Estudios acerca del establecimiento de conexiones entre enunciados hablados: ¿qué pueden contribuir a la promoción de la construcción de una representación coherente del discurso por parte de los estudiantes?

The aim of this article is to provide an overview of how the establishment of discourse connections among spoken statements has been studied by approaches to discourse analysis and psycholinguistic studies, in order to highlight what variables appear to be important for understanding how comprehension of spoken discourse can be facilitated. The consideration of discourse analysis approaches allows us to think about the role of the establishment of discourse connections among speech acts in the classroom, the uses of contextualization cues by bilingual students, the identification of social and cultural notions in teachers’ discourse, and the interactional effects of teachers’ interventions. Preliminary psycholinguistic studies contribute to our understanding of the role of establishing causal connections and integrating adjacent statements through the presence of discourse markers in the comprehension of spoken discourse by college students. The results of these approaches and studies provide insight into students’ comprehension of classroom discourse, and hold the potential for implications for instruction.El propósito de este artículo es realizar un recorrido a través de enfoques de análisis del discurso y estudios de psicolingüística que han investigado el establecimiento de conexiones entre enunciados hablados, a fin de destacar las variables que parecen ser centrales para facilitar la comprensión. La consideración de los enfoques del análisis del discurso nos permitirán pensar acerca del rol del establecimiento de conexiones entre actos del lenguaje en el aula, las funciones de las claves de contextualización, la identificación de las nociones sociales y culturales en el discurso de los profesores, los efectos de las intervenciones de los profesores en la interacción con los estudiantes. Los estudios preliminares de psicolingüística contribuirán a nuestra comprensión del rol del establecimiento de conexiones causales e integración de enunciados adyacentes a través de marcadores del discurso por parte de estudiantes universitarios. La consideración de estos enfoques y estudios nos ayudarán a pensar acerca de las contribuciones que sus propuestas y métodos pueden hacer al enriquecimiento de nuestro entendimiento de cómo los estudiantes comprenden el discurso producido durante las clases.Fil: Yomha Cevasco, Jazmin. Universidad de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Broek, Paul van den. Leiden University; Países Bajo

La contribución de los modelos de procesamiento de la causalidad al estudio de la comprensión del discurso y la facilitación del aprendizaje del alumno

Discourse comprehension involves the establishment of semantic or meaningful causal connections. The aim of this paper is to review four models that have contributed to the study of the establishment of these connections: the Causal Chain Model, the Causal Network Model, the Causal Inference Maker, and the Landscape Model. These models contribute to the facilitation of student learning, given that they provide useful tools for improvement of texts structure in order to promote the establishment of meaningful connections and the revision of students’ prior incorrect ideas, and for the design of interventions that promote the generation of inferences and the monitoring of comprehension. The presentation of their key ideas, of empirical support for their psychological validity, and of applications to education will allow us to highlight the contributions that these models make to our understanding of the importance of the processing of causality for discourse comprehension and the facilitation of student learning.La comprensión del discurso implica establecer conexiones causales semánticas o significativas. El objetivo de este artículo es revisar cuatro modelos que han contribuido al estudio del establecimiento de estas conexiones: el modelo de cadena causal, el modelo de red causal, el modelo generador de inferencias causales y el modelo de paisaje. Estos modelos contribuyen a facilitar el aprendizaje de los estudiantes, dado que proporcionan herramientas útiles para mejorar la estructura de los textos con el fin de promover el establecimiento de conexiones significativas y la revisión de las ideas previas incorrectas de los estudiantes, y para el diseño de intervenciones que promuevan la generación de inferencias y el monitoreo de la comprensión. La presentación de sus ideas clave, de la evidencia empírica que apoya su validez psicológica y de las aplicaciones de sus herramientas a la educación permitirá resaltar las principales nociones que estos modelos hacen a nuestro entendimiento de la importancia del procesamiento de la causalidad para la comprensión del discurso y la facilitación del aprendizaje de los estudiantes.Fil: Yomha Cevasco, Jazmin. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Van Den Broek, Paul. Leiden University; Países Bajo

Learning from Texts: Activation of Information from Previous Texts during Reading

