Introduction: Mood disorders such as anxiety and depression are common following menopause and andropause. The lack of sex steroid hormones is suggested as the primary cause of these disturbances. The level of luteinizing hormone (LH) would also rise 3-4 times than normal in these people. The potential effects of LH on mood and cognitive symptoms following menopause and andropause are not clear...

This paper describes an architecture for intelligent agents that incorporates an emotional control mechanism based on the threat evaluation system proposed in a model for anxiety disorders. Evolutionary computing techniques are proposed to evaluate the effectiveness of the emotional mechanism as well as to try to find out why some individuals are more prone to anxiety than others. This can be c...

The effect of propranolol was studied on 23 dental phobics in a double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial involving actual dental treatment. The subjects were selected because they showed high physiological reactivity in the dental situation. Twelve subjects received the test drug and 11 subjects received the placebo at individualized doses of either 80 or 120 mg. A significant difference...

We present results of a randomized controlled study that compared different types of affective support messages delivered by pedagogical agents. Results suggest that using a character that is empathic and emphasizes the malleability of intelligence and the importance of effort provides useful results in student learning, while reducing boredom and anxiety. Emphasizing success and failure (“That...

The pediatric emergency department can be frightening for children. Visits are unplanned, and frequently accompanied by significant emotional and physical distress. While treatment of pain and anxiety in children have been historically inadequate, the barriers to their treatment have largely been overcome through increased awareness, child- and family-focused care, standardized assessment, inst...

Excessive anger can foster health problems and damage relationships. Traditional methods for treating individuals with anger-related problems have employed skills training and relaxation methods. This paper proposes that anger and anxiety share many clinical features, and that intervention models that have been effectively employed in the treatment of anxiety disorders can also be used safely i...

We examine whether exposure to direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) for antidepressant drugs affects individual use of these medications among those suffering from depression. Prior studies have almost exclusively relied on making connections between national or market-level advertising volume/expenditures and national or individual-level usage of medications. This is the first study to: estim...

We have previously reported the presence of dehydroepiandosterone (DHEA) in the day-old-chick brain, and a role for it in enhanced memory formation. Here we confirm that intracerebral injections of DHEA 5 min before training on the weak passive avoidance task enhanced recall 24 hours after training. Recall per se on an appetitive visual categorization task was not altered by administration of D...

Relapse of psychosis is common and has profound adverse consequences. Early signs interventions assume that timely prediction of relapse allows preventative action to reduce the chance of full relapse. The utility of early signs in this context is critically reviewed. Cohort studies suggest that early signs (e.g. anxiety, insomnia) appear in the few weeks before relapse and have modest predicti...