Search

Objectives To evaluate the efficacy of oral colistin-neomycin in preventing multidrug-resistant Enterobacterales (MDR-E) infections in solid organ transplant (SOT) recipients. Methods Multicentre, open-label, parallel-group, controlled trial with balanced (1:1) randomization in five transplant units. SOT recipients were screened for MDR-E intestinal colonization (extended-spectrum β-lactamase or carbapenemase producing) before transplantation and +7 and + 14 days after transplantation and assigned 1:1 to receive treatment with colistin sulfate plus neomycin sulfate for 14 days (decolonization treatment (DT) group) or no treatment (no decolonization treatment (NDT) group). The primary outcome was diagnosis of an MDR-E infection. Safety outcomes were appearance of adverse effects, mainly diarrhoea, rash, nausea and vomiting. Patients were monitored weekly until 30 days after treatment. Intention-to-treat analysis was performed. Results MDR-E rectal colonization was assessed in 768 SOT recipients; 105 colonized patients were included in the clinical trial, 53 receiving DT and 52 NDT. No significant decrease in the risk of infection by MDR-E was observed in the DT group (9.4%, 5/53) compared to the NDT group (13.5%, 7/52) (relative risk 0.70; 95% confidence interval 0.24–2.08; p 0.517). Four patients (5.6%), three (5.6%) in the DT group and one (1.9%) in the NDT group, developed colistin resistance. Twelve patients (22.7%) in the DT group had diarrhoea, eight related to treatment (15.0%); one patient (1.8%) developed skin rash and another (1.8%) nausea and vomiting. Two patients (3.8%) in the NDT group developed diarrhoea. Conclusions DT does not reduce MDR-E infections in SOT. Colistin resistance and adverse effects such as diarrhoea are a potential issue that must be taken seriously.

Despite gender is a salient feature in face recognition, the question of whether stereotyping modulates face processing remains unexplored. Event-related potentials from 40 participants (20 female) was recorded as male and female faces matched or mismatched previous gender-stereotyped statements and were compared with those elicited by faces preceded by gender-unbiased statements. We conducted linear mixed-effects models to account for possible random effects from both participants and the strength of the gender bias. The amplitude of the N170 to faces was larger following stereotyped relative to gender-unbiased statements in both male and female participants, although the effect was larger for males. This result reveals that stereotyping exerts an early effect in face processing and that the impact is higher in men. In later time windows, male faces after female-stereotyped statements elicited large late positivity potential (LPP) responses in both men and women, indicating that the violation of male stereotypes induces a post-perceptual reevaluation of a salient or conflicting event. Besides, the largest LPP amplitude in women was elicited when they encountered a female face after a female-stereotyped statement. The later result is discussed from the perspective of recent claims on the evolution of women self-identification with traditionally held female roles.

Human sociality and prosociality rely on social and moral feelings of empathy, compassion, envy, schadenfreude, as well as on the preference for prosocial over antisocial others. We examined the neural underpinnings of the processing of lexical input designed to tap into these type of social feelings. Brainwave responses from 20 participants were measured as they read sentences comprising a randomly delivered ending outcome (fortunate or unfortunate) to social agents previously profiled as prosocial or antisocial individuals. Fortunate outcomes delivered to prosocial and antisocial agents aimed to tap into empathy and envy/annoying feelings, respectively, whereas unfortunate ones into compassion for prosocial agents and schadenfreude for antisocial ones. ERP modulations in early attention-capture (100-200 ms), semantic fit (400 ms), and late reanalysis processes (600 ms) were analyzed. According to the functional interpretation of each of these event-related electrophysiological effects, we conclude that: 1) a higher capture of attention is initially obtained in response to any type of outcome delivered to a prosocial versus an antisocial agent (frontal P2); 2) a facilitated semantic processing occurs for unfortunate outcomes delivered to antisocial agents (N400); and 3) regardless of the protagonist's social profile, an increased later reevaluation for overall unfortunate versus fortunate outcomes takes place (Late Positive Potential). Thus, neural online measures capture a stepwise unfolding impact of social factors during language comprehension, which include a facilitated processing of misfortunes when they happen to occur to antisocial peers (i.e., schadenfreude).