Learning often involves integration of information from multiple texts. The aim of the current study was to determine whether relevant information from previously read texts is spontaneously activated during reading, allowing for integration between texts (experiment 1 and 2), and whether this process is related to the representation of the texts (experiment 2). In both experiments, texts with inconsistent target sentences were preceded by texts that either did or did not contain explanations that resolved the inconsistencies. In experiment 1, the reading times of the target sentences introducing inconsistencies were faster if the preceding text contained an explanation for the inconsistency than if it did not. This result demonstrates that relevant information from a prior text is spontaneously activated when the target sentence is read. In experiment 2 free recall was used to gain insight into the representation after reading. The reading time results for experiment 2 replicated the reading time results for experiment 1. However, the effects on reading times did not translate to measurable differences in text representations after reading. This research extends our knowledge about the processes involved in multiple text comprehension: Prior text information is spontaneously activated during reading, thereby enabling integration between different texts

Human Resource beleid, duurzame inzetbaarheid en oudere werknemers

__Inleidend__ Gezien de sterke vergrijzing van Westerse samenlevingen (o.a. OECD, 2012; UN, 2007) en ontwikkelingen op overheidsniveau rond het ophogen van de pensioengerechtigde leeftijd is het (nood)zaak voor beleidmakers en Human Resource (HR) professionals om oudere werknemers op een gezonde, gemotiveerde en productieve manier langer in dienst te houden. Duurzaam inzetbaar houden van oudere medewerkers is hiermee een thema dat voor de komende jaren hoog op de agenda staat van HR professionals. In dit hoofdstuk zullen wij verschillende typen Human Resource (HR) beleid bespreken gericht op het verbeteren van de duurzame inzetbaarheid van werknemers, en dan met name oudere werknemers. Onder Human Resource Management verstaan wij alle activiteiten die samenhangen met het managen van werk en mensen in organisaties (Boxall & Purcell, 2011). ..

Efficacy of three artemisinin combination therapies for the treatmentof uncomplicated Plasmodium falciparum malaria in the Republic of Congo

BACKGROUND: Presented here are the results of a comparative trial on the efficacy of three artemisinin-based combinations conducted from May to October 2004, in Pool Province, Republic of Congo. METHODS: The main outcome was the proportion of cases of true treatment success at day 28. Recrudescences were distinguished from re-infections by PCR analysis. A total of 298 children of 6–59 months were randomized to receive either artesunate + SP (AS+SP), artesunate + amodiaquine (AS+AQ) or artemether + lumefantrine (AL), of which 15 (5%) were lost to follow-up. RESULTS: After 28 days, there were 21/85 (25%) recurrent parasitaemias in the AS+SP group, 31/97 (32%) in the AS+AQ group and 13/100 (13%) in the AL group. The 28-day PCR-corrected cure rate was 90.1% [95% CI 80.7–95.9] for AS+SP, 98.5% [95% CI 92.0–100] for AS+AQ and 100% [95.8–100] for AL, thereby revealing a weaker response to AS+SP than to AL (p = 0.003) and to AS+AQ (p = 0.06). A potential bias was the fact that children treated with AL were slightly older and in better clinical condition, but logistic regression did not identify these as relevant factors. There was no significant difference between groups in fever and parasite clearance time, improvement of anaemia and gametocyte carriage at day 28. No serious adverse events were reported. CONCLUSION: Considering the higher efficacy of AL as compared to AS+SP and the relatively high proportion of cases with re-infections in the AS+AQ group, we conclude that AL is clinically more effective than AS+SP and AS+AQ in this area of the Republic of Congo. Implementation of the recently chosen new national first-line AS+AQ should be monitored closely

Effect of spatially varying material properties on the post-buckling behaviour of composite panels utilising geodesic stochastic fields

The post-buckling behaviour of panels can be very sensitive to imperfections or variations in materials or geometry. This paper presents an ecient numerical model to calculate the eects of material stiffness variations on the non-linear response of a structure. This is done by first defining a geodesic mesh on which a unit variance random field is generated. This field uses the true geodesic distance on the structure to calculate how points in the field should be correlated. The fields generated are projected onto a 3D structural mesh which is used for assembly and post-processing of the structural model. The structural model, based on the Unified Formulation is capable of accurate non-linear calculations of both straight and curved elements. Baseline results generated using the implementation are compared to those in literature, and verified using Abaqus. Random material variations are then applied to the structure in a Monte Carlo analysis. The analyses show that the local variation of stiffness can have a variety of effects on the non-linear response of structures. Aside from the change of mean stiffness causing a change in bifurcation or limit point load, the different stiffness distributions can affect and trigger competing buckling modes and post-buckling modes and affect their corresponding post-buckling load-deflection paths