Multiple Testing for Neuroimaging via Hidden Markov Random Field

Traditional voxel-level multiple testing procedures in neuroimaging, mostly $p$-value based, often ignore the spatial correlations among neighboring voxels and thus suffer from substantial loss of power. We extend the local-significance-index based procedure originally developed for the hidden Markov chain models, which aims to minimize the false nondiscovery rate subject to a constraint on the false discovery rate, to three-dimensional neuroimaging data using a hidden Markov random field model. A generalized expectation-maximization algorithm for maximizing the penalized likelihood is proposed for estimating the model parameters. Extensive simulations show that the proposed approach is more powerful than conventional false discovery rate procedures. We apply the method to the comparison between mild cognitive impairment, a disease status with increased risk of developing Alzheimer's or another dementia, and normal controls in the FDG-PET imaging study of the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative.Comment: A MATLAB package implementing the proposed FDR procedure is available with this paper at the Biometrics website on Wiley Online Librar

Women in History--Maria Poveka Martinez

Native American artisan Maria Poveka Martinez played a vital role in the revival of pottery making throughout the Southwest United States. Born in 1887 in the San Ildefonso region of New Mexico, Maria first made pottery as a child and received encouragement from her aunt, who was an excellent potter. 1907 is the year that Maria began her pottery career in earnest. During this year, Maria\u27s husband Julian worked as a digger at an archeological site near their pueblo. Maria was at the* excavation site when the diggers uncovered shards of decorated black on cream pottery. She took great interest in the pottery shards and was asked by some of the archeologists if she could recreate some of the vessels and prehistoric decorative patterns. Excited by the project, Maria carefully studied the patterns and then created some historically inspired pottery for the archeologists. Impressed with Maria\u27s pottery, the archeologists placed more orders for her work and she began to earn an income by selling her pots. Prior to this point in history, the ancient tradition of Native American pottery making had begun to wane, possibly due a lack of interest by Anglo society

Women in History--Maria Poveka Martinez

Native American artisan Maria Poveka Martinez played a vital role in the revival of pottery making throughout the Southwest United States. Born in 1887 in the San Ildefonso region of New Mexico, Maria first made pottery as a child and received encouragement from her aunt, who was an excellent potter. 1907 is the year that Maria began her pottery career in earnest. During this year, Maria\u27s husband Julian worked as a digger at an archeological site near their pueblo. Maria was at the* excavation site when the diggers uncovered shards of decorated black on cream pottery. She took great interest in the pottery shards and was asked by some of the archeologists if she could recreate some of the vessels and prehistoric decorative patterns. Excited by the project, Maria carefully studied the patterns and then created some historically inspired pottery for the archeologists. Impressed with Maria\u27s pottery, the archeologists placed more orders for her work and she began to earn an income by selling her pots. Prior to this point in history, the ancient tradition of Native American pottery making had begun to wane, possibly due a lack of interest by Anglo society

What Is Wrong With The Rhapsode? The Role Of Inspiration In Plato’s The Ion

In Plato’s Ion we find Socrates engaged in a conversation with the rhapsode Ion. During the course of the dialogue, Socrates gives a critical account of the nature of the rhapsode’s profession. But what exactly is it that Socrates criticises? And is his account entirely critical or does he, in the end, attach some positive value to the rhapsode’s profession in virtue of its being a ‘divinely inspired’ activity?1 In this essay I shall argue that Socrates does in fact give an entirely critical account of the rhapsode’s profession. Thus I agree with Nickolas Pappas, who says that “the claim of poetic madness is as derogatory as any other imputation of insanity.

