An Entropy Model of Artifical Grammar Learning

We propose a model to characterize the type of knowledge acquired in Artificial Grammar Learning (AGL). In particular, we suggest a way to compute the complexity of different test items in an AGL task, relative to the training items, based on the notion of Shannon entropy: The more predictable a test item is from training items, the higher the likelihood that it will be selected as compatible to the training items. Our model is an attempt to formalize some aspects of inductive inference by providing a quantitative measure of the knowledge abstracted by experience. We motivate our particular approach from research in reasoning and categorization, where reduction of entropy has also been seen as a plausible cognitive objective. This may suggest that reducing (Shannon) uncertainty may provide a single explanatory framework for modeling as diverse aspects of cognition, as learning, reasoning, and categorization

Seven peasant communities in pre-industrial Europe. A comparative study of French, Italian and Swedish rural parishes (18th and early 19th century)

This dissertation is an attempt at providing comparable descriptions of the social structure of seven peasant communities in pre-industrial Europe: four French, one Italian and two Swedish. It is concerned with elements of the social structure such as family and kinship organization, geographical mobility and the life cycle of individuals.' It also describes the relations between different, villages, and between the social classes composing the communities. The evidence used is derived from some of the most standardized 18th and 19th century documents: parish registers and early census listings. This explains why results obtained from very different cultural areas -Catholic and Protestant, economically advanced and backward- can be compared. Swedish, Italian and French parish records are fairly similar. Comparable records lead to comparable results: quantitative indices describing geographical mobility, household structure, kinship networks, choice of godparents, can therefore be calculated in the same manner for several parishes. I have also tried to present a fairly detailed description of the agrarian structure of each community and to study the interaction between economic life and other aspects of the social structure such as family and kinship or geographical mobility. The seven villages analysed in the dissertation represent four types of agricultural organization: large-scale or capitalist farming, (northern France), share-cropping (Tuscany), middle peasants (Sweden) and one variety of feudal system (Brittany). Traditional society does not seem to have been very homogeneous: many distinct patterns of family and kinship organization, or of geographical mobility, existed in 18th and early 19th century Europe. Although certainly not the only one, agrarian organization was one of the important factors which explain these differences

A GBT Survey for HI 21 cm Absorption in the Disks and Halos of Low-Redshift Galaxies

We present an HI 21 cm absorption survey with the Green Bank Telescope (GBT) of galaxy-quasar pairs selected by combining data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and the Faint Images of the Radio Sky at Twenty-Centimeters (FIRST) survey. Our sample consists of 23 sightlines through 15 low-redshift foreground galaxy - background quasar pairs with impact parameters ranging from 1.7 kpc up to 86.7 kpc. We detected one absorber in the GBT survey from the foreground dwarf galaxy, GQ1042+0747, at an impact parameter of 1.7 kpc and another possible absorber in our follow-up Very Large Array (VLA) imaging of the nearby foreground galaxy, UGC 7408. Both of the absorbers are narrow (FWHM of 3.6 and 4.8 km/s), have sub Damped Lyman alpha column densities, and most likely originate in the disk gas of the foreground galaxies. We also detected H I emission from three foreground galaxies, including UGC 7408. Although our sample contains both blue and red galaxies, the two H I absorbers as well as the H I emissions are associated with blue galaxies. We discuss the physical conditions in the 21 cm absorbers and some drawbacks of the large GBT beam for this type of survey.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures, 3 table

Public health information seeking, trust, and COVID-19 prevention behaviors: Cross-sectional study

BACKGROUND: Preventative health measures such as shelter in place and mask wearing have been widely encouraged to curb the spread of the COVID-19 disease. People\u27s attitudes toward preventative behaviors may be dependent on their sources of information and trust in the information. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to understand the relationship between trusting in COVID-19 information and preventative behaviors in a racially and politically diverse metropolitan area in the United States. METHODS: We conducted a web-based cross-sectional survey of residents in St. Louis City and County in Missouri. Individuals aged ≥18 years were eligible to participate. Participants were recruited using a convenience sampling approach through social media and email. The Health Belief Model and the Socioecological Model informed instrument development, as well as COVID-19-related questions from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. We performed an ordinary least squares linear regression model to estimate social distancing practices, perceptions, and trust in COVID-19 information sources. RESULTS: Of the 1650 eligible participants, the majority (n=1381, 83.7%) had sought or received COVID-19-related information from a public health agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or both. Regression analysis showed a 1% increase in preventative behaviors for every 12% increase in trust in governmental health agencies. At their lowest levels of trust, women were 68% more likely to engage in preventative behaviors than men. Overall, those aged 18-45 years without vulnerable medical conditions were the least likely to engage in preventative behaviors. CONCLUSIONS: Trust in COVID-19 information increases an individual\u27s likelihood of practicing preventative behaviors. Effective health communication strategies should be used to effectively disseminate health information during disease outbreaks

Sensitive electrochemiluminescence (ECL) immunoassays for detecting lipoarabinomannan (LAM) and ESAT-6 in urine and serum from tuberculosis patients.

BackgroundTuberculosis (TB) infection was responsible for an estimated 1.3 million deaths in 2017. Better diagnostic tools are urgently needed. We sought to determine whether accurate TB antigen detection in blood or urine has the potential to meet the WHO target product profiles for detection of active TB.Materials and methodsWe developed Electrochemiluminescence (ECL) immunoassays for Lipoarabinomannan (LAM) and ESAT-6 detection with detection limits in the pg/ml range and used them to compare the concentrations of the two antigens in the urine and serum of 81 HIV-negative and -positive individuals with presumptive TB enrolled across diverse geographic sites.ResultsLAM and ESAT-6 overall sensitivities in urine were 93% and 65% respectively. LAM and ESAT-6 overall sensitivities in serum were 55% and 46% respectively. Overall specificity was ≥97% in all assays. Sensitivities were higher in HIV-positive compared to HIV-negative patients for both antigens and both sample types, with signals roughly 10-fold higher on average in urine than in serum. The two antigens showed similar concentration ranges within the same sample type and correlated.ConclusionsLAM and ESAT-6 can be detected in the urine and serum of TB patients, regardless of the HIV status and further gains in clinical sensitivity may be achievable through assay and reagent optimization. Accuracy in urine was higher with current methods and has the potential to meet the WHO accuracy target if the findings can be transferred to a point-of-care TB test

Public deliberation as a teaching andragogy: Implications for adult student learning from a doctoral higher education policy course

Public deliberation provides an inclusive and robust mechanism for making shared decisions in community and political settings; however, its application to teaching and learning remains underutilized (McMillan & Harriger, 2007). This manuscript reports on a case study of the use of public deliberation as a teaching andragogy in a graduate level course in higher education policy, which showed that public deliberation creates greater ownership of the course, fosters critical thinking and student agency, and implicates taking action