bamboo
Monday, November 5, 2012
Sunday, October 21, 2012
My Sustainability Mantra
A Vegetarian Diet is good for your and good for the Planet.
Nothing will benefit human health and increase the chances for
survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian
diet. - Albert Einstein
Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world. - Howard Zinn
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.”
- Mahatma Gandhi
WHEN SPIDERS UNITE, THEY CAN TIE DOWN A LION.
-Ethiopian proverb
Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world. - Howard Zinn
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.”
- Mahatma Gandhi
WHEN SPIDERS UNITE, THEY CAN TIE DOWN A LION.
-Ethiopian proverb
Baby panda takes first steps | Photo Gallery - Yahoo! News
Photo By HANDOUT/REUTERS Fri, Oct 19, 2012San Diego Zoo veterinarians look on as the Zoo's 11-week-old giant panda cub takes baby steps during a morning veterinary examination at the zoo, in this publicity photograph released October 18, 2012. REUTERS/Ken Bohn/San Diego Zoo/Copyright Zoological Society of San Diego/Handout
Veterinarians measure the giant panda cub during his weekly exam at the San Diego Zoo, in San Diego, California, October 9, 2012. The panda measures 11 inches (28 cm) from the base of his head to the tip of his tail. His overall length, from the tip of his nose to the tip of his tail, is approximately 20 inches (53cm). He weighed 7.3 pounds (3.3 kilograms). REUTERS/San Diego Zoo/Ken Bohn/Handout
45-day old male panda cub is pictured during an examination at the San Diego Zoo in San Diego, California, September 12, 2012.During the exam, animal care staff could see the cub's eyes beginning to open. It will take about another 20 days for the eyes to be fully open. REUTERS/San Diego Zoo/Handout
A 5-week-old giant panda cub, weighing 3.2 pounds (1.5 kg), is seen in this handout picture released by San Diego Zoo on September 6, 2012. San Diego zoo veterinarians have determined, on their third look, that the cub is male. According to veterinarian Meg Sutherland Smith, DVM, the cub weighs lighter than Bai Yun's previous five cubs and it looks healthy with a belly girth of 12 inches, which indicates that it is eating well. REUTERS/Maria ...
5-week-old giant panda cub, weighing 3.2 pounds (1.5 kg), is seen in this handout picture released by San Diego Zoo on September 6, 2012. San Diego zoo veterinarians have determined, on their third look, that the cub is male. According to veterinarian Meg Sutherland Smith, DVM, the cub weighs lighter than Bai Yun's previous five cubs and it looks healthy with a belly girth of 12 inches, which indicates that it is eating well. REUTERS/Maria ...
This image provided by the San Diego Zoo shows a giant panda cub receiving its first veterinary exam Thursday, Aug. 23, 2012, in San Diego. The exam allowed staff to determine that the cub is healthy, thriving and weighs 1.5 pounds, but were not able to determine the sex. This is the sixth giant panda born at the San Diego Zoo, the most born at a breeding facility outside of China.(AP Photo/San diego Zoo, Ken Bohn)
Baby panda takes first steps | Photo Gallery - Yahoo! News
http://news.yahoo.com/photos/san-diego-panda-cub-slideshow/baby-panda-photo-1350662205.html
Monday, September 17, 2012
Thursday, September 13, 2012
Mindful Pracice and The WWW.
Is the Web Driving Us Crazy? A Mindful Response
It’s undeniable. The bond between human and digital device gets stronger every year. The average person sends or receives four times the amount of text messages since 2007. People are starting to feel their phone vibrate in their pockets when in fact there was never a vibration. This has been called “phantom-vibration syndrome.”There’s a historical shift happening that we’ll only begin to understand years from now. With the wonderful things that the internet has brought us, it also hard to deny the ADHD and OCD-like qualities many of us are picking up as we continue to merge with our digital devices.
As you practice and repeat something, it becomes a habit, and whether the kick starter was a need to use the internet for business or social reason, the devices we have today are pretty good and getting us to use them over and over again. What do you need to be aware of?
The fact is, every day our brain is being trained dozens, if not hundreds, of times to check for messages; be it texting, messaging, Facebook, Twitter, emails, voicemails or any other form of notification. Threfore, it’s going to train the brain to constantly be anticipating the next message. Consider how many times you’ve been on a walk to your car, to the bathroom, in a line or wherever and grabbed for the phone in your pocket. At times, this may have happened even if you forgot your phone. It’s already a habit.
