Theory of mind, the attribution of mental states to others is one form of social cognition. The aim of this paper is to highlight the importance of another, much simpler, form of social cognition, which I call vicarious representation. Vicarious representation is the attribution of other-centered properties to objects. This mental capacity is different from, and much simpler than, theory of mind as it does not imply the understanding (or representation) of the mental  states of another agents. I argue that the most convincing experiments that are supposed to show that non-human primates have theory of mind in fact demonstrate that they are capable of vicarious representation. The same is true for the experiments about the theory of mind of infants under 12 months. And if I know that my daughter knows how to open her bedroom door, this may also influence my actions. We use this ability, the ability to attribute mental states – beliefs, desires, wishes, etc. – to others all the time. In fact, it would be very difficult to get by without this ability, which is known as ‘theory of mind’.In the last paragraph, I used the term ‘theory of mind’ as a synonym for the ability to attribute mental states to others, a characterization that encompasses both the theory theory  around us. Representing something means attributing properties to this thing. And depending on what kind of properties we attribute, we get very different representational processes.First, some of the properties we attribute to objects  are properties that can be fully specified without reference to any particular agent. The shape of a triangle is a property that can be fully specified without reference to any particular agent. Similarly, the color of the triangle is also a property that can be fully specified without reference to any particular agent .Second, we very often attribute what I call self-centered properties to objects. Self-centered properties are properties that cannot be fully specified without reference to the representing subject. They are relational properties, the two relata of which are the object and the representing subject. Egocentric spatial location , egocentric weight  and egocentric size (size indexed to our grip size) are self-centered properties. The attribution of self-centered properties is necessary for performing actions.Suppose that you want to pick up a cup. In order to perform this action, you need to represent the cup as having a certain spatial location; otherwise, you would have no idea in which direction to reach. And this spatial location needs to be a self-centered one, representing the spatial location of the cup relative to where your hand is. You also need to represent it as having a certain size, otherwise you could not approach it with the appropriate grip size. Again, this size property needs to be a self-centered size property, representing the size of the cup relative to your grip size. In short, without representing objects as having self-centered properties we could not perform any bodily actions. The attribution of self-centered properties should be part of any attempt at understanding the mind.The attribution of self-centered properties does not entail the representation of ourselves as agents. Self-centered properties are relational properties. One of the two relata is the object and the other one is the representing subject. But the representing subject does not need to be represented explicitly (as the representing subject) whenever this relational property is attributed to an object. To use the examples of self-centered properties that play a role in the performance of actions, when I reach out to grasp a cup, this does not entail representing myself as an agent. It does, however, entails representing my grip size in some way.I defined self-centered properties as properties that cannot be fully specified without reference to the agent. But what is it about the agent that needs to be specified? Is a self-centered property indexed to the agent's spatial location? Her perspective? Her action? Her emotion? Here, we need some more distinctions.Self-centered action-relevance properties are properties that cannot be fully specified without reference to the agent's action. If I represent something as edible for me, this amounts to the attribution of self-centered action-relevance properties. The property of being edible for me cannot be fully specified without reference to my action. The same goes for the property of being graspable for me, or, in general, for the property of affording a certain action to me. Note that the use of the term ‘affording an action’ does not imply any talk of, let alone, endorsement of, Gibsonian affordances . Affordi1Self-centered emotional relevance properties are properties that cannot be fully specified without reference to the agent's emotions. If I represent something as scary to me or disgusting to me, this amounts to the attribution of self-centered emotional relevance properties. The property of being disgusting to me cannot be fully specified without reference to my emotion (of disgust). This is not in any way a revisionary way of thinking about emotions: thinking about the representation that (partly) constitutes emotions as the attribution of self-centered emotional relevance properties is consistent with all mainstream accounts of emotion .another agent. Other-centered properties are, just like self-centered properties, relational properties, but the two relata of this kind of relational property are the object and another subject (a subject different from the representing subject).So far, I have not said anything even remotely controversial or surprising. But now enters vicarious representation. We have seen that the attributed properties can be self-centered or not centered at all. But they can also be other-centered properties, by which I mean properties that cannot be fully specified without reference to We need to ask, as we did in the case of self-centered properties about how the other agent specifies these other-centered properties: What is it about the other agent that the other-centered property is indexed to? Her spatial location? Her perspective? Her action? Her emotion? Again, more distinctions are needed.Other-centered action-relevant properties are properties that cannot be fully specified without reference to the other agent's action. When I represent something as edible for someone else or as graspable for someone else (or as affording an action to someone else), this amounts to the attribution of an other-centered action-relevance property. The property of being edible for my friend Jane cannot be fully specified without reference to Jane's action (of eating).Other-centered emotional relevance properties are properties that cannot be fully specified without reference to the other agent's. When I represent something as scary or disgusting for someone else, this amounts to the attribution of an other-centered emotional relevance property. The property of being disgusting for my friend Jane cannot be fully specified without reference to Jane's emotion (of disgust). Some of our most important social emotions work like this .It is important that both self-centered and other-centered properties are indexed to particular agents – self-centered properties to myself and other-centered properties to some other particular agent. They are not indexed to agent-types. Representing an object as something I should run away from amounts to the attribution of a self-centered property. And representing an object as something you should run away from amounts to the attribution of an other-centered property. Both of these properties are indexed to a particular subject (myself and you). They are not indexed to a type of subjects, like humans in general or living beings in general. Here is another example. Edible for me is a self-centered property. Edible for Jane is an other-centered property. Edible  is neither as it is not indexed to a particular subject.We very often represent things vicariously. When we are following a sport event on TV, say, a football game, and we cheer for team A, we represent the ball or players of team B as having various other-centered action-relevance properties (where this other is often a member of team A). When we are watching movies, we also often represent vicariously. Suppose that you are watching a Tom and Jerry cartoon, where Tom is chasing Jerry, who gets stuck in a corner where a hammer happens to be lying around. You represent the hammer as having not self-centered, but as Jerry-centered action-relevance properties – as affording a certain action not to yourself, but to Jerry .3Vicarious representation does not count as theory of mind on any of the definitions of theory of mind I mentioned in I am sitting in my armchair looking out of my heavily reinforced window. I see my neighbor standing in the middle of the street, deep in thought. I also see that unbeknownst to her, a tiger is approaching her from behind and it is about to attack her. I attribute other-centered (neighbor-centered) action-relevance properties to the tiger. Not a self-centered one – I am safe and sound behind my heavily reinforced window –, but other-centered ones. In this example, I know that my neighbor does not see the tiger, but I nonetheless represent the tiger vicariously: as having very salient other-centered action-relevance properties.One Week (1920), a portable house maybe, which, in this film, gets stuck on the train tracks with the train approaching and its owners feverishly trying to dislodge it. This example may help us to appreciate why other-centered properties are always indexed to an agent who is, at least in principle, is capable of performing some action. A cardboard box or a portable house is not capable of performing any action. When we watch the scene in One Week, we do not attribute portable house-centered properties to anything. We attribute Buster-centered properties (because Buster is an agent). Vicarious representation is the representation of an object (train or tiger) as having other-centered properties .Note that while the tiger is an agent, nothing depends on this in the present example – if a (very quiet) train was approaching her from behind, this would not change the example. . What is crucial, however, is that my neighbor is an agent: if the tiger was about to attack a cardboard box (or if the train was approaching a cardboard box), this would not trigger vicarious representation. It might amount to representing the tiger as having cardboard box-centered properties, but cardboard-centered properties are not other-centered properties as other-centered properties are indexed to a specific agent (and a cardboard box is not an agent). We can and often do have strong emotional reaction when we see something threatening an inanimate object . Presumably not a cardboard box, but, as in the Buster Keaton short Vicarious representation is a form of social cognition. I represent the tiger vicariously – I attribute a neighbor-centered action-relevance property to the tiger, something like the property of something my neighbor should run away from. This property is very much indexed to my neighbor: it cannot be fully specified without reference to my neighbor. But attributing this property to the tiger (or the train) does not entail attributing any mental state to my neighbor. So this instance of vicarious representation would be an example of social cognition without theory of mind.Our cognitive  engagement with others is as strong (or maybe even stronger) if there is an epistemic asymmetry between the two agents (between me and my neighbor). If I know more than you do – if I see something close to you as a threat, whereas you don't – I am likely to react as strongly as (or maybe even more strongly than) I would if you were also aware of the threat. This very basic ‘Watch out!’ reaction is difficult to explain in terms of the attribution of mental states. What mental state am I supposed to attribute to my neighbor who is about to be attacked by the tiger? Clearly not any mental state that would involve tigers given that my neighbor is not aware of any tigers. So this way of engaging with my neighbors is not based on the attribution of mental states to her. It is based on the vicarious representation of something I perceive as a threat to her.not aware of the threat and I compare this mental state (attributed to you) with my own mental state of being aware of the threat and this comparison triggers my reaction. But this explanatory scheme presupposes extremely complex mental processes in order to explain a very simple and instinctive reaction.Defenders of the idea of theory of mind could say that I attribute the mental  state to you that you are In short, vicarious representation is very different from, and much simpler than, theory of mind. I am not denying that theory of mind is an important form of social cognition. But it is not the only one. And it is definitely not the most rudimentary one. I will argue in In other words, vicarious representation is a form of social cognition that comes on a spectrum. Some instances require no attribution of mental states to anyone. The tiger case would be an example. Some other instances do require attribution of mental states – in these instances vicarious representation is influenced by theory of mind. Here is an example: I go to a party with my friend Julien and the first person I see is Julien's ex, making out with another guy. I don't really care about this girl, but I know Julien still does. I will represent this event in a vicarious manner: I attribute a number of other-centered (Julien-centered) action-relevance and