Developing Christian Womanhood

The writer of this research paper became interested in the development of Christian womanhood through encounters with teenage girls when working as a sponsor of a church youth group. In a regular meeting the girls were separated from the fellows as a \u27lib night\u27 was held and what it means to be a girl was discussed. The girls were eager to know more about what makes them women, how it affects their interpersonal relationships and what difference it makes to be a Christian. As a result the writer became more aware of the wealth of material on today\u27s market written for the Christian woman. This paper provided an opportunity to review some of this literature. Women today are experiencing new freedoms and traditional roles are being challenged. What are the Christian writers saying about this? How is it affecting the Christian woman and as a result the Christian community

The Psychology of Mediation: Issues of Self and Identity and the IDR Cycle

Issues of self and identity raise profound and often painful questions about who we are. Psychoanalytic developmental theory considers these questions by analyzing the way the sense of self develops in childhood. On the other hand, many spiritual traditions insist that however it develops, the In recent years, there have been some important attempts to bridge the gap between these two positions. Yet, the nature of the self and its identity still remains a fundamental mystery. This article considers the self from these perspectives, and others, including neuroscience and social psychology, within the context of mediation. On a psychological level, parties in mediation typically move through a cycle of narcissistic inflation, deflation, and then, hopefully, realistic resolution. I call this the IDR cycle. This process demands strength of self on a basic, simple, healthy ego level, especially at the outset. Parties strive to be equal to the task. However, during impasse and other critical moments, if the parties wish to reach resolution, they may have to release their psychological investments in the outcome of the negotiation. Thus, the capacity to let go is also a critical aspect of the psychology of mediation. The mediator\u27s own issues of self and identity will also arise during mediation. During critical moments, the mediator, too, may have to release the sense of narcissistic self-investment in the outcome. Thus, our usefulness as mediators will often depend on the extent to which we have learned to deal with issues of self and identity, not only in others, but in ourselves

Suppression of spin-pumping by a MgO tunnel-barrier

Spin-pumping generates pure spin currents in normal metals at the ferromagnet (F)/normal metal (N) interface. The efficiency of spin-pumping is given by the spin mixing conductance, which depends on N and the F/N interface. We directly study the spin-pumping through an MgO tunnel-barrier using the inverse spin Hall effect, which couples spin and charge currents and provides a direct electrical detection of spin currents in the normal metal. We find that spin-pumping is suppressed by the tunnel-barrier, which is contrary to recent studies that suggest that the spin mixing conductance can be enhanced by a tunnel-barrier inserted at the interface

Fourier methods for the perturbed harmonic oscillator in linear and nonlinear Schr\"odinger equations

We consider the numerical integration of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation with a potential trap given by a time-dependent harmonic potential or a small perturbation thereof. Splitting methods are frequently used with Fourier techniques since the system can be split into the kinetic and remaining part, and each part can be solved efficiently using Fast Fourier Transforms. To split the system into the quantum harmonic oscillator problem and the remaining part allows to get higher accuracies in many cases, but it requires to change between Hermite basis functions and the coordinate space, and this is not efficient for time-dependent frequencies or strong nonlinearities. We show how to build new methods which combine the advantages of using Fourier methods while solving the timedependent harmonic oscillator exactly (or with a high accuracy by using a Magnus integrator and an appropriate decomposition).Comment: 12 pages of RevTex4-1, 8 figures; substantially revised and extended versio

INTERNAL INTESTINAL FISTULAE CAUSED BY AMOEBIASIS

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Understanding Individual Political Behaviors in Organizations: Instrument Development and Validation

Organizational politics impacts decision making, leadership, policy implementation, change, and individual effectiveness. Although generally acknowledged as a reality of organizational life, political behavior is misunderstood, certainly a highly sensitive topic and furthermore, scholarly literature decries the paucity of empirical research on the topic. Consequently, the purpose of this research was to design and validate an instrument, in the in-basket simulation format, that measures an individual\u27s political effectiveness. The instrument\u27s proposed purpose was the exploration of an individual\u27s political behavior for two reasons: (1) as a new research tool to facilitate quantitative and qualitative research; and (2) as a developmental activity for the participants. Using critical incidents about political behavior and merger case studies, an in-basket simulation was constructed upon the following elements: a composite definition of political behavior; a typology of political behavior; and the body of social exchange theory which includes power considerations. Content validity was established through the verification of the in-basket instrument\u27s three hypotheses: (1) that various political behaviors can be presented by the in-basket respondents, (2) that these behaviors will range from ineffective to effective solutions to organizational situations, and (3) that the political behaviors expressed will vary with the type of problem presented. The instrument was administered to two volunteer pilot groups of 33 managers from various organizations. The managers\u27 responses to the in-basket items were evaluated by a panel of judges who then organized a behaviorally anchored scoring key and scoring procedures. Two pairs of independent scorers marked the in-basket responses for each pilot group and the interrater reliability calculations were statistically significant. Trained assessors conducted post in-basket interviews which explored the respondents\u27 motives for acting or not acting in a political manner. The in-basket instructions, scoring, and administration procedures were standardized. In summary, a valid and reliable instrument for measuring and interpreting individual political behavior was developed

RNA-Seq optimization with eQTL gold standards.

BackgroundRNA-Sequencing (RNA-Seq) experiments have been optimized for library preparation, mapping, and gene expression estimation. These methods, however, have revealed weaknesses in the next stages of analysis of differential expression, with results sensitive to systematic sample stratification or, in more extreme cases, to outliers. Further, a method to assess normalization and adjustment measures imposed on the data is lacking.ResultsTo address these issues, we utilize previously published eQTLs as a novel gold standard at the center of a framework that integrates DNA genotypes and RNA-Seq data to optimize analysis and aid in the understanding of genetic variation and gene expression. After detecting sample contamination and sequencing outliers in RNA-Seq data, a set of previously published brain eQTLs was used to determine if sample outlier removal was appropriate. Improved replication of known eQTLs supported removal of these samples in downstream analyses. eQTL replication was further employed to assess normalization methods, covariate inclusion, and gene annotation. This method was validated in an independent RNA-Seq blood data set from the GTEx project and a tissue-appropriate set of eQTLs. eQTL replication in both data sets highlights the necessity of accounting for unknown covariates in RNA-Seq data analysis.ConclusionAs each RNA-Seq experiment is unique with its own experiment-specific limitations, we offer an easily-implementable method that uses the replication of known eQTLs to guide each step in one's data analysis pipeline. In the two data sets presented herein, we highlight not only the necessity of careful outlier detection but also the need to account for unknown covariates in RNA-Seq experiments

Topology of the Spin-polarized Charge Density in bcc and fcc Iron

We investigate the topology of the spin-polarized charge density in bcc and fcc iron. While the total spin-density is found to possess the topology of the non-magnetic prototypical structures, in some cases the spin-polarized densities are characterized by unique topologies; for example, the spin-polarized charge densities of bcc and high-spin fcc iron are atypical of any known for non-magnetic materials. In these cases, the two spin-densities are correlated: the spin-minority electrons have directional bond paths with deep minima in the minority density, while the spin-majority electrons fill these holes, reducing bond directionality. The presence of two distinct spin topologies suggests that a well-known magnetic phase transition in iron can be fruitfully reexamined in light of these topological changes. We show that the two phase changes seen in fcc iron (paramagnetic to low-spin and low-spin to high-spin) are different. The former follows the Landau symmetry-breaking paradigm and proceeds without a topological transformation, while the latter also involves a topological catastrophe.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures. Phys. Rev. Lett. (in press