Detecting the emotional state of others from facial expressions is a key ability in emotional competence and several instruments have been developed to assess it. Typical emotion recognition tests are assumed to be unidimensional, use pictures or videos of emotional portrayals as stimuli, and ask the participant which emotion is depicted in each stimulus. However, using actor portrayals adds a layer of difficulty in developing such a test: the portrayals may fail to be convincing and may convey a different emotion than intended. For this reason, evaluating and selecting stimuli is of crucial importance. Existing tests typically base item evaluation on consensus or expert judgment, but these methods could favor items with high agreement over items that better differentiate ability levels and they could not formally test the item pool for unidimensionality. To address these issues, the authors propose a new test, named Facial Expression Recognition Test (FERT), developed using an item response theory two-parameter logistic model. Data from 1,002 online participants were analyzed using both a unidimensional and a bifactor model, and showed that the item pool could be considered unidimensional. The selection was based on the items' discrimination parameters, retaining only the most informative items to investigate the latent ability. The resulting 36-item test was reliable and quick to administer. The authors found both a gender difference in the ability to recognize emotions and a decline of such ability with age. The PsychoPy implementation of the test and the scoring script are available on a Github repository. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

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Purpose:The effect of high arterial oxygen levels and supplemental oxygen administration on outcomes in traumatic brain injury (TBI) is debated, and data from large cohorts of TBI patients are limited. We investigated whether exposure to high blood oxygen levels and high oxygen supplementation is independently associated with outcomes in TBI patients admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU) and undergoing mechanical ventilation.Methods: This is a secondary analysis of two multicenter, prospective, observational, cohort studies performed in Europe and Australia. In TBI patients admitted to ICU, we describe the arterial partial pressure of oxygen (PaO 2 ) and the oxygen inspired fraction (FiO 2 ). We explored the association between high PaO 2 and FiO 2 levels within the first week with clinical outcomes. Furthermore, in the CENTER-TBI cohort, we investigate whether PaO 2 and FiO 2 levels may have differential relationships with outcome in the presence of varying levels of brain injury severity (as quantified by levels of glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) in blood samples obtained within 24 h of injury). Results:The analysis included 1084 patients (11,577 measurements) in the CENTER-TBI cohort, of whom 55% had an unfavorable outcome, and 26% died at a 6-month follow-up. Median PaO 2 ranged from 93 to 166 mmHg. Exposure to higher PaO 2 and FiO 2 in the first seven days after ICU admission was independently associated with a higher mortality rate. A trend of a higher mortality rate was partially confirmed in the OzENTER-TBI cohort (n = 159). GFAP was independently associated with mortality and functional neurologic outcome at follow-up, but it did not modulate the outcome impact of high PaO 2 levels, which remained independently associated with 6-month mortality.

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