How visual confidence on global motion is affected by local motion ambiguity and type of motion noise, and its correlation with autistic trait tendency?

Perceptual confidence has been found to correlate with task performance in general, and is believed to be independent of stimulus features. However, certain stimulus feature could induce a subjective sense of uncertainty, which could potentially influence confidence judgments beyond task performance. The present studies aimed at assessing the effects of the ambiguity of local motion signals on perceptual confidence on a global-motion task. Participants first discriminated the global motion directions of two multiple-aperture, global-motion patterns, one generated using multiple Gabor elements and the other using multiple Plaid elements. They then performed a two-interval, forced-choice confidence task by choosing which of the two perceptual responses they were more confident in being correct. In Experiment 1, when perceptual performance was controlled by varying coherence, we found that participants chose plaids more often than Gabors, even with perceptual performance matched between the two patterns. In Experiment 2, when perceptual performance was controlled by varying luminance contrast of noisy pixels in every motion frame, such “plaid preference” in confidence bias was significantly weakened. Besides, there has been numerous studies on visual perception of autistic individuals. But not many of them has looked into the relationship between their metacognition and perceptual judgement. This study aimed at assessing the relationship between the autistic trait tendency and metacognitive process about one’s perceptual performance. Our results show that, at the same level of objective task performance, subject perceptual confidence depends on both the ambiguity of local motion signals and the type of noise. Our results also shows that there is an association between the subject perceptual confidence and the autistic trait tendency

Agnes S. Ku et Ngai Pun (éd.), Remaking Citizenship in Hong Kong: Community, Nation and the Global City, Londres, Routledge-Curzon, 2004, 261 p.

Cet ouvrage a été publié à un moment opportun où Hong Kong était le terrain d’une surenchère de discours (esprit d’entreprise, démocratisation, nationalisme) qui présentaient à la population des exigences conflictuelles, mettant à l’épreuve son aptitude à définir sa propre identité. Le livre, résultat des efforts conjugués d’un groupe de spécialistes de l’île, démystifie l’approche théorique et les interprétations régionales de la notion de citoyenneté, ainsi que les possibilités de faire de ..

Agnes S. Ku and Ngai Pun (eds), Remarking Citizenship in Hong Kong: Community, nation and the global city

This edited volume comes out at a timely moment, as Hong Kong is caught up in competing discourses (e.g., entrepreneurialism, democratisation, and nationalism) that make conflicting demands on the people, putting to a real test their ability to articulate their identity. Representing the joint efforts of a group of local scholars, the book debunks the theoretical meanings and local understandings of citizenship, and the repressive potential of the notion to be employed as a means of governanc..

竊衣

那年我遇上了織女，織女在漆黑的夜空遇上了牛郎；現在我寫了一個關於織女的故事，天上的織女仍會遇上在凡間的牛郎。 以牛郎織女的故事為小說的素材，嘗試用故事新編的形式在這個傳統的神話故事上發展：運用不同角度敘事，豐富牛郎織女的神話傳說；側重描寫主角的心理變化，令人物的個性更圓形。自古以來，牛郎織女故事，都是歌頌二人至死不渝的愛情。我希望在新編的故事上，除了重現他們對愛情的堅執，同時強調他們的愛情是跨越了時空的限制，然而，卻又敵不過分離的宿命。 小說最初的結構，是以現在仍拜織女的老婆婆為主線，透過她們在現實生活中仍有拜祭七姐（織女）的習俗，表現她們那一代對愛情的堅執，對照現代男女的「隨緣」式的戀愛態度。小說以兩代女性不同的形象作為比較，嘗試用兩、三條線織成一個故事，而織女的形象會呈現在故事中的人物，然後遇上她們的牛郎。但當我描寫牛郎織女相遇的情節時，卻令我改變了故事的內容，因為，當我描寫牛郎織女相遇的場面時，會運用一種比較虛擬的寫作手法，如描寫人物感性的心理，利用故事中四周環境的顏色、聲音及光線，營造故事情節的氣氛；這與描寫現實生活那種較平實的寫法格格不入，未能令小說的調子統一。在這個難題下，我最後決定刪去部份描寫現實的地方，並將小說中的女子變成同一個人―― 織女，以不同的形象在現實中的「牛郎」的身邊出現。 故事改動後，故事的節奏較好，而風格也比較統一。變成了一個織女在小說中不同的時間以不同的形象出現，有時是一個乖巧的女孩子，有時是像鬼魅般出現，有時又是一個被牛郎忽視的不善表達內心的女孩子，希望可以令小說保留神話中織女下凡的仙女神秘的形象及成為牛郎妻子後的賢淑的傳統女性形象；同時又在織女身上加入了現代女孩子的自覺性，以及對牛郎的重視工作更甚於她而感到孤獨的心理描寫，使織女這個人物更圓形。 此外，牛郎在故事中的性格，亦保留了神話中的牛郎那種老實、沉默的性格，但他的生活模式及過份重視工作的態度，都是典型生活在現代的人。故事中刻意減少二人的對話，希望加強他們相處在一起但又不善表達自己內心情感的齷齪感覺。讀者只能從以他們的敘事角度及以全知的敘事角度描述他們在夢境的情節中，才可以窺探他們的心理狀況。 寫這篇小說最大的挑戰是令小說的感覺統一及令小說的時間空間轉換自然。除了每次修改都需要將整部小說仔細地重新審閱一遍，更要改動小說中的字 眼，務求令小說的節奏更統一及更配合內容。從校對的過程中，我學會了以讀者的角度重新閱讀自己的小說，可以更客觀地指出小說中的錯漏。另外，要在傳統的故事上創新，便需要加上不同的元素，令新編的故事有別於舊有的神話，所以我嘗試用不同的方法敘述小說。故事的開首以「我」――織女的角度敘述進行倒序，然後以全知的角度敘述故事；另外在故事中間又會安排較多的篇幅描述夢境的情節以及以牛郎的角度敘述他回憶的片段，加強故事的神秘感覺，使故事的節奏比較跳躍，令小說的意境更豐富。 小說的題目《竊衣》的意思是牛郎織女的神話中，牛郎偷看織女沐浴及偷竊織女羽衣的一個情節。以「竊衣」作為小說的題目是因為這幕對牛郎織女是非常重要，亦是我很喜歡的一節。牛郎因為偷了織女的羽衣，令織女不能返回天上， 然後與他結成夫婦，誕下兩個兒子；而羽衣亦是令織女重返天上的「工具」，從此二人永遠分離，只能每年七月七日鵲橋相會。我認為竊衣除了是牛郎偷織女的衣服的動作外，亦是他們命運的轉捩點。 小說中，我用了頗多的篇幅描寫了天上的織女星及牛郎星遙遙相距的場景， 是因為有一次我在晚上坐飛機。當我望向窗外，看見一大堆閃閃發亮的星星像恆河的沙般在機艙外組成了很多不同的星座圖。我呆看著星星近半小時，興奮的心情久久不能平伏，亦促使我寫了這篇織女星與牛郎星在天上每年相遇一次的故事。希望兩顆星星會再次下凡、重新相遇、繼續相戀以及永遠思念