8 páginas, 2 figuras, 1 tabla., SARS-CoV-2 nosocomial outbreaks in the first COVID-19 wave were likely associated with a shortage of personal protective equipment and scarce indications on control measures. Having covered these limitations, updates on current SARS-CoV-2 nosocomial outbreaks are required. We carried out an in-depth analysis of a 27-day nosocomial outbreak in a gastroenterology ward in our hospital, potentially involving 15 patients and 3 health care workers. Patients had stayed in one of three neighboring rooms in the ward. The severity of the infections in six of the cases and a high fatality rate made the clinicians suspect the possible involvement of a single virulent strain persisting in those rooms. Whole-genome sequencing (WGS) of the strains from 12 patients and 1 health care worker revealed an unexpected complexity. Five different SARS-CoV-2 strains were identified, two infecting a single patient each, ruling out their relationship with the outbreak; the remaining three strains were involved in three independent, overlapping, limited transmission clusters with three, three, and five cases. Whole-genome sequencing was key to understand the complexity of this outbreak. IMPORTANCE We report a complex epidemiological scenario of a nosocomial COVID-19 outbreak in the second wave, based on WGS analysis. Initially, standard epidemiological findings led to the assumption of a homogeneous outbreak caused by a single SARS-CoV-2 strain. The discriminatory power of WGS offered a strikingly different perspective consisting of five introductions of different strains, with only half of them causing secondary cases in three independent overlapping clusters. Our study exemplifies how complex the SARS-CoV-2 transmission in the nosocomial setting during the second COVID-19 wave occurred and leads to extending the analysis of outbreaks beyond the initial epidemiological assumptions., This work was supported by Instituto de Salud Carlos III (Ref COV20/00140: SeqCOVIDConsorcio para la epidemiología genómica de SARS-CoV-2 en España) and by Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC) (PTI Salud Global). L.P.-L. holds Miguel Servet contracts CP15/00075 and CPII20/00001.

Several behavioral studies have reported a detrimental effect of emotion on reasoning tasks, either when the content of the reasoning and/or the mood state of the individual are emotionally loaded. However, the neural mechanisms involved in this phenomena remain largely unexplored. In an event-related potentials (ERPs) study, we examined the consequences of an induced mood over the electrophysiological signals obtained while processing logical and illogical categorical conclusions. Prior to performing a syllogism reading task, we aimed to induce, by using short film clips, high arousal negative and positive moods and neutral affective states to participants in three separate recording sessions. Our mood induction procedure was only successful at inducing a highly arousing negative state. Behaviorally, participants committed more errors overall while judging the invalidity versus the validity of illogical and logical conclusions, respectively, but no influences from mood state emerged at this logical validity task. Electrophysiologically and overall a negative going N400 deflection was larger for illogical relative to logical conclusions in a parietal region between 300 and 420 ms. However, further analysis revealed that the logical conclusions were only more expected (smaller N400 amplitudes) in the negative relative to the neutral and the positive sessions, providing support to theoretical views that posit that a more analytic reasoning style might be implemented under a negative mood state. These results provide further electrophysiological evidence of the influence of mood on other cognitive processes, particularly on the anticipation and processing of logical conclusions during online reasoning tasks.

The protective capacity and duration of humoral immunity after SARS-CoV-2 infection are not yet understood in solid organ transplant recipients. A prospective multicenter study was performed to evaluate the persistence of anti-nucleocapsid IgG antibodies in liver transplant recipients 6 months after coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) resolution. A total of 71 liver transplant recipients were matched with 71 immunocompetent controls by a propensity score including variables with a well-known prognostic impact in COVID-19. Paired case-control serological data were also available in 62 liver transplant patients and 62 controls at month 3 after COVID-19. Liver transplant recipients showed a lower incidence of anti-nucleocapsid IgG antibodies at 3 months (77.4% vs. 100%, p < .001) and at 6 months (63.4% vs. 90.1%, p < .001). Lower levels of antibodies were also observed in liver transplant patients at 3 (p = .001) and 6 months (p < .001) after COVID-19. In transplant patients, female gender (OR = 13.49, 95% CI: 2.17-83.8), a longer interval since transplantation (OR = 1.19, 95% CI: 1.03-1.36), and therapy with renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system inhibitors (OR = 7.11, 95% CI: 1.47-34.50) were independently associated with persistence of antibodies beyond 6 months after COVID-19. Therefore, as compared with immunocompetent patients, liver transplant recipients show a lower prevalence of anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies and more pronounced antibody levels decline.

