Objective: Mindfulness training has been shown to improve psychological well-being and physical health. One proposed pathway for the positive effects of mindfulness training is through the development of new emotion regulation strategies, such as the ability to experience emotions by observing and accepting them without judgment. Theoretically, this should facilitate recovery from negative emotional states; however, this has rarely been examined empirically.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is associated with impaired functioning and depression. Our aim was to examine relationships between OCD symptoms, depression and functioning before and after exposure and response prevention (ERP), a type of cognitive-behavioural therapy for OCD, specifically examining whether functioning, depression and other cognitive factors like rumination and worry acted as mediators.
Methods: Forty-four individuals with OCD were randomised to 4 weeks of intensive ERP treatment first (n = 23) or waitlist then treatment (n = 21).
Study Objectives: To investigate the comparative efficacy of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), Tai Chi Chih (TCC), and sleep seminar education control (SS) on the primary outcome of insomnia diagnosis, and secondary outcomes of sleep quality, fatigue, depressive symptoms, and inflammation in older adults with insomnia.
Design: Randomized controlled, comparative efficacy trial.
Setting: Los Angeles community.
Background: Stress is a common and costly behavioral health issue. Technology-based behavioral health programs (e.g.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAnn Behav Med
October 2011
Background: Poor sleep is prospectively linked to all-cause and cardiovascular mortality. Inflammatory processes may be an important biological mechanism linking poor sleep to cardiovascular disease. Such processes involve active participation of signaling molecules called cytokines in development of atherosclerotic plaques.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Problems with sleep are common in patients with SSc and impact daily function. Little research, however, has examined factors associated with sleep disruption in SSc. Therefore, the objective of this study was to investigate socio-demographic and medical factors associated with sleep disruption in SSc.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: We conducted a citation analysis to explore the impact of articles published in Health Psychology and determine whether the journal is fulfilling its stated mission.
Design: Six years of articles (N = 408) representing three editorial tenures from 1993-2003 were selected for analysis.
Main Outcome Measures: Articles were coded for several dimensions enabling examination of the relationship of article features to subsequent citations rates.
Psychoneuroendocrinology
May 2009
Experimental sleep deprivation in healthy humans affects levels of ghrelin and leptin, two primary hormones involved in energy balance that regulate appetite and body weight. No study to date has examined levels of these hormones in patients with chronic insomnia. In this study, men diagnosed with primary insomnia using DSM-IV criteria (n=14) and age and body weight comparable healthy control men (n=24) underwent polysomnography.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFStudy Objectives: To determine the efficacy of a novel behavioral intervention, Tai Chi Chih, to promote sleep quality in older adults with moderate sleep complaints.
Design: Randomized controlled trial with 16 weeks of teaching followed by practice and assessment 9 weeks later. The main outcome measure was sleep quality, as assessed by the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI).
Objective: Psychological stress is thought to aggravate disease activity in rheumatoid arthritis (RA), although the physiologic mechanisms are unclear. Tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNFalpha) is an inflammatory cytokine involved in the exacerbation of RA, and TNFalpha antagonists have emerged as efficacious treatments. The purpose of this study was to determine whether RA patients show increased monocyte production of TNFalpha following acute psychological stress and whether such responses are abrogated in RA patients taking TNFalpha antagonists.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjectives: This study examined whether chronic interpersonal stress is associated with cellular markers of inflammation and regulation of these responses by in vitro doses of glucocorticoids in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients. The association between these markers of inflammation and fatigue was also tested.
Methods: Fifty-eight RA patients completed up to 30 daily ratings of the stressfulness of their interpersonal relations.
Objective: To analyze sex differences in nocturnal vagal tone and cardiac sympathovagal balance during sleep in healthy men and women.
Methods: In two groups of healthy, non-obese adults (15 men and 14 women), sleep was polygraphically recorded and heart rate variability was assessed during an awake period prior to sleep and during sleep. Vagal tone was estimated by the high-frequency (HF) power component of heart rate variability, and sympathovagal balance was indexed by the ratio of low-frequency (LF) power to HF power.
