Dibble Dibble Dop!

These are just SOME of my notes as I am transcribing them. I am posting them straight without commentary for two reasons:  maybe someone can connect their own dots and I will not have to type everything twice. This is just a block from the first quarter of day one at IMFAR! I will process and comment with some additional information I gather after I figure out what the heck I wrote in the first place. Enjoy this appetiser. Also, I had the privilege of taking all my notes in a beautiful little journal made by one of my bestest best, Nonna Clancy (psst, that's a nickname). She is a very talented book conservator and binder. And, she is generous. I am the proud owner of her work as are The Dumplings.


DAY ONE


IMFAR conference purpose: identify questions, methodology, and collaboration




Geri Dawson (Chapel Hill) Autism Speaks


• Improve lives: detect, translate, treatment, disseminate


• PREVENTION? “INVESTMENT”?


• $170million in research support


• Top –bottom research


• Discover risk factors


• Method detection


• Quality of life for adults


• Drugs (for profit and non-profit)


• Novel treatments


• Dissemination to community esp. “underserved”


• AGRE genome project


• Use of rat models


• Outcome measures


• Toddler Treatment Network (17 medical centers serving 22,000)


• 34 countries


• DSM V funding two studies effects on prevalence and diagnostics






Alan Parker Simons Foundation SFARI


• Many areas: math, computers, physical science


• Check website for news stories


• Simons Simplex Collection


• De Novo gene disruption: 7q11.23


• Simons VIP


• Making bio-collections available to others


• List of over 200 implicated genes


• Identifies variant sequences


• Protein interactions


• Strength of research on risk factors


• ??animal models??


• sfari.org




Keynote Speaker: Ruth Feldman (Yale, Israel)
Bio-behavioral Synchrony and the Development of Social Reciprocity- Implications of Clinical Practice OXYTOCIN

Paraphrased overview from program book: Cconceptual model of bio-behavioral synchrony (the coordination of psychological and behavioral response between attachment partners during social contact), theoretical and empirical framework for the study of attachment bonds and origins of social reciprocity. Study of hormonal response in the form of gaze, vocal, affective, and touch modalities. OT oxytocin provides the neurohormonal substrate for parental, romantic, and filial attachments. Various forms of close relationships express similar synchronized behavior and OT increase and is mutual-influencing among close partners. OT is linked to distinct patterns of brain activation and genetic markers. The use of OT and behavioral interventions for social disorders in early childhood are implicated in increased human affiliation, social reciprocity through the matrix of biological attunement and close behavioral synchrony.


• OXTR oxytocin receptor gene


• Martin Cooper “Face Menu”


• Bonding is selective and enduring for survival of species


• Types: peer, parietal, filial


• Rules of social exchange are learned


• Capacity for empathy


• Studies are emerging and intensifying BEHAVIORAL


• Synchrony- collaborate and build societies like ants, schools of fish, and sharks


• 4-channel


• Behavior to biology


• Mother/parent provide bio-cues and social cues building bonds to eventual social bonds (w/in time limit early pregnancy to 1st year of life)


• Post-partum behavior essential


• Mother’s body is a bio-regulator/ function to regulate


• Grooming- relaying heavily on tactile contact translates to “social” touch


• Gaze, motherease, affect, affectionate touch, social contingency program newborns


• Infant scanning used to detect


• Mothers provide stimulation


• Looking for phenotypes- gaze synchrony, parental touch


• At 3mo active with face to face “dance-like”


• 3-9mo CRITICAL to maintain gaze and tolerance, synchrony remains (affect and rhythm)


• Basic quality of interaction set in first few months


• fathers stimulate with novelty


• Mother framed w/ gaze


• OXYTOCIN in hypothalamus: social interaction, theory of mind, stress reduction (interacts with dopamine)


• Works in loop: more oxytocin = more touch = more oxytocin etc.


• Doesn’t readily cross blood/brain


• PNS CNS


• Early studies using plasma samples not brain


• Amounts varied but stable within individuals


• Tells about “openness”


• NO difference in levels of men and women (parents)


• Increased during bond formation of pregnancy and immediately after birth


• Also seen in the first 3mo of “falling in love”


• Not significant after 3yrs (in parent interactions)


• Types: parental, best friend, romantic


• CNS PNS coordinate (effect one and or both)


• Use oxytocin nasally in studies


• ASD related to oxytocin function (reciprocity and pathways CNS PNS)


• CD38/OXTR/rs3796863/rs2254298/rs1042778 (co-morbidity w/ depression)


• ASD levels markedly lower


• When parents low, children low


• Does it effect girls consistently?


• What happens when genetic risk is identified???


• Birth – 5yrs


• Double blind research- administered to parents not children b/c of parallel effect of oxytocin (high risk infants), co-evaluation of mother and father care


• Longer gaze


• Synchrony uses mirror neuron NOT rt. amygdala, longer duration, more organized activation


• intrusiveness and gaze aversion uses amygdala not mirror neurons “choppy”


• coherent vs. disorganized anxiety


• temporal, parietal


• studies in post-partum depression