bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Surprise and human-agent interactions
Authors: Clavel Chloé
Published: December 2015

Affective Computing aims at improving the naturalness of human-computer interactions by integrating the socio-emotional component in the interaction. The use of embodied conversational agents (ECAs) – virtual characters interacting with humans – is a key answer to this issue. On the one hand, the ECA has to take into account the human emotional behaviours and social attitudes. On the other hand, the ECA has to display socio-emotional behaviours with relevance. In this paper, we provide an overview of computational methods used for user’s socio-emotional behaviour analysis and of human-agent interaction strategies by questioning the ambivalent status of surprise. We focus on the computational models and on the methods we use to detect user’s emotion through language and speech processing and present a study investigating the role of surprise in the ECA’s answer.
Nested term recognition driven by word connection strength
Authors: Marciniak Malgorzata , Mykowiecka Agnieszka
Published: December 2015

Domain corpora are often not very voluminous and even important terms can occur in them not as isolated maximal phrases but only within more complex constructions. Appropriate recognition of nested terms can thus influence the content of the extracted candidate term list and its order. We propose a new method for identifying nested terms based on a combination of two aspects: grammatical correctness and normalised pointwise mutual information (NPMI) counted for all bigrams in a given corpus. NPMI is typically used for recognition of strong word connections, but in our solution we use it to recognise the weakest points to suggest the best place for division of a phrase into two parts. By creating, at most, two nested phrases in each step, we introduce a binary term structure. We test the impact of the proposed method applied, together with the C-value ranking method, to the automatic term recognition task performed on three corpora, two in Polish and one in English.
Extracting bilingual terms from the Web
Authors: Gaizauskas Robert , Lestari Paramita Monica , Barker Emma , Pinnis Marcis , Aker Ahmet , Solé Marta Pahisa
Published: December 2015

In this paper we make two contributions. First, we describe a multi-component system called BiTES (Bilingual Term Extraction System) designed to automatically gather domain-specific bilingual term pairs from Web data. BiTES components consist of data gathering tools, domain classifiers, monolingual text extraction systems and bilingual term aligners. BiTES is readily extendable to new language pairs and has been successfully used to gather bilingual terminology for 24 language pairs, including English and all official EU languages, save Irish. Second, we describe a novel set of methods for evaluating the main components of BiTES and present the results of our evaluation for six language pairs. Results show that the BiTES approach can be used to successfully harvest quality bilingual term pairs from the Web. Our evaluation method delivers significant insights about the strengths and weaknesses of our techniques. It can be straightforwardly reused to evaluate other bilingual term extraction systems and makes a novel contribution to the study of how to evaluate bilingual terminology extraction systems.
The Sociopolitical Thesaurus as a resource for automatic document processing in Russian
Authors: Loukachevitch Natalia , Dobrov Boris
Published: December 2015

This paper presents the structure and current state of the Sociopolitical thesaurus, which was developed for automatic document analysis and information-retrieval applications in Russian in a broad domain of public affairs. The scope of the Sociopolitical thesaurus resembles traditional information-retrieval thesauri for broad domains such as the EUROVOC or UNBIS thesauri, but the Sociopolitical thesaurus is intended as a tool for automatic document processing and this difference leads to considerable distinctions in the thesaurus structure and principles of its development. The knowledge representation in the Sociopolitical thesaurus is based on the combination of three existing traditions of developing information-retrieval thesauri, wordnets, and formal ontology research, which facilitates the consistent representation for such a broad scope of concepts and automatic document analysis of unstructured texts. The Sociopolitical thesaurus is used in such applications as conceptual indexing in information-retrieval systems, knowledge-based text categorization, automatic summarization of single and multiple documents, and question-answering. This paper presents an evaluation of the Sociopolitical thesaurus in automatic knowledge-based text categorization.
Forecasting the Impacts of Silver and Bighead Carp on the Lake Erie Food Web
Authors: Zhang Hongyan , Rutherford Edward S. , Mason Doran M. , Breck Jason T. , Wittmann Marion E. , Cooke Roger M. , Lodge David M. , Rothlisberger John D. , Zhu Xinhua , Johnson Timothy B.
Published: December 2015

