Anti-Americanism: an exploration of a contested concept in Western Europe

Despite its popular currency and salience, anti-Americanism is understudied and misunderstood by social scientists. Even within academia, studies of anti-Americanism are often polemic, and logically or methodologically flawed. Focusing on Western Europe, we argue that anti-Americanism is a public opinion phenomenon, and present a definition of anti-Americanism based on social psychology, and demonstrate how cognitive psychological processes shape anti-Americanism. We outline several predictors of anti-Americanism, processes of internal cognition, responses to international political events, patterns of interpersonal communication and information diffusion, and the contextual role of ideology. We also observe the important implications European anti-Americanism has for support international institutions, and demonstrate that anti-Americanism leads to less overall support for major global actors such as the United Nations, the World Bank, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and the European Union. We also argue that, because of the invasion of Iraq and the events leading up to the invasion, anti-Americanism in Europe has reached a new high point

A global normal form for two-dimensional mode conversion

Mode conversion is a phenomenon that is of interest as a method for heating in fusion reactors. A magnetosonic wave with dispersion relation DMS propagates toward the interior of the plasma, where it excites an ion-hybrid wave with dispersion relation DIH and thereby transfers energy to the plasma. We wish to study this process using ray-based methods. The 2 2 dispersion matrix D, which is, in general, a function of the phase space variables (x; y; kx; ky), must be put into normal form, in which the diagonals of D, identied as the uncoupled dispersion relations, DMS and DIH, Poisson-commute with the o-diagonals, identied as the coupling constants. Once in this form, we look at the points in the four- dimensional phase space that satisfy DMS(x; y; kx; ky) = 0 = DIH(x; y; kx; ky), which, in general, will be a two-dimensional surface we call the conversion surface. We implement our normal form algorithm on two models. First, we consider a slab model, in which D depends only on (x; kx; ky). Then we consider a two-dimensional model of the polodial cross section of a tokamak reactor with a DT plasma with a density ratio of one- to-one. Using numerical methods, we put D into normal form and identify the conversion surface. For both models, we nd that there are regions in the four-dimensional phase space where the normal form transformation is well behaved and the conversion surface is what we expect. These are where the two dispersion surfaces DMS(x; y; kx; ky) = 0 and DIH(x; y; kx; ky) = 0 intersect transversely. However, there are also regions in the phase space where the normal form transformation is not well behaved. These coincide with tangential conversions, that is, where the two dispersion surfaces intersect tangentially. In this case, we must revisit the normal form theory and adapt it to this non-generic situation. Finally, we compute the transmission and conversion coecients for such tangential conversions

X-Ray Referrals for Uncomplicated Fractures

Emergency departments (EDs) in the United States are frequently overutilized for patients in need of an X-ray imaging despite outpatient clinics, ski hills, and express care facilities having the capacity to perform X-Rays and have them read and interpreted by local Radiologists. ED visits are associated with significantly increased wait times and auxiliary costs compared to express care and outpatient facilities. Particularly within the State of Vermont, ski hills provide a reliable population of injured patients with uncomplicated fractures in need of an X-ray examination. Here, we assess potential causes and explanations for ED overuse and lack of express care utilization for uncomplicated fractures that do not require a higher level of care, as well as publish currently available X-ray sites within the State of Vermont as a means of educating local providers and promoting lower healthcare expenditure and decreased wait times for injured patients.https://scholarworks.uvm.edu/fmclerk/1506/thumbnail.jp

EFFECTS OF SEDUCTIVE AND BORING DETAILS ON READERS\u27 COMPREHENSION OF EXPLANATORY TEXTS

Two experiments were conducted that examined the effects of tangential information on readers\u27 comprehension of explanatory texts. Participants were recruited from Introduction to Psychology courses. They were assigned to read one of three versions of a text (i.e., a base-text version, a base-text plus seductive details version or a base-text plus boring details version) about the process of lightning or the lifecycle of a white dwarf star. In Experiment 1, participants were told they had to write down everything they could remember from their passage when they finished reading. The base-text group recalled more of the core content than either of the other two groups. Lengthening a text by adding tangential information interfered with readers\u27 ability to recall the information. More interestingly, the boring details group recalled more core content than the seductive details group. The degree of interestingness of the tangential information had an independent effect on readers\u27 memory. Reading times were also recorded and analyzed. The seductive details group spent less time reading the core content of the passage than either the base-text and boring details groups, which did not differ. The presence of seductive details reduced the amount of attention readers allocated to processing the core content of the passage. In Experiment 2, readers were told that they had to verify whether or not certain sentences were presented in the passage they just finished reading. Reading times did not differ among the three groups. A post-hoc analysis of reading times across experiments revealed that participants in Experiment 1 spent more time processing the passages than those in Experiment 2. This suggests that changing the memory task from free-recall to a recognition-based task may have altered readers\u27 online processing. In the sentence verification task, there was a tendency for participants who read a passage that included detail sentences to respond faster but less accurately. The presence of detail sentences lead readers to perform more poorly on identifying whether or not sentences were actually in the passage they read as compared to readers of the same passage without details

Improving Indoor BlueTooth Localization By Using Bayesian Reasoning To Explore System Parameters

