Situational Judgment Tests: An Overview of Development Practices and Psychometric Characteristics

Situational judgment tests (SJTs) are popular assessment methods often used for personnel selection and promotion. SJTs present problem scenarios to examinees, who then evaluate each response option for addressing the issue described in the scenario. As guidance for practitioners and researchers alike, this paper provides experience- and evidence-based best practices for developing SJTs: writing scenarios and response options, creating response instructions, and selecting a response format. This review describes scoring options, including key stretching and within-person standardization. The authors also describe research on psychometric issues that affect SJTs, including reliability, validity, group differences, presentation modes, faking, and coaching

Performance of an Attenuator Type Wave Energy Converter in Multi-directional Waves

Ocean waves are irregular, nonlinear and directionally spread (short-crested). The irregularity of waves can be considered by superposing components at different frequencies. In many frequency-domain analyses, second-order contributions can be calculated to take account of the nonlinearity in wave-structure interactions. The directional spreading of the waves is usually described by introducing a directional spectrum. Several directional spectra have been suggested by researchers. In short-crested waves, the wave energy propagates in different directions around principal wave directions, which will affect the performance of Wave Energy Converters (WEC). Especially, less energy may be harnessed for some directionally sensitive WEC.In recent work, we have examined the performance of an attenuator type WEC (Fig.1) by calculating the relative rotations between floating modules in uni-directional and multi-directional waves. The emphases have been put on operational sea states and only linear incoming waves have been considered. In this presentation, the description of multi-directional waves in a numerical model will be introduced briefly. Then the motions of an attenuator type WEC and shear forces acting on power take-off system (PTO) will be investigated. Different wave spreadings have been considered. The results of relative pitch motions have shown the significance of wave directional spreading on performance of attenuator type WECs, in particular when wave spreading factor is small. Larger relative pitch motions are obtained in uni-directional waves. Similar to the relative pitch motions, vertical shear forces acting on hinges for small wave spreading factor have been reduced by up to 26% of those in uni-directional waves. However with the increase of spreading factor, wave directional spreading has less effect on vertical shear forces acting on ideal hinges

Nonlinear interactions of regular waves with a truncated circular column

In this present paper, wave elevations around single truncated circular column have been investigated by using a potential-flow solver (DIFFRACT) and a viscous-flow solver in OpenFOAM. Results from time-domain analyses have been compared with measured time series in experiments and results given by WAMIT. Spectral analyses have been carried out for time series to consider the contributions from wave components at different harmonics. RAOs and QTFs of surface elevations have been compared with the results obtained by Kristiansen et al. (2004)

Numerical analysis of Wave-structure Interactions Using Potential-flow Solver

A potential-flow solver DIFFRACT written in FORTRAN has been used to analyse the interactions between waves and offshore structures in frequency domain. The program is based on higher-order Boundary Element Method. Meshes generated by some commercial and free pre-processors (e.g. GAMBIT and SALOME) can be imported into the potential-flow solver to carry out hydrodynamic analysis. In this poster, main capabilities of DIFFRACT have been demonstrated in several practical applications.Following numerical results can be provided by DIFFRACT• First- and second-order wave forces on structures• First- and second-order free surface elevations around structures• First-order motions of single and multiple floating bodies• Constraint forces between interconnected fixed/floating bodiesMany papers have been published basing on the numerical results from DIFFRACT and a list of publications can be found at http://www.mendeley.com/groups/2020743/4diffract/papers/. More features will be developed in future work

Degree of Landscape Fragmentation Influences Genetic Isolation among Populations of a Gliding Mammal

