Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Testing the Effectiveness of Brief Psychoeducation to Improve Parent Problem Recognition

A significant discrepancy exists between the rate of mental health problems in children and adolescents and their engagement in mental health services. A major contributor to this problem is poor mental health literacy among parents. Parents are typically responsible for identifying mental health issues in their children, but studies show that they struggle with problem recognition. The current study is the first randomized controlled trial to assess the effectiveness of an intervention to increase parents’ recognition skills of children’s mental health problems. Participants included 298 participants recruited from community and online settings. Participants ranged in age from 24 to 58 and had at least one child between ages three and 17. Parents who were randomly assigned to the intervention group viewed a pamphlet designed for the current study that provided psychoeducation about problem recognition. Parents in the control group did not view the pamphlet. All parents read three vignettes that described a child with an anxiety disorder, ADHD, and no clinical diagnosis, then completed measures of problem recognition, problem severity, and perceived need for services. Parents also answered questions about their own experiences with mental health issues. Findings revealed that the intervention did not improve problem recognition or increase perceived need for services. However, problem recognition, problem severity, and perceived need for services were rated higher among parents with a personal or familial history of mental health problems, suggesting that mental health experience increases mental health literacy. Additionally, more parents, particularly women, recognized symptoms of anxiety than symptoms of ADHD, which contrasts findings from previous studies. Personal history of anxiety was particularly high among our study sample, which may explain the disproportionately high rate of anxiety recognition. Together, these findings suggest that problem recognition is influenced by knowledge of and experience with mental health issues. Due to the brevity of the pamphlet, the dose of the intervention may have been too low to effect observable change in problem recognition. Future research is warranted to continue exploring the impact of other interventions to increase parents’ problem recognition skills.
Omega-3 Fatty Acids Inhibit Tumor Growth in a Rat Model of Bladder Cancer

Omega-3 (ω-3) fatty acids have been tested on prevention and treatment of several cancer types, but the efficacy on “in vivo” bladder cancer has not been analyzed yet. This study aimed at evaluating the chemopreventive efficacy of eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) mixture in an animal model of bladder cancer. Forty-four male Wistar rats were divided into 4 groups during a 20-week protocol: control; carcinogen—N-butyl-N-(4-hydroxybutyl) nitrosamine (BBN); ω-3 (DHA + EPA); and ω-3 + BBN. BBN and ω-3 were given during the initial 8 weeks. At week 20 blood and bladder were collected and checked for the presence of urothelium lesions and tumors, markers of inflammation, proliferation, and redox status. Incidence of bladder carcinoma was, control (0%), ω-3 (0%), BBN (65%), and ω-3 + BBN (62.5%). The ω-3 + BBN group had no infiltrative tumors or carcinoma in situ, and tumor volume was significantly reduced compared to the BBN (0.9 ± 0.1 mm3 versus 112.5 ± 6.4 mm3). Also, it showed a reduced MDA/TAS ratio and BBN-induced serum CRP, TGF-β1, and CD31 were prevented. In conclusion, omega-3 fatty acids inhibit the development of premalignant and malignant lesions in a rat model of bladder cancer, which might be due to anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, anti-proliferative, and anti-angiogenic properties.
Resistance to Change and Performance: Toward a More Even-Handed View of Dispositional Resistance

The tendency to resist changes is generally viewed in a negative light. In the present studies, I aim for a more balanced view and focus on the relationship between dispositional resistance to change and task performance. I demonstrate in three studies that whereas resistant individuals rate more poorly on nonroutine tasks, they outperform nonresistors on routine tasks. In Study 1, using data from 79 job applicants demonstrated, dispositional resistance to change was negatively associated with participants’ performance on nonroutine tasks and positively associated with their performance on routine tasks. These effects were replicated among 73 lab participants who performed an unstructured and dynamic nonroutine task (Study 2) and 108 participants who performed a routine and monotonous task (Study 3). The findings support a more balanced view of dispositional resistance to change, acknowledging its potential benefits for performing routine tasks, alongside its detrimental effects for performance on nonroutine tasks.
Electronic Communications of the EASST Volume 12 ( 2008 ) Formal Modeling of Adaptive and Mobile Processes On the Modelling of an Agent ’ s Epistemic State and its Dynamic Changes

