Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Constructive Activity in Learning From Text

This study examined the constructive cognitive activity of children listening to text and assessed the contribution of this activity to learning. Informative statements were read to 109 children (in grades 1 to 6) who were asked to think aloud about each statement. Analysis of the protocols led to a scale identifying five levels of constructive activity, with three subtypes at each level. The five levels were prefactual confabulation, knowledge/detail retelling, assimilation, problem solving, and extrapolation. The three subtypes were declarative, interrogative, and evaluative responses. Measures of prior knowledge and new learning were also obtained. A path analysis suggested that the level of activity identified by the scale exerted a direct effect on learning and mediated the effects of age and prior knowledge on learning.
Sexual minority stress and changes in relationship quality in same-sex couples

Same-sex romantic partners face the challenge of developing a positive relationship while managing stressors associated with being members of a stigmatized minority group. This study examined links between two potential sources of minority stress (internalized homonegativity and sexual orientation self-concealment) and change in predictors of relationship commitment (constraints, attractions, and satisfaction) in lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) individuals. Fifty-one LGB college students who were in a same-sex dating relationship with the same person throughout the study completed surveys at two time points six weeks apart. Initial levels of internalized homonegativity were associated with decreases in relationship attractions and satisfaction but not constraints. Initial self-concealment levels, however, were unrelated to changes in any of the relationship variables.
Learning to Respond: Supervising Novice Physical Educators in an Action Research Project

Abstract Action research guided the development of an after school community‐based physical education programme. Student‐teachers, supported by supervisory teachers, taught 10 lessons to elementary school children. A cultural circle [Freire, B. (1982) Pedagogy of the Oppressed (New York, Seabury Press)] made up of student‐teachers and supervisory teachers met once a week. The group's thematic concern was ‘effective teaching of games in physical education’. The conversation at meetings developed from student‐teachers' reliance on supervisors to lead the teaching of lessons, to student‐teachers' able to take the responsibility for teaching and guiding how lessons would be supervised. The evaluation of the study is based on Kemmis and McTaggart's criteria for action research [Kemmis, S. & McTaggart, R. (1982) The Action Research Reader, 3rd edn (Victoria, Dean University)].
From Agriculture to Arteries: a sociological-relational analysis of the food industry, diet, health and class

This thesis challenges accounts of individual choice and responsibility where food consumption is concerned, beginning with a critique of government policies to address the health effects of over-consumption of food. Whilst research from psychology and economics has acknowledged the role of habit and automaticity in some behaviours, including eating, the resulting theory of behavioural economics and its operationalisation as ‘nudge’ theory does not directly address class differences. I argue that sociological analysis can do so, and discuss the trajectory of social class in social theory in recent decades, bringing together the insights of several theorists to challenge both Giddens’s concept of reflexivity and postmodern notions of consumerism as an equalising force. I demonstrate that social theory can provide a solid underpinning to behavioural economics, and at the same time show the weakness of its policy applications to healthy eating. Given the relative inattention to the structures that shape dietary ‘choices’, in comparison to the study of behaviour, this thesis examines the nature of the food supply and traces how the food industry develops, markets and sites food, and the ways in which it engages, often interactively, with a highly segmented society. The production and targeted supply of processed foods of varying quality contributes to problematic food consumption, particularly among those of lower social status. This phenomenon is further evidenced by an epidemiological review outlining the food-health-class link. Subsequently, I conduct the first sociological analysis of food industry texts (representing food science, product development and marketing), revealing how actors within these disciplines articulate their role, function and concerns regarding current practice. A critique of marketing emerges from both practitioners and marketing academics, and I apply this and an expanded sociological critique to the role of the food supply in diet-related ill health, in which a social gradient is strongly apparent.
Viral Phylodynamics

Viral phylodynamics is defined as the study of how epidemiological, immunological, and evolutionary processes act and potentially interact to shape viral phylogenies. Since the coining of the term in 2004, research on viral phylodynamics has focused on transmission dynamics in an effort to shed light on how these dynamics impact viral genetic variation. Transmission dynamics can be considered at the level of cells within an infected host, individual hosts within a population, or entire populations of hosts. Many viruses, especially RNA viruses, rapidly accumulate genetic variation because of short generation times and high mutation rates. Patterns of viral genetic variation are therefore heavily influenced by how quickly transmission occurs and by which entities transmit to one another. Patterns of viral genetic variation will also be affected by selection acting on viral phenotypes. Although viruses can differ with respect to many phenotypes, phylodynamic studies have to date tended to focus on a limited number of viral phenotypes. These include virulence phenotypes, phenotypes associated with viral transmissibility, cell or tissue tropism phenotypes, and antigenic phenotypes that can facilitate escape from host immunity. Due to the impact that transmission dynamics and selection can have on viral genetic variation, viral phylogenies can therefore be used to investigate important epidemiological, immunological, and evolutionary processes, such as epidemic spread [2], spatio-temporal dynamics including metapopulation dynamics [3], zoonotic transmission, tissue tropism [4], and antigenic drift [5]. The quantitative investigation of these processes through the consideration of viral phylogenies is the central aim of viral phylodynamics.
Performance Evaluation of TCP and UDP Protocols in VANET Scenarios using NCTUns-6.0 Simulation Tool