Background: We report the long-term outcomes, changes in laboratory parameters, the incidence of secondary nosocomial infections and treatment cost of a Spanish cohort of patients with severe COVID-19 that received tocilizumab (TCZ). Methods: Retrospective cohort of PCR confirmed adult patients who received TCZ from March 1 to 24, 2020 in a tertiary hospital was analyzed. Patients were followed up until 10 May 2020. Results: We included 162 patients (median age 64 years; 70.4% male). At time of TCZ administration, 48.1% of patients were on invasive mechanical ventilation (IMV). Over a median follow-up of 53 days, 46.9% of patients were discharge in good conditions and 19.8% were still hospitalized. The overall mortality was 33.3%, being higher in patients on IMV than those who did not (46.2% vs 26.7%, P

Highlights • Few large series have described the clinical characteristics, treatments, costs and outcomes of COVID-19 patients in western countries. • We report our experience with the first 1,255 cases who received anti-COVID-19 treatment at a Spanish hospital. • The prevalence of acute respiratory distress syndrome and mortality was high in the early days of the Spanish epidemic. • Older age, the presence of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and the presence of severe hypoxemia, lymphocytopenia and increased C-reactive protein at admission are factors independently associated to an increased risk of death. • The cost of COVID-19 treatment is high (€0.44 million per 1,000 hospitalized patients). Higher expenses are attributable to the treatment of acute respiratory distress syndrome with tocilizumab., Few large series describe the clinical characteristics, outcomes and costs of COVID-19 in western countries. This cohort reports the first 1,255 adult cases who received anti-COVID-19 treatment at a Spanish hospital from March 1 to 24, 2020. The cost of treatment was calculated. Logistic regression model was used to explore the risk factors present on admission associated with ARDS. Bivariate Cox proportional hazard ratio model was employed to determine the hazard ratio (HR) between individual factors and death. We included 1,255 patients (median age 65 years; 57.8% male), of which 92.3% required hospitalization. Prevalence of hypertension, cardiovascular diseases and diabetes mellitus was 45.1%, 31.4%, and 19.9%, respectively. Lymphocytopenia (54.8%), elevated alanine aminotransferase (33.0%) and elevated lactate dehydrogenase (58.5%) were frequent. Overall, 36.7% of patients developed ARDS, 10.0% were admitted to an intensive care unit and 21.3% died. Most frequent antiviral combinations used were lopinavir/ritonavir plus hydroxychloroquine (44.2%), followed by triple therapy with β-interferon 1b (32.5%). Corticosteroids and tocilizumab were used in 25.2% and 12.9% of patients, respectively. The total cost of anti-COVID-19 agents was €511,825 (€408 per patient). In the multivariate analysis, risk factors associated with ARDS included older age, obesity, diabetes mellitus, severe hypoxemia, lymphocytopenia, increased creatine kinase and increased C-reactive protein. In the multivariate Cox model, older age (HR 1.07 -95%CI 1.06-1.09), cardiovascular disease (HR 1.34 -95%CI 1.01-1.79), diabetes mellitus (HR 1.45 -95%CI 1.09-1.92), severe hypoxemia (HR 2.01 -95%CI 1.49-2.72), lymphocytopenia (HR 1.62 -95%CI 1.20-2.20) and increased C-reactive protein (HR 1.04 -95%CI 1.02-1.06) were risk factors for mortality., Graphical Abstract Image, graphical abstract