Given a set of unquantified conditionals considered as default rules or a set of quantified conditionals such as probabilistic rules, an agent can build up its internal epistemic state from such a knowledge base by inductive reasoning techniques. Besides certain (logical) knowledge, epistemic states are supposed to allow the representation of preferences, beliefs, assumptions etc. of an intelligent agent. If the agent lives in a dynamic environment, it has to adapt its epistemic state constantly to changes in the surrounding world in order to be able to react adequately to new demands. In this paper, we present a high-level specification of the CONDOR system that provides powerful methods and tools for managing knowledge represented by conditionals and the corresponding epistemic states of an agent. Thereby, we are able to elaborate and formalize crucial interdependencies between different aspects of knowledge representation, knowledge discovery, and belief revision. Moreover, this specification, using Gurevich’s Abstract State Machines, provides the basis for a stepwise refinement development process of the CONDOR system based on the ASM methodology.
Spatial-Temporal Pyramid Matching for Crowd Scene Analysis

Crowd scene analysis has caught significant attention both in academia and industry as it has a great number of potential applications. In this paper, we propose a novel spatial-temporal pyramid matching scheme for crowd scene analysis. Video segments are represented as concatenated histograms of all cells at all pyramid levels with corresponding weights, which reflect corresponding matches at finer resolutions are weighted more highly than that found at coarser resolution. Using the classical stochastic gradient descent method, we also propose an online one-class support vector machine algorithm for online anomaly detection scenarios. Extensive experiments have been carried out on two benchmark datasets and the comparison to the state-of-the-art methods validate the advantages of our approach.
Classifying gene expression data of cancer using classifier ensemble with mutually exclusive features

The explosion of DNA and protein sequence data in public and private databases has been encouraging interdisciplinary research on biology and information technology. Gene expression profiles are just sequences of numbers, and the necessity of tools analyzing them to get useful information has risen significantly. In order to predict the cancer class of patients from the gene expression profile, this paper presents a classification framework that combines a pair of classifiers trained with mutually exclusive features. The idea behind feature selection with nonoverlapping correlation is to encourage classifier ensemble, which consists of multiple classifiers, to learn different aspects of training data, so that classifiers can search in a wide solution space. Experimental results show that the classifier ensemble produces higher recognition accuracy than conventional classifiers.
Differences in Empathic Concern and Perspective Taking Across 63 Countries

Cultural practices socialize people to relate to others in different ways. One critical way in which these interpersonal bonds are formed and maintained is via empathy, our emotional reactivity toward others’ experiences. However, the extent to which individuals from different cultures vary in their dispositional empathy, and the correlates of these differences, are relatively unknown. Thus, the current study explored cultural variation in empathy, and how this variation is related to psychological characteristics and prosocial behavior across cultures. Evidence from an original sample of 104,365 adults across 63 countries reveals that higher empathy countries also have higher levels of collectivism, agreeableness, conscientiousness, self-esteem, emotionality, subjective well-being, and prosocial behavior. These findings reveal that empathy is situated within a broader nomological network of other psychological characteristics, emotional expression and experiences, and prosocial behavior across cultures. The current study expands our understanding about how psychological characteristics vary across cultures and how these characteristics can manifest in broader national indicators of prosocial behavior.
Search for an Association between V249I and T280M CX3CR1 Genetic Polymorphisms, Endothelial Injury and Preeclampsia: The ECLAXIR Study

Background Preeclampsia and coronary-artery disease share risk factors, suggesting common pathophysiological mechanisms. CX3CR1/CX3CL1 mediates leukocyte migration and adhesion and has been implicated in the pathophysiology of several inflammatory diseases. M280/I249 variants of CX3CR1 are associated with an atheroprotective effect and reduced endothelial dysfunction. The aim of this study was to search for an association between V249I and T280M polymorphisms of CX3CR1, preeclampsia and endothelial dysfunction. Methodology/Principal Findings We explored these polymorphisms with real-time polymerase chain reaction in a case-control study (184 white women with preeclampsia and 184 matched normotensive pregnant women). Endothelial dysfunction biomarkers including von Willebrand factor, VCAM-1 and thrombomodulin, as well as the soluble form of CX3CL1 were measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA). The I249 and M280 alleles were associated neither with preeclampsia, nor with its more severe form or with endothelial injury. In contrast, we found a trend toward increased CX3CL1 levels in preeclampsia patients, especially in early-onset- preeclampsia as compared to its level in later-onset- preeclampsia. Conclusions/Significance This is the first study to characterize the CX3CR1 gene polymorphisms in patients with preeclampsia. We found no differences in genotype or haplotype frequencies between patients with PE and normal pregnancies, suggesting that maternal CX3CR1 V249I and T280M polymorphisms do not increase susceptibility to preeclampsia. Further studies should be performed to directly evaluate the pathophysiological role of CX3CL1, a molecule abundantly expressed in endometrium, which has been shown to stimulate human trophoblast migration.
Conveyed Leader PsyCap Predicting Leader Effectiveness Through Positive Energizing

