Getting Real: The Hypothesis of Organic Fossil Origins

In this paper I hope to at least begin to explore when this “problem of unconceived alternatives” does and does not pose a serious challenge to belief in the claims of our best theoretical science by considering an especially revealing biological example: the hypothesis that fossils are the remains of once-living organisms

Roles of Adult Education Programmes in Poverty Alleviation in Okrika and Port Harcourt City Local Government Area, Rivers State

This study examined the roles of adult education programmes in poverty alleviation in Okrika and Port Harcourt City Local Government Areas of Rivers State 3 research questions and 3 research objectives guided the study 3 hypotheses were also tested at 0 05 significant level The study adopted analytical survey design with a population of 5653 beneficiaries of Rivers State Government adult education programmes for Poverty Alleviation in the area of study out of which 2 828 beneficiaries were proportionately sampled The instrument used for data collection was a validated researcher-made questionnaire titled Roles of Adult Education Programmes in Poverty Alleviation Questionnaire The instrument has a reliability index of 0 74 Data obtained were analysed with percentages mean statistic and T-Test Findings of the study revealed that adult education programmes designed for poverty alleviation in Okrika and Portharcourt Local Government Areas are functional literacy vocational skills and technical education That these adult education programmes have promoted capacity building improve productivity and requisite vocational occupational skills for self-reliance among community member

Investigating Malawian physical science teachers' teaching strategies: a case study in nuclear physics

Malawian physical science teachers (PSTs) perceive nuclear physics to be the most difficult physics topic. This study investigated: reasons PSTs would give for this perception, teaching strategies that some PSTs would use to address learning difficulties in nuclear physics, reasons the teachers would give for using certain strategies and nature of the PSTs’ pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) in nuclear physics. Assumptions of the interpretivist paradigm and the theoretical framework of PCK guided the data collection, organisation and analysis processes. Thirty teachers completed a questionnaire, which enabled me to identify PSTs who chose nuclear physics as the most difficult, difficult aspects of nuclear physics and reasons those aspects are difficult. Stratified purposive sampling was then used to choose four case teachers. I observed two lessons on nuclear physics for each case teacher by video recording them. I interviewed each case teacher before and after both lessons. I also interviewed a group of students after each lesson. Video recordings were discussed with the respective teachers. Some documents were collected. All interviews and video recordings were transcribed into text, coded using Atlas.ti 5.2 and analysed inductively. Content analysis was used with documents. Some learning difficulties surface during lessons and they mainly related to student conceptions, nature of concepts and mathematical manipulations. The case teachers could not anticipate most of them, irrespective of qualification. It would seem the teachers were hardly aware of lesson-specific difficulties. The case teachers used combinations of strategies that focused on transmission of information. The teachers hardly probed student thinking. Reasons given for strategies adopted revealed that qualified teachers emphasised only content while the under-qualified ones also emphasised pedagogy. iv Also qualified case teachers ascertained student understanding more frequently than the less qualified ones. Also one of the qualified teachers was able to articulate main ideas of the lessons, while the other three could hardly do so. I conclude that teachers with similar characteristics as those studied here need assistance to develop the following aspects of PCK in nuclear physics: awareness of learning difficulties, use of strategies that are based on student thinking and ability to articulate main ideas

Versatility and exploratory psychometric properties of the Impulsive/Premeditated Aggression Scale (IPAS): A review

Aggression has different conceptualizations and can be behaviorally expressed in diverse ways. Designed to evaluate impulsive and premeditated forms of aggression, the Impulsive/Premeditated Aggression Scale (IPAS; Stanford et al., 2003) is a 30 item self-report questionnaire. The aim of the present study was to explore IPAS versatility in different psychological settings by reviewing and examining the exploratory psychometric prop- erties of the IPAS impulsive and premeditated subscales, across different samples and cultural backgrounds. Fifty-two articles including demographic or psychometric information (internal consistency, factor analysis, validity, reliability) were retrieved. It is suggested that the IPAS is reliable across different cultures, samples and scoring techniques. The two subscales (Impulsive and Premeditated) show acceptable internal consistency. Also, IPAS factors seem to be constant both in clinical and non-clinical samples. The IPAS appears to be a clinically useful instrument for differentiating between subtypes of aggressive behavior, to support risk assessment eva- luations, pretrial decisions and better treatment and rehabilitation strategies in offenders and clinical relevant samples.This work was supported by The Foundation for Science and Technology (Grant number SFRH/BD/76062/2011), and the Portuguese Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education through national funds and co-financed by FEDER and COMPETE2020 under the PT2020 Partnership Agreement (POCI-01-0145-FEDER007653) - Psychology Research Centre (UID/PSI/01662), awarded to the first author. The study was also supported by Grant SFRH/BPD/108602/2015 from the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology awarded to Andreia de Castro-Rodrigues

