Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Working Alliance Inventory's Measurement Properties: A Systematic Review

Measurement properties of the Working Alliance Inventory (WAI) and its various translations and adaptations for specific target groups have been investigated for over 30 years. No systematic review analyzing studies on measurement properties of the WAI has been conducted to date. COnsensus-based Standards for the selection of health Measurements INstruments (COSMIN) were developed for conducting high-quality systematic reviews on measurement properties in a transparent and standardized way. Aim of this study was to systematically review studies on measurement properties of the WAI, and its adapted versions, within psychotherapy, and other healthcare contexts using COSMIN criteria. PsycINFO, Medline, and EMBASE were searched (1989–2021). In all phases of the review procedure, study selection, data extraction, risk of bias assessment, rating of the quality of measurement properties, and rating of the quality of evidence for measurement properties, disagreement between reviewers was resolved by discussion. Results on validity, internal structure, reliability, construct validity, and responsiveness were analyzed. In total 66 studies were included. In most studies, evidence for measurement properties was according to COSMIN criteria, insufficient, lacking, or conflicting. Content validity was rated insufficient because neither patients nor healthcare professionals were involved in the development and validation process. Hence evidence for content validity of the WAI is unknown. Conflicting evidence was found for structural validity. Evidence for internal consistency could not be established. Limited evidence was found for inter-rater reliability and convergent validity. Conflicting evidence was also found for test-retest reliability and divergent validity. COSMIN criteria exposed persistent problems in validation studies of the WAI. These findings may indicate that measurement properties of the WAI are not up to current standards, or that COSMIN criteria may be less appropriate for assessing measurement properties of the WAI, or it could indicate both. The results of this systematic review suggest that WAI outcomes should be interpreted with caution and further research is needed regarding the content validity and hypotheses development. For the future, the theoretical framework underlying the measurement of the working alliance needs to be studied in psychotherapy and other health contexts, and tested in methodologically sound studies. Systematic Review Registration https://www.crd. york.ac. uk/PROSPERO/, identifier CRD42019051428.
Factors influencing Use of Human Resource Information System in Nepali Organizations

Adoption of Human Resource Information System (HRIS) could be instrumental in gaining competitive advantage to organizations across all sectors. However, the adoption of HRIS is scanty in many organizations, especially in the developing countries. This study attempted to investigate application of Unified Technology Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT) model in the context of adoption of Human Resource Information System (HRIS) in Nepali organizations. It also examined the mediating role of Behavioral Intention for actual use of HRIS. The study further investigated the moderating role of prior exposure for generating actual use of HRIS when behavioral intention already existed. One hundred thirty employees from the Human Resource Unit of different organizations participated in the study. The results showed that three factors - facilitating condition, performance expectancy, and hedonic motivation, generate behavioral intention for adoption of HRIS. The influence of these factors on actual use of HRIS was partially mediated by behavioral intention for adoption. Prior exposure of employees moderated the positive influence of three factors on actual use of HRIS. The implications of the study are discussed and limitations of the study are highlighted.
The Apapacho Violence Prevention Parenting Program: Conceptual Foundations and Pathways to Scale

Violence against children (VAC) is a major global issue with long-lasting negative consequences on individuals and societies. The present study presents a review of the literature on drivers of VAC and the core components of evidence-based violence prevention programs. Moreover, it analyzes the existing services and social infrastructure in Colombia to rigorously inform the design of the Apapacho violence prevention parenting program for families with children younger than five targeted toward Colombia. Findings indicate that (1) VAC in Colombia is a multidimensional issue with roots at the individual, family, community, and society levels, (2) evidence-based violence prevention programs share a common set of content and delivery strategies that could inform the components of the Apapacho program, and (3) there is an urgent need for scalable and flexible violence prevention programs for families with young children in Colombia. Considering existing evidence, the Apapacho violence prevention parenting program will be designed using ecological, developmental, and neuroscience-informed perspectives. This article concludes by presenting the initial components of the theory of change and discussing future directions for the design of the Apapacho program and other violence prevention interventions in LMICs.
Spatial Ability Degradation in Undergraduate Mechanical Engineering Students During the Winter Semester Break

