261 research outputs found
Cross-cultural adaptation and validation of the RhinAsthma Patient Perspective (RAPP) in the Polish population
Improving the psychometric properties of the dissociative experiences scale (DES-II): A Rasch validation study
Shortening the Frommelt Attitude Toward the Care Of the Dying Scale (FATCOD-B): a Brief 9-Item Version for Medical Education and Practice
End-of-life care training has gaps in helping students to develop attitudes toward caring for the dying. Valid and reliable assessment tools are essential in building effective educational programmes. The Frommelt Attitude Toward the Care Of the Dying scale (FATCOD-B) is widely used to measure the level of comfort/discomfort in caring for the dying and to test the effectiveness of end-of-life care training. However, its psychometric properties have been questioned and different proposals for refinement and shortening have been put forward. The aim of this study is to get to a definitive reduction of the FATCOD-B through a valid and parsimonious synthesis of the previous attempts at scale revision. Data were gathered from a sample of 220 medical students. The item response theory approach was used in this study. Of the 14 items selected from two previous proposals for scale revision, 3 had a weak correlation with the whole scale and were deleted. The resulting 11-item version had good fit indices and withstood a more general and parsimonious specification (rating scale model). This solution was further shortened to 9 items by deleting 2 of 3 items at the same level of difficulty. The final 9-item version was invariant for gender, level of religiosity and amount of experience with dying persons, free from redundant items and able to scale and discriminate the respondents
Equivalence of domains for hyperbolic Hubbard-Stratonovich transformations
We settle a long standing issue concerning the traditional derivation of
non-compact non-linear sigma models in the theory of disordered electron
systems: the hyperbolic Hubbard-Stratonovich (HS) transformation of
Pruisken-Schaefer type. Only recently the validity of such transformations was
proved in the case of U(p,q) (non-compact unitary) and O(p,q) (non-compact
orthogonal) symmetry. In this article we give a proof for general non-compact
symmetry groups. Moreover we show that the Pruisken-Schaefer type
transformations are related to other variants of the HS transformation by
deformation of the domain of integration. In particular we clarify the origin
of surprising sign factors which were recently discovered in the case of
orthogonal symmetry.Comment: 30 pages, 3 figure
The relationship between menopausal symptoms and burnout. A cross-sectional study among nurses
Multi-filter transit observations of WASP-39b and WASP-43b with three San Pedro M\'artir telescopes
Three optical telescopes located at the San Pedro M\'artir National
Observatory were used for the first time to obtain multi-filter defocused
photometry of the transiting extrasolar planets WASP-39b and WASP-43b. We
observed WASP-39b with the 2.12m telescope in the U filter for the first time,
and additional observations were carried out in the R and I filters using the
0.84m telescope. WASP-43b was observed in VRI with the same instrument, and in
the i filter with the robotic 1.50m telescope. We reduced the data using
different pipelines and performed aperture photometry with the help of custom
routines, in order to obtain the light curves. The fit of the light curves
(1.5--2.5mmag rms), and of the period analysis, allowed a revision of the
orbital and physical parameters, revealing for WASP-39b a period ( days) which is seconds larger than
previously reported. Moreover, we find for WASP-43b a planet/star radius
() which is larger in the i filter
with respect to previous works, and that should be confirmed with additional
observations. Finally, we confirm no evidence of constant period variations in
WASP-43b.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figures, accepted in PASP, scheduled for the February 1,
2015 issu
A Generating Function for all Semi-Magic Squares and the Volume of the Birkhoff Polytope
We present a multivariate generating function for all n x n nonnegative
integral matrices with all row and column sums equal to a positive integer t,
the so called semi-magic squares. As a consequence we obtain formulas for all
coefficients of the Ehrhart polynomial of the polytope B_n of n x n
doubly-stochastic matrices, also known as the Birkhoff polytope. In particular
we derive formulas for the volumes of B_n and any of its faces.Comment: 24 pages, 1 figure. To appear in Journal of Algebraic Combinatoric
Group theoretic dimension of stationary symmetric \alpha-stable random fields
The growth rate of the partial maximum of a stationary stable process was
first studied in the works of Samorodnitsky (2004a,b), where it was
established, based on the seminal works of Rosi\'nski (1995,2000), that the
growth rate is connected to the ergodic theoretic properties of the flow that
generates the process. The results were generalized to the case of stable
random fields indexed by Z^d in Roy and Samorodnitsky (2008), where properties
of the group of nonsingular transformations generating the stable process were
studied as an attempt to understand the growth rate of the partial maximum
process. This work generalizes this connection between stable random fields and
group theory to the continuous parameter case, that is, to the fields indexed
by R^d.Comment: To appear in Journal of Theoretical Probability. Affiliation of the
authors are update
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