Quality assessment of scientific manuscripts in peer review and education

We report a vignette study and a survey to investigate which study characteristics influence quality ratings academics give of articles submitted for publication, and academics and students give of students’ theses. In the vignette study, 800 respondents evaluated the quality of an abstract of studies with small or large sample sizes, showing statistically significant or non-significant results, and containing statistical reporting errors or no errors. In the survey, the same participants rated the importance of 29 manuscript characteristics related to the study’s theory, design, conduct, data analyses, and presentation for assessing either the quality of a manuscript or its publishability (article) or grade (thesis). Results showed that quality ratings were affected by sample sizes but not by statistical significance or the presence of statistical reporting errors in the rated researchvignette. These results suggest that researchers’ assessments of manuscript quality are not responsible for publication bias. Furthermore, academics and students provided highly similar ratings of the importance of different aspects relevant to quality assessment of articles and theses. These results suggest that quality criteria for scientific manuscripts are already adopted by students and are similar for submitted manuscripts and theses

Autonomy–connectedness, self-construal, and acculturation:Associations with mental health in a multicultural society

The present study investigated the associations between self-construal, acculturation, and autonomy?connectedness, as well as the relations between autonomy?connectedness and psychopathological symptoms, controlling for self-construal and acculturation. Participants were 1,209 Dutch individuals, of whom 693 (57.3%) were immigrants with a non-Western background. Results showed that an independent self-construal was positively associated with self-awareness and capacity for managing new situations, and was negatively associated with sensitivity to others (which are the three components of autonomy?connectedness). Moreover, an interdependent self-construal was negatively associated with self-awareness and capacity for managing new situations, and was positively associated with sensitivity to others. Importantly, the latter associations were similar for both Dutch natives and immigrants, and the associations between acculturation and autonomy?connectedness were small and nonsignificant. Autonomy?connectedness, after controlling for self-construal and acculturation, explained a large amount of additional variance in anxiety (12.7%) and depression (14.1), and a medium amount of additional variance in drive for thinness (3.7%) and bulimia (4.8%). Autonomy?connectedness, thus, seems to be an important construct for people with a Western background, as well as for immigrants with a non-Western background

Evolution equations on Gabor transforms and their applications

We introduce a systematic approach to the design, implementation and analysis of left-invariant evolution schemes acting on Gabor transform, primarily for applications in signal and image analysis. Within this approach we relate operators on signals to operators on Gabor transforms. In order to obtain a translation and modulation invariant operator on the space of signals, the corresponding operator on the reproducing kernel space of Gabor transforms must be left invariant, i.e. it should commute with the left regular action of the reduced Heisenberg group H_r. By using the left-invariant vector fields on H_r in the generators of our evolution equations on Gabor transforms, we naturally employ the essential group structure on the domain of a Gabor transform. Here we distinguish between two tasks. Firstly, we consider non-linear adaptive left-invariant convection (reassignment) to sharpen Gabor transforms, while maintaining the original signal. Secondly, we consider signal enhancement via left-invariant diffusion on the corresponding Gabor transform. We provide numerical experiments and analytical evidence for our methods and we consider an explicit medical imaging application

Associations between lifestyle factors and multidimensional frailty:A cross-sectional study among community-dwelling older people

