bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Is Periodontal Disease Associated with Alzheimer's Disease? A Systematic Review with Meta-Analysis
Authors: Leira Yago , Domínguez Clara , Seoane Juan , Seoane-Romero Juan , Pías-Peleteiro Juan Manuel , Takkouche Bahi , Blanco Juan , Aldrey José Manuel
Published: February 2017

Background: In the last decade, several observational studies have suggested that there exists an association between periodontal disease (PD) and Alzheimer's disease (AD). The aim of this systematic review was to investigate whether or not this link exists. Summary: The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis guideline for systematic review was used and registered at PROSPERO (CRD42016035377). The search strategy included using electronic databases and by hand searching articles published up to January 2016. MEDLINE via PubMed, EMBASE and Web of Science were searched by 2 independent reviewers. Observational studies including patients meeting criteria for both AD and PD were eligible to be included in the analysis. Quality assessment of selected studies was performed by the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale. From a total of 550 titles and abstracts, 5 studies were included (2 cross-sectional, 2 case-control and one cohort study) in the review. A fixed effects meta-analysis showed that the presence of PD is associated with the presence of AD (OR 1.69, 95% CI 1.21-2.35). When only severe forms of PD were evaluated, a significant association was also observed (OR 2.98, 95% CI 1.58-5.62). Key Messages: In the present review, a significant association was observed between PD and AD. Further studies should be carried out in order to investigate the direction of the association and factors that may confound it.
Paraneoplastic Peripheral Nervous System Manifestations of Renal Cell Carcinoma: A Case Report and Review of the Literature
Authors: Yang Ingrid , Jaros Joanna , Bega Danny
Published: February 2017

Neurologic symptoms secondary to a paraneoplastic syndrome may be the presenting manifestation of a previously undiagnosed cancer, and alertness to these syndromes may provide an opportunity for early detection and treatment of a cancer. Paraneoplastic weakness is a rare manifestation of renal cell carcinoma and may present with variable electrophysiological features. We present a case of a patient with progressive weakness, sensory changes, and urinary retention, with electrophysiological features suggestive of a complex peripheral nervous system syndrome. Ultimately, a renal cell mass was detected and resected, resulting in significant clinical improvement. We review the literature, cataloging the known neurologic syndromes and antibodies associated with renal cell carcinoma. This case highlights that paraneoplastic neurological disorders associated with RCC can take on many features and provides a resource to practitioners for early detection of a neurologic paraneoplastic syndrome arising from renal cell carcinoma.
A “buzzfeedização” da comunicação das organizações no ambiente digital
Authors: Terra Carolina Frazon
Published: February 2017

O artigo discute a condensação dos conteúdos das organizações dispostos nas redes sociais sob a luz de conceitos e autores que falam de espetacularização, efemeridade, imediatismo, liquidez, visibilidade midiática e sucesso das listas na internet. Desse aspecto do conteúdo – as listas – é que deriva o título deste trabalho, por entendermos se tratar de uma alusão ao site BuzzFeed, um dos principais representantes do formato no ambiente digital. Também correlacionamos o êxito dos conteúdos em listas a uma modalidade de marketing denominada inbound marketing, especialidade que defende a geração de conteúdo que engaja e prende a atenção do usuário da rede. O tripé de conceitos de Baldissera (2009) – organizações comunicada, falada e comunicante – também é uma referência teórica que ajuda a sustentar o trabalho. A metodologia utilizada foi a pesquisa bibliográfica.
Corpos falantes e rostos (in)visíveis: corpo, sexualidade e feminismo em “Moça, você é machista”
Authors: Tranquilin-Silva Josefina De Fatima
Published: February 2017

O artigo propõe reflexões a partir de um olhar direcionado às experiências de subjetividades juvenis, com enfoque especial nas questões sobre o ativismo feminista em espaços digitais. Tem como locus metodológico a página do Facebook “Moça, você é machista” e objetiva analisar a visibilidade do feminismo digital e o corpo feminino como instrumento de luta à sua liberdade. Concluímos que o ativismo e a visibilidade constituídos em “Moça” levam a política de identidades, que proporciona ações de politicidades juvenis, comumente por meio de resistência negociada com as estruturas do poder. A etnografia é a metodologia utilizada.
A arte do remix: uma anarqueologia dos processos de criação em mídias digitais
Authors: Leão Lúcia
Published: February 2017

As mídias digitais, os bancos de dados e a lógica do software povoam a cultura contemporânea. Nesse cenário, procedimentos específicos de criação e produção de linguagem emergem nas redes. Compreendido enquanto ato de editar fragmentos de materiais pré-existentes com o objetivo de gerar novas obras, o remix é uma prática característica da cultura digital. Este artigo inicia com uma revisão crítica a respeito da discussão sobre o remix na cultura digital (Lessig, Manovich, Navas); em seguida, discute o remix como procedimento criativo nas diferentes mídias e como escolha estética na produção de imagem e imaginário midiáticos. A colagem segundo a visão de Max Ernst é revisitada para traçar paralelos com os processos de acoplamentos do remix. Para pensar o remix enquanto linguagem, realizamos dois estudos de caso.
Exclusão digital: como é estar do lado errado da divisão digital
Authors: Ragnedda Massimo , Ruiu Maria Laura
Published: February 2017

