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Copyright of Avances en PsicologÍa Latinoamericana is the property of Colegio Mayor de Nuestra Senora del Rosario and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is considered a neurodevelopmental disorder, whose prevalence has increased in recent years, showing in some cases deficits in the cognitive area, with processing speed (PS) being one of the affected variables. Therefore, the present study aims to: 1) compare the scores obtained in relation to the PS variable between students aged 6 to 11 with ASD and their peers with neurotypical development in Metropolitan Lima; and 2) establish the PS profile of the included students with ASD. For this, 30 children aged 6 to 11 attending to regular basic education institutions (RBE) in Metropolitan Lima were sampled, 15 with neurotypical development and 15 included with ASD. For the first objective, a case -control design (CCD) was used, while the second objective was a selective non-probabilistic cross-sectional design. Results showed a lower performance by the group with ASD in the PS tasks evaluated, compared to their neurotypical peers, as well as differences were found among the children in the group with ASD, which could be associated with the variety of skills that the tasks involved chores. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Fides et Ratio is the property of Universidad La Salle de Bolivia and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In recent decades, researchers have addressed the use of technologies because of its positive and negative effects on cognitive and affective processes. The present study investigated the relationship between the frequency of use of technologies, its influence on inhibitory control and attention span, and the role played by personality and affective status in a young adult population. The study included 90 participants between the ages of 18 and 34 years. They were administered the following tests: Stroop test; Trail Making Test; D2 Test of Attention; Questionnaire on the Problem Use of New Technologies; Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Revised-Abbreviated; and the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule. A significant inverse relationship was found between the frequency of use of technologies, such as the internet and television, and inhibition and attention capabilities, whereas a significant direct relationship was found between the use of the internet and mobile phones and levels of neuroticism and negative affect. These results suggest that the excessive use of certain technologies may have a negative effect on cognitive abilities that may be modulated by affective and personality variables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: mechanical reasoning (MR) is the ability to identify the components of a system and understand how they interact in order for the system to work. Different mechanical systems, such as those of wheels and gears, require different types of reasoning. Objective: this study seeks to analyze the relationship that working memory (WM) and processing speed (PS) have with MR. Method: one hundred seventy-three (173) university students were assessed through the DAT test which consisted of 30 MR problems, the symbol search subtest of the WAIS-III battery for assessing the PS, and the BIMET-V and BIMET-VE batteries to evaluate the WM verbal and visuospatial components. Results: regression analyses showed that the proposed variables do not predict the performance in gear problems, while the visuospatial WM and the PS predict the performance in wheel problems. Discussion: the results suggest that gear problems have a low executive demand as they can be solved in a fractional way, while wheel problems require to hold in memory all the components that are part of the system and, at the same time, require a higher attentional load. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It exists a growing consensus about broad neurological abnormalities in people with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and its genetic origin, which has its expression during the neural development. As a consequence, there have been identified several impairments in high order cognitive functions in this population. However the results remain inconsistent. Our research is aimed at the neuropsychological characterization of children with ASD. To that end, we assessed a sample of 18 children diagnosed of ASD with a broad neuropsychological test battery in order to evaluate attention and executive functioning. The results obtained by this experimental group were compared with a sample of 18 typically developing children. The results show a comprehensive impairment in attention and executive functioning in the ASD group, with the exception of verbal fluency with semantic clues, planning and cognitive flexibility. Further research is needed in order to clarify the origin of these results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies show that traits of Five-Factor Model of personality and frontal neurocognitive functions share a common neurobiological basis. In penitentiary population, the relationships between these functions and traits have been little studied. This study aims to examine the relationship between personality and neurocognitive functions in offenders and determine whether measures of frontal neurocognitive functioning help to predict some percentage of variance in personality traits of penitentiary samples. Ninety-nine men (divided into groups: sex offenders against adults, non-sex offenders and control group) performed the NEO Five-Factor Personality Inventory (NEO-FFI) and Trail Making Test (TMT; parts A and B). The performance in part A of TMT was associated with Extraversion level on sex offenders and with Neuroticism level on non-sexual offenders, and explained a significant proportion of the variance of these domains personality in both groups. In conclusion, the relationship between neurocognitive functioning and personality seems to be different depending on the type of crime committed, although findings must be interpreted in a preliminary way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Improving the quality of life of patients with schizophrenia is a major goal in managing this devastating disorder, but agreement is lacking about the factors that predict quality of life (QoL) over the course of the disorder. Methods. We examined 165 hospitalized patients with schizophrenia in this study. We included measures for psychiatric (PANSS, insight and affective symptoms) and cognitive symptoms. Confirmatory factor analysis established a cognitive structure composed of the following six factors: attention, processing speed, verbal memory, fluency, working memory and executive functioning. Quality of life was assessed using the Heinrichs-Hanlon-Carpenter Scale. Results. Age, duration of illness, presence of more severe negative symptoms and most cognitive factors correlated significantly with QoL indicators. Regression analysis showed that processing speed (PS) was by far the most important cognitive factor that predicted QoL. Moreover, the interaction between PS and negative symptoms, patient age and executive functions modified the effect of PS on QoL. Finally, positive symptoms and other socio-demographic data were not related to QoL in the current study. Conclusions. Our findings suggest that PS and negative symptoms predict QoL in schizophrenia [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]