Nonindigenous bigheaded carps (Bighead CarpHypophthalmichthys nobilisand Silver CarpH. molitrix; hereafter, “Asian carps” [AC]) threaten to invade and disrupt food webs and fisheries in the Laurentian Great Lakes through their high consumption of plankton. To quantify the potential effects of AC on the food web in Lake Erie, we developed an Ecopath with Ecosim (EwE) food web model and simulated four AC diet composition scenarios (high, low, and no detritus and low detritus with WalleyeSander vitreusand Yellow PerchPerca flavescenslarvae) and two nutrient load scenarios (the 1999 baseline load and 2× the baseline [HP]). We quantified the uncertainty of the potential AC effects by coupling the EwE model with estimates of parameter uncertainty in AC production, consumption, and predator diets obtained using structured expert judgment. Our model projected mean ± SD AC equilibrium biomass ranging from 52 ± 34 to 104 ± 75 kg/ha under the different scenarios. Relative to baseline simulations without AC, AC invasion under all detrital diet scenarios decreased the biomass of most fish and zooplankton groups. The effects of AC in the HP scenario were similar to those in the detrital diet scenarios except that the biomasses of most Walleye and Yellow Perch groups were greater under HP because these fishes were buffered from competition with AC by increased productivity at lower trophic levels. Asian carp predation on Walleye and Yellow Perch larvae caused biomass declines among all Walleye and Yellow Perch groups. Large food web impacts of AC occurred in only 2% of the simulations, where AC biomass exceeded 200 kg/ha, resulting in biomass declines of zooplankton and planktivorous fish near the levels observed in the Illinois River. Our findings suggest that AC would affect Lake Erie's food web by competing with other planktivorous fishes and by providing additional prey for piscivores. Our methods provide a novel approach for including uncertainty into forecasts of invasive species' impacts on aquatic food webs.
Scaling of the MHD perturbation amplitude required to trigger a disruption and predictions for ITER
Authors: de Vries P.C. , Pautasso G. , Nardon E. , Cahyna P. , Gerasimov S. , Havlicek J. , Hender T.C. , Huijsmans G.T.A. , Lehnen M. , Maraschek M. , Markovič T. , Snipes J.A.
Published: December 2015

The amplitude of locked instabilities, likely magnetic islands, seen as precursors to disruptions has been studied using data from the JET, ASDEX Upgrade and COMPASS tokamaks. It was found that the thermal quench, that often initiates the disruption, is triggered when the amplitude has reached a distinct level. This information can be used to determine thresholds for simple disruption prediction schemes. The measured amplitude in part depends on the distance of the perturbation to the measurement coils. Hence the threshold for the measured amplitude depends on the mode location (i.e. the rational q-surface) and thus indirectly on parameters such as the edge safety factor, q
95, and the internal inductance, li(3), that determine the shape of the q-profile. These dependencies can be used to set the disruption thresholds more precisely. For the ITER baseline scenario, with typically q
95  =  3.2, li(3)  =  0.9 and taking into account the position of the measurement coils on ITER, the maximum allowable measured locked mode amplitude normalized to engineering parameters was estimated to be a·B
ML(r
c)/I
p  =  0.92 m mT/MA, or directly as a fraction edge poloidal magnetic field: B
ML(r
c)/B

θ
(a)  =  5 · 10−3. But these values decrease for operation at higher q
95 or lower li(3). The analysis found furthermore that the above empirical criterion to trigger a thermal quench is more consistent with a criterion derived with the concept of a critical island size, i.e. the thermal quench seemed to be triggered at a distinct island width.
The Realization Problem for some wild monoids and the Atiyah Problem
Authors: Ara P. , Goodearl K.
Published: December 2015

The Realization Problem for (von Neumann) regular rings asks what are the conical refinement monoids which can be obtained as the monoids of isomorphism classes of finitely generated projective modules over a regular ring. The analogous realization question for the larger class of exchange rings is also of interest. A refinement monoid is said to be wild if it cannot be expressed as a direct limit of finitely generated refinement monoids. In this paper, we consider the problem of realizing some concrete wild refinement monoids by regular rings and by exchange rings. The most interesting monoid we consider is the monoid

M

\mathcal M

obtained by successive refinements of the identity

x
0

+

y
0

=

x
0

+

z
0

x_0+y_0=x_0+z_0

. This monoid is known to be realizable by the algebra

A
=
K
[

F

]

A= K[\mathcal F]

of the monogenic free inverse monoid

F

\mathcal F

, for any choice of field

K
K

, but

A
A

is not an exchange ring. We show that, for any uncountable field

K
K

,

M

\mathcal M

is not realizable by a regular

K
K

-algebra, but that a suitable universal localization

Σ

−
1

A

\Sigma ^{-1}A

of

A
A

provides an exchange, non-regular,

K
K

-algebra realizing

M

\mathcal M

. For any countable field

F
F

, we show that a skew version of the above construction gives a regular

F
F

-algebra realizing

M

\mathcal M

. Finally, we develop some connections with the Atiyah Problem for the lamplighter group. We prove that the algebra

A
A

can be naturally seen as a

∗
*

-subalgebra of the group algebra

k
G

kG

over the lamplighter group

G
=

Z

2

≀

Z

G= \mathbb {Z}_2\wr \mathbb {Z}

, for any subfield

k
k

of

C

\mathbb {C}

closed under conjugation, and we determine the structure of the

∗
*

-regular closure of

A
A

in

U

(
G
)

\mathcal U(G)