emotional relevance properties to this event. But my doing so very much depends on what I know about Julien. So my vicarious representation of this event is influenced by the mental states I attribute to Julien.I said that some instances of vicarious representation require no theory of mind, while some others are influenced by it. I should make it clear, however, that all forms of vicarious representation presuppose the representation of animacy. I could not attribute other-centered properties to anything unless I represented someone as animate who these properties could be indexed to. But as the attribution of animacy does not presuppose the attribution of mental states to anyone  of another person on her face . There iI am not sure how this account can be made more precise: what kind of perceptual process would count as the direct perception of someone's emotions or mental states. But whatever it is, it seems to presuppose that I see the other person's face. Note that there is no such requirement in the case of vicarious representation. If you are facing away from me, and I see a tiger attacking you from behind, we still get an instance of vicarious representation. In the case of vicarious representation, there is no need for me to see your face. All I need to see is the object that I experience as affording an action to you. The direct perception of other people's mental states (if we can make this concept more precise) may or may not be one of our ways of engaging with others. But it is very different from vicarious representation.The third proposal about social cognition might not be a direct competitor of my view (but rather an explanation of the implementing mechanism thereof), but it is still worth highlighting the differences. It is the explanation of social cognition in terms of mirror neurons . The genThere are some important worries about this general suggestion . They do not attribute other-centered properties. Hence, they are very different from vicarious representation.After clarifying how vicarious representation is different from the most important accounts of social cognition, I need to make a couple of terminological remarks. I use the term ‘vicarious representation’ to describe the attribution of other-centered properties to objects. But the term ‘vicarious’ has also been used in other ways in the social cognition literature. Vicarious grief, for example, “refers to grief stimulated by someone else's loss” , p. 59. 5After having clarified what form of social cognition vicarious representation is and how it differs from other forms of social cognition, I will now argue that a number of important social cognition experiments can be explained in terms of vicarious representation better than in terms of other forms of social cognition. This is true of social cognition in infants under 12 months , non-hum5.1One big debate in the theory of mind literature concerns developmental psychology: at what age do children acquire the ability to attribute mental states to others. The initial response was age four , which qIt is important that the terminology used in these studies is not uniform. While some talk of the attribution of beliefs to others 13.5 month old infants who have watched an actor slide toy trucks on the floor look at an actor who grasps a toy truck that is enclosed in a small frame longer than they look at an actor who grasps an identical toy truck that is not enclosed (and is therefore free to slide) . The aut(b)One year olds who have watched a circle go around an obstacle on its way to a larger circle look at the small circle taking the detour when the obstacle is not there longer than they look at it going straight towards the larger circle without any detour . The aut(c)Twelve month old infants prefer helpers to hinderers: if they see a triangle helping a circle up a slope, and a square trying to prevent the circle from climbing up the slope, they show preference for the triangle . The aut(d)The general setup of experiment (b) was replicated with six and a half year olds but the agent who the infants attributed goals was a human  . Later, Nonetheless, in spite of all these differences, all these proposals are about the attribution of some kind of mental  state to another subject. My suggestion is that all the relevant experimental findings that are supposed to demonstrate that one year old and younger infants display the capacity to attribute mental states to others are in fact instances of vicarious representation. Let us take some of the most famous experimental findings about the development of social cognition.the infant represents the toy truck (a), the obstacle or lack thereof (b), (d) and the triangle or the square (c) as affording the action of sliding (a), of going around it (b), (d) and of helping or hindering (c) to the actor (a), the circle (b), (c) and the box (d).A striking feature of these experiments is that they all seem to follow the same pattern, which is in fact the pattern of vicarious representation: the infant represents an object as having other-centered action-relevance properties: as affording an action to another agent. More specifically, In other words, the experimental findings (a)-(d) can be explained without any reference to the attribution of any mental state . They can be explained with the help of vicarious representation. The evidence for social cognition in infants younger than one year is in fact evidence for vicarious representation in these infants. And this evidence tells us that vicarious representation emerges sometime between month six and nine.Take (c) as an example. The data is that the infants show preference for the triangle who helps the circle up the slope over the square who is trying to prevent the square from climbing up the slope. In the theory of mind framework, this can be explained by describing the infant as having a fairly complex mental state of attributing a disposition or maybe even virtue/vice to the triangle and the square. But vicarious representations provide a much simpler explanatory scheme: the infant does not attribute any mental state (or disposition) to anyone, she merely represents the triangle as having one other-centered (circle-centered) action-relevance property  and she represents the square as having another other-centered  action-relevance property . She represents the triangle as affording a certain action to the circle, whereas she represents the square as affording another action to the circle. On the basis of these vicarious representations, she forms an, understandable, preference for the triangle. Examples (a), (b) and (d) can be analyzed in the same way.Some key experiments about the social cognition abilities of prelinguistic infants follow the pattern outlined above in a less straightforward manner, but I would like to argue that they nonetheless are best explained with the help of the conceptual apparatus of vicarious representation. One important example is the following experiment . 10-montThe experimental setup is similar to the ones I considered above, but with a twist. During the training phase, the infant repeatedly represents the yellow cube as having one other-centered  action-relevance property and represents the green pyramid as having another other-centered  action-relevance property. And in the trial phase she represents the yellow cube as having a B-centered action-relevance property that is similar to the A-centered action-relevance property she has previously represented the yellow cube as having. Ditto for the green pyramid: she represents the green pyramid as having a B-centered action-relevance property that is similar to the A-centered action-relevance property she has previously represented the green pyramid as having.To put it more informal terms, she has represented the yellow cube as affording a certain action to A and now when B is around, she represents the yellow cube as affording the same action to B. The authors of this study take this experiment to show that the infant binds A's preference for the yellow cube to the yellow cube and not to A. That is, to the object, not to the agent. The infant learns something about the object and not (just) about the agent. And this is consistent with my interpretation. In the training phase, the infant attributes one property to the object (that is indexed to A) and in the trial phase she attributes a similar property to the same object .We can describe this scenario without presupposing any theory of mind  in 10-month old infants, with reference to vicarious representation only. But this experiment highlights the importance of clarifying just how thickly or thinly the other subject needs to be specified in the case of vicarious representation. The infant could shift seamlessly from the attribution of A-centered properties (in the training phase) to the attribution of B-centered properties  because A and B are specified very thinly – so thinly that the attribution of A-centered properties to the yellow cube serves as a very good guide for the attribution of B-centered properties to the yellow cube.And in many important experiments about social cognition in infants under 12 months the other agent is even more thinly specified. As we have seen, vicarious representation comes on a spectrum. When I represent something as having other-centered properties, this ‘other’ can be more or less fully specified. In the example I gave in On the other end of the spectrum, we have instances of vicarious representation where theory of mind plays no role whatsoever. When we attribute other-centered properties to an object, we do not need to know anything about the mental life of this ‘other’. It is enough if we know that it is a subject who occupies a certain point of view. The Another famous experiment that could be explained as an example of vicarious representation where the other subject is very thinly specified in The authors of the Here is a much simpler explanation in terms of vicarious representations .Note that all the supposed positive experiments in favor of the existence of theory of mind in non-human primates work on the very same model, starting with Premack and Woodruff's original ones: the chimp in that experiment represents objects  as having other-centered (experimenter-centered) action-properties . In other words, the chimp represents these objects vicariously, as affording various actions to the experimenter.And the same is true of the alleged anecdotal evidence for theory of mind in non-human primates. One of the earliest such anecdote is the following : a youngThe Povinelli experiments are somewhat more difficult to handle. An important contrast here is the following set of experiments with rhesus monkeys .6 The exNote that the Flombaum and Santos experiments fit the vicarious representation pattern perfectly: the monkey represents the food as affording an action (of taking it) for one of the experimenters, but not to the other. And as the monkey is afraid of the experimenter, she will only go for the food if it does not afford this action  to the experimenter. So it attributes two very different experimenter-centered action-properties to the food item (indexed to the two experimenters). This is a structurally very similar situation to the one in the Hare et al. experiments. The fact that the way the experimenters look is almost identical to the Povinelli experiments, however, offers us a neat way of comparing the alleged pro and the alleged con cases of primate theory of mind.First, we have no reason to assume that the chimp in the Povinelli experiments represents the food in a vicarious manner. We have no reason to suppose that the chimp attributes experimenter-centered action-relevance properties to the food. Povinelli's own explanation amounts to saying that the chimp represents the food as having self-centered action-properties – she represents the food as affording an action to herself and the experimenter merely figures in this action as a means of achieving its goal. We can fully explain the chimp's behavior without talking about vicarious representation (a claim Povinelli would wholeheartedly agree with). In the Hare et al. and the Flombaum and Santos experiments, in contrast, we need to posit vicarious representations. In order to explain why the chimp responds differentially to the two experimenters, we need to assume that the chimp represents the food as having two different experimenter-centered action-relevance properties (different depending on the experimenter in question). In short, there is vicarious representation at work in the Flombaum and Santos experiments, but not in the Povinelli experiments.The emphasis on vicarious representations can also help us to understand why apes and monkeys tend to do much better at competitive mind-reading tasks than in collaborative ones. The Hare et al. experiment is a competitive situation: the subordinate chimp is competing with the dominant one for food. The anecdotal evidence described in While this contrast has been made repeatedly in the literature  chimp. In the Hare et al. scenario, these two actions are incompatible: it is either the dominant or the subordinate chimpanzee who gets to eat the food. In the Povinelli scenario, the actions are not incompatible: in fact, the experimenter's action is a way of performing the chimp's action. That is why there is no vicarious representation in the Povinelli scenario, while there is vicarious representation in the Hare et al. scenario.Here is another way of putting it. The chimpanzee (or the subordinate chimp) represents the food as having self-centered action-relevance properties and as having other-centered  action-relevance properties. The question is the