Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An exploratory study on the role of foreign language aptitudes in instructed pragmatics learning in L2 Chinese

Abstract This study investigated whether and how foreign language (FL) aptitudes interacted with different instructional conditions to affect pragmatic gains in L2 Chinese. Fifty American learners of Chinese were randomly assigned to an (explicit) input-based treatment group, an (explicit) output-based treatment group, and a control group. Following a metapragmatic session, the two treatment groups practiced target request-making forms through their respective computer programs, while the control group did not practice. Gains in pragmatic performance were measured by a listening judgment test and an oral production test at immediate and delayed posttests. The participants also completed three foreign language (FL) aptitude tests assessing rote memory, grammatical sensitivity, and working memory. The results revealed different patterns of correlation between FL aptitudes and pragmatic gains. The input group showed positive correlations between working memory and reductions in judgment response times at both immediate and delayed posttests. The output group showed a positive correlation between grammatical sensitivity and gains in production speech rates at immediate posttest; a negative correlation was also found between rote memory and reductions in production planning times made at immediate posttest.
Research Note - Awareness Displays and Social Motivation for Coordinating Communication

Researchers and designers have been building awareness displays to improve the coordination of communication between distributed co-workers since the early 1990s. Awareness displays are technology designed to provide contextual information about the activities of group members. Most researchers have assumed that these displays improve the coordination of communication regardless of the relationship between the communicating parties. This article examines the conditions under which awareness displays improve coordination and the types of designs that most effectively support communication timing without overwhelming people with irrelevant information. Results from a pair of laboratory experiments indicate that awareness displays containing information about a remote collaborator's workload lead to communication attempts that are less disruptive, but only when the interrupter has incentives to be concerned about the collaborator's welfare. High-information awareness displays harmed interrupters' task performance, while abstract displays did not. We conclude that a display with an abstract representation of a collaborator's workload is optimal; it leads to better timing of interruptions without overwhelming the person viewing the display.
Cognitive Droughts

Poverty involves both low income levels and high income uncertainty. Do both these dimensions of being poor capture attention in ways that distort decision-making and trap people in poverty? We examine these issues using real-life shocks faced by farmers in Brazil: random payday variation affecting income levels, and rainfall shocks that affect income uncertainty. We find that it is income uncertainty that systematically has adverse cognitive effects; low income levels affect only the poorest households. The net adverse impacts on cognitive function prevail even though both dimensions of poverty reallocate attention to scarce-resource tasks. These results broaden our understanding of the impacts of uncertainty by exploring a psychological channel distinct from risk aversion, and help reconcile apparently contradictory evidence on the cognitive impact of poverty in previous studies.
Predictive models for identifying software components prone to failure during security attacks

Sometimes software security engineers are given a product that they not familiar with, but are asked to have a security analysis done for it in a relatively short time. An early knowledge of where the most vulnerable regions of a software-based system are likely to reside can help prioritize their efforts. In general, software metrics can be used to predict faultand failure-prone components for prioritizing inspection, testing, and redesign efforts. We believe that the security community can leverage this knowledge to design tools and metrics that can identify vulnerabilityand attack-prone software components early in the software life cycle. We analyzed a large commercial telecommunications software-based system and found that the presence of security faults correlates strongly with the presence of a more general category of reliability faults. This, of course, is not surprising if one accepts the notion that security faults are in many instances a subset of a reliability fault set. We discuss a model that can be useful for identifying attack-prone components and for prioritizing security efforts early in the software life-cycle.
Microenvironmental considerations in the application of human mesenchymal stem cells in regenerative therapies

The therapeutic utilization of stem cells has been ongoing for several decades, principally in the form of bone marrow (BM) transplants to treat various hematological disorders and other immune-related diseases. More recently, stem cells have been examined as a potential therapy for a multitude of other diseases and disorders, many of which are currently untreatable. One consideration that poses a formidable task for the successful clinical application of stem cells in new disease models is the impact of the host tissue microenvironment on the desired therapeutic outcome. In vitro, stem cells exist in surroundings directly controllable by the researcher to produce the desired cellular behavior. In vivo, the transplanted cells are exposed to a dynamic host microenvironment laden with soluble mediators and immunoreactive cells. In this review, we focus on the possible contribution by microenvironmental factors, and how these influences can be overcome in therapies utilizing mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), such as for graft versus host disease, multiple sclerosis and ischemia among others. Specifically, we examine three ubiquitous microenvironmental factors, IL-1α/β, TNFα, and SDF-1α, and consider how inhibitors and receptor antagonists to these molecules could be applied to increase the efficacy of MSC therapies while minimizing unforeseen harm to the patient.
Expectation Correction for Smoothed Inference in Switching Linear Dynamical Systems

