Comparing classifier use in 1995 and 2010 early child Cantonese to explore social change in Hong Kong

This study compared and analysed the classifier usage in two cohorts: the 492 Cantonese-speaking young children tested in 1995 (Tse & Li, 2011), and the 143 children tested in 2010 (Li & Tse, 2011). The results indicated that: (1) the 1995 and 2010 cohorts shared the same 8 most commonly used classifiers, go3, zek3, gaa3, bui1, baa2, gau6, zoeng1, gaan1; (2) Two top 10 classifiers were found in the 2010 cohort: zi1, and bou6; (3) both cohorts overused the general classifier go3; and (4) both cohorts overused zek3 and gau6 to replace sortal classifiers and even to replace the general classifier go3. The pragmatic features and the associated social changes were discussed to understand the minor changes in classifier use between 1995 and 2010 cohorts. © John Benjamins Publishing Company.postprin

Water fluoride concentration and fluorosis in Hong Kong in 1960-2001

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Patterns of dental caries severity in Chinese kindergarten children

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Bayesian analysis of clustered interval-censored data

The recording of multiple interval-censored failure times is common in dental research. Modeling multilevel data has been a difficult task. This paper aims to use the Bayesian approach to analyze a set of multilevel clustered interval-censored data from a clinical study to investigate the effectiveness of silver diamine fluoride and sodium fluoride varnish in arresting active dentin caries in Chinese pre-school children. The time to arrest dentin caries on a surface was measured. A three-level random-effects Weibull regression model was used. Analysis was performed with WinBUGS. Results revealed a strong positive correlation (0.596) among the caries lesions' arrest times on different surfaces from the same child. The software WinBUGS made the above complicated estimation simple. In conclusion, the annual application of silver diamine fluoride on caries lesions, and caries removal before the application, were found to shorten the arrest time.published_or_final_versio

Assessing change in oral health-related quality of life using OHIP

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A randomized controlled clinical trial of home tooth-whitening products

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Predicting the development of interrogative forms and functions in early years: a corpus-based study of Mandarin-speaking young children

This study examined the development of and possible predictors of interrogative forms and functions in early childhood Mandarin. All the interrogatives drawn from the Early Child Mandarin Corpus (168 children 2;6, 3;6, 4;6, and 5;6) were analyzed. The main results indicated that (i) there were significant age effects in interrogative forms and functions, with the periods between the ages of 3;6 and 4;6 and between the ages of 2;6 and 3;6 being critical in the early acquisition of interrogative forms and functions, respectively; (ii) the form–function preference was verified, with wh-questions being primarily used to seek information (RfI), and intonation/echo and rhetorical questions being used to request action (RfA); (iii) more than half (59·5%) of the Mandarin interrogatives were used for RfI, whereas only 38·9% of them were used for RfA; and (iv) age, TV viewing time, and parent–child conversation time were the significant predictors of interrogative development.postprin

Translation and validation of the Chinese (HK) version of OHIP

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Two-year result of a field trial on prevention of oral disease in Chinese kindergarten children

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Translation and validation of the Chinese (HK) version of GOHAI

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