The interaction of pitch and timing in the perception of prosodic grouping

Speakers break their otherwise continuous speech stream into meaningful segments, the edges of which are marked by audible cues such as pauses, rate changes and pitch movement. Prosodic boundaries, as these segment edges and the cues marking them are known, play a role critical to language processing and spoken language acquisition. While great progress has been made in quantifying the complicated range of acoustic cues that mark boundaries, little is understood about the cognitive processes by which these cues guide linguistic interpretation. Further, while prosodic boundary measures typically treat critical cues from pitch and timing independently, evidence suggests that pitch and timing are perceptually interdependent. In fact, pitch factors may at times distort perceived duration. This dissertation presents 3 pairs of perception experiments investigating pitch-­time interaction, including putative distortion of perceived duration from dynamic pitch and cross-‑silence pitch jumps (i.e., the kappa effect). Each pair uses the same set of stimuli, resynthesized with crossed continua of pitch and timing manipulations, in two different tasks: one psychoacoustic judgment of duration, and one of linguistic interpretation. Results suggest that perceptual interaction of major cues from timing (preboundary lengthening and pauses) and pitch (edge tones and reset) can be analyzed as reflecting gestalt-­like grouping principles (proximity, similarity and continuity) that have been shown to play a role in perceptual grouping in other cognitive domains, including vision and non-speech auditory perception. In addition to these potentially more cognitive­‐general principles, a new role is introduced for learned and potentially language-­specific patterns to prosodic grouping, in particular intonational schemas, i.e., recognizable cross-­phrase pitch patterns. Beyond this, results also support the hypothesis that perceived grouping is the driving force behind several types of pitch­based auditory illusions, including the auditory kappa effect. This dissertation offers insights into why prosodic boundaries are expressed with the particular pitch and timing cues that are common cross-­linguistically. While much language form is arbitrary, the expression of grouping by way of acoustic cues appears to be much less so. This research has potential toexplain the perceptual foundations of boundary cues, and therefore the cross-­linguistic similarities of prosodic grouping cues

Effect of Industry 4.0 on Education Systems: An Outlook

Congreso Universitario de Innovación Educativa En las Enseñanzas Técnicas, CUIEET (26º. 2018. Gijón

Sesgos cognitivos atencionales y de interpretación en personas mayores con diagnóstico de Trastorno de Ansiedad Generalizada

Tesis doctoral inédita leida en la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Facultad de Psicología. Departamento de Psicología Biológica y de la Salud. Fecha de lectura: 8 de noviembre de 201

From traditional construction to construction 4.0: legacy risks and emerging risks

[ES] El sector de la construcción presenta unas condiciones ideales para el estudio del funcionamiento de la prevención de riesgos laborales en España. Una alta afiliación, su notable incidencia de siniestralidad, el amplio abanico de riesgos, la concurrencia de empresas, una legislación específica y el especial interés por parte de la Administración e Inspección hacen que sea necesario evaluar los diferentes principios preventivos para conocer sus fuerzas y debilidades. El modelo de prevención elegido por el grueso del sector dista de los objetivos de la legislación y ha llevado a una dejación de las acciones de todos los implicados. No obstante, tiene algunos elementos específicos y positivos como el número de figuras de control o la exigencia de formación regulada obligatoria por el Convenio Colectivo. Los ajustes que se requieren en materia preventiva no pueden ser retrasados, tanto por los resultados obtenidos en la última década como por la aparición de nuevas tecnologías revolucionarias que se prevén cambiarán el entendimiento del trabajo y en el caso particular de la construcción, llevarán a que el foco preventivo deba ponerse en los riesgos que hasta ahora habían sido invisibles.[EN] The construction sector presents ideal conditions for the study of the functioning of occupational risk prevention in Spain. A high membership, a high incidence of accidents, a wide range of risks, the concurrence of companies, a specific legislation and the special interest of the Administration and the Inspectorate make it necessary to evaluate the different preventive principles in order to know their strengths and weaknesses. The prevention model chosen by most of the sector is far from the objectives of the legislation and has led to a neglect of the actions of all those involved. However, it has some specific and positive elements such as the number of control figures or the requirement of mandatory training regulated by the Collective Bargaining Agreement. The adjustments required in preventive matters cannot be delayed both by the results obtained in the last decade and by the appearance of new revolutionary technologies that are expected to change the understanding of work and in the particular case of construction will lead to the preventive focus having to be placed on risks that had been invisible until now

