635 research outputs found
Narrative Health Communication and Behavior Change: The Influence of Exemplars in the News on Intention to Quit Smoking.
This study investigated psychological mechanisms underlying the effect of narrative health communication on behavioral intention. Specifically, the study examined how exemplification in news about successful smoking cessation affects recipients\u27 narrative engagement, thereby changing their intention to quit smoking. Nationally representative samples of U.S. adult smokers participated in 2 experiments. The results from the 2 experiments consistently showed that smokers reading a news article with an exemplar experienced greater narrative engagement compared to those reading an article without an exemplar. Those who reported more engagement were in turn more likely to report greater smoking cessation intentions
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Lost Voices of Hagia Sophia: Medieval Byzantine Chant Sung in the Virtual Acoustics of Hagia Sophia. The Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross in Constantinople
What goes up, must come down? The asymmetric effects of economic growth and international threat on military spending
Accepted manuscrip
Using HoloLens Mixed Reality to research correlations between language and movement: a case study
Communication can be defined as the understanding and exchanging of meaningful messages. The role of communication is central to the lives of human beings as, everyday, we use language to interact with the world around us. Linguistic skills play a fundamental role in this scenario and Language Disorders (LD) are impairments that limit the processing of linguistic information. Early and accurate identification of LD is thus essential to promote lifelong learning and well-being. From an evolutionary perspective, some human language constructs evolved from an ancestral motor system and share the same neural pathways in the Broca’s area of the brain. This suggests a correlation between action and language. If such a relationship is well established and reliable, it would be possible to use the former as a marker of the latter. The hypothesis of our work, in a nutshell, is that movement can be a predictor of language. To study this correlation, we developed C(H)o(L)ordination, a Mixed Reality (MR) application for HoloLens 2. The application offers several activities based on visual stimuli involving motor movements, which tap on the same skills needed to perform some language tasks. We performed an exploratory study with N=22 users to test the application usability and user experience. The results suggest that C(H)o(L)ordination is a usable and powerful tool to gather insights on the ongoing debate about language evolution and language disorders
Improvement of radiopurity level of enriched CdWO and ZnWO crystal scintillators by recrystallization
As low as possible radioactive contamination of a detector plays a crucial
role to improve sensitivity of a double beta decay experiment. The radioactive
contamination of a sample of CdWO crystal scintillator by thorium
was reduced by a factor , down to the level 0.01 mBq/kg
(Th), by exploiting the recrystallization procedure. The total alpha
activity of uranium and thorium daughters was reduced by a factor ,
down to 1.6 mBq/kg. No change in the specific activity (the total
activity and Th) was observed in a sample of ZnWO crystal produced
by recrystallization after removing mm surface layer of the
crystal.Comment: 14 pages, 5 figures and 2 table
Radioactive contamination of ZnWO4 crystal scintillators
The radioactive contamination of ZnWO4 crystal scintillators has been
measured deep underground at the Gran Sasso National Laboratory (LNGS) of the
INFN in Italy with a total exposure 3197 kg x h. Monte Carlo simulation,
time-amplitude and pulse-shape analyses of the data have been applied to
estimate the radioactive contamination of the ZnWO4 samples. One of the ZnWO4
crystals has also been tested by ultra-low background gamma spectrometry. The
radioactive contaminations of the ZnWO4 samples do not exceed 0.002 -- 0.8
mBq/kg (depending on the radionuclide), the total alpha activity is in the
range: 0.2 - 2 mBq/kg. Particular radioactivity, beta active 65Zn and alpha
active 180W, has been detected. The effect of the re-crystallization on the
radiopurity of the ZnWO4 crystal has been studied. The radioactive
contamination of samples of the ceramic details of the set-ups used in the
crystals growth has been checked by low background gamma spectrometry. A
project scheme on further improvement of the radiopurity level of the ZnWO4
crystal scintillators is briefly addressed.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figures, 6 tables, submitted for publicatio
Measurements of ZnWO anisotropic response to nuclear recoils for the ADAMO project
Anisotropic scintillators can offer a unique possibility to exploit the
so-called directionality approach in order to investigate the presence of those
Dark Matter (DM) candidates inducing nuclear recoils. In fact, their use can
overcome the difficulty of detecting extremely short nuclear recoil traces. In
this paper we present recent measurements performed on the anisotropic response
of a ZnWO crystal scintillator to nuclear recoils, in the framework of the
ADAMO project. The anisotropic features of the ZnWO crystal scintillators
were initially measured with particles; those results have been also
confirmed by the additional measurements presented here. The experimental
nuclear recoil data were obtained by using a neutron generator at ENEA-CASACCIA
and neutron detectors to tag the scattered neutrons; in particular, the
quenching factor values for nuclear recoils along different crystallographic
axes have been determined for three different neutron scattering angles (i.e.
nuclear recoils energies). From these measurements, the anisotropy of the light
response for nuclear recoils in the ZnWO crystal scintillator has been
determined at 5.4 standard deviations.Comment: 22 pages; 12 figures. In press on Eur. Phys. J.
Developments and improvements of radiopure ZnWO anisotropic scintillators
The ZnWO is an anisotropic crystal scintillator; for its peculiar
characteristics, it is a very promising detector to exploit the so-called
directionality approach in the investigation of those Dark Matter (DM)
candidates inducing nuclear recoils. Recently, in the framework of the ADAMO
project, an R\&D to develop high quality and ultra-radiopure ZnWO crystal
scintillators has been carried out. In the present paper the measurements to
study the anisotropic response of a ZnWO to particles and to
nuclear recoils induced by neutron scattering are reported. Monochromatic
neutrons have been produced by a neutron generator at ENEA-CASACCIA. The
quenching factor values for nuclear recoils along different crystallographic
axes have been determined for three different nuclear recoils energies. These
results open the possibility to realize a pioneer experiment to investigate the
above mentioned DM candidates by means of the directionality.Comment: Proceedings of the IPRD 2019 Conference, 10 pages, 7 figures,
accepted for publication in JINS
Late post-operative paraparesis after rib penetration of the spinal canal in a patient with neurofibromatous scoliosis
Rib displacement into the spinal canal is a rare cause of paraplegia or paraparesis in patients affected by neurofibromatous scoliosis. We describe a case of paraparesis in a 14-year-old child affected by neurofibromatous dystrophic kyphoscoliosis, treated with combined posterior and anterior spinal arthrodesis. Seventeen days after the surgical treatment the patient developed clinical signs and symptoms of paraparesis. A CT scan showed the head of the fifth rib protruding into the spinal canal with cord compression. Rib resection and posterior cord decompression were carried out following complete neurological recovery
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