The aim of the present study was to predict the variables that facilitate integration of unaccompanied foreign minors (UFM) and to develop personal learning environment (PLE) questionnaire dimensions with respect to social integration of UFM. Methods: A social study that was descriptive in nature was conducted with a quantitative empirical-analytical focus. Results: Results from discriminant function analysis indicate that 86% of group membership was correctly classified from gender alone, with female learning environments leading to greater future success. Conclusions: It can be concluded that the predictive results possess methodological coherence. Thus, from them we can propose possible development strategies, particularly targeting males, in order to improve learning and promote social integration. According to the results obtained, improvement of learning strategies and strengthening of the very learning environments, demands new policies to be established which promote emotional improvement and better futures for UFM, especially males., Research Project Competitive EDU2017-88641-R

Inference generation is a crucial skill in language comprehension. Recent research suggests that readers use both the contents from prior written text and their background knowledge, stored in long-term memory, to generate predictive inferences about what will come up next in a sentence. We recorded Event-Related Potentials (ERPs) to examine the reader's ability to make online inferences even in the presence of pseudowords (orthographically legal, but meaningless letter strings), that is, in the presence of referents with no a priori match to vocabulary stored knowledge. As expected, a large and sustained negativity (250-900ms) was elicited by the target word 'fly' when preceded by the pseudoword 'Sias' in the sentence 'Sias fly.' relative to when preceded by 'Birds' in the sentence 'Birds fly'. However, when readers were provided with an initial statement inviting to make an inference: 'Sias have wings', the word 'fly' in 'Sias fly' only elicited a negative voltage deflection over 100ms period (250-350), rapidly falling down to baseline. This result indicates that participants rapidly generated online inferences even with a hindered access to a referent's meaning (i.e. not knowing what 'Sias' are). Remarkably, brainwave traces to the access to a word's meaning in long-term memory (access to a well-known fact such as 'Birds fly') only diverged from ERPs for an inferred-from-reading knowledge ('Sias fly') for 100ms. We conclude that a fundamental search for across sentence coherence drives fast inference making processes in reading tasks. This pattern of brain response is critical to understand the rapid acquisition of new vocabulary when learning first and second languages.

This study uses an explanatory model of the dimensions of leadership and emotional intelligence according to the methods used in particular teaching environments (universities and other educational institutions). The effect of different kinds of leadership on emotional intelligence dimensions is also established using an explanatory model. A total of 954 teachers participated in this cross-sectional study, teaching in 137 different schools/universities. The instruments used for the data collection were the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (MLQ-5) and the Trait Meta Mood Scale (TMMS-24). Data analysis was performed with the software IBM AMOS 23.0. (International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY, USA) using multi-group analysis and structural equations. Results showed that the structural equation model had a good fit. Transformational leadership depends mainly on intellectual stimulation in university teachers, whereas intrinsic motivation is more relevant at the lower educational levels. In relation to transactional leadership, contingency reward has a greater regression weight in non-university education, whereas passive leadership is governed more by passive exception in university teachers. There was a positive and direct relationship between levels of emotional intelligence and transformational leadership in non-university teachers, which reveals the need for effective understanding and management of both one&rsquo, s own and students&rsquo, emotions in order to act effectively as a leader. Transactional leadership was negatively related to some emotional intelligence dimensions, given the relevance of obtaining power in this dimension.

Summary Background Faecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) is a highly effective approach for refractory and recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection (CDI). Despite its excellent efficacy, FMT is not yet a routine procedure in most centres. There is very little experience with FMT based on lyophilized capsules, and data from European institutions are lacking. This article describes our experience with FMT to treat recurrent CDI using lyophilized oral capsules. Methods A prospectively recorded single-centre case series of patients with recurrent CDI who underwent FMT between January 2018 and May 2019 were analysed. The primary outcome was defined as resolution of CDI without recurrences over a two-month period. Overall resolution was defined as resolution of diarrhoea without recurrence of CDI within two months after a further cycle of FMT. The FMT process involved oral ingestion of four or five lyophilized capsules in a single dose. All stool donors were rigorously screened. Findings FMT was performed in 32 patients. Primary cure was achieved in 81.3% of patients, and the overall cure rate was 87.5%. FMT via lyophilized capsules was well tolerated. No FMT procedure-related adverse events and no further complications were observed for lyophilized-capsule FMT. Conclusions This initial clinical experience suggests that FMT based on oral lyophilized preparations is a safe, well-tolerated, and highly effective treatment for recurrent CDI. Administration of oral lyophilized capsules seems feasible in hospital routine and will enable FMT to be more widely used.

