Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Pathways to Children’s Academic Performance and Prosocial Behaviour: Roles of physical health status, environmental, family, and child factors

The objective of this article is to examine the pathways by which children’s physical health status, environmental, family, and child factors affect children’s academic performance and prosocial behaviour, using a theoretically‐based and empirically‐based model of competence development. The model proposes that 3 types of relational processes, dealing with opportunity, support, and skill development through participation, lead to competence. Structural equation modelling was performed on cross‐sectional, parent‐report data for approximately 10,000 Canadian children aged 6–11 years from the 1994–95 National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth. The analyses controlled for family socioeconomic status and child’s age and sex, and included 3 groups of children (those with activity‐limiting conditions, non‐activity‐limiting conditions, or no health problems). There was little evidence that children with chronic conditions were at direct risk for poorer outcomes. Children with activity‐limiting conditions were at increased indirect risk for academic difficulties through the role played by cognitive functioning. Cognitive functioning and hyperactivity/inattention difficulties were the major predictors of academic performance. Recreational participation and behavioural functioning were the main predictors of prosocial behaviour. The pathways in the model also indicated the importance of family functioning, social support to parents, and neighbourhood cohesion. In conclusion, the findings indicate the utility of the model of competence development in understanding the pathways and processes by which various factors affect children’s academic and social outcomes.
The initiation of early childhood inclusion in China: a case study from Beijing

The national policies of the Chinese government regarding preschool inclusion are emerging to promote the well-being of all children, particularly children with disabilities in natural environments such as regular preschools or in homes. Following the global trend towards inclusive education, preschools in Beijing are gradually implementing both the philosophies and practices of preschool inclusion through pilot programmes. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to illustrate how preschool inclusion is being introduced into the Chinese sociocultural context using a case study focused on a lead inclusion preschool being piloted. The authors will discuss findings from data triangulation of various data sources, including Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale-Revised ratings, interview transcriptions and document analysis.
How can language be linked to economics?: A survey of two strands of research

As the use of languages is playing a more and more important role in economic activities with the globalization of the world economy, there is growing interest in the relationship between language and economic theory. The rapidly expanding literature in this field, however, is highly fragmented. It is difficult to tell what this field of study focuses on, what has actually been investigated, and what remains to be studied. The authors attempt to review, assess and categorize the major orientations of the research on the economics of language. Those include a traditional strand of research that has focused on language and economic status, the dynamic development of languages, and language policy and planning, as well as a new strand based on game theory and pragmatics. The authors propose the use of the term “Language and economics” to define this area of research.
Student text-making as semiotic work

Semiotic work is principled engagement in the making of meaning. The semiotic work of school-based learning entails interpretation and expression framed by the curriculum and the social practices of the classroom, and realized multimodally in diverse pedagogic interactions and activities. Micro-examination of the relationship between a teacher's multimodally constituted framing of a task and students' responses in drawing and writing on individual dry-wipe whiteboards investigates the resources they selected in order to demonstrate their engagement, to make their texts suited to how they would be used, and to represent in ways apt to the subject area. These fleeting texts were just one realization of meaning among others in the semiotic flow of the lesson. Notwithstanding the speed of production and erasing soon after, the students' investment of semiotic work was principled. Taking their efforts seriously provides the ground for supporting them as they learn to make texts apt to different discourses and genres.
White Public Opinion toward Undocumented Immigrants: Threat and Interpersonal Environment

Public opinion toward undocumented immigration is discussed in the popular media yet receives less attention in the social science literature. With data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the U.S. Census, and the General Social Survey, this study examines whites' immigration opinions in 1996 and 2004. The results indicate that in 1996 whites who lived in areas with greater unemployment were more likely to favor government action against undocumented immigrants, while in 2004 whites who lived in areas with more Latino residents were less likely to favor such action. Whites who are embedded in educated networks and networks with racially different contacts are more likely to be sympathetic toward undocumented immigrants. Older networks were associated with restrictionist opinions. The interpersonal environment appears to remain consequential for whites, even if they have no contact with undocumented immigrants. This study finds that opinion formation results from broad demographic and small interpersonal structures.
Sex Offender Laws

To date, scholars have simply inferred the beliefs underlying sex offender laws from the passage and content of the legislation. Few researchers have directly spoken to legislators to determine their opinions of the sex offender problem. This study seeks to determine the perceptions of sex offenders and sex offending in the 1990s that drove the need for sex offender reform in Illinois and the degree to which these perceptions influenced the content of the laws. The findings suggest that policy makers had very distinct ideas about the nature of the sex offender problem in terms of who was responsible, who was in need of protection, and the degree to which legislative responses would address the issue. There was congruence between these personal perceptions and the content of sex offender laws. The results shed light on the degree to which public officials' personal perceptions influence the passage and content of legislation.
The efficacy of ivermectin in the chemotherapy of gastrointestinal helminthiasis in humans.