Gluten: impact on health

RESUMEN: Hace más de 10.000 años, con el inicio de la agricultura, los cereales pasaron a ser un pilar de la alimentación humana. En la actualidad, algunos de los más consumidos son el trigo, la cebada, la avena y el centeno. Dichos cereales tienen en común sus proteínas que, en conjunto, se denominan “gluten”. Debido a la composición aminoacídica y a su resistente estructura, el gluten resulta difícil de digerir para el organismo humano. Este aspecto, junto a factores como la genética y la microbiota hacen que esta molécula pueda ser causa de patologías como: la celiaquía, la sensibilidad al gluten no celiaca, la dermatitis herpetiforme, la ataxia al gluten, etc. En conjunto, estas enfermedades afectan a más del 10% de la población general, siendo el tratamiento de elección la eliminación del gluten en la dieta. Sin embargo, este método terapéutico tiene una baja tasa de adherencia siendo, por tanto, su efectividad limitada. Con objeto de apoyar o complementar la dieta sin gluten se han desarrollado una serie de terapias dirigidas a facilitar la digestión de las proteínas que conforman el gluten, así como a actuar sobre el sistema inmune (vacunas específicas) para inducir la tolerancia al gluten.ABSTRACT: More than 10.000 years ago, at the beginning of agriculture, cereals became a mainstay of human nutrition. Nowadays, some of the most consumed are wheat, barley, oats and rye. These cereals have in common their proteins that, collectively, are called "gluten". Due to the amino acid composition and its resistant structure, gluten is difficult to digest for the human organism. This aspect, added to factors such as genetics and microbiota, make this molecule to be a cause of pathologies such as: celiac disease, non-celiac gluten sensitivity, dermatitis herpetiformis, gluten ataxia, etc. Together, these diseases affect more than 10% of the general population, being the most used treatment the gluten elimination in the diet (gluten-free diet). However, this therapeutic method has a low rate of adherence and, therefore, its limited effectiveness. In order to support or complement the gluten-free diet, many therapies have been developed aimed to facilitate the gluten´s protein digestion, as well as acting on the immune system (specific vaccines) to induce the gluten tolerance.Grado en Enfermerí

Attentional biases in older adults with generalized anxiety disorder

Cognitive theories of anxiety propose that selective attention to negative information plays a central role in the development and maintenance of anxiety. The presence of such attentional bias has been confirmed in younger adults. Nevertheless, there are few studies that have explored anxiety-linked attentional bias in older adults, and the available results are inconclusive. Conversely, the socioemotional selectivity theory posits that there are agerelated changes in emotional information processing and, consistent with this account, it has been found that older adults preferentially pay more attention to positive stimuli compared with younger adults (“positivity effect”). The present study aimed to explore attentional bias towards negative and positive information in a sample of older adults with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) compared with a control group. The results showed that older adults with GAD displayed an attentional preference for negative information and attentional avoidance for positive information, whereas healthy older adults showed the reverse pattern of attentional deployment. These results suggest that selective attention toward negative information and selective avoidance of positive information may be a relevant factor in clinically anxious older adultsThis work was supported by the National Plan for Scientific Research, Development, and Technological Innovation 2008-2011 [PSI2008-02338/PSIC], the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science [AP2005-0377] and MINECO (Spain) Excellence Network PROMOSAM: Research on Processes, Mechanisms, and Psychological Treatment for the Promotion of Mental Health [PSI2014-56303-REDT]. The funding agencies played no role in the study (design, collection, analysis, and interpretation of data), or in the writing of the report or decision to submit the article for publicatio

El Mínimum Vital en sus relaciones con el derecho (El vitalismo desde una perspectiva teórico-práctica)

This article makes an analysis of Mínimum Vital theory since a point of view little-known until now, which is to bring up its relations with the laws; try to prove that this doctrine is not utopic or ingenous as so many times has been qualified by its opponents, but it’s a result of an etic which gradually must be incorporate into the society through the concrete laws and institutions. It makes to notice that the principal vitalism´s objective is to produce a greater level of social well-being consequently it must to help of a formal machine that is the system legal.TEORÍA Y PRAXIS Year 14, No.28, January-May 2016, pp. 25-48En este artículo se hace un análisis del Mínimum Vital desde un punto de vista poco tratado hasta el momento, el cual es plantear sus relaciones con el derecho. Trata de demostrar que dicha teoría no es utópica o ingenua como muchas veces se le ha calificado por parte de sus detractores, sino más bien el resultado de una ética que paulatinamente debe irse incorporando en la sociedad a través de leyes e instituciones concretas. Hace notar que el fin último del vitalismo es producir un mayor grado de bienestar social para lo cual debe de auxiliarse de una maquinaria formal, que es el derecho.TEORÍA Y PRAXIS año 14, No.28, Enero-Mayo de 2016, pp. 25-4

Radical decisions in cancer: Redox control of cell growth and death

Free radicals play a key role in many physiological decisions in cells. Since free radicals are toxic to cellular components, it is known that they cause DNA damage, contribute to DNA instability and mutation and thus favor carcinogenesis. However, nowadays it is assumed that free radicals play a further complex role in cancer. Low levels of free radicals and steady state levels of antioxidant enzymes are responsible for the fine tuning of redox status inside cells. A change in redox state is a way to modify the physiological status of the cell, in fact, a more reduced status is found in resting cells while a more oxidative status is associated with proliferative cells. The mechanisms by which redox status can change the proliferative activity of cancer cells are related to transcriptional and posttranscriptional modifications of proteins that play a critical role in cell cycle control. Since cancer cells show higher levels of free radicals compared with their normal counterparts, it is believed that the anti-oxidative stress mechanism is also increased in cancer cells. In fact, the levels of some of the most important antioxidant enzymes are elevated in advanced status of some types of tumors. Anti-cancer treatment is compromised by survival mechanisms in cancer cells and collateral damage in normal non-pathological tissues. Though some resistance mechanisms have been described, they do not yet explain why treatment of cancer fails in several tumors. Given that some antitumoral treatments are based on the generation of free radicals, we will discuss in this review the possible role of antioxidant enzymes in the survival mechanism in cancer cells and then, its participation in the failure of cancer treatments