Intelligence quotient and perceptual ability: an inter-relationship based on brainwave power ratio features

Cognitive ability refers to the characteristic approach by the brain in processing information. These can be observed through various aspects of cognition such as intelligence and perceptual ability. Studies have shown that both mental constituents originate from the same neurological substrate in the prefrontal cortex. Hence, the paper discusses the relationship between intelligence and perceptual ability using electroencephalogram (EEG) features. The study is based on resting brainwave of fifty samples and focused on the left and right prefrontal cortex. The intelligence quotient (IQ) scores obtained are then used to establish the control groups. Subsequently, the pattern of alpha and theta power ratio for each IQ level is observed and successfully correlated with perceptual ability through the Neural Efficiency Hypothesis of intelligence.Keywords: EEG; intelligence; IQ; perceptual ability; power ratio

Uncovering phantom shocks in cardiac patients with an implantable cardioverter defibrillator

Background: Implantable cardioverter defibrillator recipients sometimes report “phantom shocks” (PSs), defined as a reported shock lacking objective evidence. The aim of this study was to describe the subjective experience of PSs and their psychosocial correlates using a mixed methods approach. Methods: PS participants were matched on sex and age with individuals who received objective shocks only (OSO). Participants were interviewed and completed measures of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD Checklist—Civilian Version), depression and anxiety (Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale), disease-specific distress (Cardiac Anxiety Questionnaire—CAQ), and social desirability (Socially Desirable Response Set—SDRS). Interviews were analyzed using interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA). Results: Seventeen male patients participated (PS: n = 9; OSO: n = 8). Three themes emerged from IPA: (1) PS as a somatic experience, (2) the emotional impact of PSs, and (3) searching for meaning. Quantitative analyses showed that both groups exhibited elevated trauma and anxiety levels. Effect size differences (ESD) suggested a medium ESD on depression (P = 0.176, ηp 2 = 0.118) and PTSD (avoidance: P = 0.383, ηp 2 = 0.055, numbing: P = 0.311, ηp 2 = 0.068), and a large ESD on SDRS (P = 0.081, ηp 2 = 0.189), where PS participants, comparatively, exhibited elevated levels. A medium ESD was detected on CAQ-fear (P = 0.237, ηp 2 = 0.092) where OSO participants exhibited greater heart-focused worry. Conclusion: The qualitative and quantitative findings of this mixed method study show convergence in terms of the emotional factors associated with the experience of PSs. PSs are often reported to be indistinguishable from objective shocks, evoking alarm, frustration, and confusion, forcing the individual to face the uncertainties of what to them is a novel and confusing experience. (PACE 2013; 36:673–683)This study has not been funded by any source. AB was supported by an Ontario Graduate Scholarship. Dr. Kovacs has received speaking engagement honoraria from Medtronic Inc. Dr. Katz is supported by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research Canada Research Chair in Health Psychology. This paper is derived, in part, from the first author’s Master’s thesis

Development of Javanese Speech Emotion Database (Java-SED)

Javanese is one of the most widely spoken regional languages in Indonesia, alongside other regional languages. Emotions can be recognized in a variety of ways, including facial expression, behavior, and speech. The recognition of emotions through speech is a straightforward process, but the outcomes are quite significant. Currently, there is no database for identifying emotions in Javanese speech. This paper aims to describe the creation of a Javanese emotional speech database. Actors from the Kamasetra UNY community who are accustomed to performing in dramatic roles participated in the recording. The location where recordings are made is free of interference and noise. The actors of Kamasetra have simulated six types of emotions, including happy, sad, fear, angry, neutral, and surprised. The cast consists of ten people between the ages of 20 and 30, including five men and five women. Both humans (30 Javanese-speaking verifiers ranging in age from 17 to 50) and a machine learning system (30 Javanese-speaking verifiers with ages between 17 and 50) verify the database that has been created. The verification results indicate that the database can be used for Javanese emotion recognition. The developed database is offered as open-source and is freely available to the research community at this link https://beais-uny.id/dataset

Observational Assessment of Empathy in Parent-Child Verbal Exchanges and Their Influence on Child Behavior

