Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Multi-scale region-based saliency detection using W2 distance on N-dimensional normal distributions

We present a new segment-based method for saliency detection based on multi-size superpixels that combines local and global saliency cues. We extract superpixels at several scales and represent each superpixel with a normal distribution in CIE-Lab space estimated from its associated pixels. Global saliency is computed by grouping similar superpixels to estimate the spatial distribution of colors, while local saliency detection is achieved by determining the center-surround contrast of neighboring superpixels. Both methods rely on the Wasserstein distance on L2 norm (W2) to measure perceptual (dis-)similarity between superpixels. Additionally, we propose a Saliency Flow technique to refine the local saliency map. Our approach uses very few empirical parameters and outperforms 6 recent state-of-the-art saliency detection methods in terms of several evaluations on a widely used benchmark.
Guillain‐Barré syndrome: subtypes and predictors of outcome from India

There is a paucity of large studies evaluating the subtypes of Guillain‐Barré syndrome (GBS) and their outcome from Southeast Asia. We report cliniconeurophysiological subtypes of GBS and their correlation with triggering events and 3‐month outcome from northern India. Three hundred and twenty eight consecutive patients with GBS were clinically evaluated, including their triggers, severity, autonomic involvement, cranial nerve palsy, and respiratory paralysis. Nerve conduction study (NCS) was repeated at 3 weeks if the initial study was normal. They were categorized into acute inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculoneuropathy (AIDP), acute motor axonal neuropathy (AMAN), acute motor sensory axonal neuropathy (AMSAN), inexcitable motor nerve, and equivocal. Clinically, 204 (62.2%) patients had pure motor, 106 (32.3%) motor sensory, 16 (4.9%) Miller Fisher syndrome, and 2 (0.6%) pure sensory GBS. Based on NCS, 242 (73.8%) had AIDP, 44 (13.4%) AMAN, 15 (4.6%) AMSAN, 8 (2.4%) inexcitable motor nerves, and 27 (8.2%) equivocal GBS. AIDP patients were older, more common in summer, had lesser peak disability, and better outcome compared to those with AMAN. Eleven (3.4%) patients died and 48 (14.6%) had poor outcome at 3 months. The poor outcome was related to severity, dysautonomia, and inexcitable motor nerves. AIDP is the commonest variant of GBS in our study and has better outcome compared to AMAN.
Development of Psychotherapists: Concepts, Questions, and Methods of a Collaborative International Study

The aim of this international study is to examine the nature, correlates, and perceived determinants of development among professional psychotherapists from different countries and cultures at all career levels, trained in different professions and theoretical orientations. Psychotherapeutic development was conceptualized and assessed from several perspectives, including concurrent and retrospective reports by therapists and cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses of therapists' practices and experiences. This paper presents the main questions guiding the study, defines its core concepts, introduces the survey instrument, describes data collection procedures, and reports descriptive and scale development data from a multinational data base of nearly 3800 therapists. Analyses provide evidence for the reliability and validity of direct and indirect measures of retrospected career development and currently experienced development, and their applicability to diverse groups of psychotherapists. Diese inernat.
Career Counseling and Psychotherapy: False Dichotomies and Recommended Remedies

This paper addresses counseling psychology's ongoing concerns about the role of career counseling. First, a series of artificial distinctions exacerbating the rift between career and personal counseling are discussed. Of particular concern is the failure on the part of counselors, possibly associated with declining interest in the career realm, to properly assess and treat career-related concerns. Arguments for the continuing importance of career development and counseling are presented in the context of the increasing acknowledgement of the work/mental health interface within applied psychology and ethical imperatives to provide needed services to our clients. Second, some possible remedies for the current state of affairs are advanced, including enhancement of the theoretical basis of career research, improving our training in career assessment and counseling, and the integration of some recent trends in psychotherapy research.
Family planning knowledge, attitude, and practices among the currently married women (aged 15–45 years) in an urban area of Rohtak district, Haryana -

