bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Evaluating profitability strategies and the determinants of the risk performance of sectoral and banking institutions
Authors: St-Hilaire Walter Amedzro , Boisselier Patrick 
Published: August 2018

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the need to incorporate the loan loss provisions (LLPs) and risk measures in order to examine the repercussions on advancing approach and profitability.

Design/methodology/approach
The study investigates the effect of explanatory variables on profitability and advancing approach of the banks. The variables used in this study were determined, based on the review of relevant literature and established according to the availability of data for measurement purposes. Inspired by previous research, Hausman test is used in this study to determine whether a random or fixed effects generalized least squares model is best. The linear regression model is applied to strongly balanced panel data obtained from the ten commercial banks.

Findings
The findings demonstrate that Nigerian banking sector considers LLPs in terms of its decision making of advancing approach, while proper inclusion of credit, market and operational risk is more important for South Africa’s banks rather than the maintenance of provisions.

Originality/value
Moreover, the credit risk proves to be more needed factor of consideration for Nigerian rather for South African banks. This is an answer to the strong economy of South Africa as compared to Nigeria and more chances of default faced by Nigerian banks.
Health‐e mums: Evaluating a smartphone app design for diabetes prevention in women with previous gestational diabetes
Authors: O'Reilly Sharleen L. , Laws Rachel 
Published: August 2018

AimWomen with prior gestational diabetes have increased risk for developing type 2 diabetes postpartum. While diabetes prevention programs are effective in reducing a woman's risk, the reach of traditional face‐to‐face programs is poor in this population and using a mHealth approach appears to be promising. We aimed to evaluate a pilot smartphone app developed from an evidence‐based diabetes prevention program specifically for women with previous gestational diabetes mellitus using a series of focus groups to explore the app functionality and messaging.MethodsThe Health‐e Mums app underwent an iterative, three‐phase development: initial development, wireframe development and pilot testing. Twenty‐six women participated in four focus groups during the pilot‐testing phase. The focus group transcripts were analysed thematically to evaluate the app functionality and user‐experience.ResultsFocus group participants identified diabetes screening confusion and a need for personalisation as sub‐themes within the app functionality theme. The user‐experience exploration found generally positive findings but participants had mixed responses to the utility of video segments and applying milestones relating to diabetes prevention guidelines.ConclusionsA user‐centred approach was taken to develop a diabetes prevention program app for women with prior gestational diabetes. Women were predominantly satisfied with the overall app design, how it functioned and what the user experience would be like when fully developed.
Audit Committees and Managerial Influence on Audit Quality: ‘Voluntary’ versus ‘Mandatory’ Approach to Corporate Governance
Authors: Park Bum‐Jin 
Published: August 2018

AbstractThis study provides empirical evidence on how managerial influence to reduce audit quality is moderated by a combination of the audit committee (AC) form and compliance with AC best practice guidelines. There is a negative association between managerial ownership and audit fees; however, the association becomes positive when a voluntary AC follows best practices. Furthermore, the results are robust to the exclusion of industries with large frequency in the sample, the consideration of Korean business groups and recessionary times. The results of this study imply that a voluntary approach to corporate governance, which encourages companies to follow best practice guidelines in the form and composition of the AC, is more effective in controlling management than a mandatory approach. This study contributes to policy making aimed at improving AC effectiveness.
European Legal Integration: Towards a More Liberal Intergovernmentalist Approach
Authors: Phelan William 
Published: August 2018

AbstractMoravcsik'sThe Choice for Europeputs forward a distinctive approach to explaining the ‘grand bargains’ by which the European states constructed European integration between the 1950s and 1990s. One notable exclusion fromThe Choice for Europehowever is any detailed engagement with European legal integration, even though the creation of European law and the growing powers of the European Court of Justice must be among the most important European developments during these decades. Inspired by Moravcsik's scholarship, employing more common approaches to enforcement and escape in trade treaty systems as an explicit alternative outcome, and calling attention to the particular economic and social context of post‐war European trade, this article outlines amore‘liberal intergovernmentalist’ approach to European legal integration during the first four decades of European integration, and proposes an agenda for future research.
Prior exercise training improves cold tolerance independent of indices associated with non‐shivering thermogenesis
Authors: Knuth Carly M. , Peppler Willem T. , Townsend Logan K. , Miotto Paula M. , Gudiksen Anders , Wright David C. 
Published: August 2018

