Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Nationwide Newspaper Coverage of Islam Post-September 11: A Community Structure Approach

Using a community structure approach exploring links between city characteristics and coverage frames, this systematic national cross-section sample of 19 US newspapers tracked newspaper coverage of Islam during the year after the September 11, 2001 attacks, combining “prominence” and “direction” scores to yield a single “Media Vector,” measuring issue projection. Most (14) cities revealed favorable/neutral coverage of Islam. Pearson correlations yielded two prominent “stakeholder” characteristics negatively correlated with favorable coverage of Islam. Contrary to expectations, the higher the percentage of foreign-born citizens (r=−0.539; p=0.009) or number of Arabic/Farsi speakers (r=−0.537; p=0.011), the less favorable the coverage of Islam, the latter accounting for 29 per cent of the variance.
Fine-Grained Sentiment Analysis with Structural Features

Sentiment analysis is the problem of determining the polarity of a text with respect to a particular topic. For most applications, however, it is not only necessary to derive the polarity of a text as a whole but also to extract negative and positive utterances on a more finegrained level. Sentiment analysis systems working on the (sub-)sentence level, however, are difficult to develop since shorter textual segments rarely carry enough information to determine their polarity out of context. In this paper, therefore, we present a fully automatic framework for fine-grained sentiment analysis on the subsentence level combining multiple sentiment lexicons and neighborhood as well as discourse relations to overcome this problem. We use Markov logic to integrate polarity scores from different sentiment lexicons with information about relations between neighboring segments, and evaluate the approach on product reviews. The experiments show that the use of structural features improves the accuracy of polarity predictions achieving accuracy scores of up to 69%.
Abstract Title of Thesis: A VOXEL-BASED APPROACH TO IDENTIFYING LESION SITES IN APHASIA: COMPREHENSION AND PRODUCTION DEFICITS IN SYNTAX, SEMANTICS AND PHONOLOGY

Title of Thesis: A VOXEL-BASED APPROACH TO IDENTIFYING LESION SITES IN APHASIA: COMPREHENSION AND PRODUCTION DEFICITS IN SYNTAX, SEMANTICS AND PHONOLOGY Therese Danielle Kling, Master of the Arts, 2007 Thesis directed by: Professor Yasmeen Shah Department of Speech and Hearing Science The cortical regions of the brain traditionally associated with deficits of production and comprehension in language are Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas. Recent evidence suggests that other brain regions are involved and may be specific to linguistic areas of syntax, semantics and phonology. This paper describes the MRI results and language scores of 31 left hemisphere stroke patients with aphasia. Patients’ lesions obtained from these MRI scans were reconstructed onto templates and entered into a voxel-based analysis program called Analysis of Brain lesion (ABLe) (Solomon, Raymont, Braun, Butman & Grafman, 2007) along with language scores. The results provided evidence for five key neuroanatomical regions of interest. These include the insula, the planum temporale, the operculum, the temporoparietal occipital (TPO) junction and the putamen. The results revealed common as well as unique areas of brain lesion for each of the behaviors. A VOXEL-BASED APPROACH TO IDENTIFYING LESION SITES IN APHASIA: COMPREHENSION AND PRODUCTION DEFICITS IN SYNTAX, SEMANTICS AND PHONOLOGY By Therese Danielle Kling Thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of the Arts 2007 Advisory Committee: Professor Yasmeen Shah, Chair Dr. Allen Braun Professor Nan Ratner Professor Rochelle Newman © Copyright by Therese Danielle Kling 2007
Australian comparison data for the Test of Word Reading Efficiency (TOWRE)

