Childhood maltreatment is associated with lower exploration and disrupted prefrontal activity and connectivity during reward learning in volatile environments.

Background: Atypical reward processing is implicated in a range of psychiatric disorders associated with childhood maltreatment and may represent a latent vulnerability mechanism. In this longitudinal study, we investigated the impact of maltreatment on behavioural and neural indices of reward learning in volatile environments and examined associations with future psychopathology assessed 18 months later.

Methods: Thirty-seven children and adolescents with documented histories of maltreatment (MT group) and a carefully matched group of 32 non-maltreated individuals (NMT group) aged 10-16 were presented with a probabilistic reinforcement learning task featuring a phase of stable and a phase of volatile reward contingencies.

Heightened response to positive facial cues as a potential marker of resilience following childhood adversity.

Childhood maltreatment profoundly influences social and emotional development, increasing psychiatric risk. Alterations in the implicit processing of threat-related cues following early abuse and neglect represent a marker of mental health vulnerability. Less is known about how early adversity influences the perception of positive social cues, despite their central role in establishing and maintaining social interactions and their association with better mental health outcomes.

Serotype-Dependent Effects on the Dynamics of Pneumococcal Colonization and Implications for Transmission.

Capsule-switch mutants were compared to analyze how serotype affects the success of Streptococcus pneumoniae (Spn) during colonization and transmission. Strains of multiple serotypes were tested in highly susceptible infant mice, both singly and in competitive assays. Our findings demonstrated a role of serotype, apart from genetic background, in competitive success of strains, but this depended on timing postinoculation.

Group B Streptococcus Capsular Serotype Alters Vaginal Colonization Fitness.

Background: Group B Streptococcus (GBS) remains a leading cause of infant morbidity and mortality. A candidate vaccine targets 6 GBS serotypes, offering a potential alternative to intrapartum antibiotic prophylaxis to reduce disease burden. However, our understanding of the contributions of specific capsule types to GBS colonization and disease remains limited.

Trust and childhood maltreatment: evidence of bias in appraisal of unfamiliar faces.

Background: Child maltreatment is associated with poorer social functioning and increased risk of mental health problems in adolescence and adulthood, but the processes underlying these associations remain unclear. Although crucial for establishing and maintaining relationships, trust judgements have not been experimentally investigated in children who have experienced abuse and neglect.

Methods: A community-based sample of 75 children aged 8-16 years with maltreatment documented on the basis of social services records, and a group of 70 peers matched on age, gender, cognitive ability, socioeconomic status, and ethnicity took part in the study.

Thinking about Others' Minds: Mental State Inference in Boys with Conduct Problems and Callous-Unemotional Traits.

Children with conduct problems (CP) and high levels of callous-unemotional traits (CP/HCU) have been found to have an intact ability to represent other minds, however, they behave in ways that indicate a reduced propensity to consider other people's thoughts and feelings. Here we report findings from three tasks assessing different aspects of mentalising in 81 boys aged 11-16 [Typically developing (TD) n = 27; CP/HCU n = 28; CP and low levels of callous-unemotional traits (CP/LCU) n = 26]. Participants completed the Movie Assessment of Social Cognition (MASC), a task assessing ability/propensity to incorporate judgements concerning an individual's mind into mental state inference; provided a written description of a good friend to assess mind-mindedness; and completed the Social Judgement Task (SJT), a new measure assessing mentalising about antisocial actions.

Autobiographical memory as a latent vulnerability mechanism following childhood maltreatment: Association with future depression symptoms and prosocial behavior.

Objectives: Childhood maltreatment is associated with altered neural reactivity during autobiographical memory (ABM) recall and a pattern of overgeneral memory (OGM). Altered ABM and OGM have been linked with psychopathology and poorer social functioning. The present study investigated the association between altered ABM and subsequent socio-emotional functioning (measured two years later) in a sample of adolescents with (N = 20; maltreatment group, MT) and without (N = 17; non-MT group) documented childhood maltreatment histories.

Association of Novel Virulence Factors With Pathogenesis in a Native Valve Infective Endocarditis Model.

() is an abundant oral commensal which can cause disseminated human infection if it gains access to the bloodstream. The most important among these diseases is infective endocarditis (IE). While virulence phenotypes of have been correlated to disease severity, genetic factors mediating these phenotypes, and contributing to pathogenesis are largely uncharacterized.

Developing an emotional coping skills workbook for inpatient psychiatric settings: a focus group investigation.

Background: Evidence suggests an unmet need for provision of psychological interventions in inpatient psychiatric settings. However, inpatient wards can present a challenging environment in which to implement interventions. The authors developed the Emotional Coping Skills workbook, a psychosocial intervention designed to overcome these challenges and provide inpatients with an opportunity for psychologically-informed therapeutic engagement.

The relation between television exposure and executive function among preschoolers.

This study investigated the relations between television exposure during the preschool years and the development of executive function (EF). Data were gathered from 107 parents of preschoolers who provided information on children's television viewing, background television exposure, exposure to specific televised content, and the age at which children began watching television. Preschoolers' EF was assessed via one-on-one interviews.