Key points
Mammals defend against cold‐induced reductions in body temperature through both shivering and non‐shivering thermogenesis. The activation of non‐shivering thermogenesis is primarily driven by uncoupling protein‐1 in brown adipose tissue and to a lesser degree by the browning of white adipose tissue.
Endurance exercise has also been shown to increase markers of white adipose tissue browning.
This study aimed to determine whether prior exercise training would alter the response to a cold challenge and if this would be associated with differences in indices of non‐shivering thermogenesis.
It is shown that exercise training protects against cold‐induced weight loss by increasing food intake. Exercise‐trained mice were better able to maintain their core temperature, independent of differences in markers of non‐shivering thermogenesis.
AbstractShivering is one of the first defences against cold, and as skeletal muscle fatigues there is an increased reliance on non‐shivering thermogenesis. Brown and beige adipose tissues are the primary thermogenic tissues regulating this process. Exercise has also been shown to increase the thermogenic capacity of subcutaneous white adipose tissue. Whether exercise has an effect on the adaptations to cold stress within adipose tissue and skeletal muscle remains to be shown. Male C57BL/6 mice were either subjected to voluntary wheel running or remained sedentary for 12 days. Exercise led to decreased body weight and increased glucose tolerance. Mice were then divided into groups kept at 25°C room temperature or a cold challenge of 4°C for 48 h. Exercised mice were protected against cold‐induced reductions in weight and in parallel with increased food intake. Providing exercised mice with the same amount of food as sedentary mice eliminated the protection against cold‐induced weight loss. Cold exposure led to greater reductions in rectal temperature in sedentary compared to exercised mice. This protective effect was not explained by differences in the browning of white adipose tissue or brown adipose tissue mass. Similarly, the ability of the β3‐adrenergic agonist CL 316,243 to increase energy expenditure was attenuated in previously exercised mice, suggesting that the activation of uncoupling protein‐1 in brown and/or beige adipocytes is not the source of protective effects. We speculate that the protection against cold‐induced reductions in rectal temperature could potentially be linked to exercise‐induced alterations in skeletal muscle.
Inhibition failures and late errors in the antisaccade task: influence of cue delay
Authors: Aponte Eduardo A. , Tschan Dominic G. , Stephan Klaas E. , Heinzle Jakob 
Published: August 2018

In the antisaccade task participants are required to saccade in the opposite direction of a peripheral visual cue (PVC). This paradigm is often used to investigate inhibition of reflexive responses as well as voluntary response generation. However, it is not clear to what extent different versions of this task probe the same underlying processes. Here, we explored with the Stochastic Early Reaction, Inhibition, and late Action (SERIA) model how the delay between task cue and PVC affects reaction time (RT) and error rate (ER) when pro- and antisaccade trials are randomly interleaved. Specifically, we contrasted a condition in which the task cue was presented before the PVC with a condition in which the PVC served also as task cue. Summary statistics indicate that ERs and RTs are reduced and contextual effects largely removed when the task is signaled before the PVC appears. The SERIA model accounts for RT and ER in both conditions and better so than other candidate models. Modeling demonstrates that voluntary pro- and antisaccades are frequent in both conditions. Moreover, early task cue presentation results in better control of reflexive saccades, leading to fewer fast antisaccade errors and more rapid correct prosaccades. Finally, high-latency errors are shown to be prevalent in both conditions. In summary, SERIA provides an explanation for the differences in the delayed and nondelayed antisaccade task.NEW & NOTEWORTHY In this article, we use a computational model to study the mixed antisaccade task. We contrast two conditions in which the task cue is presented either before or concurrently with the saccadic target. Modeling provides a highly accurate account of participants’ behavior and demonstrates that a significant number of prosaccades are voluntary actions. Moreover, we provide a detailed quantitative analysis of the types of error that occur in pro- and antisaccade trials.
Neurophysiological analysis of the clinical pull test
Authors: Tan Joy Lynn , Perera Thushara , McGinley Jennifer L. , Yohanandan Shivanthan Arthur Curtis , Brown Peter , Thevathasan Wesley 
Published: August 2018