Sherry Turkle, a psychologist at MIT, already thinks we’re there. As she points out, “we are all cyborgs now.” Our brains have already merged with technology. This technology is only in its infancy and offers so many incredible gifts. We can find friends all around the world; we can get aids to help us count our calories easily to manage weight; it’s easier than ever to donate to a needed organization; with the push of an icon we can find a map and navigate wherever we want or find the top rated places to eat. This is all good stuff.
However, we’re not really going to harness the power of this technology if we’re sleepwalking through this new relationship, unaware of the tightening hold it has on our attention. As Susan Greenfield, a pharmacology professor at Oxford University says, “end[ing] up glassy-eyed zombies.”
Larry Rosen wrote a book called “iDisorder
,” and “his team surveyed 750 people, a spread of teens and adults who represented the Southern California census, detailing their tech habits, their feelings about those habits, and their scores on a series of standard tests of psychiatric disorders. He found that most respondents, with the exception of those over the age of 50, check text messages, email or their social network “all the time” or “every 15 minutes.” More worryingly, he also found that those who spent more time online had more “compulsive personality traits.” (Newsweek article)However, we can take the fear of addiction to the internet a little too far. The Newsweek article uses the following as examples of a way to make the misleading point of how dire this is:
“One young couple neglected its infant to death while nourishing a virtual baby online. A young man fatally bludgeoned his mother for suggesting he log off (and then used her credit card to rack up more hours). At least 10 ultra-Web users, serviced by one-click noodle delivery, have died of blood clots from sitting too long.”My guess is it’s probably safe to say there were mental issues co-occurring with this, but technology usage could have exacerbated those issues.
However, we can also take it too lightly, as a Forbes article explains in We’re all Internet Addicts and We’re All Screwed, says Newsweek. While the Forbes article has some entertaining bits that poke fun at Newsweek‘s focus on internet addiction, this article also mocks it for bringing up an important comment by Sherry Turkle, PhD, suggesting that texting while breast feeding can create stress in the mother that can get passed along to the child. Or that parents are on their devices at the expense of attending to their kids.
In other words, while these aren’t examples of heavy neglect, they are the little things that add up, and the Forbes author’s assertion that these aren’t things worth looking out for may be naive.
In this new era, it’s okay to love and feel the rewards of your Facebook, Twitter, blogs, Pinterest, Apps, or whatever, but it’s all about how far we take it. Each of us is in a pretty serious relationship with our technology, and so the question is, how can we begin to become more aware of how we’re relating to it? How is it affecting our relationships or our stress? Do we feel compelled to grab for it, it is splitting our attention and taxing our brains? When does it turn from a source of leisure and relaxation, like reading a magazine or book, to a source of stress and feelings of being overwhelmed?
Here’s today’s practice:
Start by just being mindful of how your body reacts to your digital devices. Do you notice a pull at times? What does that feel like? What happens when you just let it be, how long does it last? How long until it goes away?
After all, if we’re going to be married to technology, we might as well get to know it a bit better.
As always, please share your thoughts, stories and questions below. Your interaction creates a living wisdom for us all to benefit from.
Reposted from Elisha Goldstein’s Mindfulness Blog on Psychcentral.com
Blogger: The Mindful Gorilla - All posts
Red Pandas, Face Extinction
Red Pandas, Cursed by Their Adorable Looks, Face Extinction
Aug 22, 2012 5:23pm
By DAN HARRIS and JAKE WHITMAN
The red panda, an animal that once roamed vast regions of the Earth, is now on the brink of extinction, and its adorable face and gentle curiosity is only adding to its plight.
These creatures can be found in the wild at the foothills of the Himalayan Mountains, in countries such as Nepal, Bhutan and in the jungle areas surrounding Darjeeling, India, a crowded, chaotic city known for growing some of the world’s best teas.
But even there, the red panda’s natural habitat, the best chance to see one face-to-face is at a zoo. Conservationists believe there are less than 10,000 left in the wild.
Once sought after to keep as pets, red pandas are now hunted for their pelts. In Nepal and northern India, poachers can command a heavy price for their body parts. In some parts of China, their bushy tails are considered good luck charms in wedding ceremonies.