This paper reports provisional Australian comparison data and scoring instructions for the Test of Word Reading Efficiency (TOWRE). The TOWRE is a popular reading fluency test used in reading research, classroom assessment and clinical practice. Approximate ‘norms’ were obtained from children attending four primary schools in New South Wales. Results suggested that the US norms for the TOWRE may overestimate the reading level of Australian children in lower grades and that the performance on the two parallel forms (A and B) of the subtests (Sight Word Efficiency and Phonemic Decoding Efficiency) of the TOWRE did not differ from each other. While no performance differences were found between boys and girls overall, it was noted that the youngest boys outperformed the youngest girls on Form A of the Sight Word Efficiency subtest, and the youngest girls outperformed the youngest boys on Form B of the Sight Word Efficiency subtest. Limitations of the current study are discussed and a brief reference is made to a new (2012) edition of TOWRE (TOWRE-2).
The influence of renal function on the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics and simulated time course of doxacurium.

UNLABELLED Doxacurium's clearance (C1) is markedly decreased in patients with renal failure undergoing kidney transplantation. However, no studies have determined the influence of renal function (as assessed by creatinine clearance [CrCl]) on its pharmacokinetics in patients without renal failure. We studied 53 patients aged 19-59 yr. During N2O/isoflurane anesthesia, doxacurium was infused over 10 min, plasma was sampled for up to 6 h, and twitch tension was measured. A three-compartment model was fit to plasma concentration data and an effect compartment model to twitch data. Mixed-effects modeling was used to determine the influence of covariates, including CrC1, on doxacurium's pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic parameters. Obesity decreased both doxacurium's Cl (1.1% per percent above ideal body weight [IBW]) and its neuromuscular junction sensitivity (0.4% per percent above IBW). Cl increased 0.6% per mL/min increase in CrCl. In addition, the rate constant for equilibration between plasma concentration and effect decreased 46% per 1% increase in isoflurane, central compartment volume decreased 86% per 1% increase in isoflurane concentration, and slow distributional Cl decreased 69% per mg/ 100 mL increase in serum albumin. Simulations showed that the latter two covariates influence the time course of bolus doxacurium administration minimally. Both obesity and renal dysfunction prolong doxacurium's recovery markedly. When dosing is based on IBW, effects of CrCl on neuromuscular recovery are smaller compared with dosing based on actual weight. Therefore, obese patients should be dosed based on IBW. No further dosage adjustment is necessary for patients with renal dysfunction; however, recovery will take longer in patients with moderate-to-severe renal dysfunction. IMPLICATIONS We examined the factors influencing doxacurium's pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic characteristics. Both creatinine clearance and obesity significantly influence its time course. The effect of obesity is minimized if patients are dosed based on ideal body weight.
Semantically Enhanced Television News through Web and Video Integration

The Rich News system for semantically annotating television news broadcasts and augmenting them with additional web content is described. On-line news sources were mined for material reporting the same stories as those found in television broadcasts, and the text of these pages was semantically annotated using the KIM knowledge management platform. This resulted in more effective indexing than would have been possible if the programme transcript was indexed directly, owing to the poor quality of transcripts produced using automatic speech recognition. In addition, the associations produced between web pages and television broadcasts enables the automatic creation of augmented interactive television broadcasts and multi-media websites.
Measuring Attitudes to National Identity and Nation-building in Papua New Guinea

Nation-building and the tasks of encouraging a sense of national identity and political community pose an immense challenge in Papua New Guinea (PNG). With over 830 languages, it is one of the most linguistically and ethnically diverse countries in the world. Since independence in 1975, PNG has experienced high levels of political instability with frequent changes of government and allegations of corruption. Local and traditional obligations to extended family and language groups frequently supersede allegiances to the nation-state. This paper examines the attitudes of tertiary students from the University of PNG to national identity and key issues of nation-building. These students are highly likely to feature strongly among the next generation of leaders. Findings highlight the importance of family, religion and maintaining traditional customs. They also illustrate the importance of geographical region and gender in explaining differences in key attitudes towards national identity.
Facial Similarity Between Voters and Candidates Causes Influence

