Human-Computer User Interface Design for Semiliterate and Illiterate Users

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has revolutionized the lives of the people. The technology is embedded in daily life of literate or semiliterate/illiterate users. However, the user interface (UI) requirements for semiliterate/illiterate users are different from that of an educated person. The researchers of Human Computer Interaction for Development (HCI4D) face challenges to improve the usability of a UI for the semiliterate users. Therefore, a Systematic Literature Review (SLR) is conducted to provide a set of design factors and guidelines for UI development of semiliterate users. The study is based on extensive research gathered from literature to understand the user-centered design (UCD) approach, enhancing user experience (UX) for semiliterate users. This study analyses fifty two research articles that are published during 2010-2020. The findings shed light on the systematization of UI design guidelines for semiliterate/illiterate users. These guidelines can help in taking advantage of ICT during the COVID-19 pandemic. The analysis shows that seventeen main design factors are indispensable for designing UI of semiliterate users. The most suggested design factors include localization and graphics, which should be incorporated in UI for the target population. Moreover, the lag in the design factors as personalization and consistency open a road for future research

Orthodontists? preference on type of rigid fixed functional appliance for skeletal Class II correction : a survey study

Rigid fixed functional appliances are most commonly used to correct skeletal Class II malocclusions. The objective of this study was to assess orthodontists? preference of different rigid fixed functional appliances used in the U.S.A for correction of skeletal Class II malocclusions. A survey on use and preference of rigid fixed functional appliances for skeletal Class II correction was emailed to 2,227 members of the American Association of Orthodontists (AAO) in the U.S.A. Frequency distribution of different responses and their association with demographic factors was assessed. Out of 140 orthodontists completing the survey, 110 responded as using rigid fixed functional appliances. Eight incomplete responses were eliminated from data analysis. 51.5% (68/132) orthodontists used rigid fixed functional appliances. The most preferred rigid fixed functional appliance was the Herbst appliance with 72% response followed by Mandibular Anterior Repositioning Appliance (24%) and AdvanSync (4%). There was no statistically significant difference in use of rigid fixed functional appliances between different age groups (p=0.284). However, the 40-54 age group used the most rigid fixed functional appliances in practice, followed by the 25-39 year age group and the 55-69 age group using these appliances the least. There was statistical significance between the type of practice setting one works in and the use of rigid fixed functional appliances in practice (p=0.022). About 52% of orthodontists use rigid fixed functional appliances to correct skeletal Class II malocclusions. The Herbst appliance is the most commonly used and most preferred amongst all rigid fixed functional appliances with a 72% preferred rate

Prevention of: self harm in British South Asian women: study protocol of an exploratory RCT of culturally adapted manual assisted Problem Solving Training (C- MAP)

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Suicide is a major public health problem worldwide. In the UK suicide is the second most common cause of death in people aged 15-24 years. Self harm is one of the commonest reasons for medical admission in the UK. In the year following a suicide attempt the risk of a repeat attempt or death by suicide may be up to 100 times greater than in people who have never attempted suicide.</p> <p>Research evidence shows increased risk of suicide and attempted suicide among British South Asian women. There are concerns about the current service provision and its appropriateness for this community due to the low numbers that get involved with the services. Both problem solving and interpersonal forms of psychotherapy are beneficial in the treatment of patients who self harm and could potentially be helpful in this ethnic group.</p> <p>The paper describes the trial protocol of adapting and evaluating a culturally appropriate psychological treatment for the adult British South Asian women who self harm.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We plan to test a culturally adapted Problem Solving Therapy (C- MAP) in British South Asian women who self harm. Eight sessions of problem solving each lasting approximately 50 minutes will be delivered over 3 months. The intervention will be assessed using a prospective rater blind randomized controlled design comparing with treatment as usual (TAU). Outcome assessments will be carried out at 3 and 6 months. A sub group of the participants will be invited for qualitative interviews.</p> <p>Discussion</p> <p>This study will test the feasibility and acceptability of the C- MAP in British South Asian women. We will be informed on whether a culturally adapted brief psychological intervention compared with treatment as usual for self-harm results in decreased hopelessness and suicidal ideation. This will also enable us to collect necessary information on recruitment, effect size, the optimal delivery method and acceptability of the intervention in preparation for a definitive RCT using repetition of self harm and cost effectiveness as primary outcome measures.</p> <p>Trial Registration</p> <p>Current Controlled Trials 08/H1013/6</p

