A Comparative Study on Intonation Difference Between Chinese EFL Speakers and Native English Speakers Based on Visual Phonetic Software Praat

Acoustic features such as intonation are attached great importance by all English learners around the world, so as the Chinese EFL speakers. The study mainly conducts a comparative study between Chinese advanced EFL speakers and native speakers, analyzing the differences in intonation and the reasons behind it. Phonetic software Praat was used to visualized these voice data after the experiment. The result shows that all these Chinese advanced EFL speakers possess the awareness of intonation variation, but the detailed intonation variation is still quite different from the native speakers. The reason for this phenomenon is that most Chinese advanced EFL speakers fail to understand the extra-linguistic information conveyed from intonation variation. Acquiring phonetic theory and correcting intonation under the assistance of visual phonetic software are two practical methods to solve this problem

Early and late stage profiles for a new chemotaxis model with density-dependent jump probability and quorum-sensing mechanisms

In this paper, we derive a new chemotaxis model with degenerate diffusion and density-dependent chemotactic sensitivity, and we provide a more realistic description of cell migration process for its early and late stages. Different from the existing studies focusing on the case of non-degenerate diffusion, the new model with degenerate diffusion causes us some essential difficulty on the boundedness estimates and the propagation behavior of its compact support. In the presence of logistic damping, for the early stage before tumour cells spread to the whole body, we first estimate the expanding speed of tumour region as $O(t^{\beta})$ for $0<\beta<\frac{1}{2}$. Then, for the late stage of cell migration, we further prove that the asymptotic profile of the original system is just its corresponding steady state. The global convergence of the original weak solution to the steady state with exponential rate $O(e^{-ct})$ for some $c>0$ is also obtained

Sandpiles and Dominos

We consider the subgroup of the abelian sandpile group of the grid graph consisting of configurations of sand that are symmetric with respect to central vertical and horizontal axes. We show that the size of this group is (i) the number of domino tilings of a corresponding weighted rectangular checkerboard; (ii) a product of special values of Chebyshev polynomials; and (iii) a double-product whose factors are sums of squares of values of trigonometric functions. We provide a new derivation of the formula due to Kasteleyn and to Temperley and Fisher for counting the number of domino tilings of a 2m x 2n rectangular checkerboard and a new way of counting the number of domino tilings of a 2m x 2n checkerboard on a M\"obius strip.Comment: 35 pages, 24 figure

2-roots for simply laced Weyl groups

We introduce and study "2-roots", which are symmetrized tensor products of orthogonal roots of Kac--Moody algebras. We concentrate on the case where $W$ is the Weyl group of a simply laced Y-shaped Dynkin diagram $Y_{a,b,c}$ having $n$ vertices and with three branches of arbitrary finite lengths $a$, $b$ and $c$; special cases of this include types $D_n$, $E_n$ (for arbitrary $n \geq 6$), and affine $E_6$, $E_7$ and $E_8$. We show that a natural codimension-$1$ submodule $M$ of the symmetric square of the reflection representation of $W$ has a remarkable canonical basis $\mathcal{B}$ that consists of 2-roots. We conjecture that, with respect to $\mathcal{B}$, every element of $W$ is represented by a column sign-coherent matrix in the sense of cluster algebras, and we prove the conjecture in the finite and affine cases. If $W$ is a finite simply laced Weyl group, each $W$-orbit of 2-roots has a highest element, analogous to the highest root, and we calculate these elements explicitly. We prove that if $W$ is not of affine type, the module $M$ is completely reducible in characteristic zero and each of its nontrivial direct summands is spanned by a $W$-orbit of 2-roots.Comment: 28 pages, 6 figure

Examining the Link between Personality Traits, Cognitive Performance, and Consecutive Interpreting

