Change In Processing Speed And Its Associations With Cerebral White Matter Microstructure

The decline of cognition with age is one of the most feared aspects of aging, while the slowing of responses, or reduced processing speed, is one of the most reliable aspects of aging. Slowing of processing has been hypothesized to affect other domains of cognition as well. Despite the well-known slowing-age relationship and central position processing speed plays in theories of cognitive aging the neurobiological mechanisms which underpin slowing is unclear. If we could identify the biology associated with processing speed we could then attempt to develop interventions to mitigate the effects of age on those variables. In turn we could test whether “preventing” or reducing the decline of processing speed helps alleviate the decline in other cognitive domains. Not only would this provide basic knowledge about aging, cognition, and their relationship but it may also have a broader societal impact. In this project, we tested whether the amount of myelin content, indexed by MWF, in white matter tracts hypothesized to be important for performing a choice reaction time task, could explain the variance in processing speed or in change of processing speed after controlling for age effects. While MWF did not explain any additional variance in our variables of interest we did found that the geomT2-IEW, a measure thought to be related to axonal density, in the genu was negatively associated with change in processing speed. These results suggest that axons maybe an important structure supporting processing speed and that future investigations should look at both myelin and axonal changes as potential substrates sub serving processing speed

Training strategies specific to the physical education and sport in what concerns the social integration of pupils with special educational needs

The training, planning and the realization of adapted physical education classes must be part of the pedagogic knowledge ensemble of the didactic frame. For every child with special educational needs it is necessary an individual approach of the training and realization of the motor educational program. Experimental research has contained a number of 30 pupils of the Special School no. 2 Ploiesti, significant number for pointing out the problems variety with which we are confronting and that must be realized in a short period of time both for the deficiency child and for the teacher. The experiment had been realized on the basis of proper investigation methods (observation method, questionnaire method, experimental one) and processing, analysis and gathered data interpretation during the research (mathematical method, logical method, graphic method, statistic one). During the adapted physical education classes, the abilities (skills) development and education can be realized during its entire period using in this purpose free exercises or with objects, individual, in pairs or in group; also exercises can be made under the form of relay race or in more varied forms and in conditions always changed and with different difficulty levels. In selecting these activities and exercises for these subjects we had in mind the age, the deficiency severity, their option and the material equipment of the school unity. The presentation of a content adapted to the age characteristics had reduced progressively the discrepancies between the subjects and had determined the knowledge of the skills that all the subjects use in the natural, domestic, vocational, communitarian, recreational context. Our research confirms the interdependency of the motor abilities education with the manifestation level of the individual motor qualities.Strategies, instruction, motor ability, pupils, integration, special educational requests, adapted physical education

A multi-agent system for the classification of gender and age from images

[EN] The automatic classification of human images on the basis of age range and gender can be used in audiovisual content adaptation for Smart TVs or marquee advertising. Knowledge about users is used by publishing agencies and departments regulating TV content; on the basis of this information (age, gender) they are able to provide content that suits the interests of users. To this end, the creation of a highly precise image pattern recognition system is necessary, this may be one of the greatest challenges faced by computer technology in the last decades. These recognition systems must apply different pattern recognition techniques, in order to distinct gender and age in the images. In this work, we propose a multi-agent system that integrates different techniques for the acquisition, preprocessing and processing of images for the classification of age and gender. The system has been tested in an office building. Thanks to the use of a multi-agent system which allows to apply different workflows simultaneously, the performance of different methods could be compared (each flow with a different configuration). Experimental results have confirmed that a good preprocessing stage is necessary if we want the classification methods to perform well (Fisherfaces, Eigenfaces, Local Binary Patterns, Multilayer perceptron). The Fisherfaces method has proved to be more effective than MLP and the training time was shorter. In terms of the classification of age, Fisherfaces offers the best results in comparison to the rest of the system’s classifiers. The use of filters has allowed to reduce dimensionality, as a result the workload was reduced, a great advantage in a system that performs classification in real time

TRAINING EFL PRE-SERVICE TEACHERS FOR CLIL

Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) is regarded as an innovative form of education in response to the demands and expectations of the modern age. CLIL is not easy to apply and it requires considerable effort to put into practice. The teacher is an important factor in processing the CLIL classroom; therefore, it is important that the teachers are trained and qualified in CLIL concepts. CLIL is generally recognized in collaboration of subject teachers and language teachers means that teachers combine and integrate their subject knowledge. However, in this study 19 EFL pre-service teachers were trained for CLIL without any collaboration with subject teachers. The aim of this paper is to investigate strategies that EFL pre-service teachers used and challenges they faced during CLIL implementation.   Article visualizations

Special topic: The association between pulse ingredients and canine dilated cardiomyopathy: addressing the knowledge gaps before establishing causation.

