This qualitative research study with a content analysis approach aimed to explore families’ experiences of an organ donation request after brain death. Data were collected through 38 unstructured and in-depth interviews with 14 consenting families and 12 who declined to donate organs. A purposeful sampling process began in October 2009 and ended in October 2010. Data analysis reached 10 categories and two major themes were listed as: 1) serenity in eternal freedom; and 2) resentful grief. The central themes were peace (...) and honor versus doubt and regret. The findings indicated that the families faced with an organ donation request of a brain-dead loved one experienced a lasting effect long after the patient's demise regardless of their decision to donate or refusal to donate. In conclusion, this study highlights the importance of family support and follow-up in an efficient healthcare system aimed at developing trust with the families and providing comfort during and after the final decision. (shrink)

We suggest an approach to studying consciousness that focuses on its evolutionary origins. The proposed framework is inspired by the study of the transition from inanimate matter to life, which proved extremely useful for understanding what 'life' entails. We follow the theoretical and methodological scheme put forward by Tibor Ganti, who suggested a marker for the transition to life -- an evolved feature that is sufficient for ascribing dynamic persistence to a minimal living system and that can serve as a (...) point of departure for reconstructing it. We apply this approach to consciousness and suggest an overt behavioural trait -- unlimited associative learning -- as a candidate transition marker. We show that the enabling system of UAL instantiates the set of properties that are considered jointly sufficient for minimal consciousness, and discuss the experimental predictions and the implications of our approach for the taxonomic distribution of consciousness in the animal world. (shrink)

Behavioral genetic (BG) research has yielded many important discoveries about the origins of human behavior, but offers little insight into how we might improve outcomes. We posit that this gap in our knowledge base stems in part from the epidemiologic nature of BG research questions. Namely, BG studies focus on understanding etiology as it currently exists, rather than etiology in environments that could exist but do not as of yet (e.g., etiology following an intervention). Put another way, they focus exclusively (...) on the etiology of “what is” rather than “what could be”. The current paper discusses various aspects of this field-wide methodological reality, and offers a way to overcome it by demonstrating how behavioral geneticists can incorporate an experimental approach into their work. We outline an ongoing study that embeds a randomized intervention within a twin design, connecting “what is” and “what could be” for the first time. We then lay out a more general framework for a new field—experimental BGs—which has the potential to advance both scientific inquiry and related philosophical discussions. (shrink)

Objectives: To explore how subjects in a placebo-controlled vitamin A supplementation trial among Ghanaian women aged 15–45 years perceive the trial and whether they know that not all trial capsules are the same, and to identify factors associated with this knowledge.Methods: 60 semistructured interviews and 12 focus groups were conducted to explore subjects’ perceptions of the trial. Steps were taken to address areas of low comprehension, including retraining fieldworkers. 1971 trial subjects were randomly selected for a survey measuring their knowledge (...) that not all trial capsules are the same. The subjects’ fieldworkers were also interviewed about their characteristics and trial knowledge. Factors associated with knowledge were explored using multi-level modeling.Results: Although subjects knew they were taking part in research, most thought they were receiving an active and beneficial medication. Variables associated with knowledge were education and district of residence. Radio broadcasts benefited those with some schooling. Fieldworkers’ characteristics were not associated with subjects’ knowledge.Conclusions: Research and debate on new or improved consent procedures are urgently required, particularly for subjects with little education. (shrink)

Arab countries; intellectual life; congresses.