BACKGROUND: Multidimensional frailty, including physical, psychological, and social components, is associated to disability, lower quality of life, increased healthcare utilization, and mortality. In order to prevent or delay frailty, more knowledge of its determinants is necessary; one of these determinants is lifestyle. The aim of this study is to determine the association between lifestyle factors smoking, alcohol use, nutrition, physical activity, and multidimensional frailty. METHODS: This cross-sectional study was conducted in two samples comprising in total 45,336 Dutch community-dwelling individuals aged 65 years or older. These samples completed a questionnaire including questions about smoking, alcohol use, physical activity, sociodemographic factors (both samples), and nutrition (one sample). Multidimensional frailty was assessed with the Tilburg Frailty Indicator (TFI). RESULTS: Higher alcohol consumption, physical activity, healthy nutrition, and less smoking were associated with less total, physical, psychological and social frailty after controlling for effects of other lifestyle factors and sociodemographic characteristics of the participants (age, gender, marital status, education, income). Effects of physical activity on total and physical frailty were up to considerable, whereas the effects of other lifestyle factors on frailty were small. CONCLUSIONS: The four lifestyle factors were not only associated with physical frailty but also with psychological and social frailty. The different associations of frailty domains with lifestyle factors emphasize the importance of assessing frailty broadly and thus to pay attention to the multidimensional nature of this concept. The findings offer healthcare professionals starting points for interventions with the purpose to prevent or delay the onset of frailty, so community-dwelling older people have the possibility to aging in place accompanied by a good quality of life

Home-visiting interventions for families with complex and multiple problems:A systematic review and meta-analysis of out-of-home placement and child outcomes

Children growing up in families experiencing complex and multiple problems (FECMP) are at an increased risk of developing problems in multiple areas of life. A wide array of home-visiting interventions has been developed to address the complex care needs of these families. The aim of this study is to investigate out-of-home placement rates and child outcomes of these home-visiting interventions. A systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted using five scientific databases (PsycInfo, ERIC, SocIndex, MedLine, & Picarta). The systematic search of these databases yielded 8,377 hits. Forty-two publications reporting on 50 studies were included in the review. A random-effects survival curve meta-analysis model was estimated for out-of-home placement and random-effects meta-analysis models were estimated for children's behavioral problems and stressful experiences. Out-of-home placement increased from 7.5% at case closure to 24.3% one year after case closure. On average there was a moderate decrease in emotional and behavioral problems (d = 0.50) and stressful experiences (d = 0.50) during intervention, but considerable problems remained after case closure. More research is needed to investigate family and service characteristics that may explain heterogeneity in outcomes. Furthermore, there is a need to adopt a broader perspective in evaluations of home-visiting services by including outcomes related to the skills, development, and wellbeing of children

Guest Editorial : Special issue on advanced computing for image-guided intervention

Editorial Guest Editorial: Special issue on advanced computing for image-guided intervention In the past years, we have witnessed a growing number of applications of minimally invasive or non-invasive interventions in clinical practice, where imaging is playing an essential role for the success of both diagnosis and therapy. Particularly, advanced signal and image processing algorithms are receiving increasing attention, which aim to provide accurate and reliable information directly to physicians. We have seen the applications of these technologies during all stages of an intervention, including preoperational planning, intra-operational guidance and post-operational verification. For this special issue, we have received a significant number of submissions from both academia and industry, out of which we have carefully selected eleven articles with outstanding quality. These articles have covered the topics of anatomic structure identification and tracking, image registration, data visualization and newly emerging applications. In [1] have addressed the image registration problem between preand post-radiated MRI to facilitate the evaluation of the therapeutic response after External Beam Radiation Treatment (EBRT) for the prostate cancer. A different approach has been employed by We have also included three papers on ultrasound-guided image interventions. In We have included in this special issue two papers on tissue characterization from endoscopic images. Nawarathna et al. have proposed in With the increasing use of various imaging modalities in image-guided intervention and therapy, how to optimally present and visualize the data becomes also an important issue. In [10], the authors have addressed the use of autostereoscopic volumetric visualization of the patient's anatomy, which has the potential to be combined with augmented reality. The paper especially addresses the latency problem in the visualization chain, and a few improvements have been proposed. A new adjacent application has been presented in In summary, we have seen from submissions to this special issue a growing interest in applying advanced signal and image processing technologies to image-guided interventions. The submissions have covered a wide range of clinical applications using various imaging modalities. Image feature extraction remains to be an important subject and it has to be specifically designed to suit the needs for specific applications. Learning-based approaches have also attracted a lot of attention, especially in applications requiring automatic tissue characterization and classification. We are also very happy to have received new emerging applications which are able to extend the traditional interventional imaging into greater application areas. Acknowledgments We would like to thank all the reviewers who have helped to peer-review the submitted papers and their constructive comments are well appreciated

