Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Maternal locus of control and perception of family status at entry and exit of birth to three early intervention

Birth to three early intervention is unique time in the life of a family of a child with a disability in that confidence and competence of the parents can be addressed as part of the intervention goals and objectives. Locus of control is a quality measure of a parent's perception of their ability to be their child's teacher, advocate, and champion and is associated with confidence and competence. The purpose of this dissertation was to examine the association of locus of control orientation using Rotter's Locus of Control Scale (Rotter, 1966) with perception of family status as it relates to the child with the disability at entry and exit of birth to three early intervention using the Family Outcomes Survey (Bailey, 2006) in two groups of mothers at entry and exit of services. Analysis indicated there was no difference in locus of control between the two groups. Further, locus of control was not associated with the Family Outcomes Survey. The Family Outcomes survey demonstrated differences between the two groups and additional association with the socioeconomic proxy of type of insurance, length of time the family took part in early intervention, and the reason the child qualified for early intervention.
Preparation and Application of an Innovative Thrombocyte/Leukocyte-Enriched Plasma to Promote Tissue Repair in Chelonians

Platelet concentrates are widely used in mammalian regenerative medicine to improve tissue healing. Chelonians (Testudines) would benefit from the application of thrombocyte preparations to regenerate damaged tissues, since traumatic injuries are leading causes of morbidity and mortality for both wild-living and domesticated animals. The aim of this study was to establish a protocol that optimized the recovery of the thrombocytes from blood samples and to show the efficacy of thrombocyte-enriched plasma in chelonians. Peripheral blood samples were obtained from Testudo spp. (n = 12) and Trachemys scripta elegans (n = 10). Blood cells were fractionated by sodium diatrizoate-sodium polysucrose density gradient using a two-step centrifugation protocol. Thrombocytes and leukocytes were isolated and resuspended to obtain thrombocyte-leucocyte rich plasma (TLRP). The mean recovery of leukocytes and thrombocytes was 48.9% (±4.0 SEM, n = 22) of the whole blood cell content. No statistically significant difference was observed between blood samples collected from different turtle species. The ability of TLRP to form a gel was evaluated by adding variable concentrations of calcium gluconate at room temperature and at 37°C. A reliable and consistent clotting of the TLRP was obtained in glass tubes and dishes by adding 5-20% v/v of a 100 mg/ml solution of calcium gluconate. Furthermore, in order to test the clinical efficacy of TLRP, a preliminary evaluation was performed on four turtles (Testudo spp.) with traumatic injuries. In all the four animals, a successful clinical outcome was observed. The results demonstrated that a thrombocyte-enriched plasma, comparable to mammalian platelet rich plasma, can be prepared from chelonian blood samples. Furthermore, although the low number of cases presented does not allow definitive conclusions from a clinical point of view, their outcome suggests that TLRP application could be further investigated to improve the healing process of both soft and hard tissue injuries in chelonians.
The contribution of working memory to divided attention

Previous studies have indicated that increasing working memory (WM) load can affect the attentional selection of signals originating from one object/location. Here we assessed whether WM load affects also the selection of multiple objects/locations (divided attention). Participants monitored either two object‐categories (vs. one category; object‐based divided attention) or two locations (vs. one location; space‐based divided attention) while maintaining in WM either a variable number of objects (object‐based WM load) or locations (space‐based WM load). Behavioural results showed that WM load affected attentional performance irrespective of divided or focused attention. However, fMRI results showed that the activity associated with object‐based divided attention increased linearly with increasing object‐based WM load in the left and right intraparietal sulcus (IPS); while, in the same areas, activity associated with space‐based divided attention was not affected by any type of WM load. These findings support the hypothesis that WM contributes to the maintenance of resource‐demanding attentional sets in a domain‐specific manner. Moreover, the dissociable impact of WM load on performance and brain activity suggests that increased IPS activation reflects a recruitment of additional, domain‐specific processing resources that enable dual‐task performance under conditions of high WM load and high attentional demand. Hum Brain Mapp, 2013. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Treatment of an Iatrogenic Petrous Carotid Artery Pseudoaneurysm with a Symbiot Covered Stent: Technical Case Report

