Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Level of Preparation of General Education Teachers to Include Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders

Since 1998 there has been a dramatic increase in children diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) resulting in an estimated prevalence of 1 in 150 children. Federal law requires schools to educate children with ASD in the least restrictive environment, increasing the number of children with ASD in regular classrooms. Teacher preparation rarely includes training in ASD, leaving many teachers unprepared to accommodate these students. Using an online survey distributed to a random sample of Connecticut teachers, this study explored formal and informal preparation for teachers as well as teachersâ€™ feelings of confidence and competence to teach children with ASD.
An examination of the validity and reliability of the Caregiver Reaction Assessment Scale among Japanese family caregivers for older members

Objectives: Recent studies suggest the need to adjust the construct of the Caregiver Reaction Assessment Scale among the family caregivers according to different social norms and differential public services. The aim of this study is to examine the reliability of the original five-subscale CRA and to evaluate the four-subscale CRA proposed by Malhotra, Chan, Malhotra, and Ostbye (2012) among the Japanese family caregivers of old people. Method: I conducted confirmatory factor analysis of the original Given’s Caregiver Reaction Assessment scale among Japanese family caregivers for older persons and found its fit to be less than satisfactory. I then conducted exploratory factor analysis and modified CRA scale for a better fit. Results: The second confirmatory factor analysis of a modified four-factor CRA model, similar to the one developed by Manhotra et al., (2012), showed an acceptable fit. Furthermore, I checked group invariance between the two important groups of family caregivers in Japan-married women caring for parents-in-law and women caring for own parents-and confirmed configural and metric invariance of the modified (18-item four-factor) scale. Conclusion: Thus I believe my 18-item four-factor CRA is a good empirical instrument for evaluating both positive and negative effects of informal caregiving in Japan, and possibly in some other countries in Asia.
Assessment of Children's Response Styles: An Examination of Sex Differences, Stress Interactions, and Depressive Symptoms

This study evaluated a vignette style measure (CRISES) of children’s response styles to sadness. It looked at the relationship between rumination and depression in children and tested Nolen-Hoeksema’s response styles theory of depression, which was partly developed to explain the emergence of sex differences in depression in adolescence. The theory posits that sex differences in response styles precede sex differences in depression that emerge in adolescence. Adolescent stressors were also hypothesized to interact with rumination to predict changes in depression. With use of the CRISES measure, the positive correlation between rumination and distraction observed in previous studies examining young populations disappeared. More importantly, the CRISES was able to demonstrate the cross-situation consistency of response styles in a sample of children. Although no sex differences were found, response styles theory can be useful in explaining individual differences in symptoms of depression as levels of rumination and distraction were concurrently associated in the predicted directions with scores on the CDI. Furthermore, an interaction of stress and distraction demonstrated the protective influence of distraction from depressive symptomatology in the face of changes in stress.
Lies! Lies!! Lies!!!: The Psychology of Deceit

Everybody lies. Defining deceit: the language of lying. The biology of deceit. Learning to lie: developmental issues in deceit. Why people lie: the determinants of deceit. Styles of deception: the role of personality. Pathological lying. Living a lie: impostors, con-artists and persons with the Munchausen syndrome. False memories, false accusations, and false confessions. Detection of deceit. Technological detection of deceit. Therapeutic approaches for the deceitful person. Effects of deception. A psychology of deceit: conclusions and summary. Epilogue. References. Index.
Longitudinal Multistage Testing.

