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The juvenile justice system identifies youth in conflict with the law as different from the adult criminal population. The Correctional and re-integrative approach forms the basis of a good juvenile justice system. The rationale for such interventions remains to identify risk factors and protective factors for delinquency. History of victimization has been recognized as one of the risk factors for juvenile delinquency. In this context, a cross-sectional study was conducted with 160 adolescents (with a history of juvenile delinquency) residing in Child Correction Homes of Bhaktapur and Kaski districts to study the history of victimization its effect on behavioral and emotional problems. Nepalese versions of the Reduced Item Juvenile Victimization Questionnaire (JVQ) and Strength and Difficulty Questionnaire (SDQ) were used for the study. Of the participants (N=149), 93.96 % reported at least 1 victimization and 79.19% reported lifetime exposure to 3 or more different types of victimization. Total score in JVQ was a significant predictor for Hyperactivity, Emotional Problems, Peer Problems, and Total Difficulty Score of SDQ. These findings point toward the need to further study these aspects of delinquency in the Nepalese context.

Background: Tuberculous meningitis is a critical public health issue in underdeveloped nations due to its high morbidity and death. Tuberculous meningitis with non-specific symptoms of the central nervous system in children needs to be assessed with great vigilance as delay in diagnosis results in poor prognosis. Case Report: We present a case of 20 months old female child with symptoms of sensory alteration, aberrant movements, and fever. Lumbar puncture findings indicated cell count of 1121/mm3, reduced glucose level, and elevated proteins. Ventriculomegaly with diffuse hypodenseimages in the frontal and paraventricular regions with areas of ischemia and hydrocephalus were evident in the MRI. Neuroinfection was indicated with images compatible with obstructive hydrocephalus of early evolution suggestive of tuberculous meningitis. The patient was started on 2HRZE/10 hr regimen. However, the patient was observed with significant neurological sequel and presented multiple comorbidities despite supportive measures. Conclusion : Children are more susceptible to tuberculous meningitis than adults and result in death and disability, if not diagnosed early. Hence, the physicians must always be on the alert for tuberculous meningitis, especially in the areas where tuberculosis is endemic

Background: Suicide is one of the major public health concerns today in all age groups. Suicide has often been neglected in adolescents. We aimed to find out the prevalence of suicidal ideas and attempts, and explore its association with family support and self-esteem among school going students of Kathmandu valley. Methods: We performed a cross-sectional study using a semi structured proforma, P4 Suicide screener, Nepali family support and difficulties scale and Rosenberg self-esteem scale among 211 students of grade eight to ten of two community schools of Kathmandu valley. Socio-demographic and clinical data were tabulated and descriptive analysis were done. The tests for normal distribution were performed initially and then Fisher exact test (categorical) and Mann Whitney U test (continuous variable) were used as applicable. Results: The P4 suicide screen showed 27.96% of the students to be positive. The risk stratification revealed that the maximum percentage (76.3%) of screen positive students had higher risk. The group of students who had no suicidal risk had significantly higher score in family support and difficulty scale as compared to the student with suicidal risk. However, the self-esteem score had no statistically significant difference between the two groups. Conclusion: The suicide risk was present among one-third of the students with high risk among the majority. Considering this high prevalence, it is crucial for parents, teachers and all healthcare providers to be proactive and look for warning signs with all children and adolescents.

