Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
E-teachers at work: Exploring a process for reviewing e-teaching for ongoing professional learning

The effective teacher is a reflective teacher who seeks to learn from a range of sources (literature, formal theory, evidence) in order to continually improve student learning. This project seeks to capture the impact on practice inherent in the collegial development of a theoretically informed framework which enables lecturers to monitor and analyse what they do to create an effective online teacher presence and thereby facilitate a productive online learning environment for their students. Initially, the project involves a pilot group of tertiary e-teachers interacting with the seven principles for good practice in undergraduate education (Chickering and Gamson, 1987) to develop a framework to monitor and analyse online interactions for evidence of their teacher presence. Secondly, lecturers will be invited to submit an electronic portfolio which contains samples of online interaction which are evidence of their teacher presence online. Thirdly, working with an experienced online lecturer as a mentor, lecturers can develop a process which helps them analyse and review this data to identify both strengths and areas for further professional learning. Finally, through a reflective process lecturers will identify factors which contribute to effective online teacher presence. This is a work-in-progress report on this research project which received the 2006 ASCILITE research grant. This concise paper outlines the research proposal, rationale and methodology, and gives an update on progress with the project.
A Fair Load Sharing Scheme for Multi-source Multimedia Overlay Application Layer Multicast

IP multicasting is an efficient and scalable way to deliver high quality audio and video streams for group communication. However, widespread deployment of IP multicast is unlikely in near future and it requires substantial infrastructure modifications. For rapid deployment of multicast application, Application Layer Multicast (ALM) is an alternate choice to circumvent this situation, as it supports group communication independent of network layer support. Previous studies on ALM mainly focused on achieving high throughput for bandwidth intensive applications and unfairness of communication quality is still a serious issue in multi-source communication. In this paper, we present an autonomous distributed scheme to construct an ALM tree to improve fairness and overall communication quality among the participants in a multi-source multimedia communication. Extensive simulation and experimental results show that our proposed scheme increases the incoming bitrate of the lowest recipient among all the nodes, as well as improving fairness for all receivers.
Abstract GSOS Rules and a Modular Treatment of Recursive Definitions

Terminal coalgebras for a functor serve as semantic domains for state-based systems of various types. For example, behaviors of CCS processes, streams, infinite trees, formal languages and non-well-founded sets form terminal coalgebras. We present a uniform account of the semantics of recursive definitions in terminal coalgebras by combining two ideas: (1) abstract GSOS rules l specify additional algebraic operations on a terminal coalgebra; (2) terminal coalgebras are also initial completely iterative algebras (cias). We also show that an abstract GSOS rule leads to new extended cia structures on the terminal coalgebra. Then we formalize recursive function definitions involving given operations specified by l as recursive program schemes for l, and we prove that unique solutions exist in the extended cias. From our results it follows that the solutions of recursive (function) definitions in terminal coalgebras may be used in subsequent recursive definitions which still have unique solutions. We call this principle modularity. We illustrate our results by the five concrete terminal coalgebras mentioned above, e. \,g. , a finite stream circuit defines a unique stream function.
Hating waiting

Difficulty tolerating uncertainty has been linked to heightened negative affect and risk for various forms of psychopathology. Willingness to tolerate uncertainty is usually assessed by self-report but investigating behavior under uncertainty may be particularly informative. This study examined whether willingness to wait in uncertainty is related to individual differences in impulsivity, anxiety, and emotion regulation. Students (n = 56) completed an uncertain gambling task in which they chose between a small, low-probability reward available immediately and a larger, higher probability reward available after an uncertain delay. The distribution of the data indicated two groups: those who always waited and those who did not. Non-waiters compared to waiters were characterized by higher levels of delay discounting, neuroticism, inhibitory intolerance of uncertainty, and worry. They also reported more tension following the task than did waiters. Among non-waiters, greater delay discounting was associated with less willingness to wait in uncertainty. These findings suggest a link between compromised decision-making under uncertainty and heightened risk for psychopathology.
Chapter 2 Creative Ecosystems

