Techniques for increasing the efficiency of Earth gravity calculations for precision orbit determination

Two techniques were analyzed. The first is a representation using Chebyshev expansions in three-dimensional cells. The second technique employs a temporary file for storing the components of the nonspherical gravity force. Computer storage requirements and relative CPU time requirements are presented. The Chebyshev gravity representation can provide a significant reduction in CPU time in precision orbit calculations, but at the cost of a large amount of direct-access storage space, which is required for a global model

Enhancing Social Connectedness in Anxiety and Depression Through Amplification of Positivity: Preliminary Treatment Outcomes and Process of Change.

BackgroundAnxiety and depressive disorders are often characterized by perceived social disconnection, yet evidence-based treatments produce only modest improvements in this domain. The well-established link between positive affect (PA) and social connectedness suggests that directly targeting PA in treatment may be valuable.MethodA secondary analysis of a waitlist-controlled trial (N=29) was conducted to evaluate treatment response and process of change in social connectedness within a 10-session positive activity intervention protocol-Amplification of Positivity (AMP)-designed to increase PA in individuals seeking treatment for anxiety or depression (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02330627). Perceived social connectedness and PA/negative affect (NA) were assessed throughout treatment. Time-lagged multilevel mediation models examined the process of change in affect and connectedness throughout treatment.ResultsThe AMP group displayed significantly larger improvements in social connectedness from pre- to post-treatment compared to waitlist; improvements were maintained through 6-month follow-up. Within the AMP group, increases in PA and decreases in NA both uniquely predicted subsequent increases in connectedness throughout treatment. However, experiencing heightened NA throughout treatment attenuated the effect of changes in PA on connectedness. Improvements in connectedness predicted subsequent increases in PA, but not changes in NA.ConclusionsThese preliminary findings suggest that positive activity interventions may be valuable for enhancing social connectedness in individuals with clinically impairing anxiety or depression, possibly through both increasing positive emotions and decreasing negative emotions

The Promise of Sustainable Happiness

From ancient history to recent times, philosophers, writers, self-help gurus, and now scientists have taken up the challenge of how to foster greater happiness. This chapter discusses why some people are happier than others, focusing on the distinctive ways that happy and unhappy individuals construe themselves and others, respond to social comparisons, make decisions, and self-reflect. We suggest that, despite several barriers to increased well-being, less happy people can strive successfully to be happier by learning a variety of effortful strategies and practicing them with determination and commitment. The sustainable happiness model (Lyubomirsky, Sheldon, & Schkade, 2005) provides a theoretical framework for experimental intervention research on how to increase and maintain happiness. According to this model, three factors contribute to an individual\u27s chronic happiness level: (a) the set point, (b) life circumstances, and (c) intentional activities, or effortful acts that are naturally variable and episodic. Such activities, which include committing acts of kindness, expressing gratitude or optimism, and savoring joyful life events, represent the most promising route to sustaining enhanced happiness. We describe a half-dozen randomized controlled interventions testing the efficacy of each of these activities in raising and maintaining well-being, as well as the mediators and moderators underlying their effects. Future researchers must endeavor not only to learn which particular practices make people happier, but how and why they do so.https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/psychology_books/1010/thumbnail.jp

How your bank balance buys happiness: The importance of "cash on hand" to life satisfaction

Could liquid wealth, or "cash on hand"—the balance of one's checking and savings accounts—be a better predictor of life satisfaction than income? In a field study using 585 U.K. bank customers, we paired individual Satisfaction With Life Scale responses with anonymized account data held by the bank, including the full account balances for each respondent. Individuals with higher liquid wealth were found to have more positive perceptions of their financial well-being, which, in turn, predicted higher life satisfaction, suggesting that liquid wealth is indirectly associated with life satisfaction. This effect persisted after accounting for multiple controls, including investments, total spending, and indebtedness (which predicted financial well-being) and demographics (which predicted life satisfaction). Our results suggest that having readily accessible sources of cash is of unique importance to life satisfaction, above and beyond raw earnings, investments, or indebtedness. Therefore, to improve the well-being of citizens, policymakers should focus not just on boosting incomes but also on increasing people’s immediate access to money

The association between Extraversion and well-being is limited to one facet.

ObjectiveMõttus argues that effects should not be attributed to traits if they are driven by particular facets or items. We apply this reasoning to investigate the relationship between facets and items of Extraversion and well-being.MethodWe analyzed five cross-sectional datasets (total N = 1,879), with facet- and item-level correlations and SEM.ResultsWe found that the correlation between the energy level facet and well-being was solely responsible for the association between Extraversion and well-being. Neither sociability nor assertiveness were uniquely related to well-being when energy level was included as a predictor. Thus, the correlations between well-being and sociability and between well-being and assertiveness can be almost fully explained by these constructs' relationships with energy level.ConclusionsWe conclude that the link between Extraversion and well-being should be attributed to the energy level facet rather than generalized to the trait level

Cognitive vulnerability to depression: An exploration of dysfunctional attitudes and ruminative response styles in the United Arab Emirates

Background. There has been little exploration of Beck\u27s cognitive theory of depression and Nolen-Hoeksem\u27s response styles theory within Arab populations. Objectives. The study investigates the generalizability of these clinically influential models to Emirati citizens residing within United Arab Emirates (UAE). Method. An opportunity sample of 450 undergraduate participants was assessed for dysfunctional attitudes using an Arabic/English 40-item version of Weissman and Beck\u27s Dysfunctional Attitudes Scale (DAS). Participants also completed Arabic/English versions of Nolen-Hoeksema\u27s ruminative response styles (RRS) scale and the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II). Results. Correlation and regression analyses showed depression to be associated with both RRS and dysfunctional attitudes. Conclusion. The study supports the generalization of these clinically influential theories of depression within a UAE context. ©2011 The British Psychological Society

Block Format Error Bounds and Optimal Block Size Selection

The amounts of data that need to be transmitted, processed, and stored by the modern deep neural networks have reached truly enormous volumes in the last few years calling for the invention of new paradigms both in hardware and software development. One of the most promising and rapidly advancing frontiers here is the creation of new numerical formats. In this work we focus on the family of block floating point numerical formats due to their combination of wide dynamic range, numerical accuracy, and efficient hardware implementation of inner products using simple integer arithmetic. These formats are characterized by a block of mantissas with a shared scale factor. The basic Block Floating Point (BFP) format quantizes the block scales into the nearest powers of two on the right. Its simple modification - Scaled BFP (SBFP) - stores the same scales in full precision and thus allows higher accuracy. In this paper, we study the statistical behavior of both these formats rigorously. We develop asymptotic bounds on the inner product error in SBFP- and BFP-quantized normally distributed vectors. Next, we refine those asymptotic results to finite dimensional settings and derive high-dimensional tight bounds for the same errors. Based on the obtained results we introduce a performance measure assessing accuracy of any block format. This measure allows us to determine the optimal parameters, such as the block size, yielding highest accuracy. In particular, we show that if the precision of the BFP format is fixed at 4 bits, the optimal block size becomes 64. All theoretical derivations are supported by numerical experiments and studies on the weights of publicly available pretrained neural networks

Quantum reality and squeezed states of light

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 1994.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 67-71).by Ilya Lyubomirsky.M.S