Background: By 2050, the world’s population is expected to reach 9 billion. India accounts for 17.5% of the world’s population. In the year 2011, the couple protection rate was about 40% for India, which is still far behind to achieve the 60% couple protection rate goal. Since the inception of the program, several knowledge, attitude, and practice studies have been conducted. Objective: To assess the knowledge, attitude, and practices of the family planning methods and various sociodemographic parameters and enhance the contraceptive practice among the eligible couples in an urban area of Haryana. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted in an urban health-training center area of Rohtak district, Haryana. The study participants involved were currently married women aged 15–45 years (eligible couples). The line listing of all the eligible couples was done, and by systematic random sampling methodology, 10% of the currently married women were selected, which came out to be 320. Statistical analysis was done using SPSS software, version 16.0 (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences); we calculated percentages and applied the X2-test wherever necessary and required. Results: In this study, the total sample consisted of 318 participants, and the mean age of the participants was 32.76 ± 4.6 years. Moving to other variables, it was observed in this study that most of the participants were presenting socioeconomic status (SES) as middle class (35.7%) and lower-middle class (37.2%), followed by upper-middle class (19.6%), and the least participants belonged to the upper class (3.3%) and lower class (4.2%). Around 62% participants were currently using one or more of the various family planning methods. Female sterilization (45.6%) was the most common chosen method used among the contraceptive users, followed by intrauterine contraceptive device (23%) and condom (22%); the least preference was given to oral contraceptive pill (OCP) (9.2%). When asked specifically regarding the individual type of family planning method, most awareness was toward OCP (97.7%) and the least awareness observed for the traditional methods (30.5%). The awareness source for family planning methods were mainly doctors/multipurpose health workers/anganwadi workers (70.4%). Conclusion: On the basis of observations of our study, it was concluded that education and contraceptive practices were directly related. Health workers and mass media are playing very important roles in disseminating information about the promotion of contraceptive practices and can overcome the knowledge/practice gap.
Inspiring Group Creativity

A laboratory study examined effects of group members'perceptions of behavioral components of transformational and transactional leadership on group creativity underanonymous and identified electronic brainstorming conditions. Results indicated that perceptions of transactional goal setting and inspirational leadership were each positively related to group creativity. Intellectual stimulation and individualized consideration were negatively related to group creativity. Except for the effect of intellectual stimulation on group creativity, these effects were stronger under anonymous versus identified conditions.
A comparison of performances of danish and american students in a “threat game”

Two experiments comparing the strategy choice behavior of American and Danish male college students were conducted. In the first experiment bona fide pairs of American and Danish subjects played repeated trials of a variety of 2 × 2 nonzero sum threat games. The results of this first study indicated a number of differences between the two populations in terms of their use of and response to threats. The general pattern of results seemed to support the conjecture that, in the underdog role of the game, Danes are more submissive than Americans. In the top dog role of the game Americans are somewhat more fair than Danes. In the second experiment, 60 Americans and 60 Danish subjects played repeated trials of a variety of threat games against a programmed stooge opponent. Several different stooge strategies were employed so as to systematically vary the behavior of the other. A number of systematic differences between the American and Danish players emerged in terms of their responses to the different stooge strategies. These differences between Americans and Danes playing against the stooge player were consistent with those observed in the bona fide pairs.
Inhibitors of Bacterial Efflux Pumps as Adjuvants in Antibacterial Therapy and Diagnostic Tools for Detection of Resistance by Efflux

Active efflux is a wide-spread mechanism for bacterial resistance to antibiotics, which contributes to poor intrinsic susceptibility, cross-resistance to structurally diverse classes of drugs, or selection of other mechanisms of resistance. Thus, inhibition of efflux pumps appears to be (i) a promising strategy for restoring the activity of existing antibiotics, and (ii) a useful method to detect the presence of efflux determinants in clinical isolates. Structurally dissimilar classes of inhibitors have been patented in the last decade, some are analogues of antibiotic substrates [tetracyclines, quinolones or aminoglycosides] and others are new chemical entities [including substituted indoles, ureas, aromatic amides, piperidinecarboxylic acids, alkylamino- or alkoxyquinolines, peptidomimetics, and pyridopyrimidines]. Their spectrum of activity, in terms of companion antibiotics and bacteria, differ significantly. Narrow spectrum inhibitors are of prime interest as diagnostic tools, while broad spectrum inhibitors are expected for adjuvant therapies. Apart from (i) a peptidomimetic inhibitor of Mex pumps in Pseudomonas aeruginosa (MC-04,124), for which efficacy was evaluated in animal models, and (ii) a piperidinecarboxylic acid inhibitor of fluoroquinolone efflux in Gram-positive (VX-710), which was safely administered to humans, most of these products have only demonstrated their activity in vitro, so further investigations are needed to evaluate their clinical potential.
Mutations in both gp120 and gp41 Are Responsible for the Broad Neutralization Resistance of Variant Human Immunodeficiency Virus Type 1 MN to Antibodies Directed at V3 and Non-V3 Epitopes

