Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The impact of service providers' emotional displays on service evaluation : evidence of emotional contagion

The present work begins with an exhaustive and comparative review of the emotions literature in psychology and in sociology. In Chapter Six, a model of the emotion system of the service encounter is developed. In part, it represents a conceptualization and a substantial and substantive extension of Hochschild's (1983a) work on emotional labor . The model not only accounts for the emotional reactions of consumers to the affective displays of service providers but provides an interdisciplinary perspective on emotion. Accordingly, we draw on elements from cognitive and somatic perspectives in psychology, Hochschild's (1983a) interactional theory, the views of other social constructivists, purist sociological perspectives, and on perspectives from communication studies in an attempt to account for the multilevel emotional dynamics which occur in the service encounter. It becomes evident that emotions are not simply intrapersonal states but that they are also social or interpersonal phenomena. It is also stressed that the consumer's and service provider's emotion processes involve different determinants. Importantly, it is suggested that cognitive appraisal theories do not provide the only general mechanism which may account for consumer emotion in the service encounter. Alternatively, primitive emotional contagion rests on somatic theories of emotion. Its underlying mechanism is essentially pre-attentive (unconscious) and thus does not imply the type of mental calculus which is suggested by appraisal theorists as a determinant of emotion. At a theoretical level, primitive emotional contagion appears to better account for emotion in a dynamic and interactive manner than do cognitive theories which essentially represent stimulus-response models. It also represents a compelling explanation for mutual entrainment, synchrony, rapport, and matched emotional states in interaction. On the other hand, cognitive appraisal theories appear to provide a mechanism for consumer emotion after the occurrence of failure in a component of service. Next, an experimental study is conducted to test a variety of hypotheses based on the proposed conceptual model and the services evaluation literature. Results indicate that the interaction between the valence of a service provider's emotional displays and the social context of these displays does have a significant effect on various evaluation factors including service quality dimensions, satisfaction, and behavioral intent. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
Updating database schemas without breaking the UI: modeling using cognitive semantic categories

Data management user interfaces are ubiquitous in information systems and web-based applications. From the oldest spreadsheet to the most modern database, end users and administrators alike have interacted with tabular data. Usually, each concept is represented by a table and columns. Change to the structure of each concept requires structural change to the tables and columns, which is costly. Tailor-made database and web applications may overcome this obstacle by designing UIs on top of the data layer, providing some degree of data independence. However, changes in their schemas do not automatically propagate into the user interface, and so their maintenance is expensive. In this paper we present a user interface that lets the end user alter the schema without the need for programming skills, eliminating the need for expensive software maintenance. To this end we propose an automatically generated user interface to include schema and data management functions. We built and evaluated an Adaptive Information System user interface (AIS UI), incorporating schema evolution functionality. In usability testing, first-time users were able to perform various data management tasks equally fast or faster than users using Microsoft Access, and on average ~43% faster than users using Microsoft Excel. Task completion rates using the AIS significantly exceeded those using Microsoft Access and were comparable (>95%) with those using Microsoft Excel.
Reducing worry and subjective health complaints: A randomized trial of an internet-delivered worry postponement intervention.

OBJECTIVES Several studies have shown that perseverative, worrisome thoughts are prospectively related to subjective health complaints (SHC) and that a short worry postponement intervention can decrease these complaints. As SHC and worry are prevalent and costly, we tested whether the intervention can be offered online to reduce these complaints in the general population. DESIGN A randomized parallel-group trial was conducted with self-selected participants from the general population. METHODS Via the research website, 996 participants were instructed to register their worrying for 6 consecutive days. The intervention group was instructed to postpone worry to a special 30-min period in the early evening. The Subjective Health Complaints inventory, as administered before and after the intervention, and daily worry frequency and duration were considered the primary outcomes. RESULTS Three hundred and sixty-one participants completed the study. Contrary to our expectation, the registration group (n = 188) did not differ from the intervention group (n = 163) in SHC (ηp² = .000, CI [0.000-0.003]), or in worry frequency or duration. Nevertheless, the different worry parameters were moderately related to SHC (r between .238 and .340, p ≤ .001). CONCLUSIONS In contrast to previous studies using pen-and-pencil versions of the worry postponement intervention, this study suggests that a direct online implementation was not effective in reducing SHC and worry. Overall, participants had high trait worry levels and reported difficulty with postponing worrying. Reducing SHC and worries via the Internet might require more elaborate interventions that better incorporate the advantages of delivering interventions online. STATEMENT OF CONTRIBUTION What is already known on this subject? The perseverative cognition hypothesis argues that perseverative cognition, such as worry and rumination, acts as a mediator by which psychosocial stress may produce negative health effects. Prior research has indeed shown that worry and subjective health complaints (SHC) are prospectively related, but causality studies - that is, showing that changes in worry induce changes in health outcomes - are scarce and have mainly been conducted in young samples. These studies showed that reducing worry, using a worry postponement intervention, can reduce daily worrying and SHC. What does this study add? Trait and daily worrying are associated with SHC. An online worry postponement intervention is ineffective in reducing worry and SHC. Paper-and-pencil interventions cannot directly be used as online interventions.
Attribute Regularization Based Human Action Recognition

