Description:
Item response theory (IRT) based differential item functioning (DIF) was used to examine the construct and normative invariance of the DSM-IV oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) symptoms for ratings across Malaysian and Australian children, and Malaysian Malay and Malaysian Chinese children. To accomplish these goals, parents completed the Disruptive Behavior Rating Scale, which includes the eight DSM-IV ODD symptoms. Although the comparisons involving Malaysian and Australian children indicated DIF for five symptoms, only the symptom for “touchy” showed notable DIF. This was also the only symptom that showed DIF for the comparisons involving Malay and Chinese children. There were also minimal differences in the latent mean scores across Australian and Malaysian children and also Malay and Chinese children. These results indicate good support for the construct and normative invariance of the ODD symptoms for the samples compared.
Description:
In this paper, we propose a method for indexing and retrieval of images based on shapes of objects. The concept of connectivity is introduced. 3D models are used to represent 2D images. 2D images are decomposed a priori using connectivity which is followed by 3D model construction. 3D model descriptors are obtained for 3D models and used to represent the underlying 2D shapes. We have used spherical harmonics descriptors as the 3D model descriptors. Difference between two images is computed as the Euclidean distance between their descriptors. Experiments are performed to test the effectiveness of spherical harmonics for retrieval of 2D images. The proposed method is compared with methods based on principal components analysis (PCA) and generic Fourier descriptors (GFD). It is found that the proposed method is effective. Item S8 within the MPEG-7 still images content set is used for performing experiments.
Description:
A useful patient admission prediction model that helps the emergency department of a hospital admit patients efficiently is of great importance. It not only improves the care quality provided by the emergency department but also reduces waiting time of patients. This paper proposes an automatic prediction method for patient admission based on a fuzzy min–max neural network (FMM) with rules extraction. The FMM neural network forms a set of hyperboxes by learning through data samples, and the learned knowledge is used for prediction. In addition to providing predictions, decision rules are extracted from the FMM hyperboxes to provide an explanation for each prediction. In order to simplify the structure of FMM and the decision rules, an optimization method that simultaneously maximizes prediction accuracy and minimizes the number of FMM hyperboxes is proposed. Specifically, a genetic algorithm is formulated to find the optimal configuration of the decision rules. The experimental results using a large data set consisting of 450740 real patient records reveal that the proposed method achieves comparable or even better prediction accuracy than state-of-the-art classifiers with the additional ability to extract a set of explanatory rules to justify its predictions.
Description:
Science can be basic (or pure) and curiosity driven, or applied, in which new products or processes are developed or creative solutions to problems are sought. On the other hand, business primarily focuses on profit generation and growth. However, business itself is represented by both the service and manufacturing sectors. The benefits of science to the latter would be through the development of new products and improvement of their processes, whereas the former could also benefit from logical scientific thinking and investigation. Because small business often focuses on survival and does not have the resources to conduct the investigations required for an early response to new developments and market forces, its competitiveness can suffer. On the other hand, scientists are engrossed in their new discoveries and are usually not as adept at promoting these where they can do the most good. This chapter is a review of some historical, interspersed with current unpublished, examples of how the commercialization gap between science and business can be closed to the benefit of each. Opportunities for small and larger enterprises are described, primarily in the manufacturing sector, but benefits of science to members of the service sector that rely upon natural resources, such as drycleaners and forensic laboratories, will also be discussed. The strategies proposed highlight the importance of networking and facilitation by a ‘champion’ for the communication of innovations in a competitive environment, and the importance of marketing skills in an age of technological transparency, revolutionary advance in science, environmental sensitivity and dwindling resources. Examples range from the utilization or production of high-tech innovations to the implementation of the simplest measures for cutting costs and using resources more efficiently in small business. How the scientific/academic community can derive maximum benefits from collaborating with business is also discussed.
Description:
In six experiments, subjects judged the sizes of squares that were presented visually and/or haptically, in unimodal or bimodal conditions. We were interested in which mode most affected size judgments in the bimodal condition when the squares presented to each mode actually differed in size. Three factors varied: whether haptic exploration was passive or active, whether the choice set from which the subjects selected their responses was visual or haptic, and whether cutaneous information was provided in addition to kinesthetic information. To match the task for each mode, visual presentations consisted of a cursor that moved along a square pathway to correspond to the haptic experience of successive segments revealed during exploration. We found that the visual influence on size judgments was greater than the influence of haptics when the haptic experience involved only kinesthesis, passive movement, and a visual choice set. However, when cutaneous input was added to kinesthetic information, size judgments were most influenced by the haptic mode. The results support hypotheses of sensory integration, rather than capture of one sense by the other.
