Identification of Early Behavioral Markers of Anxiety and Social Withdrawal in Preschool Children

This study examined an observational method for identifying specific behaviors to indicate social anxiety and social withdrawal in preschool children. During an interaction task with a novel adult, 28 children (ages 4 and 5) were observed for specific verbal and non-verbal behaviors (i.e., total utterances, commands, questions, unsolicited conversation, direct responses, eye gaze aversion, non-verbal response, physical distancing, freezing, smiling ) and global behaviors (i.e., shyness, volume or speech, and postural rigidity), theoretically relevant to early childhood social anxiety. Behaviors observed during the interaction task were examined in relation to the parent-reported Spence Preschool Anxiety Scale\u27s social anxiety subscale (Spence, Rapee, Edwards, & Ingram, 2001) and the percentage of solitary behavior observed during unstructured play at preschool (Morris, Messer, & Gross, 1995). Four years later, participants were re-contacted and 15 parents and children completed the Social Phobia and Anxiety Inventory for Children, Parent Report (P-SPAIC; Beidel, Turner, Hamlin, & Morris, 2000), the Child Behavior Checklist Social Competence Subscale (CBCL, Social Competence; Achenbach, 1991), and the Social Phobia and Anxiety Inventory for Children, Item 10 self-report (SPAIC-10, T. Morris, personal communication). Preliminary analyses revealed that the specific verbal and non-verbal behaviors (with the exception of physical distancing and commands) were significantly correlated with the global behaviors. The global behaviors did not predict a significant amount of variance in solitary behavior during unstructured play. None of the specific verbal or non-verbal behaviors were significantly related to solitary behavior during unstructured play or the Spence Preschool Anxiety Scale\u27s social anxiety subscale. Although solitary behavior during unstructured play and the Spence Preschool Anxiety Scale\u27s social anxiety subscale were significantly related, neither one was significantly differentially related to any of the specific verbal or non-verbal behaviors observed during the interaction task. Unsolicited conversation and direct responses were significantly related to CBCL Social Competence at follow-up. Although a significant difference was not detected, a large effect was seen for total utterances, commands, and non-verbal responses to direct questions for those children who were elevated on one or more of the follow-up measures compared to children who were not elevated on any follow-up measure. Although limited by a lack of adequate statistical power and a restricted range of social anxiety at baseline, the study has important implications for the identification of specific behaviors in preschool that may be risk-factors for social anxiety childhood

Social anxiety and facial affect recognition in preschool children

Previous research relating anxiety and facial affect recognition, focusing mostly on school-aged children and adults, has yielded mixed results. The current study sought to demonstrate an association among behavioral inhibition and parent-reported social anxiety, shyness, social withdrawal and facial affect recognition performance using the Diagnostic Analysis of Nonverbal Accuracy Scale in 30 preschool children, ages 4 years to 5 years 8 months. Results indicated that social anxiety, social withdrawal, shyness, and behavioral inhibition together account for 25% of the variance in facial affect recognition performance, although this proportion was not statistically significant r2 = .25, F(4,24) = 1.95, p = .13. A limit of the investigation was the relatively small sample size. Further studies with larger samples are required to better understand the possible association

Virtual Collaborative R&D Teams in Malaysia Manufacturing SMEs

This paper presents the results of empirical research conducted during March to September 2009. The study focused on the influence of virtual research and development (R&D) teams within Malaysian manufacturing small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). The specific objective of the study is better understanding of the application of collaborative technologies in business, to find the effective factors to assist SMEs to remain competitive in the future. The paper stresses to find an answer for a question “Is there any relationship between company size, Internet connection facility and virtuality?”. The survey data shows SMEs are now technologically capable of performing the virtual collaborative team, but the infrastructure usage is less. SMEs now have the necessary technology to begin the implementation process of collaboration tools to reduce research and development (R&D) time, costs and increase productivity. So, the manager of R&D should take the potentials of virtual teams into account