Traditional evolutionary approaches to computer creativity focus on optimisation, that is they define some criteria that allows the ranking of individuals in a population in terms of their suitability for a particular task. The problem for creative applications is that creativity is rarely thought of as a single optimisation. For example, could you come up with an algorithm for ranking music or painting? The difficulty is that these broad categories are shifting and subjective: I might argue that Mozart is more musically creative than Lady Gaga, but others may disagree. Objective, fine-grained ranking of all possible music is impossible, even for humans. I will show how reconceptualising the exploration of a creative space using an “ecosystemic” approach can lead to more open and potentially creative possibilities. For explanatory purposes, I will use some successful examples that are simple enough to explain succinctly, yet still exhibit the features necessary to demonstrate the advantages of this approach. 2.1 Creative Systems In this book you will find a broad range of definitions of creativity. Dorin and Korb (Chap. 13), for example, emphasise a system’s propensity to generate novelty irrespective of its perceived value, similarly Schmidhuber (Chap. 12) views creativity as a problem of learning information compression. Nake (Chap. 3) is more sceptical about formal computer models of creativity, seeing the popular concept of creativity today as “a US-American invention,” one that may be considered as a means for activity, or as its goal. Pachet (Chap. 5) prefers to focus on “virtuosity”, emphasising the thousands of hours that human artists must spend to master a discipline or instrument. Each of these views place a different emphasis on which qualities, properties or functions are important to understanding creativity precisely, and hence appreciating its worth or relevance in any given domain. If we take Boden’s popular definition—that creativity involves the generation of ideas or artefacts that are new, surprising, and valuable (Boden 2010)—then an J. McCormack (! ) Centre for Electronic Media Art, Monash University, Caulfield East, Victoria 3145, Australia e-mail: Jon.McCormack@monash.edu J. McCormack, M. d’Inverno (eds.), Computers and Creativity, DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-31727-9_2, © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2012 39
INTERSPEECH 2014 Special Session: Phase Importance in Speech Processing Applications

In many speech processing applications, the spectral amplitude is the dominant information while the use of phase spectrum is not so widely spread. In this paper, we present an overview on why speech phase spectrum has been neglected in the conventional techniques used in different applications including: speech separation/enhancement, automatic speech and speaker recognition and speech synthesis. We proceed with giving highlights on the recent progress carried out in demonstrating the importance of phase in different applications and how it impacts on the overall performance. The paper is an introduction to the Interspeech 2014 special session phase importance in speech processing applications. Index Terms: Phase spectrum, speech enhancement, speech recognition, speech analysis, speech synthesis.
Musings Upon the Theme of Peer-to-Peer Search

Efficient search is an active topic in peer-to-peer networks. To date most of the work in this area has been oriented towards devising new algorithms. However, little has been done to understand the fundamental similarities and differences between the wide variety of proposed designs. Such an understanding would be invaluable for the architects of future decentralized systems. In order to stimulate further research in this direction, we present an overview of six example systems whose designs cover the majority of current research themes in peer-to-peer search. The diversity of the presented approaches demonstrates the breadth of the design space available. Based on these examples, we identify a number of open issues that require
Mapping Parallel Programs into Hierarchical Distributed Computer Systems

In most cases modern distributed computer systems (computer clusters and MPP systems) have hierarchical organization and non-uniform communication channels between elementary machines (computer nodes, processors or processor cores). Execution time of parallel programs significantly depends on how they map to computer system (on what elementary machines parallel processes are assigned and what channels for inter-process communications are used). The general problem of mapping a parallel program into a distributed computer system is a well known NP-hard problem and several heuristics have been proposed to approximate its optimal solution. In this paper an algorithm for mapping parallel programs into hierarchical distributed computer systems based on task graph partitioning is proposed. The software tool for mapping MPI applications into multicore computer clusters is considered. The quality of this algorithm with the NAS Parallel Benchmarks is evaluated.
A new Bayesian formulation for Holt's exponential smoothing

In this paper we propose a Bayesian forecasting approach for Holt's additive exponential smoothing method. Starting from the state space formulation, a formula for the forecast is derived and reduced to a two-dimensional integration that can be computed numerically in a straightforward way. In contrast to much of the work for exponential smoothing, this method produces the forecast density and, in addition, it considers the initial level and initial trend as part of the parameters to be evaluated. Another contribution of this paper is that we have derived a way to reduce the computation of the maximum likelihood parameter estimation procedure to that of evaluating a two-dimensional grid, rather than applying a five-variable optimization procedure. Simulation experiments confirm that both proposed methods give favorable performance compared to other approaches. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
HUBUNGAN TINGKAT BERPIKIR KRITIS TERHADAP HASIL BELAJAR FISIKA SISWA DENGAN MENERAPKAN MODEL PEMBELAJARAN PROBLEM BASED LEARNING