. Using this, we show that the subgroup of

R

\mathbb R

generated by the von Neumann dimensions of matrices over

k
G

kG

contains

Q

\mathbb {Q}

.
Productivity and Economic Growth in U.S. Agriculture: A New Look
Authors: Ball Eldon V , Wang Sun L , Nehring Richard , Mosheim Roberto
Published: December 2015

It is widely reported that productivity growth is the main contributor to economic growth in U.S. agriculture. This article provides estimates of economic growth since World War II and decomposes that growth into the contributions of input growth and productivity growth. The analysis is based on recently revised production accounts, now spanning the 1948–2013 period. Our findings are fully consistent with those reported in the literature; productivity growth dominates input growth as a source of economic growth in the agricultural sector.
CD4 memory T cells develop and acquire functional competence by sequential cognate interactions and stepwise gene regulation
Authors: Kaji Tomohiro , Hijikata Atsushi , Ishige Akiko , Kitami Toshimori , Watanabe Takashi , Ohara Osamu , Yanaka Noriyuki , Okada Mariko , Shimoda Michiko , Taniguchi Masaru , Takemori Toshitada
Published: December 2015

Memory CD4+ T cells promote protective humoral immunity; however, how memory T cells acquire this activity remains unclear. This study demonstrates that CD4+ T cells develop into antigen-specific memory T cells that can promote the terminal differentiation of memory B cells far more effectively than their naive T-cell counterparts. Memory T cell development requires the transcription factor B-cell lymphoma 6 (Bcl6), which is known to direct T-follicular helper (Tfh) cell differentiation. However, unlike Tfh cells, memory T cell development did not require germinal center B cells. Curiously, memory T cells that develop in the absence of cognate B cells cannot promote memory B-cell recall responses and this defect was accompanied by down-regulation of genes associated with homeostasis and activation and up-regulation of genes inhibitory for T-cell responses. Although memory T cells display phenotypic and genetic signatures distinct from Tfh cells, both had in common the expression of a group of genes associated with metabolic pathways. This gene expression profile was not shared to any great extent with naive T cells and was not influenced by the absence of cognate B cells during memory T cell development. These results suggest that memory T cell development is programmed by stepwise expression of gatekeeper genes through serial interactions with different types of antigen-presenting cells, first licensing the memory lineage pathway and subsequently facilitating the functional development of memory T cells. Finally, we identified Gdpd3 as a candidate genetic marker for memory T cells.
T follicular helper cells, T follicular regulatory cells and autoimmunity
Authors: Zhu Yangyang , Zou Le , Liu Yun-Cai
Published: December 2015

CD4 + T follicular helper (Tfh) cells are recognized as a distinct T-cell subset, which provides help for germinal center (GC) formation, B-cell development and affinity maturation, and immunoglobulin class switching, as an indispensable part of adaptive immunity. Tfh cell differentiation depends on various factors including cell-surface molecule interactions, extracellular cytokines and multiple transcription factors, with B-cell lymphoma 6 (Bcl-6) being the master regulator. T follicular regulatory (Tfr) cells are also located in the GC and share phenotypic characteristics with Tfh cells and regulatory T cells, but function as negative regulators of GC responses. Dysregulation of either Tfh or Tfr cells is linked to the pathogenesis of autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus. This review covers the basic Tfh and Tfr biology including their differentiation and function, and their close relationship with autoimmune diseases.
Spatiotemporal variation in resource selection of servals: insights from a landscape under heavy land-use transformation
Authors: Ramesh Tharmalingam , Kalle Riddhika , Downs Colleen T.
Published: December 2015

Changes in habitat composition and structure along natural agricultural habitat gradient affect spatial ecology of carnivores at both intraspecific and interspecific levels. An important prerequisite for the conservation and management of habitat specialists is a sound understanding of how they use indigenous habitats within fragmented landscapes. We present the 1st comprehensive study on home range, overlap, and resource selection of 16 radiocollared servals ( Leptailurus serval ) in the Drakensberg Midlands, South Africa. Servals (11 males and 5 females) were livetrapped and radiotracked between May 2013 and August 2014 covering 4 seasons (winter, spring, summer, and autumn). Mean annual home range estimates (95% and 50% fixed kernel [FK], respectively) for males (38.07 km 2 ; 8.27 km 2 ) were generally larger than for females (6.22 km 2 ; 1.04 km 2 ). Although male core ranges varied slightly in spring, overall serval home ranges were stable across seasons. There was considerable intersexual home range overlap (> 85%), whereas intrasexual overlap was rare (< 10%). Home range size decreased with increase in age and less availability of wetland, while it increased in males at both levels (95% FK and 50% FK). For both sexes, Manley’s selection index indicated that natural habitats including wetlands and forest with bushland ranked higher than all other habitat classes. However, forested habitat was used approximately 2 times more frequently by males than females whereas cropland was avoided by both sexes. Overall, wetlands were ranked highest, followed by forest with bushland, grassland, plantations, and cropland in terms of serval resources selection. Our results emphasize that natural habitats, mainly wetlands and forests with bushland, are important predictors of spatiotemporal habitat use of servals in the agricultural mosaics of South Africa.
Örebro Musculoskeletal Pain Screening Questionnaire Short-Form and STarT Back Screening Tool
Authors: Fuhro Fernanda Ferreira , Fagundes Felipe Ribeiro Cabral , Manzoni Ana Carolina Taccolini , Costa Leonardo Oliveira Pena , Cabral Cristina Maria Nunes
Published: December 2015

Study Design.

