Purpose Five experiments probed auditory-visual (AV) understanding of sentences by users of cochlear implants (CIs). Method Sentence material was presented in auditory (A), visual (V), and AV test conditions to listeners with normal hearing and CI users. Results (a) Most CI users report that most of the time, they have access to both A and V information when listening to speech. (b) CI users did not achieve better scores on a task of speechreading than did listeners with normal hearing. (c) Sentences that are easy to speechread provided 12 percentage points more gain to speech understanding than did sentences that were difficult. (d) Ease of speechreading for sentences is related to phrase familiarity. (e) Users of bimodal CIs benefit from low-frequency acoustic hearing even when V cues are available, and a second CI adds to the benefit of a single CI when V cues are available. (f) V information facilitates lexical segmentation by improving the recognition of the number of syllables produced and the relative strength of these syllables. Conclusions Our data are consistent with the view that V information improves CI users' ability to identify syllables in the acoustic stream and to recognize their relative juxtaposed strengths. Enhanced syllable resolution allows better identification of word onsets, which, when combined with place-of-articulation information from visible consonants, improves lexical access.

Background: Global positioning system (GPS)-based navigation apps are very useful in our lives. However, whether and how the usage of these apps affects spatial cognition and the sense of direction is still unclear.Methods: A total of 108 individuals were recruited and completed the GPS dependence, internet gaming behavior, and impulsivity test using scales. The eye-tracking-based general mental rotation (MR) task and target finding (TF; require individuals to find a target specified in a 3D street map in a rotated version of top 2D view map) task were used to assess their spatial cognition and the sense of direction. The correlation was used to relate GPS navigation usage, spatial cognition ability, and impulsivity. Subgroup analyses stratifying by gaming hours of individuals (< 2 h or ≥ 2 h) or maps (countryside or city) in TF task were performed. The moderating and mediating effect analyses were conducted to verify these relationships.Results: The GPS dependency score was nominal positively correlated with fixations in the TF task in the entire cohort (r = 0.202, unadjusted p = 0.036); it was significant in city (r = 0.254, p = 0.008) and gaming time of < 2 h (r = 0.459, p = 0.001) subgroups. The high-score (upper 30%) group of GPS dependency had more fixations on the original target building in the training area and indicative building in the test area than the low-score (lower 30%) group. GPS dependency was not associated with the correct rate and reaction time in the TF task or any of the indicators in the MR task (p > 0.05). The GPS dependency mediated the indirect effect of impulsivity on the fixations on TF. The internet gaming time moderated the association between GPS dependency and fixations on TF.Conclusion: The dependency on GPS-based navigation apps was associated with impaired spatial cognition but may not significantly affect the sense of direction.

Individuals with high risk of internet gaming disorder (HIGD) showed abnormal psychological performances in response inhibition, impulse control, and emotion regulation, and are considered the high-risk stage of internet gaming disorder (IGD). The identification of this population mainly relies on clinical scales, which are less accurate. This study aimed to explore whether these performances have highly accurate for discriminating HIGD from low-risk ones. Eye tracking based anti-saccade task, Barratt impulsiveness scale (BIS), and Wong and Law emotional intelligence scale (WLEIS) were used to evaluate psychological performances in 57 individuals with HIGD and 52 matched low risk of internet gaming disorder (LIGD). HIGD group showed significantly increased BIS total (t = −2.875, p = 0.005), attention (t = −2.139, p = 0.035), motor (t = −2.017, p = 0.046), and non-planning (t = −2.171, p = 0.032) scores, but significantly decreased WLEIS emotion regulation score (t = 2.636, p = 0.010) and correct rate of eye tracking anti-saccade task (t = 2.294, p = 0.024) compared with LIGD group. BIS total score was negatively correlated with the WLEIS total (r = −0.473, p &lt; 0.001) and WLEIS emotion regulation (r = −0.366, p &lt; 0.001) scores. A combination of the WLEIS emotion regulation score and the correct rate of anti-saccade task could discriminate HIGD from LIGD with 91.23% sensitivity, 82.69% specificity, and 87.16% accuracy. Participants with higher gaming hours daily were 40 times more likely to be high risk than their counterparts (p &lt; 0.001). Hence, psychological performances were worse in HIGD. A combination of abnormal emotion regulation and response inhibition might be a potential marker to identify HIGD individuals.