We introduce a method for approximate smoothed inference in a class of switching linear dynamical systems, based on a novel form of Gaussian Sum smoother. This class includes the switching Kalman 'Filter' and the more general case of switch transitions dependent on the continuous latent state. The method improves on the standard Kim smoothing approach by dispensing with one of the key approximations, thus making fuller use of the available future information. Whilst the central assumption required is projection to a mixture of Gaussians, we show that an additional conditional independence assumption results in a simpler but accurate alternative. Our method consists of a single Forward and Backward Pass and is reminiscent of the standard smoothing 'correction' recursions in the simpler linear dynamical system. The method is numerically stable and compares favourably against alternative approximations, both in cases where a single mixture component provides a good posterior approximation, and where a multimodal approximation is required.
Does Competition Improve Industrial Productivity? An analysis of Japanese industries on the basis of the industry-level panel data

This study mainly investigates the causal relation between the degree of competition, which is measured by the Lerner index, and the total factor productivity (TFP) growth rate on the basis of the Japanese industry-level panel data (Japan Industrial Productivity (JIP) Database) from 1980 to 2008. The central finding indicates that, although a positive effect of competition on the TFP growth rate is clearly observable in the manufacturing industries throughout the sample period, such effect in the non-manufacturing industries may be slightly negative in the latter half of the sample period (1995-2008). This finding of a negative competition effect may lend support to the claim that the Schumpeterian hypothesis can be applied in the case of the non-manufacturing industries. Furthermore, a weak inverted-U shape relation between the competition measure and TFP growth proposed by Aghion et al. (2005) can be seen limitedly almost exclusively in all industries.
Improving patient length-of-stay in emergency department through dynamic resource allocation policies

In this work, we consider the problem of allocating doctors in the ambulatory area of a hospital's emergency department (ED) based on a set of policies. Traditional staffing methods are static, hence do not react well to surges in patient demands. We study strategies that intelligently adjust the number of doctors based on current and historical information about the patient arrival. Our main contribution is our proposed data-driven online approach that performs adaptive allocation by utilizing historical as well as current arrivals by running symbiotic simulation in real-time. We build a simulation prototype that models ED process that is close to real-world with time-varying demand and re-entrant patients. The experimental results show that our approach allows the ED to better cope with demand surges and to meet a service level desired by the hospital.
The role of addressee backchannels and conversational grounding in vicarious word learning in four-year-olds

Children successfully learn words through overhearing others engaged in verbal interactions. The current studies investigated the degree to which four-year-old overhearers are influenced by the response behaviors of addressees and by the interactional pattern of the speakers and addressees. It was found that while addressee responses on their own did not influence vicarious word learning (Experiment 1), they did influence vicarious word learning when they were part of the shared process of dialogue construction (Experiment 2). When speaker responses reinforced the label after disagreeing addressee behaviors, vicarious word learning was boosted. This suggests that, by the age of four, vicarious word learning involves dialogue comprehension and a pragmatic understanding of the joint construction of talk by conversational partners.
Normal modes of black hole accretion disks

This article studies the hydrodynamical problem of normal modes of small adiabatic oscillations of relativistic barotropic thin accretion disks around black holes (and compact weakly magnetic neutron stars). Employing Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin (WKB) techniques, we obtain the eigenfrequencies and eigenfunctions of the modes for different values of the mass and angular momentum of the central black hole. We discuss the properties of the various types of modes and show for the first time that modes covering the whole extension of the disk (full-disk p-modes) can exist within the studied thin disk model. However, these modes have relatively short wavelengths.
The Role of Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex in the Recovery of Extinguished Fear

Conditioned fear responses to a tone paired with footshock extinguish when the tone is presented repeatedly in the absence of shock. Rather than erase the tone–shock association, extinction is thought to involve new learning accompanied by inhibition of conditioned responding. Despite much interest in extinction from a clinical perspective, little is known about the neural circuits that are involved. Although the prefrontal cortex has a well established role in the inhibition of inappropriate behaviors, previous reports have disagreed as to the role of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) in extinction. We have reexamined the effects of electrolytic vmPFC lesions made before training on the acquisition, extinction, and recovery of conditioned fear responses in a 2 d experiment. On Day 1 vmPFC lesions had no effect on acquisition or extinction of conditioned freezing and suppression of bar pressing. On Day 2 sham rats recovered only 27% of their acquired freezing, whereas vmPFC-lesioned rats recovered 86%, which was indistinguishable from a control group that never received extinction. The high recovery in lesioned rats could not be attributed to decreased motivation or altered sensitivity to footshock. vmPFC lesions that spared the caudal infralimbic (IL) nucleus had no effect. Thus, the vmPFC (particularly the IL nucleus) is not necessary for expression of extinction, but it is necessary for the recall of extinction learning after a long delay. These data suggest a role of the vmPFC in consolidation of extinction learning or the recall of contexts in which extinction took place.
Polyethylene Glycol Camouflaged Earthworm Hemoglobin

