Changing the ideological roots of prejudice: Longitudinal effects of ethnic intergroup contact on social dominance orientation

Social Dominance Orientation (SDO) has been reported to be strongly related to a multitude of intergroup phenomena, but little is known about situational experiences that may influence SDO. Drawing from research on intergroup contact theory, we argue that positive intergroup contact is able to reduce SDO-levels. The results of an intergroup contact intervention study among high school students (Study 1, N=71) demonstrated that SDO-levels were indeed attenuated after the intervention. Furthermore, this intervention effect on SDO was especially pronounced among students reporting a higher quality of contact. A cross-lagged longitudinal survey among adults (Study 2, N=363) extended these findings by demonstrating that positive intergroup contact is able to decrease SDO over time. Moreover, we did not obtain evidence for the idea that people high in SDO would engage less in intergroup contact. These findings indicate that intergroup contact erodes one of the important socio-ideological bases of generalized prejudice and discrimination

Solutions of the Ginsparg-Wilson Relation

We analyze general solutions of the Ginsparg-Wilson relation for lattice Dirac operators and formulate a necessary condition for such operators to have non-zero index in the topologically nontrivial background gauge fields.Comment: 6 pages, latex, no figures, set T to 1 in eqs. (10)--(13

Phase diagram of Regge quantum gravity coupled to SU(2) gauge theory

We analyze Regge quantum gravity coupled to SU(2) gauge theory on $4^3\times 2$, $6^{3}\times 4$ and $8^{3}\times 4$ simplicial lattices. It turns out that the window of the well-defined phase of the gravity sector where geometrical expectation values are stable extends to negative gravitational couplings as well as to gauge couplings across the deconfinement phase transition. We study the string tension from Polyakov loops, compare with the $\beta$-function of pure gauge theory and conclude that a physical limit through scaling is possible.Comment: RevTeX, 14 pages, 5 figures (2 eps, 3 tex), 2 table

Managing bereavement in the classroom: a conspiracy of silence?

The ways in which teachers in British schools manage bereaved children are under-reported. This article reports the impact of students' bereavement and their subsequent management in primary and secondary school classrooms in Southeast London. Thirteen school staff working in inner-city schools took part in in-depth interviews that focused on the impact of bereaved children on the school and how teachers responded to these children. All respondents had previously had contact with a local child bereavement service that aims to provide support, advice, and consultancy to children, their parents, and teachers. Interviews were audiotaped, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using ATLAS-ti. Three main themes were identified from analysis of interview data. Firstly, British society, culture, local communities, and the family were significant influences in these teachers' involvement with bereaved students. Secondly, school staff managed bereaved students through contact with other adults and using practical classroom measures such as "time out" cards and contact books. Lastly, teachers felt they had to be strong, even when they were distressed. Surprise was expressed at the mature reaction of secondary school students to deaths of others. The article recommends that future research needs to concentrate on finding the most effective way of supporting routinely bereaved children, their families, and teachers

Orbital quantization in the high magnetic field state of a charge-density-wave system

A superposition of the Pauli and orbital coupling of a high magnetic field to charge carriers in a charge-density-wave (CDW) system is proposed to give rise to transitions between subphases with quantized values of the CDW wavevector. By contrast to the purely orbital field-induced density-wave effects which require a strongly imperfect nesting of the Fermi surface, the new transitions can occur even if the Fermi surface is well nested at zero field. We suggest that such transitions are observed in the organic metal $\alpha$-(BEDT-TTF)$_2$KHg(SCN)$_4$ under a strongly tilted magnetic field.Comment: 14 pages including 4 figure

Splitting Proofs for Interpolation

We study interpolant extraction from local first-order refutations. We present a new theoretical perspective on interpolation based on clearly separating the condition on logical strength of the formula from the requirement on the com- mon signature. This allows us to highlight the space of all interpolants that can be extracted from a refutation as a space of simple choices on how to split the refuta- tion into two parts. We use this new insight to develop an algorithm for extracting interpolants which are linear in the size of the input refutation and can be further optimized using metrics such as number of non-logical symbols or quantifiers. We implemented the new algorithm in first-order theorem prover VAMPIRE and evaluated it on a large number of examples coming from the first-order proving community. Our experiments give practical evidence that our work improves the state-of-the-art in first-order interpolation.Comment: 26th Conference on Automated Deduction, 201