In July 2018, the Food and Drug Administration warned about a possible relationship between dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) in dogs and the consumption of dog food formulated with potatoes and pulse ingredients. This issue may impede utilization of pulse ingredients in dog food or consideration of alternative proteins. Pulse ingredients have been used in the pet food industry for over 2 decades and represent a valuable source of protein to compliment animal-based ingredients. Moreover, individual ingredients used in commercial foods do not represent the final nutrient concentration of the complete diet. Thus, nutritionists formulating dog food must balance complementary ingredients to fulfill the animal's nutrient needs in the final diet. There are multiple factors that should be considered, including differences in nutrient digestibility and overall bioavailability, the fermentability and quantity of fiber, and interactions among food constituents that can increase the risk of DCM development. Taurine is a dispensable amino acid that has been linked to DCM in dogs. As such, adequate supply of taurine and/or precursors for taurine synthesis plays an important role in preventing DCM. However, requirements of amino acids in dogs are not well investigated and are presented in total dietary content basis which does not account for bioavailability or digestibility. Similarly, any nutrient (e.g., soluble and fermentable fiber) or physiological condition (e.g., size of the dog, sex, and age) that increases the requirement for taurine will also augment the possibility for DCM development. Dog food formulators should have a deep knowledge of processing methodologies and nutrient interactions beyond meeting the Association of American Feed Control Officials nutrient profiles and should not carelessly follow unsubstantiated market trends. Vegetable ingredients, including pulses, are nutritious and can be used in combination with complementary ingredients to meet the nutritional needs of the dog

Textual analysis of artificial intelligence manuscripts reveals features associated with peer review outcome

We analyzed a data set of scientific manuscripts that were submitted to various conferences in artificial intelligence. We performed a combination of semantic, lexical, and psycholinguistic analyses of the full text of the manuscripts and compared them with the outcome of the peer review process. We found that accepted manuscripts scored lower than rejected manuscripts on two indicators of readability, and that they also used more scientific and artificial intelligence jargon. We also found that accepted manuscripts were written with words that are less frequent, that are acquired at an older age, and that are more abstract than rejected manuscripts. The analysis of references included in the manuscripts revealed that the subset of accepted submissions were more likely to cite the same publications. This finding was echoed by pairwise comparisons of the word content of the manuscripts (i.e., an indicator of semantic similarity), which were more similar in the subset of accepted manuscripts. Finally, we predicted the peer review outcome of manuscripts with their word content, with words related to machine learning and neural networks positively related to acceptance, whereas words related to logic, symbolic processing, and knowledge-based systems negatively related to acceptance

PENGELOLAAN KEINGINAN MEROKOK DENGAN PENYULUHAN METODE 4Ds DI KELURAHAN PORIS JAYA PADA MASA PANDEMI

Cigarettes contain thousands of components that are harmful to health. In addition to its content, the hazardous materials in cigarettes are also produced from the process of planting, processing, and serving. Smoking also causes various health problems. However, information about cigarettes is not widely known by its users. Cigarettes are consumed by various age groups with varying frequency. In RW 07, there are many people who smoke and there is no smoking corner. The purpose of this community service is to increase the knowledge and awareness of participants about the dangers of smoking and how to manage the desire to smoke. The method used was a blended system for 6 participants who attend face-to-face. Counseling was given in the form of lectures, watched video, discussions, pre and posttests, as well as leaflet distribution. The results showed that there was an increase in participants' knowledge with an average pre-test score of 90 to 9.67. In conclusion, after being given counseling, there was an increase in participants' knowledge about the dangers of smoking and how to manage the desire to smoke. The next community service suggestion is to practice training in managing the desire to smoke as well as support from religious leaders and family members who want to quit smoking

The Relationship Between Depressive Symptoms and Social Cognitive Processing in Partners of Long-Term Breast Cancer Survivors

Purpose/Objectives: To determine 1) if depressive symptoms in partners of long-term breast cancer survivors (BCS) could be predicted by social cognitive processing theory, and 2) if partners of younger and older breast cancer survivors were differentially affected by the cancer experience. Design: A cross-sectional, descriptive study utilizing self-report questionnaires. Setting: Indiana University and 97 ECOG-ACRIN sites. Sample: Partners of breast cancer survivors (n=508) diagnosed 3-8 years prior. Methods: Secondary data mediation analyses were conducted to determine if cognitive processing mediated the relationship between social constraints and depressive symptoms. Age-related differences on all scales were tested. Main Research Variables: Depressive symptoms; secondary variables included social constraints, cognitive processing (avoidance and intrusive thoughts), and potentially confounding variables. Findings: Cognitive processing mediated the relationship between social constraints and depressive symptoms for partners (F(5,498)= 19.911, R2=.167, p<.001). Partners of young BCS reported worse outcomes on all measures than partners of older breast cancer survivors Conclusions: As predicted by the social cognitive processing theory, cognitive processing mediated the relationship between social constraints and depressive symptoms. Furthermore, partners of younger BCS fared worse on social constraints, intrusive thoughts and depressive symptoms than partners of older BCS. Implications for Nursing: Results provide support for using the social cognitive processing theory in intervention design with partners of long-term BCS to decrease depressive symptoms. Knowledge Translation: • Partners of long-term BCS report clinically significant depression. • Partners of younger BCS report higher levels of depressive symptoms than the national average and than partners of older survivors. • Addressing social constraints within the dyad may improve depressive symptoms.This study was coordinated by the ECOG-ACRIN Cancer Research Group (Robert L. Comis, MD and Mitchell D. Schnall, MD, PhD, Group Co-Chairs) and supported in part by Public Health Service Grants CA189828, CA180795, CA37403, CA35199, CA17145 and CA49883, and from the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health and the Department of Health and Human Services. Its content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Cancer Institute. Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Institute of Nursing Research of the National Institutes of Health under Award Number F31NR013822, and by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health under Award Numbers K05CA175048 and R25CA117865. Its content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health, including the National Cancer Institute or the National Institute of Nursing Research

