Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Comparing the ESEM and CFA approaches to analyze the Big Five factors

Avaliação Psicológica, 2017, 16(3), pp. 261-267 ABSTRACT Marsh (2007) asserts that no self-reported questionnaire of the Big Five factors shows an acceptable degree of adjustment in confirmatory factor analyses (CFA). Based on CFA results, it can usually be inferred that exploratory factor analysis (EFA) solutions are incorrect, as well as concluded that the instruments evaluated by EFAs do not measure what they intend to measure. The present study investigates this assertion, evaluating the structural validity of the Personality Characteristics Inventory (PCI), a self-reported instrument of the Big Five factors. Only one EFA investigated the validity of PCI (Gomes, 2012). We re-analyzed the data of this study (716 elementary and middle school students from a Brazilian school). The solution of eight correlated factors was investigated through CFA and ESEM (exploratory structural equation modeling). The model was found to be unacceptable through CFA, showing good fit through ESEM. Marsh's assertion correctly predicted the results. Structural validity of PCI could only be concluded through ESEM.
Variation factors of project plans and their contributions to project failure in Nigeria

This study examines and analyses the variation factors of project plan and their contributions to project failure. The slippage of project plans with respect to budget, schedule and quality specifications are indicators of poor performance and imminent failure. The primary data used for the study were captured by field survey on some construction firms based on their experience and perceptions on the subject matter. The methods of multiple regression and correlation analyses were the analytical tools used for the data analysis and statistical test of hypotheses. The results of the analyses indicate that design errors, management problems and resource delivery constraints are the significant variation factors of plan that contribute significantly to project failure. The study therefore recommends evaluation of design effectiveness, prior to project implementation, adoption of material requirements planning principles, and institution of corporate policy for periodic and comprehensive human resources development programmes.
Induced karyomorphological variations in three phenodeviants of Capsicum annuum L.

EMS was used as a mutagen in Capsicum annuum L. to isolate karyomorphological mutants. Seeds of Capsicum annuum L. var Azad were first pre-soaked in distilled water and then treated with 0.5% solution of EMS for 3 durations, i.e. 3, 5, and 7 h, and genetic segregation was closely observed. Many chromosomal anomalies like stickiness, bridges, and multivalent, secondary associations, laggards, and precocious movement were observed after all 3 durations of treatment. These anomalies showed a dose- dependent increase in frequency. The morphological parameters showed a decreasing trend along with the increasing dose. However, with the 7-h dose 3 morphologically distinct plants were isolated, which varied not only from other sib plants but also from control plants. Their cytological analysis revealed a predominance of bridges and increased frequency of bridges in all 3 plants. Therefore, it can be presumed that these 2 factors together may be responsible for creating deviations in these 3 plants.
Ergodic properties of linear dynamical systems

The Multiplicative Ergodic theorem, which gives information about the dynamical structure of a cocycle $\Phi $, or a linear skew product flow $\pi $, over a suitable base space ${\bf M}$, asserts that for every invariant probability measure $\mu $ on ${\bf M}$ there is a measurable decomposition of the vector bundle over ${\bf M}$ into invariant measurable subbundles, and that every solution with initial conditions in any of these subbundles has strong Lyapunov exponents. These exponents depend on the measure $\mu $, and when $\mu $ is ergodic, they are constant (almost everywhere) on ${\bf M}$ and form a finite set mess $\Sigma (\mu )$. The dynamical spectrum dyn $\Sigma $ consists of those values $\lambda \in {\bf R}$ for which the shifted flow $\pi _\lambda $ fails to have an exponential dichotomy over ${\bf M}$. The Spectral theorem for linear skew product flows states that when ${\bf M}$ is compact and dynamically connected then dyn $\Sigma $ is the finite union of k disjoint compact intervals and th.
Aetolians, Europeans and Canadians: A Comparative analysis of federations

In the present essay we begin with a short presentation of the Aetolian proto-federation and compare its structure and institutions with two modern ones, that of Canada and that of the European Union. We will then make an evaluation of the three federations according to two sets of criteria. a) Democratisation, which contains four sub-criteria: “isonomia” (equality in front of the law) “isokratia” (political equality), “isegoria” (equality to propose initiatives) and “isopoliteia” (single citizenship, the transfer of the political rights of a citizen of a state, when he moves to another within the federation) b) Cohesion, which comprises the following four sub-criteria : i) monetary union, ii) fiscal union and federal budget iii) federal regulation and the basic economic freedoms, of goods and services, capital and labour and iv) common external and defence policy. The results of the evaluation show that according to the criterion of democratisation, the Aetolian ranks first and the EU last, while according to cohesion, the Aetolian ranks first and the EU last, while according to cohesion, the Aetolian and Canadian rank as about equal while the EU again lags behind.
Determinants of Corn Rootworm Resistant Corn Adoption in Indiana

