bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Accuracy of radiological staging in identifying high‐risk colon cancer patients suitable for neoadjuvant chemotherapy: a multicentre experience
Authors: Dighe S. , Swift I. , Magill L. , Handley K. , Gray R. , Quirke P. , Morton D. , Seymour M. , Warren B. , Brown G. 
Published: April 2011

AbstractAim  A pilot study was undertaken to determine the accuracy of computed tomography (CT) staging in identifying patients with high‐risk colon cancers who would be considered as candidates for a neoadjuvant therapy trial (FOxTROT) and those at low risk (T1/T2) who would be excluded.Method  Participating radiologists from 19 centres attended workshops for standardization of image interpretation according to previously defined prognostic criteria: good prognosis tumours, including, T1/T2; intermediate prognosis, T3 < 5 mm tumour invasion beyond the muscularis propria (MP); and poor prognosis tumours, including T3 with tumour extension ≥ 5 mm beyond the MP or T4. The CT findings were compared with histopathology as the reference standard.Results  Of 94 patients with radiological and pathological data, 71% were categorized by CT as having a poor prognosis. The sensitivity and specificity of CT in identifying these tumours were 87% (95% CI, 74–94) and 49% (95% CI, 33–65). Sensitivity and specificity for tumour infiltration beyond the MP (T3/T4 vs T1/T2) were 95% (95% CI, 87–98) and 50% (95% CI, 22–77), respectively. Including all CT‐staged T3 and T4 patients in the trial would have increased the proportion eligible for entry to 89% (n = 84) without affecting the false‐positive rate of 7%. Some 20% of T3/T4 patients would have been ineligible for FOxTROT because of synchronous metastases.Conclusion  In a multicentre setting, CT scanning identified high‐risk (T3/4) colon cancers with minimal overstaging of T1/T2 tumours, thus establishing the feasibility of radiologically guided neoadjuvant chemotherapy.
Predicting potential climate change impacts with bioclimate envelope models: a palaeoecological perspective
Authors: Roberts David R. , Hamann Andreas 
Published: April 2011

ABSTRACTAim  We assess the realism of bioclimate envelope model projections for anticipated future climates by validating ecosystem reconstructions for the late Quaternary with fossil and pollen data. Specifically, we ask: (1) do climate conditions with no modern analogue negatively affect the accuracy of ecosystem reconstructions? (2) are bioclimate envelope model projections biased towards under‐predicting forested ecosystems? (3) given a palaeoecological perspective, are potential habitat projections for the 21st century within model capabilities?Location  Western North America.Methods  We used an ensemble classifier modelling approach (RandomForest) to spatially project the climate space of modern ecosystem classes throughout the Holocene (at 6000, 9000, 11,000, 14,000, 16,000, and 21,000 YBP) using palaeoclimate surfaces generated by two general circulation models (GFDL and CCM1). The degree of novel arrangement of climate variables was quantified with the multivariate Mahalanobis distance to the nearest modern climatic equivalent. Model projections were validated against biome classifications inferred from 1460 palaeoecological records.Results  Model accuracy assessed against independent palaeoecology data is generally low for the present day, increases for 6000 YBP, and then rapidly declines towards the last glacial maximum, primarily due to the under‐prediction of forested biomes. Misclassifications were closely correlated with the degree of climate dissimilarity from the present day. For future projections, no‐analogue climates unexpectedly emerged in the coastal Pacific Northwest but were absent throughout the rest of the study area.Main conclusions  Bioclimate envelope models could approximately reconstruct ecosystem distributions for the mid‐ to late‐Holocene but proved unreliable in the Late Pleistocene. We attribute this failure to a combination of no‐analogue climates and a potential lack of niche conservatism in tree species. However, climate dissimilarities in future projections are comparatively minor (similar to those of the mid‐Holocene), and we conclude that no‐analogue climates should not compromise the accuracy of model predictions for the next century.
DPR Debate: Growth Identification and Facilitation: The Role of the State in the Dynamics of Structural Change
Authors: Lin Justin , Monga Célestin , te Velde Dirk Willem , Tendulkar Suresh D. , Amsden Alice , Amoako K. Y. , Pack Howard , Lim Wonhyuk 
Published: April 2011