Correlation and agreement analysis.

Objective.

The objective of this study was to compare the Brazilian Portuguese versions of the Örebro Musculoskeletal Pain Screening Questionnaire Short-Form (ÖMPSQ-short) and the STarT Back Screening Tool (SBST)-Brazil in patients with low back pain and to verify their correlation with disability, kinesiophobia, and pain.

Summary of Background Data.

The ÖMPSQ-short and the SBST were designed to identify patients at risk of developing pain and disability related to psychosocial factors.

Methods.

We assessed 130 patients, who answered the ÖMPSQ-short, SBST-Brazil, Roland-Morris disability questionnaire, Tampa scale of kinesiophobia, and Pain Numerical Rating scale. The total scores of the ÖMPSQ-short and the SBST-Brazil were correlated with the other questionnaires. Cross-tabulation and Cohen κ were used to analyze the agreement between the ÖMPSQ-short and the SBST-Brazil for participant classification as low or high risk for involvement of psychosocial factors.

Results.

The ÖMPSQ-short and the SBST-Brazil presented good correlation between total scores (r = 0.73), good correlation with disability (ÖMPSQ-short: r = 0.72; SBST-Brazil: r = 0.76), and kinesiophobia (ÖMPSQ-short: r = 0.68; SBST-Brazil: r = 0.60) and moderate correlation with pain in the last episode (ÖMPSQ-short: r = 0.39; SBST-Brazil: r = 0.48), in last 2 weeks (ÖMPSQ-short: r = 0.39; SBST: r = 0.43), and current pain (ÖMPSQ-short: r = 0.39; SBST-Brazil: r = 0.31). Participant classification as high or low risk by the two questionnaires showed moderate agreement (κ = 0.49). A total of 83% of participants were classified correctly by the two questionnaires.

Conclusion.

The ÖMPSQ-short and the SBST-Brazil showed good correlation between total scores and moderate agreement for patient classification in relation to the presence of psychosocial factors.

Level of Evidence: 3
Prehospital rapid sequence induction following trauma in the era of regional networks for major trauma
Authors: Naumann David N. , McLaughlin Aisling , Midwinter Mark J. , Crombie Nicholas
Published: December 2015

Objective

Rapid sequence induction (RSI) provides prompt airway control during emergency evacuation of trauma patients. Physicians may be tasked to travel with paramedic ambulance crews to the scene of injury when RSI is more likely to be required. This study investigates whether there are any differences in the practice of prehospital RSI during emergency retrievals for trauma since the establishment of the regional Major Trauma Network (MTN) in March 2012.

Methods

A retrospective observational study examined prehospital records for all trauma patients from September 2010 to January 2015 at a Major Trauma Centre in Birmingham, UK. Prehospital physician availability increased from 12 to 24 h after March 2012, and tasking became centralized. Data included demographics, mechanism of injury, crew personnel, and details of RSI. The periods before and after the establishment of the regional MTN were compared.

Results

There were 5244 patients: 1432 (27.3%) before and 3812 (72.7%) after March 2012. Of the patients, 67.2% were male. The most common injuries were road traffic collisions (45.0%). Physicians were more likely to be present after (2345 missions, 61.5%) than before (529 missions, 36.9%) March 2012 (P<0.01). RSI was performed 434 (8.3%) times and was more likely during the latter than the former period [359 (9.4%) vs. 75 (5.2%), P<0.01]. Successful tracheal intubation was achieved in 99% of occasions.

Conclusion

The establishment of regional MTNs enables centrally tasked, 24-h physician availability for emergency trauma patients. There has been an increase in physician presence on emergency missions and increased frequency of RSI for at-risk trauma patients at times when there may previously have been an unmet requirement.
Mortality in Spanish pediatric emergency departments: a 5-year multicenter survey
Authors: Lopez Edurne , Udaondo June , Olabarri Mikel , Martinez-Indart Lorea , Benito Javier , Mintegi Santiago
Published: December 2015

Background

Analysis of the causes of death in children in the pediatric emergency department (ED) may aid the development of management and prevention practices.

Objective

To identify the causes of death in Spanish pediatric EDs and to analyze the management of these children in the prehospital and hospital settings.

