Psychological distance intervention reminders reduce alcohol consumption frequency in daily life.

Modifying behaviors, such as alcohol consumption, is difficult. Creating psychological distance between unhealthy triggers and one's present experience can encourage change. Using two multisite, randomized experiments, we examine whether theory-driven strategies to create psychological distance-mindfulness and perspective-taking-can change drinking behaviors among young adults without alcohol dependence via a 28-day smartphone intervention (Study 1, N = 108 participants, 5492 observations; Study 2, N = 218 participants, 9994 observations).

Acceptability, Feasibility, and Effectiveness of Immersive Virtual Technologies to Promote Exercise in Older Adults: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.

Context: This review aimed to synthesize the literature on the acceptability, feasibility, and effectiveness of immersive virtual technologies to promote physical exercise in older people.

Method: We performed a literature review, based on four databases (PubMed, CINAHL, Embase, and Scopus; last search: 30 January 2023). Eligible studies had to use immersive technology with participants aged 60 years and over.

Message self and social relevance increases intentions to share content: Correlational and causal evidence from six studies.

Information sharing within social networks can catalyze widespread attitudinal and behavioral change and the chance to share information with others has been characterized as inherently valuable to people. But what are the sources of value and how might they be leveraged to promote sharing? We test ideas from the value-based virality model that the value of sharing increases when people perceive messages as more relevant to themselves and to people they know, resulting in stronger intentions to share. We extend this work by considering how sharing context-broadcasting to a wide audience or narrowcasting directly to someone-may alter these relationships.

Impact of COVID-19 Nonpharmaceutical Interventions on the Extent of Norovirus Contamination in Oyster Production Areas in Ireland during Winter 2020 to 2021.

Abstract: A significant decrease in norovirus prevalence and concentration was observed in oyster production areas in Ireland during winter 2020 to 2021. Oyster production areas impacted by human wastewater discharges that had been undergoing norovirus surveillance since 2018 were investigated. Samples collected in the winter seasons of 2018 to 2019 and 2019 to 2020, prior to when the COVID-19 pandemic interventions were applied, showed a prevalence of 94.

Brain and behavior in health communication: The Canadian COVID-19 Experiences Project.

Background: Vaccine hesitancy and inconsistent mitigation behavior performance have been significant challenges throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. In Canada, despite relatively high vaccine availability and uptake, willingness to accept booster shots and maintain mitigation behaviors in the post-acute phase of COVID-19 remain uncertain. The aim of the Canadian COVID-19 Experiences Project (CCEP) is threefold: 1) to identify social-cognitive and neurocognitive predictors of mitigation behaviors, 2) to identify optimal communication strategies to promote vaccination and mitigation behaviors, and 3) to examine brain health outcomes of SARS-CoV-2 infection and examine their longevity.

Overlapping Functional Representations of Self- and Other-Related Thought are Separable Through Multivoxel Pattern Classification.

Self-reflection and thinking about the thoughts and behaviors of others are important skills for humans to function in the social world. These two processes overlap in terms of the component processes involved, and share overlapping functional organizations within the human brain, in particular within the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC). Several functional models have been proposed to explain these two processes, but none has directly explored the extent to which they are distinctly represented within different parts of the brain.

Health news sharing is reflected in distributed reward-related brain activity.

Neuroimaging has identified individual brain regions, but not yet whole-brain patterns, that correlate with the population impact of health messaging. We used neuroimaging to measure whole-brain responses to health news articles across two studies. Beyond activity in core reward value-related regions (ventral striatum, ventromedial prefrontal cortex), our approach leveraged whole-brain responses to each article, quantifying expression of a distributed pattern meta-analytically associated with reward valuation.

Estimating the distribution of norovirus in individual oysters.

Norovirus in oysters is a significant food safety risk. A recent ISO detection method allows for reliable and repeatable estimates of norovirus concentrations in pooled samples, but there is insufficient data to estimate a distribution of copies per animal from this. The spread of norovirus accumulated across individual oysters is useful for risk assessment models.

Efficacy of the Vertebral Body Stenting System for the Restoration of Vertebral Height in Acute Traumatic Compression Fractures in a Non-osteoporotic Population.

Introduction: To evaluate the effectiveness of percutaneous image-guided vertebral body stenting (VBS) at restoring vertebral height in acute, stable, traumatic thoracolumbar fractures in a young, non-osteoporotic population.

Materials And Methods: A single-centre retrospective review of all traumatic non-osteoporotic fractures treated with VBS between 2010 and 2017 was performed. Inclusion criteria included patients with recent (< 10 days), symptomatic and stable thoracolumbar compression fractures.

Neural valuation of antidrinking campaigns and risky peer influence in daily life.

Objective: Health behavior is affected by competing sources of influence like media messages and peers. In the context of alcohol consumption, college students are targeted by antidrinking media messages, but tend to have proalcohol conversations with peers. How do humans integrate competing sources of influence on daily behavior? We observed individuals under exposure to antialcohol media messages and proalcohol conversations and tested a "common neural value" account of how contradictory influences are integrated to affect behavior.

Adverse events associated with currently used medical treatments for cystinuria and treatment goals: results from a series of 442 patients in France.

Objective: To evaluate medical treatments, in terms of adverse events (AEs) and therapeutic goals, in a large series of patients with cystinuria.

Patients And Methods: Data from 442 patients with cystinuria were recorded retrospectively. Crystalluria was studied in 89 patients.

Cognitive regulation of ventromedial prefrontal activity evokes lasting change in the perceived self-relevance of persuasive messaging.

Persuasive messages can change people's thoughts, feelings, and actions, but these effects depend on how people think about and appraise the meaning of these messages. Drawing from research on the cognitive control of emotion, we used neuroimaging to investigate neural mechanisms underlying cognitive regulation of the affective and persuasive impact of advertisements communicating the risks of binge drinking, a significant public health problem. Using cognitive control to up-regulate (vs.