More than a billion individuals are infected with the four major soil-transmitted helminths of humans: Ascaris, hookworm, Trichuris, and Strongyloides [1]. In the developing world, available evidence suggests a substantial role for these intestinal nematodes in the generation of malnutrition and of the growth retardation that commonly follows [1]. Drug therapy for some of these intestinal helminth infections has existed for years, but polyparasitism is the rule in most affected individuals, and, unfortunately, no single broad spectrum anthelmintic agent has yet shown complete efficacy against all four nematodes [2]. Additionally, to be highly effective against Trichuris trichiura, Strongyloides stercoralis, or even hookworm, most drugs usually must be administered in multiple doses. A single anthelmintic drug effective in a single dose against all of these highly prevalent nematodes would clearly be advantageous. Ivermectin, an anthelmintic drug in wide use for several years by the veterinary industry, is unsurpassed both in its broad antinematode spectrum and in its remarkable potency when compared with previously available compounds [3]. In doses of up to 200 pg/kg this compound has recently been found to be safe and effective in humans [4]; larval forms of two systemic filarial nematodes of man, Onchocerca volvulus and Wuchereria bancrofti, are highly susceptible to therapy with ivermectin [5, 6]. As the drug has had extremely limited testing against gastrointestinal nematodes in humans [7], we conducted a pilot study to assess the efficacy of ivermectin as single-dose treatment against the common soil-transmitted helminthiases of humans.
The Interpersonal Approach to Morality: A Gender and Cultural Analysis

Abstract A gender and cultural study of moral judgment was conducted, examining possible gender, cultural, and ethnic differences, to test the adequacy of the theoretical and methodological model of Kohlberg (1969) as a representation of female reasoning. Seventy British, Mexican-American, Black American, and White American men and women were administered the Moral Judgment Interview (Form A). Protocols were scored according to Standard Issue Scoring (Colby et al., 1987). Results supported the assumption of structural universality in moral judgment. Replies across ethnic and cultural groups corresponded to Kohlberg's replies and to his stages, yet an interpersonal orientation to morality was evident in the protocols. Issues of care, communication, and omission were frequently expressed throughout the interviews.
High Harmonics with Controllable Polarization by a Burst of Linearly-Polarized Driver Pulses

We theoretically explore a scheme for generation of bright circularly and elliptically polarized high-order harmonics by bursts of linearly polarized pulses with a rotating polarization axis. Circularly polarized harmonics are formed if the bursts are comprised of N pulses that uphold an N-fold rotational symmetry, for N > 2. Rotating the polarization axes of the comprising pulses can generate elliptical harmonics with a collectively tunable ellipticity, from circular through elliptic to linear. The method preserves the single-cycle, single-atom and macroscopic physics of ‘standard’ linearly polarized high harmonic generation, with a high yield and cutoff energy. We investigate the method from a time-domain perspective, as well as a photonic perspective, and formulate the energy and spin-angular momentum conservation laws for this scheme. We find that the case of N = 4 is optimal for this method, resulting with the highest conversion efficiency of elliptical photons. The new features of this source offer new applications to helical ultrafast spectroscopy and ellipsometry.
How personality and risk-taking attitude affect the behavior of adventure recreationists

Scientific understanding of the relationships among the personality, risk-taking attitude, and behavior of adventure-based recreationists is limited. This study examines how personality and risk-taking attitude affect adventure behavior for two different adventure recreation activities (white water rafting and scuba diving) in Taiwan. A total of 843 usable questionnaires were collected and analyzed. The empirical results indicate that the risk-taking attitude of recreationists positively and significantly influences adventure behavior and that the recreationists’ personality traits positively and significantly influence their risk-taking attitude in white water rafting and scuba diving activities. Extraversion and openness traits positively and significantly influence the risk-taking attitude of both groups of recreationists, but a negative relationship between conscientiousness and risk-taking attitude was found only in scuba divers. The managerial implications of this study are discussed, and recommendations for future research are presented.
Coding for the Initiation of Pseudopregnancy by Temporally Patterned Activation of Amygdalar NMDA Receptors