relation between the two actions that specify the self-centered and the other-centered action-relevance properties. In competitive scenarios, the performance of one of these excludes the performance of the other . In cooperative scenarios, in contrast, the performance of the two actions is compatible – performing one is a means of performing the other (like in the Povinelli experiment).To generalize from these two cases, in competitive scenarios, the action the other agent (is about to) perform is incompatible with the action the subject (is about to) perform. In cooperative scenarios, there is no such incompatibility. Hence, in competitive situations, the subject needs to consider what action objects afford to the other agent – she can't just consider her own action. This amounts to having vicarious representation, which non-human primates are capable of. In the cooperative situation, in contrast, the subject needs to do something very different and much more complicated: she would need to consider not just the other-centered properties of an object, but also the other-centered properties of an action that the object affords. In the Povinelli setup, the chimp would need to consider what action is afforded to the experimenter by the action of her own begging gesture. In short, she would need to keep track of one action (by the other agent) afforded by another action (by she herself). And this would amount to having some kind of second-order action-representation, which is a much more complex mental state than vicarious representation. The real difference between competitive and cooperative situations is about actions – more precisely about the compatibility/incompatibility of the actions afforded to the subject and to the other agent. The theoretical framework of vicarious representation can explain this difference. The theory of mind framework cannot.I argued that we can explain the seemingly conflicting results of the Hare et al. and the Povinelli experiments as instances of vicarious representation. Further, it seems that chimpanzees are capable of this (and maybe only this) way of engaging with other agents. Some of the controversy around the empirical findings about chimpanzee theory of mind could therefore be resolved in the sense that there seems to be solid evidence that primates are capable of vicarious representation, even if one is skeptical of the evidence that they have the ability to attribute mental states to each other. Making a distinction between vicarious representation and theory of mind can help us understand the social cognition skills of non-human primates better.5.3The third big debate about the concept of theory of mind is not about preverbal infants or non-human primates, but about adult human beings. We attribute beliefs and desires to each other all the time. The question is: how do we do it? What are the mental processes that make the cognitive engagement of adult humans with others possible?We have seen that in adult humans vicarious representation and theory of mind are often intertwined. But this does not mean that we can't find empirical evidence for the importance of vicarious representation in adult humans.One important finding is that we (adult humans) are much more likely to spontaneously describe things from someone else's perspective when the performance of an action is involved in some way . If we sAnother experiment that is very relevant here is the following . Just asOne important empirical debate about the mental processes that make adult human social cognition possible concerns the Social Simon Effect. In the standard Simon task, the participant carries out a spatially defined response to a non-spatially defined stimulus, but the location of this  stimulus influences the response time: responses are faster if stimulus location and response location correspond. For example, if the subject sees a triangle, she is supposed to push a button on her right and if she sees a square, she has to push a button on her left. When the triangle appears in the right hand side of her visual field , her reaction is faster than it is when it appears on the left. This is the standard Simon Effect . The SocThe original interpretation of the Social Simon Effect was that it demonstrates that we have ‘action co-representations’ when we perform joint actions with others: a representation of both one's own action and the other person's action : “. . .iBut this is not the only interpretation. It has also been suggested that the reason for the Social Simon Effect is that the other agent provides a spatial reference frame – the other person's mind does not play any role in creating the effect: she is relevant only for helping us to localize the stimulus and the response in space . On thisNeither of these interpretations is unproblematic. The problem with the first, ‘action co-representation’ interpretation is that the Social Simon Effect is also present when the subject is a subject with autism spectrum disorder . But it The problem with the second, ‘spatial reference frame’ interpretation is that the Social Simon Effect depends on the actor's bad mood , and, imThe concept of vicarious representation can help us to resolve this debate. The Social Simon Effect can be interpreted as a manifestation not of ‘theory of mind’, but of vicarious representation. The effect is present because the actor is aware of the action the stimulus on the left hand side affords to her co-actor. The actor represents the stimulus on the left hand side as affording an action not to herself but to her co-actor. The actor attributes other-centered, that is, co-actor-centered action-properties to the stimulus.This does not entail attributing any mental states to the co-actor – which explains why the effect is still present in the case of autism spectrum disorder subjects. But it does involve social cognition, namely, vicarious representation – which explains why the effect is sensitive to the agent's mood, to the relationship between the agents and to whether the agent thinks that the co-actor is a computer. As in the case of non-human primates and preverbal infants, explaining Social Simon Effect by appealing to vicarious representation is a novel, third way between explaining the effect with the help of (some version of) ‘theory of mind’ and explaining it as not involving any social cognition whatsoever.6We have seen that an object can be represented in self-centered, other-centered and non-centered manner. Representing it in an other-centered manner is what constitutes vicarious representation. Given that I argued that this form of other-centered cognition happens at a very early age, this raises a very big-picture question about what comes first: the representation of the self or the representation of the other.The question goes back at least as far as Piaget's work, who argued that the representation of others is based on, and comes after, the representation of the self . We reprThis consensus has been broken recently. In a series of papers, Victoria Southgate argues persuasively that it's the other way round: the representation of the other comes first and it is the representation of the other that the representation of the self is based on see esp. . This moI want to propose a third possible way of relating self-representation and other-representation. First, the terms ‘the representation of the self’ and ‘the representation of the other’ cover a lot of different kinds of representations. But we can narrow down the question about the attribution of self-centered and of other-centered properties. The question remains: what comes first?The Piagetian answer would be that infants start out representing objects as in a self-centered manner and then this gives rise to other-centered representations. The Southgate-ian answer would be the exact opposite. I want to propose a form of compromise between these two approaches. Self-centered and other-centered representations mutually strengthen and reinforce one another. We have fairly clear evidence that infants start executing goal-directed actions at around 4 month and we have seen that this ability presupposes the attribution of self-centered action-relevance properties to the object they are manipulating. We have also seen that a couple of months later infants are capable of attributing other-centered action-relevance properties. And this, in turns makes it possible for the infant to attribute more complex and more highly specified self-centered properties, which then leads to the attribution of even more complex and more highly specified other-centered properties, and so on.I will not defend this view here, nor will I examine the same question in the context of not the ontogeny but of the phylogeny of self-representation versus other-representation. Nor will I address where non-centered representations come in see . But one7I argued that we should shift the emphasis in the most important contemporary debates about social cognition from theory of mind to vicarious representation. Theory of mind is an important form of social cognition. We have known that for 40 years. My aim was to argue that vicarious representation is also an important form of social cognition, which could help us make progress in debates concerning social cognition in non-human primates, infants under 12 months and even adult humans.This is a single authored paper.


File fragment classification of video file formats is a topic of interest in network forensics. There are some publicly available datasets for file fragments of various file types such as textual, audio, and image file formats. However, there is no public dataset for file fragments of video file formats. So, in order to evaluate and compare the performance of the classification methods, a challenge is the need to have such datasets.In this study, we present a dataset that contains file fragments of 10 video file formats: 3GP, AVI, ASF, FLV, MKV, MOV, MP4, WebM, OGV, and RMVB. Corresponding to each format, the dataset contains the file fragments of video files with different video codec types: H.263, MPEG-4, WMV, H.264, FLV1, H.265, VP8, VP9, Theora, and RealVideo. Totally, 20 different pairs of video format and codec are employed. For each pair of video format and codec, 30,000 file fragments are provided. Totally, the dataset contains 600,000 file fragments. A huge part of the Internet traffic is used for transmitting video files. Due to the large size of these files, they are segmented into fragments. The fragments are communicated over the network. Some of these fragments can be received by the network surveillance unit. The network surveillance unit may desire to identify the file format of each fragment for network forensics purposes.Some researches have been carried in the field of file fragment classification of video file formats –3. ThereIn this study, we present a dataset that contains file fragments of 10 video file formats: 3GPP file format (3GP), Audio Video Interleaved (AVI), Advanced systems format (ASF), Flash Video (FLV), Matroska Video (MKV), QuickTime Movie (MOV), MPEG-4 Part 14 (MP4), Web Movie (WebM), OGV, and RealMedia Variable Bitrate (RMVB). Corresponding to each format, the dataset contains the file fragments of video files with different video codec types: H.263, MPEG-4, Windows Media Video (WMV), H.264, FLV1, H.265, VP8, VP9, Theora, and RealVideo.First, the whole set of the original video files are prepared. These files are taken from a private archive of Iranian movies and television series. The format of these files is either MKV or MP4. All these videos are encoded by H.264 codec. The frame rate of these videos varies from 15 to 25 frames per second with a frame size from 384 × 288 to 1920 × 1090. The audio codec of the original video files is either Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) or MPEG Audio Layer-3 (MP3) with bitrates from 128 to 320 kbps.The set of the original video files are converted in order to obtain video files in 20 different pairs of format/codec: 3GP/H.263, 3GP/MPEG4, AVI/WMV, AVI/H.264, AVI/MPEG4, ASF/WMV, FLV/FLV1, MKV/H.264, MKV/H.265, MKV/MPEG4, MOV/H.264, MOV/H.265, MOV/MPEG4, MP4/H.264, MP4/H.265, MP4/MPEG4, WebM/VP8, WebM/VP9, OGV/Theora, and RMVB/RealVideo.Regardless of video format/codec, the contents of any two converted video files are not the same. For each pair of format/codec, we have 60 compressed videos. So, totally we have 1200 video files. Each of these files is segmented into 1 Kbyte (i.e. 1024 bytes) fragments. Then, 500 fragments are randomly selected among the fragments of each file. Same as [For each pair of video format/codec, we have 30,000 file fragments. So, the dataset of file fragments contains 600,000 file fragments. The dataset is partitioned according to 20 different pairs of video format/codec. Each partition is represented by an individual data file shown in Table Data file 21 (i.e. SettingsTable.pdf) contains a table, in which, the software program employed for generating the videos of each pair of format/codec is specified. In this table, the employed compression settings are also specified. Data file 22 (i.e. ConversionSettings.zip) contains several screenshots of the software programs that display the employed compression settings. These screenshots actually demonstrate how the videos are converted. Data file 23 (i.e. ReadFragments.m) is a script in MATLAB language that reads all the fragments from one or more data files. The details of this script are given in .The size of the fragments is considered to be fixed and equal to 1024 bytes.A defined subset of video formats and codecs are considered.The number of raw data files for each pair of video format and codec is 60.