This DPR Debate is based on the contribution by Justin Lin, Chief Economist at the World Bank, and his colleague Célestin Monga, on ‘Growth Identification and Facilitation: The Role of the State in the Dynamics of Structural Change’. The article under consideration is important and timely as it articulates a number of new policy implications from Justin Lin's earlier work on New Structural Economics, which was discussed in a previous DPR debate (Lin and Chang, 2009). This symposium contains the article and comments on it from five distinguished specialists, and closes with a rejoinder by Lin and Monga. This introduction discusses the article, the comments and the rejoinder.The historical record indicates that, in all successful economies, the state has always played an important role in facilitating structural change and helping the private sector sustain it across time. This article puts forward a new approach to help policy‐makers in developing countries identify those industries that may hold latent comparative advantage, and recommends ways of removing binding constraints to facilitate private firms' entry into those industries. Two types of government interventions are distinguished: first, policies that facilitate structural change by overcoming information, co‐ordination and externality issues, which are intrinsic to industrial upgrading and diversification; and second, policies aimed at protecting certain selected firms and industries that defy the comparative advantage determined by the existing endowment structure.
Constraints on infants’ musical rhythm perception: effects of interval ratio complexity and enculturation
Authors: Hannon Erin E. , Soley Gaye , Levine Rachel S. 
Published: April 2011

AbstractEffects of culture‐specific experience on musical rhythm perception are evident by 12 months of age, but the role of culture‐general rhythm processing constraints during early infancy has not been explored. Using a habituation procedure with 5‐ and 7‐month‐old infants, we investigated effects of temporal interval ratio complexity on discrimination of standard from novel musical patterns containing 200‐ms disruptions. Infants were tested in three ratio conditions: simple (2:1), which is typical in Western music, complex (3:2), which is typical in other musical cultures, and highly complex (7:4), which is relatively rare in music throughout the world. Unlike adults and older infants, whose accuracy was predicted by familiarity, younger infants were influenced by ratio complexity, as shown by their successful discrimination in the simple and complex conditions but not in the highly complex condition. The findings suggest that ratio complexity constrains rhythm perception even prior to the acquisition of culture‐specific biases.
Electrophysiological evidence for the magnocellular‐dorsal pathway deficit in dyslexia
Authors: Jednoróg Katarzyna , Marchewka Artur , Tacikowski Paweł , Heim Stefan , Grabowska Anna 
Published: April 2011

AbstractIn adults, the onset of coherent motion compared to random motion in a random dot kinematogram leads to a right hemispheric amplitude advantage of the N2 response. The source of this asymmetry is believed to lie in the motion selective MT+ cortex. Here, we tested whether the right tempo‐parietal N2 component shows a similar regularity in children. In particular, we were interested in whether coherent vs. incoherent motion modulates the amplitude of N2 similarly in dyslexic and control children. We found higher N2 amplitude for coherent compared to random motion in the right hemisphere for controls but not for dyslexics. This effect was related to topographical differences of N2 amplitude for random motion between the studied groups and was accompanied by longer reaction times to random motion in dyslexic compared to control children. Furthermore, a negative correlation between the amplitude of N2 for random motion and spelling errors was observed in both groups, which is consistent with previous findings linking the magnocellular‐dorsal (MD) pathway with orthographic skills. These data support the hypothesis of subtle deficiencies in the MD pathway in dyslexia.
Shape, color and the other‐race effect in the infant brain
Authors: Balas Benjamin , Westerlund Alissa , Hung Katherine , Nelson III Charles A. 
Published: April 2011

