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PubMed1991

Disciplines within general practice.

The disciplines within general practice derive partly from its community setting, and partly from the nature of professional expertise. The maladies range from a high prevalence of low risk, self-limited illness to a low prevalence of high risk, persistent disease. Each set calls on different knowledge and skills. The setting offers the substrate for studying social and behavioural sciences and community health development in action. Choosing a few particular fields, and developing those with rigour, could strengthen general practice as a discipline with special insights and skills to offer all branches of clinical practice. Four fields of activity have been identified. In each, general practice has a clear responsibility and opportunity. I have suggested some knowledge and skill areas for their success--clinical 'working' knowledge, decision making and judgment, predictive knowledge, planning knowledge, calibration of investigators, intuitive knowledge, local knowledge, leadership skills and people management, measurement of burden of illness, calculation of cost-benefit trade-offs, building of local databases, re-learning fine discrimination in clinical perception, and understanding of community development. These subjects have not been part of formal medical education, or of much academic study in family practice. Despite their being central to the success of daily practice, the curriculum is silent about the study of these areas of practical knowledge, reasoning, judgment and skill. Worse, we do not have a common language to express clearly what we are talking about. Experience and skill lie within the practitioner, and are used in practical, concrete situations.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Family Practice↗
PubMed1990

Through the lens of the artist-scientist: reflections for the pediatric oncology nurse.

Science and art need not be in conflict because both require use of imagination, cognitive insight, discipline, and creative application. Conceptual shifts in neuroscience have offered new validity to intuitive beliefs regarding the mind-body unit. One example is the articulation of a neuroimmunomodulatory mechanism of tumor growth. Another critical scientific advancement is the delineation of human physiologic circadian rhythmicity. This emergent discipline asserts the time-based pattern of dynamic physiologic functioning, and thereby embraces the changing, unique, yet predictable human condition. A chronobiology of cancer is now documented and merits the clinician's attention. The nature of time creates a natural bridge between this leading edge endeavor of science and the arts; this bridge is most notably found in music. Each of these paradigms witnesses to the reality that the experience of time is frequently nonlinear. Expression of form and symbolism characterize art and serve as its vehicle. If we dare to become more aware of our experience and the tools of mind, body, spirit, and senses in ourselves and in others, we will come to view our sensate selves as possessing stature equal to that of such biologic measurements as pressure and white blood count.

Circadian Rhythm↗
PubMed2001

Joseph Hooker: the making of a botanist.

Joseph Hooker became one of the most influential botanists of his day. He is best remembered as a friend of Charles Darwin and an early advocate of natural selection. However, after returning to Britain from his first major voyage, Hooker spent years struggling to find a paid position that would allow him to pursue his studies of plant classification and distribution. As he worked to establish himself, he also helped transform the status of botany as a discipline. In all his efforts, Hooker relied on a network of unpaid, colonial collectors, whose often-forgotten contributions to Victorian natural history are vital to the understanding of the professionalization of the sciences in the 19th century.

Botany↗
PubMed1995

The reflective educator.

Since the Boulder conference on training in clinical psychology in 1949, at least 13 national conferences have been convened to examine issues in training for practice in psychology, all based on the assumption that extensive training is required to develop professional skills in psychotherapy, psychodiagnosis, and related professional functions. This assumption is challenged by a large body of research that fails to show any relationship between training and efficacy in common forms of practice. Educators of professional psychologists are urged to heed the challenge closely and examine its implications critically. At the same time, educators of researchers in psychology are encouraged to examine common assumptions about the nature of practice in psychology and to consider conceptions of professional work that emphasize reflection in action and disciplined inquiry, rather than psychotherapy and psychodiagnosis, as defining features. Education for practice is neither science nor art, but a profession in itself. When the educational process is approached from this vantage point, novel opportunities for systematic investigation emerge. Decisive studies of the appropriate kind have yet to be done.

Curriculum↗
PubMed2001

On mental events, disciplinary boundaries, and reductionism: a reply to Plaud.

