bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Allocation of Colony‐Level Foraging Effort in Vespula germanica in Response to Food Resource Quantity, Quality, and Associated Olfactory Cues
Authors: Taylor Benjamin J. , Nordheim Erik V. , Jeanne Robert L. 
Published: May 2012

AbstractIn social insects, selection takes place primarily at the level of the colony. Therefore, unlike solitary insects, social species are expected to forage at rates that maximize colony fitness rather than individual fitness. Workers can increase the net benefit of foraging by responding to increased resource availability, by responding more strongly to higher‐quality resources, and by decreasing the uncertainty with which nestmates find resources. Unlike many ants and social bees, no social wasp is known to utilize a nest‐based recruitment signal to inform nestmates of food location. On the other hand, wasps do learn the odor of food brought to the nest and use this cue to locate the food source outside the nest. Here, we quantify the effects of three food‐associated variables on the allocation of foraging effort in the yellowjacket Vespula germanica. We used an experimental approach to assess whether resource quantity, quality, or associated olfactory information affect the probability that a forager will leave the nest on a foraging trip. We addressed these questions by inserting a known amount of sucrose solution directly into nests and recording foraging effort (departure rate) over the subsequent hour‐long observation period. No differences were found in foraging effort because of the presence/absence of olfactory cues, but there was strong evidence that foraging effort increased in response to resource influx and resource quality. Thus, while olfactory cues are learned in the nest, only resource quality and the cue of increased amount of food in the nest factor into a forager's decision of whether or not to depart on a foraging trip. However, as prior work has shown, once a wasp forager leaves the nest, it uses the learned olfactory cues to aid in finding resources.
Team‐based learning methods in teaching topographical anatomy by dissection
Authors: Burgess Annette W. , Ramsey‐Stewart George , May James , Mellis Craig 
Published: May 2012

AbstractBackground:  While the effectiveness of teaching human topographical anatomy by groups of medical students carrying out embalmed cadaver dissections has been recognized for centuries, the mechanisms by which this teaching is so effective have not been well described.Methods:  In the recently reintroduced 7‐week elective anatomy by whole body dissection course for senior medical students at Sydney Medical School, team‐based learning (TBL) principles were used in the course design and implementation. In the 2011 course, 42 senior medical students participated. The effectiveness of TBL pedagogy was assessed by knowledge acquisition and retention and by administration of a questionnaire to evaluate the impact of the principles of this pedagogy.Results:  The course produced a marked increase in topographical anatomical knowledge. The median pre‐course assessment score was 9/20 (interquartile range 5) and the median post‐course assessment score was 19.5/20 (interquartile range 1.75). The difference was statistically significant (P < 0.001). There was near universal agreement by students that five key principles of TBL (small groups, instructor selected allocation to groups, regular assessments, inter‐ and intra‐group competitiveness, and prescribed out‐of‐class preparation), contributed to this knowledge acquisition.Conclusion:  The application of TBL methodology to teaching human anatomy by dissection enables a large group of students to have small group experiences without a large number of teachers. It results in effective acquisition of topographical anatomical knowledge and appears to provide better acquisition of such knowledge than the previous methods of anatomy teaching to which these students had been exposed.
Pediatric hypnosis: pre‐, peri‐, and post‐anesthesia
Authors: Kuttner Leora 
Published: May 2012

SummaryObjective:  Pediatric hypnosis has a useful role in pre‐, peri‐, and post‐anesthesia to minimize anticipatory anxiety, and as adjunctive treatment to reduce and control pain. This article reviews the literature in the use of hypnosis in pediatric anesthesia to highlight its role and relevancy.Background:  Current research indicates there is an immediate and enduring impact, and long‐term benefits of this child‐centered intervention. Hypnosis can be included in presurgical consultations to establish cooperation and signals for increasing comfort and to address fears and provide suggestions for rapid recovery with changed expectations for the child’s own benefit. Thus prepared, the child is in a heightened state of receptivity and statements and suggestions carry through to peri‐ and post‐anesthesia, when hypnosis can help with extubation, reduce nausea, and ease recovery.Method:  The Magic Glove is one hypno‐anesthesia technique that simultaneously addresses pain and anxiety. The process of hypnosis requires training and supervised practice.Conclusion:  Patients in hypnosis treatment conditions have less anxiety and shorter hospital stays and experience less long‐term pain and discomfort than do patients in control conditions. There appears little reason not to provide hypnosis as an adjunctive treatment for pediatric patients undergoing anesthesia.
The EEG signal: a window on the cortical brain activity
Authors: Constant Isabelle , Sabourdin Nada 
Published: May 2012