Empathy, the ability to both experientially share in and understand others’ thoughts, behaviors, and feelings, is vital for human adaptation. Deficits in empathy development have implications across the lifespan for the development of prosocial behavior, social functioning, mental health disorders, and risk for antisocial behavior (e.g., Guajardo, Snyder, & Petersen, 2009; Moreno, Klute & Robinson, 2008). In light of these societal and individual burdens, it is imperative to foster and strengthen the development of this ability early in life to prevent or ameliorate such negative outcomes. This type of prevention can take a variety of forms, but parent and child verbal exchanges and modeling are often the most direct methods after two years of age (e.g., Moreno et al., 2008). The aim of this research was to inform the development of a system to naturalistically assess empathy development via home-based observation of mothers and their children’s verbal exchanges. The proposed system, iEAR-Empathy in Parent-Child Interactions (iEAR-EPIC), is a verbal coding system to code for verbal behaviors empirically demonstrated to foster empathy development, as well as behaviors found to indicate empathy development. The development of the iEPIC was theoretically informed by Preston and de Waal’s (2002) Perception Action Mechanism (PAM) model of empathy, a neurocognitive-emotional model of empathy. This model demonstrates empathy as a maturing system in which emotional and cognitive understanding develop in tandem through brain-environment interactions. However, the iEPIC also accounts for the interplay between parents and neurocognitive emotional processes, and thus captures the parallel, increasingly interactive, development of cognitive and emotional abilities from infancy onward in the context of a parent-child dyad. To develop and test the iEPIC, an ethnically diverse subsample of 84 mothers and their 2 to 6-year-old children were recruited from a large, northeastern, urban, public university. After consenting, mother-child dyads were recorded for a 4-hour period during the dyad’s evening routine (5-9p.m.), using a two-minutes on, 10 seconds off protocol, resulting in 28 2-minute clips (56 minutes total) per dyad. Recordings were transcribed and reviewed, and then 4 pairs of coders were trained in the iEPIC coding system, and then coded the dyad recordings for behaviors comprising the proposed iEPIC assessment system. The iEPIC observational assessment system consists of 5 codes for each parent and child: Reflection (R), Exploring Emotion and State (EES), Emotion and State Description (ESD), and Empathic Understanding and Concern (EUC), as well as Neutral verbalizations (N; non-study-related verbalizations). The EES, ESD, and EUC each have levels of complexity, with higher levels expected to occur more frequently in older children (e.g., 4 years and older). There were several purposes of the current study: 1) assess inter-rater reliability for the iEPIC coding system 2) determine if hypothesized factors, Parent and Child EES, ESD, and EUC exist (6 factors total; 3 for parent and 3 for child) such that levels 1-3 for EES and ESD, and levels 1-4 EUC load unto their respective Child and Parent factors and that these factors are sufficiently different from one another 3) examine whether higher level codes occur, on average, more frequently in older children, particularly EUC in children 4 years of age and older only 4) to determine whether iEPIC behavior frequency increase is associated with a decrease in child disruptive behavior as measured by the ECBI and observed and coded “Child Disruptive Behavior,” 4) to determine whether parent iEPIC behaviors are positively correlated with and concurrently predict child iEPIC behaviors and 5) whether parent engagement and parent affect, are moderators in the relationship between parent and child iEPIC behaviors, 6) assess the potential moderating influence of Child Disruptive Behavior on parent iEPIC behaviors predicting child iEPIC behaviors and 7) explore the mean differences between gender and different ethnicities in child iEPIC behavior frequencies. Results showed that the iEPIC coding system exhibited good inter-rater reliability with almost all rater pairs having an intra-class correlation coefficient above .70, with the exception of 1 pair that had a mean coefficient close at .68. The median for all coefficients was .77. However, the child codes were found to be more reliable. Exploratory Factor Analyses (EFA) found a 15 variable, 5 factor solution that resulted in a factor structure different than expected, with the exception of the PEUC factor, which did have the 4 levels for that parent code load onto it. The RMSEA for the 5-factor solution demonstrated a good fit. The following factors were labeled: “Parent Empathic Understanding and Concern,” “Child Complex Explore, Describe, and Empathic Concern,” “Parent Complex Explore and Describe,” “Parent and Child Explore and High Child Empathic Concern,” and “Parent and Child Describe.” Analyses also showed that only Child ESD2, Total Child ESDs, and Child EES1 codes were significantly more frequent for children 4 years and older. Interestingly, Parent ESD2 also occurred significantly more often and Parent EES1 significantly less often for those with children 4 years and older. The only significant relationship in the expected direction was that child iEPIC behavior frequency was negatively associated with coded Child Disruptive Behavior. The ECBI Intensity and Problem scores were, in contrast to hypotheses, positively correlated with Parent ESD3 and Child ESD1. The implications for this are discussed. Total Parent iEPIC behavior (PTotal) frequency was found to concurrently predict Total Child iEPIC behavior (CTotal). Although Parent Engagement reduced the influence of PTotal on CTotal, it did not make the relationship insignificant. Parent Affect and Child Disruptive Behavior did not significantly influence the relationship between Parent Total mean iEPIC behaviors and Child Total mean iEPIC behaviors. There were no differences between genders and there was only one significant difference between ethnicities with Caucasian and Latino-Non-White children displaying EES2 behavior more frequently. Future analyses are required to further explore these relationships. Limitations and future directions are discussed. Overall, the iEPIC coding system was found to be a reliable assessment tool for empathy-related parent and child verbal behaviors and shows promise for further validation and development