Child labourers are more likely to have experienced physical victimisation, which may increase risk for anxiety/depression, by shaping threat biases in information-processing. To target threat biases and vulnerability for anxiety/depression, we evaluated whether Cognitive Bias Modification (CBM) training could be feasibly and acceptably delivered to rescued youth labourers. Seventy-six physically abused rescued labourers aged 14-17 (40 from Nepal, 36 from India) in out-of-home care institutions received either multi-session computerized CBM or control training. Training targeted attention away from threat to positive cues and the endorsement of benign over threat interpretations. Feasibility and acceptability data were gathered along with pre and post intervention measures of attention and interpretation bias and emotional and behavioural symptoms. In terms of feasibility, uptake (proportion of those who completed the pre- intervention assessment from those who consented) and retention (proportion of those who completed the post-intervention assessment from those who completed the pre-intervention assessment) were above 75% in both countries. Average acceptability ratings were mostly ‘moderate’ on most indices for both countries, and none of the participants reported experiencing serious adverse events or reactions in response to or during the trial. Secondarily, CBM participants showed increased attention to positive and decreased attention to threatening stimuli, as well as increased endorsement of benign interpretation and decreased endorsement in negative interpretations of ambiguous social situations. Symptom changes were less clear. Delivering CBM to former child labourers in out-of-home care institutions has interventive potential. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03625206, Date of registration: August, 10, 2018 UK Medical Research Council (MR/N006194/1) and the Department of Biotechnology, India (BT/IN/DBT-MRC/DFID/20/RP/2015-16).

This study investigated adolescents’ own and parental expectations about cross-group friendships between peers from different socio-economic status (SES). Nepalese adolescents (N = 389, M(age) = 14.08; grades: 7–10) evaluated an ambiguous peer encounter between a low and a high SES peer. Overall, adolescents attributed negative intentions to high-SES more than to low-SES peers. Most adolescents expected that high- and low-SES targets could not be friends, that parents of high-SES targets would disapprove of cross-group friendships, referencing social hierarchies and reputation, and that parents of low-SES targets would support friendship citing moral concerns and social mobility. Most adolescents were aware of systemic reasons that underlie SES biases. Given that low SES adolescents often suffer when excluded from peer experiences, these findings indicate that parental socialization strategies should focus not only on protecting children from experiences of discrimination but also from experiences related to social inequalities and a lack of social mobility.

Land cover change is rapidly following path of environmental degradation, imbalance on ecosystem. Kathmandu, Lalitpur and Bhaktapur district has experienced a very high trend of urbanization and land use land cover change. Mapping this trend is absolutely necessary for sustainable development as well as conservation of the ecosystem. While there are desktop applications for making this mapping and analysis possible, upgrading to the web is the best possible way in order to interact with public as well as much easier way of data visualization, data analysis and data dissemination. This paper portrays the design and implementation process along with the visualization of a WebGIS platform via thin client architecture. A dynamic web map portal has been developed concerning the land cover change of Kathmandu, Lalitpur and Bhaktapur district. Among the several Free Open Source server software, OpenGeo Suite has been adopted for the project because it has a robust and flexible design that allows us to reliably handle and publish geospatial data. PostgreSQL/PostGIS, QGIS, Geoserver, Leaflet, and Apache Tomcat has been utilized as the web server in this suite. A fully functional website has been developed in order to host the maps and its components. WMS layers has also been published using Geoserver and styled as can be displayed on the web map portal. Leaflet plugins has been used with the help of which different tools like Zoom, Pan, Full Screen View and Distance Calculator are made available on the portal.

Warfarin is the standard of care, and direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs) are a group of newer drugs to prevent stroke in patients with valvular heart disease. The aim of this meta-analysis is to compare the efficacy and safety of DOACs and warfarin in the prevention of stroke in patients with valvular heart disease (VHD). The current meta-analysis was conducted using the standards developed by the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) recommendation. The databases from the Cochrane library, PubMed, and Excerpta Medica database (EMBASE) were used to search for relevant articles without placing restrictions on the year of publication. Outcomes assessed in the current meta-analysis included a number of patients with stroke or systemic embolism, patients having myocardial infarction during the study period, patients with major bleeding events, and patients who died due to any reason. Overall, five studies were included in the current meta-analysis. Direct oral anticoagulants were associated with a lower risk of stroke or systemic embolism in patients with VHD (relative risk (RR): 0.75, 95% confidence interval (C)I: 0.60 to 0.94). The risk of major bleeding events is 31% lower in patients receiving DOAC compared to patients receiving warfarin (RR: 0.69, 95% CI: 0.58 to 0.83). No significant difference was found between the two groups in terms of all-cause mortality and myocardial infarction. The current meta-analysis shows that DOACs were associated with a lower risk of stroke or systemic embolism as compared to warfarin in patients with VHD. Besides this, the risk of major bleeding events was also lower in patients receiving DOACs compared to patients receiving warfarin. No significant differences were reported in terms of myocardial infarction and all-cause mortality between the two groups.

