Technology, organization and materiality: Reflections on the Problem of Agency

In management and information systems research, there has been a long-standing debate over the relationship between technology and the organization in which it is embedded. This debate flares up periodically and this is one such time. At one extreme is technological determinism, which makes the claim that technology is the cause and organizational change is the effect. At the other extreme is social determinism, which claims that social action and interaction is the cause and technological change is the effect. Is there a way out of this debate? How can we make sense of the interactions between people and machines? In this paper, we will examine the debate, discuss what is at stake in its resolution and explore an alternative

Population Aging and Intergenerational Transfers: Introducing Age into National Accounts

In all societies intergenerational transfers are large and have an important influence on inequality and growth. The development of each generation of youth depends on the resources that it receives from productive members of society for health, education, and sustenance. The well-being of the elderly depends on familial support and a variety of social programs. The National Transfer Accounts (NTA) system provides a comprehensive approach to measuring all reallocations of income across age and time at the aggregate level. It encompasses reallocations achieved through capital accumulation and transfers, distinguishing those mediated by public institutions from those relying on private institutions. This paper introduces the methodology and presents preliminary results emphasizing economic support systems in Taiwan and the United States. As the two economies differ in their demographic configuration, their level of development, and their old-age support systems, comparing them will shed light on the economic implications of population aging under alternative institutional arrangements.

The U.S. Army Telemedicine and m-Health Program: Making a Difference at Home and Abroad

This article highlights the deployment of telemedicine by the U.S. Army through the various echelons of care and in overseas locations, including range and scope of health services provided by telemedicine in a challenging environment. This is followed by a discussion of technological developments advances in mobile communications likely to change the practice of telemedicine in the military from limited fixed-point access to a highly mobile individual with handheld communication devices.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/140278/1/tmj.2012.0297.pd

Balancing Industrial Concentration and Competition for Economic Development in Asia: Insights from South Korea, China, India, Indonesia and the Philippines

In pursuit of economic growth and development, countries have tried to strike a balance between competition and industrial policies across time. This paper will review the empirical evidence on industrial concentration and its economic correlates (notably firms' performance as measured by profitability, factor productivity and innovation). It will also analyze how the introduction of competition policies and laws in South Korea, China, India, Indonesia and the Philippines affected industrial concentration. It will examine at what point in their industrialization and economic development these economies implemented these laws and policies. The empirical literature suggests that industrial concentration could exhibit an inverted-U-shaped relationship as far as its link to certain economic indicators of success, such as productivity and innovation. This suggests a role for recalibrating policies to adjust the balance between industrial concentration and competition, so that the over-all outcomes are net welfare enhancing. Indeed, country policy experiences reviewed here appear to demonstrate this recalibration, notably following privatization and liberalization policies

A psychophysical measurement and analysis of motion perception in normal and binocularly deprived monkeys

PURPOSE. To measure psychophysically the thresholds for motion detection in the nasal and temporal directions under monocular viewing conditions in monkeys reared under conditions of daily alternating monocular occlusion (AMO). The hypothesis was that motion perception would be asymmetric with more sensitivity for motion in the nasal direction. METHODS. Three monkeys subjected to AMO (AMO monkeys) and three normal monkeys were studied. All were trained with operant conditioning techniques to discriminate coherent from random motion in a random dot display. The percentage of dots in the display that moved either left or right was varied. Thresholds for motion detection of nasally directed and temporally directed stimuli were measured to determine whether the motion perception of AMO monkeys was asymmetric, as predicted. RESULTS. A two-factor analysis of variance revealed a statistically significant difference between treatment groups (normal versus AMO) and directions (nasal versus temporal) and a significant interaction. The interaction was due to a significant difference between nasal and temporal directions for the AMO group, but no significant difference for the normal group. Planned comparisons were performed based on each animal's best eye (eye most sensitive to nasal motion) and worst eye (eye least sensitive to temporal motion). No significant differences were found between the two groups in the best eyes' responses to the nasal direction, but the worst eyes' responses in the temporal direction were significantly poorer in the AMO group. A neural model that can account for these findings is based on a Hebbian teacher located in the nucleus of the optic tract that strengthens connections of a subpopulation of directionally selective cortical neurons. CONCLUSIONS. AMO rearing results in asymmetric motion perception. Thresholds for detecting nasally directed motion are normal, whereas thresholds for detecting temporally directed motion are deficient. These results demonstrate that motionprocessing mechanisms in primates exhibit experience-dependent developmental neural plasticity. The locus of the neural plasticity could be a subpopulation of directionally selective neurons in the striate cortex (V1). (Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci. 2001;42:2547-2553 V isual experience during the early postnatal period plays an important role in development of those parts of the brain that process visual information. 1,2 At birth, human and monkey infants exhibit smooth-pursuit eye movements with stronger responses in the nasal than the temporal direction and asymmetrical monocular optokinetic nystagmus (MOKN) responses characterized by a reduction in the frequency of beats and in amplitude of slow-phase tracking in the temporal direction. 10,11 Evidence of cortical asymmetry in motion processing comes from measurements of visually evoked potentials to motion (MVEP) elicited by oscillating horizontal stimuli. 12-15 MVEP responses produced by human and monkey infants are dominated by the first harmonic component and show responses that are 180°out of phase in the two eyes during monocular viewing. These results have been interpreted as demonstrating that there is a directional bias in neonates that works in opposite directions in the left and right eyes. The neonatal asymmetrical responses to smooth pursuit, MOKN, and MVEPs become symmetrical by approximately 6 months of age in humans and after a few weeks in monkeys. 27 These findings of prolonged motion asymmetries of various forms in visually deprived animals and in humans with infantile esotropia have led to the hypothesis that binocular visual experience during a sensitive period of postnatal development may be crucial to the normal development of motion processing. Studies in humans suggest that the sensitive period associated with asymmetric motion processing may end very early. For example, children who experienced early visual deprivation within the first 6 months of life (early-onset esotropia) displayed MOKN asymmetry, even when the strabismus was corrected, and some amount of binocular fusion finally develFrom th

