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Semantic and inferencing abilities in children with communication disorders
Background: Semantic and inferencing abilities have not been fully examined in children with communication difficulties.
Aims: To investigate the inferential and semantic abilities of children with communication difficulties using newly designed tasks.
Methods & Procedures: Children with different types of communication disorder were compared with each other and with three groups of typically developing children: those of the same chronological age and two groups of younger children. In total, 25 children aged 11 years with specific language impairment and 22 children, also 11 years of age, with primary pragmatic difficulties were recruited. Typically developing groups aged 11 (nâ=â35; ageâmatch), and those aged 9 (nâ=â40) and 7 (nâ=â37; language similar) also participated as comparisons.
Outcomes & Results: For Semantic Choices, children with specific language impairment performed significantly more poorly than 9â and 11âyearâolds, whilst the pragmatic difficulties group scored significantly lower than all the typically developing groups. Borderline differences between specific language impairment and pragmatic difficulties groups were found. For inferencing, children with communication impairments performed significantly below the 11âyearâold peers, but not poorer than 9â and 7âyearâolds, suggesting that this skill is in line with language ability. Six children in the pragmatic difficulties group who met diagnosis for autism performed more poorly than the other two clinical groups on both tasks, but not statistically significantly so.
Conclusions: Both tasks were more difficult for those with communication impairments compared with peers. Semantic but not inferencing abilities showed a nonâsignificant trend for differences between the two clinical groups and children with pragmatic difficulties performed more poorly than all typically developing groups. The tasks may relate to each other in varying ways according to type of communication difficulty
Accountability disclosure of SOEs: comparing hybrid and private European news agencies
Purpose: This paper aims to explore the financial and non-financial accountability disclosure patterns of state-owned enterprises (SOEs), as hybrid organizations. Design/methodology/approach: Adopting the hybridity concept and resorting to stakeholder theory, this paper works on a comparison between the accountability disclosure patterns of hybrid and private organizations operating in the same industry. European national news agencies are selected as units of analysis and an extensive web content analysis is performed on three categories of information. Findings: SOEs are found to disclose a broader spectrum of information than private organizations, and differences between them have been found. Nevertheless, both financial and non-financial disclosures are underdeveloped in the two organizational types. Research limitations/implications: This paper illustrates how hybridity explains SOEsâ accountability disclosure patterns. Results could not be complemented through information on disclosure through alternative channels. Future studies are encouraged to perform simultaneous comparisons among hybrid, public and private organizations, as well as considering industry specifics. Practical implications: As web accountability disclosure helps to address the demands of distant stakeholders, efforts are needed to enhance SOEsâ web accountability disclosures and not to undermine democratic accountability relationships. Originality/value: This paper contributes to the ongoing debate on the accountability mechanisms and style of SOEs. Using a framework for hybrid organizations provides an understanding of how SOEs, as hybrid organizations, disclose information for accountability. In turn, this allows, and then promotes, the investigation of social phenomena by conceiving hybridity as a standalone institutional space
Embedding sustainability dimensions in university collections management: a âscientific journeyâ into a natural history museum
Purpose â The purpose of this research aims at extending the knowledge on whether and how universities
include sustainability dimensions in managing their collections. Precisely, the study focusses on the creation of
a university museum (UM), as an embryonic stage of life during which management concerns both strategic
and operational issues.
Design/methodology/approach â Sustainability is envisioned as a multifaceted concept, composed of the
economic, cultural, environmental and social dimensions. Resorting to an acknowledged theoretical model for
sustainable development in museum management, a qualitative interpretative study is carried out, gathering
data from multiple sources. The empirical setting is the University of Pavia, which has recently created a new
Museum of Natural History (Kosmos).
Findings â Results highlight how sustainability dimensions intertwin in UM creation. Moreover, the economic
dimension emerges as a basement for the others. Value for the community, expressed in economic terms, must
be ensured in UMs creation as well as throughout its entire life, in order to support cultural, environmental and
social sustainability.
Research limitations/implications â Focussing on the embryonic stage of UMs life allowed to consider
how sustainability is embedded in relevant strategic and operational decisions. Nevertheless, scholars are
encouraged to replicate the study in other stages of UMsâ life, in a way to provide insights on its dynamics.