Imaging infective endocarditis:Adherence to a diagnostic flowchart and direct comparison of imaging techniques

BACKGROUND: Multimodality imaging is recommended to diagnose infective endocarditis. Value of additional imaging to echocardiography in patients selected by a previously proposed flowchart has not been evaluated. METHODS: An observational single-center study was performed. Adult patients suspected of endocarditis/device infection were prospectively and consecutively enrolled from March 2016 to August 2017. Adherence to a diagnostic imaging-in-endocarditis-flowchart was evaluated in 176 patients. Imaging techniques were compared head-to-head in 46 patients receiving echocardiography (transthoracic plus transesophageal), multi-detector computed tomography angiography (MDCTA), and 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography (FDG-PET/CT). RESULTS: 69% of patients (121/176) adhered to the flowchart. Sensitivity of echocardiography, MDCTA, FDG-PET/CT in patients without prosthesis was 71%, 57%, 29% (86% when combined), while specificity was 100%, 75%, 100%, respectively. Sensitivity in patients with prosthesis was 75%, 75%, 83%, respectively (100% when combined), while specificity was 86% for all three modalities. Echocardiography performed best in the assessment of vegetations, morphological valve abnormalities/dehiscence, septum defects, and fistula formation. MDCTA performed best in the assessment of abscesses and ventricular assist device infection. FDG-PET/CT performed best in the assessment of cardiac device infection, extracardiac infectious foci, and alternative diagnoses. CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrates that the evaluated imaging-in-endocarditis-flowchart is applicable in daily clinical practice. Echocardiography, MDCTA, and FDG-PET/CT provide relevant complementary diagnostic information, particularly in patients with intracardiac prosthetic material

Selective Hypothesis Reporting in Psychology:Comparing Preregistrations and Corresponding Publications

In this study, we assessed the extent of selective hypothesis reporting in psychological research by comparing the hypotheses found in a set of 459 preregistrations with the hypotheses found in the corresponding articles. We found that more than half of the preregistered studies we assessed contained omitted hypotheses (N = 224; 52%) or added hypotheses (N = 227; 57%), and about one-fifth of studies contained hypotheses with a direction change (N = 79; 18%). We found only a small number of studies with hypotheses that were demoted from primary to secondary importance (N = 2; 1%) and no studies with hypotheses that were promoted from secondary to primary importance. In all, 60% of studies included at least one hypothesis in one or more of these categories, indicating a substantial bias in presenting and selecting hypotheses by researchers and/or reviewers/editors. Contrary to our expectations, we did not find sufficient evidence that added hypotheses and changed hypotheses were more likely to be statistically significant than nonselectively reported hypotheses. For the other types of selective hypothesis reporting, we likely did not have sufficient statistical power to test for a relationship with statistical significance. Finally, we found that replication studies were less likely to include selectively reported hypotheses than original studies. In all, selective hypothesis reporting is problematically common in psychological research. We urge researchers, reviewers, and editors to ensure that hypotheses outlined in preregistrations are clearly formulated and accurately presented in the corresponding articles.</p

What Numbers Tell: Contribution of Vegetable Oils towards Sustainable Development Goals

