Understanding communicative actions:A repetitive TMS study

Previous work has shown that the right posterior superior temporal sulcus (RpSTS) is involved in inferring both instrumental goals and communicative intentions of observed actions (1, 2), using previous knowledge to generate perceptual and/or conceptual inferences (3, 4). Here, we disturb neural activity in RpSTS to test whether this region is necessary for understanding the meaning of novel communicative actions. Thirteen subjects received two 20 min sessions of low-frequency (1 Hz) repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS), either over RpSTS (50,-42,14) or over a control region (area MT+, -43,-70,10), before performance of a communicative game and a control task. The game involved controlled non-verbal communicative interactions between pairs of subjects (40 trials). Each pair was asked to jointly create a goal configuration of two geometrical tokens, using the movements of the tokens on a gameboard as the only available communicative channel (5). One participant (a confederate) knew the goal configuration, and she moved her token on the gameboard to inform an addressee (a participant) where and how to position his token. The control task was a visual search paradigm that involved the same stimuli, responses, joint attention, and inter-subjects dependencies, but no communicative necessities. Performance was indexed by Task Efficiency, defined as the number of correct responses per unit of planning time, and by Efficiency Rate, defined as the rate of change (across trials) in Task Efficiency. After rTMS over RpSTS, but not left MT+, the Efficiency Rate of the addresses was reduced in the communicative game, but not in the visual search. In contrast, after rTMS over left MT+, subjects were not able to benefit from experience gained during the previous trials of the visual search task (Task X Site interaction, p<0.05). There were no corresponding interactions between tasks and site of rTMS intervention on the Task Efficiency parameter. These findings qualify how RpSTS contributes to understanding the meaning of non-verbal communicative actions. Repetitive TMS over RpSTS did not disrupt the ability of addressees to interpret novel communicative actions. Rather, this region appears to be necessary for incorporating previous knowledge, accumulated during interactions with a communicative partner, to constrain the inferential process that leads to action understanding

New directions in point-contact spectroscopy based on scanning tunneling microscopy techniques (Review Article)

Igor Yanson showed 38 years ago for the first time a point-contact measurement where he probed the energy resolved spectroscopy of the electronic scattering inside the metal. Since this first measurement, the pointcontact spectroscopy (PCS) technique improved enormously. The application of the scanning probe microscopy (SPM) techniques in the late 1980s allowed achieving contacts with a diameter of a single atom. With the introduction of the mechanically controlled break junction technique, even spectroscopy on freely suspended chains of atoms could be performed. In this paper, we briefly review the current developments of PCS and show recent experiments in advanced scanning PCS based on SPM techniques. We describe some results obtained with both needle-anvil type of point contacts and scanning tunneling microscopy (STM). We also show our first attempt to lift up with a STM a chain of single gold atoms from a Au(110) surface

A Dutch paediatric palliative care guideline: a systematic review and evidence-based recommendations for symptom treatment

Background: Children with life-threatening and life-limiting conditions can experience high levels of suffering due to multiple distressing symptoms that result in poor quality of life and increase risk of long-term distress in their family members. High quality symptom treatment is needed for all these children and their families, even more so at the end-of-life. In this paper, we provide evidence-based recommendations for symptom treatment in paediatric palliative patients to optimize care. Methods: A multidisciplinary panel of 56 experts in paediatric palliative care and nine (bereaved) parents was established to develop recommendations on symptom treatment in paediatric palliative care including anxiety and depression, delirium, dyspnoea, haematological symptoms, coughing, skin complaints, nausea and vomiting, neurological symptoms, pain, death rattle, fatigue, paediatric palliative sedation and forgoing hydration and nutrition. Recommendations were based on evidence from a systematic literature search, additional literature sources (such as guidelines), clinical expertise, and patient and family values. We used the GRADE methodology for appraisal of evidence. Parents were included in the guideline panel to ensure the representation of patient and family values. Results: We included a total of 18 studies that reported on the effects of specific (non) pharmacological interventions to treat symptoms in paediatric palliative care. A few of these interventions showed significant improvement in symptom relief. This evidence could only (partly) answer eight out of 27 clinical questions. We included 29 guidelines and two textbooks as additional literature to deal with lack of evidence. In total, we formulated 221 recommendations on symptom treatment in paediatric palliative care based on evidence, additional literature, clinical expertise, and patient and family values. Conclusion: Even though available evidence on symptom-related paediatric palliative care interventions has increased, there still is a paucity of evidence in paediatric palliative care. We urge for international multidisciplinary multi-institutional collaboration to perform high-quality research and contribute to the optimization of symptom relief in palliative care for all children worldwide

Factors Associated with Revision Surgery after Internal Fixation of Hip Fractures