The CRESST Dark Matter Search

We present first competitive results on WIMP dark matter using the phonon-light-detection technique. A particularly strong limit for WIMPs with coherent scattering results from selecting a region of the phonon-light plane corresponding to tungsten recoils. The observed count rate in the neutron band is compatible with the rate expected from neutron background. CRESST is presently being upgraded with a 66 channel SQUID readout system, a neutron shield and a muon veto system. This results in a significant improvement in sensitivity.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, to be published in the proceedings of the 5th International Workshop on the Identification and Detection of Dark Matter IDM 2004, Edinburgh, Sept. 2004, World Scientifi

Procalcitonin guided antibiotic therapy and hospitalization in patients with lower respiratory tract infections: a prospective, multicenter, randomized controlled trial

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background:</p> <p>Lower respiratory tract infections like acute bronchitis, exacerbated chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and community-acquired pneumonia are often unnecessarily treated with antibiotics, mainly because of physicians' difficulties to distinguish viral from bacterial cause and to estimate disease-severity. The goal of this trial is to compare medical outcomes, use of antibiotics and hospital resources in a strategy based on enforced evidence-based guidelines versus procalcitonin guided antibiotic therapy in patients with lower respiratory tract infections.</p> <p>Methods and design:</p> <p>We describe a prospective randomized controlled non-inferiority trial with an open intervention. We aim to randomize over a fixed recruitment period of 18 months a minimal number of 1002 patients from 6 hospitals in Switzerland. Patients must be >18 years of age with a lower respiratory tract infections <28 days of duration. Patients with no informed consent, not fluent in German, a previous hospital stay within 14 days, severe immunosuppression or chronic infection, intravenous drug use or a terminal condition are excluded. Randomization to either guidelines-enforced management or procalcitonin-guided antibiotic therapy is stratified by centre and type of lower respiratory tract infections. During hospitalization, all patients are reassessed at days 3, 5, 7 and at the day of discharge. After 30 and 180 days, structured phone interviews by blinded medical students are conducted. Depending on the randomization allocation, initiation and discontinuation of antibiotics is encouraged or discouraged based on evidence-based guidelines or procalcitonin cut off ranges, respectively. The primary endpoint is the risk of combined disease-specific failure after 30 days. Secondary outcomes are antibiotic exposure, side effects from antibiotics, rate and duration of hospitalization, time to clinical stability, disease activity scores and cost effectiveness. The study hypothesis is that procalcitonin-guidance is non-inferior (i.e., at worst a 7.5% higher combined failure rate) to the management with enforced guidelines, but is associated with a reduced total antibiotic use and length of hospital stay.</p> <p>Discussion:</p> <p>Use of and prolonged exposure to antibiotics in lower respiratory tract infections is high. The proposed trial investigates whether procalcitonin-guidance may safely reduce antibiotic consumption along with reductions in hospitalization costs and antibiotic resistance. It will additionally generate insights for improved prognostic assessment of patients with lower respiratory tract infections.</p> <p>Trial registration:</p> <p>ISRCTN95122877</p

Z_2-Regge versus Standard Regge Calculus in two dimensions

We consider two versions of quantum Regge calculus. The Standard Regge Calculus where the quadratic link lengths of the simplicial manifold vary continuously and the Z_2-Regge Model where they are restricted to two possible values. The goal is to determine whether the computationally more easily accessible Z_2 model still retains the universal characteristics of standard Regge theory in two dimensions. In order to compare observables such as average curvature or Liouville field susceptibility, we use in both models the same functional integration measure, which is chosen to render the Z_2-Regge Model particularly simple. Expectation values are computed numerically and agree qualitatively for positive bare couplings. The phase transition within the Z_2-Regge Model is analyzed by mean-field theory.Comment: 21 pages, 16 ps-figures, to be published in Phys. Rev.

Imperfect nesting and transport properties in unconventional density waves

We consider the effect of imperfect nesting in quasi-one dimensional unconventional density waves. The phase diagram is very close to those in a conventional DW. The linear and non-linear aspects of the electric conductivity are discussed. At T=0 the frequency dependent electric conductivity develops a small dip at low frequencies. The threshold electric field depends strongly on the imperfect nesting parameter, allowing us to describe the measured threshold electric field in the low temperature phase of the quasi-two dimensional organic conductor, alpha-(BEDT-TTF)_2KHg(SCN)_4 very well.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figure