O desenvolvimento da sociedade da informação reforçou a existência de obstáculos que dificultam o acesso e o uso apropriado das tecnologias por certos grupos, levando a novas formas de exclusão no mercado de trabalho, nas instituições governamentais, no lazer, e nas atividades educativas. Contudo, reduzir o hiato entre aqueles que estão conectados e aqueles que não estão tendo acesso físico mais barato e mais rápido à internet não resulta automaticamente numa eliminação da distância colocada pelas desigualdades digitais. É um erro assumir um posicionamento tecnologicamente determinista, que vê o acesso à tecnologia como solução para os problemas sociais, incluindo problemas de desigualdade social, democracia, liberdade, interação social e um senso de comunidade. Na verdade, muitas dimensões e padrões existentes podem gerar e reforçar desigualdades, aumentando ainda mais as distâncias entre cidadãos/usuários. O termo “hiato digital”, muitas vezes usado como expressão binária, pode não ser adequado porque sugere um hiato unidimensional, baseado principalmente no fator econômico – possuir tecnologia –, ao passo em que há hiatos em perspectivas múltiplas, que vão além do simples acesso ou da obtenção dos recursos. Essas dimensões criam desigualdades digitais que, se não forem retratadas, produzem e reforçam as desigualdades sociais. Os conceitos de estratificação social e digital estão intimamente interligados.
Apresentação do Dossiê “Fronteiras críticas das mídias digitais”
Authors: Limberto Andrea
Published: February 2017

Apresentação do Dossiê do número 20, volume 10, de 2016.
Abordagens críticas para o estudo do digital e da televisão
Authors: Soares Rosana De Lima
Published: February 2017

Editorial do número 20, volume 10, de 2016.
Taxonomic revision of the genus Tetraglochin (Rosaceae, Rosoideae) and morphometric analysis of its species
Authors: CIALDELLA ANA M. , POMETTI CAROLINA L.
Published: February 2017

Tetraglochin is a small genus distributed along the Andes from Perú to southern Argentina and central Chile, belonging to the family Rosaceae. Systematic studies in Tetraglochin are scarce, and circumscription of some members of this genus is controversial. In order to evaluate the degree of morphological differentiation between the species of this genus, we performed morphometric analyses using multivariate methods (non parametric ANOVA, phenetic analysis and canonical discriminant analysis) including those specimens with intermediate characteristics between T. alata and T. ameghinoi. The phenogram obtained showed two principal clusters; this picture suggested a clear grouping of the specimens of T. alata, T. ameghinoi, T. aff. alata and T. andina. In the canonical discriminant analysis five groups were found and in general terms all individuals of T. alata, T. aff. alata and T. ameghinoi were grouped together. When multivariate analyses were applied almost all specimens could be correctly assigned to its species. However, specimens of T. alata, T. aff. alata and T. ameghinoi , were not well discriminated. Following recent phylogenetic results on the genus, and morphometric analyses perfomed herein for the first time, we present an updated taxonomic revision of Tetraglochin, based on exomorphological, vegetative and reproductive characters, including a key to identify species and varieties, their associated synonymy, full descriptions, geographical distribution and illustrations. As result, a new combination, T. alata var. ameghinoi is proposed, T. alata var. patagonica is reduced to synonymy of T. alata var. alata, and T. paucijugata and T. tragacantha are reduced to synonymy of T. cristata. Lectotypes for Margyricarpus acanthocarpus, Tetraglochin acanthocarpa var. lasiocarpa, var. dasycarpa, var. macropoda and var. lejocarpa are designated. One species, Tetraglochin buxifolia is excluded from the genus.
Dendrocalamus phuthoensis (Poaceae: Bambusoideae), a new species from Phu Tho province, Vietnam
Authors: NGUYEN HOANG NGHIA , NGUYEN VAN THO , LE VIET LAM , TRAN VAN TIEN , VIEN NGUYEN
Published: February 2017

A new species of Dendrocalamus (Poaceae: Bambusoideae), D. phuthoensis, is described and illustrated from Phu Tho Province, Vietnam. This species is similar to D. longiligulatus, but differs by its culm sheath glabrous, culm sheath ligule 6–7 mm long, serrulate, young culms densely brown pubescent, florets 7–9, arranged in the pseudospikelet, palea 12–14 mm long, with 3 or 4 veins between keels and without veins on each wing.
Two new taxa of Impatiens (Balsaminaceae) from southern parts of Western Ghats, India
Authors: PRABHUKUMAR KONICKAL MAMBETTA , JAGADEESAN RAVEENDRAN , PRASAD GOPALAKRISHNAN , NAGARAJ BHAGAVATHI AMMA NATARAJAN ACHARI , KUMAR VANNARATTA VEETTIL NAVEEN , VEERALINGA BHASKAR , BALACHANDRAN INDIRA
Published: February 2017