Adoption of transgenic corn resistant to corn rootworm (CRW corn) was analyzed using a probit model with data from a survey of Indiana producers. Operator age, farm size, and regional and self-reported measures of rootworm pressure were all statistically significant in explaining adoption. In addition to these typical explanatory variables, market access variables, price variables, and insect resistant management plan requirements were very significant. These findings suggest that the value of CRW corn to the producer is strongly influenced by the fact that it is not yet fully approved for sale in Europe.
Multi-objective reconfiguration of radial distribution systems using reliability indices

This paper deals with the distribution network reconfiguration problem in a multi-objective scope, aiming to determine the optimal radial configuration by means of minimizing the active power losses and a set of commonly used reliability indices formulated with reference to the number of customers. The indices are developed in a way consistent with a mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) approach. A key contribution of the paper is the efficient implementation of the å-constraint method using lexicographic optimization in order to solve the multi-objective optimization problem. After the Pareto efficient solution set is generated, the resulting configurations are evaluated using a backward/forward sweep load-flow algorithm to verify that the solutions obtained are both non-dominated and feasible. Since the å-constraint method generates the Pareto front but does not incorporate decision maker (DM) preferences, a multi-attribute decision making procedure, namely, the technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) method is used in order to rank the obtained solutions according to the DM preferences, facilitating the final selection. The applicability of the proposed method is assessed on a classical test system and on a practical distribution system.
Construct Validity of Physical Self-Description Questionnaire Responses : Relations to External Criteria

The Physical Self-Description Questionnaire (PSDQ) is a multidimensional physical self-concept instrument with 11 scales: Strength, Body Fat, Activity, EnduranceFitness, Sports Competence, Coordination, Health, Appearance, Flexibility, Global Physical, and Global Esteem. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the construct validity of PSDQ responses in relation to 23 external criteria, including measures of body composition, physical activity, endurance, strength, and flexibility for 192 (113 boys and 79 girls) high school students. Each external validity criterion was predicted a priori to be most highly correlated with one of the PSDQ scales. In support of the convergent validity of the PSDQ responses, every predicted correlation was statistically significant. In support of the discriminant validity of the PSDQ responses, most predicted correlations were larger than other correlations involving the same criterion. These results support the construct validity of PSDQ responses in relation to external criteria and their potential usefulness in a wide variety of sports and exercise settings.
Exact fully 3D Navier–Stokes solutions for benchmarking

SUMMARY Unsteady analytical solutions to the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations are presented. They are fully three-dimensional vector solutions involving all three Cartesian velocity components, each of which depends non-trivially on all three co-ordinate directions. Although unlikely to be physically realized, they are well suited for benchmarking, testing and validation of three-dimensional incompressible Navier-Stokes solvers. The use of such a solution for benchmarking purposes is described.
Functional Approaches to Study Leaf Senescence in Sunflower

Senescence is an age-dependent process at the cellular, tissue, organ or organism level, leading to death at the end of the life span (Nooden 1988). Annual plants as grain and oil crops undergo a visual process towards the end of the reproductive stage that is accompanied by nutrient remobilization from leaf to developing seeds (Buchanan-Wollaston et al. 2003). The final stage of this process is leaf death but this is actively delayed until all nutrients have been removed and recycle through the process of developmental senescence. It have been documented that a delay in leaf senescence has an important impact on grain yield trough the maintenance of the photosynthetic leaf area during the reproductive stage in different crops (Ewing & Claverie 2000), including sunflower (Sadras et al. 2000; De la Vega et al. 2011). The potential yields of sunflower crop are far from the real ones in all Argentina productive regions. In Balcarce, for example, while the potential yields are estimated in 5,000 kg.ha-1, those obtained by the best producers only reach 3,000 kg.ha-1, and the average in the region ranges in 1,800 kg.ha-1 (Dosio & Aguirrezabal 2004). These differences could possibly be due to the inability of current hybrids to keep their green leaf area for long periods, which would allow greater use of the incident radiation during the grain filling period which plays an important role in determining the yield and oil concentration in sunflower (Dosio et al. 2000; Aguirrezabal et al. 2003).
Do reduced child care prices make parents work more

This paper exploits exogenous variation in the price of child care stemming from a major child care price reform, to estimate the effects of child care costs on parents’ labour supply. The reform introduced a cap on the price that local governments could charge parents, and lead to considerable reductions in the price of child care depending on family type and region. Since the price is de-termined by a handful of observed characteristics, we are able to match house-holds that are similar in all relevant aspects, but experienced quite different price changes due to the reform. Our difference-in-differences regression matching estimates are very precise, but mostly close to zero.
The EU-Senegal mobility partnership: from launch to suspension and negotiation failure