Kemampuan berpikir kritis merupakan aspek yang sangat penting yang harus dimiliki oleh siswa dalam pembelajaran fisika, terutama dalam memecahkan permasalahan-permasalan yang membutuhkan alternatif pemecahan yang lebih mendalam yang sebenarnya tidak jauh dari permasalahan yang kita temui dalam kehidupan sehari-hari. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menganalisis hubungan setiap tingkat berpikir kritis terhadap hasil belajar fisika siswa. Pada penelitian ini siswa dibagi atas 3 kelompok, yaitu berpikir kritis tinggi, menengah, dan rendah. Dari hasil regresi diperoleh berpikir kritis memiliki hubungan fungsional yang signifikan terhadap hasil belajar fisika siswa pada kelompok tinggi dan menengah atau F(hitung)>F(tabel) untuk kedua kelompok tersebut, hal ini berbeda untuk kelompok tingkat berpikir kritis rendah dimana F(hitung)>F(tabel) (0,082 < 5,12) yang artinya tidak terdapat hubungan fungsional yang signifikan antara variabel berpikir kritis rendah dengan variabel hasil belajar dengan menerapkan model problem based learning (PBL) atau menunjukkan bahwa tidak memberikan pengaruh yang signifikan aspek berpikir kritis rendah terhadap hasil belajar yang diperoleh siswa. Kontribusi atau sumbangan berpikir kritis tinggi dengan hasil belajar fisika siswa untuk setiap kelompok berturut-turut adalah sebesar 85,0%, 40,7%, dan 1% sedangkan sisanya (residunya) dijelaskan oleh variabel lain yang tidak diteliti. Berdasarkan hasil analisis maka diketahui bahwa tingkat berpikir kritis siswa secara keseluruhan memiliki hubungan fungsional yang signifikan terhadap hasil belajar dengan nilai R square 0,827 atau 82,7% sumbangan berpikir kritis siswa terhadap hasil belajar yang menerapkan model PBL. Semakin tinggi tingkat berpikir kritis siswa maka semakin besar hubungan fungsional yang signifikan terhadap hasil belajar, dan juga semakin besar kontribusi/sumbangan berpikir kritis terhadap hasil belajar yang diperoleh siswa yang menerapkan model PBL. Tidak terdapat hubungan fungsional yang signifikan pada kelompok berpikir kritis rendah dengan variabel hasil belajar yang menerapkan model PBL. Kata Kunci : Berpikir kritis, hasil belajar, analisis regresi, problem based learning.
Role of iron deficiency anemia in the propagation of beta thalssemia gene

Background The diagnostic criterion for beta thalassemia trait (BTT) is elevated Hb-A2 levels. Iron deficiency anemia (IDA) reduces the synthesis of Hb-A2, resulting in reduced Hb-A2 levels, so patients with co-pathological conditions BTT with IDA, may have a normal level of Hb-A2. Many socio-economic factors like unawareness, poor diagnostic facilities, and cost of molecular diagnosis (for screening purposes) result in interpretation of these subjects as normal. Methods Venous blood samples from 200 unmarried females having a family history of thalassemia were collected, and basic hematological parameters, hemoglobin electrophoresis, and molecular analysis for beta thalassemia were done. Patients with IDA and patients with co-pathological conditions BTT and IDA were treated with oral iron. These subjects were then followed for a period of 20 weeks. Results Of the 200 females, 34 were found to be anemic. Hemoglobin electrophoresis identified 16 of these patients as BTT. Molecular analysis of all patients confirmed this diagnosis, but identified 8 additional patients with BTT. Eight patients that were not detected with hemoglobin electrophoresis were found to have co-pathology of BTT with IDA. Conclusion Patients with the co-pathological condition BTT with IDA may be interpreted as being normal, as they have normal Hb-A2 levels. These misdiagnosed subjects when marry with BTT have the potential to produce beta thalassemia major in offspring. This is one of the factors playing a major role in the propagation of beta thalassemia gene in Pakistani population, and become a serious hindrance for the thalassemia prevention program in Pakistan.
Latency aware decoder for high-order modulations MIMO transmissions with parallel processing architectures

High order modulations with multi-stream transmissions have been proposed recently as a promising feature to increase the available data rates in the upcoming releases of LTE systems. Increasing the modulation order requires additional processing capabilities in both infrastructure nodes and mobile terminals. However, most of decoding algorithms are based either on turbo processing strategies or successive interference cancellation schemes. For mobile terminals, such strategies introduce significant decoding latency and are not compatible with parallel computing architectures that are implemented in modern devices. This paper proposes a tunable complexity scheme for multi-stream transmissions with high modulation orders (64QAM and higher). The scheme is based on lattice reduction followed by a list based maximum likelihood detection. The proposed strategy allows the same performance as successive interference cancellation schemes and offers a better decoding latency with parallel processing architectures.
Impact of the ocean carbonate chemistry on living foraminiferal shell weight: Comment on “Carbonate ion concentration in glacial‐age deep waters of the Caribbean Sea” by W. S. Broecker and E. Clark

