Personality Matters: Treatment Outcomes in Different Personality Subgroups of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has been identified as a heterogeneous disorder with multiple syndromes and etiologies (Tordjman et al., 2017). The current literature has yet to identify valid subgroups with key distinct features in the ASD population that can contribute further insights into the disorder. By taking a bottom-up approach in observing trait differences within ASD through the lens of personality profiles, it is possible that homogeneous subgroups may be identified. Thus, the present study aimed to identify possible personality subgroups within school-aged children in the ASD population, and to evaluate potential differences in treatment outcomes between these subgroups as one mechanism for assessing the predictive validity of the subgroups. Data from a CBT treatment multi-site RCT with school-aged children (N=213; ages 7 – 13 years old) were used. Latent profile analysis of the participants’ personality measure scores revealed a 5-class solution that best fit the data. Omnibus ANCOVAs identified significant differences between the five identified personality subgroups on the Child Anxiety Impact Scale (CAIS; Langley et al., 2014) treatment outcome scores, after controlling for pre-treatment scores. Furthermore, specific contrasts revealed that personality subgroup response to CBT treatment for anxiety was also contingent on the type of treatment each individual received. One subgroup (Group 1) responded better to a particular treatment condition (Standard-of-Practice CBT), while another subgroup (Group 2) responded better to the other treatment condition (Adapted CBT). Exploratory analyses and implications are discussed

Comparing e-Learning Tools’ Success: The Case of Instructor–Student Interactive vs. Self-paced Tools

E-learning tools have profoundly transformed modern pedagogical approaches. Vendors provide different types of systems, such as self-paced (SP) and instructor–student interactive (ISI) e-learning tools. Although both types of tools represent promising solutions to facilitate the learning process, it is important to theoretically identify a framework to evaluate the success of these tools and assess whether one type of tool is more effective than another. Toward this end, we (1) propose a model to evaluate e-learning tools’ success by extending and contextualizing Seddon’s information systems (IS) success model for the e-learning environment and (2) formulate four hypotheses to predict the differences in the success factors between SP and ISI tools. We test the model and hypotheses using data from 783 students across seven higher education institutions in Hong Kong. The results support the proposed e-learning tool success model and three of the four hypotheses. ISI tools outperform SP tools in terms of system quality, perceived usefulness, satisfaction, and learning outcome

Mutations and amplification of oncogenes in endometrial cancer

Alterations in oncogenes are critical steps in the development of endometrial cancer. To investigate the potential clinical relevance of the amplification of the oncogenes c-erbB2, c-myc, and int-2 and the mutation of K-ras in endometrial cancer, 112 tumors were examined using PCR-based fluorescent DNA technology. Amplification of the three oncogenes and the mutation of K-ras were correlated with age, tumor size, lymph node status, metastases, stage, histological types, grade, steroid hormone receptor expression (estrogen receptor, ER; progesterone receptor, PgR), family history of cancer, previous history of cancer or precursor lesions, and previous history of hormone replacement therapy. Oncogene amplification of c-erbB2 was detected in 18.9%, of c-myc in 2.7% and of int-2 in 4.2%, and K-ras mutation in 11.6%. No significant correlations could be detected between amplification of c-erbB2 and any of the other parameters. Mutation of K-ras is associated with positive expression of PgR. This might indicate that mutation and activation of K-ras are involved in the development of hormonal independence in endometrial cancer

ANTERIOR CRUCIATE LIGAMENT INJURY RISK FACTORS DIFFERENCES BETWEEN FEMALE DANCERS AND FEMALE SOCCER PLAYERS DURING SINGLE-LEGGED AND DOUBLE LEGGED LANDING TASKS

The purpose of this study was to compare ACL injury risk factors between female dancers and female soccer players during single-legged drop landing and double legged drop landing vertical jump tasks. Fifteen elite female soccer players and 45 professional female dancers (15 ballet, 15 modern, and 15 Korean dancers) were recruited to participate in this study. Two-way repeated measure of ANOVAs (participant groups & landing tasks, 4x2) were used. Female dancers landed with a significantly lower trunk flexion, trunk external rotation, knee external rotation, and knee valgus moment than those of female soccer players. Also, single-legged drop landing task demonstrated a higher trunk external rotation and knee valgus moment than those of double legged drop landing vertical jump task