Red pandas also face the threat of deforestation. It takes as much as four pounds of bamboo a day to keep these little guys going.
Darjeeling is home to one of the most successful red panda breeding
centers in the world: The Padmaja Naidu Himalayan Zoological Park. But
while zoo officials hope their match-making will produce offspring that
potentially could be returned to the wild, they also worry about what
they called the “red panda curse” – their cute faces and loving natures
make these animals a target.
Red pandas seem so lovable that they have been featured in movies – Dustin Hoffman voiced the character Master Shifu in the “Kung Fu Panda” movies – as well as video games, postage stamps and beer bottles. Even “Firefox,” the popular Web browser, is named after them.
When red pandas were first discovered in the early 1800s, a full 50 years before the giant panda, they were a must-have accessory of the Victorian age. Furry, friendly and about the size of a house cat, European women clamored to have a red panda by their side.
As far as biologists know, red pandas only exist today in the region around the Himalayas. However, a red panda tooth, estimated to be around 4 to 7 million years old, was recently found in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains of Tennessee.
Steve Wallace, the curator for the East Tennessee Natural History Museum located in Gray, Tenn., said he and his team have unearthed evidence of giant turtles, saber-toothed cats and pot-bellied rhinos at the Gray Fossil site, but were not expecting to dig up an ancient red panda tooth.
Since it was discovered, red panda bones have become common at the site. Wallace said the ancient Tennessee “firefox” was probably much larger, about the size of a mountain lion, and thrived in the thick forests once found in that part of the world.
One theory about what caused the red pandas to disappear from the
Blue Ridge Mountains is that raccoons moved in and began competing for
the same food. While scientists do not yet fully understand why evidence
of this animal surfaced in the southern United States, they are hoping
their discoveries can help bring the red panda back from the brink.
“Understanding why fossil red pandas were so much more successful, so much more widespread, than pandas today, could be a very beneficial to actually protecting them and ensuring that they’ll be here for future generations,” Wallace said.
The red panda, an animal that once roamed vast regions of the Earth, is now on the brink of extinction, and its adorable face and gentle curiosity is only adding to its plight.
These creatures can be found in the wild at the foothills of the Himalayan Mountains, in countries such as Nepal, Bhutan and in the jungle areas surrounding Darjeeling, India, a crowded, chaotic city known for growing some of the world’s best teas.
But even there, the red panda’s natural habitat, the best chance to see one face-to-face is at a zoo. Conservationists believe there are less than 10,000 left in the wild.
Once sought after to keep as pets, red pandas are now hunted for their pelts. In Nepal and northern India, poachers can command a heavy price for their body parts. In some parts of China, their bushy tails are considered good luck charms in wedding ceremonies.
Red pandas also face the threat of deforestation. It takes as much as four pounds of bamboo a day to keep these little guys going.
Credit: Jake Whitman/ABC News
Red pandas seem so lovable that they have been featured in movies – Dustin Hoffman voiced the character Master Shifu in the “Kung Fu Panda” movies – as well as video games, postage stamps and beer bottles. Even “Firefox,” the popular Web browser, is named after them.
When red pandas were first discovered in the early 1800s, a full 50 years before the giant panda, they were a must-have accessory of the Victorian age. Furry, friendly and about the size of a house cat, European women clamored to have a red panda by their side.
As far as biologists know, red pandas only exist today in the region around the Himalayas. However, a red panda tooth, estimated to be around 4 to 7 million years old, was recently found in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains of Tennessee.
Steve Wallace, the curator for the East Tennessee Natural History Museum located in Gray, Tenn., said he and his team have unearthed evidence of giant turtles, saber-toothed cats and pot-bellied rhinos at the Gray Fossil site, but were not expecting to dig up an ancient red panda tooth.
Since it was discovered, red panda bones have become common at the site. Wallace said the ancient Tennessee “firefox” was probably much larger, about the size of a mountain lion, and thrived in the thick forests once found in that part of the world.
Ancient red panda skull found in Tennessee. Credit: Jake Whitman/ABC News
“Understanding why fossil red pandas were so much more successful, so much more widespread, than pandas today, could be a very beneficial to actually protecting them and ensuring that they’ll be here for future generations,” Wallace said.
