EEG correlates of social interaction at distance

This study investigated EEG correlates of social interaction at distance between twenty-five pairs of participants who were not connected by any traditional channels of communication. Each session involved the application of 128 stimulations separated by intervals of random duration ranging from 4 to 6 seconds. One of the pair received a one-second stimulation from a light signal produced by an arrangement of red LEDs, and a simultaneous 500 Hz sinusoidal audio signal of the same length. The other member of the pair sat in an isolated sound-proof room, such that any sensory interaction between the pair was impossible. An analysis of the Event-Related Potentials associated with sensory stimulation using traditional averaging methods showed a distinct peak at approximately 300 ms, but only in the EEG activity of subjects who were directly stimulated. However, when a new algorithm was applied to the EEG activity based on the correlation between signals from all active electrodes, a weak but robust response was also detected in the EEG activity of the passive member of the pair, particularly within 9 – 10 Hz in the Alpha range. Using the Bootstrap method and the Monte Carlo emulation, this signal was found to be statistically significant

Measuring regional progress: regional index of sustainable economic well-being (R-ISEW) for all the English regions

This report describes the development and application of a Regional Index of Sustainable Economic Well-Being (R-ISEW), and calculates it for all English regions

Workload-Aware Performance Tuning for Autonomous DBMSs

Optimal configuration is vital for a DataBase Management System (DBMS) to achieve high performance. There is no one-size-fits-all configuration that works for different workloads since each workload has varying patterns with different resource requirements. There is a relationship between configuration, workload, and system performance. If a configuration cannot adapt to the dynamic changes of a workload, there could be a significant degradation in the overall performance of DBMS unless a sophisticated administrator is continuously re-configuring the DBMS. In this tutorial, we focus on autonomous workload-aware performance tuning, which is expected to automatically and continuously tune the configuration as the workload changes. We survey three research directions, including 1) workload classification, 2) workload forecasting, and 3) workload-based tuning. While the first two topics address the issue of obtaining accurate workload information, the third one tackles the problem of how to properly use the workload information to optimize performance. We also identify research challenges and open problems, and give real-world examples about leveraging workload information for database tuning in commercial products (e.g., Amazon Redshift). We will demonstrate workload-aware performance tuning in Amazon Redshift in the presentation.Peer reviewe

Autopoiesis and Dance

Este artigo oferece um compromisso conceitual com o processo de criatividade em movimento. No trabalho implantamos uma visão a partir da noção de autopoiese - um termo que engloba “autonomia”, "self" e "poiesis" (que significa "criação" e “produção”) - que foi introduzida pelos biólogos teóricos, Humberto Maturana e Francisco Varela , em 1972, para definir a química de manutenção do self de células vivas e foi, posteriormente, também aplicada aos campos da teoria dos sistemas e sociologia. Neste trabalho, empregaremos a formalização para sugerir como o processo de engajamento de um dançarino com o movimento é capaz de reproduzir e manter-se; explorando, teoricamente, como essa atenção é mantida e como, inevitavelmente, a vontade do dançarino deve esgotar, eventualmente, e como seus movimentos desaparecerem de volta à quietude

Autopoiesis, Creativity and Dance

For many years three key aspects of creative processes have been glossed over by theorists eager to avoid the mystery of consciousness and instead embrace an implicitly more formal, computational vision: autonomy, phenomenality and the temporally embedded and bounded nature of creative processes. In this paper we will discuss autopoiesis and creativity; an alternative metaphor which we suggest offers new insight into these long overlooked aspects of the creative processes in humans and the machine, and examine the metaphor in the context of dance choreography

Trauma and dissociation in psychosis

In this thesis we attempt to address the complex issue of the relationship between trauma, dissociation, and psychosis. We start by providing a brief presentation of the background to this thesis, which is followed by an outline of the main clinical aspects and theories of psychosis. Subsequently, a broad evolutionary overview of trauma is given within which existing influential cognitive theories of PTSD are placed. Current models of dissociation are then reviewed and related to the view of trauma and traumatic stress reactions previously outlined, before providing an evaluative synthesis of the theoretical approaches and convergent conceptualisations of trauma, dissociation, and psychosis in order to disentangle some of the plausible processes underlying their relationship.It was hypothesised that dissociation, occurring as a result of trauma (experience of psychosis), plays a key role in the formation and maintenance of psychotic symptoms, chiefly hallucinations and delusions. We used methods from experimental psychopathology to investigate the potential role played by dissociative processes in the disruption of the cognitive processes of attention and memory for trauma-related, positive and neutral information in two groups of participants: 30 individuals with psychosis and 30 matched controls. In particular, we used self-report measures of symptomatology, recovery style, trauma-related symptoms, and dissociation, and 1 employed two experimental tasks. The first was specifically devised to assess attentional processes: a Directed Forgetting Stroop Task (DFST) performed under conditions of divided attention. The second task was a Word-Stem Completion Task (WSCT) on which we applied the process dissociation procedure (PDP; Jacoby, 1991) in order to estimate the relative contribution to dissociation of implicit and explicit memory.As expected, our findings revealed that compared to controls the experimental group processed information preferentially in an implicit manner, and that this effect was predicted by levels of dissociation and trauma-related distress. Although enhanced unconscious memory was not specific to trauma-related material, it significantly contributed to the level of positive symptomatology when mediated by stress levels. In contrast, the contribution of recovery style in the maintenance of psychotic symptoms was not supported, although this may reflect a limitation of the self-report measures employed in our study. Contrary to what was hypothesised, we did not find a standard directed forgetting effect in our memory task or an advantage (less interference due to dissociation) in our task of divided attention.Results are discussed in the light of the theoretical background, previous experimental literature, methodological limitations, and current models of trauma and dissociatio

EEG correlates of social interaction at distance

This study investigated EEG correlates of social interaction at distance between twenty-five pairs of participants who were not connected by any traditional channels of communication. Each session involved the application of 128 stimulations separated by intervals of random duration ranging from 4 to 6 seconds. One of the pair received a one-second stimulation from a light signal produced by an arrangement of red LEDs, and a simultaneous 500 Hz sinusoidal audio signal of the same length. The other member of the pair sat in an isolated sound-proof room, such that any sensory interaction between the pair was impossible. An analysis of the Event-Related Potentials associated with sensory stimulation using traditional averaging methods showed a distinct peak at approximately 300 ms, but only in the EEG activity of subjects who were directly stimulated. However, when a new algorithm was applied to the EEG activity based on the correlation between signals from all active electrodes, a weak but robust response was also detected in the EEG activity of the passive member of the pair, particularly within 9 – 10 Hz in the Alpha range. Using the Bootstrap method and the Monte Carlo emulation, this signal was found to be statistically significant

Absenteeism as a mechanism of repression of demand in the Brazilian public sector: accounting reflex in federal education public institutions

Absenteeism is seen as a critical problem in public organizations, since the factors that generate it negatively impact the productivity of organizations. In this sense, considering that Federal Institutions of Higher Education represent almost half of the entire workforce existing in the Federal Executive Branch, this article aims to identify absenteeism, as well as its typification, in addition to measuring its accounting reflex. The methodology adopted was panel data analysis, through the analysis of the absenteeism index with time series from 2008 to 2018. The research findings reinforce that absenteeism is more representative when it is due to a stricto sensu graduate program and medical licenses. Furthermore, it was found that the absenteeism rate doubles every 5 years