Description:
The current study examined the measurement and structural invariance of the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES-D; Radloff, 1977) across ratings provided by older adult men (. n=. 573) and women (. n=. 605). Ratings were modeled in terms of the original four-factor oblique model: a simple structure with correlated factors for Depressed Affect, Positive Affect, Somatic Symptoms, and Interpersonal Difficulties. Multiple-group confirmatory factor analysis supported full measurement and structural invariance, and no sex difference for the four latent factors. These findings indicate good support for measurement and structural invariance of CES-D ratings across older adult men and women. The psychometric and practical implications of the findings are discussed.
Description:
Cognitive models of anxiety and depression have long suggested a central role for future-oriented thinking in these disorders. Experimental studies suggest that anxiety and depression are characterised by distinct future-oriented thinking profiles, and that these profiles are markedly different from those of asymptomatic adults. In this paper, we review these profiles and propose two explanatory models marked by two different neurocognitive systems. The Reconstructive Memory Model emphasises a role for emotionally driven learning and retrieval in episodic foresight (i.e., the construction of future-oriented scenarios), and the Valuation Model proposes that an overweighing of risk and uncertainty estimates can be invoked to explain the future-oriented thought patterns. We consider the effectiveness of interventions aimed at altering such thought patterns. We suggest that future research aimed at elucidating the neurobiological underpinnings of future-oriented thinking in anxiety and depression can play an important role in advancing development of effective biological and psychosocial interventions for these disorders.
Description:
In this paper, we present a novel approach of implementing a combination methodology to find appropriate neural network architecture and weights using an evolutionary least square based algorithm (GALS).1 This paper focuses on aspects such as the heuristics of updating weights using an evolutionary least square based algorithm, finding the number of hidden neurons for a two layer feed forward neural network, the stopping criterion for the algorithm and finally some comparisons of the results with other existing methods for searching optimal or near optimal solution in the multidimensional complex search space comprising the architecture and the weight variables. We explain how the weight updating algorithm using evolutionary least square based approach can be combined with the growing architecture model to find the optimum number of hidden neurons. We also discuss the issues of finding a probabilistic solution space as a starting point for the least square method and address the problems involving fitness breaking. We apply the proposed approach to XOR problem, 10 bit odd parity problem and many real-world benchmark data sets such as handwriting data set from CEDAR, breast cancer and heart disease data sets from UCI ML repository. The comparative results based on classification accuracy and the time complexity are discussed.
Description:
This paper introduces a new ensemble approach, Feature-Subspace Aggregating (Feating), which builds local models instead of global models. Feating is a generic ensemble approach that can enhance the predictive performance of both stable and unstable learners. In contrast, most existing ensemble approaches can improve the predictive performance of unstable learners only. Our analysis shows that the new approach reduces the execution time to generate a model in an ensemble through an increased level of localisation in Feating. Our empirical evaluation shows that Feating performs significantly better than Boosting, Random Subspace and Bagging in terms of predictive accuracy, when a stable learner SVM is used as the base learner. The speed up achieved by Feating makes feasible SVM ensembles that would otherwise be infeasible for large data sets. When SVM is the preferred base learner, we show that Feating SVM performs better than Boosting decision trees and Random Forests. We further demonstrate that Feating also substantially reduces the error of another stable learner, k-nearest neighbour, and an unstable learner, decision tree.
Description:
Research with the maintenance-rehearsal paradigm, in which word pairs are rehearsed as distractor material during a series of digit recall trials, has previously indicated that low frequency and new word pairs capture attention to a greater degree than high frequency and old word pairs. This impacts delayed recognition of the pairs and interferes with immediate digit recall. The effect on immediate digit recall may provide the missing converging evidence for the role of attention in memory. In the current study, 3 experiments were conducted to further investigate the role of attention capture and novelty in storage and forgetting. In addition to the previously established effects, the novelty of switching rehearsal between 2 pairs was found to impair both digit recall and memory for the first pair. The attentional effects we obtained were dependent upon participant expectation, and forgetting appears to be due to interference with consolidation rather than decay or traditional associative interference. Finally, the attentional effects we observed in associative recognition were primarily reflected in a lowering of the false alarm rate with increases in the strength of the parent pairs. Although dual-process models can accommodate this finding on the assumption that recollection is invoked at test alongside familiarity, we showed that the level of recall in this paradigm is so small that recollection can be ruled out. Accordingly, our results are challenging for the existing models of associative recognition to accommodate.
