Yoxas/statistical_literacy huggingface dataset:
The present study examined the cross-lagged relationship between home numeracy practices (e.g., formal teaching, number games, and number application) and early mathematical skills (basic number processing, and arithmetic skills) among Chinese young children. A total of 155 children (82 boys; mean age = 67.49 months, SD = 3.58 months) were assessed with basic number processing and arithmetic skills at three timepoints during the kindergarten year, and their parents reported the frequency of parent-child numeracy activities. Main results from random-intercept cross-lagged panel models showed that, at the within-family level, earlier basic teaching activities uniquely predicted subsequent basic number processing, while both advanced teaching activities and number game activities at earlier timepoints predicted the following arithmetic skills. These results indicated a unidirectional effect from home numeracy practices on early mathematical skills during the early years.
The present study examined the hypothesis that changes in the oxidation-reduction state of thiol residues in functional proteins play a major role in the expression of the ventilatory responses in conscious rats that occur during a hypoxic-hypercapnic (HH) gas challenge and upon return to room air. A HH gas challenge in vehicle-treated rats elicited robust and sustained increases in minute volume (via increases in frequency of breathing and tidal volume), peak inspiratory and expiratory flows, and inspiratory and expiratory drives while minimally affecting the non-eupneic breathing index (NEBI). The HH-induced increases in these parameters, except for frequency of breathing, were substantially diminished in rats pre-treated with the potent and lipophilic disulfide-reducing agent, L,D-dithiothreitol (100 µmol/kg, IV). The ventilatory responses that occurred upon return to room air were also substantially different in dithiothreitol-treated rats. In contrast, pre-treatment with a substantially higher dose (500 µmol/kg, IV) of the lipophilic congener of the monosulfide, N-acetyl-L-cysteine methyl ester (L-NACme), only minimally affected the expression of the above-mentioned ventilatory responses that occurred during the HH gas challenge or upon return to room air. The effectiveness of dithiothreitol suggests that the oxidation of thiol residues occurs during exposure to a HH gas challenge and that this process plays an essential role in allowing for the expression of the post-HH excitatory phase in breathing. However, this interpretation is contradicted by the lack of effects of L-NACme. This apparent conundrum may be explained by the disulfide structure affording unique functional properties to dithiothreitol in comparison to monosulfides. More specifically, the disulfide structure may give dithiothreitol the ability to alter the conformational state of functional proteins while transferring electrons. It is also possible that dithiothreitol is simply a more efficient reducing agent following systemic injection, although one interpretation of the data is that the effects of dithiothreitol are not due to its reducing ability.
The present study examined the social-emotional development items assessed by kindergarten teachers in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Birth Cohort to determine the optimal factor structure underlying the items as well as the reliability and validity of the resulting factors. This study identified an empirically derived factor structure for teacher-reported social development, investigated whether there was evidence of bias in teacher assessments of social-emotional constructs, examined factor invariance across demographic characteristics (i.e., race and ethnicity, sex, and poverty status), and examined the external validity of the derived factors by determining the extent to which they were associated with well-established measures of early childhood competencies. Findings suggested a 4-factor solution was optimal, consisting of (a) Interpersonal Skills, (b) Externalizing Behavior, (c) Approaches to Learning, and (d) Perspective Taking. Findings offer suggestive evidence of teacher biases in assessments and some, although not conclusive, support for the invariance of social-emotional dimension across demographic characteristics. Results provide a useful next step toward documenting reliable and valid social-emotional measures for use in early childhood research and challenges users of national datasets to think critically about the use of "scales" without a priori attention to important psychometric properties.
The present study explored the construct validity of the Psychometric Entrance Test (PET) for higher education in Israel, as represented by the factorial structure of the scholastic aptitudes it measures, and focused on whether the test presents a single measure of overall ability or a measure of the fields of knowledge that are being tested. In Study 1, we used Exploratory Factor Analysis to generate hypotheses regarding the factorial structure of the test. In Study 2, Confirmatory Factor Analysis was carried out to compare competing models that were constructed based on theoretical considerations and the results of Study 1. The findings indicated that a two-layered hierarchical model, encompassing both a General Ability factor and three scholastic domain-specific factors (Verbal Reasoning, Quantitative Reasoning, and English), showed the best fit. Within the framework of the CFA, several statistical procedures were applied to assess reliability (indicator and complexity) and validity (convergent and divergent. ).