Clostridium difficile (CD) diagnosis is very varied and under discussion. Different research groups disagree on the clinical significance of patients with negative direct toxin and positive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) or even more with direct toxin and glutamate dehydrogenase (GDH) both negatives, but CD detected by toxigenic culture (TC). The objective was to analyze the characteristics of patients with 3 different diagnostic criteria. We compared these 3 groups of patients: group 1: (GDH+/direct toxin+/PCR+), group 2: (GDH+/direct toxin-/PCR+) and group 3: (GDH-/direct toxin-/PCR not done/TC+). The proportion of patients with CD infection (CDI) (not colonization) for groups 1 to 3 was, respectively, 90.3%, 95.4%, and 59.1%. No differences between severity (40.8%, 38.5%, 27.3%), recurrence (20.3%, 24.1%, 7.6%), or related mortality (12.5%, 5.2%, 0%) were found within the 3 groups of patients. Laboratory clinical results should not be used as the only tool to differentiate CDI versus colonization or severity. We recommend that PCR or a second-look TC be performed on all patients.

(1) Background: Several researches have shown the relationship between healthy habits and physical and mental health. Thus, it is essential to study how some psychosocial factors can promote positive behaviours in university students, specifically in those who will be teachers of Physical Education. (2) Methods: This descriptive and cross-sectional research was conducted on 775 university students of Physical Education from Spain. This study aims to develop an explanatory model for the relationships between motivational climate, healthy habits (Mediterranean Diet (MD), Physical Activity (PA) and substance consumption) and some indicators of physical health (oxygen consumption (VO2MAX)) and mental health (self-concept) according to gender, using structural equations analysis. (3) Results: The motivational climate was positively associated with PA, showing a stronger relationship for ego-oriented climate in women. The adherence to MD showed a positive association with PA and self-concept, while it is negative for the consumption of tobacco in men. Likewise, PA was directly related to VO2MAX with a higher regression weight for women. The ego-oriented motivational climate was negatively related to tobacco consumption in women. (4) Conclusions: Task-oriented goals are related to more positive and healthy behaviours such as PA, although it was no association was found with MD. Therefore, we can conclude the importance of promoting task-oriented goals in educational contexts linked to Physical Education in order to avoid negative behaviours., This research was funded by Precompetitive Research Projects for Young Researchers 2017—Modality B under de Grant PPJI_B-05. University of Granada

Background: Several studies have shown that following a healthy diet and practicing regular physical activity (PA) are related with multiple health benefits. However, the cognitive and academic implications of these behaviors within adolescents requires further study. Material and Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted with a simple of 1059 adolescents from Spain. The main instruments employed were the Adherence to Mediterranean Diet Test (KIDMED), the Physical Activity Questionnaire for Adolescents (PAQ-A) and the Motivation and Learning Strategies Short Form (MSLQ-SF). Results: Practicing PA for more than three hours per week was related to better dietary habits (p &lt, 0.001) such as increased consumption of vegetables (0.75 &plusmn, 0.43 vs. 0.62 &plusmn, 0.48), fish (0.67 &plusmn, 0.47 vs. 0.58 &plusmn, 0.49), cereals (0.85 &plusmn, 0.35 vs. 0.77 &plusmn, 0.41) and nuts (0.44 &plusmn, 0.49 vs. 0.35 &plusmn, 0.47). High adherence to a Mediterranean diet (MD) was positively related to elaboration strategies (r = 0.116), organizational strategies (r = 0.109), critical thinking (r = 0.116), self-regulation (r = 0.159), time and study habits (r = 0.160), self-regulation of effort (r = 0.118), and intrinsically orientated goals (r = 0.090) (p &lt, 0.01 for all variables). Practicing PA every week was also related to improvements in several of the measured variables and in addition was related to lower levels of anxiety within the academic environment (r = &minus, 0.070, p &lt, 0.05). Conclusions: Given the benefits of eating habits and the practice of PA in the cognitive processes involved in adolescent learning, intervention programs within the educational context are recommended to improve healthy habits.