This article introduces longitudinal multistage testing (lMST), a special form of multistage testing (MST), as a method for adaptive testing in longitudinal large-scale studies. In lMST designs, test forms of different difficulty levels are used, whereas the values on a pretest determine the routing to these test forms. Since lMST allows for testing in paper and pencil mode, lMST may represent an alternative to conventional testing (CT) in assessments for which other adaptive testing designs are not applicable. In this article the performance of lMST is compared to CT in terms of test targeting as well as bias and efficiency of ability and change estimates. Using a simulation study, the effect of the stability of ability across waves, the difficulty level of the different test forms, and the number of link items between the test forms were investigated.
Outage Probabilities in Infrastructure-Based Single-Frequency Relay Links

This paper considers usage of a single-frequency mode for cell coverage extension in infrastructure-based relay links. We provide new closed-form expressions for outage probability by taking into account practical constraints such as interference due to frequency reuse and signal leakage between the relay transmitter and receiver. The analysis covers both decode-and-forward and amplify-and-forward protocols both in downlink and in uplink. For amplify-and-forward relaying, variable gain and fixed gain methods for transmit power normalization are discussed. Simulations show excellent agreement with theory and confirm that the single-frequency mode can be applied at the cost of tolerable signal degradation.
Metabolism of MK-0524, a Prostaglandin D2 Receptor 1 Antagonist, in Microsomes and Hepatocytes from Preclinical Species and Humans

(3R)-4-(4-Chlorobenzyl)-7-fluoro-5-(methylsulfonyl)-1,2,3,4-tetrahydrocyclopenta[b]indol-3-yl acetic acid (MK-0524) is a potent orally active human prostaglandin D2 receptor 1 antagonist that is currently under development for the prevention of niacin-induced flushing. The major in vitro and in vivo metabolite of MK-0524 is the acyl glucuronic acid conjugate of the parent compound, M2. To compare metabolism of MK-0524 across preclinical species and humans, studies were undertaken to determine the in vitro kinetic parameters (Km and Vmax) for the glucuronidation of MK-0524 in Sprague-Dawley rat, beagle dog, cynomolgus monkey, and human liver microsomes, human intestinal microsomes, and in recombinant human UDP glucuronosyltransferases (UGT). A comparison of Km values indicated that UGT1A9 has the potential to catalyze the glucuronidation of MK-0524 in the liver, whereas UGT1A3 and UGT2B7 have the potential to catalyze the glucuronidation in the intestine. MK-0524 also was subject to phase I oxidative metabolism; however, the rate was significantly lower than that of glucuronidation. The rate of phase I metabolism was ranked as follows: rat ∼ monkey > human intestine > dog > human liver with qualitatively similar metabolite profiles across species. In all the cases, the major metabolites were the monohydroxylated epimers (M1 and M4) and the keto-metabolite, M3. Use of inhibitory monoclonal antibodies and recombinant human cytochromes P450 suggested that CYP3A4 was the major isozyme involved in the oxidative metabolism of MK-0524, with a minor contribution from CYP2C9. The major metabolite in hepatocyte preparations was the acyl glucuronide, M2, with minor amounts of M1, M3, M4, and their corresponding glucuronides. Overall, the in vivo metabolism of MK-0524 is expected to proceed via glucuronidation, with minor contributions from oxidative pathways.
Atrial arrhythmia, triggering events and conduction abnormalities in isolated murine RyR2‐P2328S hearts

RyR2 mutations are associated with catecholaminergic polymorphic tachycardia, a condition characterized by ventricular and atrial arrhythmias. The present experiments investigate the atrial electrophysiology of homozygotic murine RyR2‐P2328S (RyR2S/S) hearts for ectopic triggering events and for conduction abnormalities that might provide a re‐entrant substrate.
Autoethnography in Vocational Psychology: Wearing Your Class on Your Sleeve

This article addresses reflective practice in research and practice and takes the issue of consciousness of social class in vocational psychology as a working example. It is argued that the discipline’s appreciation of social class can be advanced through application of the qualitative research method autoethnography. Excerpts from an autoethnographic study are used to explore the method’s potential. This reflexive research method is presented as a potential vehicle to improve vocational psychologists’ own class consciousness and to concomitantly enhance their capacity to grasp social class within their own spheres of research and practice. It is recommended that autoethnography be used for research, training, and professional development for vocational psychologists.
An HMM-based speech synthesis system applied to German and its adaptation to a limited set of expressive football announcements

