from the Editors-in-Chief

unknown. Keep an open mind to the possibilities that research opens for you and work through difficult tasks with persistence, courage, and dedication. Information that is used to establish and evaluate causal relationships between objects and events can be gleaned from many sources, especially those that rely on language and perception. For example, sentences with a verb structure using change of state verbs such as “to break” or “to freeze” imply sequential events that express understood causal relationships. At this time, little research has examined the neural correlates of causal verb processing or has compared them to the more well researched brain activity involved in perceptual causal processing. This study investigated the extent to which the evaluation of causal verbs and causal image pairs recruits brain areas distinct from non-causal verbs and non-causal image pairs. The authors administered a lexical task and a separate perceptual task involving causal judgments to 6 participants in an MRI scanner. Data analysis yielded no activation differences for the linguistic task conditions, suggesting that there was no difference in causal processing between the change of state and non-change of state verbs used in the current study. In the perceptual task, the activation peaks that were found for the causal image pairs in the inferior parietal lobule and supramarginal gyrus, rather than the expected frontal areas, suggest that perceptual causality is evaluated based on modality-specific qualities such as spatial change and implied motion. The depiction of sequential events and before-after states in the causal image stimuli provide a new context for perceptual processing in parietal and temporal cortices. Further analysis and additional research that utilizes a more explicit linguistic task will focus on the role language plays in encoding causality based on perceptual information so as to further clarify neural recruitment during causal processing. Lexical ambiguity resolution refers to our ability to select the correct meaning for words that look or sound the same but have different interpretations. There is debate, however, as to how lexical ambiguity is resolved: whether all meanings of an ambiguous word are accessed automatically before context is used at the next level of processing to select the correct meaning (modular interpretation), or whether context (such as sentential information) plays a part much earlier, due to interaction from other levels of processing (interactive inter-pretation). Evidence exists for both accounts; however there is little research that compares automatic versus controlled lexical access. This study therefore used a within-participants design to compare automatic versus controlled processing of ambiguous words, using word-target pairs that either represented the dominant (most common), subordinate (less common), or unrelated, meanings. Masked priming was used to induce automatic, subconscious processing, and overt priming to make comparisons with controlled, conscious processing. A marginally significant interaction was found, whereby reaction times to a lexical decision task were faster to dominant targets and slower to subordinate and unrelated targets in masked conditions (in overt conditions reaction times were similar for all conditions). This suggested that the automatic processing of ambiguous words might be selective for the dominant response only. If so, then a modular account of lexical ambiguity resolution would be insufficient, and access to multiple meanings of ambiguous words might depend on controlled, interactive processes. Many families of children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) rely on community-based services for support and treatment. However, these treatment intervention strategies often lack the efficacy of individualized interpersonal therapy, creating a need to improve on current community-based treatments. Because children spend the majority of their daily lives in the classroom, it is suggested that school-based therapy programs, such as those incorporating the arts, may be a beneficial foundation for providing therapy to children on the autism spectrum. A fifth grade classroom of children with ASD completed a 12-week art-based treatment intervention program to determine the functionality and efficacy of incorporating therapy techniques through fine arts in a classroom setting. Teacher ratings revealed significant improvement in social skills as well as decreases in internalizing and overall behavioral problems from pre-treatment to post-treatment assessment. Based on child and teacher satisfaction reports, the intervention program is supported as being feasible, easily integrated into the classroom curriculum, and beneficial in teaching students social skills that they believed they would use throughout their daily lives. Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is thought to be caused by hyperactivity of the cortico-striato-thalamo-cortical circuitry in the brain altering behavior and cognitive control. Symptoms of OCD include obsessive, persistent, and repetitive thoughts, an inability to resist compulsive behaviors, and an impulsive urge to perform and complete a task. These behavioral impairments reduce an individual’s ability to control his/her actions and live a quality life. Many neurotransmitter systems are involved in the pharmacotherapy of OCD. Strong evidence in the past decade supports intervention in the serotonergic neurotransmitter system using SSRIs, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, as the first-line drug treatment for OCD. SSRIs and other drugs are frequently used together to reduce OCD-like symptoms in both preclinical and clinical models. Preclinical studies using rodents focus on specific compulsive and impulsive behaviors as determined by marble burying or nestlet shredding behaviors. Drugs mediated by the glutamatergic and dopaminergic systems are also currently being investigated as potential treatment options for OCD. Alleviation of OCD symptoms in clinical subjects often is measured as a decrease in the Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS). The serotonin-dopamine hypothesis of OCD requires further research in role of motivation as a cause of compulsive behavior in OCD.