426 research outputs found
E-Readers Are More Effective than Paper for Some with Dyslexia
E-readers are fast rivaling print as a dominant method for reading. Because they offer accessibility options that are impossible in print, they are potentially beneficial for those with impairments, such as dyslexia. Yet, little is known about how the use of these devices influences reading in those who struggle. Here, we observe reading comprehension and speed in 103 high school students with dyslexia. Reading on paper was compared with reading on a small handheld e-reader device, formatted to display few words per line. We found that use of the device significantly improved speed and comprehension, when compared with traditional presentations on paper for specific subsets of these individuals: Those who struggled most with phoneme decoding or efficient sight word reading read more rapidly using the device, and those with limited VA Spans gained in comprehension. Prior eye tracking studies demonstrated that short lines facilitate reading in dyslexia, suggesting that it is the use of short lines (and not the device per se) that leads to the observed benefits. We propose that these findings may be understood as a consequence of visual attention deficits, in some with dyslexia, that make it difficult to allocate attention to uncrowded text near fixation, as the gaze advances during reading. Short lines ameliorate this by guiding attention to the uncrowded span
Strings from Feynman Graph counting : without large N
A well-known connection between n strings winding around a circle and
permutations of n objects plays a fundamental role in the string theory of
large N two dimensional Yang Mills theory and elsewhere in topological and
physical string theories. Basic questions in the enumeration of Feynman graphs
can be expressed elegantly in terms of permutation groups. We show that these
permutation techniques for Feynman graph enumeration, along with the Burnside
counting lemma, lead to equalities between counting problems of Feynman graphs
in scalar field theories and Quantum Electrodynamics with the counting of
amplitudes in a string theory with torus or cylinder target space. This string
theory arises in the large N expansion of two dimensional Yang Mills and is
closely related to lattice gauge theory with S_n gauge group. We collect and
extend results on generating functions for Feynman graph counting, which
connect directly with the string picture. We propose that the connection
between string combinatorics and permutations has implications for QFT-string
dualities, beyond the framework of large N gauge theory.Comment: 55 pages + 10 pages Appendices, 23 figures ; version 2 - typos
correcte
The Cone-Like H-alpha Nebula in NGC 4945: A Galactic Superwind Bow Shock ?
We find that a non-axisymmetric bow shock model, with an appropriate choice
of parameters, could fit the line splitting velocity field of the cone-like
H nebula in NGC 4945 better than a canonical cone model. Meanwhile, the
bow shock model could also reproduce the morphology of the H nebula.
The bow shock results from the interaction of the galactic superwinds with a
giant HII region. It is implied that the starburst ring or disk around the
galactic nucleus should be generating strong winds, and the bright H
knot northwest of the nucleus be suffering an anisotropic mass loss process.Comment: 14 pages, aasms4.sty, 3 figures not included (available upon request)
To appear in ApJ Letters. email chy, [email protected]
Shorter Lines Facilitate Reading in Those Who Struggle
People with dyslexia, who ordinarily struggle to read, sometimes remark that reading is easier when e-readers are used. Here, we used eye tracking to observe high school students with dyslexia as they read using these devices. Among the factors investigated, we found that reading using a small device resulted in substantial benefits, improving reading speeds by 27%, reducing the number of fixations by 11%, and importantly, reducing the number of regressive saccades by more than a factor of 2, with no cost to comprehension. Given that an expected trade-off between horizontal and vertical regression was not observed when line lengths were altered, we speculate that these effects occur because sluggish attention spreads perception to the left as the gaze shifts during reading. Short lines eliminate crowded text to the left, reducing regression. The effects of attention modulation by the hand, and of increased letter spacing to reduce crowding, were also found to modulate the oculomotor dynamics in reading, but whether these factors resulted in benefits or costs depended on characteristics, such as visual attention span, that varied within our sample
The Effects of Visual Attention Span and Phonological Decoding in Reading Comprehension in Dyslexia: A Path Analysis
Increasing evidence has shown visual attention span to be a factor, distinct from phonological skills, that explains single-word identification (pseudo-word/word reading) performance in dyslexia. Yet, little is known about how well visual attention span explains text comprehension. Observing reading comprehension in a sample of 105 high school students with dyslexia, we used a pathway analysis to examine the direct and indirect path between visual attention span and reading comprehension while controlling for other factors such as phonological awareness, letter identification, short-term memory, IQ and age. Integrating phonemic decoding efficiency skills in the analytic model, this study aimed to disentangle how visual attention span and phonological skills work together in reading comprehension for readers with dyslexia. We found visual attention span to have a significant direct effect on more difficult reading comprehension but not on an easier level. It also had a significant direct effect on pseudo-word identification but not on word identification. In addition, we found that visual attention span indirectly explains reading comprehension through pseudo-word reading and word reading skills. This study supports the hypothesis that at least part of the dyslexic profile can be explained by visual attention abilities