Interpreting is a highly complex activity that not only demands proficient linguistic expertise, but also non-linguistic abilities such as non-linguistic cognitive performance (Macnamara, 2012; Riesbeck et al., 1978; Wang, 2004). In addition to this, individual differences in personality may also play a potential role in the interpreter's ability to perform their job (Barrick & Mount, 1991; Rothmann & Coetzer, 2003). The current study sought to examine whether there is a relationship between personality traits, cognitive ability, and consecutive interpreting. The five-factor model of personality (Costa & McCrae, 1988) was used to examine the personality of participants with its five categories of personality type (Openness to Experience; Conscientiousness; Extraversion; Agreeableness; and Neuroticism), and five cognitive ability tasks (Working Memory; Attentional Control; Multi-tasking; Speed of Information Processing; and Psychological Endurance) were chosen to examine their potential relationship with interpreting ability. To fulfill this goal, an empirical study was conducted, collecting data from 80 participants in total (40 with consecutive interpreting backgrounds in the experimental group and 40 without interpreting foundations as a control group). Data was collected using online questionnaires and a set of cognitive tasks. The three online questionnaires, the Big Five (Goldberg, 1992), Attentional Control Scale (Derryberry & Reed, 2002) and Psychological Endurance Scale (Hamby et al., 2015) were used to examine participants’ personality, Attentional Control and Psychological Endurance respectively, whilst the objective cognitive tasks were designed to measure participant Working Memory, Multi-tasking ability and Speed of Information Processing using the Listening Span Test (Liu et al., 2004), Digits Symbol Substitution Test (Kaufman & Lichtenberger, 2006; Wechsler, 1939) and Linguistic Dual Task (Stachowiak, 2015; Meyer & Kieras, 1997) respectively. The main findings of the current results were: firstly, a significant difference was found in cognitive abilities between experimental and control group in the areas of Working Memory, Attentional Control, Multi-tasking and Psychological Endurance. Secondly, several personality traits correlated with scores on some cognitive abilities. For example, Openness to Experience positively correlated with Attentional Control and Psychological Endurance; Conscientiousness positively correlated with Working Memory, Attentional Control and Psychological Endurance; Extraversion positively correlated with Attentional Control and Psychological Endurance; whilst Neuroticism negatively correlated with Attentional Control and Psychological Endurance. Thirdly, several personality traits (Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness and Extraversion) appear to be significantly related more to the experimental group than the control group. Finally, mediation analysis appears to show that interpreting training has a mediating effect on the relationship between certain types of personality traits and cognitive abilities. In some cases, interpreting training and personality traits appear to exert an interacting effect and have a combining influence on some cognitive abilities. These findings can hopefully provide a foundation for future study and be applied in practice to help interpreting training projects and cognitive ability improvement

Comparison of utilization and complications of peripherally inserted central catheters versus peripheral midline catheters in a large academic medical center

Background: Peripherally inserted central catheters (PICCs) are a commonly used central intravenous (IV) access device, which sometimes cause severe complications. Midline catheters (MC) are peripheral IV access devices that may reduce the need for central lines, and hence central line associated blood stream infection (CLABSI). The objective of this study is to compare the utilization and safety of PICC and MC. Methods: This was a retrospective quality improvement study. Data were collected using electronic medical records and IV team insertion data. SAS v9.3 was used for analysis. Means and standard deviations were calculated to describe central tendencies and variation. Fisher’s Exact Tests were used to describe strength of associations between variables. Results: From January to May 2015, a total of 206 PICCs and 200 MCs were inserted in 367 individual patients. There was a total of 12 individual PICCs and 39 individual MCs involved with complications. MCs are associated with higher rate of non-serious complications as compared to PICCs. However, the severe complications were not significantly different between PICCs and MCs (4.9% vs. 9.0%, P=0.1182). Among the 206 PICCs, four readmissions were related to PICC issues, while among the 200 MCs, no readmission was caused by MC issues. Conclusions: The reduction of CLABSIs could be a reasonable trade off for the increased non-severe complications associated with MCs. As technology of these devices is evolving, longer-term data will be essential to assure safety of MCs. Additional prospective studies could more objectively assess the safety and efficacy of these two devices. Public Health Importance: A CLABSI is one of the most costly health care-associated infections (HAIs), and can cause prolonged hospital stays, increased costs and risk of mortality