The present study had two main goals: (1) to investigate the difference between perception and mental imagery using a visual illusion as a stimulus; (2) to inspect gender related differences in perception and imagery. Our main hypothesis, that there would be no differences between perception and mental imagery, was motivated by previous neuroimaging data. Unlike these neuroimaging studies that demonstrate great similarity between the two processes, results obtained in behavioral studies have not always been consistent. We assumed that this inconsistency was a consequence of methodological differences. Hence, we explored the two processes with a modified behavioral procedure. The additional exploration of gender differences was motivated by the discrepancy between our findings and the existing literature. In two experiments, participants estimated the lines constituting the horizontal-vertical illusion, either in perception or imagery task. Results confirmed that there was no significant difference between perception and imagery: the illusion was equally strong in both tasks. In the second experiment, an additional factor was tested, stimulus size. The results showed that, although there was no significant difference in illusion strength, there was a gender difference in the size of mental image for medium and large stimuli. While male subjects performed equally in the two tasks, female subjects tended to underestimate size in the imagery task. This tendency intensified as the stimulus size increased. Our results not only inform us about the status of illusions in imagery but also offer some answers about the spatial nature of mental representations. We hope that such precise measurements of mental representation might provide better understanding of reasoning that uses mental images.
The present study investigated potential predictors of food insecurity among UK university students during the COVID-19 pandemic. Close-ended questionnaire administered to a cross-sectional sample of UK university students. Data were collected using an online survey platform in October 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic. A nationally representative sample of UK university students (n 640). Odds ratios (OR) obtained from logistic regression were statistically significant for three measures of economic hardship. First, students who relied on financial aid from student loans were 1·9 times more likely to report being food insecure than students who did not rely on financial aid from student loans. Second, students who could not pay their utility bill (v. those that could pay) were 3·1 times the odds of being food insecure. Finally, as perceived difficulty in paying for accommodation increased across the sample, the odds of being food insecure also increased (OR = 1·9). We also found that students who were recently ill were 2·2 times more likely to be food insecure compared with students who were not recently ill. We did not find any evidence that testing positive for COVID-19 predicted food insecurity, and university supplied food parcels/boxes did not reduce student food insecurity. Both economic factors and illness play a significant role in self-reported food insecurity in higher education students during pandemic lockdown. Further research is needed to explore food insecurity, economic factors and illness outside of a pandemic context.
The present study investigated the province-level distribution and drivers of infant mortality rate (IMR) in mainland China. Ecological analysis based on publicly available data for all 31 provinces in mainland China. Data on province-level IMRs in 2020 were obtained from the official websites of the healthcare commissions within each province and from the China Health Statistics Yearbook 2021. Data on potential IMR drivers were retrieved from the China Statistical Yearbook 2021. GeoDa V.1.12.1 and ArcMap V.10.2 software were used to examine province-level distribution of IMR. Global and local spatial autocorrelations were performed, and Getis-ord G* hotspots and coldspots were identified. Geodetector was used to analyse the individual and joint influence of drivers on IMR. IMRs in 2020 varied from 1.91 to 7.60 per 1000 live births across provinces. The following statistically significant drivers with q values >0.5 were identified: health literacy of the population (0.6673), male illiteracy rate (0.6433), proportion of the population older than >65 years (0.6369), per capita government health expenditure (0.6216), forest coverage rate (0.5820), per capita disposable income (0.5785), per capita number of hospitals (0.5592), per capita gross regional product (0.5410) and sulfur dioxide concentration in the atmosphere (0.5158). The following three interactions among these drivers emerged as strongest influences on province-level IMR: proportion of population >65 years ∩ per capita gross regional product (q=0.9653), forest coverage rate ∩ per capita gross regional product (0.9610) and per capita government health expenditure ∩ sulfur dioxide (0.9295). IMR in mainland China varies substantially across the country, being generally high-west and low-east. Several factors, on their own and interacting together, contribute to IMR. Policies and programmes to reduce IMR should be formulated according to local conditions and should focus on western provinces of the country.
The present study proposed the idea of segment manipulation of complex cognition (SMCC), and technically made it possible the quantitative treatment and systematical manipulation on the premise diversity. The segment manipulation of complex cognition divides the previous inductive strengths judgment task into three distinct steps, attempting to particularly distinguish the psychological processes and their rules. The results in Experiment 1 showed that compared with the traditional method, the quantitative treatment and systematical manipulation of SMCC on the diversity did not change the task's nature, and remain rational and a good measurement of inductive strength judgment. The results in Experiment 2 showed that the participants' response rules in the triple-step task were expected from our proposal, and that in Step 2 the "feeling of surprise" (FOS), which seems implausible but predicted from the diversity premises, was measured, and its component might be the critical part that produced the diversity effect. The "feeling of surprise" may reflect the impact of emotion on cognition, representing a strong revision to premise probability principle of pure rational hypothesis proposed by Lo et al., and its roles in the diversity effect are worthy of further research. In this regards were discussed the mistakes that the premise probability principle makes when it takes posterity probability as prior probability.