Methods

This was a retrospective descriptive multicenter survey including all patients whose death was certified in 18 Spanish pediatric EDs between 2008 and 2013.

Results

During the study period, 3 542 426 episodes were registered in the EDs. Of these, 54 patients died (mortality rate: 1.5/100 000 visits). Data of 53 patients are analyzed (male 36, 67%, 31 younger than 2 years old and 43.3% nonpreviously healthy children). The main causes of death were related to their previous illnesses (24.5%), sudden infant death syndrome (20.7%), and traumatism (18.8%).

Prehospital cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) was performed in 31 patients, and exclusively by health workers in 19 patients. In 35 patients, the parents witnessed the event and seven began CPR.

Thirty children were transferred to the pediatric EDs by medical transport (56.6%) and all of them received prehospital CPR (vs. one patient out of 23 arrived in a nonmedical transportation).

In 37 patients, CPR was performed in the pediatric EDs. Overall, CPR lasted 40±23 min (range, 10–120 min). CPR was not performed in seven patients at any time.

Conclusion

The main causes of death in Spanish pediatric EDs are related to previous illnesses, sudden infant death syndrome, and nonintentional lesions. Several actions have to be considered to improve the quality of care of these children in prehospital and emergency settings.
Immune Modulatory Therapy Causing Acute Coronary Syndrome
Authors: Agrawal Yashwant , Jacob Chris , Demchuk Nathan , Tikaria Richa , Virupannavar Shanti , Khajuria Bhavik , Kalavakunta Jagadeesh K.
Published: December 2015

Intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) is a therapeutic preparation of pooled polyspecific IgG used effectively in immune thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP), autoimmune diseases, and inflammatory diseases. We present a case of a 67-year-old male who presented with diffuse petechiae and was diagnosed with immune thrombocytopenic purpura with platelet count less than 10,000 per milliliter. Treatment was initiated with IVIG. When the third dose of IVIG was being administered he developed hypertensive urgency and non-ST segment elevation myocardial infarction. He was deemed not to be a candidate for cardiac catheterization and was treated conservatively. IVIG can cause major thrombotic adverse events such as deep vein thrombosis, myocardial infarction and stroke, which are attributed to thrombosis and hyperviscocity. Decreasing the dosage of IVIG, administration of anticoagulants are proposed treatments for such events. We propose that patients receiving high-dose IVIG with previous coronary artery disease require meticulous cardiac monitoring. Further research is needed to determine the true adverse effects of high-dose IVIG and prophylaxis regimens to decrease the risk.
Assessing Adherence to Insulin Initiation Recommendations at a Suburban Family Medicine Clinic
Authors: Harris Kira B. , Olin Jacqueline L.
Published: December 2015

The American Diabetes Association recommends insulin initiation when A1c ≥10%. The aim of this study was to determine adherence to insulin initiation in patients with an A1c ≥10% at an outpatient family medicine clinic. The secondary objectives were to determine whether initiation of insulin within 3 weeks of an A1c ≥10% increased the rate or decreased the time to achieve an A1c <7% and to determine whether pharmacist involvement increased the rate of reaching an A1c <7%. This institutional review board–approved, retrospective, observational, cohort study identified 120 patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus and an A1c ≥10% in 2014. Patients already receiving insulin or those without a follow-up A1c were excluded. Study outcomes included proportion of patients receiving insulin therapy within 3 weeks of A1c >/=10%, rate of meeting A1c <7%, time to reach A1c <7%, and proportion of patients meeting with a pharmacist. Fifty-five patients with a mean age of 55 years, a mean duration of diabetes of 6.4 years, and a mean baseline A1c of 11.7% met the inclusion criteria. Most patients were receiving no therapy (29%), monotherapy (27%), or dual therapy (29%) at baseline. Insulin was initiated in 5 patients (9.1%, P < 0.05) within 3 weeks of the qualifying A1c. Another 5 patients (P < 0.05) received insulin at some point during the study. An A1c <7% was achieved in 35.6% of patients not receiving insulin, 20% of patients receiving early insulin, and no patients who received insulin after 3 weeks. The mean time to A1c <7% was 6 months for patients not on insulin and 3 months for those receiving early insulin. Thirty-three percent of patients who met with a pharmacist reached an A1c <7% compared with 30% of patients who did not. Adherence to insulin initiation guidelines and rate of achieving A1c <7% in patients with A1c ≥10% is low. Increasing pharmacy involvement may increase the rate of reaching goal A1c.
Diversity of Pico- to Mesoplankton Along the 2000 km Salinity Gradient of the Baltic Sea
Authors: Hu Yue O.O. , Karlson Bengt , Charvet Sophie , Andersson Anders F.
Published: December 2015

