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Résumé Afin d’aider les parents de jeunes enfants avec un trouble du spectre de l’autisme (TSA) à faire face au stress qu’engendrent les difficultés liées à l’autisme de leur enfant, un programme psychoéducatif de formation a été élaboré. Ce programme francophone de douze séances de deux heures et trois visites au domicile, intitulé « L’A.B.C. du comportement de l’enfant ayant un TSA : Des parents en action ! », est basé sur l’analyse appliquée du comportement. Il a été évalué auprès d’un groupe pilote afin d’en déterminer la validité sociale et l’efficacité. Les résultats de six parents d’enfants âgés entre quatre et six ans montrent une augmentation des connaissances sur les TSA et les pratiques éducatives en fin de programme. Une amélioration du comportement de l’enfant a également été observée pour quatre parents. Les familles sont satisfaites du programme, surtout celles ayant un enfant avec TSA et retard de développement. Objectives Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are not only affecting the development of the child diagnosed with this disorder, but also their entire family. Parents of children with ASD face many challenges that affect their well-being and family's quality of life. These parents need support to understand their child's diagnosis, to face maladaptive behaviors and to promote skill acquisition. Parent training programs (PT) are known to increase parents’ knowledge and skills in these areas. The potential benefits for the families are reduced stress for parents, improvements in the child's development and better parent–child interactions. Unfortunately, a few structured PTs are available to French-speaking families with an ASD child. In order to provide them with this type of intervention, we developed a French parent training named “L’A.B.C. du comportement de l’enfant ayant un TED/TSA: Des parents en action!” and based on applied behavior analysis. The application and evaluation of this new intervention technique follow the recommendations for research studies on psychosocial interventions for individuals with ASD. Therefore, an initial efficacy study has been conducted to establish the promise of this PT. This paper presents the results of the first group of parents. Methods A group of ten parents attended 12 bimonthly sessions of 2 h and three individual home visits. They progressively learned behavioral intervention strategies to face disruptive behaviors and enhance their children's communication and adaptive skills. Six parents (three couples) of three children with ASD (ages 4–6) participated in this study. Measures of efficacy were taken pre- and post-treatment assessment and at a 3-month follow-up: parent's level of knowledge in ASD and behavioral intervention strategies, parenting stress, parent's number of depressive symptoms, children's adaptive functioning and problem behaviors. Parents were also asked for their opinion on the social validity of the program: adequacy of the objectives, acceptability of the methods and satisfaction of the results. Results Parents have significantly improved their knowledge in ASD and behavioral intervention strategies in post-treatment. Four parents reported an improvement in their child's behavior at the end of the PT, but for the two others, the PT was not enough to manage the behavior problems of their son with an Asperger Syndrome. They suggest a specific PT for parents who have a child with Asperger syndrome. All of the participants evaluated the methods used as acceptable and the objectives targeted by the PT as important and necessary for parents of children with ASD. Moreover, all of them recommended this PT to others families and considered continuing using the behavioral intervention strategies they had learned. Conclusions This new French PT program seems to be a feasible and promising intervention for parents of young children with ASD and developmental delay. The content of the PT will be refined and tested on a larger group before being manualized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated the spatial analysis of tactile hierarchical patterns in 110 early-blind children aged 6-8 to 16-18 years, as compared to 90 blindfolded sighted children, in a naming and haptic drawing task. The results revealed that regardless of visual status, young children predominantly produced local responses in both tasks, whereas the production of integrated responses emerged later. Development of local and global processing seems to proceed similarly in the two populations, but local processing continued to occur at high levels over a larger age range in the blind. The possibility of visual mediation is pointed out, as totally blind children tended to process information locally more often than blind children with minimal light perception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an exploratory study, the relationships between two major concepts in psychological adjustment, coping strategies, and defense mechanisms were investigated. Sport competition is an example of a real-world context in which people's responses to stressful situations can be investigated. The extent to which participants reported different uses of coping strategies and defense mechanisms was assessed in terms of performance. 26 elite kayakers were classified into one of two groups, depending on the discrepancy between their standard performance and their performance in competition. Correlations were found among the coping strategies of seeking social support, positive reappraisal/planful problem solving, and mature defenses and between the coping strategy of distancing/avoidance and immature defenses. The results of multivariate and univariate analyses confirmed a significantly different use of coping strategies and defense mechanisms between the two performance groups. In light of these findings, certain recommendations in terms of methodology and application are warranted. Coping strategies and defense mechanisms should be studied to improve adjustment to sport performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In [J. Differential Equations 146 (2) (1998) 320–335], Franc¸oise gives an algorithm for calculating the first nonvanishing Melnikov function Mℓ of a small polynomial perturbation of a Hamiltonian vector field and shows that Mℓ is given by an Abelian integral. This is done under the condition that vanishing of an Abelian integral of any polynomial form ω on the family of cycles implies that the form is algebraically relatively exact.We study here a simple example where Franc¸oise's condition is not verified. We generalize Franc¸oise's algorithm to this case and we show that Mℓ belongs to the C[logt,t,1/t] module above the Abelian integrals.We also establish the linear differential system verified by these Melnikov functions Mℓ(t). [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In this article, we explored relations between selected Rorschach variables and blood glucose control in Insulin-Dependent Diabetes Mellitus (IDDM) patients. Three domains of psychological functioning are taken into consideration: emotional distress, coping and problem solving, and cognitive efficiency. Seventy-one IDDM patients (38 men, 33 women; mean age 42.2 ± 14.9 years) from an outpatient unit took the Rorschach Comprehensive System (Exner, 1986). Nine variables were selected as independent variables. Blood glucose, a dependent variable, was measured by the proportion of glycated hemoglobin. Results of 2 regression analyses show that Y and C' correlate to higher blood glucose. WSum C and the absence of texture related to lower levels of blood glucose. A confounding effect of complications was observed. The findings suggest that emotional factors should be accorded greater attention in behavioral self-regulations in diabetes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The dimorphic yeast Candida albicans is a component of the normal microflora at the mucosal surfaces of healthy individuals. It possesses an array of phenotypic properties considered as virulence traits that contribute to pathogenicity of the yeast in immuno-compromised patients. We addressed the question of the pathogenicity of lineages of C. albicans with regard to their genotype in three series of C. albicans isolates (a series of commensal isolates collected in healthy individuals, a group of bloodstream isolates and a group of non-bloodstream clinical isolates) using a Multi-Locus Microsatellite Typing (MLMT) approach based on the analysis of the polymorphism of 11 microsatellite loci. The MLMT analysis of the three series, corresponding to 174 C. albicans isolates, gave a 100% typability to the method, with a DP index of 0.999. The UPGMA analysis showed that the isolates segregated in eight phylogenetic groups. Interestingly, the clustering was comparable when using NJ and MS-tree algorithms and a good concordance index of the clustering was observed with MLST. All in all our data strongly indicated MLMT as a reliable tool for DNA-typing studies in C. albicans. Isolates from healthy and non-healthy individuals segregated at the same proportions into the eight phylogenetic groups, suggesting that isolates of different origin share the same overall pathogenicity. Surprisingly allelic frequencies at the HIS3 microsatellite differed significantly in commensal isolates (group A) from pooled groups B and C (clinical isolates), raising the possibility that some individual alleles at the HIS3 microsatellite may be associated with distinct pathogenic profiles in C. albicans. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Background and aims: Fatigue is considered as a feature of IBD. Nevertheless, medical variables would partly explain this complex phenomenon. Psychological variables would be especially connected to fatigue for patients in remission. Moreover, personality is known to be linked to the fatigue of patients with CFS. This preliminary study aimed to determine if personality dimensions are linked to the perception of fatigue in IBD. Methods: 81 IBD outpatients in remission completed the MFI (fatigue); ISI, EES (sleep disturbances); TCI-R (personality); HADS (depression and anxiety). Medical data were collected (ferritin, C-reactive protein, number of flare-ups, number of hospitalizations, duration of the disease and surgical sequelae). Results: With the exception of surgical sequelae, none of the medical variables was linked to fatigue perception. Anxiety and sleep disturbances were the most continuously connected to fatigue perception. Significant relationships were observed between personality categorization on Persistence, Self-Directness and the level of fatigue. Conclusion: In order to improve vitality in IBD patients in remission, identification and treatment of psychological aspects should become a dimension of disease management. Fatigue should not be considered only as a direct feature of IBD. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Objectives: Because of the fluctuating and occasional character of Crohn's disease (CD), patients have to cope with a changeable condition of health. Personal perceived control is known to be an important element of adaptation to their medical condition. The objectives of this work are to determine if perceived personal control is predictive of the clinical activity of the disease and of psychological distress (depression, anxiety). Methods: The Hospital Anxiety Depression Scale (HADS), the causal dimension scale and the Clinical Global Impression (CGI; assessing perceived severity) were administered to 160 patients affected by Crohn's disease. Indicators of inflammation (CRP), disease duration and clinical activity of the disease were also asessed. Results: Globally, CD patients perceive their disease as being personally neither controllable nor uncontrollable. Whereas psychological distress is significantly higher when the disease is active, the relationship between the variables appears complex. The feeling of personal control is explained by the clinical activity of the disease (p=.0001) and by the perception that CD is unstable (p<.00001) and globally impacts the life of patients (p=.001). Nevertheless perception of personal control does not explain the clinical activity of the disease. Finally, psychological distress is explained by the perception that the medical team is unable to control the disease (p=.00001) and by the global consequences of the disease on life (p<.005). Conclusions: Psychological treatments should take these dimensions into account so as to improve the well-being and medical conditions of patients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]