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BACKGROUND: Effective emotional regulation (ER) skills are important for sexual function, as they impact emotional awareness and expression during sexual activity, and therefore, satisfaction and distress. Emotion regulation interventions may offer a promising approach to improve sexual health. Web-based emotion regulation may be a therapeutic strategy for men and women with sexual health concerns. Nevertheless, there is a scarcity of intervention trials investigating its effects in this context, much less using the internet. OBJECTIVE: This study aims to investigate the effects of a web-based emotion regulation training program for sexual function in both men and women. METHODS: The participants were recruited based on their self-reported sexual problems, which for men was defined by a score of <25 on the International Index Erectile Function (IIEF) and for women by a score of <26.55 on the Female Sexual Function Index (FSFI). The final sample included 60 participants who were randomized to either a web-based emotion regulation training for sexual function or to a waitlist control group. The treatment consisted of an 8-week web-based emotion regulation training for sexual function. The participants were assessed at baseline, post intervention, and the 3-month follow-up. RESULTS: Of the 60 participants included, only 6 completed all 3 assessment points (n=5, 20% in the treatment group and n=1, 5% in the waitlist control group) after receiving the intervention. At follow-up, there were no significant differences between groups in any measure. Among the intervention completers, large-to-moderate within-group effect sizes were observed between the assessment points on measures of emotion regulation, depression, lubrication, orgasm, thoughts of sexual failure, and abuse during sexual activity. The adherence rate was very low, limiting the generalizability of the findings. CONCLUSIONS: Participants who completed the intervention showed improvements in both sexual f

Using a unique harmonized real‐time data set from the COME‑HERE longitudinal survey that covers five European countries (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Sweden) and applying a non‑parametric machine learning model, this paper identifies the main individual and macro‑level predictors of self‑protecting behaviors against the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‑19) during the first wave of the pandemic. Exploiting the interpretability of a Random Forest algorithm via Shapely values, we find that a higher regional incidence of COVID‑19 triggers higher levels of self‑protective behavior, as does a stricter government policy response. The level of individual knowledge about the pandemic, confidence in institutions, and population density also ranks high among the factors that predict self‑protecting behaviors. We also identify a steep socioeconomic gradient with lower levels of self‑protecting behaviors being associated with lower income and poor housing conditions. Among socio‑demographic factors, gender, marital status, age, and region of residence are the main determinants of self‑protective measures.

Background: Internalizing behaviors are an indicator of children’s psychological and emotional development, predicting future mental disorders. Recent studies have identified associations between DNA methylation (DNAm) and internalizing behaviors. This prospective study aimed at exploring the associations between pace of biological aging and the developmental trajectories of internalizing behaviors. Methods: Participants were children from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) cohort (N=974). Measures of DNA methylation were collected at birth, age 7 and ages 15-17. The pace of aging was estimated using the DunedinPoAm algorithm (PoAm). Internalizing behaviors reported by caregivers between ages 4 and 16 using the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. To explore heterogeneity in the association between PoAm and internalizing behaviors we use Poisson quantile regression in cross-section heterogeneity and longitudinal latent class analysis over the childhood and adolescence. Results: Internalizing behavior trajectories were identified: low-risk, childhood limited, late onset and early onset (persistent). Accelerated aging at birth was negatively associated with internalizing behaviors in early childhood but positively correlated during adolescence. Higher PoAm at birth increased chance of low-risk profile, while decreasing likelihood of childhood limited trajectory. PoAm at age 15 was negatively associated with childhood limited profile and positively linked to late onset trajectories. Associations were larger at higher values of internalizing symptoms. Conclusions: The heterogeneity in the association between biological age acceleration and internalizing behaviors suggests a complex dynamic relationship, particularly in children with high or increased risk of adverse mental health outcomes.

OBJECTIVE: Visceral hypersensitivity is considered a key symptom in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), both of which seriously affect health-related quality of life (HrQoL). Previous findings are mostly based on invasive procedures that may interfere with the assessment of visceral perception. The current study, therefore, investigates whether IBD and IBS are characterized by altered perception of “natural” gastric distensions (“interoception”). METHODS: Twenty IBD patients in remission (13 Crohn‟s disease, 7 ulcerative colitis), 12 IBS patients, and 20/12 matched healthy control (HC) individuals, respectively, underwent the water load test, in which they could drink ad libitum until the subjective thresholds of satiation (stage 1) and fullness (stage 2) were reached. Gastric motility was assessed using electrogastrography. RESULTS: IBD patients drank significantly more water until satiation than IBS patients, whereas no differences between patients and HC groups were observed. Electrogastrographic patterns were comparable between groups, suggesting no pathologies in gastric motility in IBD or IBS. The amount of water consumed until satiation negatively correlated with HrQoL related Gastric interoception in IBD and IBS to bowel symptoms in IBD patients, but was positively associated with emotional well-being in IBS patients. CONCLUSION: Our findings implicate relative gastric hypersensitivity in IBS, and relative hyposensitivity in IBD patients, which are both related to specific HrQoL aspects.

Interoceptive sensibility is the self-perceived dispositional tendency to be internally self-focused and interoceptively cognizant. One would expect that persons with high interoceptive sensibility would be more consistent in their subjective ratings to pain stimulation, i.e., the same intensity would be rated similarly across different time points of the session. The present study investigated the relationship between interoceptive sensibility and perception of acute pain, realized by transcutaneous electrical stimulation to the inner forearm, compromising both the subjective pain ratings and the cardiovascular response to the painful stimulation in young healthy adults. To determine the interoceptive sensibility the MAIA-2 was used. In two session design participants received short, individualized pain stimuli in the non-painful to moderate pain range, which they rated regarding subjective intensity and unpleasantness on visual analog scales. The task was repeated three times in one session. Preliminary results suggest a positive relationship between different subscales of the MAIA-2 and the intensity and unpleasantness ratings of painful and non-painful stimulations. Over the three repetitions of stimulation, a differentiated picture forms with respect to possible sensitization or habituation of the participants. These findings suggest that there is an impact of interoceptive sensibility on the perception of pain. Using the MAIA-2 to determine the interoceptive sensibility is an economical approach, since previous studies worked with the heartbeat detection task or other experimental paradigms. Incorporating interoceptive sensitivity could be helpful for future interventions and possible treatments in pain patients.

We here investigate the role of risk aversion in COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy. The theoretical effect is ambiguous, as both COVID-19 infection and vaccination side-effects involve probabilistic elements. In large-scale data covering five European countries, we find that vaccine hesitancy falls with risk aversion, so that COVID-19 infection is perceived as involving greater risk than is vaccination.