Social science research demonstrates that people are drawn to others perceived as similar. We extend this finding to political candidates by comparing the relative effects of candidate familiarity as well as partisan, issue, gender, and facial similarity on voters’ evaluations of candidates. In Experiment 1, during the week of the 2006 Florida gubernatorial race, a national representative sample of voters viewed images of two unfamiliar candidates (Crist and Davis) morphed with either themselves or other voters. Results demonstrated a strong preference for facially similar candidates, despite no conscious awareness of the similarity manipulation. In Experiment 2, one week before the 2004 presidential election, a national representative sample of voters evaluated familiar candidates (Bush and Kerry). Strong partisans were unmoved by the facial similarity manipulation, but weak partisans and independents preferred the candidate with whom their own face had been morphed over the candidate morphed with another voter. In Experiment 3, we compared the effects of policy similarity and facial similarity using a set of prospective 2008 presidential candidates. Even though the effects of party and policy similarity dominated, facial similarity proved a significant cue for unfamiliar candidates. Thus, the evidence across the three studies suggests that even in high-profile elections, voters prefer candidates high in facial similarity, but most strongly with unfamiliar candidates.
On the perceived effectiveness of transformational–transactional leadership: The role of encouraged strategies and followers' regulatory focus

The present research sought to examine when and why transformational and transactional leadership are perceived by followers to be effective. A series of five studies revealed that perceived effectiveness of transformational and transactional leadership is influenced by the fit between leadership style-driven encouraged strategies and followers' preferred strategies. Specifically, we found that transformational leadership primarily encourages promotion-focused strategies and, accordingly, creates a regulatory fit for promotion-focused followers. In contrast, transactional leadership primarily encourages prevention-focused strategies, creating a regulatory fit for prevention-focused followers. As a consequence of this regulatory fit, leadership is perceived as more effective and predictive of enhanced effort. By integrating literature on self-regulation with insights from leadership research, this research contributes to a deeper understanding of the leadership process and of interpersonal influences on self-regulatory experiences.
Information Technology Adoption Across Time: A Cross-Sectional Comparison of Pre-Adoption and Post-Adoption Beliefs

The process of information technology adoption and use is critical to deriving the benefits of information technology. Yet from a conceptual standpoint, few empirical studies have made a distinction between individuals' pre-adoption and post-adoption (continued use) beliefs and attitudes. This distinction is crucial in understanding and managing this process over time. The current study combines innovation diffusion and attitude theories in a theoretical framework to examine differences in pre-adoption and post-adoption beliefs and attitudes. The examination of Windows technology in a single organization indicates that users and potential adopters of information technology differ on their determinants of behavioral intention, attitude, and subjective norm. Potential adopter intention to adopt is solely determined by normative pressures, whereas user intention is solely determined by attitude. In addition, potential adopters base their attitude on a richer set of innovation characteristics than users. Whereas pre-adoption attitude is based on perceptions of usefulness, ease-of-use, result demonstrability, visibility, and trialability, post-adoption attitude is only based on instrumentality beliefs of usefulness and perceptions of image enhancements.
Application of the stretched exponential function to fluorescence lifetime imaging of biological tissue

The fluorescence decay in fluorescence lifetime imaging (FLIM) is typically fitted to a multi-exponential model with discrete lifetimes. The interaction between fluorophores in heterogeneous samples (e.g. biological tissue) can, however, produce complex decay characteristics that do not correspond to such models. Although they appear to provide a better fit to fluorescence decay data than the assumption of a mono-exponential decay, the assumption of multiple discrete components is essentially arbitrary and often erroneous. The stretched exponential function (StrEF) describes fluorescence decay profiles using a continuous lifetime distribution as has been reported for tryptophan, being one of the main fluorophores in tissue. We have demonstrated that this model represents our time-domain FLIM data better than multi-exponential discrete decay components, yielding excellent contrast in tissue discrimination without compromising the goodness of fit, and it significantly decreases the required processing time. In addition, the stretched exponential decay model can provide a direct measure of the sample heterogeneity and the resulting heterogeneity map can reveal subtle tissue differences that other models fail to show.
Propafenone shows class Ic and class II antiarrhythmic effects.