Two new taxa of Impatiens viz. I. mankulamensis sp. nov. and I. panduranganii sp. nov. (Balsaminaceae), are described from the southern Western Ghats, India. Notes on description, distribution, morphological variation and conservation status accompany each description, along with colour photographs.
Should we describe genera without molecular phylogenies?
Authors: PÁLL-GERGELY BARNA
Published: February 2017

For nearly a decade I have published species descriptions and revisions of land snails in peer- reviewed journals. As a systematist, it is often requisite to reclassify species into other, sometimes unnamed genera. Although in most cases editors and reviewers have not commented on the taxonomic changes I have made and the new taxa I described, I sometimes received negative critiques when I described new genera unaided by molecular phylogenetic support. I feel these critiques have become increasingly more frequent, and am convinced that many fellow taxonomists share this experience. Addressing this problem is particularly difficult due to three reasons. First, it is impossible to support these observations with statistical data (i.e. the frequency of similar reviews increasing or not); second, the increasing number of published phylogenetic works reveals more and more cases of polyphyletic genera, which might suggest that morphology-based generic grouping is unreliable, and thus, should be avoided; and third, no publications exist suggesting not to describe genera using (still) reliable morphological foundations. Subsequently, the unsatisfactory review process of taxonomic works is often exacerbated by the biases of reviewers and their inobservance of valuable historic convention in light of the current wave of molecular phylogenies. Moreover, the future value of morphological descriptions for biodiversity assessments (i.e. IUCN) is not even addressed.
A new species and three newly recorded species of the dacnusine genus Dacnusa Haliday (Hymenoptera: Braconidae: Alysiinae) from China
Authors: ZHENG MIN-LIN , CHEN JIA-HUA
Published: February 2017

A new species of the genus Dacnusa from the Palaearctic region of China, Dacnusa (Pachysema) heterodentatus sp. nov. is described. As well, three newly recorded species from the Palaearctic region in China are reported, along with their descriptions and illustrations: Dacnusa (Agonia) adducta (Haliday), Dacnusa (Aphanta) sasakawai Takada and Dacnusa (Dacnusa) maculipes Thomson. A key is presented to the subgenera of Dacnusa and the most similar species to these four reported species.
Mobile Radar as an Undergraduate Education and Research Tool: The ERAU C-BREESE Field Experience with the Doppler on Wheels
Authors: Milrad Shawn M. , Herbster Christopher G.
Published: February 2017

Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University Convective-Boundary Research Engaging Educational Student Experiences (ERAU C-BREESE) was an 18-day National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded educational Doppler on Wheels (DOW) deployment through the Center for Severe Weather Research in May 2015. ERAU C-BREESE had three primary areas of focus: meteorological field observations and research, undergraduate experiential learning, and local community outreach. ERAU undergraduate meteorology students had the unique opportunity to forecast for, collect, and analyze field measurements of sea-breeze processes and convection. The scientific objectives of ERAU C-BREESE were to forecast, observe, and analyze central Florida sea-breeze processes and thunderstorms by combining a DOW with more traditional tools. Specific scientific investigations were spurred by nine intensive observation periods (IOPs) throughout central Florida. Specific details are provided for IOP9, the most successful IOP, from both forecast and observational perspectives. Summaries of local community outreach, student education and responsibilities, and a discussion of the benefits of experiential learning are also provided.
Grand Challenges in Understanding the Interplay of Climate and Land Changes
Authors: Liu Shuguang , Bond-Lamberty Ben , Boysen Lena R. , Ford James D. , Fox Andrew , Gallo Kevin , Hatfield Jerry , Henebry Geoffrey M. , Huntington Thomas G. , Liu Zhihua , Loveland Thomas R. , Norby Richard J. , Sohl Terry , Steiner Allison L. , Yuan Wenping , Zhang Zhao , Zhao Shuqing
Published: February 2017

Half of Earth’s land surface has been altered by human activities, creating various consequences on the climate and weather systems at local to global scales, which in turn affect a myriad of land surface processes and the adaptation behaviors. This study reviews the status and major knowledge gaps in the interactions of land and atmospheric changes and present 11 grand challenge areas for the scientific research and adaptation community in the coming decade. These land-cover and land-use change (LCLUC)-related areas include 1) impacts on weather and climate, 2) carbon and other biogeochemical cycles, 3) biospheric emissions, 4) the water cycle, 5) agriculture, 6) urbanization, 7) acclimation of biogeochemical processes to climate change, 8) plant migration, 9) land-use projections, 10) model and data uncertainties, and, finally, 11) adaptation strategies. Numerous studies have demonstrated the effects of LCLUC on local to global climate and weather systems, but these putative effects vary greatly in magnitude and even sign across space, time, and scale and thus remain highly uncertain. At the same time, many challenges exist toward improved understanding of the consequences of atmospheric and climate change on land process dynamics and services. Future effort must improve the understanding of the scale-dependent, multifaceted perturbations and feedbacks between land and climate changes in both reality and models. To this end, one critical cross-disciplinary need is to systematically quantify and better understand measurement and model uncertainties. Finally, LCLUC mitigation and adaptation assessments must be strengthened to identify implementation barriers, evaluate and prioritize opportunities, and examine how decision-making processes work in specific contexts.
Irrigation Effects on Land–Atmosphere Coupling Strength in the United States
Authors: Lu Yaqiong , Harding Keith , Kueppers Lara
Published: February 2017