Postural reflexes are impaired in conditions such as Parkinson’s disease, leading to difficulty walking and falls. In clinical practice, postural responses are assessed using the “pull test,” where an examiner tugs the prewarned standing patient backward at the shoulders and grades the response. However, validity of the pull test is debated, with issues including scaling and variability in administration and interpretation. It is unclear whether to assess the first trial or only subsequent repeated trials. The ecological relevance of a forewarned backward challenge is also debated. We therefore developed an instrumented version of the pull test to characterize responses and clarify how the test should be performed and interpreted. In 33 healthy participants, “pulls” were manually administered and pull force measured. Trunk and step responses were assessed with motion tracking. We probed for the StartReact phenomenon (where preprepared responses are released early by a startling stimulus) by delivering concurrent normal or “startling” auditory stimuli. We found that the first pull triggers a different response, including a larger step size suggesting more destabilization. This is consistent with “first trial effects,” reported by platform translation studies, where movement execution appears confounded by startle reflex-like activity. Thus, first pull test trials have clinical relevance and should not be discarded as practice. Supportive of ecological relevance, responses to repeated pulls exhibited StartReact, as previously reported with a variety of other postural challenges, including those delivered with unexpected timing and direction. Examiner pull force significantly affected the postural response, particularly the size of stepping.NEW & NOTEWORTHY We characterized postural responses elicited by the clinical “pull test” using instrumentation. The first pull triggers a different response, including a larger step size suggesting more destabilization. Thus, first trials likely have important clinical and ecological relevance and should not be discarded as practice. Responses to repeated pulls can be accelerated with a startling stimulus, as reported with a variety of other challenges. Examiner pull force was a significant factor influencing the postural response.
Neuronal population mechanisms of lightness perception
Authors: Ruff Douglas A. , Brainard David H. , Cohen Marlene R. 
Published: August 2018

The way that humans and animals perceive the lightness of an object depends on its physical luminance as well as its surrounding context. While neuronal responses throughout the visual pathway are modulated by context, the relationship between neuronal responses and lightness perception is poorly understood. We searched for a neuronal mechanism of lightness by recording responses of neuronal populations in monkey primary visual cortex (V1) and area V4 to stimuli that produce a lightness illusion in humans, in which the lightness of a disk depends on the context in which it is embedded. We found that the way individual units encode the luminance (or equivalently for our stimuli, contrast) of the disk and its context is extremely heterogeneous. This motivated us to ask whether the population representation in either V1 or V4 satisfies three criteria: 1) disk luminance is represented with high fidelity, 2) the context surrounding the disk is also represented, and 3) the representations of disk luminance and context interact to create a representation of lightness that depends on these factors in a manner consistent with human psychophysical judgments of disk lightness. We found that populations of units in both V1 and V4 fulfill the first two criteria but that we cannot conclude that the two types of information in either area interact in a manner that clearly predicts human psychophysical measurements: the interpretation of our population measurements depends on how subsequent areas read out lightness from the population responses. NEW & NOTEWORTHY A core question in visual neuroscience is how the brain extracts stable representations of object properties from the retinal image. We searched for a neuronal mechanism of lightness perception by determining whether the responses of neuronal populations in primary visual cortex and area V4 could account for a lightness illusion measured using human psychophysics. Our results suggest that comparing psychophysics with population recordings will yield insight into neuronal mechanisms underlying a variety of perceptual phenomena.
Democracia e ditadura na teoria política de Marx e Engels | emocracy and dictatorship in the political theory of Marx and Engels
Authors: Rodrigues Theófilo Codeço Machado 
Published: August 2018