SummaryThe accurate assessment of the depth of anesthesia, allowing a more accurate adaptation of the doses of hypnotics, is an important end point for the anesthesiologist. It is a particularly crucial issue in pediatric anesthesia, in the context of the recent controversies about the potential neurological consequences of the main anesthetic drugs on the developing brain. The electroencephalogram signal reflects the electrical activity of the neurons in the cerebral cortex. It is thus the key to assessment of the level of hypnosis. Beyond visual analysis, several monitoring devices allow an automated treatment of the electroencephalographic (EEG) signal, combining time and frequency domain analysis. Each of these monitors focuses on a specific combination of characteristics of the signal and provides the clinician with useful information that remains, however, partial. For a comprehensive approach of the EEG‐derived indices, the main features of the normal EEG, in adults and children, will be presented in the awake state and during sleep. Age‐related modifications accompanying cerebral maturation during infancy and childhood will be detailed. Then, this review will provide an update on how anesthetic drugs, particularly hypnotics, influence the EEG signal, and how the main available monitors analyze these drug‐induced modifications. The relationships between pain, memory, and the EEG will be discussed. Finally, this review will focus on some specific EEG features such as the electrical epileptoid activity observed under sevoflurane anesthesia. The EEG signal is the best window we have on cortical brain activity and provides a fair pharmacodynamic feedback of the effects of hypnotics. However, the cortex is only one of several targets of anesthesia. Hypnotics and opiates, have also subcortical primary targets, and the EEG performances in the evaluation or prediction of nociception are poor. Monitoring subcortical structures in combination with the EEG might in the future allow a better evaluation and a more precise adaptation of balanced anesthesia.
Globalization, decision making and taboo in nursing
Authors: Keighley T. 
Published: May 2012

KEIGHLEY T. (2012) Globalization, decision making and taboo in nursing. International Nursing Review59, 181–186This paper is a reflection on the representation of nurses and their practice at a global level. In considering the International Council of Nurses (ICN) conference in Malta (2011), it is clear that certain assumptions have been made about nurses and their practice which assume that globalization is under way for the whole of the profession and that the assumptions can be applied equally around the world. These assumptions appear in many ways to be implicit rather than explicit. The implicitness of the assumptions is examined against the particular decision‐making processes adopted by the ICN. An attempt is then made to identify another base for the ongoing global work of the ICN. This involves the exploration of taboo (that which is forbidden because it is either holy or unclean) as a way of examining why nursing is not properly valued, despite years of international representation. The paper concludes with some thoughts on how such a new approach interfaces with the possibilities held out by new information technologies.
Nurses' potential to lead in non‐communicable disease global crisis
Authors: DeCola P. , Benton D. , Peterson C. , Matebeni D. 
Published: May 2012