An 18GHz Wide-Band Buffer

Recent developments in wireless communication and systems, such as sixth-generation (6G), radar and instrumentation have led to massive use of high-frequency carriers. As a result, there is a high demand for Analog-to-Digital Converters (ADCs) in direct-conversion architectures with high bandwidth, high-resolution, and with the highest possible power efficiency and spectral purity. A potential performance enhancement of an ADC can be realized by adding a voltage Input Buffer (IB). To increase the IB bandwidth and decrease the distortion from the nonlinear sampling circuit, a low output impedance is required. Therefore, to achieve low output impedance, it is necessary to dissipate power that is often equal to or greater than the power dissipated in the rest of the ADC blocks combined, since the output impedance is inversely proportional to the bias current. Consequently, input buffers are one of the most "power-hungry" building blocks of any direct receiver chain. In recent years, due to the high ADC resolution and quantization range, the existing approaches use IBs with supply voltages above the nominal rails, for instance, 2.5 or 4.0 V, to increase the linearity and to not limit the ADC output swing. However, it inherently creates reliability and robustness issues. This work investigates several different input buffers implemented in 7 nm FinFET technology with 1.8V of supply voltage in which a one pico farad of sampling capacitance is driven. The study starts by exploring four single-stage topologies in thick gate devices with and without linearity techniques, for example, the drain-source voltage "bootstrap" technique. Moreover, two bandwidth extension techniques are introduced, for instance, the Bridge T-coil with Series Peaking and the Distributed Approach. Lastly, two-stage IB architectures with thick oxide devices together with thin oxide devices are implemented. Finally, the new solutions presented meet the requirements by exhibiting more than 18 GHz of bandwidth with a linearity (IIP3) higher than 16.3 dBm, and a DC power consumption lower than 178.2 mW without compromising reliability and robustness issues.Os mais recentes desenvolvimentos nos sistemas de comunicação sem fios, como a sexta geração (6G) de redes móveis, levaram ao uso massivo de portadoras de alta frequência. Com efeito, é crescente a demanda por conversores analógico-digital (ADCs) nas arquiteturas de conversão direta, com elevada largura de banda, de alta resolução, com um baixo consumo de energia e com uma elevada linearidade. Uma potencial melhoria no desempenho do ADC pode ser alcançada através de um input buffer (IB). Para aumentar a largura de banda do IB e diminuir a distorção causada pelo circuito de amostragem é necessária uma baixa impedância de saída. Sendo a impedância de saída inversamente proporcional à corrente de polarização, para alcançar umaimpedância de saída baixa é essencial dissiparpotência que muitas das vezes é igualou superior à soma da potência consumida no resto dos blocos do ADC. Consequentemente, o input buffer é um dos blocos da cadeia recetora que mais energia consume. Nos últimos anos, devido à elevada resolução do ADC, as abordagens existentes usam input buffers com tensões de alimentação superiores à tensão nominal de alimentação, por exemplo, 2.5 ou 4.0 V, de forma a aumentar a linearidade e não limitar a tensão saída do ADC. Porém, inerentemente surgem questões de fiabilidade e robustez. Neste contexto, o escopo do presente trabalho é investigar diversos input buffers implementados em tecnologia 7 nm FinFET com 1.8V de tensão de alimentação e com uma capacidade de carga de um pico farad. O estudo começa por explorar quatro topologias de input buffer com dispositivos de grandes dimensões, com e sem técnicas de linearidade, nomeadamente, a técnica que força a tensão dreno-fonte a ser constante. Ademais, são introduzidas duas técnicas que aumentam a largura de banda, The Bridge T-coil com Series Peaking e a Distributed Approach. Finalmente, são implementadas arquiteturas de input buffer com dois andares em dispositivos de pequenas e grandes dimensões. Por último, são apresentadas novas soluções que cumprem inteiramente as especificações, uma vez que exibem uma largura de banda maior que 18 GHz com uma linearidade (IIP3) superior 16.3 dBm e um consumo de potência inferior a 178.2mW, sem comprometer a fiabilidade e a robustez dos dispositivos

Stress and heart rate: significant parameters and their variations

The aim of this paper is to identify heart rate parameters with higher significant values when a set of people are performing a task under stress condition. In order to accomplish this, one computer application with arithmetic and memory activities which lets drive the subjects to different stages of activity and stress has been designed. Tests are formed by initial and final rest periods and three task phases with incremental stressful level. Electrocardiogram is measured in each state and parameters are extracted from it. A statistical study using analysis of variance (ANOVA) is done to see which ones are the most significant. It is concluded that the median of RR segments is the parameter to best determine the state of stress.Regional Government of Andalusia (p08-TIC-3631

Reimagining Speech: A Scoping Review of Deep Learning-Powered Voice Conversion

Research on deep learning-powered voice conversion (VC) in speech-to-speech scenarios is getting increasingly popular. Although many of the works in the field of voice conversion share a common global pipeline, there is a considerable diversity in the underlying structures, methods, and neural sub-blocks used across research efforts. Thus, obtaining a comprehensive understanding of the reasons behind the choice of the different methods in the voice conversion pipeline can be challenging, and the actual hurdles in the proposed solutions are often unclear. To shed light on these aspects, this paper presents a scoping review that explores the use of deep learning in speech analysis, synthesis, and disentangled speech representation learning within modern voice conversion systems. We screened 621 publications from more than 38 different venues between the years 2017 and 2023, followed by an in-depth review of a final database consisting of 123 eligible studies. Based on the review, we summarise the most frequently used approaches to voice conversion based on deep learning and highlight common pitfalls within the community. Lastly, we condense the knowledge gathered, identify main challenges and provide recommendations for future research directions