The paper assesses the capability of an HMM-based TTS system to produce German speech. The results are discussed in qualitative terms, and compared over three different choices of context features. In addition, the system is adapted to a small set of football announcements, in an exploratory attempt to synthesise expressive speech. We conclude that the HMMs are able to produce highly intelligible neutral German speech, with a stable quality, and that the expressivity is partially captured in spite of the small size of the football dataset.
Variational Heteroscedastic Gaussian Process Regression

Standard Gaussian processes (GPs) model observations' noise as constant throughout input space. This is often a too restrictive assumption, but one that is needed for GP inference to be tractable. In this work we present a non-standard variational approximation that allows accurate inference in heteroscedastic GPs (i.e., under input-dependent noise conditions). Computational cost is roughly twice that of the standard GP, and also scales as O(n3). Accuracy is verified by comparing with the golden standard MCMC and its effectiveness is illustrated on several synthetic and real datasets of diverse characteristics. An application to volatility forecasting is also considered.
Using Images to Help Children Talk About Their Experiences

Prior research evaluating the effect of Human Figure Diagrams (HFDs) on the nature of children’s recall of touch related information has yield mixed findings. We examined the nature of information elicited by 9-11 year old children (n=55) following participation in a scripted event that incorporated instances of physical contact/touch. We examined the amount and accuracy of information reported under the following conditions; with the aid of a HFD, a photograph of the child, or verbal prompts only. Children presented with HDFs or photographs reported significantly more information following an exhaustive verbal interview, than children provided with verbal prompts only. The accuracy of reports was high overall and did not differ significantly by condition. When children were asked focussed questions about instances of both true and false touch that was not reported during the verbal interview, the accuracy of their accounts reduced significantly compared to phases of the interview that were predominantly child-led. This suggests that visual aids may be safe to use to clarify/elaborate on already reported information, at least with this age group. Specific questions about instances of unreported touch should be avoided.
The Relationship Between Flow-Mediated Brachial Artery Vasodilation and Coronary Vasomotor Responses to Bradykinin: Comparison with Those to Acetylcholine

Flow-mediated dilation (FMD) of brachial artery provides a noninvasive assessment of coronary endothelial dysfunction. Acetylcholine (ACh) has been used as an agent for estimating coronary endothelial function. In contrast to ACh, there is no evidence for a relationship between FMD and coronary vasodilation to bradykinin (BK). The aim of this study was to compare the flow-mediated vasodilation of brachial artery with coronary vasomotor responses to intracoronary ACh or BK in patients with an angiographically normal left anterior descending coronary artery. Ninety-one patients underwent the cardiac catheterization examination with coronary endothelial function testing and the brachial ultrasound study. BK (0.2, 0.6, 2.0 μg/min) and ACh (3, 10, 30 μg/min) were administered into the left coronary artery in a stepwise manner. Coronary blood flow was evaluated by the Doppler flow velocity measurement. Coronary diameters were measured by the quantitative coronary angiography. The assessment of endothelial function in the brachial artery was made in response to reactive hyperemia with high-resolution ultrasound. Bradykinin induced dose-dependent increases in epicardial coronary diameter and blood flow. There was a significant positive correlation between FMD- and BK-induced vasodilations of epicardial coronary arteries (0.2 μg/min: r = 0.30; 0.6 μg/min: r = 0.42; 2.0 μg/min: r = 0.44, P < 0.01, respectively) and resistance coronary arteries (0.2 μg/min: r = 0.40; 0.6 μg/min: r = 0.56; 2.0 μg/min: r = 0.59, P < 0.0001, respectively). FMD correlated with ACh-induced vasomotions of resistance but not epicardial coronary arteries. No correlation was seen between nitroglycerin-induced brachial artery vasodilation and BK-induced coronary vasodilation. The endothelial dysfunction of peripheral arteries correlated well with that of the coronary arteries especially vasomotor responses to BK.
Women who run with the wolves : contacting the power of the wild woman

