AutoDiscern: Rating the Quality of Online Health Information with Hierarchical Encoder Attention-based Neural Networks

Patients increasingly turn to search engines and online content before, or in place of, talking with a health professional. Low quality health information, which is common on the internet, presents risks to the patient in the form of misinformation and a possibly poorer relationship with their physician. To address this, the DISCERN criteria (developed at University of Oxford) are used to evaluate the quality of online health information. However, patients are unlikely to take the time to apply these criteria to the health websites they visit. We built an automated implementation of the DISCERN instrument (Brief version) using machine learning models. We compared the performance of a traditional model (Random Forest) with that of a hierarchical encoder attention-based neural network (HEA) model using two language embeddings, BERT and BioBERT. The HEA BERT and BioBERT models achieved average F1-macro scores across all criteria of 0.75 and 0.74, respectively, outperforming the Random Forest model (average F1-macro = 0.69). Overall, the neural network based models achieved 81% and 86% average accuracy at 100% and 80% coverage, respectively, compared to 94% manual rating accuracy. The attention mechanism implemented in the HEA architectures not only provided 'model explainability' by identifying reasonable supporting sentences for the documents fulfilling the Brief DISCERN criteria, but also boosted F1 performance by 0.05 compared to the same architecture without an attention mechanism. Our research suggests that it is feasible to automate online health information quality assessment, which is an important step towards empowering patients to become informed partners in the healthcare process

Deconstructing climate misinformation to identify reasoning errors

Misinformation can have significant societal consequences. For example, misinformation about climate change has confused the public and stalled support for mitigation policies. When people lack the expertise and skill to evaluate the science behind a claim, they typically rely on heuristics such as substituting judgment about something complex (i.e. climate science) with judgment about something simple (i.e. the character of people who speak about climate science) and are therefore vulnerable to misleading information. Inoculation theory offers one approach to effectively neutralize the influence of misinformation. Typically, inoculations convey resistance by providing people with information that counters misinformation. In contrast, we propose inoculating against misinformation by explaining the fallacious reasoning within misleading denialist claims. We offer a strategy based on critical thinking methods to analyse and detect poor reasoning within denialist claims. This strategy includes detailing argument structure, determining the truth of the premises, and checking for validity, hidden premises, or ambiguous language. Focusing on argument structure also facilitates the identification of reasoning fallacies by locating them in the reasoning process. Because this reason-based form of inoculation is based on general critical thinking methods, it offers the distinct advantage of being accessible to those who lack expertise in climate science. We applied this approach to 42 common denialist claims and find that they all demonstrate fallacious reasoning and fail to refute the scientific consensus regarding anthropogenic global warming. This comprehensive deconstruction and refutation of the most common denialist claims about climate change is designed to act as a resource for communicators and educators who teach climate science and/or critical thinking

Diagnostic Theory of Information as a Testing Technique to Ascertain the Different Levels of Spanish Vocabulary Skills

The purpose of this study was to investigate the use of information theory as a testing technique to diagnose the different levels of Spanish vocabulary skills. This study is not an attempt to analyze mistakes or to debate which language proficiency test is the best in testing language abilities or expertness. This test was constructed to determine the readability and the validity of information theory as a testing tool. A secondary purpose was to determine whether this technique could help increase a person\u27s ability to comprehend reading material at their level of second language learning. Vocabulary skills were tested at the beginner, intermediate, advanced and native stages of language proficiency. This study consisted of three experimental groups. The first was composed of fifty students from the Allendale Columbia School who are learning Spanish as a second language. Their ages ranged from twelve to nineteen years old. This group was further categorized as non-native language learners at the beginner, intermediate and advanced levels of language development. The second group consisted of non-educated native Spanish speakers and language trained non-native Spanish speakers and finally, the third group was composed of non-language trained educated Spanish speakers and language trained native Spanish speakers. The first group was tested with a variety of reading materials in the target language. This was done to verify their language level. The materials presented consisted of two to three paragraphs with part of the information deleted. The objective of the test was for the subjects to encode the missing letters within a five minute time frame. All three groups were presented with a similar testing procedure at different levels of difficulty. The reading passages consisted of approximately 200 to 250 bits of information each. Shannon\u27s citation for calculating redundancy was used to compute the predictability of the passages, as well as, to determine the level of each subject tested. The subjects in group one made significant improvement on test scores at their instructional level. The second and third group made positive, yet not significant improvements at their level of language proficiency. Within the limitations of this study the following conclusions can be drawn: 1. The findings of this project suggest that the results of this study must be interpreted with caution and can only be generalized to a similar population. 2. The findings failed to show any significant difference between a language trained non-native Spanish speaker and a non-language trained native Spanish speaker. 3. The findings suggested that for classroom applications and implications further research is warranted

