcohol curve within alcohol testing sessions, even when visual sensitivity had adapted to alcohol intake effects. The results of this study illustrate the utility of tracing acute intake effects over repeated occasions of intoxication, and empirically testing subjects' assumed decisional strategies when modeling these effects.

Adult↗
PubMed1977

Judgment of emotion among chronic schizophrenics.

This study investigated accuracy of judgment as to posed facial expressions and nonverbal scenes of various emotions. Ss were 16 male and 16 female chronic schizophrenics and a normal control group of equal size and sex composition. The results revealed that normal Ss were significantly more accurate than schizophrenics in identifying emotions from both posed photographs of the face and nonverbal videotape scenes. S sex was not found to affect differentially the schizophrenic or normal Ss' response accuracy to both the photographs and videotapes. Further, it was observed that both groups' accuracy improved when given multiple-choice alternatives to select from as contrasted to their open-ended free responses; this was especially true for the schizophrenic group. Teaching patients to identify and practice expressing discrete emotions was suggested.

Adult↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Infant disease patterns in northern Cameroon.

The epidemiology of common diseases of infants seen in district health service clinics in a culturally heterogeneous population in northern Cameroon was studied. Significantly higher incidences were found for respiratory tract infection in infants of non-Moslem households, and for diarrhoea in infants of Moslem households. A subsequent interview survey of parents of children aged 0-5 years revealed a higher prevalence of smokers and millet stalk kitchens in the compounds of non-Moslems. Other possible risk factors were explored. The findings indicated that in this area the influence of culture on disease in infants is strong, and epidemiological differences among cultural groups should be considered in the design of disease control programmes in the community.

Cameroon↗
PubMedDate not supplied

Early childhood feeding practices in northern Cameroon.

Following the identification of differences in disease patterns among infants from households of different social groups (Moslem and non-Moslem) in northern Cameroon, 534 mothers and their children 0-23 months old were studied to determine early childhood feeding practices in the 2 groups. Several significant differences were revealed. Compared with non-Moslem infants, Moslems were more likely to be given animal milk instead of breast milk before the age of 3 d. On average, millet pap was introduced to Moslem babies between their 1st and 2nd months and to non-Moslem babies between their 3rd and 4th months. Moslem mothers more commonly prepared pap with oil or cow butter as an ingredient. Moslem mothers also planned to wean their children at an earlier age than non-Moslems and were less likely to report boiling their children's drinking water. Moslem mothers of infants less than 5 months old were likely to believe their breast milk was insufficient. The implications of these findings on the higher incidence of infant diarrhoea, stunting and early childhood death among Moslems are discussed.

Age Factors↗