AbstractThe ‘other‐race’ effect describes the phenomenon in which faces are difficult to distinguish from one another if they belong to an ethnic or racial group to which the observer has had little exposure. Adult observers typically display multiple forms of recognition error for other‐race faces, and infants exhibit behavioral evidence of a developing other‐race effect at about 9 months of age. The neural correlates of the adult other‐race effect have been identified using ERPs and fMRI, but the effects of racial category on infants’ neural response to face stimuli have to date not been described. We examine two distinct components of the infant ERP response to human faces and demonstrate through the use of computer‐generated ‘hybrid’ faces that the observed other‐race effect is not the result of low‐level sensitivity to 3D shape and color differences between the stimuli. Rather, differential processing depends critically on the joint encoding of race‐specific features.
Interventions promoting physical activity among obese populations: a meta‐analysis considering global effect, long‐term maintenance, physical activity indicators and dose characteristics
Authors: Gourlan M. J. , Trouilloud D. O. , Sarrazin P. G. 
Published: April 2011

SummaryAs the benefits that regular physical activity (PA) have on obesity are well known, many interventions promote active lifestyle adoption among obese populations. This meta‐analysis aims to determine (i) the global effect that interventions promoting PA among obese populations have on their PA behaviour; (ii) variations in the effect of interventions depending on the PA indicator used; (iii) the programme's dose characteristics and (iv) maintenance of the intervention effects after the intervention has ended. A comprehensive search through databases and review articles was completed. Forty‐six studies met the inclusion criteria. Calculations of effect size (Cohen's d) and a moderator analysis were conducted. The meta‐analysis showed that interventions globally have an impact on the PA behaviour of obese populations (d = 0.44; 95% CI = 0.31, 0.57). The moderator analysis revealed that interventions of less than 6 months reported significantly larger effects than longer interventions. Moreover, the interventions had a stronger impact on the number of steps and the PA indexes (i.e. composite scores reflecting PA practice) than on other PA indicators. Finally, the analysis revealed that interventions succeed in maintaining PA behaviour after the intervention is over. However, relatively few studies addressed this issue (n = 9). Despite global positive effects, further research is needed to determine the optimal dose for interventions and to evaluate the maintenance of intervention effects.
Composite farming systems in an era of change: Nagaland, Northeast India
Authors: Cairns Malcolm , Brookfield Harold 
Published: April 2011

AbstractComposite farming systems, first clearly identified by Rambo, are those in which radically different technologies are found together in a single farming complex. Data from diaries kept by groups of farming families in two Angami Naga villages in northeast India, Khonoma and smaller Tsiesema, detailing inputs into and outputs from wet‐rice terraces and jhum (swidden) fields in the years 2000 and 2001, are presented and discussed to detail the workings of related but different composite systems. The 2000–2001 survey caught an important set of changes in midstream. Although returns to labour from the first‐year jhums were much higher than those from the wet‐rice terraces in 2000–2001, jhums were declining in significance as a growing non‐farm economy joined the production of cool‐climate vegetables and a spice crop for the Indian market as principal sources of livelihood. This story is told in the light of recent writing on the demise of swidden in the larger Southeast Asian region, and it is suggested that greater attention be paid to the composite systems, which are not uncommon in this region. This might help diversify what has perhaps been an oversimplified discussion.
Exploring Thailand's mortality transition with the aid of life tables
Authors: Carmichael Gordon A. 
Published: April 2011

AbstractThe project Thai Health‐Risk Transition: A National Cohort Study seeks to better understand the health implications of modernisation and globalisation forces impacting on Thailand. As part of its ‘look‐back’ component this paper seeks, using available life tables, to document the country's post‐war mortality transition. The onset of transition through mass campaigns of the late 1940s and 1950s is first discussed before attention turns to the life tables. They are predictably far from flawless, but careful analysis does permit trends that have seen around 30 years added to life expectancy to be traced, and age patterns of improved survivorship and their relation to initiatives to improve health to be examined. The broad benefits generated by mass campaigns, ongoing improvements in infant and early childhood mortality, and a phased impact of the expansion of primary health care in rural areas on adult survival prospects after the mid‐1970s are demonstrated. The paper also investigates the consequences for mortality of a motorcycle‐focused rapid increase in road fatalities in the late 1980s and early 1990s and the HIV/AIDS epidemic that developed after 1984.
Export quality: Representing Fijian bodies and the economy of war
Authors: Bolatagici Torika 
Published: April 2011