The prolonged lockdown imposed to contain the COrona VIrus Disease 19 COVID-19 pandemic prevented many people from direct contact with nature and greenspaces, raising alarms for a possible worsening of mental health. This study investigated the effectiveness of a simple and affordable remedy for improving psychological well-being, based on audio-visual stimuli brought by a short computer video showing forest environments, with an urban video as a control. Randomly selected participants were assigned the forest or urban video, to look at and listen to early in the morning, and questionnaires to fill out. In particular, the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) Form Y collected in baseline condition and at the end of the study and the Part II of the Sheehan Patient Rated Anxiety Scale (SPRAS) collected every day immediately before and after watching the video. The virtual exposure to forest environments showed effective to reduce perceived anxiety levels in people forced by lockdown in limited spaces and environmental deprivation. Although significant, the effects were observed only in the short term, highlighting the limitation of the virtual experiences. The reported effects might also represent a benchmark to disentangle the determinants of health effects due to real forest experiences, for example, the inhalation of biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOC). In March 2020, the outbreak of the COrona VIrus Disease 19 (COVID-19) pandemic turned into a major public health crisis and one of the greatest challenges we have to face. It constitutes a multidimensional stressor, affecting our whole society, single individuals, and families and involving physical personal risks, daily routines’ disruptions, uncertainty, social isolation, economic loss, unemployment risk, etc., , and parMoreover, the economic uncertainty worsened by the global pandemic crisis could affect psychological health and well-being through further stressors like unemployment risk, job uncertainty, debts, and recession .Beyond the abovementioned stresses, the widespread social isolation, quarantine, and lockdown measures adopted in the attempt to contain the infection spreading caused high levels of psychological distress, unfavorably influencing mental health by compromising emotional and cognitive functioning. Many emotional effects were associated to the quarantine, including stress, depression, irritability, insomnia, fear, confusion, anger, frustration, and boredom . OverallMany people were confronted with an unprecedented situation characterized by staying at home and changing completely their daily life. Along with other factors, also the lack of spending some quality time in natural environments might have also contributed to the global level of distress.The responses and interventions to be undertaken in this crisis should be adequate to the levels of complexity and uncertainty of the pandemic. As far as psychological stress is considered, we suggest considering also the role of nature and its benefits on well-being perception.Spending time in natural settings is a powerful body–mind experience that everybody knows and enjoys. Importantly, it is not only a subjectively enjoyable experience, but an astounding amount of supportive research demonstrated that being surrounded by nature generates significant benefits to physical and mental health ,8,9,10.In this context, a broad range of positive effects were related to forest exposure, ranging from an impact on mood, stress level, and other psychological variables, with focus on anxiety ,12,13,14A key research question focused on the identification of the key components of the forest setting that convey these health effects, as well as the attribution of the same effects to different components. A wealth of aspects contributes to make the contact with nature such a powerful tool for the human psychophysical well-being, while the effects of the forest on the human health are mediated by the use of visual, auditory, tactile, and olfactive senses ,18.α-pinene and d-limonene) [α-pinene and 3-carene) [Among the olfactive elements, long-lasting physiological health benefits were attributed to the inhalation of certain bioactive compounds residing in the forest atmosphere, including natural airborne microbiota and phytoncides, or biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs), mainly monoterpenes (MTs), followed by sesquiterpenes . For exaimonene) ,21 and i-carene) .It is also important to point out significant short-term psychological and physiological benefits deriving from the exposure to still images of forests, underlying the powerful effects triggered even by creating nature-based mental images . Over thAll these findings could contribute to promote the creation of virtual environments, from 2-D videos to immersive virtual reality, designed by landscape architects and urban planners, which could become important, nonmedical tools to improve the psychological and physiological health. These virtual tools might be particularly interesting and useful in specific contexts  where nature-based immersive experiences are precluded or for people suffering from a motor disease.Moreover, it might be important to compare the effects of virtual experiences with real forest immersion, also in order to disentangle the effects related to key features of natural forest settings. Indeed, real natural experiences unavoidably involve a multiplicity of stimulations, and recognizing the distinct effects produced by specific components of the forest environment, such as BVOCs, may be challenging.The abovementioned evidence of health benefits led to the inclusion of forest therapy in national healthcare systems in a few countries in the Far East . More reThe focus of this study was to evaluate the possible beneficial effects of a virtual natural enrichment on daily life and specifically on anxiety levels. The circumstances related to the COVID-19 pandemic provided an extraordinary context for testing the effectiveness of the video exposure to the forest environments on stress and anxiety levels in healthy people forced by the lockdown to stay in limited and confined spaces in a condition of natural environment deprivation and lack of direct nature contact.The isolation caused by the lockdown might have raised the levels of anxiety .This extreme condition enabled us to study experimentally the anxiety level after excluding confounding factors of normal everyday life, such as social interaction or events or activities .Testing during the COVID-19 quarantine was particularly important for two main reasons:This study aimed to explore whether an audio-visually presented forest-based video might boost a relaxing effect by reducing, in general, psychological activation and, specifically, state anxiety levels. A control condition was used, consisting of a video presenting an urban context.The main hypotheses were that (1) the view of the short forest video affected levels of state and trait anxiety in healthy people forced to prolonged quarantine due to the lockdown measures and that (2) mediated nature experience can improve our capacity to recover in a stressful context, characterized by environmental isolation and lack of direct nature contact.The pilot study intends to contribute to the evaluation of opportunities of mediated nature exposure as a way for mitigating anxiety disorders in a home-based environment during the quarantine period.Moreover, evaluating the effect of the audio-visual exposure to forest environments on the psychological well-being could represent a benchmark, based on which the effects of other sensorial variables typical of real forest experiences, such as the inhalation of BVOCs, can be assessed and possibly disentangled.Participants were recruited in Italy from the general population through announcements on social networks and mailing lists using a snowball strategy. A personal email containing a general explanation of the protocol was sent to individuals potentially interested in participating in the study who responded to the announcement.All participants were ≥18 years of age and gave their informed consent to the procedure and the processing of personal data. All data were collected and processed anonymously. The study was performed according to the Declaration of Helsinki and was approved by the Ethical Committee of the University of Florence .A total of 90 participants were initially recruited and randomly assigned to the two experimental conditions described in A parallel-group design was employed , where pThe study was performed between 25 April and 3 May 2020. This period corresponded to the last week of Italy’s national strict lockdown due to COVID-19. On 4 May, the Italian government started to ease restrictions.The video in the Forest condition consisted of forest environments located in the Apennine Mountains nearby the cities of Prato and Pistoia (Tuscany region). The video was shot in two different locations named Calvana  and Acquerino . Five different scenes without people were recorded, including coniferous and beech trees and water streams. Duration: 5.09 min, resolution 3686 by 2304 dots per inch (dpi), 25 frames per second (fps), audio 48,000 Hz.The control video (Urban condition) consisted of urban environments. The video was shot in five different locations in downtown Prato, Tuscany, Italy. Five different scenes were recorded, comprising building scenes  without people. Duration: 5.10 min, resolution 3686 by 2304 dpi, 25 fps, audio 48,000 Hz. Both Forest video (S1) and Urban video (S2) are available in the Before each video, a brief guide (8 s) invited the participant “to Breath, to Look at, to Listen to”, aimed at inducing a mindful attention mediated by the senses involved in that experience.Measures included a demographic questionnaire