OBJECTIVE AND IMPORTANCE Surgery involving the middle ear or the temporal bone may cause an injury to the petrous carotid artery resulting in a pseudoaneurysm. Conventional treatment of such pseudoaneurysms has ranged from carotid occlusion to conservative management. The use of a balloon-expandable stent and/or Guglielmi detachable coils may be effective in a partially healed pseudoaneurysm. This report details the case of an acute petrous carotid pseudoaneurysm after a myringotomy procedure that was effectively treated with an expanded polytetrafluoroethylene-covered stent. CLINICAL PRESENTATION During a right myringotomy procedure, pulsatile blood was encountered in a 42-year-old woman with a history of repeated ear infections and bilateral middle ear ventilation tube placement. The blood was adequately tamponaded with gauze packing. Computed tomography of the temporal bone demonstrated a dehiscent carotid artery, and cerebral angiography revealed a 6-mm right petrous carotid pseudoaneurysm. INTERVENTION/TECHNIQUE An 8-French guide catheter was positioned via a transfemoral approach into the cervical right internal carotid artery, and the patient was systemically heparinized. A 4- × 31-mm Symbiot covered stent (Boston Scientific/Scimed, Maple Grove, MN) was passed over a Choice PT exchange wire (Boston Scientific/Scimed) to cover the neck of the pseudoaneurysm, obliterating the pseudoaneurysm. The patient was given aspirin and clopidogrel after stenting, and ear exploration was possible later the same day. Follow-up computed tomographic angiography performed 6 weeks later verified patency of the stent. CONCLUSION The use of an expanded polytetrafluoroethylene-covered stent may effectively treat intracranial internal carotid artery pseudoaneurysms in an acute setting. This treatment allows preservation of the parent artery and immediate treatment by reconstruction of the incompetent arterial wall to prevent potentially life-threatening hemorrhagic complications.
A study on the effects of sales related factors on brand equity

Article history: Received January 4, 2014 Accepted 1 June 2014 Available online June 3 2014 This paper presents an empirical investigation to study the effects of sales related factors on brand equity. The study designs a questionnaire and distributes it among all 353 sales representatives who work for a dairy producer in province of Mazandaran, Iran. Using principal component analysis, seven variables including qualification criteria, motivation, personality, empowering sales representative, information size, personal characteristics and sales interest in job on brand equity are extracted. The implementation of structural equation modeling has confirmed that there were positive and meaningful relationships between seven factors and brand equity. The highest impact belongs to empowering sales representative followed by qualification criteria, quantity of information, personality and sales motivation. © 2014 Growing Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Coping With Administrative Constraints by Quebec School Principals

The rapid pace of ongoing change in the Quebec education system has had an important impact on the complexity of the job and the workload of school principals. The present study examined the coping strategies used by school principals when facing administrative constraints. The Administrative Stress Index ASI (N = 238) was used to identify and link the main stressors to the stressful encounters found on video for six principals out of the sample who accepted to be filmed during a working day. Coping strategies were identified in five sequences that met the necessary criteria for the explanatory qualitative analysis. The results show that the main sources of stress come from administrative constraints, and that the principals are not passive but rather try to cope by addressing the constraints they are faced with and by seeking information or support. Principals also have to cope with their emotions and show a lot of self-control. Overall, these findings point to the need for a better understanding of the relationship between stress and coping.
Objectification Theory: Toward Understanding Women's Lived Experiences and Mental Health Risks

This article offers objectification theory as a framework for understanding the experiential consequences of being female in a culture that sexually objectifies the female body. Objectification theory posits that girls and women are typically acculturated to internalize an observer's perspective as a primary view of their physical selves. This perspective on self can lead to habitual body monitoring, which, in turn, can increase women's opportunities for shame and anxiety, reduce opportunities for peak motivational states, and diminish awareness of internal bodily states. Accumulations of such experiences may help account for an array of mental health risks that disproportionately affect women: unipolar depression, sexual dysfunction, and eating disorders. Objectification theory also illuminates why changes in these mental health risks appear to occur in step with life-course changes in the female body.
Myeloid differentiation factor 88 is required for resistance to Neospora caninum infection

