Het meten van taalbegrip bij slechthorende kinderen

Het meten van taalbegrip bij slechthorende kinderen met de Reyneil Test voor Taalbegrip lijkt zonder meer niet goed mogelijk, omdat de items bestaan uit gesproken opdrachten en het begrip mede afhankelijk is van het goed kunnen verstaan van de opdracht. In dit artikel wordt een procedure met gebarenondersteuning beschreven, op een manier die grenzentesten wordt genoemd. Deze testprocedure is toegepast bij 61 leerlingen van de PH. Burgerschool, een school voor kinderen met verminderd gehoor in Amsterdam. Met de gevolgde procedure wordt een zogenaamde beginscore berekend die in feite de normale testscore is, en een eindscore die wordt verkregen na toepassing van de gebarenondersteuning. Uit de resultaten bleek dat slechthorende kinderen beter tot hun recht komen met de eindscore dan met de beginscore. De eindscore benadert het latente taalbegripsniveau beter dan de beginscore

Het meten van taalbegrip bij slechthorende kinderen

Het meten van taalbegrip bij slechthorende kinderen met de Reyneil Test voor Taalbegrip lijkt zonder meer niet goed mogelijk, omdat de items bestaan uit gesproken opdrachten en het begrip mede afhankelijk is van het goed kunnen verstaan van de opdracht. In dit artikel wordt een procedure met gebarenondersteuning beschreven, op een manier die grenzentesten wordt genoemd. Deze testprocedure is toegepast bij 61 leerlingen van de PH. Burgerschool, een school voor kinderen met verminderd gehoor in Amsterdam. Met de gevolgde procedure wordt een zogenaamde beginscore berekend die in feite de normale testscore is, en een eindscore die wordt verkregen na toepassing van de gebarenondersteuning. Uit de resultaten bleek dat slechthorende kinderen beter tot hun recht komen met de eindscore dan met de beginscore. De eindscore benadert het latente taalbegripsniveau beter dan de beginscore

Soil fungal community composition correlates with site-specific abiotic factors, tree community structure, and forest age in regenerating tropical rainforests

Simple Summary:& nbsp;Regenerating forests represent over half of all tropical forests. While regeneration processes of trees and animal groups have been studied, there is surprisingly little information about how the diversity and community composition of fungi and other microorganisms change and what ecological roles play in tropical forest regeneration. In this study, we compared the diversity and community composition of trees and soil fungi among primary forests and regenerating forests of different ages in two sampling areas in southern Costa Rica. Our study shows that while forest age has a significant influence, environmental factors, such as mesoclimate and soil chemistry, have stronger effects on both fungal and tree communities. Moreover, we observed that the more dissimilar tree communities are between any two sites, the more dissimilar the composition of fungal communities. The results presented here contribute to a better understanding of the successional processes of tropical forests in different regions and inform land use and forest management strategies, including, but not limited to, conservation, restoration, and sustainable use.Successional dynamics of plants and animals during tropical forest regeneration have been thoroughly studied, while fungal compositional dynamics during tropical forest succession remain unknown, despite the crucial roles of fungi in ecological processes. We combined tree data and soil fungal DNA metabarcoding data to compare richness and community composition along secondary forest succession in Costa Rica and assessed the potential roles of abiotic factors influencing them. We found a strong coupling of tree and soil fungal community structure in wet tropical primary and regenerating secondary forests. Forest age, edaphic variables, and regional differences in climatic conditions all had significant effects on tree and fungal richness and community composition in all functional groups. Furthermore, we observed larger site-to-site compositional differences and greater influence of edaphic and climatic factors in secondary than in primary forests. The results suggest greater environmental heterogeneity and greater stochasticity in community assembly in the early stages of secondary forest succession and a certain convergence on a set of taxa with a competitive advantage in the more persisting environmental conditions in old-growth forests. Our work provides unprecedented insights into the successional dynamics of fungal communities during secondary tropical forest succession.Plant science

Trade-Offs Between Carbon Stocks and Timber Recovery in Tropical Forests are Mediated by Logging Intensity