Practical implications â University collections managers can benefit from this research by acknowledging
the role played by the economic dimension of sustainability. Notwithstanding their mission, universities should
pay attention to extracting economic value from the management of their collections, as a means to ensure
innovative and sustainable management on the cultural, environmental and social respects. Furthermore, this
research suggests how a higher education system is able to create a new museum by relying on
interdisciplinary competencies, which support sustainability since the embryonic stage.
Originality/value âThis research contributes to the cultural heritage management literature by proposing an
updated version of the sustainable development model for museums, which highlights the different relevance
of the sustainability dimensions with particular regard to the UM creation and managemen
Dynamic filtering of static dipoles in magnetoencephalography
We consider the problem of estimating neural activity from measurements
of the magnetic fields recorded by magnetoencephalography. We exploit
the temporal structure of the problem and model the neural current as a
collection of evolving current dipoles, which appear and disappear, but whose
locations are constant throughout their lifetime. This fully reflects the physiological
interpretation of the model.
In order to conduct inference under this proposed model, it was necessary
to develop an algorithm based around state-of-the-art sequential Monte
Carlo methods employing carefully designed importance distributions. Previous
work employed a bootstrap filter and an artificial dynamic structure
where dipoles performed a random walk in space, yielding nonphysical artefacts
in the reconstructions; such artefacts are not observed when using the
proposed model. The algorithm is validated with simulated data, in which
it provided an average localisation error which is approximately half that of
the bootstrap filter. An application to complex real data derived from a somatosensory
experiment is presented. Assessment of model fit via marginal
likelihood showed a clear preference for the proposed model and the associated
reconstructions show better localisation
CAD/CAM Diagnostic Esthetic Functional Splint (DEFS) as a removable prototype to evaluate the final prosthetic rehabilitation: a narrative review.
The main objective of this narrative review was to provide an overview of DEFS (Diagnostic Esthetic Functional Splint), namely CAD/CAM manufactured, âsnap-retainedâ, tooth-colored splints available by materials exhibiting a certain degree of elasticity (like polycarbonates or acetal resins) for restoring function, esthetics and occlusion in several clinical situations, before or as an intermediate alternative to undergoing the final treatment. The search strategy included all papers dealing with snap-retained prosthetic systems and was based on a literature review of papers available in electronic databases (Pubmed/Medline, Evidence-Based Dentistry, BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine, Dynamed, Embase, BMJ Clinical Evidence, Web of Science, Scientific reports); eligible papers were researched on Opengreyand a manual search was performed, as well. From the electronic databases emerged 13,199 records, many of which were duplicates. The grey literature and the manual research did not produce any eligible article. After duplicates removal, 7690 records were obtained. Titles, abstracts and keywords were analyzed. The studies concerning the topic of interest were examined by the reviewers and discussed. Although no evidence-based data were found in the literature, according to the authorsâ clinical experience, the DEFS (Diagnostic Esthetic Functional Splint) is a very promising solution in multiple clinical situations, due to its diagnostic, therapeutical, functional and esthetic versatility
Rational control of the activity of a Cu2+-dependent DNAzyme by re-engineering purely entropic intrinsically disordered domains
The function and activity of many proteins is finely controlled by the modulation of the entropic contribution of intrinsically disordered domains that are not directly involved in any recognition event. Inspired by this mechanism, we demonstrate here that we could finely regulate the catalytic activity of a model DNAzyme (i.e., a synthetic DNA sequence with enzyme-like properties) by rationally introducing intrinsically disordered nucleic acid portions in its original sequence. More specifically, we have re-engineered here the well-characterized Cu2+-dependent DNAzyme that catalyzes a self-cleavage reaction by introducing a poly(T) linker domain in its sequence. The linker is not directly involved in the recognition event and connects the two domains that fold to form the catalytic core. We demonstrate that the enzyme-like activity of this re-engineered DNAzyme can be modulated in a predictable and fine way by changing the length, and thus entropy, of such a linker domain. Given these attributes, the rational design of intrinsically disordered domains could expand the available toolbox to achieve a control of the activity of DNAzymes and, in analogy, ribozymes through a purely entropic contribution
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