215,600 research outputs found
Educational approaches to improving knowledge and attitude towards dental hygiene among elementary school children
The selection of appropriate dental health education methods will be beneficial in promoting dental health. This study aimed to determine the difference in the effect of role-playing method and storytelling method on knowledge and attitudes towards oral hygiene among elementary school students. The research subjects were 112 students in grade 5. The subjects were divided into 2 different treatment groups, namely 56 students in grade 5 at SD Negeri Tegalrejo I with the storytelling method and 56 students in grade 5 at SD Negeri Tegalrejo II using the role-playing method. The measuring instrument in this research was a questionnaire. The data analysis used the Mann-Whitney test and Wilcoxon Signed Ranks test because the data were not normally distributed. The results of the analysis showed that there was a significant increase over time in knowledge and attitudes carried out in 3 assessments. The mean rank for delta values between the pre-test and posttest 2 for the knowledge variable using the role-playing method was 51.29 while that using the storytelling method was 61.71. Meanwhile, the mean rank for delta values for the attitude variable using the role-playing method was 49.93, while that using the storytelling method was 63.07. The results of the delta analysis from pre-test to post-test 1 and pre-test to post-test 2 showed that the storytelling group experiences a higher increase in knowledge and attitudes than the role-playing group (p<0.05). Provision of education using a storytelling method shows better improvement in students’ knowledge and attitudes towards oral hygiene than using a role-playing method
Advances in Extreme Learning Machines
Nowadays, due to advances in technology, data is generated at an incredible pace, resulting in large data sets of ever-increasing size and dimensionality. Therefore, it is important to have efficient computational methods and machine learning algorithms that can handle such large data sets, such that they may be analyzed in reasonable time. One particular approach that has gained popularity in recent years is the Extreme Learning Machine (ELM), which is the name given to neural networks that employ randomization in their hidden layer, and that can be trained efficiently. This dissertation introduces several machine learning methods based on Extreme Learning Machines (ELMs) aimed at dealing with the challenges that modern data sets pose. The contributions follow three main directions.
  Firstly, ensemble approaches based on ELM are developed, which adapt to context and can scale to large data. Due to their stochastic nature, different ELMs tend to make different mistakes when modeling data. This independence of their errors makes them good candidates for combining them in an ensemble model, which averages out these errors and results in a more accurate model. Adaptivity to a changing environment is introduced by adapting the linear combination of the models based on accuracy of the individual models over time. Scalability is achieved by exploiting the modularity of the ensemble model, and evaluating the models in parallel on multiple processor cores and graphics processor units. Secondly, the dissertation develops variable selection approaches based on ELM and Delta Test, that result in more accurate and efficient models. Scalability of variable selection using Delta Test is again achieved by accelerating it on GPU. Furthermore, a new variable selection method based on ELM is introduced, and shown to be a competitive alternative to other variable selection methods. Besides explicit variable selection methods, also a new weight scheme based on binary/ternary weights is developed for ELM. This weight scheme is shown to perform implicit variable selection, and results in increased robustness and accuracy at no increase in computational cost. Finally, the dissertation develops training algorithms for ELM that allow for a flexible trade-off between accuracy and computational time. The Compressive ELM is introduced, which allows for training the ELM in a reduced feature space. By selecting the dimension of the feature space, the practitioner can trade off accuracy for speed as required.