E-Readers Are More Effective than Paper for Some with Dyslexia
E-readers are fast rivaling print as a dominant method for reading. Because they offer accessibility options that are impossible in print, they are potentially beneficial for those with impairments, such as dyslexia. Yet, little is known about how the use of these devices influences reading in those who struggle. Here, we observe reading comprehension and speed in 103 high school students with dyslexia. Reading on paper was compared with reading on a small handheld e-reader device, formatted to display few words per line. We found that use of the device significantly improved speed and comprehension, when compared with traditional presentations on paper for specific subsets of these individuals: Those who struggled most with phoneme decoding or efficient sight word reading read more rapidly using the device, and those with limited VA Spans gained in comprehension. Prior eye tracking studies demonstrated that short lines facilitate reading in dyslexia, suggesting that it is the use of short lines (and not the device per se) that leads to the observed benefits. We propose that these findings may be understood as a consequence of visual attention deficits, in some with dyslexia, that make it difficult to allocate attention to uncrowded text near fixation, as the gaze advances during reading. Short lines ameliorate this by guiding attention to the uncrowded span
M. Kontsevich's graph complex and the Grothendieck-Teichmueller Lie algebra
We show that the zeroth cohomology of M. Kontsevich's graph complex is
isomorphic to the Grothendieck-Teichmueller Lie algebra grt_1. The map is
explicitly described. This result has applications to deformation quantization
and Duflo theory. We also compute the homotopy derivations of the Gerstenhaber
operad. They are parameterized by grt_1, up to one class (or two, depending on
the definitions). More generally, the homotopy derivations of the (non-unital)
E_n operads may be expressed through the cohomology of a suitable graph
complex. Our methods also give a second proof of a result of H. Furusho,
stating that the pentagon equation for grt_1-elements implies the hexagon
equation
Shorter Lines Facilitate Reading in Those Who Struggle
People with dyslexia, who ordinarily struggle to read, sometimes remark that reading is easier when e-readers are used. Here, we used eye tracking to observe high school students with dyslexia as they read using these devices. Among the factors investigated, we found that reading using a small device resulted in substantial benefits, improving reading speeds by 27%, reducing the number of fixations by 11%, and importantly, reducing the number of regressive saccades by more than a factor of 2, with no cost to comprehension. Given that an expected trade-off between horizontal and vertical regression was not observed when line lengths were altered, we speculate that these effects occur because sluggish attention spreads perception to the left as the gaze shifts during reading. Short lines eliminate crowded text to the left, reducing regression. The effects of attention modulation by the hand, and of increased letter spacing to reduce crowding, were also found to modulate the oculomotor dynamics in reading, but whether these factors resulted in benefits or costs depended on characteristics, such as visual attention span, that varied within our sample
The Beta Ansatz: A Tale of Two Complex Structures
Brane tilings, sometimes called dimer models, are a class of bipartite graphs on a torus which encode the gauge theory data of four-dimensional SCFTs dual to D3-branes probing toric Calabi-Yau threefolds. An efficient way of encoding this information exploits the theory of dessin d’enfants, expressing the structure in terms of a permutation triple, which is in turn related to a Belyi pair, namely a holomorphic map from a torus to a P1 with three marked points. The procedure of a-maximization, in the context of isoradial embeddings of the dimer, also associates a complex structure to the torus, determined by the R-charges in the SCFT, which can be compared with the Belyi complex structure. Algorithms for the explicit construction of the Belyi pairs are described in detail. In the case of orbifolds, these algorithms are related to the construction of covers of elliptic curves, which exploits the properties of Weierstraß elliptic functions. We present a counter example to a previous conjecture identifying the complex structure of the Belyi curve to the complex structure associated with R-charges
A New Upper Limit for the Tau-Neutrino Magnetic Moment
Using a prompt neutrino beam in which a nu_tau component was identified for
the first time, the nu_tau magnetic moment was measured based on a search for
an anomalous increase in the number of neutrino-electron interactions. One such
event was observed when 2.3 were expected from background processes, giving an
upper 90% confidence limit of 3.9x10^-7 Bohr magnetons.Comment: 9 pages; 1 figur
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