Basins of attraction for various Steffensen-Type methods

The dynamical behavior of different Steffensen-type methods is analyzed. We check the chaotic behaviors alongside the convergence radii (understood as the wideness of the basin of attraction) needed by Steffensen-type methods, that is, derivative-free iteration functions, to converge to a root and compare the results using different numerical tests. We will conclude that the convergence radii (and the stability) of Steffensen-type methods are improved by increasing the convergence order. The computer programming package MATHEMATICA provides a powerful but easy environment for all aspects of numerics. This paper puts on show one of the application of this computer algebra system in finding fixed points of iteration functions.The authors are indebted to the referees for some interesting comments and suggestions. This research was supported by Ministerio de Ciencia y Tecnologia MTM2011-28636-C02-02.Cordero Barbero, A.; Soleymani, F.; Torregrosa Sánchez, JR.; Shateyi, S. (2014). Basins of attraction for various Steffensen-Type methods. Journal of Applied Mathematics. 2014. https://doi.org/10.1155/2014/539707S2014Soleymani, F. (2011). Optimal fourth-order iterative method free from derivative. Miskolc Mathematical Notes, 12(2), 255. doi:10.18514/mmn.2011.303Zheng, Q., Zhao, P., Zhang, L., & Ma, W. (2010). Variants of Steffensen-secant method and applications. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 216(12), 3486-3496. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2010.04.058Neta, B., Scott, M., & Chun, C. (2012). Basins of attraction for several methods to find simple roots of nonlinear equations. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 218(21), 10548-10556. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2012.04.017Neta, B., & Scott, M. (2013). On a family of Halley-like methods to find simple roots of nonlinear equations. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 219(15), 7940-7944. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2013.02.035Neta, B., & Chun, C. (2013). On a family of Laguerre methods to find multiple roots of nonlinear equations. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 219(23), 10987-11004. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2013.05.002Neta, B., Chun, C., & Scott, M. (2014). Basins of attraction for optimal eighth order methods to find simple roots of nonlinear equations. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 227, 567-592. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2013.11.017Amat, S., Busquier, S., & Plaza, S. (2005). Dynamics of the King and Jarratt iterations. Aequationes mathematicae, 69(3), 212-223. doi:10.1007/s00010-004-2733-yChicharro, F., Cordero, A., Gutiérrez, J. M., & Torregrosa, J. R. (2013). Complex dynamics of derivative-free methods for nonlinear equations. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 219(12), 7023-7035. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2012.12.075Cordero, A., García-Maimó, J., Torregrosa, J. R., Vassileva, M. P., & Vindel, P. (2013). Chaos in King’s iterative family. Applied Mathematics Letters, 26(8), 842-848. doi:10.1016/j.aml.2013.03.012Chun, C., Lee, M. Y., Neta, B., & Džunić, J. (2012). On optimal fourth-order iterative methods free from second derivative and their dynamics. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 218(11), 6427-6438. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2011.12.013Cordero, A., Torregrosa, J. R., & Vindel, P. (2013). Dynamics of a family of Chebyshev–Halley type methods. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 219(16), 8568-8583. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2013.02.042Soleimani, F., Soleymani, F., & Shateyi, S. (2013). Some Iterative Methods Free from Derivatives and Their Basins of Attraction for Nonlinear Equations. Discrete Dynamics in Nature and Society, 2013, 1-10. doi:10.1155/2013/301718Susanto, H., & Karjanto, N. (2009). Newton’s method’s basins of attraction revisited. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 215(3), 1084-1090. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2009.06.041Vrscay, E. R., & Gilbert, W. J. (1987). Extraneous fixed points, basin boundaries and chaotic dynamics for Schr�der and K�nig rational iteration functions. Numerische Mathematik, 52(1), 1-16. doi:10.1007/bf01401018Blanchard, P. (1984). Complex analytic dynamics on the Riemann sphere. Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, 11(1), 85-142. doi:10.1090/s0273-0979-1984-15240-6Varona, J. L. (2002). Graphic and numerical comparison between iterative methods. The Mathematical Intelligencer, 24(1), 37-46. doi:10.1007/bf03025310Kung, H. T., & Traub, J. F. (1974). Optimal Order of One-Point and Multipoint Iteration. Journal of the ACM, 21(4), 643-651. doi:10.1145/321850.321860McMullen, C. (1987). Families of Rational Maps and Iterative Root-Finding Algorithms. The Annals of Mathematics, 125(3), 467. doi:10.2307/1971408Smale, S. (1985). On the efficiency of algorithms of analysis. Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, 13(2), 87-122. doi:10.1090/s0273-0979-1985-15391-1Liu, Z., Zheng, Q., & Zhao, P. (2010). A variant of Steffensen’s method of fourth-order convergence and its applications. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 216(7), 1978-1983. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2010.03.028Cordero, A., Hueso, J. L., Martínez, E., & Torregrosa, J. R. (2012). A Family of Derivative-Free Methods with High Order of Convergence and Its Application to Nonsmooth Equations. Abstract and Applied Analysis, 2012, 1-15. doi:10.1155/2012/836901Zheng, Q., Li, J., & Huang, F. (2011). An optimal Steffensen-type family for solving nonlinear equations. Applied Mathematics and Computation, 217(23), 9592-9597. doi:10.1016/j.amc.2011.04.035Soleymani, F., Karimi Vanani, S., & Jamali Paghaleh, M. (2012). A Class of Three-Step Derivative-Free Root Solvers with Optimal Convergence Order. Journal of Applied Mathematics, 2012, 1-15. doi:10.1155/2012/56874