Land–atmosphere coupling strength describes the degree to which the atmosphere responds (e.g., via changes in precipitation) to changes in the land surface state (e.g., soil moisture). The Midwest and Great Plains of the United States have been shown to be “hot spots” of coupling by many climate models and some observations. However, very few of the modeling studies have reported whether the climate models applied irrigation in the Midwest and Great Plains, where 24%–27% of farmland is irrigated, leaving open the question of whether irrigation affects current estimates of coupling strength. This study used a regional climate model that incorporated dynamic crop growth and precision irrigation (WRF3.3–CLM4crop) to investigate irrigation effects on land–atmosphere coupling strength. Coupling strength was quantified using multiple indices and the irrigated land-induced precipitation was tracked using a back trajectory method. The indices showed a consistent and significant decline in local coupling strength with irrigation in the Midwest and northern Great Plains. These reductions were due to increased soil moisture but decreased local precipitation and lower sensitivity of latent heat flux to soil moisture over irrigated regions. The back trajectories of water vapor transport confirmed that irrigation largely did not contribute to local precipitation. Water vapor from irrigated land was transported to the Midwest and U.S. Northeast where it fell as precipitation, suggesting that irrigation has a broader spatial impact on soil moisture–precipitation coupling than simply through local soil moisture–evapotranspiration coupling. The present study suggests that climate models without irrigation schemes may overestimate the land–atmosphere coupling strength over irrigated agricultural regions but underestimate coupling strength over neighboring nonirrigated regions.
Interdecadal Changes in the Relationship between Interannual Variations of Spring North Atlantic SST and Eurasian Surface Air Temperature
Authors: Chen Shangfeng , Wu Renguang
Published: February 2017

This study investigates interdecadal changes in the relationship between interannual variations of boreal spring sea surface temperature (SST) in the North Atlantic and surface air temperature (SAT) over the mid-to-high latitudes of Eurasia during 1948–2014. Analyses show that the connection between the spring North Atlantic tripole SST anomaly pattern and the Eurasian SAT anomalies has experienced marked interdecadal shifts around the early 1970s and mid-1990s. The connection is strong during 1954–72 and 1996–2014 but weak during 1973–91. A diagnosis indicates that interdecadal changes in the connection between the North Atlantic SST and Eurasian SAT variations are associated with changes in atmospheric circulation anomalies over Eurasia induced by the North Atlantic tripole SST anomaly pattern. Further analyses suggest that changes in atmospheric circulation anomalies over Eurasia are related to changes in the position of atmospheric heating anomalies over the North Atlantic, which may be due to the change in mean SST. Marked atmospheric heating anomalies appear over the tropical western North Atlantic during 1954–72 and 1996–2014 but over the subtropical central-eastern North Atlantic during 1973–91. Barotropic model experiments confirm that different background flows may also contribute to changes in anomalous atmospheric circulation over Eurasia.
Precipitation Identification with Bispectral Satellite Information Using Deep Learning Approaches
Authors: Tao Yumeng , Gao Xiaogang , Ihler Alexander , Sorooshian Soroosh , Hsu Kuolin
Published: February 2017

In the development of a satellite-based precipitation product, two important aspects are sufficient precipitation information in the satellite-input data and proper methodologies, which are used to extract such information and connect it to precipitation estimates. In this study, the effectiveness of the state-of-the-art deep learning (DL) approaches to extract useful features from bispectral satellite information, infrared (IR), and water vapor (WV) channels, and to produce rain/no-rain (R/NR) detection is explored. To verify the methodologies, two models are designed and evaluated: the first model, referred to as the DL-IR only method, applies deep learning approaches to the IR data only; the second model, referred to as the DL-IR+WV method, incorporates WV data to further improve the precipitation identification performance. The radar stage IV data are the reference data used as ground observation. The operational product, Precipitation Estimation from Remotely Sensed Information Using Artificial Neural Networks–Cloud Classification System (PERSIANN-CCS), serves as a baseline model with which to compare the performances. The experiments show significant improvement for both models in R/NR detection. The overall performance gains in the critical success index (CSI) are 21.60% and 43.66% over the verification periods for the DL-IR only model and the DL-IR+WV model compared to PERSIANN-CCS, respectively. In particular, the performance gains in CSI are as high as 46.51% and 94.57% for the models for the winter season. Moreover, specific case studies show that the deep learning techniques and the WV channel information effectively help recover a large number of missing precipitation pixels under warm clouds while reducing false alarms under cold clouds.
Wind Effects on the Shape of Raindrop Size Distribution
Authors: Testik Firat Y. , Pei Bin
Published: February 2017