Plaud's (2001) radical behavioral manifesto suggests that a psychological science based exclusively upon the study of environment-behavior functional contingencies would yield a discipline unencumbered by mentalism, vaguely delineated disciplinary boundaries, or inappropriate reductionism. In reply, we note that: (a) mental events-e.g., thoughts and feelings-are increasingly accessible to objective investigation, and provide an observable proximal causal mechanism for the environmental selection of behavior; (b) the call for pristine disciplinary boundaries is anachronistic, inasmuch as progress in the natural sciences has engendered disciplinary boundaries that are increasingly porous; (c) cognitive neuroscience facilitates a comprehensive understanding of complex human behavior by mapping out the relationship between such behavior and underlying brain events, thereby engaging in an appropriate form of reductionism (constitutive reductionism) that has become a hallmark of the natural sciences; and (d) ironically, it is radical behaviorism, in its disavowal of the informational level of complexity instantiated in brain events, that engages in inappropriate eliminative reductionism (i.e., reducing neural information to "nothing but" its underlying bring states).

Behaviorism↗
PubMed2000

[Is there a place for humanistic dimension in medical education?].

Inspired by the concept of "two cultures", coined by C.P. Snow, this paper discusses the role of the humanities in relation to the natural sciences in a recently (since 1993) revised medical curriculum at the Faculty of Medicine in Trondheim, Norway. A concept of a "third culture" is identified as well: community medicine in a broad sense, disciplines dealing with health, illness and disease in the context of society and the environment. The implementation of the new curriculum was affected by intended and unintended social forces. The result was a hybrid model rather than the planned "pure" problem-based model. The humanities and "third culture" disciplines tended to yield to the pressure from the basic sciences when numbers of formal lectures were strictly limited, while the basic sciences themselves felt cut short by clinical disciplines. Problem-based learning in groups did seem efficient in basic sciences and clinical subjects, but not for the humanities or third culture disciplines. This apparent limitation in the problem-based approach was probably due to contextual factors, rather than inherent in the method itself.

Concept Formation↗
PubMed1992

Threats to the world eco-system: a role for the social scientists.

This paper seeks to identify some of the major threats to our fragile eco-system through human actions. We have sought to highlight that since these threats to our composite ecological heritage are global in nature, our responses shall have to be at the global level. We have tried to analyse a role the social scientists can exercise in response to these threats. We have merely shown possible responses within their professional disciplines. Can they play an activist's role? The paper does not prescribe any push-button role while emphasizing role of social scientists in environmental education. Every discipline among the social sciences will need to carve out its own role keeping in view local conditions. The current stocktaking of the situation under the UNCED process may require the international community to review existing institutional structures in the field or create new ones.

Climate↗
PubMed2003

What is primary care informatics?

Primary care informatics is an emerging academic discipline that remains undefined. The unique nature of primary care necessitates the development of its own informatics discipline. A definition of primary care informatics is proposed, which encompasses the distinctive nature of primary care. The core concepts and theory that should underpin it are described. Primary care informatics is defined as a science and as a subset of health informatics. The proposed definition is intended to focus the development of a generalizable core theory for this informatics subspecialty.

Decision Making, Organizational↗
PubMed2006

Personality traits and university program.

Participants were 147 undergraduates majoring in programs classified as more professional (education, n = 28; business, n = 33) or less professional (natural sciences, n = 36; social science, n = 50) and more people-oriented (education, social sciences) or less people-oriented (business, natural sciences). They completed self-report tests for 13 personality constructs (five from Goldberg's version of the Five Factor Model, three from Eysenck and Eysenck's theory, and five others). Students in less professional disciplines scored higher on openness to experience (intellect/imagination) than those in more professional disciplines. Students in more people-oriented disciplines scored higher on empathy than those in less people-oriented disciplines. Women scored higher than men on conscientiousness, industriousness, and empathy, but lower than men on independence. Critical comments are offered and suggestions for research are made.

Adult↗
PubMedDate not supplied

[Current developments in genetics and their implications concerning the problems of social deviations].