Broecker and Clark (2002) use the "size normalized weight" of planktic foraminifera to estimate the carbonate ion concentration ([CO3=]) of Atlantic glacial upper deep water. This method was introduced by Lohmann (1995) and is based on the fact that, within a defined size fraction, dissolution decreases shell weight in proportion to the degree of undersaturation with respect to CaCO3. Based on the following assumptions,1) the thickness of the foraminiferal shell wall does not depend on growth conditions,2) the saturation [CO3=] for calcite, [CO3=]sat., increases by 20 µmol kg-1 km-1 (Broecker and Clark, 2001),3) the weight loss slope is universal and ca. 0.3 µg (µmol kg-1)-1 (Broecker and Clark, 2001),4) the offset between the bottom water and pore water [CO3=] was the same during glacial time as during the Holocene,Broecker and Clark (2002) calculate that the [CO3=] of Atlantic glacial upper deep water was 14 µmol kg-1 higher than during the Holocene. Although they recognize that some of their assumptions are not strictly valid, they do not assess the impact of those assumptions on their [CO3=] estimate. Here we comment on several of those assumptions and attempt to quantify their impact on Broecker and Clark's (2002) calculations.
Scanline Sampler without Detailed Balance: An Efficient MCMC for MRF Optimization

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) is an elegant tool, widely used in variety of areas. In computer vision, it has been used for the inference on the Markov random field model (MRF). However, MCMC less concerned than other deterministic approaches although it converges to global optimal solution in theory. The major obstacle is its slow convergence. To come up with faster sampling method, we investigate two ideas: breaking detailed balance and updating multiple nodes at a time. Although detailed balance is considered to be essential element of MCMC, it actually is not the necessary condition for the convergence. In addition, exploiting the structure of MRF, we introduce a new kernel which updates multiple nodes in a scanline rather than a single node. Those two ideas are integrated in a novel way to develop an efficient method called scanline sampler without detailed balance. In experimental section, we apply our method to the OpenGM2 benchmark of MRF optimization and show the proposed method achieves faster convergence than the conventional approaches.
Fault locations in transmission systems by evolutionary algorithms

This paper aims at presenting the development and implementation of an approach to deal with fault location in transmission systems by Evolutionary Algorithms. An Evolutionary Strategy was applied to address an optimization problem, from the generation of a population of individuals that represent possible solutions to the problem, as well as evolutionary operators such as selection, mutation and crossover. Some variants of the basic approach were also considered in such a way to determine the fault location with better performance. A case study, based on the 30 bus IEEE study system, demonstrates the potential of the proposed methodology.
Effective and Efficient Identification of Persistent-state Hidden (semi-) Markov Models

The predominant learning strategy for H(S)MMs is local search heuristics, of which the Baum-Welch/ expectation maximization (EM) algorithm is mostly used. It is an iterative learning procedure starting with a predefined topology and randomly-chosen initial parameters. However, state-of-the-art approaches based on arbitrarily defined state numbers and parameters can cause the risk of falling into a local optima and a low convergence speed with enormous number of iterations in learning which is computationally expensive. For models with persistent states, i.e. states with high self-transition probabilities, we propose a segmentation-based identification approach used as a pre-identification step to approximately estimate parameters based on segmentation and clustering techniques. The identified parameters serve as input of the Baum-Welch algorithm. Moreover, the proposed approach identifies automatically the state numbers. Experimental results conducted on both synthetic and real data show that the segmentation-based identification approach can identify H(S)MMs more accurately and faster than the current Baum-Welch algorithm.
The Role of Leisure in the Dehumanization of Black Girlhood: Egypt’s story

ABSTRACT With recent reports highlighting the dehumanization of Black girls, the authors attempt to deconstruct the relationship between the racialized gendered oppression they experience and their use of leisure to practice and perform resistance and agency using narrative ethnography. The reality of oppression in the lives of Black girls shows the complex ways dehumanization becomes part of the Black girlhood experience. As we look into the role of leisure within the complexities of Black girlhood, our epistemological views inform our understanding of how Black girls navigate, endure, and resist against multiple systems of oppression. Using Black feminist theory as a guide, this research study examined how one Black girl, Egypt, adopted the use of performance art to practice resistance and agency. The authors hope that future research will consider the oppression, agency, and resistance that exist within the lives of Black girls.
A Latent Class Analysis Approach to Extradyadic Involvement

Extradyadic involvement — emotional, romantic, or sexual involvement with another person outside of one's romantic relationship — may have serious personal and relational consequences. The current research examines extradyadic involvement in two samples of individuals in relationships and identifies subgroups of people based on their engagement in different types of extradyadic behaviour. To assess involvement in such behaviour, we created a new behavioural inventory intended to broaden the conceptualisation of types of extradyadic behaviours. Subgroups of individuals who engage in these behaviours were extracted using latent class analysis. Study 1 assessed undergraduate students in relationships (N = 339), and results revealed four classes of individuals: loyal, confiding, deceptive, and unfaithful. Follow-up tests demonstrated that these classes of individuals differed significantly in ways that are consistent with the investment model and attachment theory. Study 2 (N = 202) replicated the four-class solution, as well as the group differences in relationship functioning and attachment orientations. Results suggest theoretically consistent typologies of extradyadic behaviour that may be useful in differentiating deceptive behaviour in close relationships in a more precise way.