paper presents an insight into the VANETs (Vehicular Ad- hoc NETworks) technology. The main objective of this study is to investigate the performance of transport layer protocols in different VANET environments. AODV routing protocol is used at network layer for routing message packets between vehicles. To conduct this study two traditionally used transport layer protocols, namely, TCP and UDP, have been selected for making performance evaluations on basis of three performance metrics, namely, throughput, number of packet drop and number of collision packets. In order to make this study more comprehensive, three set of mobility scenarios are considered and evaluations are conducted with the help of a very advanced and efficient simulation tool - "NCTUns-6.0 simulator".
Leadership and Social Identification in Military Units: Direct and Indirect Relationships1

This study examines some antecedents and consequences of social identification in military units. Data were collected from 2 samples in each unit: staff members and soldiers. It was found that identification with the unit was related to 3 categories of leader behavior: an emphasis on collective identity, an emphasis on shared values, and inclusive behaviors. Some of the effects of leader behaviors on members' social identification were mediated by their effects on unit culture. Some of the effects of leader behaviors on the social identification of more distant subordinates (soldiers) were mediated by their effects on the social identification of closer subordinates (staff members). Differential effects of leader behaviors on the 2 levels of subordinates were also discovered.
Relationship between job control, work pressure and strain : studies in the USA and in The Netherlands

The purpose of this study was to test a model of job control, work pressure and strain in two samples in the USA and in The Netherlands. According to the proposed model, work pressure has a mediating role between job control and worker strain. The present model specifies three types of job control: task or instrumental control, conceptual or resource control, and decision organization control. Task and resource control are assumed to reduce the stressor of work pressure which, in turn, is related to high strain. Organization control is assumed to be positively related to work pressure. The model was tested in two samples : one US sample of 273office employees and one Dutch sample of 958 employees in a variety of jobs. The same measure of job control was used in both samples. Resultspartially confirm the proposed model. As predicted by the proposed model, high task control was related to low work pressure, whereas high organization control was related to high work pressure. The effects of task control and .
A two-step technique for extract class refactoring

We propose a novel approach supporting the Extract Class refactoring. The proposed approach analyzes the (structural and semantic) similarity of the methods in a class in order to identify chains of strongly related methods. The identified method chains are used to define new classes with higher cohesion than the original class. A preliminary evaluation reveals that the approach is able to identify meaningful refactoring operations.
Matrix Factorization for Near Real-time Geolocation Prediction in Twitter Stream

The geographical location is vital to geospatial applications such as event detection, geo-aware recommendation and local search. Previous research on this topic has investigated geolocation prediction framework via conducting pre-partitioning and applying classification methods. These existing approaches target user’s geolocation all at once via concatenation of tweets. In this paper, we study a novel problem in geolocation. We aim to predict user’s geolocation at a given tweet’s posting time. We propose a geo matrix factorization model to address this problem. First, we map tweets into a latent space using a matrix factorization technique. Second, we use a linear combination in the latent space to predict exact latitude and longitude. However, we only use one individual tweet as the input instead of using a concatenation of all tweets of a user. Our experimental results show that the proposed model has outperformed a set of regression models and state-of-the-art classification approaches.
Assessing the Impact of the ASEAN Economic Community

Consequences of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) are investigated using a dynamic computable general equilibrium (CGE) model. Quantitative assessments of the effects on economic welfare, trade flows and sectoral output are offered. When the removal of trade barriers are combined with reductions in administrative and technical barriers and lowering the trade and transport margins under the assumption of endogenously determined productivity, the estimated welfare gains for the year 2015 range from 1.1% in Indonesia to 9.4% in Thailand. The results suggest that streamlining customs procedures and other reductions in administrative and technical barriers, as well as increased competition and improvements in infrastructure, are significant in enlarging the benefits of the AEC.
Validation of a Standardized Normalization Template for Statistical Parametric Mapping Analysis of 123I-FP-CIT Images