Microscopic plankton form the productive base of both marine and freshwater ecosystems and are key drivers of global biogeochemical cycles of carbon and nutrients. Plankton diversity is immense with representations from all major phyla within the three domains of life. So far, plankton monitoring has mainly been based on microscopic identification, which has limited sensitivity and reproducibility, not least because of the numerical majority of plankton being unidentifiable under the light microscope. High-throughput sequencing of taxonomic marker genes offers a means to identify taxa inaccessible by traditional methods; thus, recent studies have unveiled an extensive previously unknown diversity of plankton. Here, we conducted ultra-deep Illumina sequencing (average 105sequences/sample) of rRNA gene amplicons of surface water eukaryotic and bacterial plankton communities along a 2000 km transect following the salinity gradient of the Baltic Sea. Community composition was strongly correlated with salinity for both bacterial and eukaryotic plankton assemblages, highlighting the importance of salinity for structuring the biodiversity within this ecosystem. The distribution of major planktonic taxa followed expected patterns as observed in monitoring programs, but also novel groups to the Baltic were identified, such as relatives to the coccolithophoreEmiliana huxleyiin the northern Baltic Sea. The deep sequencing also enabled accurate enumeration of highly resolved (> 99% identity) operational taxonomic units, which revealed contrasting distribution profiles among closely related populations, reflecting niche partitioning into ecotypes. This study provides the first ultra-deep sequencing-based survey on eukaryotic and bacterial plankton biogeography in the Baltic Sea.
scDD: A statistical approach for identifying differential distributions in single-cell RNA-seq experiments
Authors: Korthauer Keegan D. , Chu Li-Fang , Newton Michael A. , Li Yuan , Thomson James , Stewart Ron , Kendziorski Christina
Published: December 2015

The ability to quantify cellular heterogeneity is a major advantage of single-cell technologies. Although understanding such heterogeneity is of primary interest in a number of studies, for convenience, statistical methods often treat cellular heterogeneity as a nuisance factor. We present a novel method to characterize differences in expression in the presence of distinct expression states within and among biological conditions. Using simulated and case study data, we demonstrate that the modeling framework is able to detect differential expression patterns of interest under a wide range of settings. Compared to existing approaches, scDD has higher power to detect subtle differences in gene expression distributions that are more complex than a mean shift, and is able to characterize those differences. The freely available R package scDD implements the approach.
Not just dialling it in
Authors: Vorley Tim , Williams Nick
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of smartphone apps in fostering effectual thinking. The paper considers both the effectual development of entrepreneurial ideas and the associated change in entrepreneurial confidence and perceived entrepreneurial skills of students at a UK Higher Education Institution.

Design/methodology/approach

– The research was conducted with 60 first year undergraduate management students who had not previously undertaken enterprise education. Students were divided into three groups: the first was given a process-based briefing on developing entrepreneurial ideas; the second the process-based briefing and an additional method-based briefing on developing entrepreneurial ideas; while the third the same process-based briefing and use of the smartphone application as a method-based learning tool.

Findings

– The results show the value of method-based teaching and the potential value of smartphone based learning tool to support independent method-based learning. Compared to the process-based approach, the method-based approach is shown to have an increased effect on the development of entrepreneurial ideas, as well as increasing entrepreneurial confidence and entrepreneurial skill of the participants.

Practical implications

– Implications for the future development of enterprise and entrepreneurial education are presented, referring to factors which enable entrepreneurial ideas to be developed and how pedagogical approaches shape this.

Originality/value

– The study adds to the emergent literature on enterprise education by evidencing the need to develop new approaches and identify in what ways these may be informed by a more effectual approach.
Employer demands from business graduates
Authors: McMurray Stephen , Dutton Matthew , McQuaid Ronald , Richard Alec
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to report on research carried out with employers to determine demand for business and management skills in the Scottish workforce.

Design/methodology/approach

– The research used a questionnaire in which employers were interviewed (either telephone or face to face), completed themselves and returned by e-mail, or completed an online survey. In total, 71 employers took part in the study.

Findings

– The research found that the factors which are most important to employers when recruiting graduates were; personal attitude, employability skills, relevant work experience and degree result. The most important transferable skills to employers when recruiting graduates were; trustworthiness, reliability, motivation, communication skills and a willingness to learn.

Social implications

– The paper shows the importance of graduates developing excellent job searching skills, high-quality work experience and developing business courses to enhance students’ employability and better meet employers’ wants.

Originality/value

– The paper is timely given the introduction of Key Information Sets. The provision of such information will drive HEI to further develop students’ employability to obtain graduate-level jobs.
A dynamic capabilities view of employability
Authors: Finch David J , Peacock Melanie , Levallet Nadege , Foster William
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– The increasing demand for post-secondary education, and the ongoing difficulty students’ face in securing appropriate work upon program completion, highlight the importance of an enhanced understanding of employability resources for university graduates. Just as organizations achieve a strategic advantage from resources and dynamic capabilities (DCs), university graduates can similarly apply these principles and tactics to be competitive in the job market. The purpose of this paper is to ask the question: how can new graduates enhance their competitive advantage when entering the employment market? To address this question the authors propose to adopt the DCs framework to analyze the competitive advantage of a graduate and argue that university graduates can take specific steps to enhance their own competitive advantage in the labor market.