The wind effects on the shape of drop size distribution (DSD) and the driving microphysical processes for the DSD shape evolution were investigated using the dataset from the Midlatitude Continental Convective Clouds Experiment (MC3E). The quality-controlled DSD spectra from MC3E were grouped for each of the rainfall events by considering the precipitation type (stratiform vs convective) and liquid water content for the analysis. The DSD parameters (e.g., mass-weighted mean diameter) and the fitted DSD slopes for these grouped spectra showed statistically significant trends with varying wind speed. Increasing wind speeds were observed to modify the DSD shapes by increasing the number of small drops and decreasing the number of large drops, indicating that the raindrop breakup process governs the DSD shape evolution. Both spontaneous and collisional raindrop breakup modes were analyzed to elucidate the process responsible for the DSD shape evolution with varying wind speed. The analysis revealed that the collisional breakup process controls the wind-induced DSD shape. The findings of this study are of importance in DSD parameterizations that are essential to a wide variety of applications such as radar rainfall retrievals and hydrologic models.
Surface Cooling, Winds, and Eddies over the Continental Shelf
Authors: Brink K. H.
Published: February 2017

Models show that surface cooling over a sloping continental shelf should give rise to baroclinic instability and thus tend toward gravitationally stable density stratification. Less is known about how alongshore winds affect this process, so the role of surface momentum input is treated here by means of a sequence of idealized, primitive equation numerical model calculations. The effects of cooling rate, wind amplitude and direction, bottom slope, bottom friction, and rotation rate are all considered. All model runs lead to instability and an eddy field. While instability is not strongly affected by upwelling-favorable alongshore winds, wind-driven downwelling substantially reduces eddy kinetic energy, largely because the downwelling circulation plays a similar role to baroclinic instability by flattening isotherms and so reducing available potential energy. Not surprisingly, cross-shelf winds appear to have little effect. Analysis of the model runs leads to quantitative relations for the wind effect on eddy kinetic energy for the equilibrium density stratification (which increases as the cooling rate increases) and for eddy length scale.
Economic consequences of occupational deregulation
Authors: Damelang Andreas , Haupt Andreas , Abraham Martin
Published: February 2017

This paper provides new evidence of occupational closure and rent-sharing in the labour market. In many labour market segments, occupational closure refers only to self-employed positions, but not to employees within these occupations. We study the relation of changes in entry regulation for firms and the corresponding economic consequences for employees within these firms. Based on bargaining theory, we argue that economic rents are shared with employees. In order to identify this ‘indirect’ channel of occupational closure, this paper uses a major reform in the German craft sector in 2004. This reform relaxes entry regulation into self-employment in more than half of the craft occupations. By using rich administrative data in a fixed-effects framework, we compare wages of employees in both markets pre- and post-reform. We find that employees in the reformed market are negatively affected after the reform. This proves the existence of former wage rents due to rent-sharing in closed market segments. This average wage effect, however, is not constant for all employees. If employees can make a credible threat to the employer to take advantage of deregulation and set up their own business, they can counteract the negative wage effects of the reform. As a consequence, our empirical results show that wages of young and skilled employees are less affected by the reform.
Visualising the health of communities: Using Photovoice as a pedagogical tool in the college classroom
Authors: Cooper Cheryl , Sorensen William , Yarbrough Susan
Published: February 2017

Objective:

To describe the use of Photovoice as a pedagogical tool to promote experiential learning and critical dialogue among participants on an undergraduate community health course.

Design:

A descriptive study of the use of the pedagogical tool Photovoice, based on three foundational education theories.

Results:

Based on teachers’ reflective evaluation of student responses, Photovoice emerged as a useful tool for encouraging dialogic engagement in the classroom, for experiential learning through interaction with the physical environment and for increasing student agency by reducing the teacher as authority model.

Conclusion:

Photovoice may be useful in a variety of college courses as a way to foster critical thinking, to promote agency among students, to enhance understanding of complex social phenomena and to expand the ways in which both students and teachers think about their physical and social worlds.
The impact of an empowerment intervention on people with schizophrenia: Results of a randomized controlled trial
Authors: Hasan Abdalhadi , Musleh Mahmoud
Published: February 2017

Aims:

The aim of the study was to assess what empowerment intervention has on people with schizophrenia.

Methods:

A randomized controlled trial was carried out between November 2015 and May 2016 involving 112 participants who had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. Patients, who were 18 years and above diagnosed with Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th ed.; DSM-V) schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder from the outpatient mental health clinics in Jordan, were randomly assigned to take part in an intervention that consisted of receiving 6 weeks’ worth of information booklets, with face to face discussions, while receiving their usual medication or allocated treatment as usual. The participants were assessed at baseline, immediately after the intervention and at 3-month follow-up. The primary outcome was a change in the helplessness score. Secondary outcomes were psychiatric symptoms, recovery rate, empowerment and quality of life.

Results:

This study showed that people with schizophrenia in the intervention group showed more improvement in the helplessness score immediately post-intervention ( F = 74.53, p < .001) and at 3-month follow-up ( F = 75.56, p < .001), they reported significant improvements in all secondary outcomes.

