We seek to investigate voice quality characteristics, in particular on a breathy to tense dimension, as an indicator for psychological distress, i.e. depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), within semi-structured virtual human interviews. Our evaluation identifies significant differences between the voice quality of psychologically distressed participants and not-distressed partic...

the cities are home to half of the people who live on the planet earth. they stimulate economic growth and cultural prosperity, but they are also the center of pollution and poverty. therefore, the livability of cities, in particular urban distressed areas, has always been one of the issues and challenges facing thinkers in different fields of urban management. however, the planning to improve ...

BACKGROUND There are concerns that pre-operative psychological distress might be associated with reduced patient satisfaction after total hip replacement (THR). METHODS We investigated this in a multi-centre prospective study between January 1999 and January 2002. We dichotomised the patients into the mentally distressed (MHS ≤ 56) and the not mentally distressed (MHS > 56) groups based on th...

This study tested Bowlby and Ainsworth's hypothesis that a hierarchy of caregivers exists whereby infants prefer one caregiver over another when distressed. We examined parent gender (mother vs. father), primary caregiver status (defined as the parent who spent most time with the infant and performed most of the caregiving tasks), and role of toddlers' history of attachment security with each p...

BACKGROUND The role of personality in heart transplantation (HTx) remains largely unknown. We examined the distressed personality (Type D) as a predictor of outcomes in patients suffering from end-stage heart disease who underwent HTx. METHODS Using the DS14 scale, 51 patients (75% men; 54.1 +/- 9.7 years of age) were diagnosed as Type D or non-Type D in the pre-transplant period. End-points ...

BACKGROUND There still is much debate with regard to the role of psychosocial factors in cancer. Evidence suggests that cancer and coronary heart disease (CHD) may have common causes. This study examined the role of pessimism, anxiety and personality in the development of cancer among men who had been diagnosed with CHD but were free of cancer at baseline. METHODS Two hundred and forty-six me...

According to family systems theory, children's emotional development is likely to be influenced by family interactions at multiple levels, including marital, mother-child, and father-child interactions, as well as by interrelations between these levels. The purpose of the present study was to examine parents' marital conflict and mothers' and fathers' distressed responses to their infant's nega...

BACKGROUND Little is known about the impact of psychological risk factors on cardiac prognosis in the drug-eluting stent era. We examined whether the distressed personality (Type D) moderates the effect of percutaneous coronary intervention with sirolimus-eluting stent implantation on adverse clinical events at 2-year follow-up. Type D is an emerging risk factor in patients with cardiovascular ...