The competence and warmth of Thai students’ attitudes towards varieties of English: the effect of gender and perceptions of L1 diversity

Previous language attitude research indicates that presenting speech forms allows listeners to index information about and attach social meaning to the perceived group(s) of speakers. Despite the volume of research undertaken elsewhere in Asia, there appear to be no in-depth studies investigating Thai nationals’ evaluations of specific varieties of English speech. This large-scale study examines 204 Thai university students’ attitudes towards forms of UK, US, Japanese, Chinese, Thai and Indian English, provided by highly proficient female speakers. The study also examines the extent to which Thai students’ perceptions of linguistic diversity in their L1 and their gender affect their attitudes. Multivariate analysis demonstrated UK, US and Thai English speech was ranked significantly higher than other Asian forms of English, for competence and warmth, attitudinal dimensions consistent with recent findings in social cognition. Further analysis indicated females and those most positive towards L1 variation expressed significantly higher levels of ingroup loyalty towards Thai English speakers. The findings are compared and contrasted with the results of equivalent studies undertaken in other Asian contexts and, given recent cutting-edge research in social cognition confirming the primacy of warmth judgements, calls for language attitude researchers to consider speaker warmth ratings more fully in future studies

Interchannel Coupling in the Photoionization of the M-shell of Kr Well Above Threshold: Experiment and Theory

Photoionization cross sections and asymmetry (β) parameters for Kr 3s, 3p, and 3d subshells have been measured and calculated in the 300–1300-eV photon energy range. Good agreement between experiment and theory is found for both cross-section branching ratios and β parameters. Interchannel coupling among the channels arising from 3s, 3p, and 3d subshells is found to be necessary for quantitative accuracy of the theory. This shows that the interchannel coupling phenomenology far above threshold, found previously for outer shells of Ne and Ar, is also operative for inner atomic shells

Validity of the Independent-Particle Approximation in X-Ray Photoemission: The Exception, Not the Rule

A combined experimental and theoretical study of argon valence photoionization illustrates the discovery of the broad lack of validity of the independent-particle approximation (IPA) for x-ray photoemission. In addition to previously known breakdowns of the IPA, which are limited to high photon energies and regions very near threshold, the observed breakdown in photoionization at intermediate energies demonstrates generally that the IPA is valid only in very restricted domains. These restrictions are expected to be relevant throughout the periodic table, with consequences for a wide variety of applications

First Results from the High-Brightness X-Ray Spectroscopy Beamline 9.3.1 at ALS

Beamline 9.3.1 at the Advanced Light Source (ALS) is a windowless beamline, covering the 1–6 keV photon energy range. This beamline is designed to achieve the goal of high brightness at the sample for use in the x‐ray atomic and molecular spectroscopy (XAMS) science, surface and interface science, biology and x‐ray optical development programs at ALS. X‐ray absorption and time‐of‐flight photoemission measurements in 2–5 keV photon energy range along with the flux, resolution, spot size and stability of the beamline will be discussed. Prospects for future XAMS measurements will also be presented

Anionic Photofragmentation of CO: A Selective Probe of Core-Level Resonances

Anion-yield spectroscopy using x rays is shown to be a selective probe of molecular core-level processes, providing unique experimental verification of shape resonances. For CO, partial anion and cation yields are presented for photon energies near the C K edge. The O- yield exhibits features above threshold related only to doubly excited states, in contrast to cation yields which also exhibit pronounced structure due to the well-known σ* shape resonance. Because the shape resonance is completely suppressed for O-, anion spectroscopy thus constitutes a highly selective probe, yielding information unobtainable with absorption or electron spectroscopy

Asteroseismology of the Hyades red giant and planet host epsilon Tauri

Asteroseismic analysis of solar-like stars allows us to determine physical parameters such as stellar mass, with a higher precision compared to most other methods. Even in a well-studied cluster such as the Hyades, the masses of the red giant stars are not well known, and previous mass estimates are based on model calculations (isochrones). The four known red giants in the Hyades are assumed to be clump (core-helium-burning) stars based on their positions in colour-magnitude diagrams, however asteroseismology offers an opportunity to test this assumption. Using asteroseismic techniques combined with other methods, we aim to derive physical parameters and the evolutionary stage for the planet hosting star epsilon Tau, which is one of the four red giants located in the Hyades. We analysed time-series data from both ground and space to perform the asteroseismic analysis. By combining high signal-to-noise (S/N) radial-velocity data from the ground-based SONG network with continuous space-based data from the revised Kepler mission K2, we derive and characterize 27 individual oscillation modes for epsilon Tau, along with global oscillation parameters such as the large frequency separation and the ratio between the amplitude of the oscillations measured in radial velocity and intensity as a function of frequency. The latter has been measured previously for only two stars, the Sun and Procyon. Combining the seismic analysis with interferometric and spectroscopic measurements, we derive physical parameters for epsilon Tau, and discuss its evolutionary status.Comment: 13 pages, 13 figures, 4 tables, accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysic

Phase Space Reduction and Vortex Statistics: An Anyon Quantization Ambiguity

We examine the quantization of the motion of two charged vortices in a Ginzburg--Landau theory for the fractional quantum Hall effect recently proposed by the first two authors. The system has two second-class constraints which can be implemented either in the reduced phase space or Dirac-Gupta-Bleuler formalism. Using the intrinsic formulation of statistics, we show that these two ways of implementing the constraints are inequivalent unless the vortices are quantized with conventional statistics; either fermionic or bosonic.Comment: 14 pages, PHYZZ

Cosmic Microwave Background, Accelerating Universe and Inhomogeneous Cosmology

We consider a cosmology in which a spherically symmetric large scale inhomogeneous enhancement or a void are described by an inhomogeneous metric and Einstein's gravitational equations. For a flat matter dominated universe the inhomogeneous equations lead to luminosity distance and Hubble constant formulas that depend on the location of the observer. For a general inhomogeneous solution, it is possible for the deceleration parameter to differ significantly from the FLRW result. The deceleration parameter $q_0$ can be interpreted as $q_0 > 0$ ($q_0=1/2$ for a flat matter dominated universe) in a FLRW universe and be $q_0 < 0$ as inferred from the inhomogeneous enhancement that is embedded in a FLRW universe. A spatial volume averaging of local regions in the backward light cone has to be performed for the inhomogeneous solution at late times to decide whether the decelerating parameter $q$ can be negative for a positive energy condition. The CMB temperature fluctuations across the sky can be unevenly distributed in the northern and southern hemispheres in the inhomogeneous matter dominated solution, in agreement with the analysis of the WMAP power spectrum data by several authors. The model can possibly explain the anomalous alignment of the quadrupole and octopole moments observed in the WMAP data.Comment: 20 pages, no figures, LaTex file. Equations and typos corrected and references added. Additional material and some conclusions changed. Final published versio