AbstractFijian bodies have become a valuable commodity in the economy of war. Remittances from workers overseas are Fiji's largest income – exceeding that of tourism and sugar export. This essay examines historical and contemporary representations of the black male body that perpetuate the exploitation of Fijians by inscribing the Fijian male body as warrior, criminal and protector. Taking a multidisciplinary approach informed by sociology, cultural theory, Pacific studies, visual culture, feminist and post‐colonial theory, my practice is the vehicle through which I address issues of neocolonial commodification of Fijian bodies. Through an analysis of my own staged photographs and vernacular images taken by Fijians working for private security military companies and British and US armies, I hope to challenge audiences to consider their own perceptions of Fijian agency and subjectivity. By theorising the politicisation of the black body and interrogating colonial representations of blackness, I argue that we can begin to create links between the historical and contemporary exploitation of Fijians and that at the essence of both is an underlying racial hierarchy and economic requirement for cheap and, arguably, expendable labour.
Governing sex workers in Timor Leste
Authors: Harrington Carol 
Published: April 2011

AbstractThis paper argues that international security forces in Timor Leste depend upon civilian partners in HIV/AIDs ‘knowledge networks’ to monitor prostitutes' disease status. These networks produce mobile expertise, techniques of government and forms of personhood that facilitate international government of distant populations without overt coercion. HIV/AIDs experts promote techniques of peer education, empowerment and community mobilisation to construct women who sell sex as health conscious sex workers. Such techniques make impoverished women responsible for their disease status, obscuring the political and economic contexts that produced that status. In the militarised context of Timor Leste, knowledge of the sexual conduct of sub‐populations labelled high risk circulates among global HIV/AIDs knowledge networks, confirming their expert status while obscuring the sexual harm produced by military intervention. HIV/AIDs knowledge networks have recently begun to build Timorese sex worker organisations by contracting an Australian sex worker NGO to train a Timorese NGO tasked with building sex worker identity and community. Such efforts fail to address the needs and priorities of the women supposedly empowered. The paper engages theories of global knowledge networks, mobile technologies of government, and governmentality to analyse policy documents, reports, programmes, official statements, speeches, and journalistic accounts regarding prostitution in Timor Leste.
Bleeding boundaries: Gendered analyses of militarism in the Western Pacific
Authors: Teaiwa Teresia 
Published: April 2011

AbstractThis introduction to an Asia Pacific Viewpoint special section on militarism and gender in the Pacific argues that gendered analyses are crucial to understanding processes of militarization, and that multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approaches are integral in that effort. The introduction also provides background to the articles, outlining their origin in a workshop on militarism and gender in the Pacific held in Wellington, New Zealand in 2009, and its subsequent iteration in sessions at the Oceanic Conference of International Studies in 2010. The special section constitutes the first publication of a permanent working group on militarism and gender in the Pacific with an international, multidisciplinary membership.
ROLLING REGRESSION VERSUS TIME‐VARYING COEFFICIENT MODELLING: AN EMPIRICAL INVESTIGATION OF THE OKUN'S LAW IN SOME EURO AREA COUNTRIES
Authors: Zanin Luca , Marra Giampiero 
Published: April 2011

ABSTRACTDuring the last decade, economists have shown that the inverse relationship between economic growth and unemployment rate varies over time. Rolling regression has been the main tool used to quantify such a relationship. This methodology suffers from several well‐known problems which lead to spurious non‐linear patterns in the Okun's coefficient behaviour over time. Here, we take a penalized regression spline approach to estimate the Okun's time‐varying effects. As a result, spurious non‐linearities are suppressed and hence important time‐varying coefficient features revealed. Our empirical results show that the inverse relationship in some Euro area countries is spatially heterogeneous and time‐varying. The findings are complemented by the calculation of the rate of output growth needed for a stable unemployment rate, as proposed by Knotek.
AN EXAMPLE OF AN OPTIMAL FORECAST EXHIBITING DECREASING BIAS WITH INCREASING FORECAST HORIZON
Authors: Aretz Kevin , Peel David A. 
Published: April 2011