D\"aRF: Boosting Radiance Fields from Sparse Inputs with Monocular Depth Adaptation

Neural radiance fields (NeRF) shows powerful performance in novel view synthesis and 3D geometry reconstruction, but it suffers from critical performance degradation when the number of known viewpoints is drastically reduced. Existing works attempt to overcome this problem by employing external priors, but their success is limited to certain types of scenes or datasets. Employing monocular depth estimation (MDE) networks, pretrained on large-scale RGB-D datasets, with powerful generalization capability would be a key to solving this problem: however, using MDE in conjunction with NeRF comes with a new set of challenges due to various ambiguity problems exhibited by monocular depths. In this light, we propose a novel framework, dubbed D\"aRF, that achieves robust NeRF reconstruction with a handful of real-world images by combining the strengths of NeRF and monocular depth estimation through online complementary training. Our framework imposes the MDE network's powerful geometry prior to NeRF representation at both seen and unseen viewpoints to enhance its robustness and coherence. In addition, we overcome the ambiguity problems of monocular depths through patch-wise scale-shift fitting and geometry distillation, which adapts the MDE network to produce depths aligned accurately with NeRF geometry. Experiments show our framework achieves state-of-the-art results both quantitatively and qualitatively, demonstrating consistent and reliable performance in both indoor and outdoor real-world datasets. Project page is available at https://ku-cvlab.github.io/DaRF/.Comment: Project Page: https://ku-cvlab.github.io/DaRF

PARTIAL CLICK PROTECTIONS FOR ADS

Partial click protections for ads are introduced in this publication. The partial click protections for ads include applying one or more click protections to one or more specific portions of an ad unit instead of the entire ad unit. The one or more specific portions of the ad are differentiated from other portions of the ad based on various criteria. The one or more specific portions of the ad unit include specific portions of a button in the ad unit

Stage of cancer diagnoses among migrants from the former Soviet Union in comparison to the German population – are diagnoses among migrants delayed?

Background: In this study, we compared stage at diagnosis, standardized incidence ratio (SIR) and standardized mortality ratio (SMR) of most frequent cancer diagnoses between re-settlers (Aussiedler) from the former Soviet Union and the general population in the Saarland in Germany to assess possible delays in diagnosis of cancer among this migrant group. Methods: Lung cancer, colorectal cancer, breast cancer, prostate cancer, malignant melanoma of the skin and stomach cancer diagnoses among a cohort of 18,619 re-settlers living in the Saarland between 1990 and 2009 were identified by the federal state’s cancer registry. Vital status was available for the respective time-period and used to calculate SIR and SMR in comparison to the autochthonous population. Tumor stages were condensed into local and advanced stages. Odds ratios (OR) for an advanced tumor stage were modeled in dependence of re-settler-status and relevant covariates by logistic regression. Missing values were addressed in a sensitivity analysis. The influence of duration of stay in Germany on advanced stage diagnosis was analyzed among re-settlers. Results: SIR and SMR of lung and breast cancer were lower among female re-settlers, while SIR and SMR of colorectal and prostate cancer were lower among male re-settlers. SIR and SMR of stomach cancer were elevated among both sexes. Female re-settlers showed an elevated OR for being diagnosed with advanced stage breast cancer. Both male and female re-settlers showed an elevated OR when observing all six sites combined (OR among males 1.47, p = 0.04; OR among females 1.37, p = 0.05). The result of elevated ORs was supported in the sensitivity analysis. Finally, male re-settlers showed a weak association between duration of stay in Germany and reduced risk for advanced stage diagnosis. Conclusion: Re-settlers were more likely to be diagnosed at an advanced tumor stage. These findings are in line with previous research having shown unfavorable health care utilization of re-settlers. Overall, low mortality rates despite an increased risk of advanced stage at diagnosis argue for a sufficient follow-up care, comparable to the autochthonous population