Conclusion:

This study indicated that the empowering intervention was an effective intervention when integrated with treatment as usual.
A Mediation Model for Ideas of Reference
Authors: Senín-Calderón Cristina , Perona-Garcelán Salvador , Fuentes-Márquez Sandra , Rodríguez-Testal Juan F.
Published: February 2017

Ideas of reference are common in human beings, but they are frequent in certain psychopathological disorders, mainly those concerning the psychotic spectrum. The purpose of this study was to attempt to construct a model predicting the appearance of ideas of reference and to test the relationship of personality (based on the Gray model), emotional, and self-consciousness variables. Five-hundred and seventy-four participants (287 patients with several different psychopathological diagnoses) filled in the Referential Thinking Scale (REF), the GHQ-28, the Self-Consciousness Scale (SCS-R), and the SPSRQ Scale. The resulting model found full mediation of sensitivity to punishment, sensitivity to reward, depression, and public self-consciousness between anxiety and ideas of reference, regardless of the group they were in (patients vs. nonpatients). This result, based on the appearance of anxiety symptomatology, explains 43% of the variance in scores, showing the presence of ideas of reference and therefore enables prediction of a set of vulnerabilities (established with self-reports) which could lead to a psychological state of high general pathological risk and proneness to psychosis in particular.
Determinants of Financial Inclusion in Tribal Districts of Odisha: An Empirical Investigation
Authors: Sahoo Auro Kumar , Pradhan Bibhuti Bhusan , Sahu Naresh Chandra
Published: February 2017

The study has tried to investigate the status of the financial inclusion of tribal people in two tribal concentrated districts, namely Bolangir and Mayurbhanj, in the state of Odisha. Field investigations were undertaken to find out the status of financial inclusion in six villages of these two districts where the proportion of the tribal population was larger than that of the total population. Primary data were collected from 300 households by using a semi-open survey schedule. It was found that about 71.7 per cent of households had no savings bank accounts; 70.7 per cent were not involved in self-help group activities and 97.7 per cent did not have post office savings accounts. Additionally, a logit regression model was used to identify the various determinants of financial inclusion of tribal households. The results revealed that years of education attained by the household head, size of private-owned land, total annual income of the household and participation in the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) were significant determinants for financial inclusion among tribal people.
BJP’s Electoral Victory in Assam, 2016: Co-opting the Khilonjiyas
Authors: Dutta Akhil Ranjan
Published: February 2017

The landslide victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Assam’s assembly election in April 2016 provokes diametrically opposite interpretations. While for the rank and file of the Sangh Parivar, the victory reveals a consolidation of Hindutva forces in the state, at the other end of the spectrum, some portions of the intelligentsia, who want to project the BJP as a changed and secular entity, assert that the electoral results do not reflect the rise of Hindutva in the state but rather the advance of indigenous and identity politics. For the latter, the key to BJP’s electoral triumph was its alliance with regional-ethnic forces against the backdrop of the growing insecurity among Assam’s indigenous people caused by a steady influx from Bangladesh. While Hindu consolidation, through different agencies and institutions, gained momentum in the state, in the present elections, it was the highly emotive campaign for the protection of the rights of the Khilonjiyas (the indigenous) that assured victory for the BJP-led alliance. But it is important to understand the way ‘indigenous’ was constructed as an exclusionary category to bring in communal divisions in the electoral battle. The theory of ‘indigenous’ propagated during the elections had nothing do with substantive rights like the ‘right to self-determination’ or ‘rights over resources’, emphasised by the International Declarations on Rights of the Indigenous People. The international bidding for the auction of 12 oil fields in Assam by the BJP-led union government immediately after the new state government had assumed power and the collective resistance by nationalist and indigenous groups against this decision exposed the hollowness of the ‘indigenous agenda’ of the BJP in Assam.
Scheduled Castes, reservations and religion
Authors: Fazal Tanweer
Published: February 2017

This article revisits the promulgation of the Scheduled Caste Order 1950, appended to Article 341 of the Indian Constitution. The Order provides the list of Scheduled Castes (SCs) and sets the prerequisites for a series of robust entitlements to India’s ‘untouchable castes’. The Order of 1950, however, also serves as a dampener to the equality claims of low castes of non-Hindu denominations by precluding them from the entitlements that the SC status promises. The Order has been amended twice—in 1956 to include Sikh low castes and in 1990 to accommodate the neo-Buddhists. However, the untouchable convertees to Islam and Christianity continue to remain outside its purview. The article develops on the deliberations surrounding the promulgation of the Government Order of 1950 in the Constituent Assembly, subsequently in the Indian Parliament, in the courts and in the public domain. Through an analysis of the discussions and disputes around this question, it attempts to deconstruct the nationalist common sense on the question of inequality and caste among non-Hindus, its fears and anxieties regarding proselytisation and the emerging idea of nationhood and citizenship.
Imagining uses for things: Teaching “useful knowledge” in the early eighteenth century
Authors: Whitmer Kelly J
Published: February 2017