Credit: Jake Whitman/ABC News
Monday, September 3, 2012
Red Pandas Standing
Uploaded by a1candidate
on Jan 23, 2011
Red Pandas (also known as the Firefox) are definitely the cutest and most amazing animal EVER
Dont you wish you could hug one in your arms?
Dont you wish you could hug one in your arms?
License: Standard YouTube License
Red Panda's Plight.....Cute and ENDANGERED
Published on Aug 22, 2012 by ABCNews
The race is on to save these adorable creatures before they are hunted into extinction.
License: Standard YouTube License
License: Standard YouTube License
Giant Panda News
Giant Panda News
Female Giant Panda's Hormones on the Rise
August 20, 2012
National Zoo scientists have detected a secondary rise in urinary progesterone in its female giant panda, Mei Xiang. Giant panda breeding season began this year in April at the Smithsonian's
National Zoo when female giant panda, Mei Xiang (may-SHONG), went into
estrus.Saturday, August 25, 2012
New Baby Panda
San Diego Zoo’s Baby Panda Has First Checkup
Image credit: Ken Bohn/San Diego Zoo/AP Photo
Zoo veterinarians were able to evaluate the cub’s overall health but were only given a few minutes to do so in order to not cause the mother, Bai Yun, any stress.
“The exam was very short, just about three minutes,” said Victoria Girdler, a senior keeper in the panda area, who was present for the exam. “It was the first one, so we just wanted to do a quick check of fingers, toes, weight, eyes.”
And in just three minutes, the zoo veterinarians deemed it was a healthy baby cub, weighing just over a pound.
“We’re still not sure of the gender yet,” Girdler said. “For that, we have to check a couple of times over the next few exams.”
Before they could conduct the exam, the team of vets and keepers had to make sure the cub was ready to be taken away from its mother.
“One of the things keepers do to make sure it stays calm is take a blanket rubbed in mama’s smell and set it under the baby so it is comfortable.”
The team had to make sure Bai Yun was ready for the exam, too.
“What we did was watch to see when Bai Yun would go out of the den to eat on a regular basis,” Girdler said. “We had seen her come out of the den to eat at that same time over the past few days, so we knew she was comfortable enough to leave the baby. We practiced closing the door a few times for a minute here and there and she showed all the signs of being ready.”
As soon as Bai Yun indicated that she wasn’t happy, the exam ended.
“It made a cry out, which Bai Yun did hear, which is why the exam was pretty short,” Girdler said. “If there were any signs of her being uncomfortable, we made sure to put it back in the den with mama.”
But even though it caused interruption, the cause meant a healthy cub.
“A good cry means that the lungs are doing well, too,” Girdler said. Just one more sign that baby panda is healthy.
“Bai Yun is such a great mom,” Girdler said. “She snuggles, she bonds with it, she cleans it and takes care of it. It’s an amazing bond to see.”
There are only roughly 1,600 giant pandas left in the world. The San Diego Zoo is just one of four zoos in the U.S. to have pandas.
Source: ABC News, Nature and Environment
SHOWS: World News
Thursday, August 9, 2012
About the Red Panda
Red Panda Playing With A Pumpkin
Licence: Standard YouTube Licence
About the Red Panda
The Red Panda, or “firefox,” is often referred to as the “lesser panda” in deference to the better-known giant panda. Others prefer “first panda” – Western scientists described it 50 years earlier, and gave pandas their name. Few people outside its native habitat have even heard of the red panda, let alone seen one.
The Two Sub-species of the Red Panda
The red panda has been previously classified in the families Procyonidae (raccoons) and Ursidae (bears), but recent research has placed it in its own family Ailuridae, in superfamily Musteloidea along with Mustelidae and Procyonidae. Two subspecies are recognized:
Ailurus fulgens fulgens: Found in Nepal, northeastern India (West Bengal, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh), Bhutan, and part of China.Ailurus fulgens styani (also known as a. f. refulgens): Only found in China (in the Hengduan Mountains in Sichuan and the East Nujiang River of Yunnan Province) and northern Myanmar.
The head and body length of red pandas averages 56 to 63 cm (22 to 25 in), and their tails about 37 to 47 cm (15 to 19 in).