Female rats modulate the number and interval between the intromissions the female receives during mating. This patterned vaginocervical stimulation (VCS) is critical for triggering long-term changes in prolactin (PRL) secretion necessary for pregnancy or pseudopregnancy (P/PSP). Previous work has shown that NMDA receptor activation in the posterodorsal medial amygdala (MEApd) is required at the time of mating for VCS to induce the twice-daily PRL surges characteristic of P/PSP. The current studies examined whether patterned activation of glutamate receptors within the MEApd induces P/PSP. In anesthetized, cycling females, three 0. 27μg NMDA infusions given at 30 min intervals into the MEApd initiated P/PSP, whereas a single NMDA infusion of the same total dose (0.8 μg) had no effect. In conscious, freely behaving females, three infusions of an excitatory amino acid (EAA) mixture applied at the same interval were more effective in initiating P/PSP and nocturnal PRL surges than were single infusions at the same or higher concentrations. Infusion intervals of 5 and 60 min as well as continuous 1 h infusion did not induce P/PSP. Finally, a synergistic effect was observed between EAA and mating stimulation, because a subthreshold EAA infusion combined with subthreshold numbers of intromissions induced P/PSP. These results demonstrate that repeated, properly spaced, temporally discreet periods of glutamate receptor activation within the MEApd, which mimic mating stimulation, encode for P/PSP. Such findings suggest that single intromissions normally release individually subthreshold quanta of glutamate within the MEApd that summate to induce P/PSP.
A Theoretical Account of an Empirical Fact in Psychology

It is the purpose of this article to indicate that the basic concepts in the theory of behavior that our present mathematical work is endeavoring to establish -see [2] and [3]-can provide a precise explanation for a fact that is coming to be observed more and more, in divers particular forms, in the areas of psychology and sociology. In reference to human beings in particular the phenomenon has produced many descriptions of itself. From among these we can fix on certain characteristic expressions to give a succinct first partial statement of the fact in question. It is this: new involvement is in general conducive to coming more alive. There are many forceful examples of the awareness of this empirical fact that can be cited within the domain of professional clinical psychology, and we shall point to some of these. But the incidence of this awareness, and the incidence of striking examples of the fact itself, go well beyond professional circles. It is the case today that this empirical generality is accepted to one or another degree consciously as a piece of natural theory and is applied, by professionals and nonprofessionals alike, with the result that we are seeing good effect in many problem areas that had not previously yielded to more traditional theoretical notions. We ourself-the present author-have participated at first-hand in the wave of experience that has been bringing the underlined empirical fact into greater and sharper prominence. Between the years 1964 and 1974 we organized and conducted, from the Berkeley campus of the University of California, with funding provided by the Field Foundation in New York, a nation-wide program in the United States aimed at bringing the so-called black colleges more into the main stream of higher education. This SCDC (-abbreviation for Special Committee for Development of Communication with Negro Colleges and Universities-) program was extraordinarily successful both in an absolute sense and in contrast to other programs that had posed similar goals for themselves. In retrospect it is clear that the unique degree of achievement of this program was due, first, to its intuitive appreciation (-it was not consciously applying a theory at that time-)
University of Birmingham On degree sequences forcing the square of a Hamilton cycle

A famous conjecture of Pósa from 1962 asserts that every graph on n vertices and with minimum degree at least 2n/3 contains the square of a Hamilton cycle. The conjecture was proven for large graphs in 1996 by Komlós, Sárközy and Szemerédi [27]. In this paper we prove a degree sequence version of Pósa’s conjecture: Given any η > 0, every graph G of sufficiently large order n contains the square of a Hamilton cycle if its degree sequence d1 ≤ · · · ≤ dn satisfies di ≥ (1/3 + η)n + i for all i ≤ n/3. The degree sequence condition here is asymptotically best possible. Our approach uses a hybrid of the Regularity-Blow-up method and the ConnectingAbsorbing method.
Sea ice surface temperature product from MODIS