This article focuses on the negotiations that the European Commission, with the formal support of France, Italy and Spain, opened with Senegal in 2008 for a mobility partnership agreement. Mobility partnerships, as defined by the Commission in 2007, are a new EU (multilateral) instrument for managing migratory flows into the Union. The negotiations with Senegal were indefinitely suspended in 2009 and are now widely considered as having failed. This article sets out to identify the factors that contributed to the suspension of talks. It shows that failure can be attributed to a complex web of factors originating in the specific Senegalese, European and Senegal-EU political landscapes and jointly contributing to an unfavourable cost-benefit calculation by the French and Senegalese parties to the negotiation, to an unclear and awkward negotiating strategy on the part of the European Commission and to incoherent, EU and Senegalese, foreign policies. This, in turn, points to the complex task of concluding multilateral agreements on issues as politically sensitive, for both parties, as migration.
Self-Efficacy and Alexithymia as Moderators between perceived social support and Stress among Parents of Children with Learning Disabilities

The purpose of this cross-sectional study was to examine Self-Efficacy and Alexithymia as moderators between perceived social support and Stress among parents of children with Learning Disabilities. The convenience sample of the study consisted of 98 parents of children with Learning Disabilities from Ahwaz (Iran). This descriptive correlational study was conducted in 2014–15. Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS), General Self-Efficacy Scale (GCE), Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20), and Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) were completed by parents. Hierarchical linear regression analyses were used to examine the moderating role of Self-Efficacy and Alexithymia. The results revealed that Self-Efficacy and Alexithymia were moderators in the relationship between Perceived social support and Stress. The findings supported the hypothesis that higher levels of self-efficacy (see: Figure 1) would be associated with lower levels of Stress, and that lower levels of Alexithymia (see: Figure 2) would be associated with lower levels of Stress.
Title Suicide rates in China , 2004 – 2014 : comparing data from twosample-based mortality surveillance systems

Background: The decreasing suicide rate in China has been regarded as a major contributor to the decline of global suicide rate in the past decade. However, previous estimations on China’s suicide rates might not be accurate, since often they were based on the data from the Ministry of Health’s Vital Registration (“MOH-VR”) System, which is biased towards the better-off population. This study aims to compare suicide data extracted from the MOH-VR System with a more representative mortality surveillance system, namely the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s Disease Surveillance Points (“CDC-DSP”) System, and update China’s national and subnational suicide rates in the period of 2004–2014. Methods: The CDC-DSP data are obtained from the National Cause-of-Death Surveillance Dataset (2004–2014) and the MOH-VR data are from the Chinese Health Statistics Yearbooks (2005–2012) and the China Health and Family Planning Statistics Yearbooks (2013–2015). First, a negative binomial regression model was used to test the associations between the source of data (CDC-DSP/MOH-VR) and suicide rates in 2004–2014. Joinpoint regression analyses and Kitagawa’s decomposition method are then applied to analyze the trends of the crude suicide rates. Results: Both systems indicated China’s suicide rates decreased over the study period. However, before the two systems merged in 2013, the CDC-DSP System reported significantly higher national suicide rates (IRR = 1.18, 95% Confidence Interval [CI]: 1.13–1.24) and rural suicide rates (IRR = 1.29, 95% CI: 1.21–1.38) than the MOH-VR System. The CDC-DSP System also showed significant reversing points in 2011 (95% CI: 2006–2012) and 2006 (95% CI: 2006– 2008) on the rural and urban suicide trends. Moreover, the suicide rates in the east and central urban regions were reversed in 2011 and 2008. Conclusions: The biased MOH-VR System underestimated China’s national and rural suicide rates. Although not widely appreciated in the field of suicide research, the CDC-DSP System provides more accurate estimations on China’s suicide rates and is recommended for future studies to monitor the reversing trends of suicide rates in China’s more developed areas.
The high performance of Dutch and Flemish 15-year-old native pupils: explaining country differences in math scores between highly stratified educational systems

This paper aims to explain the high scores of 15-year-old native pupils in The Netherlands and Flanders by comparing them with the scores of pupils in countries with the same highly stratified educational system: Wallonia, the German Länder, the Swiss German cantons, and Austria. We use the data from the Programme for International Pupil Assessment (PISA) 2006 together with the specific PISA data of Germany and Switzerland. We apply a multilevel model that takes into account the individual-, curriculum-, and system-level features in these highly stratified educational systems. The high scores of the Dutch pupils can be explained by the size of The Netherlands' vocational sector. The high Flemish scores can be partly explained by the high curriculum mobility. Central exit exams are not a good explanation of the high Dutch scores. Despite being limited to highly stratified systems, we still find educational policies and arrangements to have significant effects on the educational performance of pupils.
Highlights on Aberrant Face Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorder and its Percussions on Management of Autistics