Behavior
Red pandas are generally solitary, but there are a couple of exceptions to the rule. First, young red pandas grow relatively slowly, so they develop extended associations with their mothers that last for over a year. Second, red pandas have short relationships during the annual breeding season.
The home ranges of female red pandas often measure about one square mile, while males can live in areas twice that size. Male home ranges frequently overlap with at least one female home range and sometimes expand during the breeding season. Because red pandas constantly need to conserve energy, they only cover 650 to 1,000 feet of their home ranges per day and about 25% of their home ranges per month.
Red pandas have several ways of marking their territories and home ranges. These include urine, secretions from anal glands, and scents from glands on the pads of their feet. They have also been known to use communal latrine sites to stake out territory and share information with others. In addition, red pandas often communicate using body language (such as head bobbing and tail arching) and a variety of noises (such as a threatening “huff-quack” and a warning whistle).
(Image from Tambako the Jaguar on Flickr)
Food
The red panda’s diet is very unusual for a mammal and consists mostly
of bamboo. When the weather is warm enough, they also eat insects and
fruit. Although the giant panda eats almost every part of the bamboo
plant (except the roots), the red panda only eats the youngest, most
tender shoots and leaves. In addition, the red panda chews the bamboo
thoroughly, whereas the giant panda hardly chews at all.The red panda’s dietary specialization has an profound impact on the animal’s daily life. For one thing, bamboo is very high in indigestible fiber, making it extraordinarily difficult for red pandas to extract the nutrients that they need. Cows, horses, and other herbivorous mammals normally have very strong teeth and extra fermentation chambers in their guts. However, while red pandas have large teeth, their guts are not specialized to handle plant matter. In fact, red pandas only extract about one quarter of the nutrients from bamboo, and food passes through their digestive tract quite quickly. That means that many red pandas lose as much as 15 percent of their body weight during the winter, when their other preferred foods (such as insects) are not readily available.
To cope with the lack of food during the winter months, red pandas have evolved several ways of meeting their energy demands. For instance, red pandas can spend as much as 13 hours a day looking for and eating bamboo. They also have a very low metabolic rate (almost as low as sloths), and can slow their metabolism even further in colder temperatures. Finally, their thick fur covers their entire body, including the soles of their feet, allowing them to conserve their body heat.
(Image from Tambako the Jaguar on Flickr)
Habitat & Range
Red pandas only live in temperate forests in the foothills of the Himalayas. The temperature in this region is generally cool, and there is little annual variation. The southern slopes of the mountains trap the water from seasonal monsoons, supporting forests of firs, deciduous hardwoods, and rhododendrons. A bamboo understory grows in these forests and provides the bulk of the red panda’s diet. However, these swaths of bamboo are only found in narrow bands throughout the red panda’s range. Thus, although red pandas are distributed across thousands of miles of territory, they are restricted to these small, fragile areas because of their dependence on the bamboo plants.
(Photo by Red Panda Network)
Source: Red Panda: The Fire Cat by Miles Roberts (ZooGoer 21(2), 1992).
Population & Protections
Protecting the red panda goes hand in hand with protecting its habitat.
In the past, the dense root systems and undergrowth of Nepal’s forests
could be relied upon to retain moisture and slow water runoff.
Recently, however, logging and other forms of forest degradation have
upset this balance and sent rich soil cascading down mountainsides with
the annual monsoons. Many Nepalese people count on the red panda’s
habitat for their survival, and this problem cannot disappear on its
own. For example, Langtang National Park in Nepal is considered to be
an important area for red pandas, but 30,000 people live near the park
and depend on its resources. The reality is that these people are not
opposed to change. Rather, they lack viable economic alternatives. By
working directly with the people of the PIS Corridor, we aim to create a
new system in which conserving the red panda’s prime habitat will
actually benefit the surrounding communities.The exact size of Asia’s red panda population is currently unknown, but zoos around the world have taken up the call preserve the species. More than 80 zoos currently have red pandas (find out your nearest zoo here), and almost all of them participate in a management program to ensure the survival of a viable zoo population. In North America, the red panda population management program is called the Red Panda Species Survival Program (SSP). The SSP keeps a studbook of all red pandas on the continent, determines which animals should be mated, and develops long-term research and management strategies for the species. Other management programs have been created in Japan, Europe, Australia, and China.