Impact of age and comorbidities on health-related quality of life for patients with prostate cancer: evaluation before a curative treatment

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Interpretation of comparative health-related quality of life (HRQOL) studies following different prostate cancer treatments is often difficult due to differing patient ages. Furthermore, age-related changes can hardly be discriminated from therapy-related changes. The evaluation of age-and comorbidity-related changes was in focus of this study.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>HRQOL of 528 prostate cancer patients was analysed using a validated questionnaire (Expanded Prostate Cancer Index Composite) before a curative treatment. Patients were divided into age groups ≤65, 6670, 7175 and >75 years. The impact of specific comorbidities and the Charlson Comorbidity Index (CCI) were evaluated. The questionnaire comprises 50 items concerning the urinary, bowel, sexual and hormonal domains for function and bother. For assessment of sexual and hormonal domains, only patients without prior hormonal treatment were included (n = 336).</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Urinary incontinence was observed increasingly with higher age (mean function scores of 92/88/85/87 for patients ≤65, 6670, 7175 and >75 years) complete urinary control in 78%/72%/64%/58% (p < 0.01). Sexual function scores decreased particularly (48/43/35/30), with erections sufficient for intercourse in 68%/50%/36%/32% (p < 0.01) a decrease of more than a third comparing patients ≤65 vs. 6670 (36%) and 6670 vs. 7175 years (39%). The percentage of patients with comorbidities was lowest in the youngest group (48% vs. 66%/68%/63% for ages 6670/7175/>75 years; p < 0.05). A multivariate analysis revealed an independent influence of both age and comorbidities on urinary incontinence, specifically diabetes on urinary bother, and both age and diabetes on sexual function/bother. Rectal domain scores were not significantly influenced by age or comorbidities. A CCI>5 particularly predisposed for lower urinary and sexual HRQOL scores.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Urinary continence and sexual function are the crucial HRQOL domains with age-related and independently comorbidity-related decreasing scores. The results need to be considered for the interpretation of comparative studies or longitudinal changes after a curative treatment.</p

Personality psychology: Lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts reveal only half of the story—Why it is time for a paradigm shift

This article develops a comprehensive philosophy-of-science for personality psychology that goes far beyond the scope of the lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts that currently prevail. One of the field’s most important guiding scientific assumptions, the lexical hypothesis, is analysed from meta-theoretical viewpoints to reveal that it explicitly describes two sets of phenomena that must be clearly differentiated: 1) lexical repertoires and the representations that they encode and 2) the kinds of phenomena that are represented. Thus far, personality psychologists largely explored only the former, but have seriously neglected studying the latter. Meta-theoretical analyses of these different kinds of phenomena and their distinct natures, commonalities, differences, and interrelations reveal that personality psychology’s focus on lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts entails a) erroneous meta-theoretical assumptions about what the phenomena being studied actually are, and thus how they can be analysed and interpreted, b) that contemporary personality psychology is largely based on everyday psychological knowledge, and c) a fundamental circularity in the scientific explanations used in trait psychology. These findings seriously challenge the widespread assumptions about the causal and universal status of the phenomena described by prominent personality models. The current state of knowledge about the lexical hypothesis is reviewed, and implications for personality psychology are discussed. Ten desiderata for future research are outlined to overcome the current paradigmatic fixations that are substantially hampering intellectual innovation and progress in the field