Albuminuria is a risk factor for chronic kidney disease and cardiovascular events in diabetic people. The pathogenic processes in these circumstances have been documented to be significantly influenced by enhanced renin-angiotensin system activity. The current meta-analysis was carried out to assess the efficacy of direct renin inhibitors in preventing the progression of diabetic kidney disease. This meta-analysis was conducted as per the guidelines of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA). We searched the relevant medical literature through PubMed, Cochrane library and EMBASE. The primary efficacy outcome was a percentage change in urine albumin-creatinine ratio (UACR) (in mg/g) level. Other primary efficacy outcomes included remission from microalbuminuria to normal albuminuria and progression from microalbuminuria to macroalbuminuria. Four randomized control studies were identified and included in the current meta-analysis involving 9,609 participants. The use of direct renin inhibitors was superior in reducing mean UACR compared to angiotensin receptor blockers and angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors. The pooled mean difference in UACR between direct renin inhibitors and the control group was 9.42% (95% CI: -15.70 to -3.15: p-value=0.003). The odds of progression from microalbuminuria to normal albuminuria are 1.26 times higher in patients receiving direct renin inhibitors compared to patients in the control group (OR: 1.26, 95% CI: 1.08-1.46, p-value=0.002). The odds of remission from microalbuminuria to macroalbuminuria were 20% lower in patients receiving direct renin inhibitors compared to patients in the control group (OR: 0.80, 95% CI: 0.69-0.93, p-value=0.003). The use of aliskiren is associated with a significant reduction in UACR, increased remission from microalbuminuria to normal albuminuria and decreased progression from microalbuminuria to macroalbuminuria.

To evaluate high yielding drought tolerant rice varieties in different altitudes, a field experiment was carried out at Duradanda, Lamjung, Nepal during rainy season of 2016 under rainfed condition. The experiment was laid out in a factorial randomized block design with two replications. The treatments comprised of six different rice varieties viz. Sukhadhan-1, Sukhadhan-2, Sukhadhan-3, Sukhadhan-4, Sukhadhan-5 and Sukhadhan-6 and four altitudes viz. 1000, 1200, 1400 and 1600 masl. The results revealed that rice variety Sukhadhan-2 produced the highest grain yield (2.93 t/ha) followed by Sukhadhan-5 (2.92 t/ha) and Sukhadhan-3 (2.82 t/ha). The highest grain yield of Sukhadhan-2 was due to higher number of effective tillers/m2 (228), higher number of grains/panicle (83), higher panicle length (21.79 cm) and low sterility percentage (27.91%) as compared to other varieties. Regarding to altitudes, the highest grain yield (3.34 t/ha) was obtained in lower altitude (1000 masl) followed by 1200 masl (2.79 t/ha), 1400 masl (2.68 t/ha and 1600 masl (1.85 t/ha). The lower yield in higher altitude was due to higher sterility percentage, less number of effective tillers per unit area and less number of effective grains per panicle. It seems that the performance of these varieties was good up to 1400 masl.