Citationally Enhanced Semantic Literature Based Discovery

We are living within the age of information. The ever increasing flow of data and publications poses a monumental bottleneck to scientific progress as despite the amazing abilities of the human mind, it is woefully inadequate in processing such a vast quantity of multidimensional information. The small bits of flotsam and jetsam that we leverage belies the amount of useful information beneath the surface. It is imperative that automated tools exist to better search, retrieve, and summarize this content. Combinations of document indexing and search engines can quickly find you a document whose content best matches your query - if the information is all contained within a single document. But it doesn’t draw connections, make hypotheses, or find knowledge hidden across multiple documents. Literature-based discovery is an approach that can uncover hidden interrelationships between topics by extracting information from existing published scientific literature. The proposed study utilizes a semantic-based approach that builds a graph of related concepts between two user specified sets of topics using semantic predications. In addition, the study includes properties of bibliographically related documents and statistical properties of concepts to further enhance the quality of the proposed intermediate terms. Our results show an improvement in precision-recall when incorporating citations

Incidence of Executive Functions on Reading Comprehension Performance in Adolescents

Introducción.La comprensión lectora es una habilidad cognitiva compleja que se ha asocia-do a procesos ejecutivoscomola memoria de trabajo (MT) y la inhibición. Dado que el desa-rrollo de estas habilidades continúa hasta la adolescenciatardía, esta investigación propone estudiar el rol que sobre los distintos niveles de rendimiento en comprensión lectora ejercen ambos procesosen adolescentes de dos franjas etarias.Método.Se evaluó el desempeño en comprensión de textos, MT,inhibición,fluidez lectora y habilidades verbales en 104 adolescentes (12/13 años n= 53; 17/18 años n= 51).Resultados.Se encontró que los desempeños en comprensión lectora, MTe inhibición pre-sentan incrementossignificativos según la edad. A su vez, la correlación parcial mostró que lacomprensión lectora se asocia a: habilidades verbales, MTe inhibición.Por último, las prue-bas de diferencia de grupos señalan que los estudiantes con alto y bajo rendimiento en com-prensión difieren significativamente en habilidades verbales y funcionamiento ejecutivo en la franja 12/13 años. En cambio, sólo difieren significativamente en habilidades verbales en la franja 17/18 años.Conclusión.La comprensión lectora, la MT y la inhibición mejoran durante la adolescencia. Sin embargo, la relación entre estas habilidades difiere según el momento etario considerado.Introduction.Reading comprehension is a complex cognitive skill that has been associated with executive functions such as working memory (WM) and inhibition. Given that the development of these abilities continues through late adolescence, this study seeks to explore the role that both processes play with respect to varying levels of reading comprehension performance in adolescents in two age groups.Method.We evaluated performance in the comprehension of texts, WM, inhibition, reading fluency and verbal skills in 104 adolescents (12/13 years of agen= 53; 17/18 years of agen= 51).Results.We found that reading comprehension performance, WM and inhibition increased significantly with age. Further, a partial correlation showed that reading comprehension is associated with: verbal skills, WM and inhibition. Lastly, group difference testing indicates that students with high and low comprehension performance differ significantly in verbal skills and executive functioning in the 12/13 age group. In the 17/18 age group, however, they only differed significantly in terms of verbal skills.Conclusion.Reading comprehension, WM and inhibition improve during adolescence. However, the relationship among these abilities differs by age group.Fil: Demagistri, Maria Silvina. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. Facultad de Psicología. Centro De Investigación en Procesos Básicos, Metodologías y Educación; ArgentinaFil: Richard's, Maria Marta. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. Facultad de Psicología. Centro De Investigación en Procesos Básicos, Metodologías y Educación; ArgentinaFil: Canet Juric, Lorena. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata. Facultad de Psicología. Centro De Investigación en Procesos Básicos, Metodologías y Educación; Argentin