Attitudes and Beliefs of Seventh-day Adventists Concerning Psychology, Counseling, and Mental Health Issues

Problem. As in the mainstream population, Adventists are dealing with a variety of mental health issues, and there has been no empirical research which explored their attitudes and beliefs concerning psychology, counseling, and mental health issues. Method. A survey was used to collect data on beliefs about psychology, attitudes towards counseling, beliefs about mental health issues, and beliefs about medical care from a sample of 317 Adventist adults from the Illinois Conference. Data were also analyzed to understand the relationship between the independent variables—gender, utilization of psychological services, the Seventh-day Adventist’s degree of knowledge about the writings of Ellen G. White on psychology, and the Seventh-day Adventist’s degree of knowledge about the writings of Adventists on psychology—and the dependent variables: beliefs about psychology, attitudes toward counseling, and beliefs about mental health issues. Results. The study showed that, in general, Adventists have positive beliefs towards psychology and mental health issues and positive attitudes towards counseling. Using categorical regression, the study also indicated that having knowledge about psychology is related to having positive beliefs about psychology as a legitimate science, having positive attitudes about the role of counseling, having positive attitudes about participating in counseling, and having positive beliefs about the existence of mental health issues. Adventists who are currently or have used psychological services in the past have positive beliefs about psychology, positive understanding of the role of counseling, and positive attitudes about participating in counseling. Conclusions. Positive beliefs and attitudes of Adventists concerning psychology, counseling, and mental health issues are confirmed. With this information, mental health workers can be better equipped to serve the Adventist community. The conclusions gleaned from this study can also serve as a catalyst for beginning a dialogue among the Adventist church leadership to understand how they can better support the congregants who have mental health needs

Challenging computations of Hilbert bases of cones associated with algebraic statistics

In this paper we present two independent computational proofs that the monoid derived from $5\times 5\times 3$ contingency tables is normal, completing the classification by Hibi and Ohsugi. We show that Vlach's vector disproving normality for the monoid derived from $6\times 4\times 3$ contingency tables is the unique minimal such vector up to symmetry. Finally, we compute the full Hilbert basis of the cone associated with the non-normal monoid of the semi-graphoid for $|N|=5$. The computations are based on extensions of the packages LattE-4ti2 and Normaliz.Comment: 10 page

Competitive Issues in the Deregulated United States Railroad Industry

In 1980, the railroad industry was deregulated due to poor industry performance as well as an ideological shift. The newly developed contestable market theory provided the political justification for deregulating what was previously perceived as a natural monopoly. The theme of this study is the examination of whether contestable market conditions exist in the U.S. surface transportation industry which are sufficient to justify giving up direct governmental involvement in the railroad industry. The main generic market structures that play an important role in the regulatory discussion are introduced and implications for regulatory intervention in the case of railroads are drawn. The market structures examined are the perfect competition model, the natural monopoly, the contestable market theory and the cartel. Next, the history of railroad regulation and the changing position of railroads in the surface market is described. This history ranges from beginning of regulation in 1887 up to its abolishment in 1980. The outcomes of railroad deregulation regarding market concentration and operations are analyzed and key factors of railroad profitability are determined. Some consideration is given to the regulatory environment of other surface transportation modes, mainly the trucking industry, because the intermodal market is the relevant market for contestability. The intermodal transportation market which has grown rapidly since deregulation is described and analyzed. The present railroad market is segmented. The segments are examined for their degree of contestability. Particular markets are introduced. E.g., the market extremes of transportation of wheat out of the Northern Plains and intermodal container traffic in the Ohio River Valley are examined for “fit” of the Contestable Market Theory. Open-access as a suitable alternative form of railroad regulation is discussed. This study finds that no railroad market segment is contestable and hence that railroad deregulation based on contestable markets is not justified

An Investigation into the Imposed Cognitive Load of Static & Dynamic Type Systems on Programmers

Static and dynamic type systems have long been a point of contention in the programming language wars. Yet, for many years, arguments on either side were drawn from personal experience and not empirical evidence. A challenge for researchers is that the usability of language constructs is difficult to quantify, especially since usability can be interpreted in many ways. By one definition, language usability can be measured in terms of the level of cognitive load imposed on a developer. This can be done through questionnaires, but ultimately user responses are subject to bias. In recent years, eye-tracking has been shown to be an effective means of measuring cognitive load via direct physiological measures. Towards the goal of measuring type system usability, we present a user study in which participants completed programming tasks in Java and Groovy. This thesis explored the use of the Index of Cognitive Activity (ICA) as a cognitive load measurement tool and considered novices and experts separately in the analysis. We found ICA to be an ineffective means of measuring type system usability and we cannot say conclusively whether it can be generally applied to programming tasks. Despite this, our results contradict previous studies as we found type system did not affect success rate, task completion time, or perceived task difficulty