AIMS Propafenone is a well-known Class Ic antiarrhythmic agent. It has the typical chemical structure of a beta-blocker, but human studies on its beta-blocking effects revealed conflicting results. METHODS AND RESULTS Twelve healthy males received single oral doses of 600 mg propafenone and placebo according to a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, cross-over protocol. Four hours following drug intake, heart rate and blood pressure were measured, and plasma concentrations of propafenone were determined at rest, during exercise and after recovery. At exercise, propafenone significantly decreased heart rate (-6%, P < 0.05), systolic blood pressure (-6%, P < 0.05), and the rate-pressure product (-11%, P < 0.05). Plasma concentrations of propafenone increased during exercise (+23%, P < 0.05) and decreased during recovery (-33%, P < 0.05). CONCLUSION Both effects on heart rate and blood pressure as well as the changes of plasma concentrations of propafenone during exercise represent two particular features of beta-blockers. Therefore, we conclude that propafenone is both a Class Ic and a Class II antiarrhythmic agent, and 600 mg propafenone, i.e. the dose recommended in current guidelines for cardioversion of paroxysmal atrial fibrillation, cause clinically significant beta-blockade. Thus, single oral doses of 600 mg propafenone appear also suitable for cardioversion of paroxysmal atrial fibrillation in patients with structural heart disease since beta-blockers are explicitly indicated in the treatment of both coronary artery disease and heart failure.
Statistical Phrase-Based Translation

We propose a new phrase-based translation model and decoding algorithm that enables us to evaluate and compare several, previously proposed phrase-based translation models. Within our framework, we carry out a large number of experiments to understand better and explain why phrase-based models out-perform word-based models. Our empirical results, which hold for all examined language pairs, suggest that the highest levels of performance can be obtained through relatively simple means: heuristic learning of phrase translations from word-based alignments and lexical weighting of phrase translations. Surprisingly, learning phrases longer than three words and learning phrases from high-accuracy word-level alignment models does not have a strong impact on performance. Learning only syntactically motivated phrases degrades the performance of our systems.
Choosing Content and Methods: Focus Group Interviews with Faculty Teachers in Norwegian Pre-Service Subject Teacher Education in Design, Art, and Crafts

The study is aimed at generating knowledge on how faculty teachers reflect and justify their choice of subject content logic in teacher education, exemplified by a concurrent pre-service Subject Teacher Education in design, art, and crafts. Focus-group interviews generated data. Three topics were discussed: too many choices, different logics, and avoiding confrontation. Faculty teachers expressed various understandings of content knowledge (CK) and pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), linked to the teachers' intuitive and reasoned reflections and preconceptions through the anchoring effect and attribute substitution. The study contributes to the knowledge base by reframing problematic sides of education, and by expanding the understanding of CK and conditions for PCK by exploring the thread between educational psychologist Lee Shulman and psychologist Daniel Kahneman.
Interplay between network topology and dynamics in neural systems

This thesis is a compendium of research which brings together ideas from the fields of Complex Networks and Computational Neuroscience to address two questions regarding neural systems: 1) How the activity of neurons, via synaptic changes, can shape the topology of the network they form part of, and 2) How the resulting network structure, in its turn, might condition aspects of brain behaviour. Although the emphasis is on neural networks, several theoretical findings which are relevant for complex networks in general are presented -- such as a method for studying network evolution as a stochastic process, or a theory that allows for ensembles of correlated networks, and sets of dynamical elements thereon, to be treated mathematically and computationally in a model-independent manner. Some of the results are used to explain experimental data -- certain properties of brain tissue, the spontaneous emergence of correlations in all kinds of networks. -- and predictions regarding statistical aspects of the central nervous system are made. The mechanism of Cluster Reverberation is proposed to account for the near-instant storage of novel information the brain is capable of.
The RNA export factor Gle1p is located on the cytoplasmic fibrils of the NPC and physically interacts with the FG‐nucleoporin Rip1p, the DEAD‐box protein Rat8p/Dbp5p and a new protein Ymr255p

