Pattern languages in HCI: A critical review

This article presents a critical review of patterns and pattern languages in human-computer interaction (HCI). In recent years, patterns and pattern languages have received considerable attention in HCI for their potential as a means for developing and communicating information and knowledge to support good design. This review examines the background to patterns and pattern languages in HCI, and seeks to locate pattern languages in relation to other approaches to interaction design. The review explores four key issues: What is a pattern? What is a pattern language? How are patterns and pattern languages used? and How are values reflected in the pattern-based approach to design? Following on from the review, a future research agenda is proposed for patterns and pattern languages in HCI

‘Understanding’ as a practical issue in sexual health education for people with intellectual disabilities: a study using two qualitative methods

Objective: Sexual health education is important in addressing the health and social inequalities faced by people with intellectual disabilities. However, provision of health-related advice and education to people with various types and degrees of linguistic and learning difficulties involves addressing complex issues of language and comprehension. This paper reports an exploratory study using two qualitative methods to examine the delivery of sexual health education to people with intellectual disabilities. Methods: Four video-recordings of sexual health education sessions were collected. Conversation analysis was used to examine in detail how such education occurs as a series of interactions between educators and learners. Interviews with four educators were carried out and analyzed using thematic analysis. Results: The analysis shows how educators anticipate problems of comprehension and how they respond when there is evidence that a person does not understand the activity or the educational message. This occurs particularly when verbal prompts involve long sentences and abstract concepts. We show a characteristic pattern which arises in these situations, in which both educator and learner jointly produce a superficially correct response. Conclusions: While interviews allows us some insight into contextual issues, strategy, and aspects of sexual health education which occur outside of the actual teaching sessions, analysis of actual interactions can show us patterns which occur in interactions between educators and learners when comprehension is in question. Addressing how sexual health education is delivered in practice and in detail provides valuable lessons about how such education can be improved

Forms of resistance in people with severe and profound intellectual disabilities

Government policy in the UK emphasises that people with intellectual disabilities should have the opportunity to make choices and exert control over their own lives as much as possible. The ability of a person to resist activities and offers is therefore important, particularly for people with severe and profound intellectual disabilities, who are likely to have language impairments and need to communicate their choices non-verbally. Video and ethnographic data were collected from two services for people with severe and profound intellectual disabilities. Examples of resistance by people with severe and profound intellectual disabilities and responses to that resistance by support workers, were collected and examined using conversation analysis and ethnographic description. A range of non-verbal resistance behaviours are described, and the difficulty for support workers in identifying resistance when behaviour is ambiguous is discussed. The importance of understanding these behaviours as examples of decision-making is stressed

Evidence of a Large Novel Gene Pool Associated with Prokaryotic Genomic Islands

Microbial genes that are “novel” (no detectable homologs in other species) have become of increasing interest as environmental sampling suggests that there are many more such novel genes in yet-to-be-cultured microorganisms. By analyzing known microbial genomic islands and prophages, we developed criteria for systematic identification of putative genomic islands (clusters of genes of probable horizontal origin in a prokaryotic genome) in 63 prokaryotic genomes, and then characterized the distribution of novel genes and other features. All but a few of the genomes examined contained significantly higher proportions of novel genes in their predicted genomic islands compared with the rest of their genome (Paired t test = 4.43E-14 to 1.27E-18, depending on method). Moreover, the reverse observation (i.e., higher proportions of novel genes outside of islands) never reached statistical significance in any organism examined. We show that this higher proportion of novel genes in predicted genomic islands is not due to less accurate gene prediction in genomic island regions, but likely reflects a genuine increase in novel genes in these regions for both bacteria and archaea. This represents the first comprehensive analysis of novel genes in prokaryotic genomic islands and provides clues regarding the origin of novel genes. Our collective results imply that there are different gene pools associated with recently horizontally transmitted genomic regions versus regions that are primarily vertically inherited. Moreover, there are more novel genes within the gene pool associated with genomic islands. Since genomic islands are frequently associated with a particular microbial adaptation, such as antibiotic resistance, pathogen virulence, or metal resistance, this suggests that microbes may have access to a larger “arsenal” of novel genes for adaptation than previously thought

Ocular Penetration of N-Formimidoyl Thienamycin (MK-787) and Potentiation by Dipeptidase Inhibitor (MK-791)

