The Empirical Analysis of the Comprehensibility of Process Models created by Process Mining

Companies use process models to specify their operational processes. With the help of process models, the business processes in a company are analysed by process mining techniques to optimise them. The subdiscipline of process discovery identifies the actual state of business processes and enables them to be examined. Various tools and algorithms can be used, which lead to different process visualisations. The type of process visualisation has a major influence on the comprehensibility of process models. The objective of this thesis is to investigate the comprehensibility of process models generated by process mining. For this purpose, an exploratory eye-tracking study is conducted with fifteen participants. The study examines process models from two scenarios - a vaccination process and an insurance process. The corresponding process models are created manually, and event logs are generated from them using self-created applications. These event logs are loaded into the process mining tools Celonis Snap, Disco, ProM, Apromore and PM4Py and process models are generated from them. A selection of the resulting process models is then tested for comprehensibility in the user study. The analysis of variance (ANOVA) shows no significant differences between the different generated process models. Finally, with the Pearson correlation’s help, the participants’ subjective ranking is highly significantly related to the level of acceptability and cognitive load. The correlation between the time spent looking at the process models and the number of correctly answered comprehension questions is interesting. From this correlation, it can be concluded that understanding process models requires a certain amount of time. An astonishing result of the study is that the quality between manually created models and models generated by process mining is similarly high. Despite interesting results, further studies are needed, as the study is confronted with some limitations (particularly the number of participants). The results can be used as a basis for future studies to further explore this field of research

Konzeption und Realisierung einer mobilen Serious Games Anwendung zur Verbesserung der Geräuschlokalisierung für Tinnituspatienten

Etwa 9 Prozent der Menschen in Deutschland leiden zumindest gelegentlich an Tinnitus. In der Literatur werden verschiedene Behandlungsmaßnahmen diskutiert. Neben den klassischen Therapieansätzen stellen mobile Health-Anwendungen neuartige Möglichkeiten dar. Der emotionale Zustand des Patienten hat einen Einfluss auf die Beschwerden. Um negativen Emotionen entgegenzuwirken, soll in der vorliegenden Arbeit eine mobile Serious Games Anwendung entwickelt werden. Diese trainiert das Richtungshören durch Geräuschlokalisierungen und ermöglicht so das Trainieren der selektiven Wahrnehmung für Tinnituspatienten. In der entwickelten Anwendung befindet sich der Spieler in einem Geisterschloss und soll auftauchende Geister fotografieren, um diese verschwinden zu lassen. Die Geister sind nicht sichtbar. Der Spieler muss durch aufmerksames Hören sein Smartphone in die Richtung drehen, aus der das Geräusch kommt. Durch Score-Punkte wird die Motivation hochgehalten. Das Ergebnis dieser Arbeit ist eine funktionierende Serious Games Anwendung für Android-Geräte, die nach zukünftigen Erweiterungen im Google Play Store oder einem anderen App Store bereitgestellt werden kann

Societies Drifting Apart? Behavioural, Genetic and Chemical Differentiation between Supercolonies in the Yellow Crazy Ant Anoplolepis gracilipes

Background: In populations of most social insects, gene flow is maintained through mating between reproductive individuals from different colonies in periodic nuptial flights followed by dispersal of the fertilized foundresses. Some ant species, however, form large polygynous supercolonies, in which mating takes place within the maternal nest (intranidal mating) and fertilized queens disperse within or along the boundary of the supercolony, leading to supercolony growth (colony budding). As a consequence, gene flow is largely confined within supercolonies. Over time, such supercolonies may diverge genetically and, thus, also in recognition cues (cuticular hydrocarbons, CHC’s) by a combination of genetic drift and accumulation of colony-specific, neutral mutations. Methodology/Principal Findings: We tested this hypothesis for six supercolonies of the invasive ant Anoplolepis gracilipes in north-east Borneo. Within supercolonies, workers from different nests tolerated each other, were closely related and showed highly similar CHC profiles. Between supercolonies, aggression ranged from tolerance to mortal encounters and was negatively correlated with relatedness and CHC profile similarity. Supercolonies were genetically and chemically distinct, with mutually aggressive supercolony pairs sharing only 33.1%617.5% (mean 6 SD) of their alleles across six microsatellite loci and 73.8%611.6% of the compounds in their CHC profile. Moreover, the proportion of alleles that differed between supercolony pairs was positively correlated to the proportion of qualitatively different CHC compounds. These qualitatively differing CHC compounds were found across various substance classes including alkanes, alkenes and mono-, di- and trimethyl-branched alkanes. Conclusions: We conclude that positive feedback between genetic, chemical and behavioural traits may further enhance supercolony differentiation through genetic drift and neutral evolution, and may drive colonies towards different evolutionary pathways, possibly including speciation

