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OBJECTIVE: In the last decade, using social network sites (SNSs) has grown and become an integral part of daily routine for adolescents. As known, ADHD is a major public health problem for all addiction types, including the Internet and SNSs addiction. Our aim was to examine the effect of ADHD, impulsivity types, using motivations, internalizing and externalizing symptoms on Facebook (FB) overuse and FB addiction among adolescents. METHODS: Participants were recruited from ADHD and non-ADHD adolescents who were applied to the child and adolescent psychiatry and have an active FB account. We used FB Use and Motivations Form, the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale (BIS), Bergen FB Addiction Scale (BFAS) and Conners-Wells’ Adolescent Self-Report Scale-Long form (CASS:L). RESULTS: Our results indicated that ADHD adolescents have more fake FB accounts, have their own accounts for longer time, are using FB for more motivation types and FB overuse is more frequent than in non-ADHD counterparts. According to the degree of FB use, we have shown that adolescents with FB overuse behaviour have more externalizing symptoms and have higher CASS:L and Barrat impulsivity scores than others. Risk factors for FB overuse are: having a fake FB account and having higher ADHD index scores; risk factors for FB addiction are: higher attentional impulsivity, higher conduct problems scores and higher ADHD index scores. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study have improved our understanding about the risk factors of a new behavioural addiction type among adolescents.

Developmental dyscalculia is a neurodevelopmental disorder specific to arithmetic learning even with normal intelligence and age-appropriate education. Difficulties often persist from childhood through adulthood lowering the individual’s quality of life. However, the neural correlates of developmental dyscalculia are poorly understood. This study aimed to identify brain structural connectivity alterations in developmental dyscalculia. All participants were recruited from a large scale, non-referred population sample in a longitudinal design. We studied 10 children with developmental dyscalculia (11.3 ± 0.7 years) and 16 typically developing peers (11.2 ± 0.6 years) using diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging. We assessed white matter microstructure with tract-based spatial statistics in regions-of-interest tracts that had previously been related to math ability in children. Then we used global probabilistic tractography for the first time to measure and compare tract length between developmental dyscalculia and typically developing groups. The high angular resolution diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging and crossing-fiber probabilistic tractography allowed us to evaluate the length of the pathways compared to previous studies. The major findings of our study were reduced white matter coherence and shorter tract length of the left superior longitudinal/arcuate fasciculus and left anterior thalamic radiation in the developmental dyscalculia group. Furthermore, the lower white matter coherence and shorter pathways tended to be associated with the lower math performance. These results from the regional analyses indicate that learning, memory and language-related pathways in the left hemisphere might be related to developmental dyscalculia in children.

OBJECTIVES: Previous studies suggested that inattention was related particularly with reading problems among students. However, most of the former studies had clinically referred samples. A majority of the studies conducted with nonreferred samples have evaluated academic achievement with single or a few parent- or teacher-rated items. Almost none of the studies have investigated reading, writing, and mathematics achievements in a single sample. Data from low- and middle-income countries on the subject are exceedingly scarce. Objectives of the present study were to compare actual measurements of reading fluency, reading comprehension, reading and writing errors, mathematics achievement, and teacher ratings of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms in a single sample. METHODS: Teachers rated ADHD symptoms in a single, nonreferred, population sample (n = 2493) of first- to fourth-grade students with a SNAP-4 rating scale. Actual measurements of reading fluency, reading comprehension, reading and writing errors, and mathematics achievement were also obtained. Fluid IQ was evaluated with Ravens Progressive Matrices. Students were grouped into Predominantly Inattentive (PI), Hyperactive/Impulsive (HI), Combined (C), or control groups. Univariate and multivariate analyses were conducted. Statistical significance was set at p

Dyscalculia is a learning disability affecting the acquisition of arithmetical skills in children with normal intelligence and age-appropriate education. Two hypotheses attempt to explain the main cause of dyscalculia. The first hypothesis suggests that a problem with the core mechanisms of perceiving (non-symbolic) quantities is the cause of dyscalculia (core deficit hypothesis), while the alternative hypothesis suggests that dyscalculics have problems only with the processing of numerical symbols (access deficit hypothesis). In the present study, the symbolic and non-symbolic numerosity processing of typically developing children and children with dyscalculia were examined with functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Control (n = 15, mean age: 11.26) and dyscalculia (n = 12, mean age: 11.25) groups were determined using a wide-scale screening process. Participants performed a quantity comparison paradigm in the fMRI with two number conditions (dot and symbol comparison) and two difficulty levels (0.5 and 0.7 ratio). The results showed that the bilateral intraparietal sulcus (IPS), left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and left fusiform gyrus (so-called “number form area”) were activated for number perception as well as bilateral occipital and supplementary motor areas. The task difficulty engaged bilateral insular cortex, anterior cingulate cortex, IPS, and DLPFC activation. The dyscalculia group showed more activation in the left orbitofrontal cortex, left medial prefrontal cortex, and right anterior cingulate cortex than the control group. The dyscalculia group showed left hippocampus activation specifically for the symbolic condition. Increased left hippocampal and left-lateralized frontal network activation suggest increased executive and memory-based compensation mechanisms during symbolic processing for dyscalculics. Overall, our findings support the access deficit hypothesis as a neural basis for dyscalculia.