Thinning and burning in oak woodlands

July 2013.A Thesis presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School University of Missouri--Columbia In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Science.Thesis supervisor: Dr. John M. Kabrick.The legacy of fire suppression in savanna, woodland, and forest ecosystems since the early 20th century has allowed heavy encroachment of fire-intolerant species throughout open-oak communities of Midwestern North America. Shifts in resource gradients and the development of novel environmental-species relationships in many of today's second-growth stands has challenged conventional management techniques for objectives such as regenerating oak and pine, reducing fuel loads, and controlling invasive species. This study evaluates controlled burning and mechanical thinning treatments as methods for achieving these objectives while reversing the departure from natural or historic conditions in fire-suppressed woodland communities. We investigated each of these silvicultural practices, including the combination, for over a decade to address changes in stand structure, species composition, tree growth, and bole damage. We found that overstory stocking was significantly reduced after two prescribed burns and lowest in harvest-burn plots, which also contained the greatest percent coverage of forbs, graminoids, shrubs, and vines. Woodland indicator species responded almost equally to harvest-only and burn-only treatments, while the combination led to significantly greater coverage's than in control. Species diversity, richness, and evenness were also greatest on sites where two prescribed fires were conducted following harvests, although there was no significant difference between other treatments. Fire-induced mortality was significant after two prescribed burns, especially where harvested, but had minimal impact on trees >25 cm. Basal re-sprout in harvested stands was marginally reduced by two prescribed fires, but the density of small diameter stems (<12 cm) was still greater than pre-treatment levels ten years after treatments were initiated. Results suggest that severe canopy disturbances such as mechanical thinning do improve structure and composition that is characteristic of open oak-pine woodlands; however, repeated prescribed fires are essential for sustaining open conditions. Overall, treatments show great potential for restoring stands from fully-stocked conditions and maintaining resemblance of historic woodland communities.Includes bibliographical references (pages 106-125)

School readiness at the nexus between poverty and education: The insights of two Jamaican teachers

In this article, the role of poverty as a barrier to children’s readiness for school is discussed. Using two Jamaican early childhood teachers to illuminate the findings, this piece sought to gain insight into teachers’ perspectives about supporting children, who come from impoverished circumstances, to be ready for primary school. Thematic analysis of the transcribed interviews revealed two dominant themes; Better preparation to meet children’s developmental needs Unrealistic expectations- curriculum expectations perpetuate knowledge gap These findings draw attention to some of the challenges teachers face in meeting the needs of children who live in poverty. These challenges have implications for the provision of equitable early childhood opportunities for children from diverse socio-economic backgrounds

Africans in Cape Town : state policy and popular resistance, 1936-73

This local history focusses on Cape Town's black African population, the development 'Native' (later 'Bantu') policy, as well as the escalating organised resistance which arose in response. The study relies as far as possible on archival sources to disaggregate these themes. On this basis, it provides a detailed analysis of the evolution of policy with regard to influx control, squatter control and residential segregation in the local context. Escalating resistance is discussed in a similarly-nuanced focussing particularly on mounting tensions between the pragmatic 'united frontists' of the Communist Party and the progressive wing of the local ANC, and 'principled' political opponents to the left and the right. Considerable continuity in 'Native Policy' is revealed over what used to be seen as the great divide of 1948, when segregation was supposed suddenly to have given way to something qualitatively different named apartheid. The regionally-specific policy of 'Coloured Labour Preference' is shown to have been, in practice, nothing but empty rhetoric employed in a failed attempt to justify a cruel policy aimed at safeguarding the racial exclusivity of the franchise, while at the same time providing cheap and tractable labour. The thesis calls into question a common assumption that class-concepts best explain changing patterns of resistance in the urban areas of South Africa. Ideological and strategic tensions, irreducible to class-differences are shown to have played a significant role in retarding the struggle for national liberation