Background: Femoral neck fractures are associated with high rates of revision surgery after management with internal fixation. Using data from the Fixation using Alternative Implants for the Treatment of Hip fractures (FAITH) trial evaluating methods of internal fixation in patients with femoral neck fractures, we investigated associations between baseline and surgical factors and the need for revision surgery to promote healing, relieve pain, treat infection or improve function over 24 months postsurgery. Additionally, we investigated factors associated with (1) hardware removal and (2) implant exchange from cancellous screws (CS) or sliding hip screw (SHS) to total hip arthroplasty, hemiarthroplasty, or another internal fixation device. Methods: We identified 15 potential factors a priori that may be associated with revision surgery, 7 with hardware removal, and 14 with implant exchange. We used multivariable Cox proportional hazards analyses in our investigation. Results: Factors associated with increased risk of revision surgery included: female sex, [hazard ratio (HR) 1.79, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.25-2.50; P = 0.001], higher body mass index (fo

A good reason to buy: Justification drives the effect of advertising frames on impulsive socially responsible buying

Today, consumers expect companies to be socially responsible. However, the literature is undecided about the effects of communicating one's corporate social responsibility activities to consumers. This raises the question of how sustainability-driven companies can best advertise their products to stimulate ethical consumption: using self-benefit frames, where the main beneficiary is the consumer, or using other-benefit frames, where the main beneficiary is a third party. Using three experiments, this study examines the effect of other-benefit (vs. self-benefit) advertising frames on consumers' impulse purchases from sustainability-driven companies. Increasing impulse purchases can help such companies to strengthen their competitive positions. Additionally, it is studied to what extent two types of justification (moral versus deservingness) explain the proposed effect of advertising frames. The results show that only other-benefit frames affect impulse buying behavior, both directly, as mediated by moral justification. This study's insights may help sustainability-driven companies to decide on their advertising strategies by providing evidence that other-benefit-framed advertisements are more effective in enhancing impulse purchases than self-benefit-framed advertisements

A Two-Dimensional Explanation Framework to Classify AI as Incomprehensible, Interpretable, or Understandable

Because of recent and rapid developments in Artificial Intelligence (AI), humans and AI-systems increasingly work together in human-agent teams. However, in order to effectively leverage the capabilities of both, AI-systems need to be understandable to their human teammates. The branch of eXplainable AI (XAI) aspires to make AI-systems more understandable to humans, potentially improving human-agent teamwork. Unfortunately, XAI literature suffers from a lack of agreement regarding the definitions of and relations between the four key XAI-concepts: transparency, interpretability, explainability, and understandability. Inspired by both XAI and social sciences literature, we present a two-dimensional framework that defines and relates these concepts in a concise and coherent way, yielding a classification of three types of AI-systems: incomprehensible, interpretable, and understandable. We also discuss how the established relationships can be used to guide future research into XAI, and how the framework could be used during the development of AI-systems as part of human-AI teams.Accepted author manuscriptInteractive Intelligenc

The influence of interdependence and a transparent or explainable communication style on human-robot teamwork

Humans and robots are increasingly working together in human-robot teams. Teamwork requires communication, especially when interdependence between team members is high. In previous work, we identified a conceptual difference between sharing what you are doing (i.e., being transparent) and why you are doing it (i.e., being explainable). Although the second might sound better, it is important to avoid information overload. Therefore, an online experiment (n = 72) was conducted to study the effect of communication style of a robot (silent, transparent, explainable, or adaptive based on time pressure and relevancy) on human-robot teamwork. We examined the effects of these communication styles on trust in the robot, workload during the task, situation awareness, reliance on the robot, human contribution during the task, human communication frequency, and team performance. Moreover, we included two levels of interdependence between human and robot (high vs. low), since mutual dependency might influence which communication style is best. Participants collaborated with a virtual robot during two simulated search and rescue tasks varying in their level of interdependence. Results confirm that in general robot communication results in more trust in and understanding of the robot, while showing no evidence of a higher workload when the robot communicates or adds explanations to being transparent. Providing explanations, however, did result in more reliance on RescueBot. Furthermore, compared to being silent, only being explainable results a higher situation awareness when interdependence is high. Results further show that being highly interdependent decreases trust, reliance, and team performance while increasing workload and situation awareness. High interdependence also increases human communication if the robot is not silent, human rescue contribution if the robot does not provide explanations, and the strength of the positive association between situation awareness and team performance. From these results, we can conclude that robot communication is crucial for human-robot teamwork, and that important differences exist between being transparent, explainable, or adaptive. Our findings also highlight the fundamental importance of interdependence in studies on explainability in robots.Interactive Intelligenc