Spatial Ability Degradation in Undergraduate Mechanical Engineering Students During the Winter Semester Break by Benjamin J. Call, Doctor of Philosophy Utah State University, 2018 Major Professor: Dr. Wade H. Goodridge Department: Engineering Education While spatial ability has a well-researched correlation with success in engineering, both academically and professionally, the vast majority of research is limited to short-term effects. Researchers have statistically shown that most interventions have a positive impact on spatial ability and claim that the impact is enduring. However, quantifying the duration of impact generally suffers from two limitations: 1) there is not a sufficient gap to determine if the impact endures, i.e., most research fails to follow up with participants more than a week later; and 2) no allowance is made for the influence of non-deliberate factors that may be increasing the spatial ability of participants. The nondeliberate factor of particular concern in this paper is undergraduate engineering coursework (Engineering Graphics and Statics) which have been correlated with increases in spatial ability – thus rendering them a type of indirect intervention even if they are not generally recognized as such. The research presented herein tracked changes in undergraduate engineering students’ spatial ability during the winter academic break following three courses
Face Image Quality Assessment in Electronic ID Documents

Face image quality estimation is still an open issue since, unlike what happens for other biometric characteristics such as fingerprints, no standard definitions are available yet. The problem is even harder when the focus of quality assessment is the context of electronic ID documents for which, according to the provisions of ISO/IEC 39794-5, a quality value will be stored in the future in dedicated quality blocks. In case of high-quality images, the general indicators available in the literature tend to assign a flat score that does not contribute to provide significant information. This work documents a study aimed at defining a quality score indicator for high-quality images, able to predict the utility of a specific image for face verification purposes. A quality regressor is proposed, based on a large set of quality elements including ISO/ICAO controls and quality scores provided by deep-learning based solutions. A number of experiments highlight specific issues to be addressed in this scenario and confirm the effectiveness of the proposed approach with different face recognition systems.
Los corredores kenianos y españoles de larga distancia y su práctica deliberada

El presente estudio analizo las percepciones subjetivas de un grupo de corredores kenianos y espanoles de larga distancia de nivel internacional sobre sus tareas de entrenamiento. Para alcanzar este objetivo cumplimentaron un cuestionario basado en una taxonomia de actividades de entrenamiento valoradas en cuatro dimensiones: Relevancia, Esfuerzo, Concentracion y Diversion. En este estudio participaron 38 corredores divididos en dos grupos por su nacionalidad. Todos estos atletas eran varones y especialistas de pruebas de larga distancia (10000 metros, Media Maraton y Maraton). Los dos grupos de nacionalidad fueron: Kenianos (n= 20) y Espanoles (n= 18). Los resultados mostraron que actividades de entrenamiento como la competicion o los tests, el interval training largo y corto y las carreras largas a ritmo elevado fueron consideradas como las tareas que mejor caracterizaban la practica deliberada. Ademas de ser las que mayor concentracion y esfuerzo les reclamaban tambien fueron las mas divertidas. Como diferencias entre grupos mas destacadas, los corredores kenianos no practicaban algunas actividades de entrenamiento como el trabajo de pesas y condicion fisica, la tecnica de carrera o el entrenamiento alternativo, a diferencia de los espanoles. Otro hallazgo ha sido comprobar como los corredores kenianos, en comparacion con los corredores espanoles, otorgaron una mayor importancia a las carreras largas a ritmo elevado, valorando en ellas de forma clara la concentracion.
Trace‐element composition of zircon in Kofu and Tanzawa granitoids, Japan: Quantitative indicator of sediment incorporated in parent magma

Zircon is one of the most important minerals in geochronologic research. Isotopic ratios and trace elements in zircons are expected to reflect those of their parent magmas. Many geochemical researchers have proposed various discrimination diagrams for zircon to indicate tectonic setting and to identify source rock. Because most detrital zircons accumulated at river mouths are derived primarily from granitoids, the classification of zircon within granitoids is potentially meaningful. In our research, we focused on sediment involvement during granitoid formation and tried to identify trace‐element compositions in zircon that are sensitive to variation in sediment incorporation. To accomplish this, we examined trace‐element compositions of both the granitoids and the included zircons in the Kofu granitic complex and the Tanzawa tonalitic plutons in Japan. Among the high‐field‐strength elements (Th, U, Ta, Nb, Hf, and rare earth elements), only Nb and Ta concentrations in the granitoids increased as the rate of sediment contribution increased. However, the zircon did not show such trends in Nb and Ta content. Zircon Y and P contents exhibited a positive correlation, indicating that xenotime substitution occurs to some extent. Because P exists as pentavalent ions in igneous systems, its presence likely affects the concentrations of pentads in zircon. When we divided the Nb and Ta contents by the P content, it became clear that zircon Nb/P and Ta/P ratios increase depending on sediment involvement. While some exceptions exist, we found that zircon Yb/Gd ratios also respond to sediment involvement. Our data further demonstrated that zircons in granitoids with significant sediment incorporation are characterized by low Ce/P contents, which is partly attributable to monazite crystallization before zircon saturation. This study demonstrates that combining these element ratios is useful for indicating sediment incorporation.
Combining Navigation and Manipulation Costs for Time-Efficient Robot Placement in Mobile Manipulation Tasks