Highlighting the neurological basis of normal face processing and its abnormalities in ASD seems crucial because of its percussions on symptomatology and the management plan of autistic children. Human face processing that has been proven to be compromised in many autistic individuals is pivotal for proper social interactions. Such spontaneous perceptual task in normal children is carried out by face processing areas of the brain as fusiform gyrus, superior temporal sulcus, and amygdala. Behavioral, electrophysiological, and neuroimaging studies showed evidences of dysfunction of such areas in many autistics who often focus on face periphery and cannot interpret that it tells something about a person’s state of mind. Very early targeted intervention can stimulate face processing areas of the brain during the early developmental phases of social brain circuitry which in turn will help autistics to pay attention to faces and learn how to understand emotional expressions. Eventually, prevention or at least significant amelioration of both the spectrum and severity of autistic symptomatology might be possible.
The Child Support Grant and teenage childbearing in South Africa

This paper examines data on teenage fertility and patterns of uptake of the Child Support Grant in South Africa from 1998 to 2005, to assess how far this Grant is associated with the trend in teenage childbearing. Teenage fertility was fairly high during the 1980s when state financial assistance to teenage mothers did not adequately serve the majority of South Africans. Since the first half of the 1990s, however, teenage fertility has steadily declined. This trend was already underway when the grant was expanded in 1998 to reach beneficiaries in all sub-groups of the national population. If teenage girls were having children primarily to benefit from the Child Support Grant, then more would be making claims than is in fact the case. The findings of this study do not suggest any significant positive association between the grant and the trend in teenage childbearing in South Africa during the past decade.
Foreign direct investment in Kenya

The purpose of this study is to identify the key factors that influence FDI decisions in Kenya and to explore the empirical relationship between FDI and economic growth in Kenya.The findings of the study reveal that the main determinants of FDI in Kenya are market size (proxied by GDP), stable macroeconomic policies and a level of human capital that is tolerable by investors.There is no significant relationship of human capital to overall economic growth which suggests that there is a shortage of skilled labour in the Kenya.
Prognostic evaluation of bradyarrhythmias and heart rate variability in endurance master athletes

To investigate the possible differences in autonomic regulation of circulation between endurance trained older subjects and older subjects who practiced moderate exercise, 10 elderly male endurance athletes, aged 65 ± 2.6 (group A), were compared with 12 male elderly subjects, aged 66 ± 3.7, who practiced moderate exercise (group B), and with a control group (group C) composed of 20 healthy younger male subjects aged 32 ± 2.3 who practiced moderate exercise. ECG holter monitoring and heart rate variability analysis data were col-lected. Episodes of heart rate below 40 beats/min were found in 4 subjects of groups A and in 1 subject of group C. The non-spectral indexes used to analyze heart rate variability are significantly higher in athletes of group A and in subjects of group C than in subjects of group B. The results of spectral analysis are in keeping with a sympathetic prevalence during the day and a vagal pre-dominance during the night, but there was lower vagal activity during the night and higher adrenergic activity during the day in sedentary subjects. Older en-durance athletes seem to have more profound bradyarrhythmias than healthy elderly controls, but the age-related decrease in heart rate variability seems to be retarded. This may have a positive prognostic value, as it may decrease the risk of life threatening ventricular arrhythmias.
Effect of probiotics and thyme essential oil on the texture of cooked chicken breast meat.

Bac kground. Texture is probably the single most critical quality factor associated with the consumers’ ultimate satisfaction with a poultry meat product and can be affected by several factors including the type of feed used for chickens fattening. The use of probiotics for meat and carcass quality improvement has been questioned, while the possibility of deposition of essential oils in various muscle tissues can alter the sensory attributes of the chicken’s meat. Material and methods. Probiotics and thyme essential oil in the percentage of 0.05% were used as feed supplements for Ross 308 broiler chickens, as the broilers were reared in four separated groups based on the feed supplement as follows: control, probiotics, thyme essential oil and combination of probiotics and thyme essential oil group, while the fattening period was 42 days. TA.XT Plus-Texture analyser apparatus was used for determination of the texture profi le and Warner Bratzler shear force for the cooked breast meat. Results. Warner Bratzler shear test results showed that the tested feed additives were not affecting the texture of the chicken breast meat, while probiotic appears to have moderately effect on the hardness, cohesiveness, springiness and chewiness attributes of the cooked breast meat compared with the other groups, this effect of probiotics considered as negligible, as the results showed that all the tested groups meat were very tender according to the tenderness scale. Conclusions. According to the obtained results it can be concluded the combination of probiotics and thyme group resulted in the lowest score for the hardness, cohesiveness, springiness and chewiness attributes, while probiotics group scored the highest compared with the control.