DECOLA P., BENTON D., PETERSON C., & MATEBENI D. (2012) Nurses' potential to lead in non‐communicable disease global crisis. International Nursing Review59, 321–330Background:  The incidence and projected rise of non‐communicable diseases (NCDs) are a significant global public health threat. Nurses as health educators are well positioned to support health promotion and prevention efforts. The intent was to understand nurses' interest, challenges and enabling factors in carrying out this important role in addressing the NCD crisis.Method:  A stratified representative survey of 1600 nurses in eight countries was conducted to better understand how nurses perceive their role in addressing risk factors associated with NCDs, as well as the types of supports required in order to facilitate this work. The study also explores nurses' changing views of the profession and their practice environment. The structured survey was administered via telephone and face‐to‐face interviews composed primarily of multiple choice closed‐ended questions.Results:  Key findings included that 95% of nurses wanted to use their knowledge, skills and time to educate individuals on the threat and prevention of NCDs. They expressed their belief that they should be spending significantly more time, on average almost twice the amount as they currently are able to devote, on preventing the development or escalation of NCDs. However, nurses' potential to do this is diluted by heavy workloads; over one third reported that their workload had worsened over the last 5 years, and 95% of nurses are experiencing time pressures. Nurses believe these constraints, almost unanimously (98%), keep them from being able to spend more time with patients in an educational capacity.Conclusions:  Nurses are interested in spending more time addressing NCD prevention, but workload, time constraints and their perception towards the job of nursing hinder them from achieving their potential. Unhealthy lifestyle choices are a risk factor for NCDs; through awareness and education, positive behaviour change is possible. Research has demonstrated that nurses are effective at supporting individuals to make behaviour change, administering disease management programmes and enabling self‐care as well as self‐management. Practice environment issues that prevent nurses from fully reaching their potential in addressing the NCD crisis need to be addressed.
Ethnic Land Rights in Western Ghana: Landlord–Stranger Relations in the Democratic Era
Authors: Boone Catherine , Duku Dennis Kwame 
Published: May 2012

ABSTRACT InCitizen and Subject(1996), Mahmood Mamdani denounced the ‘bifurcated nature’ of the African state which, in his account, imposed ethnic hierarchy and chiefly despotism on rural dwellers while reserving democratic citizenship for the urban minority. Have twenty years of ‘decentralized democracy’ in many countries washed away these distinctions? This article takes up this issue in an analysis of the politics of land allocation and landlord–stranger relations in Western Ghana. An analysis of historical trajectories, and our own field observations and interviews in two Western Region districts, suggest that at the local level, the bifurcated character of political authority that was identified by Mamdani persists in the domain of economic rights. The record also shows that state policies and institutions, rather than working to chip away at ethnic hierarchy and chiefly authority, work at least in part to reproduce these features of the local political economy. In both non‐democratic and democratic eras, Ghana's central government has played an important role in shoring up chiefly and ethnic privilege in the land domain. These local hierarchies influence the practical meaning of democracy and economic liberalization for rural citizens, and should be explored more systematically in future studies of democratic and electoral politics in Ghana and elsewhere.
RAMSEY TAXES MEET PRICE RIGIDITY
Authors: TEO WING LEONG , YANG C. C. 
Published: May 2012

Abstract‘Ramsey taxes’ are commodity taxes that minimize deadweight loss. Evidence has shown dramatic differences in the extent of price rigidity across goods: while the prices of some goods change frequently, the prices of other goods seldom change. This paper examines Ramsey taxes in the presence of heterogeneous price rigidity. We find that, to minimize deadweight loss, lower (higher) tax rates should be imposed on goods with rigid prices if their relative prices are too high (low) relative to the would‐be situation of no price stickiness. Intuitively, Ramsey taxes remedy the relative price distortion caused by the price rigidity of some goods. We calibrate our model to data from Taiwan and the USA, showing a significant cut in welfare cost if Ramsey rather than uniform taxes are applied.
FOREIGN THREATS, TECHNOLOGICAL PROGRESS AND THE RISE AND DECLINE OF IMPERIAL CHINA
Authors: CHAN KENNETH S. , LAFFARGUE JEAN‐PIERRE 
Published: May 2012