Social role theory posits that binary gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in less egalitarian countries, reflecting these countries’ more pronounced sex-based power divisions. Conversely, evolutionary and self-construal theorists suggest that gender gaps in agency and communion should be larger in more egalitarian countries, reflecting the greater autonomy support and flexible self-construction processes present in these countries. Using data from 62 countries (N = 28,640), we examine binary gender gaps in agentic and communal self-views as a function of country-level objective gender equality (the Global Gender Gap Index) and subjective distributions of social power (the Power Distance Index). Findings show that in more egalitarian countries, gender gaps in agency are smaller and gender gaps in communality are larger. These patterns are driven primarily by cross-country differences in men’s self-views and by the Power Distance Index (PDI) more robustly than the Global Gender Gap Index (GGGI). We consider possible causes and implications of these findings., National Science Centre, Poland 2017/26/M/HS6/00360, United States Department of Health & Human Services, National Institutes of Health (NIH) - USA, NIH National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) RL5GM118963, Universidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia, Spain RTI2018-093550-B-I00, Grant Agency of the Czech Republic 20-01214S, Institute of Psychology, Czech Academy of Sciences RVO: 68081740, UK Research & Innovation (UKRI), Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC) ES/S00274X/1 MCIN/AEI PID2019-111549GB-I00, European Research Council (ERC) European Commission ERC-2016-COG 725128, Swedish Research Council Swedish Research Council for Health Working Life & Welfare (Forte) 2017-00414, University of Brasilia 04/2019

During the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the COVIDiSTRESS Consortium launched an open-access global survey to understand and improve individuals’ experiences related to the crisis. A year later, we extended this line of research by launching a new survey to address the dynamic landscape of the pandemic. This survey was released with the goal of addressing diversity, equity, and inclusion by working with over 150 researchers across the globe who collected data in 48 languages and dialects across 137 countries. The resulting cleaned dataset described here includes 15,740 of over 20,000 responses. The dataset allows cross-cultural study of psychological wellbeing and behaviours a year into the pandemic. It includes measures of stress, resilience, vaccine attitudes, trust in government and scientists, compliance, and information acquisition and misperceptions regarding COVID-19. Open-access raw and cleaned datasets with computed scores are available. Just as our initial COVIDiSTRESS dataset has facilitated government policy decisions regarding health crises, this dataset can be used by researchers and policy makers to inform research, decisions, and policy. © 2022, The Author(s). U.S. Department of Education, ED: P031S190304; Texas A and M International University, TAMIU; National Research University Higher School of Economics, ВШЭ The COVIDiSTRESS Consortium would like to acknowledge the contributions of friends and collaborators in translating and sharing the COVIDiSTRESS survey, as well as the study participants. Data analysis was supported by Texas A&M International University (TAMIU) Research Grant, TAMIU Act on Ideas, and the TAMIU Advancing Research and Curriculum Initiative (TAMIU ARC) awarded by the US Department of Education Developing Hispanic-Serving Institutions Program (Award # P031S190304). Data collection by Dmitrii Dubrov was supported within the framework of the Basic Research Program at HSE University, RF.

© The Author(s), 2021. Child labourers are at risk of poorer mental health and once rescued require urgent mental health interventions to ameliorate the long-term impact. In our review, only two published scientific studies evaluated custom-made interventions; other programmes were obtained from non-governmental organisations (NGOs), which need rigorous trial evaluation. We also sought the viewpoints of stakeholders working directly with rescued young people, as well as consulting young people with lived experiences of child labour. We propose that psychoeducational interventions aimed at employees working directly with young people could represent a fruitful approach for low- and middle-income countries in the Asia-Pacific region but also more generally. UK Medical Research Council (MR/N006194/1); Department of Biotechnology, India (BT/IN/DBT-MRC/DFID/20/RP/2015-16).