N-formimidoyl thienamycin (MK-787) is a new /?-lactam with potent activity against both aerobic and anaerobic gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria. Its spectrum and activity suggest it may be useful in treatment of complicated intraocular infections. Its ocular penetration was studied in New Zealand white rabbits immediately before and after the third dose of 40 mg/kg administered intravenously at q6h intervals. Plasma, aqueous humor, and vitreous humor were obtained by direct aspiration, and antibiotic levels were asayed using an agar well diffusion method. MK-787 penetrated uninflamed intraocular fluids, including vitreous humor, although vitreous concentrations achieved (0.1-0.2 Mg/ml) were significantly lower than the mean peak plasma (15 Mg/ml) and aqueous concentrations (7 Mg/ml). Nevertheless, the intraocular levels attained approached or exceeded the MIC 90 and markedly enhanced spectrum of activity against both gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria

Doing it differently: Engaging interview participants with imaginative variation

Imaginative variation was identified by Husserl (1936/1970) as a phenomenological technique for the purpose of elucidating the manner in which phenomena appear to consciousness. Briefly, by engaging in the phenomenological reduction and using imaginative variation, phenomenologists are able to describe the experience of consciousness, having stepped outside of the natural attitude through the epochē. Imaginative variation is a stage aimed at explicating the structures of experience, and is best described as a mental experiment. Features of the experience are imaginatively altered in order to view the phenomenon under investigation from varying perspectives. Husserl argued that this process will reveal the essences of an experience, as only those aspects that are invariant to the experience of the phenomenon will not be able to change through the variation. Often in qualitative research interviews, participants struggle to articulate or verbalise their experiences. The purpose of this article is to detail a radical and novel way of using imaginative variation with interview participants, by asking the participants to engage with imaginative variation, in order to produce a rich and insightful experiential account of a phenomenon. We will discuss how the first author successfully used imaginative variation in this way in her study of the erotic experience of bondage, discipline, dominance & submission, and sadism & masochism (BDSM), before considering the usefulness of this technique when applied to areas of study beyond sexuality

How adults with a profound intellectual disability engage others in interaction

Using video records of everyday life in a residential home, we report on what interactional practices are used by people with severe and profound intellectual disabilities to initiate encounters. There were very few initiations, and all presented difficulties to the interlocutor; one (which we call "blank recipiency") gave the interlocutor virtually no information at all on which to base a response. Only when the initiation was of a new phase in an interaction already under way (for example, the initiation of an alternative trajectory of a proposed physical move) was it likely to be successfully sustained. We show how interlocutors (support staff; the recording researcher) responded to initiations verbally, as if to neurotypical speakers - but inappropriately for people unable to comprehend, or to produce well-fitted next turns. This misreliance on ordinary speakers' conversational practices was one factor that contributed to residents abandoning the interaction in almost all cases. We discuss the dilemma confronting care workers

Soft systems methodology: a context within a 50-year retrospective of OR/MS

Soft systems methodology (SSM) has been used in the practice of operations research and management science OR/MS) since the early 1970s. In the 1990s, it emerged as a viable academic discipline. Unfortunately, its proponents consider SSM and traditional systems thinking to be mutually exclusive. Despite the differences claimed by SSM proponents between the two, they have been complementary. An extensive sampling of the OR/MS literature over its entire lifetime demonstrates the richness with which the non-SSM literature has been addressing the very same issues as does SSM

Impact testing to determine the mechanical properties of articular cartilage in isolation and on bone

The original publication is available at www.springerlink.comNon peer reviewedPostprin

Nuclear Transparency to Intermediate-Energy Protons

Nuclear transparency in the (e,e'p) reaction for 135 < Tp < 800 MeV is investigated using the distorted wave approximation. Calculations using density-dependent effective interactions are compared with phenomenological optical potentials. Nuclear transparency is well correlated with proton absorption and neutron total cross sections. For Tp < 300 MeV there is considerable sensitivity to the choice of optical model, with the empirical effective interaction providing the best agreement with transparency data. For Tp > 300 MeV there is much less difference between optical models, but the calculations substantially underpredict transparency data and the discrepancy increases with A. The differences between Glauber and optical model calculations are related to their respective definitions of the semi-inclusive cross section. By using a more inclusive summation over final states the Glauber model emphasizes nucleon-nucleon inelasticity, whereas with a more restrictive summation the optical model emphasizes nucleon-nucleus inelasticity; experimental definitions of the semi-inclusive cross section lie between these extremes.Comment: uuencoded gz-compressed tar file containing revtex and bbl files and 5 postscript figures, totalling 31 pages. Uses psfi