AbstractThis paper addresses why technological progress occurred off‐and‐on in Imperial China but came to a standstill at around the time of the European Renaissance, leading to the decline of Imperial China. We suggest that the threat of war could have induced innovative activities as well as the accumulation of public capital, which led to the development of a modern sector in Imperial China. Using numerical simulation, we find a stagnated equilibrium in an agrarian economy under low threats of war and another with a high level of technological knowledge, public capital and a vibrant modern sector under strong threats. Long periods of peace would have the opposite effect. Some supportive historical evidence from urbanization is provided.
Health‐related quality of life and cost‐effectiveness of treatment in subarachnoid haemorrhage
Authors: Malmivaara K. , Juvela S. , Hernesniemi J. , Lappalainen J. , Siironen J. 
Published: May 2012

BackgroundTreatment of aneurysmal subarachnoid haemorrhage (SAH) demands high healthcare resource utilization. Case fatality and disability remain as common outcomes ofSAH. The purpose of this study was to perform a treatment cost‐effectiveness analysis of patients withSAH.MethodsWe performed a long‐term follow‐up of theSAHpatients treated in our institution over a 3‐year period starting February 1998. Outcome 10 years after theSAHand treatment costs were evaluated. The health‐related quality of life was evaluated using the EuroQol (EQ‐5D) questionnaire and visual‐analogue scale (VAS). The cost of a quality‐adjusted life year (QALY) was calculated.ResultsMedian follow‐up time of the 178 patients was 10.8 years. Overall mortality rate was 24%. Of the 43 non‐survivors, 42% died within 6 months. For the 135 survivors, the medianEQ‐5D index value was 1.00, which is similar to that for normal population. The medianVASvalue was 80, which is comparable to normal population's value. Of the survivors, 88% (119/135) were able to live at home and 63% (85/135) returned to work afterSAH. The cost of neurosurgical treatment for oneQALYwas 1700€.ConclusionLong‐term outcome of survivors after aneurysmalSAHwas relatively good: most of them lived at home, 63% had returned to work and 36% were still working. The quality of life index of the survivors was similar to that of normal populations, and the survivors were as satisfied with their health as people in general are. Cost of neurosurgical treatment and cost of aQALYgained were acceptable.
Productive Efficiency and Territorial Externalities in Small and Medium‐Sized Industrial Firms: A Dynamic Analysis of the District Effect
Authors: HERNANDEZ‐SANCHO FRANCESC , SOLER‐MARCO VICENT , SALA‐GARRIDO RAMÓN , ALMENAR‐LLONGO VICENT 
Published: May 2012

ABSTRACTA series of works have analysed differential behaviour in terms of productive efficiency between companies inside a hypothetical industrial district and those outside the district. This objective has been addressed using measures of technical efficiency. The results obtained provide valuable information for quantifying the district effect at a given moment in time. However, constant changes in the market and business behaviour mean that it is worthwhile studying the business district effect from a dynamic point of view. In this study, we provide this new vision through the use of Malmquist productivity indices. This methodology enables us to analyse possible differential evolutions by comparing the productive efficiency of companies inside and outside a district over a period of time. An empirical application has been made on a set of small and medium‐sized Spanish ceramic producers during the period of economic expansion between 1996 and 2007.
Shaping the Rural–Urban Symbiosis: Density, Dispersal, Remoteness, and Town Size in South‐East Australia
Authors: GRIFFIN TREVOR L. C. , SMAILES PETER J. , ARGENT NEIL M. 
Published: May 2012

ABSTRACTWithin the context of economic and social change in rural Australia, this paper identifies four structural dimensions of non‐metropolitan communities that are shown to influence a range of areal and socio‐demographic characteristics. The analysis shows that such influence is essentially maintained whether the social catchments forming the database are subdivided by State or by an equivalent number of landscape types. Also, although the dimensions influence both the urban and dispersed elements of the communities, the strength of the relationships is substantially greater if those elements are considered as a symbiotic whole. Throughout, net rural local density (as opposed to gross density) is shown to be a consistently important dimension of rural communities in relatively sparsely settled lands such as those of south‐eastern Australia, supported by the important subsidiary influence of relative settlement dispersal and town size. The paper concludes with a discussion of the processes involved in the impact of those structural dimensions upon rural society.
Poverty, Innovation Capacity, and State Economic Development in the Knowledge Economy: Evidence from the U.S.
Authors: HALL JEREMY L. , HOWELL‐MORONEY MICHAEL E. 
Published: May 2012