Gle1p is an essential, nuclear pore complex (NPC)‐associated RNA export factor. In a screen for high copy suppressors of a GLE1 mutant strain, we identified the FG‐nucleoporin Rip1p and the DEAD‐box protein Rat8p/Dbp5p, both of which have roles in RNA export; we also found Ymr255p/Gfd1p, a novel inessential protein. All three high copy suppressors interact with the C‐terminal domain of Gle1p; immunoelectron microscopy localizations indicate that Gle1p, Rip1p and Rat8p/Dbp5p are present on the NPC cytoplasmic fibrils; Rip1p was also found within the nucleoplasm and on the nuclear baskets. In vivo localizations support the hypothesis that Rip1p contributes to the association of Gle1p with the pore and that Gle1p, in turn, provides a binding site for Rat8p/Dbp5p at the NPC. These data are consistent with the view that Gle1p, Rip1p, Rat8p/Dbp5p and Ymr255p/Gfd1p associate on the cytoplasmic side of the NPC to act in a terminal step of RNA export. We also describe a human functional homologue of Rip1p, called hCG1, which rescues Rip1p function in yeast, consistent with the evolutionary conservation of this NPC‐associated protein.
Mindfulness and experiental avoidance in fibromyalgia patients

Objective: Previous research has presented mindfulness- based therapies as a promising approach in the treatment of fibromyalgia. The purpose of this study was to examine the convergent validity of the Dutch version of the Five Facets Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ) in fibromyalgia patients. The FFMQ assesses mindfulness via the five facets observe, describe, act aware, nonjudging and nonreacting to inner experience. Methods: 119 patients with a self- reported diagnosis of fibromyalgia were recruited via the website of the fibromyalgia patient association. Mindfulness was assessed online using the FFMQ as well as experiential avoidance (EA) using the Acceptance and Action Questionnaire (AAQ). Pearson correlations between the mindfulness subscales and EA were conducted. The mindfulness facets describe and act aware were expected to be moderately negative correlated to EA. A strong correlation with nonjudging and nonreacting to inner experience was anticipated. The observe scale was estimated to be positively or nonsignificantly correlated to EA. Results: All correlations are in the expected direction and strength except for the nonreacting which is only moderately related to EA. Conclusion: Findings support adequate convergent validity of the Dutch version of the FFMQ in fibromyalgia patients.
Cross-species gene-family fluctuations reveal the dynamics of horizontal transfers

Prokaryotes vary their protein repertoire mainly through horizontal transfer and gene loss. To elucidate the links between these processes and the cross-species gene-family statistics, we perform a large-scale data analysis of the cross-species variability of gene-family abundance (the number of members of the family found on a given genome). We find that abundance fluctuations are related to the rate of horizontal transfers. This is rationalized by a minimal theoretical model, which predicts this link. The families that are not captured by the model show abundance profiles that are markedly peaked around a mean value, possibly because of specific abundance selection. Based on these results, we define an abundance variability index that captures a family's evolutionary behavior (and thus some of its relevant functional properties) purely based on its cross-species abundance fluctuations. Analysis and model, combined, show a quantitative link between cross-species family abundance statistics and horizontal transfer dynamics, which can be used to analyze genome ‘flux’. Groups of families with different values of the abundance variability index correspond to genome sub-parts having different plasticity in terms of the level of horizontal exchange allowed by natural selection.
Response to Taguchi and Noma on “Relationship between Directionality and Orientation in Drawings by Young Children and Adults”

When assessing the relationship between direction and orientation in drawings by young children and adults, Taguchi and Noma used a fish-drawing task. However, the fish is not convenient enough as an object for such a task so it is highly preferable to use, instead of a single object, a set of several objects to assess directionality quantitatively. These authors' conclusions do not acknowledge alternative explanations.