Mobile manipulation tasks require a seamless integration of navigation and manipulation capabilities. Finding suitable robot placements to pick up and place objects in such tasks is crucial for time-efficient task execution. Sub-optimal robot placements result in infeasible solutions or require larger re-positioning of the mobile base to reach target objects, increasing the overall time to complete the task. In this work, we propose an approach that, given a set of objects, autonomously selects the optimal placements of a humanoid robot in conjunction with the best grasp candidate and corresponding arm. In contrast to previous approaches, our method considers both the navigation costs between consecutive robot placements and the manipulation costs to reduce the time needed to complete the task. We evaluate our method on a simulated table clearing task that requires the robot to move between pickup and discard locations and demonstrate the applicability in a real-world experiment on the humanoid robot ARMAR-6. In addition, we perform a run-time analysis and show that our approach can integrate sensory feedback to update the optimal placement in dynamic environments.
Music students’ workload, stress, and coping in higher education: Evidence-based policymaking

Evidence-based policies are needed to support students as they cope with their experiences of workload and stress in higher music education. This subject was explored in the Music Student Workload Project as a collaboration between Finland and the United Kingdom in seven studies: (1) a theoretical study scrutinizing diverse higher music education systems in connection with equality and cultural reproduction; (2) a systematic review mapping international research on music students’ workload; (3) a methodological study discussing the transcendental phenomenological approach as a method for obtaining a meaningful understanding of music students’ experiences in higher education; (4) a qualitative study exploring music students’ workload experiences in connection with their meaningful engagement in music; (5) a mixed-method study shedding light on music students’ proactive coping styles in connection with workload and stress; (6) a mixed-method study examining music students’ experienced workload, stress, and livelihoods; and (7) a qualitative study exploring teachers’ ways of supporting music students’ workload and stress. The meta-narrative synthesis was conducted by triangulating the key elements of these studies to generate four actionable policy and intervention recommendations to inform educational policies and practices for supporting students in coping with workload and stress in higher music education: (1) support music students’ proactive coping skills; (2) find solutions to the unequal workload and stress experiences between low-income and well-off students, different genders, and different study programs; (3) ensure teachers’ continuing professional development, particularly in the learner-centered pedagogical approaches; and (4) invest resources for providing more longitudinal, cross-cultural, and interventional research investigating music students’ discipline-specific experiences of workload and stress.
Biocompatibility Study of Curcumin-Loaded Pluronic F127 Nanoformulation (NanoCUR) against the Embryonic Development of Zebrafish (Danio rerio)

Curcumin (CUR) has been studied for its biomedical applications due to its active biological properties. However, CUR has limitations such as poor solubility, low bioavailability, and rapid degradation. Thus, CUR was nanoformulated with the application of polymeric micelle. Previous studies of CUR-loaded Pluronic F127 nanoformulation (NanoCUR) were generally prioritized toward cancer cells and its therapeutic values. There are reports that emphasize the toxicity of CUR, but reports on the toxicity of NanoCUR on embryonic developmental stages is still scarce. The present study aims to investigate the toxicity effects of NanoCUR on the embryonic development of zebrafish (Danio rerio). NanoCUR was synthesized via thin film hydration method and then characterized using DLS, UV-Vis, FTIR, FESEM, and XRD. The toxicity assessment of NanoCUR was conducted using zebrafish embryos, in comparison to native CUR, as well as Pluronic F127 (PF) as the controls, and ROS assay was further carried out. It was revealed that NanoCUR showed an improved toxicity profile compared to native CUR. NanoCUR displayed a delayed toxicity response and showed a concentration- and time-dependent toxicity response. NanoCUR was also observed to generate a significantly low reactive oxygen species (ROS) compared to native CUR in ROS assay. Overall, the results obtained highlight the potential of NanoCUR to be developed in clinical settings due to its improved toxicity profile compared to CUR.
Motivations and barriers to embracing augmented reality: An exploratory study with Vietnamese retailers

The most crucial key to successfully approaching customers is enhancing the interaction experience between customers and retailers. This study explores the motivations for adopting augmented reality (AR) in retailing small and medium-sized retailers in Vietnam. A structured questionnaire was delivered to a total sample of 302 Vietnamese retailers and got 215 clean and valid responses. The survey was conducted both online and offline for ten months, from February 2021 to December 2021. The chosen surveyors are retailing managers and owners of retailing firms. These firms sell fashion products, technology gadgets, and household products. The data were statistically analyzed using Smart PLS software and the partial least equation structural model. The findings indicate three direct, positive, and significant factors that influence the retailer’s AR adoption, including (1) organizational attitude toward AR, (2) organizational innovativeness, and (3) competition pressure in which organizational attitude toward AR and organization innovativeness are two critical motivational drivers. The competition pressure has been identified as the challenge barrier. The cost barriers affect organizational attitude toward AR but do not significantly influence AR adoption. Along with theoretical contributions, this paper also gave some theoretical and practical implications for retailers who have the intention to adopt AR and integrate AR into their current retailing system.
Impact of Blood Pressure and Blood Pressure Change During Middle Age on the Remaining Lifetime Risk for Cardiovascular Disease: The Cardiovascular Lifetime Risk Pooling Project