Am J Physiol Regul Integr Comp Physiol
July 2007
Sex differences in the prevalence of inflammatory disorders exist, perhaps due to sex differences in cellular mechanisms that contribute to proinflammatory cytokine activity. This study analyzed sex differences of monocyte intracellular expression of IL-6 and its associations with reproductive hormones and autonomic mechanisms in 14 matched pairs of men and women (n = 28). Monocyte intracellular IL-6 production was repeatedly assessed over two circadian periods.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Gerontol A Biol Sci Med Sci
November 2006
Background: Aging is associated with increases of sympathetic nervous system activation implicated in the onset of hypertension and cardiovascular disease. The purpose of this study was to examine whether the practice of Tai Chi Chih (TCC), a movement-based relaxation practice, would acutely promote decreases of sympathetic activity in elderly persons.
Method: The sample included two groups of older men and women (age > or = 60 years): TCC practitioners (n = 19) and TCC-naïve participants (n = 13).
Cocaine dependence is associated with an increased risk of infectious diseases. The innate immune system triggers effector pathways to combat microbial pathogens through expression of tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha) and interleukin-6 (IL-6). It is not known whether cocaine alters the capacity of monocytes to respond to a bacterial challenge in humans.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjectives: To determine whether older adults with a history of depression show impairments in health functioning and sleep quality at a gradient between older adults with no history of depression and those with current major depression and to examine whether poor sleep quality contributes to declines in health functioning in addition to the contribution of depressive symptoms.
Design: Cross-sectional.
Setting: Three urban communities: Denver, Colorado, and Los Angeles and San Diego, California.
Objective: Structural validity for the Health Assessment Questionnaire-Disability Index (HAQ-DI) has recently been provided for patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The goal of the current study was to examine the structural validity of the HAQ-DI in patients with systemic sclerosis (SSc, scleroderma) and to compare its performance with that in patients with RA.
Methods: The HAQ-DI structural validity was first assessed in a sample of 100 scleroderma patients using confirmatory factor analysis.
Study Objectives: The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) is widely used to assess subjective sleep disturbances in psychiatric, medical, and healthy adult and older adult populations. Yet, validation of the PSQI single-factor scoring has not been carried out.
Design: The PSQI was administered as a self-report questionnaire.
Background: This study examined whether nocturnal vagal tone as indexed by the high-frequency (HF) power component of heart rate variability is related to measures of sleep depth and daytime perceptions of sleep quality, sleepiness, and fatigue in alcohol dependence.
Methods: Abstinent alcohol-dependent patients (n = 14) and comparison control subjects (n = 14) underwent all-night polysomnography along with assessment of heart rate variability during an awake period before sleep and during sleep. Sleep-quality perceptions, along with self-reported sleepiness and levels of energy and fatigue, were obtained in the morning.
Objective: This study examined immune, endocrine, and cardiovascular reactivity during stressful behavioral challenge in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) seropositive (HIV+) and seronegative (HIV-) men and women and assessed whether immunocellular reactivity was differentially associated with concomitant alterations in sympathetic response.
Methods: The 133 HIV+ [84 asymptomatic, 49 symptomatic] and 92 HIV- subjects completed a speech stress reactivity protocol.
Results: Immunocellular reactivity to the speech stressor did not differ among asymptomatic and symptomatic HIV+ groups; however, relative to seronegatives, reactivity differences were present.
Objective: The extensively used Health Assessment Questionnaire Disability Index (HAQ-DI) has been well received by the research and clinical community, notably because of its measurement strengths including reliability and stability of scores over time, utility in observational studies and clinical trials, predictive relationship with morbidity and mortality in rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and its translation for use in different countries. However, HAQ-DI scoring has not been validated. The purpose of this study was to examine the structural validity of the HAQ-DI and evaluate the latent factors underlying HAQ-DI scoring.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: This study was conducted to determine whether immune activation occurs in major depression, and to evaluate the associations between disordered sleep and markers of inflammation in patients with major depressive disorder.
Methods: All-night polysomnography was obtained in patients with acute Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition major depressive disorder (n = 22) and age-, gender-, and body weight-matched comparison controls (n = 18). After the onset of sleep, nocturnal serum levels of interleukin-6 (IL-6), soluble intercellular adhesion molecule (sICAM), monocyte chemotactic protein (MCP-1), and IL-6 soluble receptor (IL-6sR) were sampled.