This study reports an event-related potential (ERP) experiment examining whether valuation (i.e., one's own values) is integrated incrementally and whether it affects L2 speakers' online interpretation of the sentence. We presented Spanish native speakers and French–Spanish mid-proficiency late L2 speakers with visual sentences containing value-consistent and value-inconsistent statements (e.g., ‘Nowadays, paedophilia should be prohibited/tolerated across the world.’). Participants' brain activity was recorded as they were reading the sentences and indicating whether they agreed with the statements or not. Behaviourally, the two groups revealed identical valuation. The ERP analyses showed both a semantic (N400) and an affect-related response (LPP) to value-inconsistent statements in the native group, but only an LPP in the non-native group. These results suggest that valuation is integrated online (presence of LPP) during L2 sentence comprehension but that it does not interfere with semantic processing (absence of N400). This work was supported by grants from the Spanish Government (PSI2011-23033, CONSOLIDER-INGENIO2010 CSD2007-00048, ECO2011-25295, and ECO2010-09555-E), from the Catalan Government (SGR 2009-1521) and from the 7th Framework Programme (AThEME 613465). Clara Martin is supported by the Basque Foundation for Science (IKERBASQUE) and the BCBL institution.

Why is it more difficult to comprehend a 2nd (L2) than a 1st language (L1)? In the present article we investigate whether difficulties during L2 sentence comprehension come from differences in the way L1 and L2 speakers anticipate upcoming words. We recorded the brain activity (event-related potentials) of Spanish monolinguals, French-Spanish late bilinguals, and Spanish-Catalan early bilinguals while reading sentences in Spanish. We manipulated the ending of highly constrained sentences so that the critical noun was either expected or not. The expected and unexpected nouns were of different gender so that we could observe potential anticipation effects already on the article. In line with previous studies, a modulation of the N400 effect was observed on the article and the noun, followed by an anterior positivity on the noun. Importantly, this pattern was found in all 3 groups, suggesting that, at least when their 2 languages are closely related, bilinguals are able to anticipate upcoming words in a similar manner as monolinguals.

This event-related potential (ERP) study explored the behaviour of N400 and post-N400 frontal positivities (pN400FP) during the processing of emotionally biased and unbiased sentences that randomly led to highly expected or unexpected word outcomes. Unexpected outcomes (as determined by sentence completion written tests) elicited significantly larger N400 and pN400FP responses than did highly expected outcomes. Emotionally neutral outcomes triggered a significant N400 expectancy effect across all scalp locations, including frontal sites, whereas emotionally biased outcomes elicited a significant N400 effect localized to posterior scalp regions. The subsequent pN400FP effect was significant only when emotional expectations were violated and not when emotionally neutral sentences led to unexpected outcomes. This frontal effect, linked to the processing of lexically unexpected but plausible words, showed larger amplitudes for unexpected pleasant surprises than for unexpected setbacks. Our results support the view that the pN400FP response to unexpected verbal outcomes entails more than a generic reaction to a lexical ‘misprediction’. Rather, they favour the hypothesis that the affective content of the sentence being processed influences the effort needed to override a lexical prediction, such that more effort is needed to override a pessimistic prediction than an optimistic one.

