My dissertation focuses on the means through which a new worker-identity is getting crafted in the city of Kolkata in India under the impact of neoliberal economic policies of the state on one hand and the changing modes of capital formation on the other. Kolkata’s position as the pre-eminent city of British India in the nineteenth century had led to a huge influx of industrial capital. However, the post-independence era saw a gradual flight of capital due to a long history of political and social turbulence. With the liberalization of the Indian economy in the 1990s, both national and trans-national capital have started flowing back into Kolkata, especially in sectors such as real-estate, retail and service industries. This has led to a huge proliferation of expensive shopping malls and cafes in the city employing a large urban youth population, usually from under-privileged backgrounds. With the state giving up its former faith in socialist principles and instead strongly committing itself to neoliberal economic reforms, the future of development for Kolkata is getting tied to its capacity to attract corporate capital, particularly in organized retail and service sectors. As such, urban labor is coming under a tremendous scrutiny to delineate an identity according to principles of flexibility, self-discipline and responsiveness to the needs of contemporary private capitalist interests. In spaces like shopping malls and exclusive cafes, workers are repeatedly trained and indoctrinated to show an affective capacity to serve, be cheerful in their work and to display through bodily comportments the signs of a global cosmopolitanism that can sustain consumption. However, with most of the workers themselves coming from low-income backgrounds with little or no knowledge of the roles they are asked to play as part of their work, uncertainties and anxieties exacerbate the already precarious position of these young workers. This study therefore looks at how workers negotiate everyday work environments and how such work environments in turn alter and condition their identity through multiple strategies of discipline and control emanating from both the neoliberal state as well as corporate institutions. / text

Maladaptive decision-making that typifies drug addiction could reflect alterations in cognitive and emotional processing when these individuals are faced with choices. Even if this is true, it is not clear whether these deficits are a cause or a consequence of chronic drug use. The following experiments were designed to determine the effect of acute alcohol intoxication on affective processing in healthy individuals, as measured through a variety of behaviours. In the first experiment, acute alcohol intoxication did not impair performance on a task that recruits the orbitofrontal cortex, a key area for decision-making. In the second experiment examining preference formation, there was a clear dissociation between alcohol’s effect on implicit and explicit memory: acute intoxication impaired explicit memory, while leaving implicit learning intact. In a subsequent experiment, both alcohol and placebo groups showed altered physiological and subjective responses to a psychosocial stressor. Although acute alcohol intoxication did not affect risk-taking, an individual variable (tension-reactivity) moderated performance on this laboratory task. This experiment also revealed a relationship between stress-reactivity and subsequent risk-taking, one explanation being that high levels of cortisol increased individual sensitivity to task outcomes. Finally, an analysis of the accumulated information on drinking rates, impulsivity, and drug use suggests that female drinking rates may be approaching the levels reported by males. There were also significant differences in sensitivity to alcohol’s effects when participants were intoxicated in the lab. Heavy drinkers showed a greater sensitivity to the pleasurable effects of alcohol despite feeling less intoxicated and desiring more alcohol than other individuals. These combined effects could put heavy drinkers at greater risk for alcohol-related problems. Taken as a whole, these studies suggest that individual factors play a stronger role in moderating affective processing than do the direct pharmacological effects of alcohol. / Thesis (Ph.D, Psychology) -- Queen's University, 2008-03-20 14:29:40.722

This work is the result of an investigation into aspects of prolactin and dopamine in primary affective disorders. It is introduced by a discussion on the need for obtaining good scientific data on the organic and psychosocial aspects of psychiatric illness, and in particular, primary affective disorders. A short perspective of the history of depressive illness preceeds the review of relevant scientific literature on primary affective disorder. The literature survey covers aspects which indicate organic causal factors as well as viewing numerous organic studies which are thought to be relevant to this investigation. The role of dopamine in motor behaviour is considered in some detail. Psychopharmacological evidence that the mesolimbic and nigrostriatal dopaminergic systems are involved in motor regulation is reviewed. The role of dopamine receptors in motor behaviour is important to the conceptual framework of this thesis. Dopamine D 2 and D 1 receptors are considered and the opposing roles of these receptors is thought to be significant. Drugs affecting manic and depressive phases of primary affective disorders are reviewed. Emphasis is placed on dopaminergic aspects of various drugs in primary affective disorders as with pimozide as an antimanic agent, and nomifensine as an antidepressant. The possible role of noradrenaline in learning and mood regulation and in the dialogue with dopamine is looked at from an experimental and clinical point of view. Dopaminergic control of prolactin is reviewed and in particular the nature of the D4 receptor. The fact that these receptors which are on the pituitary mammotrophs have similarities to the D2 receptors is relevant. Thus considerable commonality exists between the dopaminergic regulation of motor behaviour and regulation of prolactin. Prolactin is used as an index of dopamine function in patients with primary affective disorders. Motor behaviour is strongly influenced by affective disorders.The central theme of the study itself was to indirectly evaluate dopamine function in primary affective disorder by measuring prolactin levels. As strong tonic inhibition is exerted by dopamine on prolactin, a series of challenges to the dopamine system was decided upon in order to generate a number of serum prolactin values. A dopamine agonist L-dihydroxyphenylalanine (indirect) and an antagonist, chlorpromazine, were used to stress the system mildly. The procedure was carried out under standard conditions both in the illness phase and upon significant recovery. Both these investigations were conducted in a drug-free state. The data generated was subjected to statistical analysis. The results of the analysis suggests that prolactin levels are low in depressed patients, and increase upon recovery, while manic patients have elevated levels which decrease with recovery. The pattern of the curves obtained from the challenge procedure suggests a possible supersensitivity of dopamine receptors in the manic patients. Blunting of responses of depressed patients remains a possibility but a study against normal controls is required to further assess this aspect. Evidence is therefore found for altered prolactin levels in illness phases of primary affective disorders. This is thought to be due to an abnormality in the dopamine regulation of prolactin. A discussion on the possible mechanisms and significance of these changes involves Beta-endorphin in an attempt to tie motor changes to mood regulation. Shortcomings of the study and future implications and developments are considered. / Thesis (M.D.)-University of Natal, Durban, 1986.