Neospora caninum is an intracellular parasite that causes major economic impact on cattle raising farms, and infects a wide range of warm-blooded hosts worldwide. Innate immune mechanisms that lead to protection against this parasite are still unknown. In order to investigate whether myeloid differentiation factor 88 (MyD88) is required for resistance against N. caninum, genetically deficient mice (MyD88−/−) and wild type littermates were infected with live tachyzoites and the resistance to infection was evaluated. We found that sub-lethal tachyzoite doses induced acute mortality of MyD88−/− mice, which succumbed to infection due to uncontrolled parasite replication. Higher parasitism in MyD88−/− mice was associated with the lack of IL-12 production by dendritic cells, delayed IFN-γ responses by NKT, CD4+ and CD8+ T lymphocytes, and production of high levels of IL-10. MyD88−/− mice replenished with IL-12 and IFN-γ abolished susceptibility as the animals survived throughout the experimental period. We conclude that protective IFN-γ-mediated immunity to N. caninum is dependent on initial MyD88 signaling, in a mechanism triggered by production of IL-12 by dendritic cells. Further knowledge on Toll-like receptor recognition of N. caninum antigens is encouraged, since it could generate new prophylactic and therapeutic tools to control parasite burden.
‘Don't forget to say thank you’: The effect of an acknowledgement on donor relationships

Abstract Donor attrition is a major cause of concern for non-profit organisations. Non-profits can improve retention by nurturing donor relationships. Acknowledging or thanking the donor is a vital building block in the non-profit organisation–donor relationship. This paper examines the impact of such acknowledgements on donor relationships. In study 1, we employed cross-sectional data obtained from 478 donors to a regional public television station in the United States. We found that the effect of acknowledgements on the donor relationship is moderated by how frequently the donor gives to the organisation, and that acknowledgements help strengthen the non-profit's relationship with less frequent donors. In study 2, we used an experimental design (111 respondents) to probe the emotional effects of a thank-you note. The findings indicate that acknowledgements enhance positive emotions and alleviate negative emotions; the converse effect is observed when the donor does not get a thank-you note. Thus acknowledging the donor's gift provides a promising means of fostering donor relationships and retaining donors.
Cross-Sectional Comparison of Small Animal [18F]-Florbetaben Amyloid-PET between Transgenic AD Mouse Models

We aimed to compare [18F]-florbetaben PET imaging in four transgenic mouse strains modelling Alzheimer’s disease (AD), with the main focus on APPswe/PS2 mice and C57Bl/6 mice serving as controls (WT). A consistent PET protocol (N = 82 PET scans) was used, with cortical standardized uptake value ratio (SUVR) relative to cerebellum as the endpoint. We correlated methoxy-X04 staining of β-amyloid with PET results, and undertook ex vivo autoradiography for further validation of a partial volume effect correction (PVEC) of PET data. The SUVR in APPswe/PS2 increased from 0.95±0.04 at five months (N = 5) and 1.04±0.03 (p<0.05) at eight months (N = 7) to 1.07±0.04 (p<0.005) at ten months (N = 6), 1.28±0.06 (p<0.001) at 16 months (N = 6) and 1.39±0.09 (p<0.001) at 19 months (N = 6). SUVR was 0.95±0.03 in WT mice of all ages (N = 22). In APPswe/PS1G384A mice, the SUVR was 0.93/0.98 at five months (N = 2) and 1.11 at 16 months (N = 1). In APPswe/PS1dE9 mice, the SUVR declined from 0.96/0.96 at 12 months (N = 2) to 0.91/0.92 at 24 months (N = 2), due to β-amyloid plaques in cerebellum. PVEC reduced the discrepancy between SUVR-PET and autoradiography from −22% to +2% and increased the differences between young and aged transgenic animals. SUVR and plaque load correlated highly between strains for uncorrected (R = 0.94, p<0.001) and PVE-corrected (R = 0.95, p<0.001) data. We find that APPswe/PS2 mice may be optimal for longitudinal amyloid-PET monitoring in planned interventions studies.
Phase-separation kinetics in a model with order-parameter-dependent mobility