In reading tasks, words that convey a false statement elicit an enhanced N400 brainwave response, relative to words that convey a true statement. N400 amplitude reductions are generally linked to the online expectancy of upcoming words in discourse. White lies, contrary to false statements, may not be unexpected in social scenarios. We used the event-related potential (ERP) technique to determine whether there is an impact of social context on sentence processing. We measured ERP responses to target words that either conveyed a social "white" lie or a socially impolite blunt truth, relative to semantic violations. Word expectancy was controlled for by equating the cloze probabilities of white lying and blunt true targets, as measured in previous paper-and-pencil tests. We obtained a classic semantic violation effect (a larger N400 for semantic incongruities relative to sense making statements). White lies, in contrast to false statements, did not enhance the amplitude of the N400 component. Interestingly, blunt true statements yielded both a late frontal positivity and an N400 response in those scenarios particularly biased to white lying. Thus, white lies do not interfere with online semantic processing, and they do not engage further reanalysis processes, which are typically indexed by subsequent late positivity ERP effects. Instead, an N400 and a late frontal positivity obtained in response to blunt true statements indicate that they were treated as unexpected events. In conclusion, unwritten rules of social communicative behavior influence the electrical brain response to locally coherent but socially inappropriate statements.

Brainwave responses to words in context depend on semantic and world-knowledge expectations. Using the N400 component of event-related potentials as an index of word expectation, we explored brain responses to negatively and positively biased sentence frames randomly presented with their emotionally matched highly expected outcome or with violations that included switches to unexpected emotionally opposite outcomes or nonsense. Nonsense elicited large N400 responses regardless of the bias of the preceding sentence frame. Unexpected emotionally opposite outcomes elicited smaller than nonsense N400 responses and subsequent post-N400 frontal positivities, both unaffected by sentence frame bias. Over a midline-posterior scalp region, expected positive outcomes elicited larger N400 responses than negative ones, despite a high and matched word probability. Our study reveals that brains respond to unexpected emotional outcomes regardless of the direction of the emotional switch and hints at the possibility that the strength of positive and negative expectations may be adjusted before experiencing unexpected events.

Previous event-related potential studies have demonstrated the online generation of inferences during reading for comprehension tasks. The present study contrasted the brainwave patterns of activity to the fulfilment or violation of various types of inferences (causal, emotional, locative). Relative to inference congruent sentence endings, a typical centro-parietal N400 was elicited for the violation of causal and locative inferences. This N400 effect was initially absent for emotional inferences, most likely due to their lower cloze probability. Between 500 and 750ms, a larger frontal positivity (pN400FP) was elicited by inference incongruent sentence endings in the causal condition. In emotional sentences, both inference congruent and incongruent endings exerted this frontally distributed late positivity. For the violation of locative inferences, the larger positivity was only marginally significant over left posterior scalp locations. Thus, not all inference eliciting sentences evoked a similar pattern of ERP responses. We interpret and discuss our results in line with recent views on what the N400, the P600 and the pN400FP brainwave potentials index.

Event-related potentials were used to examine the role of grammatical gender in auditory sentence comprehension. Native Spanish speakers listened to sentence pairs in which a drawing depicting a noun was either congruent or incongruent with sentence meaning, and agreed or disagreed in gender with the immediately preceding spoken article. Semantically incongruent drawings elicited an N400 regardless of gender agreement. A similar negativity to prior articles of gender opposite to that of the contextually expected noun suggests that listeners predict specific words during comprehension. Gender disagreements at the drawing also elicited an increased negativity with a later onset and distribution distinct from the canonical N400, indicating that comprehenders attend to gender agreement, even when one of the words is only implicitly represented by a drawing.

Event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were used to examine the role of grammatical gender in written sentence comprehension. Native Spanish speakers read sentences in which a drawing depicting a target noun was either congruent or incongruent with sentence meaning, and either agreed or disagreed in gender with that of the preceding article. The gender-agreement violation at the drawing was associated with an enhanced negativity between 500 and 700 msec post-stimulus onset. Semantically incongruent drawings elicited a larger N400 than congruent drawings regardless of gender (dis)agreement, indicating little effect of grammatical gender agreement on contextual integration of a picture into a written sentence context. We also observed an enhanced negativity for articles with unexpected relative to expected gender based on prior sentence context indicating that readers generate expectations for specific nouns and their articles.