Description:
Orthogonal facial processing models attempt to mimic the local decomposition performed in the visual cortex by simple cell receptive fields. The purpose of this study was to investigate how the neurophysiological validity of orthogonal models of facial processing could be improved by implementing a "whitening" filter, based on current knowledge of similar filtering that occurs in the retina. By using a metric known as the "distributed coding efficiency index" (DCE), this study demonstrates that an orthogonal facial processing model significantly increased coding efficiency when a low-pass, zero-phase whitening filter was applied. The extent to which orthogonal decomposition of filtered data represents a realistic V1 model is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Description:
The principal purpose of this study was to identify those developmental factors most predictive of adult perceptual and decision-making skill. Qualitative data on developmental experiences and social support were collected from semi-structured interviews of 29 elite Australian Football League (AFL) players, 16 of whom were independently classified by a panel of coaches as expert decision-makers and 13 as less-skilled decision-makers. While high levels of parental support and a fierce desire to win, established from an early age, were evident for all players in the elite sample, the expert decision-makers were more likely to have bad (i) extensive experience of invasion games during their development, (ii) early experience of playing against adults or older children, (iii) playing experience in related sports (especially basketball), and (iv) their father as a coach at some stage during their junior years. The developmental characteristics observed for the expert decision-mak! ers extend quantitative findings on the practice hours of The same cohort (Berry et al., 2008) and indicate that observable differences in decision-making skills amongst adult players, even at an elite level, may be directly linked to each players particular developmental and practice experiences.
Description:
Grip selection tasks have been used to test "planning" in both autism and developmental coordination disorder (DCD). We differentiate between motor and executive planning and present a modified motor planning task. Participants grasped a cylinder in 1 of 2 orientations before turning it clockwise or anticlockwise. The rotation resulted in a comfortable final posture at the cost of a harder initial reaching action on 50% of trials. We hypothesized that grip selection would be dominated by motoric developmental status. Adults were always biased towards a comfortable end-state with their dominant hand, but occasionally ended uncomfortably with their nondominant hand. Most 9- to 14-year-olds with and without autism also showed this "end-state comfort" bias but only 50% of 5- to 8-year-olds. In contrast, children with DCD were biased towards selecting the simplest initial movement. Our results are best understood in terms of motor planning, with selection of an easier initial grip resulting from poor reach-to-grasp control rather than an executive planning deficit. The absence of differences between autism and controls may reflect the low demand this particular task places on executive planning.
Description:
This paper examines the effect of the Big Five personality traits on job satisfaction and subjective wellbeing (SWB). The paper also examines the mediating role of job satisfaction on the Big Five-SWB relationship. Data were collected from a sample of 818 urban employees from five Chinese cities: Harbin, Changchun, Shenyang, Dalian, and Fushun. All the study variables were measured with well-established multi-item scales that have been validated both in English-speaking populations and in China. The study found only extraversion to have an effect on job satisfaction, suggesting that there could be cultural difference in the relationships between the Big Five and job satisfaction in China and in the West. The study found that three factors in the Big Fiveextraversion, conscientiousness, and neuroticismhave an effect on SWB. This finding is similar to findings in the West, suggesting convergence in the relationship between the Big Five and SWB in different cultural contexts. The research found that only the relationship between extraversion and SWB is partially mediated by job satisfaction, implying that the effect of the Big Five on SWB is mainly direct, rather than indirect via job satisfaction. The study also found that extraversion was the strongest predictor of both job satisfaction and SWB. This finding implies that extraversion could be more important than other factors in the Big Five in predicting job satisfaction and SWB in a high collectivism and high power distance country such as China. The research findings are discussed in the Chinese cultural context. The study also offers suggestions on the directions for future research.
Description:
As an individual difference variable assessing the extent to which attitudes towards past, present and future influence behavior, time perspective is a potentially useful construct. However, its development and utility has been compromised by measurement issues. Recently, a short form of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (ZTPI), the SZTPI-15 has been suggested to yield valid and reliable scores. Using three independent samples from America, Australia, and the United Kingdom, the present study tested the psychometric properties of SZPTI-15 scores. Confirmatory factor analyses did not support the 5-factor structure and internal consistency estimates for four of the subscales were low. Fit indices obtained from exploratory structural equation modeling were better, suggesting that permitting items to load on multiple factors improved model fit. Correlations with variables shown to be related to ZTPI factors broadly supported the concurrent validity of the SZTPI-15. Results suggest that further psychometric examination of SZTPI-15 scores is required.