Improving intercultural communication skills: A challenge facing institutions of higher education in the 21st century

Following discussion of the rationales for improving students' intercultural communication skills, this article described how the professors at the University of Rhode Island and their counterparts around the world use the Internet as a mechanism for improving a student's intercultural awareness and sensitivity. Using the Internet, students here and abroad debate on timely, relevant topics to become aware of how people of different cultures see things differently. In addition, they write and exchange cross-cultural dialogues and explanatory notes to become interculturally sensitive. In this way, the students meet with their future partners of the global workplace, while honing their computer skills, writing skills, and enhancing their intercultural awareness and sensitivity. However, those in higher education who want to implement this kind of Internet-based teaching technique on a permanent basis must first address several difficult issues, including how to find like-minded professors here and abroad who are willing to participate. If correctly used over time, these techniques (international e-mail debate and cross-cultural dialogues) can improve students' intercultural awareness and sensitivity. Assessment of whether or not this improvement lasts over a period of time presents a quantitative problem. Defining intercultural sensitivity practically and satisfactorily is the first task facing educators interested in following this path toward improved communication. One of the greatest challenges facing the institutions of higher education of the 21st Century is how to improve intercultural communication skills of their students. Accompanied by a yet-to-be-developed instrument for quantitative measurement of long-term outcomes, projects like the international e-mail debate and cross-cultural dialogue may well become the tools for understanding and negotiation in the new global environment. --

A new skew-elliptical distribution and its properties

This article generalizes a multivariate skew-elliptical distribution and describes its many interesting properties. The univariate version of the new distribution is compared with two other currently used distributions. The use of the new distribution is illustrated with a real data example suitable for regression modelling. The new model provides a better model fit than its two rivals as evaluated by some suitable Bayesian model selection criteria

Class-based Rough Approximation with Dominance Principle

Dominance-based Rough Set Approach (DRSA), as the extension of Pawlak's Rough Set theory, is effective and fundamentally important in Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA). In previous DRSA models, the definitions of the upper and lower approximations are preserving the class unions rather than the singleton class. In this paper, we propose a new Class-based Rough Approximation with respect to a series of previous DRSA models, including Classical DRSA model, VC-DRSA model and VP-DRSA model. In addition, the new class-based reducts are investigated.Comment: Submitted to IEEE-GrC201

A Note on Pretzelosity TMD Parton Distribution

We show that the transverse-momentum-dependent parton distribution, called as Pretzelosity function, is zero at any order in perturbation theory of QCD for a single massless quark state. This implies that Pretzelosity function is not factorized with the collinear transversity parton distribution at twist-2, when the struck quark has a large transverse momentum. Pretzelosity function is in fact related to collinear parton distributions defined with twist-4 operators. In reality, Pretzelosity function of a hadron as a bound state of quarks and gluons is not zero. Through an explicit calculation of Pretzelosity function of a quark combined with a gluon nonzero result is found.Comment: improved explanation, published version in Phys. Lett.

Are object detection assessment criteria ready for maritime computer vision?

Maritime vessels equipped with visible and infrared cameras can complement other conventional sensors for object detection. However, application of computer vision techniques in maritime domain received attention only recently. The maritime environment offers its own unique requirements and challenges. Assessment of the quality of detections is a fundamental need in computer vision. However, the conventional assessment metrics suitable for usual object detection are deficient in the maritime setting. Thus, a large body of related work in computer vision appears inapplicable to the maritime setting at the first sight. We discuss the problem of defining assessment metrics suitable for maritime computer vision. We consider new bottom edge proximity metrics as assessment metrics for maritime computer vision. These metrics indicate that existing computer vision approaches are indeed promising for maritime computer vision and can play a foundational role in the emerging field of maritime computer vision