Switching languages has often been associated with a processing cost. In this study, the authors used event-related potentials to compare switches between two languages with within-language lexical switches as bilinguals read for comprehension. Stimuli included English sentences and idioms ending either with the expected English words, their Spanish translations (code switches), or English synonyms (lexical switches). As expected, lexical switches specifically enhanced the N400 response in both context types. Code switches, by contrast, elicited an increased negativity over left fronto-central sites in the regular nonidiomatic sentences (250-450 ms) and a large posterior positivity (450-850 ms) in both context types. In addition, both lexical and code switches elicited a late frontal positivity (650-850 ms) relative to expected completions, especially in idioms. Analysis of the individual response patterns showed correlations with vocabulary skills in English and in Spanish. Overall, the electrophysiological data suggest that for some speakers in some contexts, the processing of a code switch may actually be less costly than the processing of an unexpected within-language item.

Although extensive work has been conducted in order to study expectancies about semantic information, little effort has been dedicated to the study of the influence of expectancies in the processing of forthcoming syntactic information. The present study tries to examine the issue by presenting participants with grammatically correct sentences of two types. In the first type the critical word of the sentence belonged to the most expected word category type on the basis of the previous context (an article following a verb). In the second sentence type, the critical word was an unexpected but correct word category (an article following an adjective) when a verb is highly expected. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were measured to critical words in both sentence types. Brain waves evoked by the correct but syntactically unexpected word revealed the presence of a negativity with a central distribution around 300-500 ms after stimuli onset, an N400, that was absent in the case of syntactically expected words. No differences were present in previous time windows. These results support models that differentiate between the processing of expected and unexpected syntactic structures.

Recent studies indicate that the human brain attends to and uses grammatical gender cues during sentence comprehension. Here, we examine the nature and time course of the effect of gender on word-by-word sentence reading. Event related brain potentials were recorded to an article and noun, while native Spanish speakers read medium to high-constraint Spanish sentences for comprehension. The noun either fit the sentence meaning or not, and matched the preceding article in gender or not; in addition, the preceding article was either expected or unexpected based on prior sentence context. Semantically anomalous nouns elicited an N400. Gender disagreeing nouns elicited a posterior late positivity (P600), replicating previous findings for words. Gender agreement and semantic congruity interacted in both the N400 window—with a larger negativity frontally for double violations—and the P600 window—with a larger positivity for semantic anomalies, relative to the prestimulus baseline. Finally, unexpected articles elicited an enhanced positivity (500–700 msec post onset) relative to expected articles. Overall, our data indicate that readers anticipate and attend to the gender of both articles and nouns, and use gender in real time to maintain agreement and to build sentence meaning.

The latency of the brain response to semantic anomalies (N400 effect) has been found to be longer in a bilingual's second language (L2) than in their first language (L1) and/or to that seen in monolinguals. This has been explained in terms of late exposure to L2, although age of exposure and language proficiency are often highly correlated. We thus examined the relative contributions of these factors not only in L2 but also in L1 in a group of Spanish-English bilinguals for whom age of exposure and language proficiency were not highly correlated by recording event-related brain potentials (ERPs) to semantically congruous/incongruous words completing written sentences. We also divided our bilinguals into a Spanish-dominant subset who had late exposure and reduced vocabulary proficiency [as measured by Boston Naming Test (BNT) and Verbal Fluency Scores] in L2 (English) relative to L1 (Spanish) and an English-dominant group who had early exposure to both their languages although greater proficiency in English than in Spanish. In both groups, the N400 effect was significantly later in the nondominant than the dominant language. Although this slowing could be due to late exposure to English in the Spanish-dominant group, late exposure cannot explain the slowing in Spanish in the English-dominant group. Overall, we found that vocabulary proficiency and age of exposure are both important in determining the timing of semantic integration effects during written sentence processing--with vocabulary proficiency predicting the timing of semantic analysis in L1 and both age of exposure and language proficiency, although highly correlated, making additional small but uncorrelated contributions to the speed of semantic analysis/integration in L2.