and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory Form Y (STAI) , acquireThe SPRAS Part II is an 11-item scale that elicits anxiety symptoms that occur in response to danger, stress, or a phobic stimulus . The queThe experimental procedure  was idenThe study started with a baseline assessment carried out in the weekend (25–26 April): Participants were requested to complete the demographic questionnaire and the STAI-Y1 and STAI-Y2. During five days (Monday to Friday), the two groups entered the intervention phase. Each participant was requested to watch the assigned video every day in the morning (between 8 a.m. and 12 p.m.) before starting her/his activities and before consulting news or newspapers. They were instructed to watch the video alone in a quiet, soundproof, and possibly isolated environment in the house. Moreover, they were invited to use headphones to better hear the sounds of the video.Before and immediately after watching the assigned video, participants were required to fill the online SPRAS using the specific link. After the completion of the 5-day period, participants filled in again the STAI-Y1 and STAI-Y2 as post-intervention measures.The 5-day trial period was chosen in order to guarantee the continuity of experiment and avoid introducing a discontinuity in habits, which would not have been possible if weekend days had been included in the period of the trial. Moreover, the uncertainty about the end of the strict lockdown period at the time of designing the experimental procedure made it difficult to plan a longer trial.t and χ2 tests were used, including pretreatment SPRAS values for each day.The analysis was carried out only on cases that completed the SPRAS before and after viewing the assigned videos. Preliminary analyses compared the two groups across sociodemographic variables of interest: Age, gender, area of residence, presence of external space in the residence/could see a green area outside, education, presence of chronic diseases, regular practice of sports, previous experience with meditation or yoga as well as experience with COVID-19 (having relatives or close friends infected by the virus), impossibility to perform his/her sport inside the residence, forced isolation due to direct contact with COVID-19. Student’s t-test (hereinafter indicated as “t”). The one-week, pre–post difference of the STAI-Y subscales (STAI-Y1 and STAI-Y2) were computed by means of paired-sample Student’s t-test.A repeated-measure ANOVA with a condition as the independent variable and the pre- and post-treatment SPRAS measure as the dependent variable was performed for each day of the study. Based on previous literature, assuming a medium effect size (f = 0.30), with alpha = 0.05, a sample of 68 participants enabled a power of 0.83. The pre–post differences within each condition were assessed through paired-sample Student’s p > 0.05) arose between the pretreatment SPRAS levels for any day.Descriptive analyses of sociodemographic data distinguished by the condition are reported in Descriptive statistics of SPRAS data, including mean scores, standard deviation, and minimum and maximum values for each group, for each day of detection, and for each test administered are reported in p < 0.001), day 2 (t(40) = 3.58, p = 0.001), day 3 (t(40) = 3.42, p = 0.001), day 4 (t(40) = 2.46, p = 0.018), and day 5 (t(40) = 2.93, p = 0.006). In the Urban condition, there were no pre–post differences with the exception of day 3 (t(33) = −2.93, p = 0.006) and day 4 (t(33) = −2.93, p = 0.006).Concerning STAI-Y, there were no significant one-week, pre–post differences in either condition for both state and trait anxiety measures .In this study, we examined the effect of a 5-day intervention consisting of watching a video of natural environments on perceived anxiety levels in healthy individuals, during the last week of COVID-19 strict lockdown in Italy. The main finding was that a short exposition (5 min) to a forest video induced a self-perceived relaxing effect, as revealed by the reduction of SPRAS scores with respect to those reported immediately before watching the video. This result was specifically related to the forest video, while no effect was observed in the control group (urban video). The immediate perceived benefits induced after each daily viewing of the forest video was not associated with a prolonged effect. Indeed, no differences arose between conditions (Forest vs. Urban) after the 5-day intervention. Namely, in both groups  state and trait anxiety measures remained stable after one week.Overall, our findings of virtual natural enrichment are in keeping with previous studies showing that viewing forest settings produced significantly more comfortable, calmer, and more refreshed feelings in the subjects than the city setting ,39,40. BInterestingly, the short-term psychological benefits deriving from the audio-visual stimulation with forest imagery alone were consistent with the corresponding short-term psychophysical benefits observed after short walks in green suburbs, which were, in turn, comparable with benefits conveyed by similar walks in both coniferous and deciduous forests . ApparenSeveral theoretical frameworks have been proposed to account for the beneficial effects of nature experience  on psychological health and well-being . Two majAccording to SRT , naturalAnother seminal study showed a restorative effect from the visual contact with nature  on the speed of recovering from surgery . Based oIn the present study, we exploited an exceptional situation, the Italian strict lockdown due to the COVID-19 outbreak, which represented, per se, a stressor. Indeed, several studies or surveys on COVID-19 conducted all around the word suggested that the lockdown and the quarantine might have generated or heightened emotional states in the form of increased perceived psychological distress and anxiety ,51,52.In most of the mentioned studies, the restorative effect of exposure to natural environments was evaluated by means of psychophysiological measures ,48,49, wThe ART is another conceivable theoretical reference in which the results of this study can be framed . This thThis study was affected by some limitations, mainly due to the exceptional lockdown condition. COVID-19 outbreak represented a unique experience of social isolation and spatial confinement that is a no-laboratory, naturalistic model. In this context, it would not have been possible to evaluate all possible variables, which are generally well controlled in laboratory experiments, such as the environmental condition of video watching or other intervening factors potentially affecting the psychophysiological state of participants. Moreover, the peculiar context in which the research was carried out entailed a limitation in the possibility to recruit a larger sample size. Increasing the sample size in future research will allow applying more sophisticated statistical models that take into account directly the impact of potential moderating variables such as those listed in The extent of the benefits to mental health conveyed by the virtual nature experiences carried out in this study could represent a benchmark, upon which the distinct and likely enhanced benefits of real forest experiences can be assessed, as well as possibly to attribute such distinct benefits to specific predictors, including the exposure to BVOCs in the forest atmosphere. The accuracy of quantitative assessments of the additional value conveyed by real forest experiences can benefit from controlled, virtual experiences, especially when the effects generated by single or selected stimuli can be obtained. As well, real immersive experiences could be optimized in order to generate different or enhanced forest healing effects in comparison to virtual ones, such as by means of the inhalation of BVOCs.Due to COVID-19 lockdown, this pilot study represents a naturalistic and unrepeatable condition. However, it is conceivable that the observed effect may be generalized in different social contexts characterized by similar characteristics of social isolation and spatial confinement, for example, hospitalized patients or inmates. Concerning the COVID-19 pandemic emergence, scientific literature is emerging about the management of possible further waves: The audio-visual exposure to forest-like videos, even though without long-lasting effects, might be useful to induce a temporary reduction of perceived anxiety, in the event that further lockdown periods are imposed ,55.This study examined the relaxation effect of audio-visual stimulation using a forest video, with an urban video as the control, in the absence of human–nature interactions, during COVID-19 quarantine. The results showed a short-term decrease of anxiety level after exposure to a forest video, while no long-term changes were observed. The virtual exposure to forest environments showed effective to reduce human stress levels, in people forced by lockdown to stay in limited spaces, in a condition of environmental deprivation and lack of direct nature contact.Although virtual nature is unable to fully reproduce the effects of real nature ,57,58,59Finally, the extent of benefits conveyed by affordable virtual nature experiences, such as the one reported in this study, could be used as a benchmark for the assessment and planning of real forest experiences, including, among the others, the exposure to BVOCs in the forest atmosphere. First, the results shown in this study could help in disentangling the effects generated by different elements concurring to real forest experiences. Second, any immersion in real forest environments, in order to really make sense, should convey higher or longer-lasting benefits to mental health and/or additional benefits to physiological health, in comparison with the ones reported in this study.