A review of historical developments in the field of human genetics reveals much conflict between those espousing and hereditarian position and those maintaining an environmentalist point of view. A confusion of political, propaganda, and ideological objectives with those of science has had deleterious effects on the field of human genetics, and upon the willingness of some disciplines to accept genetic contributions to the understanding of human behavior. Modern thinking in behavioral genetics rejects the Nature-Nurture dichotomy as incorrect and meaningless. The phenotype cannot be inherited; it develops as a function of interactions between the genotype and the environment. It is convenient to think of hereditary contributions to behavioral traits as fixing a reaction range; the genotype may be viewed as determining an indefinite but nevertheless circumscribed assortment of phenotypes. There have been numerous studies seeking to ascertain the genetic factors in a variety of mental disorders. The mental disorder most thoroughly studied from a genetic standpoint is schizophrenia. Three recent studies of adoptees, two in Denmark and one in America, have indicated the importance of hereditary factors in schizophrenia. Biological relatives of adoptees diagnosed as schizophrenic were more likely themselves to have suffered schizophrenic-spectrum disorders than were biological relatives of non-schizophrenic adoptees. Adoptees whose biological parents were schizophrenic or manic depressive were more likely to themselves be diagnosed schizophrenic than were adoptees whose biological parents had no psychiatric history. Children born to hospitalized schizophrenic women and who were placed for adoption shortly after birth were more likely to be schizophrenic than were matched control adoptees born to non-schizophrenic mothers. In studies conducted in Denmark, Schulsinger has also employed the adoptee method in studies of psychopathy. Diagnostic criteria were developed to reliably identify 57 cases of psychopathy from among 507 adoptees with known mental disorders. A non-psychopathic group of matched control adoptees was also formed. Mental illness among the relatives of these adoptee cases (biological and adoptive relatives) was ascertained through a careful search of psychiatric records. Psychopathic spectrum disorders were found to be more than twice as prevalent among biological relatives of the psychopathic index cases than was the case for biological relatives of the control cases. The percentage of affected cases among adoptive relatives was nearly equal for both study groups. Thus, this study provides a demonstration of the possible importance of genetic factors in the etiology of psychopathy. Other attempts to assess hereditary and constitutional aspects of criminal behavior have been made. These include twin studies and also Eysenck's study of the heritability of behavioral traits including extraversion, introversion, and emotionality.

Adoption↗
PubMed1983

Patriarchy and phantasy: a conception of psychoanalytic sociology.

The nature versus nurture controversy in the history of the social sciences is compared with the heredity versus environment debate in the history of psychoanalysis. Generally, psychoanalysis addresses the question of human thought in contrast to the social disciplines, which examine human behavior. This division of science may be considered the representation of a fundamental dichotomy between internal (latent) and external (manifest) aspects characteristic of human existence. This universal duality is based on the division between the sexes, the union of which reproduces life. This paper attempts to draw attention to the common structure of the mind and society by showing that the same pattern of manifest and latent content exists within each entity. The manifest aspect of existence is reflected in patriarchal social structure and the latent aspect in the structure of unconscious phantasy. These aspects are dialectically interrelated in that patriarchy is the manifest form of phantasy and phantasy the latent form of patriarchal order. This model of the integration of psychoanalysis and sociology is based on the work of Juliet Mitchell, particularly Psychoanalysis and Feminism. Psychoanalytic sociology is defined as a discipline that investigates the relationship between mental life and social organization.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2002

'Molecules and monkeys': George Gaylord Simpson and the challenge of molecular evolution.

In this paper, I analyze George Gaylord Simpson's response to the molecularization of evolutionary biology from his unique perspective as a paleontologist. I do so by exploring his views on early attempts to reconstruct phylogenetic relationships among primates using molecular data. Particular attention is paid to Simpson's role in the evolutionary synthesis of the 1930s and 1940s, as well as his concerns about the rise of molecular biology as a powerful discipline and world-view in the 1960s. I argue that Simpson's belief in the supremacy of natural selection as the primary driving force of evolution, as well as his view that biology was a historical science that seeks ultimate causes and highlights contingency, prevented him from acknowledging that the study of molecular evolution was an inherently valuable part of the life sciences.

Animals↗
PubMed2000

Is telemedicine a subset of medical informatics?

Informatics has a key characteristic of a new discipline in a technically transient environment--there is no universal definition of it. This is not surprising, given its complex and diverse nature. In a broad sense informatics is the interface between developing technologies and the decision sciences, in particular clinical sciences. Telemedicine has no universally accepted definition either. Telemedicine requires the use of electronic communication networks for the transmission of information and data related to the diagnosis and treatment of, as well as education about, medical conditions. The debate ensues over whether it is or is not a subset of medical informatics. The care of the elderly diploma programme is a telemedicine project within the department of family medicine at the University of Alberta; it is a distance learning programme directed towards educating and training physicians in rural Alberta. This project provided us with the practical experience of addressing both informatics and telemedicine issues jointly.

Aged↗
PubMed2005

Synthetic biology.