Background— Prior estimates of lifetime risk (LTR) for cardiovascular disease (CVD) examined the impact of blood pressure (BP) at the index age and did not account for changes in BP over time. We examined how changes in BP during middle age affect LTR for CVD, coronary heart disease, and stroke. Methods and Results— Data from 7 diverse US cohort studies were pooled. Remaining LTRs for CVD, coronary heart disease, and stroke were estimated for white and black men and women with death free of CVD as a competing event. LTRs for CVD by BP strata and by changes in BP over an average of 14 years were estimated. Starting at 55 years of age, we followed up 61 585 men and women for 700 000 person-years. LTR for CVD was 52.5% (95% confidence interval, 51.3–53.7) for men and 39.9% (95% confidence interval, 38.7–41.0) for women. LTR for CVD was higher for blacks and increased with increasing BP at index age. Individuals who maintained or decreased their BP to normal levels had the lowest remaining LTR for CVD, 22% to 41%, compared with individuals who had or developed hypertension by 55 years of age, 42% to 69%, suggesting a dose-response effect for the length of time at high BP levels. Conclusions— Individuals who experience increases or decreases in BP in middle age have associated higher and lower remaining LTR for CVD. Prevention efforts should continue to emphasize the importance of lowering BP and avoiding or delaying the incidence of hypertension to reduce the LTR for CVD.
Impact of Chromosomal Context on Origin Selection and the Replication Program

Eukaryotic DNA replication is regulated by conserved mechanisms that bring about a spatial and temporal organization in which distinct genomic domains are copied at characteristic times during S phase. Although this replication program has been closely linked with genome architecture, we still do not understand key aspects of how chromosomal context modulates the activity of replication origins. To address this question, we have exploited models that combine engineered genomic rearrangements with the unique replication programs of post-quiescence and pre-meiotic S phases. Our results demonstrate that large-scale inversions surprisingly do not affect cell proliferation and meiotic progression, despite inducing a restructuring of replication domains on each rearranged chromosome. Remarkably, these alterations in the organization of DNA replication are entirely due to changes in the positions of existing origins along the chromosome, as their efficiencies remain virtually unaffected genome wide. However, we identified striking alterations in origin firing proximal to the fusion points of each inversion, suggesting that the immediate chromosomal neighborhood of an origin is a crucial determinant of its activity. Interestingly, the impact of genome reorganization on replication initiation is highly comparable in the post-quiescent and pre-meiotic S phases, despite the differences in DNA metabolism in these two physiological states. Our findings therefore shed new light on how origin selection and the replication program are governed by chromosomal architecture.
Maternal vaccine hesitancy towards COVID-19 immunisation of children in Qatar: a population-based cross-sectional study

OBJECTIVES This study was conducted in Qatar to explore beliefs and attitudes among mothers towards coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) vaccination for their children and to understand major factors influencing vaccine hesitancy among these mothers. METHODS A population-based, online cross-sectional survey was conducted between 15 October and 15 November 2020. A composite questionnaire incorporating a validated vaccine hesitancy tool was developed and administered in both English and Arabic. Approval was obtained from the local ethics committee. Participation was voluntary and offered to all adult residents of Qatar through an online link available on social media platforms and local news portals. Only adult respondents who self-identified as mothers were included in the present study. No personal identifying data were collected. RESULTS Of the mothers surveyed, 29.4% exhibited COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy regarding their children. This exceeded these mothers’ rate of personal vaccine hesitancy (27.5%). Hesitancy rates varied significantly with ethnicity, with the highest among Qatari mothers (51.3%). Intention to vaccinate children did not differ significantly between mothers who accepted the vaccine for themselves and those who did not. Overall, the main reported concerns related to long-term vaccine safety. To a significant extent, mothers relied most on self-directed research on vaccine safety for decision-making. CONCLUSIONS The rate of maternal COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy exceeded both those mothers’ rate of personal vaccine hesitancy and the hesitancy rate in the general population. The intention to vaccinate children was independent of maternal vaccination history. Factors influencing maternal vaccine hesitancy differ from those influencing personal hesitancy and require an informed public health response.