ABSTRACT The escape of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 from effects of neutralizing antibodies was studied by using neutralization-resistant (NR) variants generated by growing the neutralization-sensitive (NS) wild-type MN virus in the presence of human serum with neutralizing antibodies, more than 99% of which were directed at the V3 region of gp120. The variants obtained had broad neutralization resistance to human sera, without limitation with respect to the V3 specificity of the sera. The molecular basis for the resistance was evaluated with molecularly cloned viruses, as well as with pseudoviruses expressing envelope glycoproteins of the NS and NR phenotypes. Nucleotide sequence analyses comparing NS and NR clones revealed a number of polymorphisms, including six in the V1/V2 region, two in C4/V5 of gp120, three in the leucine zipper (LZ) domain of gp41, and two in the second external putative α-helix region of gp41. A series of chimeras from NS and NRenv genes was constructed, and each was presented on pseudoviruses to locate the domain(s) which conferred the phenotypic changes. The neutralization phenotypes of the chimeric clones were found to be dependent on mutations in both the C4/V5 region of gp120 and the LZ region of gp41. Additionally, interaction between mutations in gp120 and gp41 was demonstrated in that a chimeric envgene consisting of a gp120 coding sequence from an NS clone and a gp41 sequence from an NR clone yielded a pseudovirus with minimal infectivity. The possible significance of predicted amino acid changes in these domains is discussed. The results indicate that polyvalent antibodies predominantly directed against V3 can induce NR through selection for mutations that alter interactions of other domains in the envelope complex.
An algorithm for removable visible watermarking

A visible watermark may convey ownership information that identifies the originator of image and video. A potential application scenario for visible watermarks was proposed by IBM where an image is originally embedded with a visible watermark before posting on the web for free observation and download. The watermarked image which serves as a "teaser. " The watermark can be removed to recreate the unmarked image by request of interested buyers. Before we can design an algorithm for satisfying this application, three basic problems should be solved. First, we need to find a strategy suitable for producing large amount of visually same but numerically different watermarked versions of the image for different users. Second, the algorithm should let the embedding parameters reachable for any legal user to make the embedding process invertible. Third, an unauthorized user should be prevented from removing the embedded watermark pattern. In this letter, we propose a user-key-dependent removable visible watermarking system (RVWS). The user key structure decides both the embedded subset of watermark and the host information adopted for adaptive embedding. The neighbor-dependent embedder adjusts the marking strength to host features and makes unauthorized removal very difficult. With correct user keys, watermark removal can be accomplished in "informed detection" and the high quality unmarked image can be restored. In contrast, unauthorized operation either overly or insufficiently removes the watermark due to wrong estimation of embedding parameters, and thus, the resulting image has apparent defect.
Use and interpretation of test scores from limited cognitive test batteries: how g + Gc can equal g.

Single scores from limited and unbalanced test batteries of cognitive ability can be ambiguous to interpret theoretically. In this study, a limited verbally and knowledge-loaded cognitive test battery, from applicants to the Swedish police academies (N = 1,344), was examined to provide foundations for the use and interpretation of test scores. Three measurement models were compared: one single factor model and two bifactor models, which decomposed the variance of the battery into orthogonal components. The models were evaluated by fit indices and omega coefficients, and then applied to the prediction of academic performance. The overall prediction of all models was similar, although specific abilities also were found to provide substantial predictive validity over and above general intelligence (g). The findings provide support for the use of single scores in applied settings (selection), but suggest that it may be more appropriate to interpret such scores as composites of substantive components, and not just as measures of g.
Current and projected annual direct costs of screening asymptomatic men for prostate cancer using prostate-specific antigen.

BACKGROUND Concern over the cost of screening for asymptomatic prostate cancer by means of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing has played an important role in PSA screening policy. However, little is known about the true costs of current PSA screening in Canada and how costs may change in the future. METHODS The authors performed a cost identification study from the perspective of provincial ministries of health. They used data from published reports, hospital discharge data, claims data from several provinces, a laboratory survey, a national survey of knowledge, attitudes and beliefs about screening, a provincial cancer registry and expert opinion to estimate current first-year screening costs. Using demographic data from Statistics Canada and various scenarios regarding changes in screening patterns, the authors derived estimates of the future costs of PSA screening. RESULTS In 1995 PSA screening cost an estimated $45 million (range $40 million to $84 million). Treatment accounted for over 61% of total costs, whereas screening, diagnosis and staging accounted for 35%. Screening all eligible men in Canada in 1995 would have cost $317 million (range $356 million to $691 million), more than the costs of all prostate cancer care in that year. Annual recurrent screening for all eligible men in 2005 would cost $219 million (range $208 million to $412 million). Projections from existing trends suggest that annual costs of PSA screening in 2000 are likely to increase from the estimated $45 million to approximately $66 million (range $59 million to $126 million). INTERPRETATION PSA screening is costly, but even universal screening would consume a smaller share of national health expenditures than previous studies have suggested. Costs attributable to PSA screening may increase in the future owing to changes in utilization patterns and demographic shifts.
Nonpsychiatric illness among primary care patients with trauma histories and posttraumatic stress disorder.