Chemistry is a broadly powerful discipline in contemporary science because it has the ability to create new forms of the matter that it studies. By doing so, chemistry can test models that connect molecular structure to behaviour without having to rely on what nature has provided. This creation, known as 'synthesis', began to be applied to living systems in the 1980s as recombinant DNA technologies allowed biologists to deliberately change the molecular structure of the microbes that they studied, and automated chemical synthesis of DNA became widely available to support these activities. The impact of the information that has emerged has made biologists aware of a truism that has long been known in chemistry: synthesis drives discovery and understanding in ways that analysis cannot. Synthetic biology is now setting an ambitious goal: to recreate in artificial systems the emergent properties found in natural biology. By doing so, it is advancing our understanding of the molecular basis of genetics in ways that analysis alone cannot. More practically, it has yielded artificial genetic systems that improve the healthcare of some 400,000 Americans annually. Synthetic biology is now set to take the next step, to create artificial Darwinian systems by direct construction. Supported by the National Science Foundation as part of its Chemical Bonding program, this work cannot help but generate clarity in our understanding of how biological systems work.

Animals↗
PubMed1990

[The cell theory--history, present state and prospects (on the 150th anniversary of the development of the cell theory)].

The main stages of history of this most important biological conception are presented and the state of the modern cell theory and its future prospects are considered. Since 1839, when T. Schwann expounded his conception of the cell, a long pathway in cognition of the cell function and organization has been covered. From the original picture of the complex organism as a "cellular state", made up of relatively independent "elementary organisms", i.e. cells the modern biology has come to the idea of the cell as an integral system either being a part of a complex organism, or living free in the nature (protists). The cell represents certain qualitatively peculiar level in a complex evolutionary established hierarchy of biological systems. Some particular tight relations, existing between cytology, as a fundamental biological science and molecular biology, genetics, ecology and other biological disciplines are considered. The importance of the cell conception is ascertained for practical aims, especially in medicine.

Animals↗
PubMed2005

European plant science: a field of opportunities.

Plants have a pivotal role in eco- and agricultural systems. Genomics is driving a rapid expansion of our understanding of how genes, individually and in networks, determine plant function. Technological developments in breeding and genomics are providing strategies to translate this knowledge into crop improvement. The possibilities range from improvement of existing crops and the systematic use of natural diversity through to the domestication of completely new species. As examples of possible goals, it is discussed how profiling of composition will integrate plant breeding and agronomic practice with emerging knowledge about nutrition and health, how improved and novel crops will contribute to the creation of new bio-based economies revolving around plant products, and how advances in our knowledge about plant-environment and plant-pathogen interactions will provide novel strategies to stabilize agricultural yield in a fluctuating environment and contribute to integrated approaches in which modern agriculture is carried out in concert with the environment. In addition, knowledge generated by plant science will be needed to monitor, understand, and cope with climate change and its impact on agriculture and ecosystems. Realization of these goals will require close interactions with related disciplines including agronomy and ecology. Further, it will be important to continue and deepen open support for research in the developing world.

Agriculture↗
PubMed1992

Genetics and biology: a comment on the significance of the Elston-Stewart algorithm.

This article recounts the background to the development of the Elston-Stewart algorithm for the genetic analysis of pedigree data. The algorithm can be used in the context of two contrasting research programmes. The first approach is analytical and reductionist. Traditional biological disciplines, such as physiology, embryology and comparative biology, describe phenomenological domains in which biological organisms are treated as complex systems with emergent properties. In the reductionist approach, these biological domains are largely abandoned in favour of descriptions in the domain of the component elements of these systems, resulting in a concentration on molecular genetics as the central object of biological science. In the second approach, it is explicitly recognized that genes and molecules, per se, cannot be explanatory with respect to emergent systemic properties. However, since the genetic variation which occurs in natural populations can influence virtually every aspect and level of biological organization, from cell lineages to ecology, the study of such variation opens new possibilities for establishing meaningful articulations between the various biological disciplines. The author's expressed preference is for the second alternative.

Algorithms↗
PubMed1998

Curriculum integration in nutrition and mathematics.

Today's school-aged children face a multitude of health issues that affect their well-being and academic performance. Partnerships have developed between health and education agencies to help American children succeed at math and science and to prepare them to make healthful, lifelong decisions. Curriculum integration provides a framework for children to apply knowledge from several disciplines and to use this knowledge to solve real-life problems at work and at play. Goals for instruction focus on the needs not only of the individual but also of society. Nutrition science and mathematics form a natural partnership. Nutrition science incorporates numerous mathematical concepts and procedures such as sorting, classifying, statistics, probability, estimation, and rates and proportion. In preparation for participation in a global and technological society that will require citizens to be quantitative thinkers, educators must endeavor to assist all children in becoming adults who are mathematically literate and competent.

Adolescent↗