Neuromyelitis optica is rare, autoimmune-mediated inflammation and demyelination of the central nervous system with a prevalence of 1-2 persons per 100,000 populations. We aim to generate a head-to-head comparison of these drugs with appropriate evidence to guide future trials and treatment guidelines in a patient with recurrent attacks of NMO. We searched the databases like PubMed, MEDLINE, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) and Embase for studies published prior to April 2021 using the keywords. Over all 929 patients from 11 different publications were included in the study. Five studies were included for quantitative synthesis. Pooling of studies showed significant mean reduction of ARR in the monoclonal antibody group (-0.26 [-0.35, -0.17], P 2=0%) and the mean difference in EDSS score from baseline in monoclonal antibodies was - 0.23(95% CI [-0.43, -0.03], P=0.02, I2=0%). There was no significant difference in frequency of total reported adverse events between monoclonal antibody and the comparator arm (RR: 1.01 [0.95, 1.07], P=0.74, I2=14%). Our findings, particularly seen from the context of a few RCTs, support the pursuit of larger, multi-center RCTs that evaluate the effectiveness of each of the currently available monoclonal antibodies and better describe their adverse risk profile.

Young people who have experienced early-life maltreatment preferentially attend to threat and draw more threatening interpretations. In turn, these threat biases may explain elevated risk for lifelong anxiety and/or depression. We investigated whether adolescent labourers with a history of physical abuse showed threat biases relative to non-abused labourers, and whether these threat biases associated with anxiety and depression.100 young people (aged 13-18 years, 64% female) from Nepal rescued from illegal child work were assessed for childhood maltreatment and anxiety and/or depression disorders. Participants completed an emotional visual search task (to measure attention engagement of positive versus negative faces) and an ambiguous scenarios questionnaire (to measure the endorsement of negative versus benign interpretations).Seventy young people reported a history of physical (and emotional) abuse. They were more likely to meet symptom thresholds for depression, and marginally, for anxiety disorders than non-physically abused participants. Abused and non-abused participants did not differ on attention engagement/disengagement of threat or on interpretational style. Abused participants with anxiety were slower to disengage from negative faces to engage with a positive face than non-anxious abused participants. Abused participants with depression endorsed more negative interpretations of ambiguous situations than those without depression.The cross-sectional design limits our ability to infer whether threat biases reflect risk markers of psychopathology.If threat biases are shown to confer risk for anxiety and depression in future studies, they could be targeted in mental health prevention programs for these vulnerable young people.