With the advent of smaller, more mobile electronic devices, a wide variety of services can now be augmented with the additional context that is provided by positional information. Systems commonly used for outdoor localization, such as GPS, cannot necessarily be used for indoor localization because often, separating a localizing device from system infrastructure with walls and other obstacles lowers accuracy. Instead, indoor localization systems can be deployed to replace the contextual information required for some situated services, that would otherwise be lost when a device moves indoors. For example, the trilateration algorithm that GPS uses to combine distance estimates from satellites can be repeated using Bluetooth (BT) devices spread throughout an environment. The signal strength of a set of beacons can be read by a localizing device, and those signal strengths can be equated to the distance between the localizing device and the beacon. These distances can then be combined using trilateration. A major source of error in such a system is that BT signal strength does not map directly to only one distance. Because microwave frequency propagation is susceptible to multipath effects and antenna direction, two devices at a fixed location can read a variety of signal strengths, which may not map to the ideal line-of-sight calibrated value. Therefore, any given signal strength reading cannot be interpreted as a single distance without introducing the potential for substantial error. One solution is to probabilistically model the relationship between distance and signal strength by modelling BT localization using a Bayesian network. In a Bayesian network, the distance versus signal strength relationship is stored as the conditional probability of a signal strength reading given a specific distance. Using a Bayesian inference algorithm, one can then reason backwards from a signal strength to a probability distribution representing the estimated position of the localizing BT device. In this thesis, I explore some of the effects of modelling BT localization with a Bayesian network. I first extend the probabilistic calibration to include the influence of the relative orientation of device antennae on the attenuation of BT signal strength between them. I then experiment with the effects of the position of a receiver within a discrete spatial bin, and of the proximity of the transmitters to the edges of the discrete space, because both have the potential to reduce the accuracy of localization using discrete variables. I found that neither affected the localization results in a significant, avoidable fashion. I then studied the effects of the scope of calibration, in terms of the number of distance values used, and of the number of beacons used in localization. I found that additional distance values and a smaller minimum distance used in calibration could result in increased BT localization accuracy, whereas many BT localization systems perform little calibration at distances smaller than 2 m. I also found that accuracy increased when the number of beacons was greater than four, and that accuracy did not significantly decrease when the number of beacons was three or fewer; whereas most trilateration systems use only three or four beacons. I conclude in general that a combination of probabilistic trilateration calibration and Bayesian network inference are viable techniques, and could allow for improvements to localization accuracy in a number of areas

Value-Added Tax On Virtual World Transactions: A South African Perspective

The dawn of the internet age has brought about concepts such as electronic commerce, virtual worlds and digitized products. When consumption tax laws such as value-added tax (VAT) or goods and service tax (GST) were legislated, these concepts were not envisaged. The aim of this article is to determine whether the South African value-added tax (VAT) Act is applicable to transactions occurring in virtual worlds. The article critically analyses section 7(1) of the VAT Act to determine its applicability to transactions occurring in virtual worlds. The benefit of this article will be to highlight the deficiency in the South African VAT Act in dealing with electronic commerce transactions as well as transactions arising in virtual worlds. The study reported here concluded that the South African VAT Act in its current format does not appear to deal with transactions occurring in virtual worlds effectively. Consequently, amendments to existing law should be effected in order to deal effectively with the transactions

A Rural Alternative School and Its Effectiveness for Preventing Dropouts

This article describes a successful alternative school located in northwest Wyoming. Students who attend this school need an atmosphere that is accepting of their differences and allow them to express themselves without fear of ridicule or punishment. These children are looking for a safe, secure place to complete their education, a place where their unique differences are respected. Bear Lodge is one such alternative high school. Students at Bear Lodge share their perspective and provide a living testimony as to the importance of alternative schools in allowing students to meet with academic success and social acceptance. Bear Lodge allows its students to work at their own pace in a caring and noncoercive environment. Here students attend school regularly, follow a standards-based curriculum, form close relationships with their peers and teachers, and know that the staff believe they can be successful in and out of school

Book Review: \u3ci\u3eThe Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates\u3c/i\u3e

This review of The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates explores the role choices and accountability play in youth development. This book illustrates how two young men with the same name from the same city and raised with similar life experiences would make different life choices that resulted in drastically different outcomes. One Wes Moore is a graduate of Johns Hopkins, Rhodes scholar, White House Fellow and successful business person. The other Wes Moore is serving a life sentence in prison for his involvement in a robbery and murder of an off-duty police officer. Recommendations for youth practitioners are discussed

An in vitro comparison of the hemodynamics of two inferior vena cava filters

AbstractPurpose: The effectiveness of an inferior vena cava (IVC) filter in preventing pulmonary embolism while preserving caval flow is significantly affected by its hemodynamic characteristics. Flow fields surrounding two types of IVC filters were compared to assess how the design of a filter may influence performance. Methods: The 12F Titanium Greenfield and VenaTech LGM inferior vena cava filters were studied in vitro with a noninvasive flow visualization technique, the photochromic flow visualization and measurement technique. Axial velocity profiles and wall shear stress distributions were measured. These results were compared with analytical data corresponding to the flow field in the absence of a filter to determine the relative extent of the flow disturbances. Results: The reductions in near-wall axial velocity and wall shear stress caused by the VenaTech filter were more extensive and severe than those caused by the Greenfield filter. These changes were the consequence of differences in the geometry and dimensions of the struts of the two filters. The measurements showed the flow fields to be laminar, with no evidence of turbulence in both cases. Conclusion: Two factors that have been linked to thrombogenesis, near-wall velocity and wall-shear stress, were significantly affected by the larger frontal profile area of the VenaTech filter. Although a larger area may increase clot-trapping efficiency, as shown by previous studies, the reduced near-wall velocities and wall shear stresses may increase the potential for thrombogenesis and, thus, caval occlusion. In contrast to other in vitro flow visualization studies, no turbulence was observed with either filter. (J Vasc Surg 2000;31:539-49.