123I-FP-CIT (123I-N-ω-fluoropropyl-2β-carbomethoxy-3β-(4-iodophenyl)nortropane) is a SPECT dopamine transporter (DAT) tracer that probes dopaminergic cell loss in Parkinson's disease (PD). Quantification of 123I-FP-CIT images is performed at equilibrium using a ratio (BR) of specific (striatal) to nonspecific (occipital) uptake with values obtained from regions of interest drawn manually over these structures. Statistical parametric mapping (SPM) is a fully automated voxel-based statistical approach that has great potential in the context of DAT imaging. However, the accuracy of the spatial normalization provided by SPM has not been validated for 123I-FP-CIT images. Our first aim was to create an 123I-FP-CIT template that does not require the acquisition of patient-specific MRI and to validate the spatial normalization procedure. Next, we hypothesized that this customized template could be used by different SPECT centers without affecting the outcomes of imaging analyses. Methods: The spatial normalization to the customized template created with SPM (template A1) was validated using 123I-FP-CIT images obtained from 6 subjects with essential tremor (ET) with normal DAT status and 6 PD patients. Variability in BR values due to the normalization was evaluated using striatal volume of interest (VOI). To determine whether different SPECT centers could use a unique 123I-FP-CIT template, we generated 3 other 123I-FP-CIT templates using different subjects and image-processing schemes. The interchangeability of these templates was assessed using (a) putamen BR values analyzed with the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and the Bland–Altman graphical analysis, and (b) SPM analysis comparing the results of group comparisons—that is, ET versus PD, obtained after normalization to each of the 4 templates. Results: There was no significant difference between pre- and postnormalization striatal BR values in our study. The mean variability calculated with putamen VOI values after normalization to each template was <10%, with the lowest ICC of 98%. Intergroup analyses performed with VOI and SPM approaches provided similar results independently of the template used. Conclusion: SPM normalization was accurate even in subjects with low striatal 123I-FP-CIT uptake, making it a promising approach for automatic analysis of 123I-FP-CIT images using a single customized template at different centers.
Biology and Neurophysiology of the Conditioned Reflex and Its Role in Adaptive Behavior

Eight of Pavlov's pupils were living several years ago, in Russia and abroad: Pyotr Anokhin, Esraz Asratyan, Nikolai Krasnogorsky, Ivanov-Smolensky (Russia), Jerzy Konorski (Poland), Takashi Hayashi (Japan), TenCate (Holland), and myself (USA.). Beritov, in Tiflis, though not a pupil of Pavlov, had been remarkably productive both experimentally and ideationally in the field of physiological behavior. By 1975, since all but two students of Pavlov, ie, those who worked directly with him, have now died, the work of his pupils may, for review purposes, be considered complete. We may thus assess the work of Pavlov by the contributions of his pupils, as well as by his influence among those who knew him only through his writings. One of the most outstanding and consistently productive of Pavlov's students was Pyotr Kuzmich Anokhin, who was an active experimentalist beginning with his sojourn in Pavlov's laboratory for about a decade, from the mid-1920s to
Poisson noise reduction in scintigraphic images using Gradient Adaptive Trimmed Mean filter

We propose a new hybrid technique for reduction of poisson noise in scintigraphic images. Our proposed method is a combination of Gradient calculation and Adaptive Trimmed Mean filter (ATMF). In a predefined window, gradient of the center pixel is averaged out. ATMF remove the lowest and highest variations in the pixel values of Gradient denoised image and average out remaining neighborhood pixel values. The proposed technique is applied on scintigraphic images. Results are compared with conventional filters i.e. Median, Wiener filter and latest denoising filter i.e. Non Local Mean (NLM) filter. The proposed scheme shows good visual results with improving Correlation, Mean Squared Error (MSE), Structural Similarity Index Metric (SSIM) and Peak to Signal Noise Ratio (PSNR) of the image.
ULTRASTRUCTURAL CHANGES IN REGRESSING TAIL MUSCLES OF XENOPUS LARVAE AT METAMORPHOSIS

Previous studies on the changes in both the activity and localization of acid hydrolases in tails of Xenopus larvae during growth and metamorphosis have led to the conclusion that the increase in activity of cathepsins and acid phosphatase in the regressing tissue reflects the synthesis of acid hydrolases by activated macrophages, rather than the release of such enzymes from preformed lysosomes in the regressing tissue itself (13, 14). In order to elucidate the mechanism that could account for the progressive stimulation of phagocytic activity, it appeared of relevance to follow the regressive changes in the fine structure of the tadpole tail. This study was also promoted by the recognition of the fact that, in spite of a voluminous literature on the histological aspect of tail regression, a number of important problems have remained unsolved. In fact, there exist divergent views, e.g. on the relative importance of autolysis and phagocytosis, or on the origin of macrophages in the regressing tadpole tail (2). The present report, based on a very extended electron microscope study, is chiefly concerned with some conspicuous early changes in the fine
Recursive Wang tiles for real-time blue noise