There has been an explosion of interest in “innovation-oriented knowledge” and utility in early modern knowledge economies. Despite this, a healthy skepticism surrounding the category of “useful knowledge” persists, at least in part because of its association with intentional concealment. Helpful in many ways, this skepticism has fostered a tendency to overlook a variety of efforts to teach “useful knowledge” in the period: efforts that were anchored in engagement with the real and involved the cultivation of an ability to direct the powers of the imagination. Indeed, for some the imagination served as a faculty central to an epistemology of use. This article takes as its example a handbook written by an early political economist (c. 1700) who endeavored to teach readers how to imagine uses for things they observed in collections while traveling so they would be better prepared to participate in a new, transnational culture of innovation.
The bottom of the universe: Flat earth science in the Age of Encounter
Authors: Allegro James J
Published: February 2017

This essay challenges the dominance of the spherical earth model in fifteenth- and early-sixteenth-century Western European thought. It examines parallel strains of Latin and vernacular writing that cast doubt on the existence of the southern hemisphere. Three factors shaped the alternate accounts of the earth as a plane and disk put forward by these sources: (1) the unsettling effects of maritime expansion on scientific thought; (2) the revival of interest in early Christian criticism of the spherical earth; and (3) a rigid empirical stance toward entities too large to observe in their entirety, including the earth. Criticism of the spherical earth model faded in the decades after Magellan’s crew returned from circuiting the earth in 1522.
Visualizing a monumental past: Archeology, Nasser’s Egypt, and the early Cold War
Authors: Carruthers William
Published: February 2017

This article examines geographies of decolonization and the Cold War through a case study in the making of archeological knowledge. The article focuses on an archeological dig that took place in Egypt in the period between the July 1952 Free Officers’ coup and the 1956 Suez crisis. Making use of the notion of the ‘boundary object’, this article demonstrates how the excavation of ancient Egyptian remains at the site of Mit Rahina helped to constitute Nasserist revolutionary modernity and its relationship to wider, post-Second World War political geographies. The dig took place as a result of an Egyptian–American collaboration designed to institute the possibility of archeology taking place along the lines of the Point Four modernization program promoted by the United States. The article discusses how this situation not only engendered contention surrounding the role of the international ‘experts’ appointed to run this excavation work, but also – and as a result – helped to constitute the monumental visual and material shape that archeological evidence relating to the Egyptian past could now take. Egypt’s revolution sat within wider Cold War political struggles, yet the ‘ground-up’ realities of this relationship helped to constitute the sort of past (and future) monumentality proposed by Nasser’s government.
Role of Emotion and Cognition on Age Differences in the Framing Effect
Authors: Pu Bingyan , Peng Huamao , Xia Shiyong
Published: February 2017

Framing effect studies indicate that individuals are risk averse for decisions framed as gains but risk-seeking for decisions framed as losses. Findings of age-related differences in susceptibility to framing are mixed. In the current study, we examined emotional arousal in two decision tasks (life saving vs. money gambling) to evaluate the effects of emotion on age differences in the framing effect. When cognitive abilities and styles were controlled, there was a framing effect in the younger group in the life-saving task, a high-emotional arousal task, while older adults did not display this classic framing effect pattern. They showed risk aversion in both positive and negative framing. Age differences existed in the framing effect. Conversely, younger and older adults in the money-gambling task both displayed the framing effect; there was no age difference. When the cognitive abilities were not controlled, the pattern of results in the high-emotional arousal task remained unchanged, while greater framing effects were found, from the perspective of effect size, for older than younger adults in the low-emotional arousal task. Limited cognitive resources would not hamper older adults’ performances when their emotional arousal was high. However, older adults with low-level emotional arousal were more susceptible than younger adults to framing because of declining cognitive capacities. This implied the importance of emotion in older adults’ decision making and supported the selective engagement hypothesis.
Seeing Christ through Hearing the Apocalypse: An Exploration of John’s Use of Ekphrasis in Revelation 1 and 19
Authors: Barnhill Gregory M.
Published: February 2017

Utilizing rhetorical criticism, this study explores the manner in which Revelation describes two visions of Christ (Rev. 1.12-18; 19.11-16) in order to understand how such descriptions are used in the service of the author’s rhetoric. As a rhetorical technique, ekphrasis mediates what a speaker sees to an audience through descriptive words. A successful ekphrasis bridges the distance between the verbal and the visual, causing hearers to see for themselves, and evokes an emotional response ( pathos) in the audience. The visions of Rev. 1 and 19 are thus understood as poetic-rhetorical acts, or mimesis: representations of life that point toward reality beyond the particulars, intended to evoke an emotional response. Such characterization of Christ through ekphrasis moves the audience to embrace the text’s worldview of a critical distance from Roman imperial ideology and a commitment to Jesus as Lord over against the deceitful powers of empire.
Rhetorical Chain-Link Construction and the Relationship between Romans 7.1-6 and 7.7–8.39: Additional Evidence for Assessing the Argument of Romans 7–8 and the Identity of the Infamous ‘I’
Authors: King Justin
Published: February 2017

