We indicate current and prospective lines of research in order to refine our views on how regret contributes to optimal decision-making.”
“Objectives: Human T-cell lymphotropic virus type 1 (HTLV-1) infection leads to the risk of developing HTLV-1-associated myelopathy/tropical spastic paraparesis (HAM/TSP) in less than 5% of cases. The mechanism of disease progression in HAM/TSP remains unknown. A significant role of certain human leukocyte antigen (HLA) genotypes in determining see more the risk of HAM/TSP has been reported in Japan, where the HLA-A*02 gene has been found to be associated with a lower HTLV-1 provirus load and with protection from HAM/TSP, whereas HLA-DRB1*0101 has been found to be associated with
an increased susceptibility to HAM/TSP. The aim of the present case-control study was to investigate the HLA class I and class II allele distribution in HTLV-seropositive French Afro-Caribbean individuals, originating from the French West Indies.
Methods: Associations with HLA class I (A and B) and class II (DRB1 and DQB1) alleles were tested in 123 HAM/TSP patients and 85 asymptomatic HTLV-1 carriers. HLA typing was undertaken on genomic DNA extracted from peripheral blood leukocytes.
Results: In our cohort, no significant Selleckchem AMN-107 effect on either the risk
of developing HAM/TSP or HTLV-1 provirus load was found for HLA class I or class II, including HLA-A*02 (p = 0.43).
Conclusions: Our findings are in contrast to those in the Japanese population, however the literature on HLA associations in HTLV-1 infections across different populations over the past decade have reported conflicting results and this suggests strong ethnic disparities. (C) 2010
International Society for Infectious Diseases. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.”
“Experimental psychology has shown differences between predictions of theory of decision and human choices. Emotions like regret can partly explain these differences. Neuroimagery used in combination with behavioural economics (neuroeconomics) has been used in order to try to disentangle CBL0137 mw the different emotional and rational factors (regret, rejoicing, reward, costs, uncertainty, trade-off between positive and negative aspects of different options). Emotions then appear as much more complex and mixed affective states than usually assumed. Not only might we feel a positive affect in punishing unfair partners, but mixed emotions can, for example, combine transmutation of previous anxiety into relief and elation by comparison with another less exciting option (elating relief). At the level of complexity of these mixed emotions-which we formally represent by comparisons between ‘unexpected utilities’ and expected ones-the main biases that Kahnemann and Tversky have shown can be explained. In spite of the complexity of these mixed emotions, some of these hypotheses might be partially tested by brain imagery.