O presente artigo analisa a forma como Marx e Engels, teóricos da política, inseriram-se no debate contemporâneo sobre a democracia no século XIX. Passada a Revolução Francesa de 1789, a democracia tornou-se o grande tema da agenda teórica do século XIX. Mas as interpretações foram, decerto, distintas. De modo bem diferente de seus contemporâneos liberais, Marx e Engels compuseram a justificativa teórica para a ação dos trabalhadores para além da democracia burguesa. Transitando entre temas como a “verdadeira democracia”, a “emancipação humana”, o “comunismo” e a “ditadura do proletariado”, os dois autores formularam teorias que não apenas informaram a grande polarização do século XX, mas que ainda referenciam debates sobre as possibilidades de uma alternativa ao capitalismo no século XXI. A hipótese aqui apresentada é a de que a tensão entre democracia e ditadura na obra dos dois permite interpretações díspares, o que garante sua permanência no debate atual.Palavras-Chave: teoria política; democracia; ditadura do proletariado; Karl Marx; Friedrich Engels. Abstract − This article analyses how Marx and Engels, political theorists, entered the contemporary debate on democracy in the 19th century. After the French Revolution of 1789, democracy became the great theme of the theoretical agenda of the 19th century. But interpretations were certainly disparate. In a very different way from their liberal contemporaries, Marx and Engels composed the theoretical justification for the action of workers beyond the bourgeois democracy. Transitioning between topics such as “true democracy,” “Human Emancipation,” “communism,” and “dictatorship of the proletariat,” the two authors formulated theories that not only informed the great polarization of the 20th century, but which still are reference to debates about the possibilities of an alternative to capitalism in the 21st century. The hypothesis presented here is that the tension between democracy and dictatorship in the work of the two authors allows different interpretations that guarantee its permanence in the current debate.Keywords: political theory; democracy; dictatorship of the proletariat; Karl Marx; Friedrich Engels.
A metamorfose das classes sociais no capitalismo contemporâneo: algumas reflexões | The metamorphosis of social classes in contemporary capitalism: reflections
Authors: Druck Graça 
Published: August 2018

Na primeira parte do artigo se apresentam algumas reflexões sobre a gênese das classes sociais no capitalismo, a partir de formulações em obras selecionadas de Marx e Engels, ressaltando a historicidade das classes em suas configurações em diferentes conjunturas, bem como a compreensão de classe como relação social. Na segunda parte, discutem-se criticamente algumas análises sobre classes ou sobre a classe trabalhadora em particular, no atual contexto da acumulação flexível, globalização e hegemonia das finanças e do neoliberalismo, buscando indicar alguns elementos para se compreender as metamorfoses das classes sociais hoje, dialogando com autores estrangeiros e brasileiros acerca da relação entre classe e “precariado”. Palavras-Chave: classes sociais; metamorfoses; capitalismo contemporâneo. Abstract – The first part of this article presents some reflections on the genesis of social classes in capitalism, based on formulations of selected works of Marx and Engels, highlighting the historicity of classes in their different configurations and the understanding of class as a social relation. In the second part, we critically discuss some analyses of class or specifically of the working class in the current context of flexible accumulation, globalization, and the hegemony of finance and neoliberalism, trying to indicate some elements to understand the metamorphoses of social classes today. We carry out this analysis debating with foreign and Brazilian authors over the link between class and the “precariat.”Keywords: social classes; metamorphoses; contemporary capitalism.
Playing with culture: Nigerian stand-up comedians joking with cultural beliefs and representations
Authors: Sunday Adesina B. , Filani Ibukun 
Published: August 2018