ABSTRACTMotivated by a central banker with an inflation target, we show that the optimal forecast bias under non‐quadratic loss functions and non‐normal forecast errors can decrease or initially increase and then decrease with the forecast horizon. We initially proof that, if the variable to forecast can be described by a generalized Rayleigh distribution, its conditional mean does in general not constitute the optimal prediction under a symmetric target zone loss function. Subsequently, we approximate the target zone loss function to show the potential for variation in optimal bias over the forecast horizon.
THE EFFICIENCY OF THE STATE‐OWNED FIRM AND SOCIAL WELFARE: A NOTE
Authors: Cato Susumu 
Published: April 2011

ABSTRACTWe consider a mixed market where a state‐owned firm competes with private firms. If the number of firms is exogenous, then a deterioration of the efficiency of the state‐owned firm might improve social welfare. This situation occurs when the state‐owned firm is inefficient and private firms are efficient. However, if the number of firms is endogenous, then a deterioration of the efficiency of the state‐owned firm must reduce social welfare.
THE MONEY DEMAND FUNCTION FOR THE EURO AREA: SOME EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE
Authors: Avouyi‐Dovi Sanvi , Drumetz Françoise , Sahuc Jean‐Guillaume 
Published: April 2011

ABSTRACTThis paper sets out to re‐examine the money demand function for the euro area. Traditional specifications often yield unsatisfactory results: instability of short and long‐term coefficients; relatively large differences between estimated and actual value of variables; and significant changes in the number of long‐term relationships, etc. Using a standard Vector Error Correction Model, we find that the usual specification is indeed unstable. However, introducing a European equity price gives rise to a more stable system. Furthermore, recursive estimates confirm the relative stability of long‐term coefficients. Estimates of the real money gap, based on the money demand equation including equity prices, point to moderate, albeit persistent, excess liquidity in the euro area in recent years. The real money gap contains information about future inflation but this content may have diminished since 2001.
Learning as a Path, Not a Goal: Contemplative Pedagogy – Its Principles and Practices
Authors: Grace Fran 
Published: April 2011

AbstractWhat is contemplative pedagogy and how is it practiced in Religious Studies classrooms? Contemplative pedagogy cultivates inner awareness through first‐person investigations, often called “contemplative practices.” Contemplative teaching practices range widely: silent sitting meditation, compassion practices, walking meditation, deep listening, mindfulness, yoga, calligraphy, chant, guided meditations, nature observation, self‐inquiry, and many others. Since narrative is a mode of instruction prevalent in contemplative literature, the article includes first‐hand reflections from students and a narrative account of how an initially skeptical professor came to incorporate contemplative teaching methods into her courses. It expands from the personal narratives to highlight the work of many contemplative professors in the field. These real‐life examples are put into the context of recent publications on shifts in higher education and meditation research. The article seeks to demonstrate the power of contemplative teaching to fulfill many hopes for liberal arts learning. Of particular importance is its emphasis on interior qualities of lifelong impact, such as self‐knowledge and ethical cultivation.
Learning Hebrew by Writing in English
Authors: Jacobson Rolf A. 
Published: April 2011

AbstractThis essay explores a midrange teaching and learning issue regarding the teaching of biblical languages and one strategy for addressing the issue. Seminary students do not yield a great enough return in exchange for the investment they are required to make in learning biblical languages. Students invest great time and money, but they do not learn to use the biblical languages to think critically about the Bible. This essay argues that a fruitful strategy for addressing this midrange issue is to require students to write in English about the Hebrew language. This strategy fosters students' ability to think critically about the biblical text. It also fosters their ability to use their budding knowledge of a biblical language to engage questions of meaning and issues of interpretation.