Whereas past research on psychological capital (PsyCap) has tended to focus on how one’s self-attributed PsyCap affects one’s work behaviors, we extend this literature by examining the concept of conveyed PsyCap and its downstream consequences, above and beyond the influence of self-attributed PsyCap. Drawing from the emotions-as-social-information model, we tested a model of conveyed leader PsyCap predicting leader effectiveness through team positive energizing. A laboratory experiment and a multisource study provided support for our hypotheses. We furthermore found that a leader’s within-team consistency in conveyed PsyCap moderates these effects, such that leaders who are more consistent in conveyed PsyCap are rated by followers as better leaders, via the mediating effect of team positive energizing. A post hoc analysis further suggests that conveyed PsyCap is more consistent when conveyed PsyCap is congruent with self-attributed PsyCap. Our work contributes to a better understanding of the underlying mechanisms that make leaders with greater conveyed PsyCap more effective and advances the conceptualization and measurement of PsyCap.
Growth inhibition of Staphylococcus aureus and escherichia coli strains by neutralizing IgY antibodies from ostrich egg yolk

Ostrich raising around the world have some key factors and farming profit depend largely on information and ability of farmers to rear these animals. Non fertilized eggs from ostriches are discharged in the reproduction season. Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli are microorganisms involved in animal and human diseases. In order to optimize the use of sub products of ostrich raising, non fertilized eggs of four selected birds were utilized for development of polyclonal IgY antibodies. The birds were immunized (200ug/animal) with purified recombinant staphylococcal enterotoxin C (recSEC) and synthetic recRAP, both derived from S. aureus, and recBFPA and recEspB involved in E. coli pathogenicity, diluted in FCA injected in the braquial muscle. Two subsequent immunization steps with 21 days intervals were repeated in 0,85% saline in FIA. Blood and eggs samples were collected before and after immunization steps. Egg yolk immunoglobulins were purified by precipitation with 19% sodium sulfate and 20% ammonium sulphate methodologies. Purified IgY 50μL aliquots were incubated in 850μL BHI broth containing 50μL inoculums of five strains of S. aureus and five strains of E.coli during four hours at 37°C. Growth inhibition was evaluated followed by photometry reading (DO550nm). Egg yolk IgY preparation from hiperimmunized birds contained antibodies that inhibited significantly (p<0,05) growth of strains tested. Potential use of ostrich IgY polyclonal antibodies as a diagnostic and therapeutic tool is proposed for diseased animals.
Adaptive checkpointing in dynamic grids for uncertain job durations

Adaptive checkpointing is a relatively new approach that is particularly suitable for providing fault-tolerance in dynamic and unstable grid environments. The approach allows for periodic modification of checkpointing intervals at run-time, when additional information becomes available. In this paper an adaptive algorithm, named MeanFailureCP+, is introduced that deals with checkpointing of grid applications with execution times that are unknown a priori. The algorithm modifies its parameters, based on dynamically collected feedback on its performance. Simulation results show that the new algorithm performs even better than adaptive approaches that make use of exact information on job execution times.
Active Ethical Leadership, Giftedness, and Creativity

This commentary is focused on Robert Sternberg’s new Active Concerned Citizenship and Ethical Leadership (ACCEL) model. The new model is well conceived and goes far beyond existing models. It is especially attractive in that the emphasis is on ethics. Now more than ever before there is a clear need for education to support ethical reasoning and behavior, and if this is coupled with active and concerned citizenship, as Sternberg proposes, we may find talents that are as of yet untapped and enormously useful for society.
The effects of extraversion and attention on short-term habituation of auditory evoked potential responses

The Effects of Extraversion and Attent ion on Short-Term Habituation of Auditory Evoked Potential Responses. The Auditory Evoked Responses to tonebursts of 80 dB, 500 hz and of . 2 second duration were recorded from two groups of 24 subjects each, c lass i f i ed as in t rover ts and extraver ts . In the experimental cond i t ion , a t r a i n of four st imul i with ISI of 1 second was repeated 24 times with an i n t e r t r a i n in terva l ( IT I ) of 60 seconds, giving a to ta l of 96 s t imulat ions. Each of the four st imuli was averaged across the 24 t r a i n s . In the control condi t ion, the 96 st imul i were given in a continuous series at the regular rate of 1/sec. Al l subjects underwent the two sessions which were given in a counterbalanced order. Half of the subjects of each group were requested to attend to the stimulus and the remaining half were instructed to ignore the st imulus. No differences between attend and ignore conditions were observed for the Nl P2 component. When the amplitude of peaks Nl and P2 was analysed from a prestimulus basel ine, an in teract ion between extraversion and attention was observed. Under the attend cond i t ion , in t rover ts displayed larger P2 amplitude than ex t raver ts . However, in t rover ts had smaller Nl amplitude than the extraverts under the attend condi t ion. Larger i n i t i a l Nl P2 amplitude was also observed for the in t rover ts thus demonstrating consistency with previous resu l ts (Stelmack, Achorn, & Michaud, 1977). These f indings suggest that the larger Nl P2 amplitude for in t rover ts found in the
The Effect of Collaborative Learning on Enhancing Student Achievement : A Meta-Analysis