AbstractIn interactions, the culture of the participants influences their contributions and interpretations. Stand-up comedians articulate contemporary culture by making mutually manifest cultural beliefs and representations within the performance space, and teach the audience how to use them. This paper investigated how Nigerian stand-up comedians employ cultural assumptions and representations in their performances. Using relevance theory for analysis and seven routines from seven Nigerian stand-up comedians as the data, this study explored how Nigerian stand-up comedians bring shared cultural knowledge into their performances. Nigerian stand-up comedians joke with culture by manipulating shared cultural representations, distorting collective knowledge, manipulating stereotypes and projecting personal beliefs. By joking with cultural beliefs and representations within the performance space, Nigerian stand-up comedians mediate and negotiate what “contemporary culture” should be.
Zataria multiflora extract and carvacrol affect cardiotoxicity induced by Adriamycin in rat
Authors: Khajavi Rad Abolfazl , Mohebbati Reza 
Published: August 2018

Abstract

Background
Because of the antioxidant effects of Zataria multiflora (ZM) and carvacrol (CAR) and also the role of oxidative stress in the induction of cardiotoxicity induced by Adriamycin (ADR), the aim of this study was to investigate the improvement effects of ZM extract and CAR on cardiotoxicity induced by ADR in rats.

Methods
Twenty-eight male rats were randomly assigned to four groups including (1) the control group; (2) the ADR group, which received ADR intravenously at the beginning of the study and the (3) ZM+ADR and (4) CAR+ADR groups, which received ZM and CAR by gavage for 28 consecutive days and ADR as single dose. Blood samples were collected on days 0 and 28 to determine serum glutamic oxaloacetic transaminase (SGOT), serum glutamic pyruvic transaminase (SGPT) and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH). Also, cardiac tissue was removed for redox marker evaluation.

Results
In the ADR group, malondialdehyde (MDA) significantly increased and superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity and total thiol contents significantly reduced, as compared with the control group, while CAR administration significantly improved this condition. Treatment with ZM significantly increased the SOD activity and total thiol content, as compared with the ADR group. The level of LDH significantly increased on day 28 in the ADR group compared to the control group, and administration of ZM and CAR significantly decreased it. The SGPT and SGOT levels in the ADR group significantly increased, and CAR administration significantly reduced them.

Conclusion
The results indicate that the administration of ZM hydroalcoholic extracts and its active ingredient, CAR, could reduce the oxidative stress damage through promotion of the cardiac and systemic antioxidant system. Also, CAR administration demonstrated better improvement in cardiotoxicity with ADR in rats.
Predictability and perception for native and non-native listeners
Authors: Baese-Berk Melissa , Morrill Tuuli H. , Dilley Laura 
Published: August 2018

Abstract
Phonological knowledge is influenced by a variety of cues that reflect predictability (e.g. semantic predictability). Listeners utilize various aspects of predictability when determining what they have heard. In the present paper, we ask how aspects of the acoustic phonetic signal (e.g. speaking rate) interact with other knowledge reflecting predictability (e.g. lexical frequency and collocation strength) to influence how speech is perceived. Specifically, we examine perception of function words by native and non-native speakers. Our results suggest that both native and non-native speakers are sensitive to factors that influence the predictability of the signal, including speaking rate, frequency, and collocation strength, when listening to speech, and use these factors to predict the phonological structure of stretches of ambiguous speech. However, reliance on these cues differs as a function of their experience and proficiency with the target language. Non-native speakers are less sensitive to some aspects of the acoustic phonetic signal (e.g. speaking rate). However, they appear to be quite sensitive to other factors, including frequency. We discuss how these results inform our understanding of the interplay between predictability and speech perception by different listener populations and how use of features reflecting predictability interacts with recovery of phonological structure of spoken language.
Crystal structure of diaqua-(N-(1-(pyrazin-2-yl)ethylidene)pyridin-1-ium-4-carbohydrazonate-κ3
N,N′,O)-tris[nitrato-κ2
O,O′)lanthanum(III), C12H15N8O12La
Authors: Jinli Liu , Peiling Zhang 
Published: August 2018

Abstract
C12H15N8O12La, monoclinic, P21/c (no. 14), a = 8.3267(7) Å, b = 28.348(2) Å, c = 9.1097(8) Å, β = 107.5410(10)°, V = 2050.3(3) Å3, Z = 4, R
gt(F) = 0.0236, wR
ref(F
2) = 0.0559, T = 296(2) K.