Data Matching and Deduplication Over Big Data Using Hadoop Framework

Entity Resolution is the process of matching records from more than one database that refer to the same entity. In case of a single database the process is called deduplication. This article proposes a method to solve entity resolution and deduplication problem using MapReduce over Hadoop framework. The proposed method includes data preprocessing, comparison and classification tasks indexing by standard blocking method. Our method can operate with one, two or more datasets and works with semi structured or structured data.XIII Workshop Bases de datos y Minería de Datos (WBDMD).Red de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Analysis of Opportunities and Challenges for R&D Management and the Role of the R&D Society for its Improvement – A Case Study in Iran

Research and Development (R&D) management in Iran is faced to many barriers and obstacles, in which R&D units are considered as the basic core of the product development and innovation. Due to structural shortcomings, a great number of organizations and industries have not been able to find their actual status. There are about different 1141 R&D units with a dispersion pattern in Iran. This paper considers and analyzes the R&D case study in one of the provinces located in the north part of Iran in order to enhance the potential R&D activities in respect with the industrialized areas and zones. In this province, there are about 2504 industrial units of which there are only 44 R&D units certified by the state government. However, there are limit numbers of these R&D units that are extensively active. This paper also addresses the current status in respect with the R&D activities to find out why there is a lack and depression of these activities in the industrial units. By considering the opportunity and challenges of these R&D units, there is a need to change these units to be active in order to quickly respond the market and demand requirements. Finally, a few alternative solutions and improvement plans are proposed, in which the Iranian R&D Society is responsible for supporting and succeeding these action plans towards the organization goals.R&D Management

Data Matching and Deduplication Over Big Data Using Hadoop Framework

Entity Resolution is the process of matching records from more than one database that refer to the same entity. In case of a single database the process is called deduplication. This article proposes a method to solve entity resolution and deduplication problem using MapReduce over Hadoop framework. The proposed method includes data preprocessing, comparison and classification tasks indexing by standard blocking method. Our method can operate with one, two or more datasets and works with semi structured or structured data.XIII Workshop Bases de datos y Minería de Datos (WBDMD).Red de Universidades con Carreras en Informática (RedUNCI

Simulation and Optimization of Coal Gasification in a Moving-bed Reactor to Produce Synthesis Gas Suitable for Methanol Production Unit

This paper presents process simulation and optimization of coal gasification process in a moving-bed reactor using Pittsburgh No. 8 coal as feed. The system of differential equations for the mass and energy balances was solved using 4th-order Runge-Kutta method and optimized by non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm-II (NSGA-II) method. The simulation was used to predict solid and gas temperature profile and gas composition along the reactor. The simulation results were compared successfully with experimental data relevant to Westfield plant in Scotland. In addition, the effect of operating parameters such as coal-to-oxygen molar ratio, steam-to-oxygen molar ratio, inlet gas temperature, reactor pressure, and oxygen mole fraction in inlet air on amount of synthesis gas (syngas) production, hydrogen to carbon monoxide molar ratio (HCMR) in produced syngas, and coal conversion was investigated. Finally, the reactor performance was optimized to produce the highest syngas production with a HCMR of two using NSGA-II method. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License

Evaluation of Yield of Wells in Ado-Ekiti, Nigeria

Pumping tests were conducted on twenty selected boreholes and five hand-dug wells cut across Ado Ekiti Metropolitan (AEM) area, with the view to ascertain yield of the wells. Constant rate pumping test and recovery method test were carried out. It was revealled that discharge is directly proportional to the yield of the boreholes and hand-dug wells at a constant drawdown, hence the discharge rate  gives the yield of each of the selected boreholes. The borehole depth ranges between 40 – 120 m while hand-dug well ranges between 3 – 15m. Borehole yield in the AEM area ranged between 0.267 l/s and 2.0 l/s. The yield was not totally dependent on the depths, but also on such parameters as porosity and permeability.  The potential of groundwater in AEM as it relates to quantity is high as all wells yielded water. The average water consumption in litres per person per day for high class income earners was estimated at 196 l/d, while that of low class income earners was 119 l/d. Most residence in AEM depend on ground water for domestic water demand. Possible improvement strategies to groundwater exploitation were highlighted. These improvement strategies and remedies are predrilling geophysical survey before siting of boreholes, monitoring groundwater exploration to avert depletion of groundwater potential zones encouraging sufficient recharge period and conducting regular laboratory tests. Keywords: yield, boreholes, hand-dug wells, recharge, Ado Ekiti