Boldness Predicts Social Status in Zebrafish (Danio rerio)

This study explored if boldness could be used to predict social status. First, boldness was assessed by monitoring individual zebrafish behaviour in (1) an unfamiliar barren environment with no shelter (open field), (2) the same environment when a roof was introduced as a shelter, and (3) when the roof was removed and an unfamiliar object (Lego® brick) was introduced. Next, after a resting period of minimum one week, social status of the fish was determined in a dyadic contest and dominant/subordinate individuals were determined as the winner/loser of two consecutive contests. Multivariate data analyses showed that males were bolder than females and that the behaviours expressed by the fish during the boldness tests could be used to predict which fish would later become dominant and subordinate in the ensuing dyadic contest. We conclude that bold behaviour is positively correlated to dominance in zebrafish and that boldness is not solely a consequence of social dominance

Returning to Text: Affect, meaning making and literacies

Existing work on literacy and affect has posed important questions for how we think about meanings and how and where they get made. The authors contribute to such work by focusing on the relation between text and affect. This is a topic that has received insufficient attention in recent work but is of pressing concern for education as text interweaves in new ways with human activity, through social media, surveillance capitalism, and artificial intelligence—ways that can be unpredictable and poorly understood. Adopting a sociomaterial sensibility that foregrounds the relations between bodies (people and things), the authors provide conceptual tools for considering how texts affect and are affected by the heterogeneous entanglements from which they emerge. In situating their argument, the authors outline influential readings of Spinoza’s theories of affect, explore how these have been mobilized in literacy research, and identify how text has been accommodated within such research. Using texts from a political episode in the United Kingdom, the authors explore the idea of social-material-textual affects to articulate relationships among humans, nonhumans, meaning making, and literacies. The authors conclude by identifying four ways in which text participates in what happens, raising questions about how different materializations of text (or indeed “not text”) are significant to the diversifying communicative practices that inflect social, cultural, economic, and political life

The spotted gar genome illuminates vertebrate evolution and facilitates human-teleost comparisons

To connect human biology to fish biomedical models, we sequenced the genome of spotted gar (Lepisosteus oculatus), whose lineage diverged from teleosts before teleost genome duplication (TGD). The slowly evolving gar genome has conserved in content and size many entire chromosomes from bony vertebrate ancestors. Gar bridges teleosts to tetrapods by illuminating the evolution of immunity, mineralization and development (mediated, for example, by Hox, ParaHox and microRNA genes). Numerous conserved noncoding elements (CNEs; often cis regulatory) undetectable in direct human-teleost comparisons become apparent using gar: functional studies uncovered conserved roles for such cryptic CNEs, facilitating annotation of sequences identified in human genome-wide association studies. Transcriptomic analyses showed that the sums of expression domains and expression levels for duplicated teleost genes often approximate the patterns and levels of expression for gar genes, consistent with subfunctionalization. The gar genome provides a resource for understanding evolution after genome duplication, the origin of vertebrate genomes and the function of human regulatory sequences

A revised dichotomous key for the mangrove crab genus Scylla de Haan, 1833 (brachyura, portunidae)

Species identification in mangrove crabs of the genus Scylla De Haan, 1833 is problematic, due to the high intraspecific variation and the continuity of diagnostic features. To determine the hierarchy of characters that are most useful in differentiating Scylla species from the Philippines, 1,185 mangrove crabs were collected from seven sites across the Philippines. Morphological species identification was contrasted with morphometric and molecular techniques. The hierarchy of characters in the existing dichotomous key resulted in the misidentification of 245 samples. Errors stem from asymmetry in the features of the chelipeds and the continuity in the features of the frontal lobe spines. Considering mainly morphological characters, the most reliable traits were the geometric patterns in the swimming and walking legs. Nonetheless, 27 individuals with morphological ambiguities exhibited unique patterns in digested nuclear ITS-1 fragments, unreported in any known species of Scylla. A revised hierarchy of characters resulted in a 97.8% match with molecular species identification. © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2018

E-books or print books?: Determining the reading preference of De La Salle University accountancy students and its effect on their academic performance

Technology has opened up a range of possibilities in the Accounting education. The pedagogy has been influenced by the concept of e-learning, especially e-books, and its benefits to students and professors. This study aims to determine the reading preference and its effect to the academic performance of De La Salle University Accountancy students. This paper provides information that will enable the Accountancy Department to make better decisions with regard to pursuing the use of e-books in some of the courses it offers. The researchers administered surveys using adopted instruments and statistical tools to support findings and make recommendations. The findings reveal that De La Salle University Accountancy students do not prefer e-books, reading preference does not have an effect to the academic performance of the students, and interviewed DLSU Accountancy faculty members who experienced using both e-books and print books in class do not prefer using e-books

Perception of patients on the therapeutic communication skills of physical therapists in the affiliated centers of De La Salle Health Sciences Institute-College of Rehabilitation Sciences in Cavite

A descriptive-correlational type of research design using survey was conducted in Unihealth-Tagaytay, St. Paul Hospital, St. Dominic Medical Center, and General Emilio Aguinaldo Memorial Hospital. A total of 55 respondents all of whom were patients with musculoskeletal conditions with no neurological involvement and with ages 20-80 years old participated in the study. Respondents were chosen using non-probability convenience sampling. Fifty five (55) physical therapists were assessed which includes 15 PT staffs and 40 interns. Researchers utilized a self-administered questionnaire that underwent validation and pilot testing. The questionnaire was a five-point Likert scale that is used to determine the quality of the identified therapeutic communication skills of the physical therapists. Data was analyzed using frequency, percentage distribution, mean, and t-test. The results yielded an overall mean score of 4.738 with very good interpretation. All domains of therapeutic communication such as personal space (4.633), touch (4.851), facial expressions (4.827), position (4.69), posture (4.655), gesture (4.756), listening (4.764), empathy (4.739), humor (4.717), completeness (4.695), clearness (4.792), conciseness (4.683), cohesiveness (4.704) and courteousness (4.824) were interpreted as very good. Overall, the physical therapists of the affiliated centers of De La Salle Health Sciences Institute-College of Physical Therapy have very good therapeutic communication skills