While several studies have demonstrated the preventive and therapeutic effects of red yeast rice (RYR), a traditional Chinese medicine, on carotid atherosclerosis through the reduction of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) level and other risk factors, the evidence remains inconsistent. This study aimed to further evaluate the effects of RYR in carotid atherosclerosis. Several databases were searched for original trials of RYR for the treatment of carotid atherosclerosis that reported plaque indicators. Carotid plaque area (AREA), carotid plaque score (SCORE), and intima-media thickness (IMT) were set as the primary outcomes, while lipid profile and safety indicators were set as the secondary outcomes. Meta-analyses were performed on the randomized controlled trials (RCTs) using Comprehensive Meta-analysis software. Heterogeneity was evaluated using the I² index and Q statistic. Subgroup, sensitivity, and dose-effect analyses were conducted. Twenty RCTs with 2217 patients were included. Compared to the control group, AREA (SMD = −0.855, 95%CI: −1.259 to −0.451, p < 0.001), IMT (SMD = −0.588, 95%CI: −0.792 to −0.384, p < 0.001), SCORE (SMD = −0.708, 95%CI: −1.135 to −0.282, p = 0.001), LDL-C (SMD = −0.938, 95%CI: −1.375 to −0.502, p < 0.001), triglyceride (SMD = −0.766, 95%CI: −0.980 to −0.551, p < 0.001), and total cholesterol (SMD = −0.858, 95%CI: −1.254 to −0.462, p < 0.001) were significantly decreased and HDL-C (SMD = 0.389, 95%CI: 0.044–0.733, p = 0.027) was significantly increased following RYR therapy. The indicators for safety were not significant and did not differ between the two groups (p > 0.050). Heterogeneities mainly existed for the treatment time or control group setting. Most results showed no changes in the sensitivity analysis. Dose-effect relationships were observed for all indicators except for TC and HDL-C. We concluded that RYR therapy showed considerable efficacy and an acceptable safety profile for the treatment of carotid atherosclerosis in the Chinese population.

Background and Aims: Problematic social media use (PMSMU) shows strong mental health associations, yet its neurocognitive mechanisms remain unclear. This study investigates emotion processing deficits in PMSMU, focusing on valence-specific attentional biases and neural dysfunction. Methods: 113 Chinese college students stratified into low-risk ( n = 55) and high-risk PMSMU ( n = 58) groups completed psychological assessments and an emotion recognition task using facial stimuli depicting the seven basic emotions selected from the Chinese Facial Affective Picture System (CFAPS) during simultaneous eye-tracking and fNIRS recording prefrontal-temporal activation. Results: High-risk PMSMU showed enhanced accuracy for joy emotion (82.58% vs. 74.31%, p = 0.013) but impaired negative emotion recognition (64.29% vs. 69.87%, p = 0.006). Eye-tracking revealed reduced nose-root fixation and increased mouth and the middle of nose attention. fNIRS identified negative-emotion-specific hyperactivation in right temporal (c1, p = 0.017) and left frontal lobes (c9, p = 0.021). Temporal activation correlated with slower sadness recognition ( r = 0.345), while attention deficits linked to reduced fear accuracy ( r = −0.261) and temporal hyperactivity ( r = 0.377). High-risk subjects reported poorer psychosocial functioning (poorer interpersonal skills, attentional control, and higher levels of anxiety and depression, p < 0.001), with frontal activation moderating negative-emotion-impairment relationships. Conclusion: PMSMU is characterized by valence-specific disruptions—including attentional bias toward positive cues, impaired fear processing, and prefrontal-temporal hyperactivation during negative emotion decoding—that collectively define it as a neurobehavioral condition leading to psychosocial impairment.