Is equipoise a useful concept to justify randomised controlled trials in the cultural context of Pakistan? A survey of clinicians in relation to a trial of talking therapy for young people who self-harm

Background: Clinical equipoise, also defined as the uncertainty principle, is considered essential when recruiting subjects to a clinical trial. However, equipoise is threatened when clinicians are influenced by their own preferences. Little research has investigated equipoise in the context of trial recruitment. Methods: This cross-sectional survey sought clinicians’ views (operationalised as 11 statements relating to treatments offered in a trial of a psychological intervention for young people) about equipoise and individual treatment preferences in the context of moral justification for recruiting young people at risk of self-harm or suicide to a randomised controlled trial (RCT) to evaluate the Youth Culturally Adapted Manual Assisted Psychological Intervention (Y-CMAP) in Pakistan. We compared the views of clinicians involved in Y-CMAP RCT recruitment to those of a sample of clinicians not involved in trial recruitment but treating similar patients, comparing their sociodemographic characteristics and the proportions of those in each group agreeing with each statement. Results: There was a response rate of 96% (75/78). Findings showed that, during trial recruitment and before the RCT results were known, the majority of all responding clinicians (73.3%) considered Y-CMAP to be an effective treatment for young people at risk of self-harm or suicide. Although there was an acknowledgement of individual preferences for the intervention, there was near consensus (90%) on the need to conduct an RCT for reaching an evidence-based decision. However, there were no significant differences in the proportion of recruiting clinicians reporting a treatment preference for Y-CMAP than non-recruiting clinicians (31 (88.6%) versus 36 (90%), p = 0.566). A significantly higher proportion of non-recruiting clinicians (87.5%) as compared to (48.5%) in the trial (p = 0.000) stated that there may be other treatments that may be equally good for the patients, seemingly undermining a preference for the intervention. Those reporting a treatment preference also acknowledged that there was nothing on which this preference was based, however confident they felt about them, thus accepting clinical equipoise as ethical justification for conducting the RCT. There was a significant group difference in views that treatment overall is better as a result of young patients’ participation in the Y-CMAP trial (p = 0.015) (i.e. more clinicians not involved in the trial agreed with this statement). Similarly, more clinicians not involved in the trial agreed on the perceived availability of other treatment options that were good for young people at risk of self-harm (p < 0.05). Conclusions: The paper highlights that clinicians in Pakistan accept the notion of clinical equipoise as an ethical justification for patient participation in RCTs. The need for conducting RCTs to generate evidence base and to reduce bias was considered important by the clinical community

PAR1 Agonists Stimulate APC-Like Endothelial Cytoprotection and Confer Resistance to Thromboinflammatory Injury

Stimulation of protease-activated receptor 1 (PAR1) on endothelium by activated protein C (APC) is protective in several animal models of disease, and APC has been used clinically in severe sepsis and wound healing. Clinical use of APC, however, is limited by its immunogenicity and its anticoagulant activity. We show that a class of small molecules termed “parmodulins” that act at the cytosolic face of PAR1 stimulates APC-like cytoprotective signaling in endothelium. Parmodulins block thrombin generation in response to inflammatory mediators and inhibit platelet accumulation on endothelium cultured under flow. Evaluation of the antithrombotic mechanism showed that parmodulins induce cytoprotective signaling through Gβγ, activating a PI3K/Akt pathway and eliciting a genetic program that includes suppression of NF-κB–mediated transcriptional activation and up-regulation of select cytoprotective transcripts. STC1 is among the up-regulated transcripts, and knockdown of stanniocalin-1 blocks the protective effects of both parmodulins and APC. Induction of this signaling pathway in vivo protects against thromboinflammatory injury in blood vessels. Small-molecule activation of endothelial cytoprotection through PAR1 represents an approach for treatment of thromboinflammatory disease and provides proof-of-principle for the strategy of targeting the cytoplasmic surface of GPCRs to achieve pathway selective signaling