Recently, attributes have been introduced as a kind of high-level semantic information to help improve the classification accuracy. Multitask learning is an effective methodology to achieve this goal, which shares low-level features between attributes and actions. Yet such methods neglect the constraints that attributes impose on classes, which may fail to constrain the semantic relationship between the attributes and actions. In this paper, we explicitly consider such attribute-action relationship for human action recognition, and correspondingly, we modify the multitask learning model by adding attribute regularization. In this way, the learned model not only shares the low-level features, but also gets regularized according to the semantic constrains. In addition, since attribute and class label contain different amounts of semantic information, we separately treat attribute classifiers and action classifiers in the framework of multitask learning for further performance improvement. Our method is verified on three challenging datasets (KTH, UIUC, and Olympic Sports), and the experimental results demonstrate that our method achieves better results than that of previous methods on human action recognition.
Effects of Genes, Sex, Age, and Activity on BMC, Bone Size, and Areal and Volumetric BMD

Quantitative genetic analyses of bone data for 710 inter‐related individuals 8–85 yr of age found high heritability estimates for BMC, bone area, and areal and volumetric BMD that varied across bone sites. Activity levels, especially time in moderate plus vigorous activity, had notable effects on bone. In some cases, these effects were age and sex specific.
Causes and consequences of corruption

Corruption has been an important priority to gain the better and more efficient economical governmental and private systems. Corruption remains serious problems in the countries. It impedes economic growth, distorts competitions, inhibits development and productivity, and undermines the rule of law and good governance understanding and conclusions seeing corruption as an interdisciplinary problem and should be handling in holistic perspective. These paper discuses about causes and consequences of corruption and culture of bribery.
High-Performance Fault Diagnosis in PWM Voltage-Source Inverters for Vector-Controlled Induction Motor Drives

This paper proposes a simple method for single switch and double switches open-circuit fault diagnosis in pulsewidth-modulated voltage-source inverters (PWM VSIs) for vector-controlled induction motor drives, which also applies to secondary open-circuit fault diagnosis. According to the phase angle of one phase current, the repetitive operation process of VSI is evenly divided into six operating stages by certain rules. At each stage, only three of the six power switches exert a vital influence on this operation and the others make a negligible influence. An open-circuit fault of power switches introduces the repetitive current distortions, whose period is identical to that of the three-phase currents. The current distortions appear at faulty stages and disappear at healthy stages. The stage is determined by recalculating the current vector rotating angle. The d - and q-axis current repetitive distortions are applied to the detection of faulty switches due to its simplicity and fair robustness, while the faulty stages are used for the identification of faulty switches. The simulations and experiments are carried out and the results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.
A Multiscale Image Representation Using Hierarchical (BV, L2 ) Decompositions

We propose a new multiscale image decomposition which offers a hierarchical, adaptive representation for the different features in general images. The starting point is a vari- ational decomposition of an image, f = u0 + v0, where (u0 ,v 0) is the minimizer of a J-functional, J(f, λ0; X, Y ) = inf u+v=fuX + λ0� vp . Such minimizers are standard tools for image ma- nipulations (e.g., denoising, deblurring, compression); see, for example, (M. Mumford and J. Shah, Proceedings of the IEEE Computer Vision Pattern Recognition Conference, San Francisco, CA, 1985) and (L. Rudin, S. Osher, and E. Fatemi, Phys. D, 60 (1992), pp. 259-268). Here, u0 should capture "essential features" of f which are to be separated from the spurious components absorbed by v0, and λ0 is a fixed threshold which dictates separation of scales. To proceed, we iterate the refinement step (uj+1 ,v j+1) = arginf J(vj ,λ 02j ), leading to the hierarchical decomposition, f = k=0 uj + vk. We focus our attention on the particular case of (X, Y )=( BV, L 2 ) decomposition. The resulting hierarchical decomposition, f ∼ j uj , is essentially nonlinear. The questions of convergence, energy decomposition, localization, and adaptivity are discussed. The decomposition is constructed by nu- merical solution of successive Euler-Lagrange equations. Numerical results illustrate applications of the new decomposition to synthetic and real images. Both greyscale and color images are considered.
Perspectives on non-financial indicators as a strategic management accounting tool:A French inquiry