The present study sought to assess the ability of teachers to identify emerging mental health disorders through a novel vignette measure. Canadian certified primary grade teachers (N = 101) completed a survey that included a novel vignette measure. Participants rated the severity of fictitious student behaviors depicted in several vignettes and their accuracy was calculated based on how closely their ratings matched the severity of symptoms depicted. Accuracy estimates derived through this measure differed considerably from previous vignette measure paradigms, producing much lower estimates of identification accuracy. A binomial logistics regression indicated that neither the gender nor pathology depicted in the vignettes significantly influenced rating accuracy. This novel vignette measure may represent a quick and effective means of assessing the accuracy of teachers in identifying emerging mental health disorders in their students.
The present study uses a mixed qualitative and quantitative method to examine three main research questions: What are the practices that mothers report they use when trying to correct their children's misbehaviors? Are there common patterns of these practices? Are the patterns that emerge related to children's well-being? Italian mother-child dyads (N=103) participated in the study (when children were 8 years of age). At Time 1 (T1), mothers answered open-ended questions about discipline; in addition, measures of maternal physical discipline and rejection and child aggression were assessed in mothers and children at T1, one year later (T2), and two years later (T3). Mothers' answers to open-ended questions about what they would do in three disciplinary situations were classified in six categories: physical or psychological punishment, control, mix of force and reasoning, reasoning, listening, and permissiveness. Cluster analysis yielded 3 clusters: Group 1, Induction (predominant use of reasoning and listening; 74%); Group 2, Punishment (punitive practices and no reasoning; 16%); Group 3, Mixed practices (combination of reasoning and punishment, as well as high control and no listening; 10%). Multiple-group latent growth curves of maternal physical discipline, maternal rejection, and child aggression were implemented to evaluate possible differences in the developmental trends from T1 to T3, as a function of cluster. Qualitative data deepen understanding of parenting because they shed light on what parents think about themselves; their self-descriptions, in turn, help to identify ways of parenting that may have long-lasting consequences for children's adjustment.
The present study validated a newly developed easy-to-use observational instrument, the Health Environment Rating Scale-Early Childhood Consultation-Classroom version (HERS-ECC-C), to measure the quality of the classroom environment within early care and education centers participating in a mental health consultation program in a diverse area of the southeastern United States. Using a confirmatory factor analysis, three factors emerged capturing critical aspects of a high-quality classroom environment and demonstrated good reliability: (1) Supportive Practices, Positive Socioemotional Practices, and Classroom Management (α = .88), (2) Health and Family Communication (α = .79), and (3) Individualizing to Children's Needs (α = .80). Criterion-related validity was established through concurrent associations between the three HERS-ECC-C subscales and the domains of the Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS) and predictive associations with the Childcare Worker Job Stress Inventory. The HERS-ECC-C Supportive Practices and Health and Family Communication subscales were associated with all three CLASS domains, and the Individualizing to Children's Needs subscale was associated with the CLASS Instructional support domain. Higher HERS-ECC-C subscale scores were associated with lower teacher-reported job stress. Findings provide initial evidence to support the use and continued development of the HERS-ECC-C as a tool to evaluate programs and classrooms engaged in mental health consultation professional development interventions.
The present study was carried out to examine the efficacy of a web-based Cyberbullying Awareness and Education (CBAE) program that was designed to raise awareness of cyberbullying among adolescents and their parents. Included in this quasi-experimental study were 64 adolescents (intervention group = 33, control group = 31) and 64 parents (intervention group = 33, control group = 31). The adolescents and parents in the intervention group took part in a 5-week CBAE program that was conducted through the website www.dijitalgencdijitalebeveyn.com, and included educational videos on (1) the Definition and Types of Cyberbullying, (2) the Causes and Outcomes of Cyberbullying, (3) Digital Citizenship, (4) Empathy (5) and Safe Internet Use; while the parents in the intervention group attended courses on (1) the Definition and Types of Cyberbullying, (2) the Causes and Outcomes of Cyberbullying, (3) Digital Parenting, (4) Empathy (5) and Safe Internet Use. The adolescents and parents in the control group, on the other hand, took part in no such interventions. Data were collected online using the Adolescent and Parent Data Collection Form, the Revised Cyber Bullying Inventory (RCBI-II) and the Adolescent and Parent Cyberbullying Awareness Form, and the acquired data were subjected to Mann-Whitney U, Wilcoxon and Independent samples t-tests for statistical analysis. The findings revealed a significant increase in the scores obtained from the CBAE Adolescent and Parent Evaluation Forms after the course, and the scores of the adolescents in the RCBI-II "I have engaged in cyberbullying" section were noted to decrease significantly in the intervention group. The CBAE web-based program was found to be effective in raising awareness of cyberbullying. As such, the use of the web-based CBAE program, which involves the parents of adolescents in the education process, is recommended as an interventional approach to the prevention of cyberbullying among adolescents. Nurses should have the necessary competences to provide cyberbullying education to adolescents and their parents.
