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Underlying sensorimotor factors, such as intermanual coupling, contributing to optimal laterality, long remain immature. Using the handmotor laterality blackboard, developmental change in symmetric bimanual motor function for 413 children in groups of 3 to 10 years of age shows synchronicity increased between groups 3 and 5 years of age; but between groups 5 and 7 years of age, given immature coupling, one hand may still disturb the movements of the other one. Between groups 7 and 9 years of age, the hands gradually stop disturbing each other and move independently and fluently. Changes in intermanual coupling with increasing unimanual independence represent expression of changing inter-hemispheric integration across groups. This promotes optimal laterality and task distribution between the hands. Maturation of the corpus callosum is inferred to be a factor in these ontogenetic changes which ultimately lead to optimal left hemisphere specialization for actions such as fluent writing.

The intimate relation between the sensory and motor functions of the hands during object manipulation and exploratory touch, the well-known improvement in object handling and constructive performance in ontogenesis and the emergent laterality thereof, assume changes in morphognostic capabilities in children. In this study we tried to corroborate the hypothesis of Mesker that mature and lateralized finger-thumb opposition is preceded by a stage of two-sided manual form agnosia in preschool children, followed by acquisition of morphognosis of the fingers and, finally, the thumbs. This study examined the development of gnostic hand function in 290 children from 3 to 11 years of age who drew the outlines of a meaningless wooden object passively felt with each hand without visual control. Analysis showed a clear ontogenetic change across the two age groups of increasing morphognostic function: 48% of the 6-yr.-olds drew correctly what the fingers of both left and right hands had perceived (thumbs, 14%). Of the 11-yr.-olds 91% and 61% performed perfectly with the right and left hands, respectively. The fingers preceded the thumbs in reproduction by most children, and the correct reproduction by the left thumb precedes that of the right thumb. The ontogenesis of bimanual sensorimotor functioning is discussed in the light of cortical and callosal development.

Objective: The overall clinical performance of porcelain veneers was evaluated at 5 years. Method and materials: Porcelain veneers were placed on 87 maxillary anterior teeth in 25 patients (19 to 69 years) by a single operator following a standardized clinical procedure. At the 5-year recall, esthetics, marginal performance, vitality, fracture rate, and patient satisfaction were recorded. Results: At recall, 93% of the veneers were satisfactory without intervention. The remaining 7% presented clinically unacceptable problems such as recurrent caries, porcelain fracture, severe clinical microleakage, or pulpal reaction. The retnetion rate of the porcelain veneers was 100%, and the maintenance of esthetics was perfect . Only 14% of the veneers presented excellent marginal adaptation over the entire outline of the restoration; however, the impact of the slight marginal defects on the clinical performance was negligible. Conclusion: Labial porcelain veneers offer a reliable and effective procedure for the conservative treatment of discolored, malformed, and malaligned anterior teeth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In literature as well as in nursing practice a growing concern about nurses' ethical competence can be observed. Based on the cognitive theory of moral development by Kohlberg, this research examined nursing students' ethical behaviour in five nursing dilemmas. Ethical behaviour refers not only to the ethical reasoning of nursing students but also to the relationship between reasoning and behaviour. Kohlberg's definition of morality was refined by adding a care perspective. The results show that the majority of students can be located in the fourth moral stage according to Kohlberg's theory, that is, the conventional level of moral development. This finding implies that students are still guided by professional rules, norms and duties, and have not (yet) succeeded in making personal ethical decisions on the basis of their own principles and acting according to such decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In literature as well as in nursing practice a growing concern about nurses’ ethical competence can be observed. Based on the cognitive theory of moral development by Kohlberg, this research examined nursing students’ ethical behaviour in five nursing dilemmas. Ethical behaviour refers not only to the ethical reasoning of nursing students but also to the relationship between reasoning and behaviour. Kohlberg’s definition of morality was refined by adding a care perspective. The results show that the majority of students can be located in the fourth moral stage according to Kohlberg?s theory, that is, the conventional level of moral development. This finding implies that students are still guided by professional rules, norms and duties, and have not (yet) succeeded in making personal ethical decisions on the basis of their own principles and acting according to such decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, the attrition wear, also called occlusal-contact-area wear, of human enamel was measured quantitatively with a computerized three-dimensional measuring technique over a period of four years. Tooth replicas from a clinical trial were used. A running-in wear period after restorative treatment, followed by steady-state wear, was suggested. The average steady-wear rate on occlusal contact areas was about 29 pm per year for molars and about 15 pm per year for premolars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The need for reliable and valid measures for ethical behavior of nurses has encouraged the authors to develop a new instrument to measure students' ethical behavior in daily nursing dilemmas. Characteristic of the instrument presented is the inclusion of two fundamental components of ethical behavior: (1) ethical reasoning (and the resulting decision), and (2) the actual implementation of the ethical decision. As for many instruments, Kohlberg's theory of moral development has been used as the conceptual framework. However, Kohlberg's abstract justice orientation was refined by a care perspective and representative nursing dilemmas were used to make the instrument conceptually more appropriate for measuring nurses' ethical behavior. The analysis of the psychometric properties of the instrument has provided several relevant indications for the reliability and validity of the ethical reasoning and implementation scores. The revealed inconsistencies in the Ethical Behavior Test could be satisfactorily interpreted in terms of Kohlberg's theory and related empirical research findings, supporting the reliability of the ethical behavior scores. The content validity rests upon the careful development of the instrument resulting in an optimal mix of dilemmas, arguments and care situations to reveal nurses' ethical behavior and in a substantial degree of correspondence between the concept and operationalization. The congruency between the patterns of ethical behavior and Kohlberg's theoretical insights about ethical reasoning and practice support the construct validity of the instrument.

To determine the cardiorespiratory response to maximal exercise before, during and after the pubescent growth spurt, thirty boys were tested at yearly intervals over a period of six consecutive years. For each individual, peak height velocity (PHV) was determined. The age at PHV (X = 13.6 years) was taken as a standard of maturation. The results from all subjects at 1.5 and 0.5 years before and 0.5 and 1.5 years after PHV are presented. The highest oxygen uptake (VO2) obtained during an incremental bicycle ergometer test to voluntary exhaustion was taken as peak oxygen uptake (VO2 peak). Across each of the four years studied, mean VO2 peak (min = 49.6; max = 52.5 ml.kg-1.min-1) and mean heart rate (HR) at VO2 peak (min = 190; max = 192) did not change significantly as a function of PHV. On the other hand, the respiratory quotient at VO2 peak increased considerably from mean minima and maxima of 0.99 and 1.01 before PHV to 1.07 and 1.10 after PHV. Ventilatory equivalent for VO2 (VE/VO2), taken as an indicator of ventilatory economy, seemed to be unaffected by the maturation process. The steepest increase in circumpubertal oxygen pulse was found one year after PHV. Average stability coefficients (r), calculated from the inter-years correlations were high for height (r = 0.95), weight (r = 0.92), HR at VO2 peak (r = 0.74), VO2 peak in 1/min (r = 0.71), oxygen pulse (r = 0.68) and tidal volume (r = 0.64).