In the early 2000s, alcohol use among young people began to decline in many western countries, especially among adolescents (ages between 12–17 years old). These declines have continued steadily over the past two decades, against the backdrop of much smaller declines among the general population.Hypotheses examining individual factors fail adequately to provide the necessary ‘big picture’ thinking needed to understand declines in adolescent drinking. We use the normalisation thesis to argue that there is strong international evidence for both processes of denormalisation of drinking and normalisation of non-drinking occurring for adolescents in many western countries.Research on declining adolescent drinking provides evidence of both denormalisation of alcohol consumption and normalisation of non-drinking. This has implications for enabling policy environments more amenable to regulation and increasing the acceptability of non-drinking in social contexts. Normalisation theory (and its various interpretations) provides a useful multi-dimensional tool for understanding declines in adolescent drinking. In the early 2000s, alcohol use among young people began to decline in many western countries, especially among adolescents (ages 12–17 years old). These declines have continued steadily over the past two decades  against et al. [In their original work, Parker et al.  drew on et al. .Parker and colleagues’ normalisation thesis identified connections across a range of variables concerning substance use and attitudes toward it, including broad social and economic changes to young people’s lives . In the increased experimentation or ‘trying’ rates,high levels of recent or regular use,high availability and accessibility,high levels of social accommodation ,high levels of cultural accommodation  andmore relaxed policy or enforcement .Based on their thesis, Parker and colleagues created the following criteria as a way of assessing processes of normalisation: al.’s tenets having been met). For example, in Australia, the ‘personal approval of regular cannabis use’ has increased steadily since 2007; however, at the same time, cannabis use has almost halved among 14- to 19-year-olds [The first three normalisation criteria focus on use and access to a substance, whereas the latter three point toward broader societal acceptance of substance use. This is important because changes in substance use and societal acceptance of substance use often happen independently or in opposite directions without normalisation occurring  is difficult to apply to alcohol use as the different ways adolescents taste, sip, or drink alcohol are rarely distinguished . HoweverAn increasing proportion of adolescents also report not having commenced alcohol use. Lifetime abstention (i.e. never having had a drink) for 14- to 19-year-olds in Australia increased from 22% to 49% between 2001 and 2019  and EuroGenerally, younger age at first drink and early experiences of intoxication have been closely linked to heavier use as adolescents grow older ,34. HoweAs well as declines in experimentation, many western countries have recently seen declines in the frequency of adolescent drinking. For example, the prevalence of weekly alcohol use for 15 to 16-year-olds fell significantly between 1999 and 2015 in four of five regions in Europe, with declines especially sharp after 2007 . MonthlyHeavy drinking measures show similar patterns. For example, in the United States, past-month ‘binge drinking’ (five or more drinks on an occasion) among 12- to 17-year-olds fell by more than half from 26% in 2002 to 12% in 2016 . The HBSet al. [In their work on adolescent drinking and cigarette use, Sznitman et al.  suggesteet al. . Recent,et al. . For 15-et al. .There remains substantial variation between countries in the scope and magnitude of reported declines. Declines seem particularly sharp in northern European and English-speaking countries, with trends elsewhere less stark . AlthougYoung people have long been the focus of alcohol policies, both in terms of specific interventions  and via broader policies like price interventions ,45,46. SAlthough there has been no attempt to systematically assess policy changes internationally, there are clear examples of policies in particular countries aiming to reduce the availability of alcohol to adolescents. These include raising the purchase age, secondary supply or social host liability laws, taxing of youth-oriented drinks, underage possession laws and strict enforcement of proof-of-age identification checks at point of sale –61. AlthNational health advice on adolescents’ drinking has also become more restrictive in some countries. In 2001, Australia’s National Health and Medical Research Council Guidelines stated that young people under the age of 18 should not exceed low-risk drinking guidelines . The revSocial accommodation is a measure of the acceptability of drinking, and for our purposes here, non-drinking, by others. A recent New Zealand study using nationally representative health survey data found that the decreasing acceptance of alcohol use by adolescents was the most important contributor to declines in heavy adolescent drinking . A recenThere is evidence for decreasing approval from parents toward adolescent drinking. Changes in parental attitudes toward alcohol, including reduced supply of alcohol to children, increased monitoring and setting alcohol norms have been linked to declines in adolescent drinking in quantitative studies ,75. As iPast research has highlighted some of the difficulties young abstainers face in social situations, leading to them avoiding drinking environments, providing excuses for non-drinking, or ‘passing’ as drinkers –83. In dThe alcohol industry’s extensive marketing of alcohol in western countries has been linked to the cultural normalisation of adolescent drinking in the 1990s and early 2000s . HoweverGreater attention to health and alcohol in prevention programs, policy and media depictions may have also made adolescents increasingly ‘drugwise’ of the harmful effects of alcohol . AlthougOnline platforms have also become an integrated part of adolescent cultures in ways that both normalise and challenge alcohol use. Earlier research showed how social media encouraged displays of drinking  and expoChanging social roles may further influence the cultural accommodation of alcohol. Research suggests young men today are less reliant on alcohol for performing masculinity ,97,104. Young people are also required to adapt to broad changes in the education and labour markets, and there is some suggestion that this may have devalued alcohol ,109. Recet al.’s key criteria. On the one hand, adolescents are drinking less and pursuing intoxication less frequently, and alcohol seems to be a less central feature of their lives. On the other hand, more young people are choosing to abstain and are experiencing less stigma as a result of their abstinence, even in contexts where alcohol use might have previously been perceived as normal (such as parties). This highlights the interrelated, yet distinct nature of these two processes. As we show in Table 1, denormalisation seems to be more supported by epidemiological data, whereas evidence for normalisation of non-drinking can be found in qualitative studies suggesting increasingly positive social and cultural environments for abstainers. The concept of ‘differentiated normalisation’ [Normalisation theory shows how various empirically identified factors and mechanisms of change co-exist and co-produce to provide an overarching theory that more holistically accounts for declines in adolescent drinking. We suggest that research on declining adolescent drinking provides evidence for both denormalisation of drinking and normalisation of non-drinking across Parker isation’  usefullyisation’ ,112,113.isation’ ,38,73,95From a public health perspective, the denormalisation of alcohol use, particularly in the context of increased health concerns (like cigarette smoking), may have created an environment more open to regulation . This miIt is important to note that, had we explored literature on regular or heavy drinkers, we may have uncovered little change, or even increases, in drinking among some samples. For example, there is some evidence that declines in adolescent drinking have occurred at proportionately different rates among heavier and lighter drinkers –118. TheNormalisation was relevant to the United Kingdom in the 1990s because change was fast, clear and one-directional . Similar


AuNSps were subsequently dropped on a glass substrate before covered by thiophanate methyl, a broad-spectrum systemic fungicide. The AuNSps coated glass substrate was subsequently dried in the air for further surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) measurements. Optical properties, shape and size of AuNSps were confirmed by UV-vis spectroscopy, XRD, SEM-EDX and TEM. The results showed that AuNSps were successfully synthesized with the size of 53 nm, and their resonance peak was located at 560 nm. The Raman signal intensity of thiophanate methyl covered on AuNSps is higher than that without AuNSps, indicating SERS effects of AuNSps deposited glass substrate.It is essential to develop a simple and sensitive method to rapidly detect residual fungicides in agricultural products to protect human health. So far, little studies have been reported on potential application of gold nanospheres (AuNSps) as a surface plasmon resonance based sensor for in-situ detection of residual fungicides. Therefore, in this study, we investigated the potential application of AuNSps as a surface plasmon resonance based sensor for in-situ detection of fungicides. AuNSps were successfully synthesized via a seed-mediated method with some modifications. Firstly, gold nanoseeds were made during the reduction of chloroauric acid by trisodium citrate dihydrate (TSC). Then, AuNSps were grown from the seeds by using HAuCl The development of science and technologies has led to the introduction of modern analytical methods with high sensitivity and accuracy, such as high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), fluorescence assay (FL), high performance liquid chromatography mass spectrometry/mass spectrometry (HPLC–MS/MS), electrochemical assay (EC) and gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS). However, these methods have some limitations such as complicated sample preparation and analysis processes that require operators to be highly qualified, time-consuming operation, high consumption of organic solvents and restricted on-site measurement. Since the discovery of Raman spectroscopy took placed in early 1928, Raman spectroscopy has been thought to be a promising method to overcome these disadvantages . SERS isThiophanate methyl whose chemical structure is shown in In this work, AuNSps were synthesized by a facile method using TSC as a reducing agent and EDTA as a protective agent during the nucleation stage. The as-synthesized AuNSps were used as a platform to investigate the SERS signal in thiophanate methyl fungicide analysis.4·3H2O, ≥99.5%) and ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid  were purchased from Merck . Trisodium citrate dihydrate  were purchased from Prolabo . Deionized (DI) water  was used during the synthesis of AuNSps. A commercial product, called TOPSIN M 70WP (containing 70% of thiophanate methyl), was purchased from Nippon Soda Company, Ltd. All reagents were used without further purification.Tetrachloroauric (III) acid trihydrate (HAuClα radiation (λ = 1.54056 Å) operated at 40 kV and 30 mA with a scanning rate of 0.02° per step in the 2θ range of 10° ≤ 2θ ≤ 90° was carried out to characterize the crystal structure of AuNSps. UV-vis spectroscopy  was utilized to investigate the optical properties of AuNSps. The Raman spectra of AuNSps samples were recorded on a LabRam HR micro-Raman instrument with a 532 nm Ar+ ion laser at room temperature.The morphology of the as-synthesized samples was obtained by scanning electron microscopy  coupling with energy-dispersive X-ray (EDX) spectroscopy operated at 20 kV of the incident electron beam energy. Transmission electron microscope (TEM) images were obtained with a JEOL JEM-1400 (120 kV). X-ray diffractometer  with Cu K4 was mixed with 10 mL of DI water, and the obtained solution was boiled at 100 °C. Under vigorous stirring 300 µL of 1% TSC was then added to the solution. The color of the solution will change from colorless to reddish. After cooling at room temperature, the solution was kept in dark for 30 min for seeding crystallization of Au nanoseeds.Au nanoseeds were synthesized by the Turkevich method  with som4 were firstly added into 100 mL of DI water under vigorous stirring. Next, 20 µL of 1% TSC and 100 µL of 0.1 M EDTA were added to the mixture. The solution was kept in the dark for 30 min for stabilization. The whole procedure of AuNSps synthesis was illustrated in For the synthesis of AuNSps, 50 µL of the Au nanoseed solution and 100 µL of 25 mM HAuCl2SO4 and 30% H2O2 in 15 min, subsequently washed with DI water and dried in the air. Twenty microliters of AuNSps solution was gently dropped onto the clean substrate homogeneously, and the substrate was then dried in the air. Next, Twenty microliters of thiophanate methyl (in DI water) was gently dropped onto the AuNSps coated glass substrate, and the substrate was subsequently dried in the air for further SERS measurements. For comparison, Raman spectra of a clean substrate, AuNSps and thiophanate methyl solutions (10−4 M and 0.1 M) were also recorded. The procedure of SERS measurement was illustrated in The Raman spectra of thiophanate methyl were recorded on an AuNSps coated glass substrate in order to study the SERS effects. To prepare AuNSps coated glass substrate, the substrate was firstly rinsed with a 3:1 (v/v) mixture of concentrated HOptical properties of AuNSps and Au nanoseeds were studied through UV-Vis spectra. As shown in The solution of Au nanoseeds consisted of clusters of Au nanosized particles with the average diameter of 18.27 ± 0.08 nm a,b. Nanoθ = 38.1° (111), 44.3° (200), 64.5° (220) and 77.7° (311) [7° (311) . No impu−1, 726 cm−1, 779 cm−1, 898 cm−1, 959 cm−1 and 1538 cm−1, which are ascribed to -N-C=S deformation, N-H wagging of –(C=O)-NH-(C=S)-, C=S stretching, C-S stretching, C=S and C-N, respectively. Moreover, other signals of =C-H deformation, N-C-N asymmetric stretching, C-O, C-O-C, C=C, C=O and N-H were also observed at 1039 cm−1, 1154 cm−1, 1267 cm−1, 1298 cm−1, 1601 cm−1 and 1708 cm−1, respectively [−4 M , therefore, was estimated as 57 µM.To elucidate the sensitivity of the method, 20 µL of thiophanate methyl solutions with concentrations ranging from 11 to 30 µM were deposited onto AuNSps coated glass substrates, which serve as Raman probes. The corresponding Raman spectra of thiophanate methyl were collected in The reproducibility of the measurement was also evaluated by collecting SERS spectra of 30 µM thiophanate methyl at 10 random locations on the as-fabricated substrate, as shown in AuNSps were successfully synthesized from crystallization of Au nanoseeds through a facile seed-mediated method using TSC as a primary reducing agent and EDTA as a protective agent during the nucleation stage. The as-synthesized AuNSps showed SERS effect for thiophanate methyl with low LOD of thiophanate methyl down to 17 µM. The Raman signal intensity of thiophanate methyl covered on AuNSps was higher than that without AuNSps, which revealed the potential application of AuNSps as a surface plasmon resonance based sensor for in-situ detection of fungicides with high sensitivity and reproducibility.


