Mechanisms to Ensure Pro-Poor Water Service Delivery in Peri-Urban and Urban areas

This report presents an overview of mechanisms for ensuring access to safe and affordable water services for the urban poor, as found in global literature. After presenting the main issues related to access to water services for the (peri-) urban poor in section 2, the report presents a number of options for improving utility-related water services to the poor in section 3, and options going beyond the utility in section 4. Finally, the conclusions of this report are presented in section 5

Grundzüge des Modellversuchs "Leittextgesteuerte Unterrichtssequenz"

In diesem Artikel werden einige Grundzüge des Modellversuchs "Leittextgesteuerte Unterrichtssequenz" dargestellt. Durchgeführt wurde dieser Versuch von August bis Dezember 1988 an der Gewerblich-Industriellen Berufsschule Bern mit Anlehrlingen (das sind "lernschwächere" Jugendliche - im folgenden als Berufsschüler bezeichnet) des Fachbereichs Holz. Ausgangspunkt war die Fragestellung, wie sich die "Leittextmethode" in einen Teilbereich der schulischen Berufsausbildung übertragen lassen könnte. Als Unterrichtsthema und Produkt für unseren Modellversuch wählten wir die Fertigung des Brettspieles "Carrom"

Comprehension of familiar and unfamiliar native accents under adverse listening conditions

This study aimed to determine the relative processing cost associated with comprehension of an unfamiliar native accent under adverse listening conditions. Two sentence verification experiments were conducted in which listeners heard sentences at various signal-to-noise ratios. In Experiment 1, these sentences were spoken in a familiar or an unfamiliar native accent or in two familiar native accents. In Experiment 2, they were spoken in a familiar or unfamiliar native accent or in a nonnative accent. The results indicated that the differences between the native accents influenced the speed of language processing under adverse listening conditions and that this processing speed was modulated by the relative familiarity of the listener with the native accent. Furthermore, the results showed that the processing cost associated with the nonnative accent was larger than for the unfamiliar native accent

Pronunciation acquisition patterns of learners with different starting levels

This study described the results of an investigation into the effect of an intensive 12-week pronunciation course in British English which 30 Dutch female 1st-year university students of English took. They read out the same text before and after the course. Each student’s ‘before’ and ‘after’ tests were recorded. Before analysis of their results, students were split up into three groups on the basis of their general starting level: high, intermediate and low. The analysis involved a before- and after comparison of the pronunciation of eleven different phonemes: /æ, ɒ, ɔː, ʌ, ʊ, d, θ/, medial /t/, coda /r/, and syllable-final /d, v/. The analysis was done by means of both auditory and acoustic analysis. Four degrees of success (or lack thereof) were defined. The results show that the consonants required the least effort, as they were already relatively acceptable before the course started. This was true of students in general, regardless of initial starting level. The three levels of students are most distinguishable on the basis of the development of the consonants during the course. The weaker students’ consonants in particular benefitted from the course. The research revealed that initial level can be used to predict the trajectory of improvement. A general conclusion is that teachers may recognise types of students before the course starts and subject them to different types of teaching

Design choices in imaging speech comprehension: An Activation Likelihood Estimation (ALE) meta-analysis

The localisation of spoken language comprehension is debated extensively: is processing located anterior or posterior on the left temporal lobe, and is it left- or bilaterally organised? An Activation Likelihood Estimation (ALE) analysis was conducted on functional MRI and PET studies investigating speech comprehension to identify the neural network involved in comprehension processing. Furthermore, the analysis aimed to establish the effect of four design choices (scanning paradigm, non-speech baseline, the presence of a task, and the type of stimulus material) on this comprehension network. The analysis included 57 experiments contrasting intelligible with less intelligible or unintelligible stimuli. A large comprehension network was found across bilateral Superior Temporal Sulcus (STS), Middle Temporal Gyrus (MTG) and Superior Temporal (STS) bilaterally, in left Inferior Frontal Gyrus (IFG), left Precentral Gyrus, and Supplementary Motor Area (SMA) and pre-SMA. The core network for post-lexical processing was restricted to the temporal lobes bilaterally with the highest ALE values located anterior to Heschl's Gyrus. Activations in the ALE comprehension network outside the temporal lobes (left IFG, SMA/pre-SMA, and Precentral Gyrus) were driven by the use of sentences instead of words, the scanning paradigm, or the type of non-speech baseline

Implicit Bias: The Decision to Shoot or Not Shoot

This study used a videogame to simulate encounters that law enforcement officers may have with potentially hostile targets. Implicit bias is something that every person carries with him or her. It is unconsciously learned from the societies within which we live, from the overt to the subliminal messages that bombard us daily. This research attempted to determine whether implicit bias real and present, and to what extent can this notion be empirically observed. The literature review covered (1) What does the existing literature say about the nature and extent of implicit bias? (2) What are some examples of implicit bias? (3) Where do we learn, and how do we acquire, implicit bias? This explanatory study sought to determine whether implicit bias may contribute to fatal shooting events. Although not statistically significant, an analysis of the raw numbers of incorrect shots may suggest that participants were more likely to make a mistake (whether Type I or II Error) when the person in the scene was White rather than Black. Popular media would suggest that the unarmed black male would be shot the most, but this study’s sample population has suggested other results

Common Coding of Speech Imitation

Most current speech scientists regard both speech perception and production to be tightly linked. Hearing or seeing speech results in the engagement of a covert imitative response, also referred to as automatic imitation. Current theories of speech and language processing firmly incorporate close connections between speech perception and speech production. For instance, the integrated theory of language production and comprehension assumes that listeners rely on an analysis-by-synthesis process during speech comprehension. This process is predicted to engage covert imitation, especially for familiar speech utterances. Behaviorally, covert imitation can be evaluated using a paradigm originally developed in cognitive psychology, the stimulus-response compatibility (SRC) paradigm. While most SRC experiments employ manual stimuli, a small but growing set of studies have been using speech stimuli to clarify how observing speech results in a covert imitative response. However, it is unclear if the integrated theory can explain the effects reported from speech SRC studies. Here, we evaluate to which extent the theory of event coding (TEC) can explain results from automatic imitation experiments with speech stimuli. TEC is a framework for action planning and action perception based on the ideomotor principle and common coding principles of action and perception. TEC offers a flexible framework for evaluating the link between action perception and action production but has to date not been applied to speech processing. In this chapter, we evaluated how well the integrated theory and TEC can explain current findings. We conclude that TEC can account for more published results than the integrated theory, but that neither theory can explain all findings. Recommendations are made for improvements to both theories