We present extensive results from two-dimensional simulations of phase-separation kinetics in a model with order-parameter dependent mobility. We find that the time-dependent structure factor exhibits dynamical scaling and the scaling function is numerically indistinguishable from that for the Cahn-Hilliard (CH) equation, even in the limit where surface diffusion is the mechanism for domain growth. This supports the view that the scaling form of the structure factor is ``universal'' and leads us to question the conventional wisdom that an accurate representation of the scaled structure factor for the CH equation can only be obtained from a theory which correctly models bulk diffusion.
Dental Care Utilization and Unmet Dental Needs in Older Korean Americans

Objective: The study explored predictors of dental care utilization and unmet dental needs in older Korean Americans, considering predisposing, enabling (dental insurance, acculturation, and family network), and need (self-rated oral health) variables. Method: Multivariate regression models were used to evaluate the data from 209 Korean Americans (aged ≥60) surveyed in Central Texas. Results: Participants with strong family networks and fair/poor self-ratings of oral health reported higher numbers of dental visits in the past year. The likelihood of having an unmet dental need increased when participants had less education, a shorter stay in the United States, no dental insurance coverage, lower levels of acculturation, more limited family networks, fair/poor self-ratings of oral health, and fewer numbers of dental visits. Discussion: Our findings underscore the vulnerability of individuals who are culturally and linguistically isolated and lack family resources, and they highlight the importance of incorporating social and cultural factors in intervention efforts.
Shades of White: Identity Status, Stereotypes, Prejudice, and Xenophobia

Social identity, cultural socialization, intergroup contact hypothesis and group threat theories were used to examine White middle school adolescents' beliefs and attitudes toward Middle Eastern peers (Chaldeans). Ten focus group interviews in each of five Midwestern schools supported the hypothesized relationships between White majority/minority status in school and the saliency and centrality of White identity, awareness of their disadvantaged position in school, feelings of exclusion and dissonance, exhibition of in-group favoritism and out-group bias. Group threat factors predicating xenophobia for adolescents differ from those identified for adults. Group threat that precipitated White adolescents' xenophobic reactions toward Chaldean adolescents, including the rigidity of boundaries between the two groups, concerns about aggression and being outnumbered by Chaldeans, fear of loneliness and loss of friends, and differential treatment by teachers. Numerical minority status and the subjective perceptions of numerical minority status in the absence of factual numerical minority status were important predictors of xenophobia.
The Interpersonal Implications of Stealing the Glory

People tend to overestimate their contribution to joint tasks, in part because their own contributions are more memorable than the contributions of their collaborators. We examined some of the interpersonal consequences of this bias. Participants engaged in either a hypothetical (Experiment 2) or real (Experiment 1) cooperative task and learned how their collaborator ostensibly allocated responsibility. We varied how much credit the collaborator took for herself, and also how much credit she gave to the participant, factors confounded in past research. In each experiment, collaborators who stole the glory were seen as less fair, harder to get along with, and less honest than were collaborators who did not. Interestingly, this effect was driven by one's own contribution being underappreciated more than one's collaborator's contribution being overstated. Mediational analyses revealed that the discord could be traced to the attribution of biased responsibility judgments to self-interest on the part of one's collaborator.
Motor Learning on a Heaving Plate via Improved-SNR Algorithms