Brugia malayi involving TRP-2 (TRPC-like channel subunits). GON-2 and CED-11, TRPM-like channel subunits, also contributed to diethylcarbamazine responses. Opening of these TRP channels produces contraction and subsequent activation of calcium-dependent SLO-1K channels. Recovery from the temporary paralysis is consistent with inactivation of TRP channels. Our observations elucidate mechanisms for the rapid onset and short-lasting therapeutic actions of diethylcarbamazine.Diethylcarbamazine is an important classic drug used for prevention and treatment of lymphatic filariasis and loiasis, diseases caused by filarial nematodes. Despite many studies, its site of action has not been established. Until now, the consensus has been that diethylcarbamazine works by activating host immune systems, not by a direct action on the parasites. Here we show that low concentrations of diethylcarbamazine have direct and rapid (<30 s) temporary spastic paralyzing effects on the parasites that lasts around 4 h, which is produced by diethylcarbamazine opening TRP channels in muscle of  Brugia malayi. Inactivation of TRP channels explain its short-lasting therapeutic activity.Verma et al. describe a new mechanism for diethylcarbamazine action, a drug classically used to treat lymphatic filariasis and loiasis. They propose that it induces rapid temporary spastic paralysis of parasites by opening TRP channels, including TRP-2 in muscle of  Loa loa, Brugia spp., and Wucheria bancrofti. The diseases are transmitted by biting insects that feed on infected hosts’ blood, picking up L1 stage microfilaria, which mature in the insect to the L3 stage, before being passed on to a subsequent uninfected host. The transmitted microfilariae mature in the new host to adults where the clinical signs produced depend on the final location of the parasites. Loiasis, or African eye worm, is caused by the filarial worm L. loa that threatens more than 29 million people causing itchy swellings of the body known as Calabar swellings. A group of filarial adults like Brugia malayi that locate in the host lymphatic system produces lymphatic filariasis. Here, they block drainage of the lymphatics inducing gross swelling of the limbs, itching, and skin infections that produce the clinical condition, elephantiasis. The unpleasant symptoms inhibit productive work of the individual and often cause social rejection. There are an estimated 67.88 million people infected with lymphatic filariasis1, which threatens 886 million people in 52 countries. There are no effective vaccines, so Mass Drug Administration (MDA) to control and prevent infection is the only practical option. Diethylcarbamazine (referred to subsequently as DEC), is a valuable and classic drug2 used for the treatment of loiasis and lymphatic filariasis4; it has a very fast therapeutic onset; it removes microfilariae from the blood, but the therapeutic benefits are temporary because the microfilariae return in the blood after only a few hours5.The neglected tropical diseases include infections like loiasis and lymphatic filariasis caused by filarial nematode parasites like 8. We have discovered that low concentrations of DEC have a direct effect on B. malayi parasites, opening Transient Receptor Potential (TRP) channels, which in turn activate calcium-dependent SLOw poke potassium channels (SLO-1) in their somatic muscle cells, and produce a temporary spastic paralysis. The identification of this site of action of DEC in filaria can explain the rapid onset of action in vivo following administration and its transient therapeutic effect that can be followed by recovery of infection levels after treatment. An entry of calcium and activation of SLO-1 channels by DEC also predicts a synergistic interaction between DEC and emodepside that is under development for treatment of filaria. The new knowledge of the mode of action of DEC will support its continued use and needed combination therapies.Until now, DEC was not understood to have direct effects on the parasites, but taken to act by stimulating host immune systemsBrugia malayi    Fig. . We testayi Fig. , and fou12) Fig. .Fig. 1DE. malayi female worms. We found in each of the preparations that DEC increased a voltage-sensitive outward current   Fig. . This ouUpon closer inspection of the standing currents caused by DEC, we observed in many recordings, an inward current that preceded the outward SLO-1 K current Fig. . These i10. The application of 5 mM 4AP inhibited the potassium currents and produced a significant inward current, which reached a steady level after 1.5 min. Following the addition of the 4AP, when a steady current was reached, the application of DEC produced a steady inward current  , a potassium channel antagonistent Fig. . In the  5) Fig. . This in 5) Fig. , and 10  5) Fig. , both noB. malayi muscle induced by DEC by perfusing the preparations with calcium-free bath solution .The inhibition of lipoxygenase and/or cyclooxygenase that block the synthesis of physiologically active prostanoids in the host and parasites has been discussed as a mechanism of action of DEC16. The PUFAs produced by these CYP450 enzymes can explain the ability of B. malayi to produce prostacyclin, PGE2 and PGD2 from arachidonic acid in the absence of cyclooxygenases and lipoxygenases18. In B. malayi, the homolog of the mammalian ω-hydroxylase is BM42071, and the homolog of the mammalian epoxygenases that are inhibited by miconazole is BM3824019. Thus, it was possible that DEC acted by inhibiting CYP450 enzymes.Nevertheless, nematodes still produce poly-unsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) with two types of cytochrome oxidase CYP450 enzymes acting on arachidonic acid: (1) ω-hydroxylases producing 20-hydroxyeicosatrienoic acids (HETEs); and (2) epoxygenases producing epoxyeicosatrienoic acids (EETs)We tested the effect of arachidonic acid and found that its effect was similar to DEC Fig. , but theNext, we tested the effect of 30 µM meclofenamic acid, an inhibitor of mammalian 5-lipoxygenase and cyclooxygenase and found Supplementary Fig. 20 to metabolites that also can activate the TRP-2 channels. The current-responses to both arachidonic acid and miconazole were slow, taking several minutes to plateau, in contrast to the faster action of DEC. The slower time course of arachidonic acid and miconazole can be explained if accumulation of metabolites arachidonic acid are required for activation of Brugia TRP channels and if DEC acts directly on these TRP channels.With no effect of meclofenamic acid and indomethacin on the amplitude of the peak DEC responses, we tested 10 µM miconazole as an inhibitor of epoxygenase CYP450 enzymes. We found that, like arachidonic acid, miconazole produced a slow inward current and reduced the amplitude of the response to DEC Fig. , suggestB. malayi.As a further test of the hypothesis that miconazole and DEC do not have an identical mode of action , we compared the effects of the two drugs on motility Fig. . We founBrugia malayi microfilariae and adults inducing spastic paralysis. Fig. trp-2, gon-2 + ced-11 knockdown effects on currents and; (4) the effect and slow time course of arachidonic acid and miconazole inducing inward currents. We point out that the slow time course of the effect of arachidonic acid inducing an inward current does not prove that arachidonic acid, or a metabolite, activates TRP channels because arachidonic or a metabolite could induce a separate inward current and then have an inhibitory effect on the TRP current. However, Fig. DEC has direct effects on B. malayi. Until now, DEC was not understood to have direct effects on the parasites, but taken to act by stimulating host immune systems8.Our observations clearly demonstrate a direct effect of therapeutically relevant DEC concentrations inhibiting motility of microfilariae and adult 5 produces a rapid (within minutes) decline in the level of microfilariae found circulating in the blood and a partial killing of the adults21. This rapid effect of DEC leads to the entrapment of the microfilariae and the adults in the liver, lymph nodes, and lungs where they undergo attack by the mononuclear phagocyte system (MPS) and lysis23. The reduction in circulating parasites is, however, transient in nature, and lasts several hours before returning to former levels. We found that the effect of DEC on microfilariae and adult females in vitro was also to produce a concentration-dependent inhibitory effect  on motility with the motility returning gradually after 3–5 h  and the EC50 for the TRP muscle current (39 µM). This is explained by the classic phenomena of “Spare Receptors” where a full biological response  can be achieved with only a proportion of activated receptors (TRP channels here) when there is a signaling cascade following receptor activation that produces loss of muscle contractility25.Intravenous DEC h Figs. . These c28 partly because of a lack of effects previously detected on the parasites in vitro. We think it is possible that the effects on motility have been overlooked because they are transient in nature.A number of authors attribute the therapeutic effects of DEC to be host mediated by their immune systems26 reported effects of DEC on host eosinophils, leukocytes, and granulocytes and Cesbron et al.27, reported effects on blood platelets. These studies and others have been reviewed7. Our studies have not tested effects on host immune systems, so we do not exclude such effects of DEC.Piessens & BeldekasB. malayi that includes activation of TRP channels that includes TRP-2 subunits of their muscle cells. TRP channels are tetramers composed of four subunits that are mostly homomeric but can also be heteromeric29. Most TRP channels are permeable to calcium and subjected to sophisticated auto-regulation mechanisms that self-regulate calcium entry and downstream calcium signaling30. We can explain the temporary spastic paralysis of B. malayi by an agonist action of DEC on TRP channels that is followed by auto-regulatory mechanisms leading to a subsequent closure of the TRP channel and recovery of