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Zusammenfassung. Die vorliegende Arbeit berichtet erste Analysen zur Reliabilität und Validität sowie klinische cut-off-Werte der deutschen Bearbeitung der Social Interaction Anxiety Scale und der Social Phobia Scale ( Mattick & Clarke, 1989 ). Die Skalen wurden 43 Patienten mit Sozialer Phobie, 69 Patienten mit anderen psychischen Störungen und 24 Kontrollpersonen ohne psychische Störungen vorgelegt. Die ermittelten Werte für die innere Konsistenz und Test-Retest-Korrelation sprechen für eine sehr hohe Reliabilität. Hinweise auf eine konvergente Validität ergaben sich aus hohen Korrelationen mit konstruktnahen Meßinstrumenten zur Sozialen Phobie, während die Korrelationen zu Depressions- und Angstmaßen erwartungsgemäß geringer ausfielen. Die beiden Skalen diskriminieren Soziophobiker sehr gut von Personen ohne psychische Störung und Angstpatienten, während die Diskriminationsleistung von depressiven Patienten geringer ausgeprägt ist. Die ermittelten cut-off-Werte liegen deutlich unter den amerikanischen Werten und sind als vorläufig zu betrachten. Insgesamt sprechen die Ergebnisse für den Einsatz der Instrumente als reliable und spezifische Screening-Instrumente für Soziale Phobie.

Indigenous peoples have been using fire in the cerrado

Fire plays an increasingly significant role in tropical forest and savanna ecosystems, contributing to greenhouse gas emissions and impacting on biodiversity. Emerging research shows the potential role of Indigenous land-use practices for controlling deforestation and reducing CO 2 emissions. Analysis of satellite imagery suggests that Indigenous lands have the lowest incidence of wildfires, significantly contributing to maintaining carbon stocks and enhancing biodiversity. Yet acknowledgement of Indigenous peoples' role in fire management and control is limited, and in many cases dismissed, especially in policy-making circles. In this paper, we review existing data on Indigenous fire management and impact, focusing on examples from tropical forest and savanna ecosystems in Venezuela, Brazil and Guyana. We highlight how the complexities of community owned solutions for fire management are being lost as well as undermined by continued efforts on fire suppression and firefighting, and emerging approaches to incorporate Indigenous fire management into market-and incentive-based mechanisms for climate change mitigation. Our aim is to build a case for supporting Indigenous fire practices within all scales of decision-making by strengthening Indigenous knowledge systems to ensure more effective and sustainable fire management.This article is part of the themed issue 'The interaction of fire and mankind'.

Although there is convincing scientific research for the role of Indigenous fire practices in sustainable land management, Indigenous peoples’ involvement in policy-making is limited. This paper presents findings from a fire management workshop where experiences and perspectives were shared among 60 academic, government, and Indigenous representatives from 27 organizations from Venezuela, Brazil, and Guyana. The data, in the form of small group discussions, participatory drawings, whole group reflections, and videos, showed that although there was general acceptance about the central role of fire in traditional Indigenous livelihoods and its importance for protecting the biological and cultural diversity of ecosystems, there were also tensions around the past imposition of a dominant fire exclusion discourse of governmental institutions in Indigenous territories. Overcoming the gaps derived from different experiences and historical worldviews, and building mutual trust and respect were the main challenges when integrating multiple perspectives through the “intercultural interface” of institutions working on environmental management and governance. The elaboration of a common declaration and next steps in the framework of a “Participatory and Intercultural Fire Management Network”, created during the workshop to enhance a sustainable fire policy, revealed the conviction of working together for Indigenous fire management legitimization and strengthening from all participants of the three countries.

Exposure to a traumatic event may result in the development of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Endocannabinoids are crucial modulators of the stress response, interfere with excessive retrieval and facilitate the extinction of traumatic memories. Exposure therapy, combined with pharmacotherapy, represents a promising tool for PTSD treatment. We investigated whether pharmacological manipulations of the endocannabinoid system during extinction learning ameliorates the behavioral changes induced by trauma exposure. Rats were exposed to inescapable footshocks paired with social isolation, a risk factor for PTSD. One week after trauma, rats were subjected to three spaced extinction sessions, mimicking human exposure therapy. The anandamide hydrolysis inhibitor URB597, the 2-arachidonoylglycerol hydrolysis inhibitor JZL184 or the cannabinoid agonist WIN55,212-2 were administered before or after the extinction sessions. Rats were tested for extinction retention 16 or 36 days after trauma and 24-h later for social interaction. Extinction training alone reduced fear of the trauma-associated context but did not restore normal social interaction. Traumatized animals not exposed to extinction sessions exhibited reductions in hippocampal anandamide content with respect to home-cage controls. Noteworthy, all drugs exerted beneficial effects, but URB597 (0.1 mg/kg) induced the best improvements by enhancing extinction consolidation and restoring normal social behavior in traumatized rats through indirect activation of CB1 receptors. The ameliorating effects remained stable long after treatment and trauma exposure. Our findings suggest that drugs potentiating endocannabinoid neurotransmission may represent promising tools when combined to exposure-based psychotherapies in the treatment of PTSD.

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