Neural predictors and effects of cognitive behavioral therapy for depression: the role of emotional reactivity and regulation.

Background: Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is an effective treatment for many patients suffering from major depressive disorder (MDD), but predictors of treatment outcome are lacking, and little is known about its neural mechanisms. We recently identified longitudinal changes in neural correlates of conscious emotion regulation that scaled with clinical responses to CBT for MDD, using a negative autobiographical memory-based task.

Methods: We now examine the neural correlates of emotional reactivity and emotion regulation during viewing of emotionally salient images as predictors of treatment outcome with CBT for MDD, and the relationship between longitudinal change in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) responses and clinical outcomes.

Neural Mechanisms of Emotion Regulation Moderate the Predictive Value of Affective and Value-Related Brain Responses to Persuasive Messages.

Emotionally evocative messages can be an effective way to change behavior, but the neural pathways that translate messages into effects on individuals and populations are not fully understood. We used a human functional neuroimaging approach to ask how affect-, value-, and regulation-related brain systems interact to predict effects of graphic anti-smoking messages for individual smokers (both males and females) and within a population-level messaging campaign. Results indicated that increased activity in the amygdala, a region involved in affective reactivity, predicted both personal quit intentions and population-level information-seeking and this was mediated by activity in ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), a region involved in computing an integrative value signal.

Brain Activity Tracks Population Information Sharing by Capturing Consensus Judgments of Value.

Information that is shared widely can profoundly shape society. Evidence from neuroimaging suggests that activity in the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC), a core region of the brain's valuation system tracks with this sharing. However, the mechanisms linking vmPFC responses in individuals to population behavior are still unclear.

Linguistic Synchrony Predicts the Immediate and Lasting Impact of Text-Based Emotional Support.

Emotional support is critical to well-being, but the factors that determine whether support attempts succeed or fail are incompletely understood. Using data from more than 1 million support interactions enacted within an online environment, we showed that emotional-support attempts are more effective when there is synchrony in the behavior of support providers and recipients reflective of shared psychological understanding. Benefits of synchrony in language used and semantic content conveyed were apparent in immediate measures of support impact (recipient ratings of support effectiveness and expressions of gratitude), as well as delayed measures of lasting change in the emotional impact of stressful life situations (recipient ratings of emotional recovery made at a 1-hr delay).

Negative Autobiographical Memory in Depression Reflects Elevated Amygdala-Hippocampal Reactivity and Hippocampally Associated Emotion Regulation.

Background: Dysregulated autobiographical recall is observed in major depressive disorder (MDD). However, it is unknown whether people with MDD show abnormalities in memory-, emotion-, and control-related brain systems during reactivity to and regulation of negative autobiographical memories.

Methods: We used functional magnetic resonance imaging to identify neural mechanisms underlying MDD-related emotional responses to negative autobiographical memories and the ability to downregulate these responses using a cognitive regulatory strategy known as reappraisal.

Longitudinal effects of cognitive behavioral therapy for depression on the neural correlates of emotion regulation.

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is effective for a substantial minority of patients suffering from major depressive disorder (MDD), but its mechanism of action at the neural level is not known. As core techniques of CBT seek to enhance emotion regulation, we scanned 31 MDD participants prior to 14 sessions of CBT using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and a task in which participants engaged in a voluntary emotion regulation strategy while recalling negative autobiographical memories. Eighteen healthy controls were also scanned.

Helping Others Regulate Emotion Predicts Increased Regulation of One's Own Emotions and Decreased Symptoms of Depression.

Although much research considers how individuals manage their own emotions, less is known about the emotional benefits of regulating the emotions of others. We examined this topic in a 3-week study of an online platform providing training and practice in the social regulation of emotion. We found that participants who engaged more by helping others (vs.

Emotion regulation deficits in regular marijuana users.

Effective regulation of negative affective states has been associated with mental health. Impaired regulation of negative affect represents a risk factor for dysfunctional coping mechanisms such as drug use and thus could contribute to the initiation and development of problematic substance use. This study investigated behavioral and neural indices of emotion regulation in regular marijuana users (n = 23) and demographically matched nonusing controls (n = 20) by means of an fMRI cognitive emotion regulation (reappraisal) paradigm.

Neural Predictors of Decisions to Cognitively Control Emotion.

Deciding to control emotional responses is a fundamental means of responding to environmental challenges, but little is known about the neural mechanisms that predict the outcome of such decisions. We used fMRI to test whether human brain responses during initial viewing of negative images could be used to predict decisions to regulate affective responses to those images. Our results revealed the following: (1) decisions to regulate were more frequent in individuals exhibiting higher average levels of activity within the amygdala and regions of PFC known a priori to be involved in the cognitive control of emotion and (2) within-person expression of a distributed brain pattern associated with regulating emotion predicted choosing to regulate responses to particular stimuli beyond the predictive value of stimulus intensity or self-reports of emotion.

Finding Positive Meaning in Negative Experiences Engages Ventral Striatal and Ventromedial Prefrontal Regions Associated with Reward Valuation.

Neuroimaging research has identified systems that facilitate minimizing negative emotion, but how the brain is able to transform the valence of an emotional response from negative to positive is unclear. Behavioral and psychophysiological studies suggest a distinction between minimizing reappraisal, which entails diminishing the arousal elicited by negative stimuli, and positive reappraisal, which instead changes the emotional valence of arousal from negative to positive. Here we show that successful minimizing reappraisal tracked with decreased activity in the amygdala, but successful positive reappraisal tracked with increased activity in regions involved in computing reward value, including the ventral striatum and ventromedial pFC (vmPFC).