Design/methodology/approach

– An extensive review of the existing human resource and strategic management literature was used to develop a conceptual DCs model of employability. The core dimensions of the conceptual model were refined using 26 one-on-one interviews with employers of new university graduates. This study concludes by recommending specific empirical and experimental research to further test the model.

Findings

– The results from the qualitative study identified the importance of four specific resources that university graduates should possess: intellectual, personality, meta-skill and job-specific. In addition, the authors suggest that integrated DCs are crucial for enhancing the value of these individual resources. Both pre-graduate application and the construction of personal narratives are essential signals that university graduates can mobilize individual resources in a complementary and strategic manner, in real-world settings, to maximize value.

Research limitations/implications

– This is an exploratory study and is designed as a foundation for future empirical and experiential research.

Practical implications

– The findings suggest that, in order to increase employability, university students need to assume a DCs view of competitive advantage. As a result, students need to reflect on both their intrinsic and learned resources to create a systematic competitive advantage that is valued, rare and difficult to replicate or substitute.

Social implications

– This paper challenges students to assume a holistic view of education by recognizing education extends far beyond a classroom. Therefore, differentiation and value creation is reflected in the synthesis and application of both intrinsic and learned resources.

Originality/value

– The integration of strategic management and human resource literature is a unique theoretical approach to explore the drivers of graduate employability.
A critical perspective on learning outcomes and the effectiveness of experiential approaches in entrepreneurship education
Authors: Scott Jonathan M , Penaluna Andy , Thompson John L
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to conduct a critical appraisal of how experiential approaches can more effectively enhance the achievement of desired learning outcomes in entrepreneurship education. In particular, the authors critique whether actual learning outcomes can be profitably used to measure effectiveness; and consider how student performance can be evaluated through the twin lenses of implementation or innovation.

Design/methodology/approach

– The authors undertook a review of both traditional and experiential approaches to entrepreneurship education. In addition to comparing these approaches, the authors critiqued a number of “taken for granted” assumptions regarding the effectiveness of experiential approaches to entrepreneurship education and made recommendations.

Findings

– Although there is a large body of research on experiential approaches towards entrepreneurship education, the authors know little about how these approaches contribute towards the effective achievement of desired learning outcomes. Whilst many authors claim that such approaches are effective, such assertions are not supported by sufficient robust evidence. Hence the authors need to establish more effective student performance evaluation metrics. In particular: first, whether actual learning outcomes are appropriate measures of effectiveness; and second, the authors should evaluate student performance through the lenses of the two “Is” – implementation or innovation.

Practical implications

– Whether actual learning outcomes are used as a measure of effectiveness at all needs to be critiqued further. Implementation involves doing things that are determined by others and matching against their expectations, whereas innovation comprises producing multiple and varied solutions that respond to change and often surprise.

Originality/value

– Through revisiting the discussions on the art and the science of entrepreneurship education, this paper represents an initial critical attempt – as part of an ongoing study – to fill a gap in entrepreneurship education research. The paper, therefore, has significant value for students, entrepreneurship educators and policy-makers.
Can university-industry linkages stimulate student employability?
Authors: Ishengoma Esther , Vaaland Terje I.
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to identify important university-industry linkage (UIL) activities that can stimulate the likelihood of employability among students.

Design/methodology/approach

– A total of 404 respondents located in Tanzania, comprising students, faculty members and employees from 20 companies operating within the oil and gas industry and mining constitute the empirical basis for the study. Descriptive analysis, the Mann-Whitney U-test and a Kruskal-Wallis test were applied to help analyse the data.

Findings

– The results reveal that UIL activities were strongly perceived to raise the employability of students, in particular student internships in companies followed by joint projects and the involvement of companies in modernizing university curricula. Adoption and diffusion internship strategies are suggested for foreign companies and for local firm, respectively, as vehicles for increasing employability.

Research limitations/implications

– Perceived effects on the likelihood of employability are measured, and not actual effects.

Practical implications

– The findings have implications for foreign companies exploring resources in the host country, local firms trying to improve competitiveness, universities trying to improve its role in society, students preparing for work-life and policy makers defining premises for resource-extractive foreign companies.

Originality/value

– Very few empirical studies of UILs have previously been carried out in a developing country context, and in particular in dealing with student employability. The fact that many developing nations have attractive rich natural resources implies that international companies have a motive to invest in the UILs, and possess valuable competencies that can improve the overall quality of the universities and the attractiveness of graduating students.
Including ethics in banking and finance programs: teaching “we shouldn’t win at any cost”
Authors: Oates Grainne , Dias Roshanthi
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to identify whether ethics is incorporated into the curriculum in postgraduate banking and finance programmes. There is growing concern that moral failure preceded the global financial crisis with waves of ethical scandals overwhelming the global banking industry highlighting a lack of integrity. Consequently, banking and financial institutions have received much criticism for focusing on higher financial returns that bring personal rewards with significant costs to the majority of society.