Linking brain regions or neural circuits to specific affective symptoms could help elucidate the neural mechanisms of affective states as well as antidepressant treatment effects. Much research has implicated the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), mid-dorsolateral frontal cortex (MDLFC), and a "frontocingulate" (i.e., MDLFC-ACC) circuit in sad affect and depression as well as the mood response to antidepressant treatment, including 10-Hz repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) applied over the MDLFC. While the empirical support for a direct role of the MDLFC in affect is unclear, a wealth of research supports the ACC as an interface between action and emotion (Paus, 2001). In a series of experiments using behavioural, brain imaging and brain stimulation techniques we investigated the involvement of the ACC and an MDLFC-ACC (i.e., frontocingulate) circuit in an "action and emotion" relevant behaviour, namely, paralinguistic aspects of speech production. (e.g., speech pitch and loudness). In Experiment 1, we examined the relationship between affect and paralinguistic aspects of speech and in Experiment 2 we investigated the role of the ACC in mediating this phenomenon. Next, applying our knowledge of the role of the ACC in affect-relevant behaviour, we combined rTMS with a speech task (Experiment 3) and with PET (Experiment 4) in order investigate further the possibility that influencing brain activity in a frontocingulate circuit may contribute to the known mood effects of rTMS applied over the MDLFC. Taken together, our results demonstrated a role for the ACC in pitch variation during affective states and suggested that changes in affect and pitch variation following 10-Hz rTMS applied over the left MDLFC may involve changes in neural activity in a network of brain regions widely implicated in affect, including a frontocingulate circuit. The findings of this collection of studies take us a step further toward understanding the r

Diss. (sammanfattning) Stockholm : Karol. inst., 1998. / Härtill 5 uppsatser.

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Diss. (sammanfattning) Stockholm : Karol. inst. / Härtill 5 uppsatser.

Theses (M.A.)--Marshall University, 2005. / Title from document title page. Includes abstract. Document formatted into pages: contains iv, 121 pages. Bibliography: p. 11-12.

There is little research which examines the real life experience of those who have Mood Disorders, and yet studies suggest that in North America as many as one in four people in the general population will develop a major episode of Mood Disorder at some point during his or her lifetime (O'Connor, 1997). The researcher has adopted the classification of Mood Disorders as described in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (APA, 1994), a manual developed by the American Psychiatric Association to guide medical practitioners, psychiatrists and psychologists in the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness. This research study, “an examination of the experience of living with Mood Disorders”, focuses on the unique experiences of five participants who live with the condition. The researcher conducted a narrative study of individuals who met the research criteria: men and women between the ages of 25 and 55 who had been diagnosed with a Mood Disorder by a medical practitioner. In one-to-one interviews, the participants told their “stories” of living with the condition. The researcher explores the impact of Mood Disorders on the lives of each of the five participants. The study examines the literature with respect to the causes, diagnosis and treatment of Mood Disorders, and surveys from an historical perspective, the field of human science research in general and narrative studies in particular. The distorted and distorting lens of an individual with Mood Disorders interferes, in a profound way, with the recognition and identification of the symptoms, and with the diagnosis and the treatment of the condition. With the passage of time, all areas of functioning become affected; the affective, cognitive, occupational, philosophical, physical, psychological, social and spiritual lives of those with the condition become influenced by the distorting quality of their lens. The research identifies five predominant states encountered by individuals with Mood Disorders. These five states are episodic, sporadic, overlapping and ambiguous: state (1) dismissing the symptoms, state (2) externalizing the cause, state (3) internalizing the cause, state (4) accepting the diagnosis, and, state (5) developing the management strategies. The researcher presents implications for educators, for professional practitioners, for those who live or work with individuals with Mood Disorders, and for those who experience Mood Disorders themselves. / Graduate