Forests and woodlands are under continuing pressure from urban and agricultural development. Tree-dependent mammals that rarely venture to the ground are likely to be highly sensitive to forest fragmentation. The Australian squirrel glider (Petaurus norfolcensis) provides an excellent case study to examine genetic (functional) connectivity among populations. It has an extensive range that occurs in a wide band along the east coast. However, its forest and woodland habitat has become greatly reduced in area and is severely fragmented within the southern inland part of the species' range, where it is recognised as threatened. Within central and northern coastal regions, habitat is much more intact and we thus hypothesise that genetic connectivity will be greater in this region than in the south. To test this we employed microsatellite analysis in a molecular population biology approach. Most sampling locations in the highly modified south showed signatures of genetic isolation. In contrast, a high level of genetic connectivity was inferred among most sampled populations in the more intact habitat of the coastal region, with samples collected 1400 km apart having similar genetic cluster membership. Nonetheless, some coastal populations associated with urbanisation and agriculture are genetically isolated, suggesting the historic pattern observed in the south is emerging on the coast. Our study demonstrates that massive landscape changes following European settlement have had substantial impacts on levels of connectivity among squirrel glider populations, as predicted on the basis of the species' ecology. This suggests that landscape planning and management in the south should be focused on restoring habitat connectivity where feasible, while along the coast, existing habitat connectivity must be maintained and recent losses restored. Molecular population biology approaches provide a ready means for identifying fragmentation effects on a species at multiple scales. Such studies are required to examine the generality of our findings for other tree-dependent species

Overemphasis of USMLE and Its Potential Impact on Diversity in Otolaryngology

Objective: Applicant demographics during the 2019-2020 residency cycle were evaluated to determine if strict utilization of United States Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) scores in applicant selection could lead to a restriction in diversity. Study design: Cross-sectional study. Setting: Otolaryngology residency applicants to a single institution. Methods: A total of 381 applicants were analyzed by age, gender, applicant type, race/ethnicity, USMLE scores, permanent zip code, and graduating medical school. Results: Among applicants, 37% were women; 9% were ≥30 years of age; 12% were underrepresented minorities (URMs); 71% to 81% had above-average socioeconomic surrogate markers; 22% were from a top 25 US News & World Report-ranked institution; and 81% were from an institution with an otolaryngology residency program. There was no increase in applicants who identified as URM from the 2015-2020 cycles. Multivariable regression analysis showed that applicants who were international medical graduates, URMs, and ≥30 years of age had lower Step 1 and Step 2 scores (P \u3c .05). Applicants who identified as women had a lower Step 1 score, and those from top 25 National Institutes of Health-funded institutions had a higher Step 1 score; however, there was no difference when Step 2 scores were compared (P \u3e .05). Conclusion: Our data suggest that in the pre-USMLE Step 1 pass/fail setting, strict adherence to USMLE scores may lead to disproportionally low recruitment of applicants who are women, ≥30 years of age, URMs, and from institutions without an otolaryngology residency program. We must implement measures against overemphasizing the absolute values of USMLE scores for a true holistic review of applicants, specifically to prevent an overemphasis on the USMLE Step 2 score

Resource utilization and outcome at a university versus a community teaching hospital in tPA treated stroke patients: a retrospective cohort study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Comparing patterns of resource utilization between hospitals is often complicated by biases in community and patient populations. Stroke patients treated with tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) provide a particularly homogenous population for comparison because of strict eligibility criteria for treatment. We tested whether resource utilization would be similar in this homogenous population between two hospitals located in a single Midwestern US community by comparing use of diagnostic testing and associated outcomes following treatment with t-PA.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Medical records from 206 consecutive intravenous t-PA-treated stroke patients from two teaching hospitals (one university, one community-based) were reviewed. Patient demographics, clinical characteristics and outcome were analyzed, as were the frequency of use of CT, MRI, MRA, echocardiography, angiography, and EEG.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Seventy-nine and 127 stroke patients received t-PA at the university and community hospitals, respectively. The two patient populations were demographically similar. There were no differences in stroke severity. All outcomes were similar at both hospitals. Utilization of CT scans, and non-invasive carotid and cardiac imaging studies were similar at both hospitals; however, brain MR, TEE, and catheter angiography were used more frequently at the university hospital. EEG was obtained more often at the community hospital.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Utilization of advanced brain imaging and invasive diagnostic testing was greater at the university hospital, but was not associated with improved clinical outcomes. This could not be explained on the basis of stroke severity or patient characteristics. This variation of practice suggests substantial opportunities exist to reduce costs and improve efficiency of diagnostic resource use as well as reduce patient exposure to risk from diagnostic procedures.</p