Damage to Association Fiber Tracts Impairs Recognition of the Facial Expression of Emotion

An array of cortical and subcortical structures have been implicated in the recognition of emotion from facial expressions. It remains unknown how these regions communicate as parts of a system to achieve recognition, but white matter tracts are likely critical to this process. We hypothesized that (1) damage to white matter tracts would be associated with recognition impairment and (2) the degree of disconnection of association fiber tracts [inferior longitudinal fasciculus (ILF) and/or inferior fronto-occipital fasciculus (IFOF)] connecting the visual cortex with emotion-related regions would negatively correlate with recognition performance. One hundred three patients with focal, stable brain lesions mapped onto a reference brain were tested on their recognition of six basic emotional facial expressions. Association fiber tracts from a probabilistic atlas were coregistered to the reference brain. Parameters estimating disconnection were entered in a general linear model to predict emotion recognition impairments, accounting for lesion size and cortical damage. Damage associated with the right IFOF significantly predicted an overall facial emotion recognition impairment and specific impairments for sadness, anger, and fear. One subject had a pure white matter lesion in the location of the right IFOF and ILF. He presented specific, unequivocal emotion recognition impairments. Additional analysis suggested that impairment in fear recognition can result from damage to the IFOF and not the amygdala. Our findings demonstrate the key role of white matter association tracts in the recognition of the facial expression of emotion and identify specific tracts that may be most critical

Insider and Outsider Perspective in Ethnographic Research

Emic and etic perspectives are consequential for research because they impact the research process, the findings of a study, and the argument made by the researcher about the implications of these findings. Moreover, because the nature of ethnographic work involves the interpretation of cultures (Geertz, 1973), there is a responsibility on the part of the researcher to the culture being studied because the perspective the researcher takes impacts the knowledge produced about the cultural group that is studied.Contributors to this discussion represent a variety of research areas including rhetoric, library studies, family, media, and intercultural communication. Recurrant themes include awareness, bias avoidance, personal distance, appreciation of one\u27s insider/ outsider status

The Influence of Medicare Home Health Payment Incentives: Does Payer Source Matter?

During the late 1990s, an interim payment system (IPS) was instituted to constrain Medicare home health care expenditures. Previous research has largely focused on the implications of the IPS for Medicare patients, but our study broadens the analysis to consider patients with other payer sources. Using the National Home and Hospice Care Survey, we found similar effects of the IPS across payer types. Specifically, the IPS was associated with a decrease in access to care for the sickest patients, less agency assistance with activities of daily living, and shorter length-of-use. However, these changes did not translate into worse discharge outcomes.Medicare, health, incentives

Jacobi-Nijenhuis algebroids and their modular classes

Jacobi-Nijenhuis algebroids are defined as a natural generalization of Poisson-Nijenhuis algebroids, in the case where there exists a Nijenhuis operator on a Jacobi algebroid which is compatible with it. We study modular classes of Jacobi and Jacobi-Nijenhuis algebroids

PREDATOR-AVOIDANCE BEHAVIOR EXTENDS TROPHIC CASCADES TO REFUGE HABITATS

Consideration of how trait-mediated indirect interactions (TMIIs) affect community dynamics is recognized as an important focus for ecological research. Although these indirect effects have been shown to mediate trophic cascades in ecological communities, our understanding of how habitat refuge influences the strength and direction of cascading effects is limited. We examined whether or not oyster toadfish (top predator) affect mud crab (intermediate predator) foraging on juvenile hard clams (infaunal prey) in oyster reefs, a physically complex habitat that can provide refuge for both intermediate predators and basal prey. In particular, we manipulated toadfish presence in mesocosms containing experimental oyster reefs and quantified both mud crab and juvenile clam mortality. Toadfish significantly reduced mud crab foraging on clams and increased clam survivorship even though mud crabs foraging on the surface of the reef sought refuge from toadfish deeper within the oyster-shell matrix where they were more proximal to clams. This counterintuitive result suggests that toadfish suppression of mud crab foraging activity is far stronger than toadfish-avoidance behavior that potentially increases crab-clam encounter rates. Therefore, TMIIs can reinforce trophic cascades even in refuge habitats where intermediate predators and their prey are physically isolated from top predators. Determining the generality of cascading effects on lower trophic levels within refugia will require investigating how habitat refuge affects the relative importance of TMIIs

A variational principle for volume-preserving dynamics

We provide a variational description of any Liouville (i.e. volume preserving) autonomous vector fields on a smooth manifold. This is obtained via a ``maximal degree'' variational principle; critical sections for this are integral manifolds for the Liouville vector field. We work in coordinates and provide explicit formulae

Hubbard Models as Fusion Products of Free Fermions

A class of recently introduced su(n) `free-fermion' models has recently been used to construct generalized Hubbard models. I derive an algebra defining the `free-fermion' models and give new classes of solutions. I then introduce a conjugation matrix and give a new and simple proof of the corresponding decorated Yang-Baxter equation. This provides the algebraic tools required to couple in an integrable way two copies of free-fermion models. Complete integrability of the resulting Hubbard-like models is shown by exhibiting their L and R matrices. Local symmetries of the models are discussed. The diagonalization of the free-fermion models is carried out using the algebraic Bethe Ansatz.Comment: 14 pages, LaTeX. Minor modification

Global temporal typing patterns in foreign language writing: Exploring language proficiency through recurrence quantification analysis (RQA)

Recurrence quantification analysis (RQA) is a time-series analysis method that uses autocorrelation properties of typing data to detect regularities within the writing process. The following paper first gives a detailed introduction to RQA and its application to time series data. We then apply RQA to keystroke logging data of first and foreign language writing to illustrate how outcome measures of RQA can be understood as skill-driven constraints on keyboard typing performance. Forty native German students performed two prompted writing assignments, one in German and one in English, a standardized copy task, and a standardized English placement test. We assumed more fluent and skilled writing to reveal more structured typing time series patterns. Accordingly, we expected writing in a well-mastered first language to coincide with higher values in relevant RQA measures as compared to writing in a foreign language. Results of mixed model ANOVAs confirmed our hypothesis. We further observed that RQA measures tend to be higher, thus indicating more structured data, whenever parameters of pause, burst, and revision analyses indicate more fluent writing. Multiple regression analyses revealed that, in addition to typing skills, language proficiency significantly predicts outcomes of RQA. Thus, the present data emphasize RQA being a valuable resource for studying time series data that yields meaningful information about the effort a writer must exert during text production

Approximating the impact of nuclear quantum effects on thermodynamic properties of crystalline solids by temperature remapping

When computing finite-temperature properties of materials with atomistic simulations, nuclear quantum effects are often neglected or approximated at the quasiharmonic level. The inclusion of these effects beyond this level using approaches like the path integral method is often not feasible due to their large computational effort. We discuss and evaluate the performance of a temperature-remapping approach that links the finite-temperature quantum system to its best classical surrogate via a temperature map. This map, which is constructed using the internal energies of classical and quantum harmonic oscillators, is shown to accurately capture the impact of quantum effects on thermodynamic properties at an additional cost that is negligible compared to classical molecular dynamics simulations. Results from this approach show excellent agreement with previously reported path integral Monte Carlo simulation results for diamond cubic carbon and silicon. The approach is also shown to work well for obtaining thermodynamic properties of light metals and for the prediction of the fcc to bcc phase transition in calcium