Plant Species Loss Affects Life-History Traits of Aphids and Their Parasitoids

The consequences of plant species loss are rarely assessed in a multi-trophic context and especially effects on life-history traits of organisms at higher trophic levels have remained largely unstudied. We used a grassland biodiversity experiment and measured the effects of two components of plant diversity, plant species richness and the presence of nitrogen-fixing legumes, on several life-history traits of naturally colonizing aphids and their primary and secondary parasitoids in the field. We found that, irrespective of aphid species identity, the proportion of winged aphid morphs decreased with increasing plant species richness, which was correlated with decreasing host plant biomass. Similarly, emergence proportions of parasitoids decreased with increasing plant species richness. Both, emergence proportions and proportions of female parasitoids were lower in plots with legumes, where host plants had increased nitrogen concentrations. This effect of legume presence could indicate that aphids were better defended against parasitoids in high-nitrogen environments. Body mass of emerged individuals of the two most abundant primary parasitoid species was, however, higher in plots with legumes, suggesting that once parasitoids could overcome aphid defenses, they could profit from larger or more nutritious hosts. Our study demonstrates that cascading effects of plant species loss on higher trophic levels such as aphids, parasitoids and secondary parasitoids begin with changed life-history traits of these insects. Thus, life-history traits of organisms at higher trophic levels may be useful indicators of bottom-up effects of plant diversity on the biodiversity of consumers

Developing "personality" taxonomies: Metatheoretical and methodological rationales underlying selection approaches, methods of data generation and reduction principles

Taxonomic "personality" models are widely used in research and applied fields. This article applies the Transdisciplinary Philosophy-of-Science Paradigm for Research on Individuals (TPS-Paradigm) to scrutinise the three methodological steps that are required for developing comprehensive “personality” taxonomies: 1) the approaches used to select the phenomena and events to be studied, 2) the methods used to generate data about the selected phenomena and events and 3) the reduction principles used to extract the “most important” individual-specific variations for constructing “personality” taxonomies. Analyses of some currently popular taxonomies reveal frequent mismatches between the researchers’ explicit and implicit metatheories about “personality” and the abilities of previous methodologies to capture the particular kinds of phenomena toward which they are targeted. Serious deficiencies that preclude scientific quantifications are identified in standardised questionnaires, psychology’s established standard method of investigation. These mismatches and deficiencies derive from the lack of an explicit formulation and critical reflection on the philosophical and metatheoretical assumptions being made by scientists and from the established practice of radically matching the methodological tools to researchers’ preconceived ideas and to pre-existing statistical theories rather than to the particular phenomena and individuals under study. These findings raise serious doubts about the ability of previous taxonomies to appropriately and comprehensively reflect the phenomena towards which they are targeted and the structures of individual-specificity occurring in them. The article elaborates and illustrates with empirical examples methodological principles that allow researchers to appropriately meet the metatheoretical requirements and that are suitable for comprehensively exploring individuals’ “personality”

Conceiving “personality”: Psychologist’s challenges and basic fundamentals of the Transdisciplinary Philosophy-of-Science Paradigm for Research on Individuals