The purpose of this meta-analysis was to investigate the effect of collaborative learning on student achievement. The sample of the study consisted of 20 representative studies involving 2434 participants selected from an extensive literature search based on the use of collaborative activities in a formal education setting cutting across multiple grade levels and subject domains. Analysis of representative studies (k = 28) yielded a moderately weighted average effect size of 0.26. A mixed effects model was used for the analysis of the moderators of effect size. The research design was not significant across true and quasi- designs. Two groups – high collaboration (Experimental condition) and no or less collaboration (control condition) – were compared to measure the effect of collaborative learning on the dependent variable of student achievement. The analyses of moderator variables were not significant or suffered from a lack of statistical power (i.e., grade levels). Implications for the use of the collaborative learning are discussed, and recommendations for future researchers are suggested along with the limitation and conclusions. Keywords: collaborative learning, meta-analysis, student achievement
“People Need to Understand Why We are Who We are”: An Ethnographic Study of Homeless Women in Brisbane

Recent statistical information suggests that the numbers of homeless women in Australia are growing. Due to the increase of female homelessness, the Department of Housing, Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (2008) published a White Paper where they emphasise two main aims: first, to halve homelessness by 2020, and second to offer supported accommodation to all rough sleepers who need it. For this to be achieved, the issues homeless women experience need to be explored and addressed. Little is known about the experiences of, and the meanings attached to, homelessness for women. While there has been an increase in the research undertaken in the field of homelessness in recent years, these examinations not only lack a qualitative dimension, they also tend to be ‘gender-blind’. This thesis, through the analysis of ethnographic data, explores the role of gender and space in the lives of homeless women in Brisbane, Australia. The research employed a grounded theory approach and was guided by the theoretical considerations of gender relations, gender identity and gendered spatiality. This thesis gives voice to the many homeless women of Brisbane. The research upon which the thesis is based involved over ten months of intensive fieldwork on the streets of Brisbane. Data were generated through life history interviews and observation and participation in the field. The findings suggest that, for homeless women (whose biographies include stories of previously abusive home lives and disadvantage) the notion of ‘being’ homeless encompasses much more than the risky reality of life on the street.
Implicitly measuring attitudes towards inclusive education: a new attitude test based on single-target implicit associations

Abstract Recent research on attitudes towards inclusion uses almost exclusively explicit measures such as questionnaires. Unfortunately, explicit attitude measures are biased by social desirability, particularly when the attitude object is ‘sensible’, as with inclusive education. Implicit attitude measures are less prone to social desirability, but research on implicit attitudes towards inclusive education is scarce. Thus, we introduce a new attitude measure based on the Single-Target Implicit Association Test (ST-IAT). In our study, 163 teacher students took the new implicit attitude test and completed questionnaires on their explicit attitudes towards inclusive education and persons with disabilities and a comprehensive scale on socially desirable responding. The results support the psychometric quality of our ‘Inclusion ST-IAT’. The implicit and explicit attitude measures are correlated but empirically distinct. Furthermore, the social desirability scores were associated with explicit but not with implicit attitudes towards inclusion, i.e. our measure of attitudes towards inclusion (a sensible topic) was not biased by social desirability. We propose that implicit measures should be used to reduce the influence of social desirability in inclusive education research. To encourage replications, we outline important research questions and provide the source code of our ST-IAT, which is open and free to use.
Liquidity Constraints of the Middle Class

Existing evidence from US middle class households shows that their MPCs out of tax rebates greatly exceed the PIH’s prediction and are weakly related to their liquid assets. The standard precautionary-saving model predicts the first fact but counterfactu-ally requires MPCs to decrease with liquid wealth. Evidence from the Survey of Consumer Finances indicates widespread saving in anticipation of major expenditures like home purchases and college education. Adding such savings to the standard precautionary-saving model allows it to generate realistic MPCs for households with liquid wealth: the approaching expenditure simultaneously motivates asset accumulation and raises MPCs by shortening the effective planning horizon. (JEL D14, D15, D31, E21, H24, H31)