Animating TTS Messages in Android using Open-Source Tools

ABSTRACT We describe in this paper how to use open-source resources to design and implement an Android application that renders a three-dimensional model of a human head to animate the lip movements of human speech from input text. The application utilizes the Android Text-To-Speech (TTS) engine[1] to convert any input text, which can be entered by the user in a text box or chosen from a menu of predefined messages, to human speech in English. Animation of the speech is carried out by a 3D graphics model of a human head composed of polygon meshes We use Java language to develop a parse

Postoperative hyperphosphatemia significantly associates with adverse survival in colorectal cancer patients

BACKGROUND: Hyperphosphatemia has been implicated in the development and treatment of various cancers. However, whether it can be used as a direct prognostic marker of colorectal cancer (CRC) has remained unexplored. Given new insights into the importance of hyperphosphatemia in CRC, we sought to evaluate the association of hyperphosphatemia with the clinical outcomes of this disease. METHODS: In a retrospective analysis of a well-characterized clinic-based cohort with 1,241 CRC patients, we assessed the association of postoperative hyperphosphatemia with patient overall survival. RESULTS: Postoperative hyperphosphatemia measured within the first month after surgery was significantly associated with CRC survival. Compared to patients with a normal phosphate level, those with hyperphosphatemia exhibited a significant unfavorable overall survival with a hazard ratio (HR) of 1.84 (95% confidence interval [CI] 1.49–2.29, P=2.6×10(−8), (log-rank P=1.2×10(−7)). Stratified analyses indicated the association was more pronounced in patients with colon (HR=2.00, 95% CI 1.57–2.56, P=3.17×10(−8)) but not rectal cancer (HR=0.96, 95% CI 0.58–1.59, P=0.889) (P interaction=0.023), as well as in those not receiving chemotherapy (HR=2.15, 95% CI 1.59–2.90, P=6.2×10(−7)) but not in those receiving chemotherapy (HR=1.30, 95% CI 0.92–1.82, P=0.136) (P interaction=0.012). Flexible parametric survival model demonstrated that the increased risk for death conferred by postoperative hyperphosphatemia persisted over 150 months after surgery. CONCLUSION: Our data indicated that postoperative hyperphosphatemia might be used as a prognostic marker of CRC patients after surgery. Since phosphate level is routinely tested in clinics, it may be incorporated into clinical models to predict CRC survival

Blood pressure variability in individuals with and without (pre)diabetes:the Maastricht Study

Objective: The mechanisms associating (pre)diabetes and cardiovascular disease (CVD) are incompletely understood. We hypothesize that greater blood pressure variability (BPV) may underlie this association, due to its association with (incident) CVD. Therefore, we investigated the association between (pre)diabetes and very short-term to mid-term BPV, that is within-visit, 24-h and 7-day BPV. Methods: Cross-sectional data from The Maastricht Study [normal glucose metabolism (NGM), n¼1924; prediabetes, n¼511; type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM), n¼975; 51% men, aged 608 years]. We determined SD for within visit BPV (n¼3244), average real variability for 24-h BPV (n¼2699) day (0900–2100 h) and night (0100–0600 h) separately, and SD for 7-day BPV (n¼2259). Differences in BPV as compared with NGM were assessed by multiple linear regressions with adjustment for potential confounders. Results: In T2DM, the average systolic/diastolic values of within-visit, 24-h and 7-day BPV were 4.8/2.6, 10.5/7.3 and 10.4/6.5 mmHg, respectively, and in prediabetes 4.9/ 2.6, 10.3/7.0 and 9.4/5.9 mmHg, respectively. T2DM was associated with greater nocturnal systolic BPV [0.42mmHg (95% confidence interval: 0.05–0.80)], and greater 7-day systolic [0.76mmHg (0.32–1.19)] and diastolic BPV [0.65mmHg (0.29–1.01)], whereas prediabetes was associated with greater within-visit systolic BPV only [0.35mmHg (0.06–0.65)], as compared with NGM. Conclusion: Both T2DM and prediabetes are associated with slightly greater very short-term to mid-term BPV, which may, according to previous literature, explain a small part of the increased CVD risk seen in (pre)diabetes. Nevertheless, these findings do not detract from the fact that very short-term to mid-term BPV is substantial and important in individuals with and without (pre)diabetes

The SEGUE Stellar Parameter Pipeline. III. Comparison with High-Resolution Spectroscopy of SDSS/SEGUE Field Stars

We report high-resolution spectroscopy of 125 field stars previously observed as part of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and its program for Galactic studies, the Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Exploration (SEGUE). These spectra are used to measure radial velocities and to derive atmospheric parameters, which we compare with those reported by the SEGUE Stellar Parameter Pipeline (SSPP). The SSPP obtains estimates of these quantities based on SDSS ugriz photometry and low-resolution (R = 2000) spectroscopy. For F- and G-type stars observed with high signal-to-noise ratios (S/N), we empirically determine the typical random uncertainties in the radial velocities, effective temperatures, surface gravities, and metallicities delivered by the SSPP to be 2.4 km/s, 130 K (2.2%), 0.21 dex, and 0.11 dex, respectively, with systematic uncertainties of a similar magnitude in the effective temperatures and metallicities. We estimate random errors for lower S/N spectra based on numerical simulations.Comment: 37 pages, 6 tables, 6 figures, submitted to the Astronomical Journa