The "wild woman" is the wise and ageless presence in the feminine psyche that gives women their creativity, energy and power. Arguing that, for centuries, the "wild woman" has been repressed by a value system which trivializes emotional truth, intuitive wisdom and instinctual self-confidence. A Jungian analyst, the author uses a combination of time-honoured myths and stories and contemporary casework to explain that the "wild woman" in all women is innately healthy, passionate and wise.
Cytochrome P450 induction by nitrated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, azaarenes, and binary mixtures in fish hepatoma cell line PLHC‐1

Nitrated polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (NP AH) and N‐heterocyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (azaarenes) are as ubiquitous in the environment as their parent PAH compounds, although occurring at lower concentrations. The toxicological importance of NPAHs and azaarenes is based on their mutagenic and carcinogenic potential. Azaarenes possess a higher solubility and mobility in the environment than PAHs. However, very little is known about the toxicity and cytochrome P450 (CYP)1A induction potencies of NPAHs and azaarenes in fish. Here we report on the cytotoxicities and relative CYP1A induction potencies of 12 NPAHs, 12 azaarenes, and 11 PAHs, determined as neutral red uptake and ethoxyresorufin‐O‐deethylase (EROD) activity, respectively, in fish hepatoma PLHC‐1 cells. Additionally, CYP1A enzyme protein was determined by ELISA for two NPAHs, azaarenes, PAHs, and binary mixtures. Compared with the structurally analogous PAHs, 2‐nitronaphthalene, 3‐nitrofluoranthene, 2‐aza‐ and 7‐azafluor‐anthene, 1,6‐dinitropyrene, benzo[a]acridine and benzo[h]quinoline revealed higher induction potencies, whereas the other compounds showed similar or less activity. The induction potency was highly dependent on the compounds structural properties, reflected by significant correlations between the half‐maximal EROD induction (‐log EC50) and the molecular descriptors lipophilicity (log Kow) and maximal molecular length (Lmax). Binary mixtures of 6‐nitrochrysene + benzo[a]anthracene, 6‐nitrochrysene + ben‐zo[a]acridine, and benzo[a]acridine + benzo[a]anthracene showed an additive interaction. The CYP1A induction potencies of NPAHs and azaarenes, demonstrated here for the first time in fish hepatoma cells, suggest that their contribution to the overall CYP1A induction potencies in PAH‐contaminated environmental samples have to be taken into account.
Songs from taboo tongues: Experiencing first language loss

This article illustrates the issues surrounding and consequences of losing a minority first language in the process of acquiring the politically dominant language of the cultural milieu (English). There are no "conclusions" in this article; however, references are made to the literature on language loss and maintenance, and to practices in teacher education programs which discourage additive bilingualism, asking teachers and teacher educators alike to reflect on some of their own pedagogical practices.
A Hybrid System for Learning Sunspot Recognition and Classification

Sunspots observation and classification are important tasks for solar astronomers. The activity of sunspots can give clues to the timing of solar flares and the solar weather in general. This paper describes a hybrid system for automatic sunspot recognition and classification. The system uses a combination of image processing and machine learning techniques to process and classify sunspot groups from digital satellite images. Sunspot data are extracted from daily images of the solar disk captured by the NASA SOHO/MDI satellite. The classification scheme attempted was the seven-class Modified Zurich scheme. The main components of the hybrid system are: 1) the image processor, 2) the feature extractor, 3) the clusterer, 4) the classification learner. Furthermore, the paper compares two clustering algorithms: hierarchical average-link and a density-based DBSCAN and examines their usefulness in dealing with sunspot data. The aim is to create clusters that closely match "natural" sunspot groups. Clustering is an important step in the process as the classification performance is dependent on it. In previous papers we have shown that by combining clustering with classification the overall results can be substantially improved.
Canaries in the coal mine: Interpersonal violence, gang violence, and violent extremism through a public health prevention lens