Forest degradation accounts for ~70% of total carbon losses from tropical forests. Substantial emissions are from selective logging, a land-use activity that decreases forest carbon density. To maintain carbon values in selectively logged forests, climate change mitigation policies and government agencies promote the adoption of reduced-impact logging (RIL) practices. However, whether RIL will maintain both carbon and timber values in managed tropical forests over time remains uncertain. In this study, we quantify the recovery of timber stocks and aboveground carbon at an experimental site where forests were subjected to different intensities of RIL (4, 8, and 16 trees/ha). Our census data span 20 years postlogging and 17 years after the liberation of future crop trees from competition in a tropical forest on the Guiana Shield, a globally important forest carbon reservoir. We model recovery of timber and carbon with a breakpoint regression that allowed us to capture elevated tree mortality immediately after logging. Recovery rates of timber and carbon were governed by the presence of residual trees (i.e., trees that persisted through the first harvest). The liberation treatment stimulated faster recovery of timber albeit at a carbon cost. Model results suggest a threshold logging intensity beyond which forests managed for timber and carbon derive few benefits from RIL, with recruitment and residual growth not sufficient to offset losses. Inclusion of the breakpoint at which carbon and timber gains outpaced postlogging mortality led to high predictive accuracy, including out-of-sample R2 values \u3e90%, and enabled inference on demographic changes postlogging. Our modeling framework is broadly applicable to studies that aim to quantify impacts of logging on forest recovery. Overall, we demonstrate that initial mortality drives variation in recovery rates, that the second harvest depends on old growth wood, and that timber intensification lowers carbon stocks

Changing the computer-patient-physician relationship : a qualitative evaluation of 30-inch computer screens in family medicine exam rooms

The electronic health record (EHR) and use of computers in today's exam rooms is a dramatic change in medicine from decades past. There are concerns about how the computer and EHR might adversely affect patient-provider interaction and that it may be detrimental to PCC. Patient-centered care (PCC) promotes active involvement of the patient in their medical care. Several positive outcomes have been associated with PCC, including: better emotional health, improved symptom burden, improved recovery, and fewer diagnostic tests and referrals both at the time of the visit and in the subsequent 2 months. PCC can therefore help to decrease medical expenditures while improving patient outcomes and satisfaction. It has been proposed that certain exam room and computer configurations combined with uses of the EHR may enhance PCC. If we can better determine how different types of computers affect this interaction, it would help suggest improvements for increasing PCC, thus gaining the aforementioned benefits of decreased cost and improved health outcomes

The ghosts of forests past and future : deforestation and botanical sampling in the Brazilian Amazon

The remarkable biodiversity of the Brazilian Amazon is poorly documented and threatened by deforestation. When undocumented areas become deforested, in addition to losing the fauna and flora, we lose the opportunity to know which unique species had occupied a habitat. Here we quantify such knowledge loss by calculating how much of the Brazilian Amazon has been deforested and will likely be deforested until 2050 without having its tree flora sufficiently documented. To this end, we analysed 399 147 digital specimens of nearly 6000 tree species in relation to official deforestation statistics and future deforestation scenarios. We find that by 2017, 30% of all the localities where tree specimens had been collected were mostly deforested. Some 300 000 km(2)(12%; 485 25 x 25 km grid cells) of the Brazilian Amazon had been deforested by 2017, without having a single tree specimen recorded. An additional 250 000-900 000 km(2)of severely under-collected rainforest will likely become deforested by 2050. If future tree sampling is to cover this area, sampling effort has to increase two- to six-fold. Nearly 255 000 km(2)or 7% of rainforest in the Brazilian Amazon is easily accessible but does yet but remain under-collected. Our study highlights how progressing deforestation increases the risk of losing undocumented species of a hyper-diverse tree flora.Peer reviewe

Consistent, small effects of tree-fall disturbances on the composition and diversity of four Amazonian forests

Understanding the resilience of moist tropical forests to tree fall disturbance events is important for understanding the mechanisms that underlie species coexistence and for predicting the future composition of these ecosystems. Here, we test whether variation in the functional composition of Amazonian forests determines their resilience to disturbance. 2. We studied the legacy of natural tree fall disturbance events in four forests across Amazonia that differ substantially in functional composition. We compared the composition and diversity of all free-standing woody stems 2 - 10 cm diameter in previously disturbed and undisturbed 20 x 20 m subplots within 55, one hectare, long-term forest inventory plots. 3. Overall, stem number increased following disturbance, and species and functional composition shifted to favour light-wooded, small-seeded taxa. Alpha diversity increased, but beta diversity was unaffected by disturbance, in all four forests. 4. Changes in response to disturbance in both functional composition and alpha diversity were, however, small (2 – 4 % depending on the parameter) and similar among forests. 5. Synthesis. This study demonstrates that variation in the functional composition of Amazonian forests does not lead to large differences in the response of these forests to tree fall disturbances and overall, these events have a minor role in maintaining the diversity of these ecosystems