Agnes S. Ku and Ngai Pun, eds, Remaking Citizenship in Hong Kong: Community, nation and the global city.

Cet ouvrage édité par Agnes S. Ku et Ngai Pun est paru opportunément, au moment la population hongkongaise du éprouver sa capacité à articuler une identité propre, face aux exigences contradictoires de l’entrepreneurialisme, de la démocratisation et du nationalisme. Réunissant les efforts d’une équipe de chercheurs de HongKong, ce recueil d’études déconstruit la notion de « citoyenneté » à l’intérieur de l’île et révèle ses potentialités répressives, dès lors qu’elle est instrumentalisée comm..

A Theoretical Analysis of the Repetition Problem in Text Generation

Text generation tasks, including translation, summarization, language models, and etc. see rapid growth during recent years. Despite the remarkable achievements, the repetition problem has been observed in nearly all text generation models undermining the generation performance extensively. To solve the repetition problem, many methods have been proposed, but there is no existing theoretical analysis to show why this problem happens and how it is resolved. In this paper, we propose a new framework for theoretical analysis for the repetition problem. We first define the Average Repetition Probability (ARP) to characterize the repetition problem quantitatively. Then, we conduct an extensive analysis of the Markov generation model and derive several upper bounds of the average repetition probability with intuitive understanding. We show that most of the existing methods are essentially minimizing the upper bounds explicitly or implicitly. Grounded on our theory, we show that the repetition problem is, unfortunately, caused by the traits of our language itself. One major reason is attributed to the fact that there exist too many words predicting the same word as the subsequent word with high probability. Consequently, it is easy to go back to that word and form repetitions and we dub it as the high inflow problem. Furthermore, we derive a concentration bound of the average repetition probability for a general generation model. Finally, based on the theoretical upper bounds, we propose a novel rebalanced encoding approach to alleviate the high inflow problem. The experimental results show that our theoretical framework is applicable in general generation models and our proposed rebalanced encoding approach alleviates the repetition problem significantly. The source code of this paper can be obtained from https://github.com/fuzihaofzh/repetition-problem-nlg.Comment: AAAI 21 Paper with Appendi

Reexamining brand loyalty and brand awareness with social media marketing: A collectivist country perspective

Purpose: This study seeks to advance the literature by examining the mediating role of brand loyalty and the moderating impact of brand awareness in the relationships between social media marketing and collectivist Chinese behavior in the hospitality service context. This exploration is grounded in brand commitment and expectancy disconfirmation theories. Methods:Empirical testing was conducted on survey data gathered from 150 collectivist Chinese customers in Hong Kong, utilizing partial least squares structural equation modeling. Results:Brand loyalty plays a partial mediating role in the relationships between social media marketing and purchase intention as well as word-of-mouth. Additionally, brand awareness exerts a negative moderating influence on social media marketing-brand loyalty link. Implications:Recommendations are provided for front-line staff tasked with addressing communication challenges by effectively managing the hotel’s social media account. They are strongly advised to steer clear of creating face-threatening situations and to demonstrate respect for the loyalty of Chinese collectivist customers. Furthermore, a negative brand awareness effect emerges when collectivist Chinese customers compare hotel brands with online travel agents

Specialist palliative care in care homes: Integrating care could improve quality of life and reduce costs (Pilot study)

The Scottish Government’s Strategic Framework for Action on Palliative and End of Life Care sets out a vision of universal access to palliative care by 2021. This includes individuals, families and carers having timely and focused conversations with appropriately skilled professionals to plan end of life care, in accordance with their needs and preferences. The vision will be achieved by widening the range of health and care staff providing palliative care, delivering appropriate training, and supporting clinical and health economic evaluations of palliative and end of life care models. Despite care homes being a key location where older people die, access to specialist palliative care is limited. Staff often feel inadequately trained or prepared to look after people who are dying. Consequently, care home residents are more likely to die in hospital, with uncontrolled symptoms, or without adequate care planning in place