Effect of Sex, Input-Response Mode, and Mnemonics on Free Recall

Thirty two males and thirty two females performed at a memorization task in which lists of words were presented either auditorially or visually. In addition to mode of presentation and sex, two other independent variables included mode of response; words being recalled by writing or orally repeating them, and mnemonic device effect; subjects being instructed to use bizarre images aide or repetition memory aide. No significant sex differences were found in this experiment. There was a significant mode of presentation effect in which subjects who heard the words recalled significantly more than subjects who saw the words. There was also a significant mnemonic device effect in which subjects using the bizarre images memory aide recalled significantly more words than those using the repetition memory aide. There were two significant two-way interactions: a sex by mnemonic device interaction and sex by trials interaction. In the sex by mnemonic device interaction, males using a mnemonic aide recalled significantly more words than males using the nonmnemonic aide of repetition. Females, on the other hand, recalled slightly fewer words when using the bizarre images aide than when the repetition aid was employed. In the sex by trials interaction, females recalled more words when intermediate-length lists of words were presented where males recalled more words when long-length lists of words were presented. The auditory mode of presentation superiority may have been a procedural artifact. In the visual condition, words were viewed for the duration of three seconds where in the auditory condition, words were heard and then followed by two seconds of silence. It may have been that this procedure forced the subjects in the auditory condition to rehearse the words more and rely more on imagery strategies. There are other possible interpretations of this finding: 1) the novelty of hearing words from a tape recorder; 2) the greater reliance of adults on verbal communication; and 3) the increased distractions during the visual condition. The mnemonic device effect was seen as being consistant with past literature in which the use of a mnemonic memory aide improves memorization. The sex by mnemonic device effect was viewed in terms of the idiosyncratic nature of mnemonic memory aides. Whereas males may have been more able to utilize the bizzare images aide, females might have preferred to employ a different memory aide. Recommendations for future research include: using reading ability as a covariable, and testing memory at several intervals after presentation

Individual cognitive-behavioural anger treatment for people with mild-borderline intellectual disabilities and histories of aggression: a controlled trial

Objectives - Anger is a significant predictor and activator of violent behaviour in patients living in institutional settings. There is some evidence for the value of cognitive-behavioural treatments for anger problems with people with intellectual disabilities. In this study, a newly designed treatment targeted at anger disposition, reactivity, and control was provided to intellectually disabled offenders with aggression histories living in secure settings. Design - About forty detained patients with mild-borderline intellectual disabilities and histories of serious aggression were allocated to specially modified cognitive-behavioural anger treatment (AT group) or to routine care waiting-list control (RC group) conditions. Methods - AT group participants received 18 sessions of individual treatment. The AT and RC groups were assessed simultaneously at 4 time points: screen, pre- and post-treatment, and at 4-month follow-up using a range of self- and staff-rated anger measures. The effectiveness of the treatment was evaluated using ANCOVA linear trend analyses of group differences on the main outcome measures. Results - The AT group's self-reported anger scores on a number of measures were significantly lower following treatment, compared with the RC wait-list condition, and these improvements were maintained at follow-up. Limited evidence for the effectiveness of treatment was provided by staffs' ratings of patient behaviour post-treatment. Conclusions - Detained men with mild-moderate intellectual disabilities and histories of severe aggression can successfully engage in, and benefit from, an intensive individual cognitive-behavioural anger treatment that also appears to have beneficial systemic effects

Weyl corrections to holographic conductivity

For conformal field theories which admit a dual gravitational description in anti-de Sitter space, electrical transport properties, such as conductivity and charge diffusion, are determined by the dynamics of a U(1) gauge field in the bulk and thus obey universality relations at the classical level due to the uniqueness of the Maxwell action. We analyze corrections to these transport parameters due to higher-dimension operators in the bulk action, beyond the leading Maxwell term, of which the most significant involves a coupling to the bulk Weyl tensor. We show that the ensuing corrections to conductivity and the diffusion constant break the universal relation with the U(1) central charge observed at leading order, but are nonetheless subject to interesting bounds associated with causality in the boundary CFT.Comment: 15 pages, v2: references adde

Uncertainty in Measurements of Distance

Ng and van Dam have argued that quantum theory and general relativity give a lower bound of L^{1/3} L_P^{2/3} on the uncertainty of any distance, where L is the distance to be measured and L_P is the Planck length. Their idea is roughly that to minimize the position uncertainty of a freely falling measuring device one must increase its mass, but if its mass becomes too large it will collapse to form a black hole. Here we show that one can go below the Ng-van Dam bound by attaching the measuring device to a massive elastic rod. Relativistic limitations on the rod's rigidity, together with the constraint that its length exceeds its Schwarzschild radius, imply that zero-point fluctuations of the rod give an uncertainty greater than or equal to L_P.Comment: 5 pages LaTe

Mobile Augmented Reality: Hyper Contextualization and Situated Language Usage Events

Language use, second-language development, and technology mediated human activity are complex processes situated in, and in some cases demonstrably interwoven with, specific material and social contexts. Our presentation describes a project that focuses on the contextually embedded nature of communicative action. Building upon recent research on ethnomethodological analyses of talk-in-interaction while walking (Haddington et al., 2013), analyses of how communicative activity mediates our understanding of objects and environments (Nevile et al., 2014; Latour, 2005), principles of extended and embodied cognition (Atkinson, 2010), and existing research on the use of mobile place-based augmented reality (AR) techniques for language learning (Holden & Sykes, 2011; Thorne, 2013; Thorne et al., 2015), this paper investigates participants’ contextually aware interactional practices as they carry out an AR activity. In response to the question of when and how action is explicitly situated in, or catalyzed by, particular aspects of the physical surround, we report on members’ methods for making unplanned use of resources from the immediate physical context in order to co-construct actions (such as wayfinding and oral reporting) to accomplish the AR game goals

Defining the Costs of an Outbreak of Karnal Bunt of Wheat

In determining the economic impact of a possible outbreak of the quarantinable wheat disease Karnal Bunt, an examination was made of the detailed components of the costs involved. The costs were classified as: (a) Direct costs (yield and quality losses); (b) Reaction costs (export bans, quality down-grading, seed industry costs); and (c) Control costs (quarantine zones, fungicides, spore destruction). The relative importance of each of these cost components is measured for a hypothetical outbreak of Karnal Bunt in the European Union, as a means of ensuring that the policy responses to such an outbreak are appropriate considering the costs involved.disease, quarantine, cost, wheat, Agricultural and Food Policy, Crop Production/Industries,