ABSTRACTWe examine poverty's effect in two ways. First, we study the relationship between poverty and capacity for innovation in the U.S. states; second, we study the combined effects of poverty and innovation capacity on U.S. state economic output and employment. Because many of the relationships among poverty, innovation capacity and economic performance are simultaneous, we employ the Arellano Bond Difference GMM estimator to estimate various models using panel data (1980–1999). The findings reveal a negative indirect effect of socio‐economic need (poverty) on human and U.S. state and local financial innovation capacity, though there is no empirical link between poverty and federal financial capacity. We find no statistically significant evidence of the contemporaneous effect of poverty on state economic performance, holding innovation capacity constant. This suggests that poverty primarily affects state economic performance indirectly through reduction of innovation capacity. Overall, our findings suggest that U.S. officials ought to be concerned about the role poverty plays in diminishing their state economies' capacity to innovate.
Town versus Gown: The Effect of a College on Housing Prices and the Tax Base
Authors: VANDEGRIFT DONALD , LOCKSHISS AMANDA , LAHR MICHAEL 
Published: May 2012

ABSTRACTThe analysis reported here suggests that the presence of a college is associated with house prices that are about 2.7 percent higher. However, the effect is caused only by 4‐year colleges, and the primary source of the effect is the degree to which the college is residential. Interestingly, the size of the college as measured by enrollment has no effect on house prices. While the results indicate that municipalities with a community college have a tax base that is 11.6 percent higher, evidence to support the claim that colleges cause the tax base increase is weak. Finally, neither the size of the college (measured by enrollment) nor the degree to which the college is residential has an impact on the tax base.
Resource Flows and the Decomposition of Regional Inequality in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei Metropolitan Region, 1990–2004
Authors: LI YUHENG 
Published: May 2012

ABSTRACTThis paper introduces a new way of decomposing regional inequality. It divides the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei metropolitan region into three sets of districts in terms of the urban–rural resource flows: urban, peri‐urban, and peripheral areas. Unlike the administrative divisions, these three sets of districts show how resource flows and agglomerates at the regional level. The paper decomposes regional inequality according to the three sets of districts. The paper's findings show that regional inequality decreased between 1990 and 1994, after which it remained steady. The study, for the first time, brings peri‐urban areas into a regional decomposition analysis, and contributes to the understanding of urban–rural resource flows and inequality changes at the regional level.
Investigating the potential value of individual parameters of histological grading systems in a sheep model of cartilage damage: the Modified Mankin method
Authors: Moody Hayley R. , Heard Bryan J. , Frank Cyril B. , Shrive Nigel G. , Oloyede Adekunle O. 
Published: May 2012

AbstractA total histological grade does not necessarily distinguish between different manifestations of cartilage damage or degeneration. An accurate and reliable histological assessment method is required to separate normal and pathological tissue within a joint during treatment of degenerative joint conditions and to sub‐classify the latter in meaningful ways. The Modified Mankin method may be adaptable for this purpose. We investigated how much detail may be lost by assigning one composite score/grade to represent different degenerative components of the osteoarthritic condition. We used four ovine injury models (sham surgery, anterior cruciate ligament/medial collateral ligament instability, simulated anatomic anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction and meniscal removal) to induce different degrees and potentially ‘types’ (mechanisms) of osteoarthritis. Articular cartilage was systematically harvested, prepared for histological examination and graded in a blinded fashion using a Modified Mankin grading method. Results showed that the possible permutations of cartilage damage were significant and far more varied than the current intended use that histological grading systems allow. Of 1352 cartilage specimens graded, 234 different manifestations of potential histological damage were observed across 23 potential individual grades of the Modified Mankin grading method. The results presented here show that current composite histological grading may contain additional information that could potentially discern different stages or mechanisms of cartilage damage and degeneration in a sheep model. This approach may be applicable to other grading systems.