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-jcc-10.1177_0022022121997997 for Psychometric Properties and Correlates of Precarious Manhood Beliefs in 62 Nations by Jennifer K. Bosson, Paweł Jurek, Joseph A. Vandello, Natasza Kosakowska-Berezecka, Michał Olech, Tomasz Besta, Michael Bender, Vera Hoorens, Maja Becker, A. Timur Sevincer, Deborah L. Best, Saba Safdar, Anna Włodarczyk, Magdalena Zawisza, Magdalena Żadkowska, Sami Abuhamdeh, Collins Badu Agyemang, Gülçin Akbaş, Nihan Albayrak-Aydemir, Soline Ammirati, Joel Anderson, Gulnaz Anjum, Amarina Ariyanto, John Jamir Benzon R. Aruta, Mujeeba Ashraf, Aistė Bakaitytė, Chiara Bertolli, Dashamir Bërxulli, Chongzeng Bi, Katharina Block, Mandy Boehnke, Renata Bongiorno, Janine Bosak, Annalisa Casini, Qingwei Chen, Peilian Chi, Vera Cubela Adoric, Serena Daalmans, Justine Dandy, Soledad de Lemus, Sandesh Dhakal, Nikolay Dvorianchikov, Sonoko Egami, Edgardo Etchezahar, Carla Sofia Esteves, Neto Felix, Laura Froehlich, Efrain Garcia-Sanchez, Alin Gavreliuc, Dana Gavreliuc, Ángel Gomez, Francesca Guizzo, Sylvie Graf, Hedy Greijdanus, Ani Grigoryan, Joanna Grzymała-Moszczyńska, Keltouma Guerch, Marie Gustafsson Sendén, Miriam-Linnea Hale, Hannah Hämer, Mika Hirai, Lam Hoang Duc, Martina Hřebíčková, Paul B. Hutchings, Dorthe Høj Jensen, Inga Jasinskaja-Lahti, Serdar Karabati, Kaltrina Kelmendi, Gabriella Kengyel, Narine Khachatryan, Rawan Ghazzawi, Mary Kinahan, Teri A. Kirby, Monika Kovács, Desiree Kozlowski, Vladislav Krivoshchekov, Clara Kulich, Tai Kurosawa, Nhan Thi Lac An, Javier Labarthe, Ioana Latu, Mary Anne Lauri, Eric Mankowski, Abiodun Musbau Lawal, Junyi Li, Jana Lindner, Anna Lindqvist, Angela T. Maitner, Elena Makarova, Ana Makashvili, Shera Malayeri, Sadia Malik, Tiziana Mancini, Claudia Manzi, Silvia Mari, Sarah E. Martiny, Claude-Hélène Mayer, Vladimir Mihić, Jasna Milošević Đorđević, Eva Moreno-Bella, Silvia Moscatelli, Andrew Bryan Moynihan, Dominique Muller, Erita Narhetali, Félix Neto, Kimberly A. Noels, Boglárka Nyúl, Emma C. O’Connor, Danielle P. Ochoa, Sachiko Ohno, Sulaiman Olanrewaju Adebayo, Randall Osborne, Maria Giuseppina Pacilli, Jorge Palacio, Snigdha Patnaik, Vassilis Pavlopoulos, Pablo Pérez de León, Ivana Piterová, Juliana Barreiros Porto, Angelica Puzio, Joanna Pyrkosz-Pacyna, Erico Rentería Pérez, Emma Renström, Tiphaine Rousseaux, Michelle K. Ryan, Mario Sainz, Marco Salvati, Adil Samekin, Simon Schindler, Masoumeh Seydi, Debra Shepherd, Sara Sherbaji, Toni Schmader, Cláudia Simão, Rosita Sobhie, Lucille De Souza, Emma Sarter, Dijana Sulejmanović, Katie E. Sullivan, Mariko Tatsumi, Lucy Tavitian-Elmadjian, Suparna Jain Thakur, Quang Thi Mong Chi, Beatriz Torre, Ana Torres, Claudio V. Torres, Beril Türkoğlu, Joaquín Ungaretti, Timothy Valshtein, Colette Van Laar, Jolanda van der Noll, Vadym Vasiutynskyi, Christin-Melanie Vauclair, Satu Venäläinen, Neharika Vohra, Marta Walentynowicz, Colleen Ward, Yaping Yang, Vincent Yzerbyt, Valeska Zanello, Antonella Ludmila Zapata-Calvente and Rita Žukauskienė in Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was funded by a Grant from the National Science Centre in Poland (Grant Number: 2017/26/M/HS6/00360) awarded to Natasza Kosakowska-Berezecka. Data collection by the following researchers was supported by Grants as follows: Emma C. O'Connor (Grant RL5GM118963 from National Institute of General Medical Sciences of the National Institutes of Health; Angel Gomez (Grant RTI2018-093550-B-I00 from the Universidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia, Spain); Sylvie Graf and Martina Hrebickova (Grant 20-01214S from the Czech Science Foundation, and Grant RVO: 68081740 from the Institute of Psychology, Czech Academy of Sciences); Teri A. Kirby (Grant ES/S00274X/1 from the Economic and Social Research Council); Soledad de Lemus (Grant PSI2016-79971-P from Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through the excellence); Michelle K. Ryan and Renata Bongiorno (Grant ERC-2016-COG 725128 from the European Research Council awarded to Michelle K. Ryan); Marie Gustafsson Senden, Anna Lindqvist and Emma Renstrom (Grant 2017-00414 from the Swedish Research Council for Health, Working Life, and Welfare); Claudio V. Torres (Grant DPI/DIRPE n. 04/2019 from the University of Brasilia)., This study was preregistered in Open Science Framework at https://osf.io/u9xfg/., Precarious manhood beliefs portray manhood, relative to womanhood, as a social status that is hard to earn, easy to lose, and proven via public action. Whereas qualitative and ethnographic data suggest that many cultures conceptualize manhood as precarious, quantitative research has yet to demonstrate the cross-cultural consistency of precarious manhood beliefs. Here, we examined the psychometric isomorphism, or measurement invariance, of a brief precarious manhood beliefs scale (the PMB). Using data from university samples in 62 countries across 13 world regions (N=33,417), we examined: (1) the isomorphism of the PMB across individual and country levels; (2) the PMB’s distinctness from, and associations with, other cross-culturally validated gender ideologies (e.g., ambivalent sexism and ambivalence toward men; Glick & Fiske, 1996, 1999); and (3) associations of the PMB with country-level indices of gender equality (the GGGI; World Economic Forum, 2019) and human development (the HDI; United Nations Development Programme, 2019). Findings indicate that the PMB is a psychometrically valid and isomorphic index of beliefs about the male gender role that accounts for unique variance in country-level gender equality and human development., National Science Center, Poland 2017/26/M/HS6/00360, United States Department of Health & Human Services National Institutes of Health (NIH) - USA NIH National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) RL5GM118963, Universidad Nacional de Educacion a Distancia, Spain RTI2018-093550-B-I00, Grant Agency of the Czech Republic 20-01214S, Institute of Psychology, Czech Academy of Sciences RVO: 68081740, UK Research & Innovation (UKRI) Economic & Social Research Council (ESRC) ES/S00274X/1, Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness PSI2016-79971-P, European Research Council (ERC) European Commission ERC-2016-COG 725128, Swedish Research Council Swedish Research Council for Health Working Life & Welfare (Forte) 2017-00414, University of Brasilia 04/2019