OBJECTIVE The authors examined the relationship between posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), trauma, and self-reported nonpsychiatric medical conditions in a sample of 502 primary care patients with one or more anxiety disorders. METHODS Primary care patients with one or more DSM-IV anxiety disorders were assessed for comorbid psychiatric and substance use problems and for a history of trauma. These individuals also completed a self-report measure of current and lifetime medical conditions, lifetime tobacco use, and current regular exercise. RESULTS Of 502 participants with at least one anxiety disorder, 84 (17 percent) reported no history of trauma, 233 (46 percent) had a history of trauma but no PTSD, and 185 (37 percent) met DSM-IV criteria for PTSD. Patients with PTSD reported a significantly greater number of current and lifetime medical conditions than did participants with other anxiety disorders but without PTSD. Primary care patients with PTSD were more likely to have had a number of specific medical problems, including anemia, arthritis, asthma, back pain, diabetes, eczema, kidney disease, lung disease, and ulcer. Possible explanations for the greater rates of medical conditions among participants with PTSD were examined as predictors in multiple regression. PTSD was found to be a stronger predictor of reported number of medical problems than trauma history, physical injury, lifestyle factors, or comorbid depression. CONCLUSIONS These findings suggest that PTSD is associated with a higher rate of general medical complaints.
A Preference‐Opportunity‐Choice Framework with Applications to Intergroup Friendship1

A long‐standing objective of friendship research is to identify the effects of personal preference and structural opportunity on intergroup friendship choice. Although past studies have used various methods to separate preference from opportunity, researchers have not yet systematically compared the properties and implications of these methods. This study puts forward a general framework for discrete choice, where choice probability is specified as proportional to the product of preference and opportunity. To implement this framework, the authors propose a modification to the conditional logit model for estimating preference parameters free from the influence of opportunity structure and then compare this approach to several alternative methods for separating preference and opportunity used in the friendship choice literature. As an empirical example, the authors test hypotheses of homophily and status asymmetry in friendship choice using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. The example also demonstrates the approach of conducting a sensitivity analysis to examine how parameter estimates vary by specification of the opportunity structure.
The Effect of Limitations on the Number of Criterion Score Values on the Significance Level of theF-Test

Many educational and psychological measurements are made with instruments that yield only a limited number of score values. Ratings and course grades, for example, are frequently recorded on a five-point scale. The effectiveness of various educational procedures, such as those used in counseling, may be evaluated on a four-point scale. Pupil traits in non-academic areas are sometimes assessed on a threepoint scale—"above average," "average," or "below average. " In situations where change in status is measured, the assessment may be simply one of "Improved" or "No change. " If such measures, numerically coded, are taken in an experiment and the investigator is concerned solely with means, he may be tempted to analyze the data via the techniques of analysis of variance. This is especially likely if there are several factors of interest in the experiment, and one or more of the hypotheses are concerned with interactions between factors. The issue is then raised, "Can data of this kind be validly analyzed via F-tests? " Investigation of this question was the primary purpose of this study.
Peripheral Benzodiazepine Receptor-Induced Myocardial Protection is Mediated by Inhibition of Mitochondrial Membrane Permeabilization

Opening of the permeability transition pore (PTP) is a key event in ischemia-reperfusion injury and several ligands of the peripheral benzodiazepine receptor (PBR), a mitochondrial outer membrane protein possibly associated with PTP, have been demonstrated as potent cardioprotective agents. Here, we investigated the mechanisms by which the specific PBR ligand 4′-chlorodiazepam (CDZ) protected the myocardium against ischemia-reperfusion. In either global or regional models of myocardial ischemia-reperfusion in rats, CDZ reduced infarct size in a dose-dependent manner (e.g., 11 ± 1% of the area at risk at 10 mg/kg versus 31 ± 3% in control; p < 0.05) and to a similar extent as ischemic or diazoxide-induced preconditioning. CDZ (10 mg/kg) reduced apoptosis (terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase dUTP nick-end labeling staining), restored mitochondrial recovery, improved oxidative phosphorylation parameters, and reduced mitochondrial membrane permeabilization with inhibition of cytochrome c and apoptosis-inducing factor releases. CDZ increased the resistance of mitochondria to Ca2+-induced PTP opening. All these cardioprotective effects of CDZ were associated with an improved stabilization of the association of Bcl-2 with the mitochondrial membrane and inhibition of the association of a cytosolic fragment of Bax, occurring during ischemia-reperfusion, with the outer mitochondrial membrane. In addition, the PTP opener atractyloside (20 μM) and the Bcl-2 inhibitor ethyl-2-amino-6-bromo-4-(1-cyano-2-ethoxy-2-oxoethyl)-4H-chromene-3-carboxylate (HA14-1) (20 μM) abrogated CDZ-induced reduction of infarct size. These results demonstrate that PBR occupancy by CDZ renders the heart more resistant to ischemia-reperfusion injury by limiting mitochondrial membrane permeabilization. This is due to a reorganization of the balance between pro- and antiapoptotic proteins of the Bcl-2 family proteins at the level of mitochondrial membranes.