A Study of Transfer in the Speech Act of Apologizing

One recent perspective on the process of transfer in second language acquisition is that second language learners' willingness to transfer rules from their first language is related to their perception of language-specificity and the distance between their first and second language (Kellerman 1978). Support for this perspective was found in Olshtain's 1981 study of the behavior of native speakers of English and Russian in the speech act of apologizing. The present study was undertaken to investigate the relationship between the transfer behavior of native speakers of Chinese in the speech act of apologizing and their intuitions about language-specificity and distance. 12 native speakers of Chinese were interviewed and asked to role-play their responses in both English and Chinese in 8 situations in which apologies were expected. Analysis of the collected data and comparison with Olshtain's data for native speakers of English indicate that there is a relationship between intuitions about language-specificity and language distance and transfer behavior

Adherence therapy versus routine psychiatric care for people with schizophrenia spectrum disorders : a randomised controlled trial

2015-2016 > Academic research: refereed > Publication in refereed journalVersion of RecordPublishe

Notorious places: image, reputation, stigma: the role of newspapers in area reputations for social housing estates

This paper reviews work in several disciplines to distinguish between image, reputation and stigma. It also shows that there has been little research on the process by which area reputations are established and sustained through transmission processes. This paper reports on research into the portrayal of two social housing estates in the printed media over an extended period of time (14 years). It was found that negative and mixed coverage of the estates dominated, with the amount of positive coverage being very small. By examining the way in which dominant themes were used by newspapers in respect of each estate, questions are raised about the mode of operation of the press and the communities' collective right to challenge this. By identifying the way regeneration stories are covered and the nature of the content of positive stories, lessons are drawn for programmes of area transformation. The need for social regeneration activities is identified as an important ingredient for changing deprived-area reputations

A lattice model for the kinetics of rupture of fluid bilayer membranes

We have constructed a model for the kinetics of rupture of membranes under tension, applying physical principles relevant to lipid bilayers held together by hydrophobic interactions. The membrane is characterized by the bulk compressibility (for expansion), the thickness of the hydrophobic part of the bilayer, the hydrophobicity and a parameter characterizing the tail rigidity of the lipids. The model is a lattice model which incorporates strain relaxation, and considers the nucleation of pores at constant area, constant temperature, and constant particle number. The particle number is conserved by allowing multiple occupancy of the sites. An equilibrium ``phase diagram'' is constructed as a function of temperature and strain with the total pore surface and distribution as the order parameters. A first order rupture line is found with increasing tension, and a continuous increase in proto-pore concentration with rising temperature till instability. The model explains current results on saturated and unsaturated PC lipid bilayers and thicker artificial bilayers made of diblock copolymers. Pore size distributions are presented for various values of area expansion and temperature, and the fractal dimension of the pore edge is evaluated.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figure

Sabotage in Contests: A Survey

A contest is a situation in which individuals expend irretrievable resources to win valuable prize(s). ‘Sabotage’ is a deliberate and costly act of damaging a rival’s' likelihood of winning the contest. Sabotage can be observed in, e.g., sports, war, promotion tournaments, political or marketing campaigns. In this article, we provide a model and various perspectives on such sabotage activities and review the economics literature analyzing the act of sabotage in contests. We discuss the theories and evidence highlighting the means of sabotage, why sabotage occurs, and the effects of sabotage on individual players and on overall welfare, along with possible mechanisms to reduce sabotage. We note that most sabotage activities are aimed at the ablest player, the possibility of sabotage reduces productive effort exerted by the players, and sabotage may lessen the effectiveness of public policies, such as affirmative action, or information revelation in contests. We discuss various policies that a designer may employ to counteract sabotage activities. We conclude by pointing out some areas of future research

Search for direct stau production in events with two hadronic tau-leptons in root s=13 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for the direct production of the supersymmetric partners ofτ-leptons (staus) in final stateswith two hadronically decayingτ-leptons is presented. The analysis uses a dataset of pp collisions corresponding to an integrated luminosity of139fb−1, recorded with the ATLAS detector at the LargeHadron Collider at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV. No significant deviation from the expected StandardModel background is observed. Limits are derived in scenarios of direct production of stau pairs with eachstau decaying into the stable lightest neutralino and oneτ-lepton in simplified models where the two staumass eigenstates are degenerate. Stau masses from 120 GeV to 390 GeV are excluded at 95% confidencelevel for a massless lightest neutralino

Adjuvanted multi-epitope vaccines protect HLA-A*11:01 transgenic mice against Toxoplasma gondii

We created and tested multi-epitope DNA or protein vaccines with TLR4 ligand emulsion adjuvant (gluco glucopyranosyl lipid adjuvant in a stable emulsion [GLA-SE]) for their ability to protect against Toxoplasma gondii in HLA transgenic mice. Our constructs each included 5 of our best down-selected CD8(+) T cell-eliciting epitopes, a universal CD4(+) helper T lymphocyte epitope (PADRE), and a secretory signal, all arranged for optimal MHC-I presentation. Their capacity to elicit immune and protective responses was studied using immunization of HLA-A*11:01 transgenic mice. These multi-epitope vaccines increased memory CD8(+) T cells that produced IFN-γ and protected mice against parasite burden when challenged with T. gondii. Endocytosis of emulsion-trapped protein and cross presentation of the antigens must account for the immunogenicity of our adjuvanted protein. Thus, our work creates an adjuvanted platform assembly of peptides resulting in cross presentation of CD8(+) T cell-eliciting epitopes in a vaccine that prevents toxoplasmosis

Expected Performance of the ATLAS Experiment - Detector, Trigger and Physics

A detailed study is presented of the expected performance of the ATLAS detector. The reconstruction of tracks, leptons, photons, missing energy and jets is investigated, together with the performance of b-tagging and the trigger. The physics potential for a variety of interesting physics processes, within the Standard Model and beyond, is examined. The study comprises a series of notes based on simulations of the detector and physics processes, with particular emphasis given to the data expected from the first years of operation of the LHC at CERN

Development of a web-enabled learning platform for geospatial laboratories: improving the undergraduate learning experience

This paper describes a web-enabled learning platform providing remote access to geospatial software that extends the learning experience outside of the laboratory setting. The platform was piloted in two undergraduate courses, and includes a software server, a data server, and remote student users. The platform was designed to improve the quality of the learning experience and to increase student confidence and proficiency with software-based geospatial skills. Laboratory grades of students using the platform were significantly higher than those of students who did not use the platform, and survey responses reported that students overwhelmingly liked the convenience of the platform, which allowed them to work from any location