This study examined the relationships between posttraumatic growth (PTG) and posttraumatic depreciation (PTD) across 10 countries and assessed the factorial invariance of the standardized inventory assessing PTG and PTD, the PTGDI-X, the expansion of the PTGI-X (Tedeschi et al., 2017). We also investigated the roles of social and cognitive factors in PTG and PTD. Data were collected from participants who identified that their most stressful life experience met the definition of trauma in Australia, Germany, Italy, Japan, Nepal, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Turkey, and the US. The participants completed the PTGDI-X and inventories measuring posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms, and predictor variables such as reexamination of core beliefs, centrality of the event, rumination, and disclosures. Results identified universal aspects such as equivalence of factor loadings of the PTGDI-X and the impact of positive/negative disclosure on PTG and PTD. Results also revealed culture-specific aspects, including the relationships between PTG and PTD, and different patterns of cognitive predictors for PTG and PTD. The current study offered the insight that, for the first time using international data, positive and negative post-trauma changes are not likely to be on opposing ends of one dimension, and it is essential to use the PTGDI-X to better understand both positive and negative aspects of post-traumatic experiences.

Background:Tendencies to attend to threatening cues in the environment and to interpret ambiguous situations with negative/hostile intent maintain and may even precipitate internalizing and externalizing problems in young people with a history of maltreatment. Challenging maladaptive information-processing styles using cognitive bias modification (CBM) training may reduce symptoms.Aims:To investigate the acceptability of CBM training in nine young people attending alternate education provision units in the UK, and 10 young people living in out-of-home care institutions in Nepal with a history of maltreatment.Method:CBM training consisted of five sessions of training over a 2-week period; each training session consisted of one module targeting attention biases and one module targeting interpretation biases for threat. A feedback form administered after training measured acceptability. Pre- and post-intervention measures of internalizing and externalizing symptoms were also taken.Results:Most young people (89%) found the training helpful and 84% found the training materials realistic. There were reductions in many symptom domains, but with individual variation. Although limited by the lack of a control condition, we established generalizability of acceptability across participants from two cultural settings.Conclusions:Replication of these findings in larger feasibility randomized controlled trials with measures of attention and interpretation bias before and after intervention, are needed to assess the potential of CBM in reducing anxiety symptoms and its capacity to engage targeted mechanisms.