Scholars often ﬁnd structural and/or logical deﬁciencies in Rom. 7.1-6 and 7.7–8.39. Such ﬁndings often lead to confusion regarding the argument of Rom. 7–8. Bruce Longenecker’s identiﬁcation of chain-link construction in 7.7–8.39 convincingly resolves many problems, but 7.1-6 remains in the lurch. A similar examination of 7.1-6, however, clariﬁes the structure and argument of that passage, its relationship to 7.7–8.39, and the argument of Rom. 7–8 as a whole. Indeed, 7.1-6 anticipates the structure and content of 7.7–8.39 through its own miniature chain-link construction. This provides not only additional but signiﬁcant evidence for the rhetorical function of 7.1-6, the argument of Rom. 7–8 and the identity of the infamous ‘I’ in Rom. 7.7-25.
The Gift and its Perfections: A Response to Joel Marcus and Margaret Mitchell
Authors: Barclay John M.G.
Published: February 2017

A response to the review-essays on Paul and the Gift by Professors Joel Marcus and Margaret Mitchell.
Investigating associations between school climate and bullying in secondary schools: Multilevel contextual effects modeling
Authors: Konishi Chiaki , Miyazaki Yasuo , Hymel Shelley , Waterhouse Terry
Published: February 2017

This study examined how student reports of bullying were related to different dimensions of school climate, at both the school and the student levels, using a contextual effects model in a two-level multilevel modeling framework. Participants included 48,874 secondary students (grades 8 to 12; 24,244 girls) from 76 schools in Western Canada. Results revealed significant associations for student perceptions of all school-climate dimensions at the student level and for a majority of the aggregated school-climate dimensions (except adult-related variables) at the school level in relation to bullying, when each school-climate dimension was included as the sole predictor in the contextual effects model. When examining the roles of all school-climate dimensions together, results showed that, at the school level, the effects of three school-climate variables – peer support, discipline/fairness/clarity of rules, and school safety – remained significant predictors of being bullied and bullying others, controlling for the effects of other school-climate dimensions at both the school and the student levels. The implications of these findings for building a safe and caring school environment are discussed.
Longitudinal study of a dual-factor model of mental health in Chinese youth
Authors: Xiong Junmei , Qin Yi , Gao Miaomiao , Hai Man
Published: February 2017

By incorporating psychopathology and subjective well-being (SWB), the dual-factor model of mental health (DFM) can comprehensively measure psychological health. We examined the utility of the DFM among 1,293 Chinese adolescents (Grades 7–12). Furthermore, we examined the dynamics of mental health group membership via a two-wave longitudinal study of 531 students. SWB, psychopathology, affective self-regulatory efficacy, academic self-efficacy, and academic emotions were measured via self-report scales. Mental health group membership was determined according to combinations of high or low SWB and high or low psychopathology. The DFM was supported by our identification of its four constituent groups (i.e. complete mental health, vulnerable, troubled, and symptomatic but content). Significant group differences were found in affective self-regulatory efficacy, academic self-efficacy, and academic emotions, with clear contrasts observed between adolescents with complete mental health and their vulnerable peers, as well as between troubled adolescents and their symptomatic but content peers. Moreover, youth with complete mental health demonstrated the highest stability and troubled youth the lowest, whereas vulnerable youth had the highest rates of transitioning into both the complete mental health and troubled groups. Implications for practice are explored within the context of screening and intervention.
Leadership development in governments of the United Arab Emirates
Authors: Mathias Megan
Published: February 2017

Developing the next generation of leaders in government is seen as a strategic challenge of national importance in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). This article examines the wicked nature of the UAE’s leadership development challenge, identifying patterns of complexity, uncertainty, and divergence in the strategic intentions underlying current leadership development efforts. It then explores the potential impact of re-framing leadership development programmes for government employees using the concept of ‘public leadership’. Responding to calls in the literature for situated and context-sensitive explorations of leadership, it draws upon recent empirical research and literature to conceptualise public leadership for the UAE before identifying three potential contributions: an orientation towards collective, public values; a connection into needed skills frameworks; and access to innovations in the design of public leadership development interventions. The article concludes that the re-framing of ‘public leadership’ has the potential to help make substantial progress on the UAE’s strategic leadership development challenge, but is not a silver bullet. Further research on both the concept, and its impact if adopted for leadership development programmes, will be required.
The Physiology of Amylin and Insulin
Authors: Martin Catherine
Published: February 2017

Glucose homeostasis is accomplished through intricate, and arguably, elegant interactions among several organs and hormones. Historically, glucose homeostasis has been viewed somewhat narrowly-insulin from pancreatic β cells regulated glucose disposal, while glucagon from pancreatic β cells regulated glucose appearance during fasting states. But more recent characterization and understanding of the role of incretin hormones from the gut-notably, glucagon-like peptide 1 and gastric inhibitory polypeptide-and amylin from pancreatic β cells has led to a more complete model of glucose homeostasis. Furthermore, availability of pharmacologic agents to replace, mimic, or enhance the actions of these hormones allows application of this more complete model of glucose homeostasis to the treatment of type 1 and type 2 diabetes. This article provides an overview of the role of the pancreatic hormone amylin in glucose homeostasis and of Pramlintide, a analogue of native amylin, recently approved as adjunct therapy to insulin in people with type 1 and type 2 diabetes.