Agnes Vanderburg: A Woman\u27s Life in the Flathead Culture

Records the life story of Agnes Vanderburg, cultural leader on the Flathead. Also includes introductory material about Native American women\u27s roles and the Flathead Reservation today

It was (not) me: Causal Inference of Agency in goal-directed actions

Summary: 
The perception of one’s own actions depends on both sensory information and predictions derived from internal forward models [1]. The integration of these information sources depends critically on whether perceptual consequences are associated with one’s own action (sense of agency) or with changes in the external world that are not related to the action. The perceived effects of actions should thus critically depend on the consistency between the predicted and the actual sensory consequences of actions. To test this idea, we used a virtual-reality setup to manipulate the consistency between pointing movements and their visual consequences and investigated the influence of this manipulation on self-action perception. We then asked whether a Bayesian causal inference model, which assumes a latent agency variable controlling the attributed influence of the own action on perceptual consequences [2,3], would account for the empirical data: if the percept was attributed to the own action, visual and internal information should fuse in a Bayesian optimal manner, while this should not be the case if the visual stimulus was attributed to external influences. The model correctly fits the data, showing that small deviations between predicted and actual sensory information were still attributed to one’s own action, while this was not the case for large deviations when subjects relied more on internal information. We discuss the performance of this causal inference model in comparison to alternative biologically feasible statistical models applying methods for Bayesian model comparison.

Experiment: 
Participants were seated in front of a horizontal board on which their right hand was placed with the index finger on a haptic marker, representing the starting point for each trial. Participants were instructed to execute straight, fast (quasi-ballistic) pointing movements of fixed amplitude, but without an explicit visual target. The hand was obstructed from the view of the participants, and visual feedback about the peripheral part of the movement was provided by a cursor. Feedback was either veridical or rotated against the true direction of the hand movement by predefined angles. After each trial participants were asked to report the subjectively experienced direction of the executed hand movement by placing a mouse-cursor into that direction.

Model: 
We compared two probabilistic models: Both include a binary random gating variable (agency) that models the sense of ‘agency’; that is the belief that the visual feedback is influenced by the subject’s motor action. The first model assumes that both the visual feedback xv and the internal motor state estimate xe are directly caused by the (unobserved) real motor state xt (Fig. 1). The second model assumes instead that the expected visual feedback depends on the perceived direction of the own motor action xe (Fig. 2). 
Results: Both models are in good agreement with the data. Fig. A shows the model fit for Model 1 superpositioned to the data from a single subject. Fig. B shows the belief that the visual stimulus was influenced by the own action, which decreases for large deviations between predicted and real visual feedback. Bayesian model comparison shows a better fit for model 1.
Citations
[1] Wolpert D.M, Ghahramani, Z, Jordan, M. (1995) Science, 269, 1880-1882.
[2] Körding KP, Beierholm E, Ma WJ, Quartz S, Tenenbaum JB, et al (2007) PLoS ONE 2(9): e943.
[3] Shams, L., Beierholm, U. (2010) TiCS, 14: 425-432.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the BCCN Tübingen (FKZ: 01GQ1002), the CIN Tübingen, the European Union (FP7-ICT-215866 project SEARISE), the DFG and the Hermann and Lilly Schilling Foundation

Preventing Violence in Low-Income Communities: Facilitating Residents\u27 Ability to Intervene in Neighborhood Problems

The violence found in low-income communities, including areas of concentrated poverty, is often extensive and can involve illegal drugs, juvenile delinquency, and even homicide. A large body of research has emerged which points to the positive effects of informal social control and social capital in preventing violence in lowincome communities, including neighbors taking leadership roles by intervening themselves. This article contains a description of an exploratory study ofa pilot training program the authors developed to facilitate residents\u27 ability to intervene in neighborhood problems in a low-income community in Atlanta, Georgia. The training incorporated concepts from restorative justice, peacemaking criminology, and macro social work, particularly consensus organizing. The results demonstrated that after their participation in the training, residents were more likely to intervene in a variety of neighborhood problems and were more likely to use direct, non-violent and peaceful intervention strategies. Participants also improved their attitudes about intervening,feeling it was appropriate to intervene and their neighborhood was safer if residents intervened in problem behaviors. This article provides an important step in exploring the development of informal social control and social capital in low-income neighborhoods. Moreover, the strategies used in the training program can be used by social workers to design programs to prevent violence

Development of a Competence-based Role Model for Managers considering current Megatrends

Due to the digital transformation and global megatrends, the industrial environment of manufacturing companies is changing faster than ever. As a result, the tasks of managers in these companies are evolving. New management roles and competences are required to master the challenges of this industrial change and remain competitive in the global market. This paper describes the development of a competence-based role model of managers in manufacturing companies focusing on the influence of current megatrends and the associated digital transformation. The model provides an overview of future tasks and roles of managers, which are becoming increasingly important in view of current megatrends. In regard to existing role models, seven roles of modern managers are derived. These management roles were evaluated in an extensive survey and detailed with corresponding competence profiles

Back disorders and lumbar load in nursing staff in geriatric care: a comparison of home-based care and nursing homes

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Back pain is one of the most frequent complaints in the nursing profession. Thus, the 12-month prevalence of pain in the lumbar spine in nursing staff is as high as 76%. Only a few representative studies have assessed the prevalence rates of back pain and its risk factors among nursing staff in nursing homes in comparison to staff in home-based care facilities. The present study accordingly investigates the prevalence in the lumbar and cervical spine and determines the physical workload to lifting and caring in geriatric care.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>1390 health care workers in nursing homes and home care participated in this cross sectional survey. The nursing staff members were examined by occupational physicians according to the principals of the multistep diagnosis of musculoskeletal disorders. Occupational exposure to daily care activities with patient transfers was measured by a standardised questionnaire. The lumbar load was calculated with the Mainz-Dortmund dose model. Information on ergonomic conditions were recorded from the management of the nursing homes. Comparisons of all outcome variables were made between both care settings.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Complete documentation, including the findings from the occupational physicians and the questionnaire, was available for 41%. Staff in nursing homes had more often positive orthopaedic findings than staff in home care. At the same time the values calculated for lumbar load were found to be significant higher in staff in nursing homes than in home-based care: 45% vs. 6% were above the reference value. Nursing homes were well equipped with technical lifting aids, though their provision with assistive advices is unsatisfactory. Situation in home care seems worse, especially as the staff often has to get by without assistance.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Future interventions should focus on counteracting work-related lumbar load among staff in nursing homes. Equipment and training in handling of assistive devices should be improved especially for staff working in home care.</p

Crystal structure of 4-hydroxy-3-meth-oxybenzaldehyde 4-methylthiosemi-carbazone methanol monosolvate

BRSF thanks CNPq/UFS for the award of a PIBIC scholarship.Peer reviewedPublisher PD