Abstract This paper asks what programmes and policies for preventing violent extremism (also called ‘countering violent extremism’, or CVE) can learn from the public health violence prevention field. The general answer is that addressing violent extremism within the wider domain of public health violence prevention connects the effort to a relevant field of research, evidence-based policy and programming, and a broader population reach. This answer is reached by examining conceptual alignments between the two fields at both the case-level and the theoretical level. To address extremist violence within the wider reach of violence prevention, having a shared model is seen as a first step. The World Health Organization uses the social-ecological framework for assessing the risk and protective factors for violence and developing effective public-health based programmes. This study illustrates how this model has been used for gang violence prevention and explores overlaps between gang violence prevention and preventing violent extremism. Finally, it provides policy and programme recommendations to align CVE with public health violence prevention.
CIB 2007-472 Systems Dynamics , Sustainability and Construction Complexity

This paper analyzes the work of Forrester and Sterman (J. W. Forrester Chair at MIT) to establish that these reliable studies address sustainability challenges such as emissions generation. However, these studies do not fully address whether the proposed required reductions in ecological impact can be realized to tame the observed growth rates. The Systems Dynamics models are based on algorithms with chaotic assumptions. In other words: there are no available system representations of complex systems that can serve as the basis for studying long-term sustainability through the twenty-first century. This lack of realistic systems representation of ‘wicked’ complex problems is the major constraint, not the number crunching capabilities of technology. Behind the lack of realistic systems representation is a deficient worldview that informs the philosophical and scientific constructs used to generate the modelling processes. This paper proposes a new model for analyzing complexity, using as a basis the reasoning of vectorial calculus.
Analysis of causes of pain after kyphoplasty for osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures

DOI: 10.3760/cma.j.issn.0366-6999.20130079 Department of Orthopaedics, the People’s Liberation Army 306 Hospital, Beijing 100101, China (Chen XM, Ma HS, Wang M, Yang B and Yuan W) Correspondence to: Dr. MA Hua-song, Department of Orthopaedics, the People’s Liberation Army 306 Hospital, Beijing 100101, China (Tel: 86-10-66356364. Fax: 86-10-64876057. Email: mh306h@ yahoo.com.cn) Short communication
[Rudolf-Virchow Prize 1999. Genetics of respiratory tract carcinomas: correlation of genotype and phenotype].

In contrast to carcinomas of the upper respiratory tract lung cancer shows a considerable variety of histological differentiations and is particularly known for its morphological heterogeneity. Of clinical relevance, however, is only the distinction between small cell carcinomas (SCLC) and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). We meanwhile investigated a tumor collective of several hundred respiratory tract carcinomas by Comparative Genomic Hybridization (CGH) and developed computer software for the statistical comparison of tumor groups. The analysis revealed recurrent patterns of chromosomal imbalances which are associated with morphological histotypes and biological phenotypes, e.g. there are chromosomal imbalances predominantly found in SCLC compared to NSCLC but also a considerable overlap between both entities. Specifically, the pattern of metastasizing lung squamous cell carcinomas (SCC) approaches that of SCLC. In addition, the analysis of a metastasizing combined SCLC after microdissection showed a clonal relationship between the SCC component of the primary tumor and the SCLC metastasis. These findings have direct consequences for the pathogenesis and classification of lung cancer. First, SCLC should be differentiated into primary and secondary carcinomas. Whereas primary SCLC as the predominant tumor type evolve directly from a precursor cell of probably epithelial origin, secondary SCLC develop via a NSCLC intermediate. Second, neuroendocrine differentiation in lung carcinomas should be used as a marker for dedifferentiation, worse prognosis and rapid tumor progression rather than an indicator of a putative tumor stem cell. The primary data is available at our online tumor database at http://amba.charite. de/cgh/.