Global sea ice products are produced from the Earth Observing System (EOS) Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) onboard both the Terra and Aqua satellites. Daily sea ice extent and ice surface temperature (IST) products are available at 1- and 4-km resolution. Validation activities during the "cold period" (when meltwater is generally not present) in the Northern Hemisphere, defined here as October through May, have been undertaken to assess the accuracy of the 1-km resolution MODIS IST algorithm and product. Validation was also done at the South Pole station in Antarctica. In the Arctic Ocean, near-surface air temperatures from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Ocean Service (NOS) Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services (CO-OPS) Alaska tide stations and from drifting buoys from the North Pole Environmental Observatory (NPEO) buoy program were compared with MODIS-derived ISTs. Using the standard MODIS sea ice product, which utilizes the MODIS cloud mask, results show a bias (mean error) of -2.1 K and a root mean square (RMS) error of 3.7 K. The negative bias means that the satellite retrieval is less than the air temperature. With the bias removed, the RMS error is 3.0 K. When additional visual cloud screening is performed to eliminate MODIS pixels thought to be contaminated by fog, results improved, with a subset of the larger dataset showing a bias of -0.9 K and an RMS error of 1.6 K. Uncertainties would be reduced in the Arctic Ocean dataset if the skin temperature of the sea ice were reported instead of the near-surface air temperatures. With the bias removed, the RMS error for the Arctic Ocean dataset is 1.3 K. Results from the South Pole station in Antarctica show that under clear skies as determined using lidar measurements, the MODIS ISTs are also very close to those of the near-surface air temperatures with a bias of -1.2 K and an RMS error of 1.7 K. With the bias removed, the RMS error for the South Pole dataset is 1.2 K. Thus, the accuracy (RMS error) of the IST measurement is 1.2-1.3 K. It is not possible to obtain an accurate IST from MODIS in the presence of even very thin clouds or fog, and this is the main limitation of the MODIS ice surface temperature product. MODIS sea ice products may be ordered from the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, CO.
Beliefs about willpower moderate the effect of previous day demands on next day’s expectations and effective goal striving

Research suggests that beliefs about willpower affect self-regulation following previous self-regulatory demands (Job et al., 2010). Some people believe that their willpower is limited, meaning that after a demanding task it needs to be replenished (limited theory). By contrast, others believe that willpower is not limited and that previous self-control tasks even activate willpower (non-limited theory). We hypothesized that when people experience a demanding day their beliefs about willpower predict their expected capacity to self-regulate and their actual self-regulation on the following day. In a daily diary study (N = 157), we measured students’ daily level of demands, their expected performance in unpleasant tasks, and their effective goal striving. Results showed that following a demanding day, students with a non-limited theory had higher expectations about their progress in unpleasant tasks and were striving more efficiently for their goals than students with a limited theory. These findings suggest that beliefs about willpower affect whether demands experienced on a previous day have positive or negative consequences on people’s self-regulation.
Roma and their education in Cyprus: reflections on INSETRom teacher training for Roma inclusion

In this paper, the authors report on the results of the implementation of the IN‐SErvice Training for Roma Inclusion (INSETRom) project in Cyprus and discuss conclusions relating to the school inclusion of Roma in the Greek Cypriot educational system. After presenting country‐specific information on Roma and the education of Roma in the Greek Cypriot educational system, the authors describe a needs assessment study which took place in the course of the INSETRom project in Cyprus. The data for this preliminary phase of the project were collected through semi‐structured interviews with Roma pupils and their parents, as well as their teachers, from the three schools attended by the largest numbers of Roma children in the Greek Cypriot educational system. Despite official policies of non‐segregation and employment of supportive measures, the data pointed to the marginalization of Roma children in the school system. On the basis of these findings, the authors then describe the design, implementation and evaluation of the teacher‐training programme that followed. The paper concludes with the discussion of contextual and methodological issues relating to teacher training for educating Roma students in multicultural school settings. The authors also reflect on factors beyond teacher training which need to be addressed if education is to become inclusive for all pupils in general, and Roma children in particular.
Genetic characterization of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 in blood and genital secretions: evidence for viral compartmentalization and selection during sexual transmission

To explore the mechanism of sexual transmission of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1), we compared HIV-1 gp120 sequences in longitudinal samples from five acute seroconvertors with those from their corresponding sexual partners (transmitters). We used a quantitative homoduplex tracking assay to compare the overall genetic composition of HIV-1 quasispecies in each transmission pair and to track the transmitted viruses during the acute and asymptomatic stages of HIV-1 infection. In the chronically infected transmitters, HIV-1 variants in genital secretions differed from those in blood and variants in cells differed from those in cell-free plasma, indicating remarkable sequence heterogeneity in these subjects as well as compartmentalization of the virus in different bodily sites. Conversely, two of five seroconvertors had only a few related variants and three of five harbored only one viral population, indicating that in these subjects the transmitted viruses were typically homogeneous. Transmitted viruses were evident in the donor's seminal plasma (one of five cases) and even more so in their seminal cells (three of five cases), suggesting that both cell-associated and cell-free viruses can be transmitted. In every pair studied, the transmitted variant(s) represents only a minor population in the semen of the corresponding transmitter, thereby providing evidence that HIV-1 selection indeed occurs during sexual transmission.