The present study was conducted with the aim of designing and validating questionnaires for evaluating the public health students' knowledge, performance, and satisfaction (KPS) in the course of educational technology. The present study was conducted with qualitative-quantitative approach. Qualitative stage was done based on experts' opinion and related articles and questionnaires for developing, designing, and validating the tools. For validating the tools, face validity and content validity was done based on the opinion of the 10 expert panel. In quantitative stage, all initial validated tools were implemented on 50 students of public health for determining the reliability. The reliability of the tools was calculated using the internal consistency method of the items with Cronbach's ⍺ coefficient, and Kuder-Richardson. All analyses were conducted using SPSS-19 software. In the field of qualitative research, an assessment tool consisting of 20 four-option questions was designed. The content validity of this tool was confirmed based on the opinions of 10 educational experts, with CVI Total = 0.862 and CVR = 0.885. Additionally, the reliability of the tool was validated through testing on 50 public health students, resulting in a reliability coefficient of r = 0.780. Furthermore, for performance evaluation, four assessment tools each comprising 20 questions (totaling 80 questions) were designed. The validity values for these tools in the areas of PowerPoint (CVI = 0.981, CVR = 0.960), pamphlet (CVI = 0.866, CVR = 0.877), poster (CVI = 0.871, CVR = 0.906), role-playing (CVI = 0.871, CVR = 0.980), and the reliability of the tools with Cronbach's ⍺ r > 0.80 were confirmed. In the satisfaction assessment section, a researcher-made questionnaire consisting of 18 questions across seven domains was designed, with confirmed content validity (CVI = 0.949, CVR = 0.861) and reliability (r = 0.928). It seems that this tool can be used to measure the KPS of students from the educational technology course of the health field and similar fields.
The present study was designed to validate an English version of the mental health literacy scale into Persian, in Iran. Statistical population consisted of all residents of 22 municipal districts of Tehran, Iran, in 2018. Multistage sampling methods were used (sample size = 1026). All participants filled the Mental Health Literacy scale; 12-item General Health Questionnaire; Multidimensional Health Locus of Control scale and a demographic checklist. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, the intra-class correlation coefficient was used for analysing data. All analyses were run with SPSS and AMOS Graphics version 18. Exploratory factor analysis revealed five components (24 items) explaining 21.68%, 20.24%, 8.97%, 6.48% and 5.36% of the variance respectively (totally explained variance = 62.74%). Confirmatory factor analysis showed an acceptable goodness-of-fit (CMIN/DF = 3.19, GFI = 0.887, CFI = 0.893, IFI = 0.894, TLI = 0.877, RMSEA = 0.065). The values of Cronbach's alpha showed satisfactory internal consistency. Two clinical correlates of mental health literacy were investigated. The structure of the mental health literacy scale was to some extent different from the one in O'Connor et al. study, but it was consistent with the definition of MHL presented by Jorm et al. This is the first Persian version of the MHL in the general population in Iran and undoubtedly needs to be checked on more studies.
The present systematic review aimed to investigate the methodological quality and the effects of fundamental motor skills and physical activity interventions on cognitive and academic skills in typically developing 3 to 7-year-old children. The review was conducted and reported in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) statement. A literature search was carried out in April 2020 using seven electronic databases. The methodological quality of the studies was assessed with the Effective Public Health Practice Project (EPHPP) Quality Assessment Tool. Cohen's d effect size calculations and post hoc power analyses were conducted for the included studies. A total of 35 studies, representing 2472 children met the inclusion criteria. Two of the studies demonstrated a strong methodological quality, while 24 were considered as methodologically weak. The majority (71%) of the included studies demonstrated the beneficial effects of the intervention on cognitive and academic skills. The most evidence was found for executive functions, language, and numeracy, and the effects were largest in enhancing memory. The effects were larger on cognitive and academic skills in the combined interventions compared to only fundamental motor skill and physical activity interventions, while fundamental motor skill interventions had larger effects than physical activity interventions. These findings indicate that it may be possible to support typically developing preschoolers' cognitive and academic learning with fundamental motor skill and physical activity interventions. However, most of the studies in this field have a weak methodological quality and thus, the presented evidence was considered weak in nature.