motility. A temporary paralysis of the worms in the blood will lead to trapping of any paralyzed parasites in different capillary beds where they will undergo attack by the mononuclear phagocyte system (MPS) and immune systems that is required for the elimination of the worms. The entry of calcium also activates of B. malayi SLO-1 K channels . Worm handling protocols were approved by Institutional Bio-safety Committee (IBC) at Iowa State University. Microfilariae and adult worms were maintained in non-phenol red Roswell Park Memorial Institute (RPMI) 1640 media  supplemented with 10% heat-inactivated fetal bovine serum  and 1% penicillin–streptomycin . The worms were stored individually in 24-well culture plates containing 2 ml of supplemented RPMI −1640 media and placed in an incubator at 37 °C supplemented with 5% CO2.Emodepside used in this study was obtained from Bayer Animal Health. Diethylcarbamazine (DEC), 4-aminopyridine, miconazole, meclofenamate, arachidonic acid, iberiotoxin, and capsaicin were obtained from Sigma Aldrich . The drugs were dissolved in distilled water or DMSO and diluted in recording solution to obtain final concentration.g for 10 min) and the highly motile microfilariae were collected and quantified microscopically. Forty microfilariae were then separated into each well of the 96 well plates in 200 μl of RPMI culture media. The microfilariae were kept at 37 °C under an atmosphere of 5% CO2 before and after addition of DEC during experiments as per protocol described by Samje et al.9. The volume was restricted so that the movement of the microfilariae was restricted to two dimensions. To observe the DEC concentration effect, we applied different concentrations of DEC  and used distilled water as the vehicle control. The motility of the microfilariae were counted manually  as the percentage of microfilariae that were motile. The microfilariae were graded as: (1) fully motile, if they showed normal movement with no coiling or, (2) immotile, if they were immotile, or contracted showing tail, head, or whole worm coiling. The percent motility of the microfilariae in the individual wells was then determined at concentrations and at different times. The percent motility at 1 h was used to determine the concentration effect plot and the EC50 of DECMicrofilariae were concentrated by centrifugation  and the motility of the worms was recorded 0, 0.5, 10, 20, 30, 40, 60, 90, 240, and 480 min post treatment. A 30 s time point was used to draw the concentration–response curve. For dsRNA experiments, the movement of worms was recorded at 0, 1, 4, 24, 48, 72, and 96 h post dsRNA treatment using the WormAssay v1.4 software. Motility of all the worms was also recorded before the application of dsRNA. The worms were treated with DEC after 96 h of RNAi to estimate the loss of drug response.Movement of adult worms was analyzed in a 24-well culture plate using the Worminator video capture and motility monitoring system as described in detailC. elegans37. Sections of about 5 mm were cut from the anterior region of the worm and placed in the recording chamber with bath solution with calcium  or without calcium . The pH of both solutions was adjusted to 7.2 with NaOH and the osmolarity maintained at ~320 mOsm. The base of the chamber was a 24 × 50 mm cover slip coated with a thin layer of Sylgard™. The worm section was then glued along one side using Glushield® cyanoacrylate glue  thereby immobilizing it and then cut open longitudinally using a tungsten needle. The resulting “muscle flap” was glued along the cut edge and the reproductive and the gut tissue were removed using fine forceps. The dissection was viewed under DIC optics (×400) using an inverted light microscope .After dissection of the adult worms, recordings were performed at room temperature. The muscle cells and the hypodermis were exposed upon dissection by modifying the methods used for 38. Patch pipettes were pulled from capillary glass , fire polished, and then filled with pipette solution with calcium  or without calcium . The pH for both solutions was adjusted to 7.2 with KOH, and the osmolarity maintained at ~315–330 mOsm. Pipettes with resistances of 3–5 MΩ were used. A 1 cm region near the tip of the electrode was covered with Sylgard™ to reduce background noise and improve frequency responses. Giga ohm seals were formed before breaking the membrane with suction. The preparation was continuously perfused in bath solution at 2 ml/min. The current signal was amplified by an Axopatch 200B amplifier  filtered at 2 kHz (three-pole Bessel filter), sampled at 25 kHz, and digitized with a Digidata 1440A .Muscle flaps were incubated in 1 mg/ml collagenase (Type 1A) in bath solution for 15–120 s and washed 10 times prior to recording. The patch-clamp technique was used to record whole-cell currents from the muscle flaps as explained in ref. TM KontesTM Pellet PestleTM . Total RNA was extracted using TRIzol® Reagent  according to the manufacturer’s instructions. About 1 µg of total RNA was used to synthesize cDNA using SuperScript® VILO™ Master Mix . Samples were either used to amplify DNA using PCR or stored at −20 °C for later use.Microfilariae and adult worms were snap frozen and crushed into fine powder in a 1.5 ml micro-centrifuge tube using Kimble14. cDNA was synthesized using the cytoplasm as a template using SuperScript® VILO™ Master Mix . cDNA was later used to perform PCR reactions.Whole-cell patch pipettes were used to collect cytoplasm from individual somatic muscle cells for expression analysis39. Target and non-target T7 promoter labeled primers were amplified using the primers trp-2f2, trp-2f2t7, trp-2r2, trp-2r2t7 for trp-2, gon-2f1, gon-2f1t7, gon-2r1, gon-2r1t7 for gon-2, ced-11f1, ced-11f1t7, ced-11r1, ced-11r1t7 for ced-11, and osm-9f, osm9ft7, osm-9r, osm9rt7 for osm-9. The primers LacZF, LacZR, LacZFt7 and LacZRt7 were used to amplify the non-target LacZ. The sequences of these primers are shown in Supplementary Table TM PRIMEG cycler  with the following cycling conditions: −95 °C × 5 min, 35 × , 72 °C × 10 min. dsRNA was synthesized using the T7 RiboMAXTM Express RNAi kit  according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Concentration and purity of dsRNA were assessed using a spectrophotometer. Adult B. malayi were soaked in 30–60 µg/ml of dsRNA for 4 days. dsRNA for the transcripts Bma osm-9, Bma gon-2, Bma ced-11, Bma trp-2, individually, a mix of Bma gon-2, ced-11, and trp-2, or for the control LacZ dsRNA or the control DNA/RNase free water was used for respectively. Worms were maintained in RPMI media as explained before. A part of the worm was cut for electrophysiology recordings and the rest was snap frozen in liquid nitrogen and stored at −80 °C for transcript analysis by qPCR.dsRNA was synthesized as explained in refs. Bma gapdh) primers: trp-2f2, trp-2r2, gon-2f1, gon-2r1, ced-11f1, ced-11r1, osm-9f, osm-9r, SSK5F, and SSK5R . The cycling conditions used were 95 °C × 10 min, 40 × . PCR efficiencies were calculated using the CFX96 Software Suite . The relative quantification of target gene knockdown was estimated by the ∆∆Ct method40.cDNA from dsRNA-treated worms were amplified using the following target and reference gene  was used to generate concentration–response curves to calculate EC50 values. The responses were plotted as the mean ± SE. Statistical analyses were performed on groups of values by using ANOVA to determine whether the group means were dissimilar. Bonferroni post-hoc tests were used for multiple comparison tests to determine whether there were significant differences between groups. T-tests were used for comparing a simple control with a test study effect. Group data presented in the manuscript subjected to statistical analysis had a minimum of n = 5 independent samples/individuals per group, regardless of the outcome of any power analysis. Minimum sample size was 5 for all the experiments and it was also randomized for minimum of three batches of worms. Worms were randomly allocated to each treatment group by blinded operator. Motility of the worms was tested on minimum of three random batches of worms with minimum of 3 worms from each batch used. The whole-cell recordings were made on random muscle/regions of the worms. Investigators were blinded to data collection for motility recordings and analysis. For electrophysiology recordings, blinding was not possible as operator had to have the knowledge of the specimen to test the drugs and randomization was irrelevant considering our experimental design as described above.Whole-cell patch-clamp data were analyzed with Clampfit 11.1  and GraphPad Prism 5.0 software. The peak current-responses from whole-cell recordings were used for analysis. For whole worm concentration–response relationships, motility/minute was plotted against log concentration. Drug concentrations were logFurther information on research design is available in the Supplementary InformationSupplementary Data 1Description of Additional Supplementary FilesReporting Summary


The “Faces of Caregiving” video project highlights the social and cultural aspects of dementia care as shared by seven Japanese Americans. We performed a content analysis of the narratives in the videos, and prominent themes included stigma, gender, resilience, and values placed on family and community. We also applied the life course perspective in examining each care trajectory and found the principles of historical time, linked lives, timing, and human agency to be not only relevant but also useful for a comprehensive understanding of the shared and unique care experiences of Japanese Americans. These results have significant practical implications in that they inform a conceptual template for developing similar video projects for other Asian ethnic groups in the United States. The video project can be replicated within an appropriate cultural context, and such a culturally sensitive approach can help better meet diverse ethnic minorities’ unmet needs for information and education. Part of a symposium sponsored by the Aging Among Asians Interest Group.