The public discourse over the cultivation of tropical vegetable oils – in particular their potential threat to endangered tropical and sub-tropical ecosystems – has become strongly polarised. Professional spin-doctors flood social media with propaganda against targeted vegetable oils, and the negative opinions they generate result in ongoing calls for boycotts [1,2]. Yet, after decades of boycotting various commodities (among many others beef, palm oil, soybean and timber and wood fibre [3]) the spin-doctors have all but failed to conserve (let alone protect) the ecosystems they so highly value. The oversimplification required to argue for a boycott of a target commodity all but lead to the pursuit of yet another solution that was “clear, simple and wrong” [4]. For instance, the complex interactions between the numerous agricultural and forestry commodities and stakeholders [3,5,6] and must be ignored to argue for a false dilemma: vegetable oil “versus” conservation. Hence, boycotts of (mostly tropical) commodities mainly demonized the various private and public initiatives that aim to transform their cultivation and processing through “buycotts” [1,2] and – much more so – the vulnerable farmers cultivating these commodities. It is therefore necessary to reset the global debate with an objective assessment of the favourable and unfavourable aspects of the vegetable oil sector. This is more so the case, when considering the (potential) impacts of the vegetable oil sector on many (most?) Sustainable Development Goals. This means assessing all vegetable oil’s impacts on the various Sustainable Development Goals and untangling the polarised opinions regarding them [2] in a balanced, evidence-oriented and global setting. Only then can the discourse concerning the impacts of vegetable oils from tropical, sub-tropical and temperate areas achieve a level playing field and determine global partnerships and (f)actual strategies for transforming the whole vegetable oil sector. During 2021, the Indonesian Auditor Network continued its cooperation with the Foreign Policy Strategy Agency (formerly the Policy Analysis and Development Agency) of Indonesia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to follow-up on its previous study on the impacts of vegetable oils on Sustainable Development Goals. The cooperation expanded the study to cover 24 indicators under 8 Sustainable Development Goals, and expanded its scope from four to twenty vegetable oil crops: 1) castor seed, 2) coconut drupe, 3) cotton seed, 4) groundnut, 5) hemp seed, 6) jojoba seed, 7) kapok fruit, 8) linseed, 9) melon seed, 10) mustard seed, 11) oil palm, 12) olive drupe, 13) poppy seed, 14) rapeseed, 15) safflower seed, 16) sesame seed, 17) shea nut, 18) soybean, 19) sunflower seed, and 20) tung nut. On this occasion, I would like to extend my gratitude and warmest appreciation to the various people who have enriched this study with their detailed contributions. In particular I wish to mention Dr. Siswo Pramono and Dr. Teuku Faizasyah (Director General and Acting Director General of the Foreign Policy Strategy Agency of Indonesia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Dr. Rio Budi Rahmanto (Head of the Centre for Multilateral Policy Strategy) and Mrs. Rahmawati Wulandari (Coordinator for Economy and Development at the Centre for Multilateral Policy Strategy) and their expert support teams, as well as Dr. Khaled Obaideen (Advisory Board Member of the Indonesian Auditor Network) and Dr. Asep Suntana (Trustee of the Indonesian Auditor Network) for their invaluable support of the study. This study starts to map the multi-dimensional cloud of interactions and impacts between vegetable oil crops and SDGs. It identifies serious data gaps concerning the impacts on various SDGs, in particular 13 and 15 (Climate Action and Life on Land), suggesting that the environmental and – more so – the social impacts by the vegetable oils sector remain poorly understood. The study also identifies the current leaders and laggards amongst the vegetable oils with regards to their contributions to the SDGs. I hope this report entices the readers to further explore the intricacies of the global vegetable oils sector and to engage in joint dialogues and research on its impacts

An integrated stewardship model: antimicrobial, infection prevention and diagnostic (AID)

Considering the threat of antimicrobial resistance and the difficulties it entails in treating infections, it is necessary to cross borders and approach infection management in an integrated, multidisciplinary manner. We propose the antimicrobial, infection prevention and diagnostic stewardship model comprising three intertwined programs: antimicrobial, infection prevention and diagnostic stewardship, involving all stakeholders. The focus is a so-called ‘theragnostics’ approach. This leads to a personalized infection management plan, improving patient care and minimizing resistance development. Furthermore, it is important that healthcare regions nationally and internationally work together, ensuring that the patient (and microorganism) transfers will not cause problems in a neighboring institution. This antimicrobial, infection prevention and diagnostic stewardship model can serve as a blue print to implement innovative, integrative infection management