Scientists exploring individuals, as such scientists are individuals themselves and thus not independent from their objects of research, encounter profound challenges; in particular, high risks for anthropo-, ethno- and ego-centric biases and various fallacies in reasoning. The Transdisciplinary Philosophy-of-Science Paradigm for Research on Individuals (TPS-Paradigm) aims to tackle these challenges by exploring and making explicit the philosophical presuppositions that are being made and the metatheories and methodologies that are used in the field. This article introduces basic fundamentals of the TPS-Paradigm including the epistemological principle of complementarity and metatheoretical concepts for exploring individuals as living organisms. Centrally, the TPS-Paradigm considers three metatheoretical properties (spatial location in relation to individuals’ bodies, temporal extension, and physicality versus “non-physicality”) that can be conceived in different forms for various kinds of phenomena explored in individuals (morphology, physiology, behaviour, the psyche, semiotic representations, artificially modified outer appearances and contexts). These properties, as they determine the phenomena’s accessibility in everyday life and research, are used to elaborate philosophy-of-science foundations and to derive general methodological implications for the elementary problem of phenomenon-methodology matching and for scientific quantification of the various kinds of phenomena studied. On the basis of these foundations, the article explores the metatheories and methodologies that are used or needed to empirically study each given kind of phenomenon in individuals in general. Building on these general implications, the article derives special implications for exploring individuals’ “personality”, which the TPS-Paradigm conceives of as individual-specificity in all of the various kinds of phenomena studied in individuals

Effectiveness and safety of opicapone in Parkinson’s disease patients with motor fluctuations: the OPTIPARK open-label study

Background The efficacy and safety of opicapone, a once-daily catechol-O-methyltransferase inhibitor, have been established in two large randomized, placebo-controlled, multinational pivotal trials. Still, clinical evidence from routine practice is needed to complement the data from the pivotal trials. Methods OPTIPARK (NCT02847442) was a prospective, open-label, single-arm trial conducted in Germany and the UK under clinical practice conditions. Patients with Parkinson’s disease and motor fluctuations were treated with opicapone 50 mg for 3 (Germany) or 6 (UK) months in addition to their current levodopa and other antiparkinsonian treatments. The primary endpoint was the Clinician’s Global Impression of Change (CGI-C) after 3 months. Secondary assessments included Patient Global Impressions of Change (PGI-C), the Unified Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS), Parkinson’s Disease Questionnaire (PDQ-8), and the Non-Motor Symptoms Scale (NMSS). Safety assessments included evaluation of treatment-emergent adverse events (TEAEs) and serious adverse events (SAEs). Results Of the 506 patients enrolled, 495 (97.8%) took at least one dose of opicapone. Of these, 393 (79.4%) patients completed 3 months of treatment. Overall, 71.3 and 76.9% of patients experienced any improvement on CGI-C and PGI-C after 3 months, respectively (full analysis set). At 6 months, for UK subgroup only (n = 95), 85.3% of patients were judged by investigators as improved since commencing treatment. UPDRS scores at 3 months showed statistically significant improvements in activities of daily living during OFF (mean ± SD change from baseline: − 3.0 ± 4.6, p < 0.0001) and motor scores during ON (− 4.6 ± 8.1, p < 0.0001). The mean ± SD improvements of − 3.4 ± 12.8 points for PDQ-8 and -6.8 ± 19.7 points for NMSS were statistically significant versus baseline (both p < 0.0001). Most of TEAEs (94.8% of events) were of mild or moderate intensity. TEAEs considered to be at least possibly related to opicapone were reported for 45.1% of patients, with dyskinesia (11.5%) and dry mouth (6.5%) being the most frequently reported. Serious TEAEs considered at least possibly related to opicapone were reported for 1.4% of patients. Conclusions Opicapone 50 mg was effective and generally well-tolerated in PD patients with motor fluctuations treated in clinical practice. Trial registration Registered in July 2016 at clinicaltrials.gov (NCT02847442)