In this article, we present the evolution of management accounting and the strategic management accounting (SMA) concept. The balanced scorecard (BSC), a SMA tool, is quite famous in European countries. Its principle objective is to articulate planning decisions with control ones thanks to non-financial indicators. Contractual theories constitute the foundations of this tool. But in Northern Europe, some specific BSC are designed in the framework of knowledge-based theories.We describe here the results of an inquiry conducted in France. Its aims are mainly to test the usefulness of non-financial indicators in driving a firm’s objectives and the link between the use of non-financial indicators and the performance. We demonstrate that the French managers associate non-financial indicators with strategic objectives. But we also conclude that they believe that there is no direct link between the use of non-financial metrics and the performance.
Viral 5′‐triphosphate RNA and non‐CpG DNA aggravate autoimmunity and lupus nephritis via distinct TLR‐independent immune responses

Certain viral nucleic acids aggravate autoimmunity through nucleic acid‐specific TLR. Viral 5′‐triphosphate RNA (3P‐RNA) and double‐stranded non‐CpG DNA induce antiviral immunity via TLR‐independent pathways but their role in autoimmunity is unknown. Transient exposure of 16‐wk‐old MRLlpr/lpr mice to 3P‐RNA aggravated lupus nephritis by increasing IFN signaling and decreasing CD4+CD25+ T cells. By contrast, transient exposure to non‐CpG DNA exacerbate lupus nephritis in association with splenomegaly, lymphoproliferation, hypergammaglobulinaemia and increased B220+CD138+ plasma cells. Both, 3P‐RNA and non‐CpG DNA increased glomerular complement factor C3c deposits but both nucleic acid formats were less potent in aggravating renal pathology as compared with CpG DNA. 3P‐RNA and non‐CpG DNA also localized to the glomerular mesangial cells and activated cultured mesangial cells to produce IL‐6. We conclude, 3P‐RNA or non‐CpG DNA both trigger autoimmune disease in MRLlpr/lpr mice by specifically activating adaptive immunity but similarly enhance inflammation on the tissue level.
The influence of CEO perceptions of personal mastery , shared vision , environment and strategic proactivity on the level of learning : Level I learning and Level II learning

This paper takes an in-depth look into the differences in learning based on the nature of the process, analyzing the influence of CEO perceptions of personal mastery, shared vision, environment and strategic proactivity on the level of learning. The hypotheses are tested using data from 239 Spanish firms. The results show that: (1) personal mastery and a well-understood environment have a positive and significant impact on the generation of Level I learning; (2) personal mastery, shared vision, ambiguous environment and strategic proactivity have a positive and significant influence on the generation of Level II learning; (3) both learning levels affect the generation of greater organizational performance and innovation.
The Application of Polarimetric Calibration using Polarimetric Scattering Characteristics of Urban Areas to ALOS PALSAR

This paper discusses an ambiguity resolution of polarimetric calibration parameter. Since ALOS was successfully launched on January 24, 2006, the utilization of polarimetric data observed by PALSAR is expected for various remote sensing applications. Thus, polarimetric calibration becomes important issue. However, there is a possibility that calibration algorithm has a 180deg sign ambiguity with respect to cross-polarized components of a calibrated scattering matrix. The reason is that two polarimetric calibration parameter sets are derived. On the other hand, we found that a 180deg phase shift of cross-polarized component occurred due to the change of an angle between a direction parallel to a building wall and a radar line of sight in azimuth plane. Thus, we examined that this scattering property was applied for selecting a correct polarimetric calibration parameter set. The experimental result shows that urban structures can be used for polarimetric calibration.
Development of a unified web-based national HIV/AIDS information system in China

Background In the past, many data collection systems were in operation for different HIV/AIDS projects in China. We describe the creation of a unified, web-based national HIV/AIDS information system designed to streamline data collection and facilitate data use. Methods Integration of separate HIV/AIDS data systems was carried out in three phases. Phase 1, from January 2006 to December 2007, involved creating a set of unified data collection forms that took into account existing program needs and the reporting requirements of various international organizations. Phase 2, from January to October 2007, involved creating a web-based platform to host the integrated HIV/AIDS data collection system. Phase 3, from November to December 2007, involved pilot testing the new, integrated system prior to nationwide application. Results Eight web-based data collection subsystems based on one platform began operation on 1 January 2008. These eight subsystems cover: (i) HIV/AIDS case reporting; (ii) HIV testing and counselling; (iii) antiretroviral treatment (ART) for adults; (iv) ART for children; (v) behavioural interventions for high-risk groups; (vi) methadone maintenance treatment; (vii) sentinel and behavioural surveillance; and (viii) local county background information. The system provides real-time data to monitor HIV testing, prevention and treatment programs across the country. Conclusion China’s new unified, web-based HIV/AIDS information system has improved the efficiency of data collection, reporting, analysis and use, as well as data quality and security. It is a powerful tool to support policy making, program evaluation and implementation of the national HIV/AIDS program and, thus, may serve a model for other countries.
Rivastigmine in apathetic but dementia and depression-free patients with Parkinson's disease: a double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomised clinical trial