Nearly 21 million components of blood and whole blood and transfused annually in the United States, while on average only 13.6 million units of blood are donated. As the demand for Red Blood Cells (RBCs) continues to increase due to the aging population, this deficit will be more significant. Despite decades of research to develop hemoglobin (Hb) based oxygen (O2) carriers (HBOCs) as RBC substitutes, there are no products approved for clinical use. Lumbricus terrestris erythrocruorin (LtEc) is the large acellular O2 carrying protein complex of the earthworm Lumbricus terrestris. LtEc is an extremely stable protein complex, resistant to autoxidation, and capable of transporting O2 to tissue when transfused into mammals. These characteristics render LtEc a promising candidate for the development of the next generation HBOCs. LtEc has a short half‐life in circulation, limiting its application as a bridge over days, until blood became available. Conjugation with polyethylene glycol (PEG‐LtEc) can extend LtEc circulation time. This study explores PEG‐LtEc pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics. To study PEG‐LtEc pharmacokinetics, hamsters instrumented with the dorsal window chamber were subjected to a 40% exchange transfusion with 10 g/dL PEG‐LtEc or LtEc and followed for 48 hours. To study the vascular response of PEG‐LtEc, hamsters instrumented with the dorsal window chamber received multiple infusions of 10 g/dL PEG‐LtEc or LtEc solution to increase plasma LtEc concentration to 0.5, then 1.0, and 1.5 g/dL, while monitoring the animals' systemic and microcirculatory parameters. Results confirm that PEGylation of LtEc increases its circulation time, extending the half‐life to 70 hours, 4 times longer than that of unPEGylated LtEc. However, PEGylation increased the rate of LtEc oxidation in vivo. Vascular analysis verified that PEG‐LtEc showed the absence of microvascular vasoconstriction or systemic hypertension. The molecular size of PEG‐LtEc did not change the colloid osmotic pressure or blood volume expansion capacity compared to LtEc, due to LtEc's already large molecular size. Taken together, these results further encourage the development of PEG‐LtEc as an O2 carrying therapeutic.
Overlap Between Google and Bing Web Search Results!: Twitter to the Rescue?

Access to diverse perspectives nurtures an informed citizenry. Google and Bing have emerged as the duopoly that largely arbitrates which English language documents are seen by web searchers. We present our empirical study over the search results produced by Google and Bing that shows a large overlap. Thus, citizens may not gain different perspectives by simultaneously probing them for the same query. Fortunately, our study also shows that by mining Twitter data one can obtain search results that are quite distinct from those produced by Google and Bing. Additionally, the users found those results to be quite informative.
Devalued Black and Latino Racial Identities

At some point most Black and Latino/a college students—even long-term high achievers—question their own abilities because of multiple forms of racial bias. The 38 high-achieving Black and Latino/a STEM study participants, who attended institutions with racially hostile academic spaces, deployed an arsenal of strategies (e.g., stereotype management) to deflect stereotyping and other racial assaults (e.g., racial microaggressions), which are particularly prevalent in STEM fields. These students rely heavily on coping strategies that alter their authentic racial identities but create internal turmoil. Institutions of higher education, including minority-serving schools, need to examine institutional racism and other structural barriers that damage the racial identities of Black and Latino/a students in STEM and cause lasting psychological strain.
Analysis of Mitochondrial 3D-Deformation in Cardiomyocytes during Active Contraction Reveals Passive Structural Anisotropy of Orthogonal Short Axes

The cardiomyocyte cytoskeleton, composed of rigid and elastic elements, maintains the isolated cell in an elongated cylindrical shape with an elliptical cross-section, even during contraction-relaxation cycles. Cardiomyocyte mitochondria are micron-sized, fluid-filled passive spheres distributed throughout the cell in a crystal-like lattice, arranged in pairs sandwiched between the sarcomere contractile machinery, both longitudinally and radially. Their shape represents the extant 3-dimensional (3D) force-balance. We developed a novel method to examine mitochondrial 3D-deformation in response to contraction and relaxation to understand how dynamic forces are balanced inside cardiomyocytes. The variation in transmitted light intensity induced by the periodic lattice of myofilaments alternating with mitochondrial rows can be analyzed by Fourier transformation along a given cardiomyocyte axis to measure mitochondrial deformation along that axis. This technique enables precise detection of changes in dimension of ∼1% in ∼1 µm (long-axis) structures with 8 ms time-resolution. During active contraction (1 Hz stimulation), mitochondria deform along the length- and width-axes of the cell with similar deformation kinetics in both sarcomere and mitochondrial structures. However, significant deformation anisotropy (without hysteresis) was observed between the orthogonal short-axes (i.e., width and depth) of mitochondria during electrical stimulation. The same degree of deformation anisotropy was also found between the myocyte orthogonal short-axes during electrical stimulation. Therefore, the deformation of the mitochondria reflects the overall deformation of the cell, and the apparent stiffness and stress/strain characteristics of the cytoskeleton differ appreciably between the two cardiomyocyte orthogonal short-axes. This method may be applied to obtaining a better understanding of the dynamic force-balance inside cardiomyocytes and of changes in the spatial stiffness characteristics of the cytoskeleton that may accompany aging or pathological conditions.
When implicit prejudice does not predict explicit prejudice: Spanish version of the Concern with Acting Prejudiced scale / Cuando el prejuicio implícito no predice el explícito: versión española de la escala Concern with Acting Prejudiced

