Publications by authors named "Valentina Paz"

Social comparison is central in human life and can be especially challenging in depression and social anxiety. We assessed event-related potentials and emotions using a social comparison task in which participants received feedback on both their own and a co-player's performance, in participants with depression and/or social anxiety (n = 63) and healthy controls (n = 72). Participants reported more negative emotions for downward (being better than the co-player [participant correct, co-player wrong]) and upward (being worse than the co-player [participant wrong, co-player correct]) comparisons versus even outcomes, with these effects being stronger in depression and social anxiety.

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Sleep is a complex behavior regulated by genetic and environmental factors, and is known to influence health outcomes. However, the effect of multidimensional sleep encompassing several sleep dimensions on diseases has yet to be fully elucidated. Using the Mass General Brigham Biobank, we aimed to examine the association of multidimensional sleep with health outcomes and investigate whether sleep behaviors modulate genetic predisposition to unfavorable sleep on mental health outcomes.

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Recent genome-wide association studies (GWASs) of several individual sleep traits have identified hundreds of genetic loci, suggesting diverse mechanisms. Moreover, sleep traits are moderately correlated, and together may provide a more complete picture of sleep health, while also illuminating distinct domains. Here we construct novel sleep health scores (SHSs) incorporating five core self-report measures: sleep duration, insomnia symptoms, chronotype, snoring, and daytime sleepiness, using additive (SHS-ADD) and five principal components-based (SHS-PCs) approaches.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study looks at how anorexia nervosa might be related to sleep patterns and our body's internal clock (circadian rhythms).
  • Researchers used genetic data from many people to see if there's a connection between the risk of anorexia and different sleep traits like insomnia and daytime sleepiness.
  • They found that people genetically prone to anorexia tend to wake up earlier, and those who wake up early may have a higher risk of developing anorexia nervosa.
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This review explores the criteria used for the selection of genetic instruments of sleep traits in the context of Mendelian randomisation studies. This work was motivated by the fact that instrument selection is the most important decision when designing a Mendelian randomisation study. As far as we are aware, no review has sought to address this to date, even though the number of these studies is growing rapidly.

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Objectives: Daytime napping has been associated with cognitive function and brain health in observational studies. However, it remains elusive whether these associations are causal. Using Mendelian randomization, we studied the relationship between habitual daytime napping and cognition and brain structure.

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Depression and social anxiety are common disorders that have a profound impact on social functioning. The need for studying the neural substrates of social interactions in mental disorders using interactive tasks has been emphasized. The field of neuroeconomics, which combines neuroscience techniques and behavioral economics multiplayer tasks such as the Ultimatum Game (UG), can contribute in this direction.

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  • Some studies show people felt less anxious and depressed during COVID-19, but most were done in richer countries with strict lockdowns.
  • In Uruguay, where there weren't many COVID cases and the lockdown was mild, researchers looked at how time and moving around affected mental health.
  • They found that over time, people reported feeling better, especially older ones, and as people started going out more, their feelings of sadness decreased.
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The iterated prisoner's dilemma (iPD) game is a well-established model for testing how people cooperate, and the neural processes that unfold after its distinct outcomes have been partly described. Recent theoretical models suggest evolution favors intuitive cooperation, which raises questions on the behavioral but also neural timelines involved. We studied the outcome/feedback stage of iPD rounds with electroencephalography (EEG) methods.

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  • Depression can make it hard for people to interact with others and can lead to avoiding social situations.
  • A study looked at how unmedicated depressed people reacted in a computer game where they could either play in a team or alone, and found that depressed participants often chose to play alone, even though it meant they earned less.
  • The study showed that feelings of shame and guilt made depressed people avoid teamwork, while healthy participants did the opposite as they became more comfortable over time.
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