  Overall, the resulting collection of proposed methods provides an efficient, accurate and flexible framework for solving large-scale supervised learning problems. The proposed methods are not limited to the particular types of ELMs and contexts in which they have been tested, and can easily be incorporated in new contexts and models
Evaluation of Variability Concepts for Simulink in the Automotive Domain
Modeling variability in Matlab/Simulink becomes more and more important. We
took the two variability modeling concepts already included in Matlab/Simulink
and our own one and evaluated them to find out which one is suited best for
modeling variability in the automotive domain. We conducted a controlled
experiment with developers at Volkswagen AG to decide which concept is
preferred by developers and if their preference aligns with measurable
performance factors. We found out that all existing concepts are viable
approaches and that the delta approach is both the preferred concept as well as
the objectively most efficient one, which makes Delta-Simulink a good solution
to model variability in the automotive domain.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figures, 6 tables, Proceedings of 48th Hawaii
International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), pp. 5373-5382, Kauai,
Hawaii, USA, IEEE Computer Society, 201
Variable Point Sources in Sloan Digital Sky Survey Stripe 82. I. Project Description and Initial Catalog (0 h < R.A. < 4 h)
We report the first results of a study of variable point sources identified
using multi-color time-series photometry from Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS)
Stripe 82 over a span of nearly 10 years (1998-2007). We construct a
light-curve catalog of 221,842 point sources in the R.A. 0-4 h half of Stripe
82, limited to r = 22.0, that have at least 10 detections in the ugriz bands
and color errors of < 0.2 mag. These objects are then classified by color and
by cross-matching them to existing SDSS catalogs of interesting objects. We use
inhomogeneous ensemble differential photometry techniques to greatly improve
our sensitivity to variability. Robust variable identification methods are used
to extract 6520 variable candidates in this dataset, resulting in an overall
variable fraction of ~2.9% at the level of 0.05 mag variability. A search for
periodic variables results in the identification of 30 eclipsing/ellipsoidal
binary candidates, 55 RR Lyrae, and 16 Delta Scuti variables. We also identify
2704 variable quasars matched to the SDSS Quasar catalog (Schneider et al.
2007), as well as an additional 2403 quasar candidates identified by their
non-stellar colors and variability properties. Finally, a sample of 11,328
point sources that appear to be nonvariable at the limits of our sensitivity is
also discussed. (Abridged.)Comment: 67 pages, 27 figures. Accepted for publication in ApJS. Catalog
available at http://shrike.pha.jhu.edu/stripe82-variable
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The Causal Effect of Campus Residency on College Student Retention
Despite theoretical evidence positing a positive relationship between campus residency and collegiate outcomes, prior research has not established a causal link. Utilizing propensity score matching and national longitudinal data, this study investigates whether living in university-owned housing impacts retention. The results suggest that the impact of living on campus is not negligible: the probability of remaining enrolled into the second year of college is 3.3 percentage points higher for on-campus residents than off-campus residents. Colleges should consider evaluating the impact of their campus housing programs on academic outcomes to inform important housing policy decisionsEducational Leadership and Polic
Who invests in home equity to exempt wealth from bankruptcy? : [This draft: May 2013]
Homestead exemptions to personal bankruptcy allow households to retain their home equity up to a limit determined at the state level. Households that may experience bankruptcy thus have an incentive to bias their portfolios towards home equity. Using US household data for the period 1996 to 2006, we find that household demand for real estate is relatively high if the marginal investment in home equity is covered by the exemption. The home equity bias is more pronounced for younger households that face more financial uncertainty and therefore have a higher ex ante probability of bankruptcy
Can we disregard the whole model? Omnibus non-inferiority testing for in multivariable linear regression and in ANOVA
Determining a lack of association between an outcome variable and a number of
different explanatory variables is frequently necessary in order to disregard a
proposed model (i.e., to confirm the lack of an association between an outcome
and predictors). Despite this, the literature rarely offers information about,
or technical recommendations concerning, the appropriate statistical
methodology to be used to accomplish this task. This paper introduces
non-inferiority tests for ANOVA and linear regression analyses, that correspond
to the standard widely used -test for and ,
respectively. A simulation study is conducted to examine the type I error rates
and statistical power of the tests, and a comparison is made with an
alternative Bayesian testing approach. The results indicate that the proposed
non-inferiority test is a potentially useful tool for 'testing the null.'Comment: 30 pages, 6 figure
Scaling limits of a model for selection at two scales
The dynamics of a population undergoing selection is a central topic in
evolutionary biology. This question is particularly intriguing in the case
where selective forces act in opposing directions at two population scales. For
example, a fast-replicating virus strain outcompetes slower-replicating strains
at the within-host scale. However, if the fast-replicating strain causes host
morbidity and is less frequently transmitted, it can be outcompeted by
slower-replicating strains at the between-host scale. Here we consider a
stochastic ball-and-urn process which models this type of phenomenon. We prove
the weak convergence of this process under two natural scalings. The first
scaling leads to a deterministic nonlinear integro-partial differential
equation on the interval with dependence on a single parameter,
. We show that the fixed points of this differential equation are Beta
distributions and that their stability depends on and the behavior of
the initial data around . The second scaling leads to a measure-valued
Fleming-Viot process, an infinite dimensional stochastic process that is
frequently associated with a population genetics.Comment: 23 pages, 1 figur
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