Fibrillin-1 regulates the bioavailability of TGFβ1

We have discovered that fibrillin-1, which forms extracellular microfibrils, can regulate the bioavailability of transforming growth factor (TGF) β1, a powerful cytokine that modulates cell survival and phenotype. Altered TGFβ signaling is a major contributor to the pathology of Marfan syndrome (MFS) and related diseases. In the presence of cell layer extracellular matrix, a fibrillin-1 sequence encoded by exons 44–49 releases endogenous TGFβ1, thereby stimulating TGFβ receptor–mediated Smad2 signaling. This altered TGFβ1 bioavailability does not require intact cells, proteolysis, or the altered expression of TGFβ1 or its receptors. Mass spectrometry revealed that a fibrillin-1 fragment containing the TGFβ1-releasing sequence specifically associates with full-length fibrillin-1 in cell layers. Solid-phase and BIAcore binding studies showed that this fragment interacts strongly and specifically with N-terminal fibrillin-1, thereby inhibiting the association of C-terminal latent TGFβ-binding protein 1 (a component of the large latent complex [LLC]) with N-terminal fibrillin-1. By releasing LLC from microfibrils, the fibrillin-1 sequence encoded by exons 44–49 can contribute to MFS and related diseases

Usability Evaluation of E-Commerce Mobile Application

Mobile is not only reducing the distance between the people; it is also providing easiness for people to buy items remotely in just one click. In today’s global village, different companies like Ali Express, eBay, Amazon, Daraz, Olx, Goto, and others have provided electronic commerce (e-commerce) platforms by offering facilities of mobile applications for users. During the current coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the e-commerce landscape is changing rapidly, and on top of health concerns, brands across the globe are concerned about how COVID-19 will impact e-commerce. Most of the people all around the world using these e-commerce applications for grocery, daily usage products, or for clothing. Providing a better User Experience (UX) to the users, the user interface (UI) of e-commerce applications should be simple and easy to use for attracting users. But there are usability issues that developers cannot comprehend because these issues can only be identified with the help of users interacting with the UI. Therefore, to evaluate the usability and to find out the user’s satisfaction System Usability Scale (SUS) is conducted on popular e-commerce mobile applications, including Ali Express, Daraz, and Goto. Sixty-Eight participants evaluated the interface from Pakistan. The results illustrated 71%, 69%, and 55% user satisfaction for Ali Express, Daraz, and Goto, respectively. Moreover, five usability experts evaluated the Goto interface to identify the existing issues in the UI. The results revealed a path for designers to develop an efficient UI interface for e-commerce applications

An inhibitory circuit from central amygdala to zona incerta drives pain-related behaviors in mice

Central amygdala neurons expressing protein kinase C-delta (CeA-PKCδ) are sensitized following nerve injury and promote pain-related responses in mice. The neural circuits underlying modulation of pain-related behaviors by CeA-PKCδ neurons, however, remain unknown. In this study, we identified a neural circuit that originates in CeA-PKCδ neurons and terminates in the ventral region of the zona incerta (ZI), a subthalamic structure previously linked to pain processing. Behavioral experiments show that chemogenetic inhibition of GABAergic ZI neurons induced bilateral hypersensitivity in uninjured mice and contralateral hypersensitivity after nerve injury. In contrast, chemogenetic activation of GABAergic ZI neurons reversed nerve injury-induced hyper-sensitivity. Optogenetic manipulations of CeA-PKCδ axonal terminals in the ZI further showed that inhibition of this pathway reduces nerve injury-induced hypersensitivity whereas activation of the pathway produces hypersensitivity in the uninjured paws. Altogether, our results identify a novel nociceptive inhibitory efferent pathway from CeA-PKCδ neurons to the ZI that bidirectionally modulates pain-related behaviors in mice.Fil: Singh, Sudhuman. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Wilson, Torri D.. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Valdivia Torres, Lesly Spring. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados Unidos. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Benowitz, Barbara. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Chaudhry, Sarah. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Ma, Jun. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Adke, Anisha P.. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Soler Cedeño, Omar. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Velasquez, Daniela. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Penzo, Mario A.. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados UnidosFil: Carrasquillo, Yarimar. National Center For Complementary And Integrative Health; Estados Unido

The Collective Submitted Works from Honors 2030

Students in the Honors 2030, Inquiries in the Social and Behavioral Sciences course each participated in the URS 2020 as their final project for the course. Dr. Wilson worked with each student as a faculty mentor to create, draft, edit, approve and publish each of the final posters and papers submitted to the 2020 URS for the course