Background Even with optimal dopaminergic treatments, many patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) are frequently incapacitated by apathy prior to the development of dementia. We sought to establish whether rivastigmine's ability to inhibit acetyl- and butyrylcholinesterases could relieve the symptoms of apathy in dementia-free, non-depressed patients with advanced PD. Methods We performed a multicentre, parallel, double-blind, placebo-controlled, randomised clinical trial (Protocol ID: 2008-002578-36; clinicaltrials.gov reference: NCT00767091) in patients with PD with moderate to severe apathy (despite optimised dopaminergic treatment) and without dementia. Patients from five French university hospitals were randomly assigned 1:1 to rivastigmine (transdermal patch of 9.5 mg/day) or placebo for 6 months. The primary efficacy criterion was the change over time in the Lille Apathy Rating Scale (LARS) score. Finding 101 consecutive patients were screened, 31 were eligible and 16 and 14 participants were randomised into the rivastigmine and placebo groups, respectively. Compared with placebo, rivastigmine improved the LARS score (from −11.5 (−15/−7) at baseline to −20 (−25/−12) after treatment; F(1, 25)=5.2; p=0.031; adjusted size effect: −0.9). Rivastigmine also improved the caregiver burden and instrumental activities of daily living but failed to improve quality of life. No severe adverse events occurred in the rivastigmine group. Interpretation Rivastigmine may represent a new therapeutic option for moderate to severe apathy in advanced PD patients with optimised dopaminergic treatment and without depression dementia. These findings require confirmation in a larger clinical trial. Our results also confirmed that the presence of apathy can herald a pre-dementia state in PD. Registration Clinicaltrials.gov reference: NCT00767091.
Photogrammetric 3D reconstruction of the old slaughterhouse in budapest

In this paper we address the problem of photo grammetric 3D reconstructions of an industrial cultural heritage site in Budapest, namely the Old Slaughterhouse. We perform an extensive comparison and evaluation of the state-of-the-art online visual SLAM (Simultaneous Localization and Mapping) and offline visual SFM (Structure from Motion) methods in order to obtain the 3D model of the building. We show results obtained using a dataset recorded with a camera-equipped Micro Air Vehicle.
Group membership failure detection: a simple protocol and its probabilistic analysis

A group membership failure (in short, a group failure) occurs when one of the group members crashes. A group failure detection protocol has to inform all the non-crashed members of the group that this group entity has crashed. Ideally, such a protocol should be live (if a process crashes, then the group failure has to be detected) and safe (if a group failure is claimed, then at least one process has crashed). Unreliable asynchronous distributed systems are characterized by the impossibility for a process to get an accurate view of the system state. Consequently, the design of a group failure detection protocol that is both safe and live is a problem that cannot be solved in all runs of an asynchronous distributed system. This paper analyses a group failure detection protocol whose design naturally ensures its liveness. We show that by appropriately tuning some of its duration-related parameters, the safety property can be guaranteed with a probability as close to one as desired. This analysis shows that, in real distributed systems, it is possible to achieve failure detection with a negligible probability of wrong suspicions.
Mathematics Education, Language, and Culture: Ponderings From a Different Geographic Context

This paper presents snippets from a research agenda focused on the interplay of mathematics education and the language, social, cultural, and political issues that affect Mexican American communities in the USA. The lessons learned and issues raised should be of interest to other contexts with non-dominant, marginalized students. The research approach is grounded on a holistic view of education, that includes families / communities, teachers and students. The underlying goal is to develop a better understanding of the appropriate conditions for the participation of all students in mathematics classrooms. This paper highlights some aspects of the research agenda of CEMELA (Center for the Mathematics Education of Latinos/as) 1 with the aim of engaging in a conversation about the mathematics education of marginalized students across different geographic contexts. While the research reported here is situated in low-income Mexican American communities in the Southwest USA, I believe that the issues I address are relevant to other groups of linguistically and culturally diverse students. I first present an overview of CEMELA’s research agenda and then I focus on one snippet from each of its three main areas of research to illustrate some of the main issues with which we are grappling. These issues are related to the concept of participation, which I view as central in discussions of equity and mathematics education. My concern is for who participates, when and how in mathematics classrooms.