Well distributed point sets play an important role in a variety of computer graphics contexts, such as anti-aliasing, global illumination, halftoning, non-photorealistic rendering, point-based modeling and rendering, and geometry processing. In this paper, we introduce a novel technique for rapidly generating large point sets possessing a blue noise Fourier spectrum and high visual quality. Our technique generates non-periodic point sets, distributed over arbitrarily large areas. The local density of a point set may be prescribed by an arbitrary target density function, without any preset bound on the maximum density. Our technique is deterministic and tile-based; thus, any local portion of a potentially infinite point set may be consistently regenerated as needed. The memory footprint of the technique is constant, and the cost to generate any local portion of the point set is proportional to the integral over the target density in that area. These properties make our technique highly suitable for a variety of real-time interactive applications, some of which are demonstrated in the paper.Our technique utilizes a set of carefully constructed progressive and recursive blue noise Wang tiles. The use of Wang tiles enables the generation of infinite non-periodic tilings. The progressive point sets inside each tile are able to produce spatially varying point densities. Recursion allows our technique to adaptively subdivide tiles only where high density is required, and makes it possible to zoom into point sets by an arbitrary amount, while maintaining a constant apparent density.
Discriminative convolutional Fisher vector network for action recognition

In this work we propose a novel neural network architecture for the problem of human action recognition in videos. The proposed architecture expresses the processing steps of classical Fisher vector approaches, that is dimensionality reduction by principal component analysis (PCA) projection, Gaussian mixture model (GMM) and Fisher vector descriptor extraction, as network layers. By contrast to other methods where these steps are performed consecutively and the corresponding parameters are learned in an unsupervised manner, having them defined as a single neural network allows us to refine the whole model discriminatively in an end to end fashion. Furthermore, we show that the proposed architecture can be used as a replacement for the fully connected layers in popular convolutional networks achieving a comparable classification performance, or even significantly surpassing the performance of similar architectures while reducing the total number of trainable parameters by a factor of 5. We show that our method achieves significant improvements in comparison to the classical chain.
Constant Factor Time Optimal Multi-Robot Routing on High-Dimensional Grids in Mostly Sub-Quadratic Time

Let $G = (V, E)$ be an $m_1 \times \ldots \times m_k$ grid. Assuming that each $v \in V$ is occupied by a robot and a robot may move to a neighboring vertex in a step via synchronized rotations along cycles of $G$, we first establish that the arbitrary reconfiguration of labeled robots on $G$ can be performed in $O(k\sum_i m_i)$ makespan and requires $O(|V|^2)$ running time in the worst case and $o(|V|^2)$ when $G$ is non-degenerate (i.e., nearly one dimensional). The resulting algorithm, \isag, provides average case $O(1)$-approximate (i.e., constant factor) time optimality guarantee. In the case when all dimensions are of similar size $O(|V|^{\frac{1}{k}})$, the running time of \isag approaches a linear $O(|V|)$. Define $d_g(p)$ as the largest distance between individual initial and goal configurations over all robots for a given problem instance $p$, building on \isag, we develop the \pafalgo (\paf) algorithm that computes $O(d_g(p))$ makespan solutions for $k = 2, 3$ using mostly $o(|V|^2)$ running time. \paf provides worst case $O(1)$-approximation regarding solution time optimality. We note that the worst case running time for the problem is $\Omega(|V|^2)$.
Expressive and receptive language skills of temperamentally shy preschoolers

Although shy children speak less in social situations, the extent to which their language skills fall behind those of their more outgoing peers remains unclear. We selected 22 temperamentally shy and 22 non-shy children from a larger group of 400 4-year-old children who were prescreened for temperamental shyness by maternal report, using the Colorado Childhood Temperament Inventory (CCTI). We then compared the two groups on widely used measures that index expressive and receptive language skills. We found that, although the temperamentally shy children scored lower on both expressive and receptive language skills compared with their non-shy counterparts, they were nonetheless performing at their age equivalency. The non-shy children, however, were performing significantly above their age level on expressive and receptive language skills. These findings suggest that the development of normal language skills is not compromised in temperamentally shy preschoolers. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.