(Image from FurryScaly on Flickr)
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Giant Panda Bear Does Handstands
Uploaded by BBCWorldwide
on Apr 4, 2008
The giant panda bear leaves its scent in
the forest and does handstand in this scenting ritual narrated by David
Attenborough for the BBC.
License: Standard YouTube License
Interesting Book on Giant Pandas
Giant Pandas:
Biology and Conservation
Donald Lindburg, Karen Baragona
The much-loved giant panda, a secretive denizen of the dense bamboo
forests of western China, has become an icon worldwide of progress in
conservation and research. This volume, written by an international team
of scientists and conservationists including Chinese researchers whose
work has not been available in English, tells the promising story of how
the giant panda returned from the brink of extinction. The most
important sourcebook on giant pandas to date, it is the first book since
1985 to present current panda research and the first to place the
species in its biological, ecological, and political contexts. More than
a progress report on a highly endangered species, Giant Pandas: Biology and Conservation details
the combination of scientific understanding, local commitment, and
government involvement that has been brought into play and asks what
more needs to be done to ensure the panda's survival.
The book is
divided into four parts--Evolutionary History of the Giant Panda,
Studies of Giant Panda Biology, Pandas and Their Habitats, and Giant
Panda Conservation. It combines the latest findings from the field and
the laboratory together with panel and workshop summaries from a recent
international conference. Taken together, the chapters highlight how
international cooperation has led to better management in the wild and
in captivity. The volume also shows how concepts such as buffer zones,
links between forest fragments, multiple-use areas, and cooperation with
local people who have a stake in the resources--highly relevant
concepts for conservation problems around the world--have been key to
the panda's survival.
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Monday, June 25, 2012
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Novel Therapies for Cognitive Dysfunction Secondary to Substance Abuse - Psychiatric Times
Novel Therapies for Cognitive Dysfunction Secondary to Substance Abuse - Psychiatric Times
Advances in the fields of neuropsychological assessment and neuroimaging have enormously expanded our knowledge about the profile and severity of cognitive deficits in patients with substance use disorders. Neuroscience studies have complemented this knowledge by revealing the neural adaptations induced by different substances (dopamine, glutamate, or serotonin) on specific cellular systems and by showing the structure and dynamics of brain systems, including frontostriatal systems and paralimbic networks involved in motivation and cognitive control.1,2
Typical cognitive deficits
Patients with substance use disorders have common cognitive impairments in frontal-executive control skill centers related to planning, working memory, inhibition, and decision making, as well as alterations in episodic memory, selective attention, and emotional processing.3 Moreover, certain drugs have more robust effects on particular cognitive functions3:
The causality of these deficits is still disputed, since a certain degree of cognitive dysfunction (linked to disinhibition) may preexist and be further exacerbated by drug exposure.5 Current neurobiological models assume that impulsivity (as a trait) may confer vulnerability for the onset and progression of substance use disorders, whereas prolonged exposure may induce relatively persistent deficits in memory, attention, and different executive functions (as a state).2,5 This evolution is mediated by neuroadaptations in the frontostriatal systems that provoke a transition from goal-directed (impulsive) toward outcome-detached (compulsive) behavior.6,7
Individual differences in genetic makeup (including genes involved in cognitive functioning or those involved in drug pharmacodynamics) and in rates of cognitive maturation and ageing are also thought to contribute to the differential impact of vulnerability as well as drug exposure in the cognitive status of patients with substance use disorders.8,9
Relevant to both causal pathways (vulnerability and neuroadaptations) is the neuropsychological concept of executive functions, which refers to a group of abilities involved in the production, monitoring, and readjustment of goal-directed behavior. Executive functions are directly involved in planning, updating of relevant information (working memory), control of prepotent inappropriate responses (inhibition), detection and correction of errors (flexibility), and adaptive decision making.10 They are also indirectly involved in successful encoding and retrieval of information (episodic memory), attentional control (sustained, selective, and dual attention), affective responsiveness, and self-awareness.11 Anatomically, they are tightly associated with the functioning of the frontostriatal systems.12
It is not surprising that study results have shown that patients with disorders related to different substances have common cognitive impairments in planning, working memory, inhibition, and decision making (core executive functions), as well as in episodic memory, selective attention, and emotional processing (executive function–related processes). Partial spontaneous recovery of cognitive function is manifest during abstinence, although different profiles of drug use and different cognitive skills are associated with different rates of recovery.3 However, certain skills, such as response inhibition, self-regulation, and decision making, are persistently impaired even after several months of abstinence.3,13
SUBSTANCE ABUSE: ADDICTION & RECOVERY
Novel Therapies for Cognitive Dysfunction Secondary to Substance Abuse
Brief Screening, Referral, and Cognitive Rehabilitation
By Antonio Verdejo-García, PhD | June 8, 2011
Dr Verdejo-García is Researcher and Lecturer at the Department of Clinical Psychology and Institute of Neuroscience, Universidad de Granada, Spain. He reports no conflicts of interest concerning the subject matter of this article.
