No abstract

Some researchers have investigated whether religiosity is one of the causes of people’s hesitancy to get vaccinated against COVID-19, but the results of the literature are inconsistent. This study aimed to test whether the intention to vaccinate could be predicted by participants’ religiosity, controlling for variables such as political orientation and trust in scientists. Study participants were 270 Brazilians, who used an online platform to respond. Intention to be vaccinated was assessed by the item “When the Covid-19 vaccine is offered, will you get vaccinated?”, whose response options ranged from “1 – Definitely not” to “5 – Definitely yes”. Organizational religious activity (ORA), non-organizational religious activity (NORA) and intrinsic religiosity (IR) were assessed by The Duke Religion Scale (DUREL). Unlike NORA and IR, the participants who had higher levels of ORA were less willing to be vaccinated. The possible mechanisms that explain these findings are discussed.

Atualmente, a crítica à religião vem sendo amplamente organizada e difundida. Investidas contundentes têm sido alardeadas por expoentes como Sam Harris, RichardDawkins, Daniel Dennett e Cristopher Hitchens. Sob essa influência, um número crescente de pessoas é levado não só a negar a existência de deuses, mas também a menosprezar qualquer coisa que esteja associada às religiões. Sensível a esse cenário, o filósofo suíço Alain de Botton discute, em seu livro Religião para Ateus, o que seria "o erro do moderno ateísmo" e, ao mesmo tempo, propõe o que pode ser ultrajante à maioria dos ateus:aprender com as religiões --sobretudo com o cristianismo, o judaísmo e o budismo. Ao abandonar a crença de que existem deuses, caberia à sociedade secular a incumbência de oferecer suporte às exigências humanas que, até então, só as religiões se dispuseram a atender. Botton sugere que, desde que descartemos seus aspectos sobrenaturais, poderíamos gozar de técnicas, ideias e práticas religiosas que, ao longo dos séculos, vem sendo úteis para a vida em comunidade e para o enfrentamento do sofrimento humano. Similarmente ao que já propusera Auguste Comte, Botton acredita que "a cultura pode substituir a Escritura" --quer seja pela arte, literatura e filosofia, quer seja pela secularização de práticas religiosas.Em um contexto marcado por críticas às religiões por um grupo crescente de ateus, agnósticos e humanistas seculares, Religião para Ateus traz uma proposta inovadora e, de certa forma, pacificadora. Ao mesmo tempo em que algumas questões sociais e individuais básicas podem ser contempladas por mecanismos seculares, inspirar-se no que as religiões sempre fizeram pode ser, além de um sinal de maturidade e gratidão, uma forma de *

Há evidências de que crianças com transtorno de déficit de atenção/hiperatividade (TDAH) apresentam mais déficits em tomada de decisão e em habilidades sociais. Objetivamos verificar se esses achados são replicados em uma amostra de crianças brasileiras e se esses dois domínios estão associados. Quarenta e nove crianças com TDAH e 57 crianças sem TDAH foram submetidas a duas tarefas computadorizadas de tomada de decisão e a um inventário de habilidades sociais. Crianças com TDAH apresentaram piores indicadores de habilidades sociais. Contudo, os grupos apresentaram padrões de decisão similares, e essas medidas não predisseram significativamente os escores gerais de habilidades sociais.

Although belief in spiritual beings can be considered the main characteristic of religiosity/spirituality, a scale focused on specifically assessing this construct while remaining pertinent to people of different religious/spiritual denominations-including atheists and agnostics-is not available. In two studies, we present the process of developing the Belief in Spiritual Beings Scale (BSBS) and identify its psychometric properties. Study 1 designed 24 items, which were subsequently evaluated by a panel of judges and 24 representatives of the target population. In study 2, 1788 Brazilians of different religious/spiritual denominations answered the BSBS and five other related scales. Exploratory factor analysis found a unidimensional solution for the data, with the final version of the scale consisting of 13 items. The BSBS score correlated positively-highly or moderately-with measurements of organizational religious activity, non-organizational religious activity, intrinsic religiosity, and Western and Eastern religious beliefs. The level of belief/disbelief in spiritual beings was different among contrasting groups (i.e., religious spiritualists, non-religious spiritualists, gnostic non-spiritualists or atheists, and agnostic non-spiritualists or agnostics), and incrementally predicted almost all the participants’ spiritual denominations. Given this preliminary evidence of validity, the BSBS is an interesting instrument for studies aiming to measure the general level of belief/disbelief in spiritual beings-the “soul” of religiosity/spirituality.

There is much evidence that the relationship between religiosity/spirituality (R/S) and mental health is linear and positive, but relatively few studies have included samples of non-religious participants in their analyses. Some findings suggest that, compared to people who have intermediate levels of R/S, those with higher levels and those with insignificant levels are mentally healthier. However, this curvilinear model does not appear to have been tested through a measure of spiritual beliefs (i.e. belief in spiritual beings) and the comparison of different religious/spiritual groups. In view of this, 1788 Brazilians were assessed in terms of their spiritual beliefs, their religious/spiritual experiences (R/SE), and their positive (happiness and meaning in life) and negative (symptoms of anxiety and depression) mental health components. We found curvilinear relationships between R/SE and all components of mental health, but the level of spiritual belief predicted only the variance in the meaning in life. With the exception of comparisons involving happiness, at least one of the groups that had intermediate levels of R/SE (spirituals and agnostics) had worse mental health than the groups that had the highest and lowest levels (religious people and atheists, respectively). Although religious people and atheists had similar levels of symptoms of anxiety and depression, the former presented more happiness and meaning in life. Together, these findings corroborate the curvilinear model, but suggest that R/SE is related in different ways to the positive and negative components of mental health.

No abstract

RESUMO:A avaliação neuropsicológica infantil é uma prática clínica relativamente recente no Brasil. Este trabalho consiste de uma revisão sistemática da literatura sobre as características da avaliação neuropsicológica infantil em estudos brasileiros publicados em português. Artigos publicados entre 2004 e 2014 foram rastreados por meio da base de dados do Portal de Periódicos da Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES). Como resultado, 10 dos 13 estudos incluídos em nossas análises avaliaram crianças que apresentavam alguma condição clínica (por exemplo, epilepsia, prematuridade ou déficits de aprendizagem). A maior parte dos instrumentos neuropsicológicos utilizados foi de origem internacional, de aplicação manual e cujo respondente é a própria criança. Além disso, a atenção, a memória e a inteligência foram as principais funções neuropsicológicas avaliadas, e a Escala de Inteligência Wechsler para Crianças e o Teste de Desempenho Escolar foram os instrumentos mais utilizados. Essas e outras características identificadas foram discutidas. PALAVRAS-CHAVE: Avaliação neuropsicológica; Testes neuropsicológicos; Neuropsicologia infantil. CHARACTERISTICS OF CHILD NEUROPSyCHOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT IN RESEARCH IN BRAZIL: A SySTEMATIC REVIEWABSTRACT: Children´s neuropsychological assessment is a still fledging clinical practice in Brazil. Current paper is a systematic review of the literature on the characteristics of child neuropsychological assessment in Brazilian studies published in Portuguese. Articles published between 2004 and 2014 were retrieved from CAPES database. Ten out of 13 studies evaluated children with clinical conditions (epilepsy, prematurity or learning deficiencies). Most neuropsychological instruments used were international, manually worked, with respondent children. Attention, memory and intelligence were the main neuropsychological functions evaluated. Wechsler´s Intelligence Scale for Children and School Performance Test were the instruments most employed. Several identified traits were discussed.