Design/methodology/approach

– The population for this study is Australian universities offering banking and finance postgraduate programs. The data for this study were collected from information available on university websites. The study uses content analysis to examine course content in 897 courses offered within banking and finance programmes.

Findings

– Findings reveal that 809 (90 per cent) out of 897 courses do not incorporate ethics into banking and finance programmes. Most of the 88 courses incorporating ethics as include the course as “core”, with a relatively small number offering ethics as an “elective”. Only a few courses were offered as stand-alone ethics courses. It appears from the information available that little focus is given to assessment of ethics.

Originality/value

– This is the first study to explore whether ethics is featured in postgraduate banking and finance programmes.
Work harassment and local government employees: Australia and USA
Authors: Xerri Matthew , Farr-Wharton Rod , Brunetto Yvonne , Lambries Dennis
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to compare the impact of management and colleagues on the perception of work harassment and outcomes of local government employees in Australia and the USA.

Design/methodology/approach

– Completed surveys from local government employees (265 from the USA and 250 from Australia) were analysed using structural equation modelling and an ANOVA.

Findings

– The results depict support for the overall measurement and structural models showing that workplace relationships impact on work harassment, and in turn employee outcomes (psychological wellbeing and Organisational Citizenship Behaviour-Individual (OCB-I)), although not all paths were accepted for each country. Statistically significant differences were found between the Australian and USA samples for both the measurement and structural models, with the sample from the USA showing much higher levels of satisfaction with workplace relationships, higher levels of psychological wellbeing, OCB-I, and lower perceptions of work harassment.

Practical implications

– The findings provide implications that Australian and US local government employees, positioned closest to the public, experience work harassment probably as a result of chronic under-resourcing both in terms of manpower and other resources, and coupled with unrealistically high-performance targets. The results depict that such work harassment is resulting in lower psychological wellbeing (USA only) and lower extra-role behaviour associated with OCB-I (Australia and USA).

Originality/value

– The value of this paper is that it benchmarks the impact of workplace relationships on work harassment for local government employees across two Anglo-American countries.
Workplace aggression toward local government employees: target characteristics
Authors: Fischer Tamar , Van Reemst Lisa , De Jong Jessica
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to explore to what extent job, organizational, and personal characteristics independently contribute to the prediction of workplace victimization of local government employees in the Netherlands. The existence of interactions between personal and context (job and organizational) characteristics is also explored.

Design/methodology/approach

– Structured survey data measured the frequency of victimization involving three types of incidents: verbal aggression; threats; and physical violence. Associations with job and personal factors and interaction effects were studied using bivariate and multivariate analyses.

Findings

– Contact frequency, perceived work stress, and type of job held by local government employees are the strongest correlates of workplace aggression. Self-efficacy in employees’ conflict management skills shows an unexpected positive association with the level of experienced aggression, especially in organizations that have low levels of prevention measures.

Research limitations/implications

– Because of the cross-sectional design of the study, no definite causal conclusions can be drawn. Common-method bias in the measurements may have led to systematic bias.

Originality/value

– This study presents an integrated model of correlates of public-initiated workplace aggression toward a population that is understudied: namely, local government employees. It also provides first insights into how job, organizational, and personal correlates of workplace victimization interact in this population.
Combatting workplace aggression in detainee transport: the Dutch case
Authors: Lasthuizen Karin , Paanakker Hester
Published: December 2015

Purpose

– In Dutch detainee care custodial transport police officers experience high levels of aggression and violence from detainees. Being a first of its kind in the Netherlands, the purpose of this paper is to unravel the true nature and origins of such workplace aggression against transport officers and focuses on the role of street-level leadership and leadership by management for its mitigation and prevention.

Design/methodology/approach

– Unique in such closed institutions as the prison system, the study employs an extensive mixed methods approach, combining observations, interviews and survey data collected among transport officers and detainees in 2012-2013.

Findings

– The research shows that within the exercised street-level leadership of transport officers especially staff orientation towards detainees has great impact. Perceived inappropriate treatment is likely to increase detainees’ aggressive behaviours, with potentially detrimental effects such as heightened levels of officers’ job stress, decreased safety and decreased quality of detainee transport. The solutions offered indicate that while transport officers could benefit from a supportive staff orientation, transport police management might need to pay more attention to rule enforcement leadership within their efforts to optimize working conditions.

Originality/value

– The major practical implication of this research is the potential impact of training in affecting the decisions of frontline public employees in a way that their street-level leadership practices manifest the organizational values and alignment with societal values to ensure an adequate public sector service delivery.