Creatures in nature have subtle and complicated interactions with their surrounding fluids, achieving levels of performance as yet unmatched by engineered solutions. Model-free reinforcement learning (MFRL) holds the promise of allowing man-made controllers to take advantage of the subtlety of fluid-body interactions solely using data gathered on the actual system to be controlled. In this thesis, improved MFRL algorithms, motivated by a novel Signal-to-Noise Ratio for policy gradient algorithms, are developed, and shown to provide more efficient learning in noisy environments. These algorithms are then demonstrated on a heaving foil, where it is shown to learn a flapping gait on an experimental system orders of magnitude faster than the dynamics can be simulated, suggesting broad applications both in controlling robots with complex dynamics and in the study of controlled fluid systems. Thesis Supervisor: Russ Tedrake Title: X Consortium Assistant Professor of EECS
Generalizing and Hybridizing Count-based and Neural Language Models

Language models (LMs) are statistical models that calculate probabilities over sequences of words or other discrete symbols. Currently two major paradigms for language modeling exist: count-based n-gram models, which have advantages of scalability and test-time speed, and neural LMs, which often achieve superior modeling performance. We demonstrate how both varieties of models can be unified in a single modeling framework that defines a set of probability distributions over the vocabulary of words, and then dynamically calculates mixture weights over these distributions. This formulation allows us to create novel hybrid models that combine the desirable features of count-based and neural LMs, and experiments demonstrate the advantages of these approaches.
Insulin Sensitivity in Newly Detected Hypertensive Patients: Influence of Captopril and Other Antihypertensive Agents on Insulin Sensitivity and Related Biological Parameters

In a recent study in which metabolic characteristics of newly detected obese and nonobese hypertensive subjects were compared with those of normotensive subjects, insulin sensitivity was decreased, fasting insulin values and insulin values after an intravenous glucose tolerance test (IVGTT) were increased, and fasting and IVGTT glucose values were increased in both hypertensive groups. Furthermore, adverse alterations in lipid profile variables were found in the hypertensive groups when compared with the normotensive group. The effects of various antihypertensive agents on these metabolic variables have been assessed in prospective trials. Treatment with the β1-selective blocking agents metoprolol and atenolol was associated with decreased insulin sensitivity and increased fasting values of insulin and glucose. There were also indications of a suppressive effect on insulin secretion during IVGTT. as well as an increase in serum triglycerides and a decrease in serum high-density lipoprotein cholesterol. Hydrochlorothiazide treatment was associated with a decrease in insulin sensitivity and an increase in blood glucose concentrations. In addition, hydrochlorothiazide increased total cholesterol. particularly the low-density lipoprotein fraction. The calcium channel blocker diltiazem did not appear to produce any negative metabolic effects. Treatment with the angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitor captopril resulted in increased insulin sensitivity with no adverse effects on lipids. All of the agents reduced blood pressure to a similar degree. These findings, and those of other studies, suggest that captopril and diltiazem offer advantages over the other agents with regard to effects on risk factors for coronary artery disease other than hypertension. Unlike diltiazem, captopril improves insulin sensitivity and this may prove to be important.
Literacy Instruction in Canadian Child Care Centers

Abstract The purpose of this study was to describe literacy instruction in child care centers, examine aspects of child care center quality that may predict such instruction, and provide a limited analysis of whether literacy instruction impacts children's concurrent pre-academic functioning. Staff and children in 103 classrooms serving preschool-age children from 64 child care centers in a major Canadian city participated in the study. Literacy instruction was captured using a series of 20-second, time-sampled observations over the course of one morning. The following types of literacy instruction were examined and are reported as a percentage of the snapshots in which they were observed: Reading Aloud, 2.8%; Word Instruction, 1.2%; Letter Identification, 1.2%; Printing/Writing, 0.7%; Symbol Recognition, 0.5%; Letter-Word Sounds, 0.2%; and Word Segmentation, 0%. Hierarchical linear models revealed that literacy instruction is a staff, rather than classroom or center, characteristic. Overall, literacy instruction occurred infrequently in child care classrooms. Indicators of quality were not found to drive literacy instruction, and literacy instruction did not predict greater verbal intelligence scores among children. Implications for research and practice are discussed.