<p>BACKGROUND: Many anecdotes and several uncontrolled case series have suggested that emotionally stressful events, and more specifically, anger, immediately precede and appear to trigger the onset of acute myocardial infarction. However, controlled studies to determine the relative risk of myocardial infarction after episodes of anger have not been reported. METHODS AND RESULTS: We interviewed 1623 patients (501 women) an average of 4 days after myocardial infarction. The interview identified the time, place, and quality of myocardial infarction pain and other symptoms, the estimated usual frequency of anger during the previous year, and the intensity and timing of anger and other potentially triggering factors during the 26 hours before the onset of myocardial infarction. Anger was assessed by the onset anger scale, a single-item, seven-level, self-report scale, and the state anger subscale of the State-Trait Personality Inventory. Occurrence of anger in the 2 hours preceding the onset of myocardial infarction was compared with its expected frequency using two types of self-matched control data based on the case-crossover study design. The onset anger scale identified 39 patients with episodes of anger in the 2 hours before the onset of myocardial infarction. The relative risk of myocardial infarction in the 2 hours after an episode of anger was 2.3 (95% confidence interval, 1.7 to 3.2). The state anger subscale corroborated these findings with a relative risk of 1.9 (95% confidence interval, 1.3 to 2.7). Regular users of aspirin had a significantly lower relative risk (1.4; 95% confidence interval, 0.8 to 2.6) than nonusers (2.9; 95% confidence interval, 2.0 to 4.1) (P<.05). CONCLUSIONS: Episodes of anger are capable of triggering the onset of acute myocardial infarction, but aspirin may reduce this risk. A better understanding of the manner in which external events trigger the onset of acute cardiovascular events may lead to innovative preventive strategies aimed at severing the link between these external stressors and their pathological consequences.</p>
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In this article, I argue that educators can utilize mindfulness practices to enhance the efficacy of anti-oppressive pedagogy. The philosophies of Wittgenstein and Nagarjuna provide a holistic human ontology and show that learning affects students at all levels: mind, body, emotion, and spirit. My analysis of the phenomenology of thinking reveals the modes of relationship to ideation. I have proposed mindfulness practice as a proven technique to address the non-cognitive forms of attachment to ideation that may remain in force despite the most thorough-going intellectual change. /// Dans cet article, l'auteure fait valoir que les enseignants peuvent utiliser des pratiques attentionnées pour augmenter l'efficacité de la pédagogie libertaire. Les philosophies de Wittgenstein et de Nagarjuna permettent une ontologie humaine holistique et démontrent que l'apprentissage affecte les étudiants sur tous les plans: l'intelligence, le corps, les émotions et l'esprit. Les analyses de la phénoménologie de la pensée révèlent les types de relation à l'idéation. La pratique attentionnée est proposée comme une technique qui a fait ses preuves pour traiter les formes d'attachement hors du champ cognitif à l'idéation qui demeure active malgré le plus profond changement intellectuel.
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Meditation is approached as a technique for the activation of religious experience. Various theories used in psychology to explain the cognitive changes brought about by meditation are briefly reviewed. Of these, the role-theory of Sundén fits best the structure and function of various meditation methods in religious history. A small scale laboratory experiment is reported, designed for the purpose of testing the predictive validity of role-theory. The results make it possible to specify the theory's contribution and limitation.
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Studies of emotion signaling inform claims about the taxonomic structure, evolutionary origins, and physiological correlates of emotions. Emotion vocalization research has tended to focus on a limited set of emotions: anger, disgust, fear, sadness, surprise, happiness, and for the voice, also tenderness. Here, we examine how well brief vocal bursts can communicate 22 different emotions: 9 negative (Study 1) and 13 positive (Study 2), and whether prototypical vocal bursts convey emotions more reliably than heterogeneous vocal bursts (Study 3). Results show that vocal bursts communicate emotions like anger, fear, and sadness, as well as seldom-studied states like awe, compassion, interest, and embarrassment. Ancillary analyses reveal family-wise patterns of vocal burst expression. Errors in classification were more common within emotion families (e.g., 'self-conscious,' 'pro-social') than between emotion families. The three studies reported highlight the voice as a rich modality for emotion display that can inform fundamental constructs about emotion.
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BACKGROUND: Patterns of temporal variation of cardiac arrests may be important for understanding mechanisms leading to the onset of acute cardiovascular disorders. Previous studies have reported diurnal variation of the onset of cardiac arrests, with high incidence in the morning and in the evening, lack of daily variation during the week, and some seasonal variation. METHODS AND RESULTS: We explored weekly and yearly (seasonal) temporal variation in 6603 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests attended by the Seattle Fire Department. We observed daily variation that peaks on Monday and seasonal variation that peaks in the winter. CONCLUSIONS: Cardiac arrests do not occur randomly during the week or year but follow certain periodic patterns. These patterns are probably associated with patterns of activities.