OBJECTIVES: Modified Checklist for Autism in Toddlers (M-CHAT) is widely used internationally to screen autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Three-item Direct Observation Screen (TIDOS) is a novel observational tool which may be used by physicians in a short time as a part of routine well-child visit. It includes the following: (a) Joint Attention, (b) Eye Contact, and (c) Response to Name. We aimed to compare the screening performance of TIDOS and M-CHAT for ASD. MATERIAL AND METHODS: A total of 1345 children aged 16–38 months were examined during well-child care visits at Social Pediatrics Department of Ankara University between May 2015 and May 2016. Five hundred and eleven of 1345 children aged 16—38 months whose parents approved informed consent were enrolled in this study to evaluate the performance of two screening tests: TIDOS and M-CHAT for ASD. The children whose screening tests were positive and controls whose tests were negative had undergone clinical evaluation for the diagnosis of ASD. Clinical evaluation was performed within 2 weeks of the initial M-CHAT, M-CHAT/F, or TIDOS screenings for screening positive children and within 3–9 months for screening randomly selected negative children. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), and negative predictive value (NPV) of those tests were determined. RESULTS: ASD was diagnosed in 5 of the 511 children in a healthy child clinic of a university hospital with the prevalence of approximately 1%. All the children with ASD were boys. The growth parameters (including body weight, height, head circumference) did not have any properties. There were no consanguineous marriages among the parents of children with ASD. The ages of mothers and fathers of the children with ASD were in a range between 31–39 years and 31–46 years, respectively. The sensitivity for diagnosis of ASD was found to be 0.60 for both M-CHAT and M-CHAT/F tests. The specificity of M-CHAT and M-CHAT/F tests for diagnosis of ASD was found to be 0.96 and 0.97, respectively. PPV were found to be 0.14 and 0.18, respectively. The sensitivity for diagnosis of ASD was found to be 0.80 for TIDOS. Specificity and PPV in the diagnosis of ASD were found to be 0.99 and 0.80, respectively. NPV for all tests were above 0.99. CONCLUSION: The current study has demonstrated that TIDOS was more sensitive and had higher PPV than M-CHAT. TIDOS has required little time and might be easily combined to routine physical examination of toddlers attending 18- to 36-month well-child clinic visits.

Objective: Although it has been suggested that attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is common in children who were abused and that ADHD can be a risk factor for abuse itself, there are very few studies which investigated whether adult ADHD is associated with childhood abuse and neglect. The aim of this study was to fill this gap in the literature. Method: Seventy adults with DSM-IV ADHD diagnosis and 70 healthy control subjects were included in the study. We used Adult ADHD Self Rating Scale (ASRS) and Wender Utah Rating Scale (WURS) to support the diagnosis. All subjects were assessed using Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ), Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Scale, Post-traumatic Stress Disorder Checklist (PCL), Dissociative Experiences Scale (DES), and Symptom Checklist-90-Revised. Results: ADHD subjects had higher ASRS inattentiveness, hyperactivity/impulsivity, WURS, and Symptoms Checklist-90 (SCL-90) General Symptom Index scores than controls. ADHD group also had higher PCL, DES and ACE scores. In CTQ, ADHD subjects had higher emotional abuse and neglect scores than control subjects. ASRS and WURS scores were correlated with PCL, ACE, CTQ Emotional Abuse, and DES scores; WURS score was also correlated with CTQ Physical Abuse and Neglect scores. Regression analysis indicated that general level of psychopathology was most significantly associated with DES and PCL scores. Conclusions: Results suggested that ADHD cases were more commonly exposed to emotional abuse and neglect. They had significantly more dissociative experiences and reported Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms more frequently. The results pointed to the importance of childhood traumatic and adverse experiences in adults with ADHD.

Temel anlamları görme algısına dayanan sözcükler konusunda şimdiye kadar yapılan çalışmalarda genellikle fiiller üzerinde durulmuştur. Görme algısı fiilerinin yüksek derecede çokanlamlı olduğu tespit edilmiştir. Bazı araştırmalarda, anlam genişlemesi yollarının dil aileleri ve kültür farklılıklarına göre değişiklikler gösterdiğine dikkat çekilmiştir. Bu çalışmadaki analiz için, ayrı dil ailelerine mensup ve tipolojik açıdan farklı gruplarda yer alan Türkçe ve Hırvatçanın görme organını ifade eden Türkçe göz ile Hırvatça karşılığı oko adları seçilmiştir. Araştırmanın üç temel amacı vardır: Birincisi, her iki dilde görme organını ifade eden adlardan türemiş sözcükler ve deyimlerin anlamlarını inceleyerek iki dilde ‘göz’ kavramı yardımıyla hangi soyut kavramların adlandırıldığını tespit etmek; ikincisi görme organını ifade eden adlar ile görme algısı fiileri arasında anlam genişlemesi yollarının benzerliklerini ve farklılıklarını ortaya çıkarmaktır. Çalışmanın üçüncü amacı ise göz ve oko adlarından türemiş farklı yapıların anlamlarının kavramsal açıdan birbiriyle nasıl ilişkili olduğunu tespit etmektir. Analizin sonuçları, göz sözcüğünü içeren yapıların Türkçede sayıca daha fazla olduğunu, dolayısıyla Türkçede görme algısının, deyim ve söz hazinesinin oluşumunda ve soyut kavramların adlandırılmasında daha önemli rol oynadığını göstermiştir. Öte yandan sonuçlar, Türkçe ve Hırvatça arasında soyut kavramların adlandırılmasında büyük benzerlikler olduğunu ortaya çıkarmıştır.