A closer look at life goals across adulthood: Applying a developmental perspective to content, dynamics, and outcomes of goal importance and goal attainability

It is well established that goals energize and direct behaviour across the lifespan. To better understand how goals are embedded in people's lives across adulthood, the present research examined life goals' content (health, personal growth, prosocial engagement, social relations, status, work), dynamics (interplay between goal importance and goal attainability), and outcomes (subjective well-being) from a developmental perspective. We argue that people rate those goals as important and attainable that enable them to master developmental tasks, that they adapt their goals to personal capacities, and that goals predict subjective well-being after 2 and 4 years. The sample included 973 individuals (18-92 years old, M = 43.00 years) of whom 637 participated 2 years later and 573 participated 4 years later. Goal importance and well-being were assessed at all occasions and goal attainability at the first two occasions. Results indicated that age was negatively associated with importance and attainability of personalgrowth, status, and work goals but positively associated with importance and attainability of prosocial-engagement goals. The association between goal importance and attainability was largely bidirectional over time; and goal attainability, rather than goal importance, was positively linked to later well-being. Implications of these findings are discussed in light of adult lifespan development

Interdependence of Approach and Avoidance Goals in Romantic Couples Over Days and Months

Objectives: Despite the centrality of people's approach goals (i.e., approach toward positive outcomes) and avoidance goals (i.e., avoidance of negative outcomes) in romantic relationships, little is known about the interdependence of approach and avoidance relationship goals between partners. Assuming that short-term, state-level goals accumulate into general goal ten- dencies, the present research tested whether partners' daily (i.e., state level) and aggregated daily (i.e., trait level) approach and avoidance goals are mutually predictive in the short term (after one day) and the long term (after 10-12 months). In addition, we explored whether goal interdependence unfolds differently across adulthood and in relationships of different duration. Method: Approach and avoidance goals were assessed daily on two 14-day measurement-burst occasions that were con- ducted 10-12 months apart. The sample consisted of N = 456 female-male couples (age: M = 33.6, SD = 13.8 years; rela- tionship duration: M = 9.6, SD = 10.7 years). Results: We observed significant short- and long-term partner effects in the prediction of couple members' approach and avoidance goals. These partner effects were restricted to trait level and they did not emerge at the state level. Almost all ef- fects were independent of age and relationship duration. Discussion: The present research underscores the importance of disentangling state- and trait-level goal tendencies when investigating the interdependence of approach and avoidance goals within romantic relationships

Influences of Glyphosate Contaminations and Concentrate Feed on Performance, Blood Parameters, Blood Cell Functionality and DNA Damage Properties in Fattening Bulls

Glyphosate (GLY), the active substance in non-selective herbicides, is often found in ruminant feed. The present feeding study aimed to investigate the effects of GLY-contaminated rations and different concentrate feed proportions (CFP) on the health of fattening German Holstein bulls. Bulls were grouped by low (LC) or high (HC) CFP with (GLYLC, GLYHC) or without GLY-contaminations (CONLC, CONHC) in their rations. Intakes (dry matter, water) and body weight were documented continuously lasting over an average range from 392.2 ± 60.4 kg to 541.2 ± 67.4 kg (mean ± SD). Blood samples collected at the trial’s beginning, and after 7 and 15 weeks, were analyzed for hematological and clinical-chemical traits, functional properties of leukocytes, redox parameters and DNA damage. The average GLY exposures of 128.6 (GLYHC), 213.7 (GLYLC), 1.3 (CONHC) and 2.0 µg/kg body weight/d (CONLC) did not lead to GLY effects for most of the assessed parameters relating to animal health and performance. CFP and time displayed marked influences on most of the experimental parameters such as higher dry matter intake and average daily gain in HC compared with the LC groups. GLY effects were rather weak. However, the observed interactive effects between GLY and CFP and/or time occurring in an inconsistent manner are likely not reproducible. Finally, all animals remained clinically inconspicuous, which brings into question the physiological relevance of putative GLY effects