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<p>BACKGROUND Seasonal and circadian variations in the occurrence of myocardial infarction and sudden cardiac death have been documented, suggesting that triggering factors may play a role in the causation of cardiac events. However, there are only sparse and conflicting data on the weekly distribution of the disorders. METHODS AND RESULTS To determine the weekly variation of acute myocardial infarction and sudden cardiac death, 5596 consecutive patients (71% men; age, 63 +/- 1 years) were analyzed in a regionally defined population (n = 330,000; age, 25 to 74 years) monitored from 1985 to 1990. The exact time of onset of symptoms was used to determine the day of the event. Patients with myocardial infarction (n = 2636) demonstrated a significant weekly variation (P < .01) with a peak on Monday, whereas patients with sudden cardiac death (n = 2960) were evenly distributed throughout the week. A similar weekly pattern was observed in subgroups of patients with myocardial infarction defined with respect to age, sex, cardiac risk factors, prior cardiac medication, and infarct characteristics. The working population demonstrated a weekly variation of myocardial infarction as opposed to the nonworking population, with a 33% increase in relative risk of disease onset on Monday (P < .05) and a trough on Sunday compared with the expected number of cases, if homogeneity was assumed. CONCLUSIONS The onset of acute myocardial infarction demonstrates a peak on Monday primarily in the working population. If this finding is confirmed in other communities, it may aid in identifying acute triggering events of myocardial infarction and perhaps in improving prevention of the disease. (Copyright © 1994 by American Heart Association)</p>
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One of the most important goals and outcomes of social life is to attain status in the groups to which we belong. Such face-to-face status is defined by the amount of respect, influence, and prominence each member enjoys in the eyes of the others. Three studies investigated personological determinants of status in social groups (fraternity, sorority, and dormitory), relating the Big Five personality traits and physical attractiveness to peer ratings of status. High Extraversion substantially predicted elevated status for both sexes. High Neuroticism, incompatible with male gender norms, predicted lower status in men. None of the other Big Five traits predicted status. These effects were independent of attractiveness, which predicted higher status only in men. Contrary to previous claims, women's status ordering was just as stable as men's but emerged later. Discussion focuses on personological pathways to attaining status and on potential mediators.
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At the turn of the twentieth century, the mind-cure movement emphasized the healing power of positive emotions and beliefs. William James defended mind-cure during the Massachusetts legislature's debates on licensing physicians in 1894 and 1898. In The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902) he used the movement's therapeutic claims to illustrate the typically American, practical turn of the "religion of healthy-mindedness." Varieties sympathetically surveys mind-cure literature, but also criticizes healthy-minded religion for its limited range and refusal to confront tragedy and radical evil. Many of today's mind/body therapies continue the mind-cure tradition and retain the limitations that James noted.
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Dynamic adjustments in cognitive control are well documented in conflict tasks, wherein competition from irrelevant stimulus attributes intensifies selection demands and leads to subsequent performance benefits. The current study investigated whether mnemonic demands, in a working memory (WM) task, can drive similar online control modifications. Demand levels (high vs. low) of WM maintenance (memory load of 2 items vs. 1 item) and delay-spanning distractor interference (confusable vs. not confusable with memoranda) were manipulated using a factorial design during a WM delayed-recognition task. Performance was best subsequent to trials in which both maintenance and distractor interference demands were high, followed by trials with high demand in either of these 2 control domains, and worst following trials with low demand in both domains. These results suggest that dynamic adjustments in cognitive control are not triggered exclusively by conflict-specific contexts but are also triggered by WM demands, revealing a putative mechanism by which this system configures itself for successful task performance.
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BACKGROUND: Although yoga and meditation have been used for stress reduction with reported improvement in inflammation, little is known about the biological mechanisms mediating such effects. The present study examined if a yogic meditation might alter the activity of inflammatory and antiviral transcription control pathways that shape immune cell gene expression.
METHODS: Forty-five family dementia caregivers were randomized to either Kirtan Kriya Meditation (KKM) or Relaxing Music (RM) listening for 12 min daily for 8 weeks and 39 caregivers completed the study. Genome-wide transcriptional profiles were collected from peripheral blood leukocytes sampled at baseline and 8-week follow-up. Promoter-based bioinformatics analyses tested the hypothesis that observed transcriptional alterations were structured by reduced activity of the pro-inflammatory nuclear factor (NF)-κB family of transcription factors and increased activity of Interferon Response Factors (IRFs; i.e., reversal of patterns previously linked to stress).
RESULTS: In response to KKM treatment, 68 genes were found to be differentially expressed (19 up-regulated, 49 down-regulated) after adjusting for potentially confounded differences in sex, illness burden, and BMI. Up-regulated genes included immunoglobulin-related transcripts. Down-regulated transcripts included pro-inflammatory cytokines and activation-related immediate-early genes. Transcript origin analyses identified plasmacytoid dendritic cells and B lymphocytes as the primary cellular context of these transcriptional alterations (both p<.001). Promoter-based bioinformatic analysis implicated reduced NF-κB signaling and increased activity of IRF1 in structuring those effects (both p<.05).
CONCLUSION: A brief daily yogic meditation intervention may reverse the pattern of increased NF-κB-related transcription of pro-inflammatory cytokines and decreased IRF1-related transcription of innate antiviral response genes previously observed in healthy individuals confronting a significant life stressor.
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<p>Some common conceptions of Buddhist meditative practice emphasize the elimination of emotion and desire in the interest of attaining tranquility and spiritual perfection. But to place too strong an emphasis on this is to miss an important social element emphasized by major figures in the Mahāyāna and Chan/Zen Buddhist traditions who are critical of these quietistic elements and who stress instead an understanding of an enlightenment that emphasizes enriched sociality and flexible readiness to engage, and not avoid, life’s fluctuations in fortune and essential impermanence. It is argued here that these criticisms of quietism are bolstered by recent advances in the philosophy and psychology of the emotions that highlight the role of emotions in framing the context of decision making—that is, in sorting out the relevant from the irrelevant, identifying salience, and directing decisions when uncertainty prevents definitive judgment. This research makes clearer why self-liberation is fundamentally a matter of liberation from judgmental habit and inflexibility, and lends support to a view of enlightenment that emphasizes compassionate engagement with others. It also provides for a more plausible picture of the cognitive transformation involved in liberation and sheds light on the rationale for certain traditional Chan and Zen teaching tactics, such as those involving koan introspection.</p>
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