Abstract The aim of this research was to adapt and validate the Concern with Acting Prejudiced (CAP) scale for a Spanish sample. This measure evaluates concern about appearing prejudiced to others or oneself and the motivation not to deviate from personal egalitarian standards. First, we completed the translation and an item content validity analysis. Then, in Study 1 (N = 198), we conducted an exploratory factor analysis. In Study 2 (N = 383), we conducted a confirmatory analysis of the unifactorial structure of the Spanish version of the scale and examined its validity. In Study 3 (N = 89), we explored the moderating role of participants’ concern with acting prejudiced in the relation between implicit prejudice and explicit prejudice. The results confirmed the unifactorial structure of the scale, its appropriate psychometric properties and its predictive validity. Moreover, we confirmed that the CAP moderated the relation between implicit and explicit prejudice. In participants with a low concern with acting prejudiced, implicit prejudice was positively related with modern prejudice; in participants with a high concern with acting prejudiced, these variables were not related.
Cuticular Membrane of Fuyu Persimmon Fruit Is Strengthened by Triterpenoid Nano-Fillers

The mechanical defensive performance of fruit cuticular membranes (CMs) is largely dependent on the molecular arrangement of their constituents. Here, we elucidated nano-sized interactions between cutin and triterpenoids in the cuticular matrix of Fuyu persimmon fruits ( Diospyros kaki Thunb. cv. Fuyu), focusing on the mechanical properties using a combination of polymer analyses. The fruit CMs of Fuyu were primarily composed of wax (34.7%), which was predominantly triterpenoids followed by higher aliphatic compounds, and cutin (48.4%), primarily consisting of 9,10-epoxy-18-hydroxyoctadecanoic acid and 9,10,18-trihydroxyoctadecanoic acid. Based on the tensile tests of the CM, the removal of wax lead to a considerable decrease in the maximum stress and elastic modulus accompanied by an increase in the maximum strain, indicating that wax is of significant importance for maintaining the mechanical strength of the CM. Wide-angle X-ray diffraction and relaxation time measurements using solid-state 13C nuclear magnetic resonance indicated that the triterpenoids in the cuticular matrix construct a nanocomposite at a mixing scale below 20-24 nm; however, the higher aliphatic compounds did not exhibit clear interactions with cutin. The results indicated that the triterpenoids in the cuticular matrix endow toughness to the CM by functioning as a nanofiller.
Turning bad into good: How resilience resources protect organizations from demanding work environments

ABSTRACT An organization’s survival and its performance are often connected to employees’ well-being, which in intensive work conditions can be compromised by employee exhaustion. To date, the last economic crisis has forced several companies to downsize and leave the remaining employees facing higher job demands and vulnerability toward job exhaustion. The present study investigates whether resilience together with other personal resources can function as a psychological shield through a mediation and/or moderation process that mitigate the emergence of burnout. Based on a sample of employees from three different Italian companies (N = 208), our results confirmed that “resilience resources” (i.e., resilience, self-efficacy, self-regulation) mediated the relationship between job demands, exhaustion, and task performance (i.e., energetic process). These results suggest that organizational environments characterized by challenging demands are likely to foster the development of resilience resources to cope with the emergence of potentially harming processes.
Quantifying beauty: an information system for evaluating universal aesthetics

In this paper we propose that a metaphor can be used to represent domains that are not easily quantifiable and thus can be used to communicate information about those domains between the human and the computer at a cognitive and visual level. We propose a model which uses the metaphor of a human face as an interface for the perception and evaluation of universal aesthetics
Mixed-Mode Modeling and Parameter Extraction of Advanced InGaAs HBTs in RFIC Systems

Mixed-mode modeling is originally demonstrated for parameter extraction of advanced InGaAs HBTs in RFIC systems. This efficient approach combines the genetic algorithm (GA) with succinct analytical formulae to determine physically meaningful circuit elements used in the SPICE-like simulator. Evaluation of simulated and analytically-derived values validates the accuracy of this methodology