Factors affecting responses of children with autism spectrum disorder to yes/no questions

This study aimed to clarify factors related to difficulties in responding to yes/no questions (Y/N-Qs) among 52 children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), 41 boys and 11 girls aged between 3:5-16:0 years. Participants completed the Tanaka-Binet Intelligence Scale V, the Picture Vocabulary Test: Revised (PVT-R), and the Pervasive Developmental Disorder - Autism Society Japan Rating Scale (PARS). A yes/no test, developed for this study, included two types of task: a naming true/false task and a request-intention task. For the naming true/false task, clear yes/no responses accounted for 60% of responses among preschool children and more than 90% of responses among school-aged children in the normal IQ and mildly cognitively-impaired groups. In contrast, clear yes/no responses accounted for less than 30% of responses in the moderately cognitively-impaired group, and less than 1% in the severely cognitively-impaired group. For the request-intention task, clear yes/no responses were higher than for naming true/false tasks. Multiple logistic regression analysis indicated that scores of PARS, estimated mental age, vocabulary age according to the PVT-R, and IQ are associated with clear yes/no responses. These findings appear to indicate that ability or inability to respond to Y/N-Qs follows a developmental pattern in children with ASD. © The Author(s) 2013

Improvement of Turbine Vane Film Cooling Performance by Double Flow Control Devices

This study deals with the studies of the effect of flow control double devices (DFCDs) on turbine vane film cooling. Aiming for improving film effectiveness, two semi-spheroid DFCDs per pitch were attached to the vane surface upstream of the cooling hole. Although the DFCDs were successfully applied to the flat plate film cooling in the previous study, the applicability to the turbine vane was to be investigated. In order to observe the flow field in detail, RANS simulation was conducted first. The DFCDs were installed upstream of each cooling hole of the pressure and suction sides of the vane to investigate the effect of the device position. In this paper, the effects of blowing ratio and cooling hole pitch were also investigated. The results obtained by CFD showed that the vortex generated from DFCD suppressed lift off of the secondary air. As a result, the film effectiveness became significantly higher than that without DFCD condition. Moreover, the improvement in the film effectiveness by DFCD was observed by both of the pressure and suction sides of the turbine vane. Based on the findings through RANS simulation, adiabatic effectiveness and total pressure loss coefficient measurement were performed in a linear cascade test facility. The experiment confirmed that the film effectiveness was improved when DFCDs existed.</jats:p