Advances in the fields of neuropsychological assessment and neuroimaging have enormously expanded our knowledge about the profile and severity of cognitive deficits in patients with substance use disorders. Neuroscience studies have complemented this knowledge by revealing the neural adaptations induced by different substances (dopamine, glutamate, or serotonin) on specific cellular systems and by showing the structure and dynamics of brain systems, including frontostriatal systems and paralimbic networks involved in motivation and cognitive control.1,2
Patients with substance use disorders have common cognitive impairments in frontal-executive control skill centers related to planning, working memory, inhibition, and decision making, as well as alterations in episodic memory, selective attention, and emotional processing.3 Moreover, certain drugs have more robust effects on particular cognitive functions3:
• Psychostimulants, on inhibition and flexibility
• Opiates, on planning and fluency
• Cannabis, on episodic memory
• Alcohol(Drug information on alcohol), on a wide range of executive functions as well as on visual-spatial and psychomotor skills
These deficits are not ubiquitous among patients with substance use disorders, and there is considerable variability in the degree of cognitive dysfunction depending on a number of drug use parameters, such as quantity, frequency, and duration of use. Heavier users typically display greater impairments. Greater quantity and longer duration of cocaine use are associated with poorer response inhibition and flexibility; longer duration of heroin use is associated with poorer flexibility; heavier cannabis use is linked to poorer episodic memory, working memory, and reasoning; and heavier alcohol use relates to poorer updating of information and less adaptive decision making.4The causality of these deficits is still disputed, since a certain degree of cognitive dysfunction (linked to disinhibition) may preexist and be further exacerbated by drug exposure.5 Current neurobiological models assume that impulsivity (as a trait) may confer vulnerability for the onset and progression of substance use disorders, whereas prolonged exposure may induce relatively persistent deficits in memory, attention, and different executive functions (as a state).2,5 This evolution is mediated by neuroadaptations in the frontostriatal systems that provoke a transition from goal-directed (impulsive) toward outcome-detached (compulsive) behavior.6,7
Individual differences in genetic makeup (including genes involved in cognitive functioning or those involved in drug pharmacodynamics) and in rates of cognitive maturation and ageing are also thought to contribute to the differential impact of vulnerability as well as drug exposure in the cognitive status of patients with substance use disorders.8,9
Relevant to both causal pathways (vulnerability and neuroadaptations) is the neuropsychological concept of executive functions, which refers to a group of abilities involved in the production, monitoring, and readjustment of goal-directed behavior. Executive functions are directly involved in planning, updating of relevant information (working memory), control of prepotent inappropriate responses (inhibition), detection and correction of errors (flexibility), and adaptive decision making.10 They are also indirectly involved in successful encoding and retrieval of information (episodic memory), attentional control (sustained, selective, and dual attention), affective responsiveness, and self-awareness.11 Anatomically, they are tightly associated with the functioning of the frontostriatal systems.12
It is not surprising that study results have shown that patients with disorders related to different substances have common cognitive impairments in planning, working memory, inhibition, and decision making (core executive functions), as well as in episodic memory, selective attention, and emotional processing (executive function–related processes). Partial spontaneous recovery of cognitive function is manifest during abstinence, although different profiles of drug use and different cognitive skills are associated with different rates of recovery.3 However, certain skills, such as response inhibition, self-regulation, and decision making, are persistently impaired even after several months of abstinence.3,13
Monday, February 27, 2012
Treed Panda
Four-year-old panda Hua Ao plays inside his enclosure at Nanshan Zoo in Yantai, Shandong Province of China.
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