Texas A&M International University: Research Information Online (RIO)
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Figurative language impairment in aphasic patients
No full textPurpose: The present study is a pilot test designed to verify the Figurative Language Battery that we have developed to explore figurative language skills of individuals with aphasia. Material and methods: Eight left brain damaged patients and ten controls were tested using the battery. The battery consists of four parts, each of which focuses on a different figurative trope (idioms, metaphors, proverbs, and similes), and employs either a Multiple Choice task (choosing the correct paraphrase from among literally related and unrelated distractors) or an Oral Completion task (providing the last, missing word of the figurative phrase). Data were collected in individual sessions during which participants were asked to complete the figurative language battery. Results: Overall, patients showed a strong literal bias in comprehending figurative expressions, i.e., they tended to interpret idioms and metaphors in a literal, rather than figurative, manner, consistent with findings reported in the literature. In addition, the obtained results confirm that the type of figurative trope significantly affects performance of individuals with aphasia. Patients performed significantly better on overlearned sequences, such as proverbs or similes, than on idioms and metaphors. Conventional metaphors were easier to understand than unconventional (novel) ones, and opaque, unambiguous idioms were easier than transparent, ambiguous ones. Conclusions: The type of figurative trope, and possibly also the type of task, affect figurative performance of individuals with aphasia. The study carries important implications for designing diagnostic tools aiming to uncover figurative language impairment in aphasia
Filial responsibility expectations among mexican american undergraduates: Gender and biculturalism
No full textHow Mexican American college students perceive responsibility for parental care is important as Mexican American elders\u27 numbers increase. The authors applied mixed methods to investigate the impact of gender and biculturalism within this group. Two hundred and eighty-six Mexican American undergraduates completed the Hamon Filial Responsibility Scale. Twenty others participated in focus groups. Females endorsed filial responsibility expectations at higher rates than males, but biculturalism influenced more change in elder care expectations among males. © The Author(s) 2011
Reseña de Libro Becerra, M. y Mastrini, G. (2009) Los dueños de la palabra. Acceso, estructura y concentración de los medios en la América latina del Siglo XXI. Buenos Aires: Prometeo Libros.
No full textBecerra y Mastrini presentan un trabajo de investigación hecho a través del Instituto Prensa y Sociedad (IPYS) de Argentina, el cual complementa la información ya publicada en su anterior libro Periodistas y Magnates (2006). Los autores, reconocidos ya en el estudio de los conglomerados y concentraciones mediáticas en América Latina, exponen en esta obra los más recientes resultados en el tema, cuyo estudio inicia desde el año 2003
Are mobile phones changing social networks? a longitudinal study of core networks in Kerala
No full textMobile telephony has diffused more rapidly than any Indian technology in recent memory, yet systematic studies of its impact are rare, focusing on technological rather than social change. We employ network surveys of separate groups of Kerala residents in 2002 and again in 2007 to examine recent shifts in mobile usage patterns and social relationships. Results show (1) near saturation of mobiles among both the professionals and nonprofessionals sampled, (2) a decrease in the number of social linkages across tie types and physical locations, and (3) a shift towards friends and family but away from work relationships in the core networks of Malayalis. We interpret these findings as support for the bounded solidarity thesis of remote communication that emphasizes social insulation and network closure as mobiles shield individuals from their wider surroundings. © The Author(s) 2011
Gender Role Attitudes: Who Supports Expanded Rights for Women in Afghanistan?
No full textWe use survey data from a national probability sample of 6,593 adult Afghans and multivariate regression that estimates the effects of several factors on separate indices of gender role attitudes generated by exploratory factor analysis to explore whether men and women differ in their gender role attitudes and the extent to which ecological and socio-demographic factors may mediate both within- and across-group differences. We find that men and women differ in their gender role attitudes, as men report more conservative attitudes than women. These differences manifest whether gender role attitude is measured as procuring basic rights for women, or empowering women politically. Moreover, men and women\u27s gender role attitudes are not immutable-education, ethnicity, and urbanization and, in women\u27s case, generational replacement-all act to mediate these differences. The profile of the Afghan man who would hold liberal gender role attitudes is an educated urbanite, non-Sunni or non-Pashtun, who believes in the compatibility of democracy and Islam, trusts outsiders, has exposure to the formal media, and would extend equal rights to all irrespective of gender, religion, or ethnicity. That of the woman is of a younger, educated urbanite, non-Pashtun, who believes in the compatibility of democracy and Islam, trusts outsiders, has exposure to the formal media, and would extend equal rights to all regardless of gender, religion, or ethnicity. © 2011 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
Reverse weekend effect, trading volume, and illiquidity
No full textPurpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the seasonal anomaly known as the reverse weekend effect detected at index level can also be observed at individual stock level. Design/methodology/approach – This paper\u27s methodology is based on the model first developed by Connolly and then employed by Chang, Pinegar, and Ravichandran in which returns are regressed against the dummy variable for Monday. In addition, the conditional variance is also included into the mean equation following Engle, Lilien, and Robins. Given the increasing evidence that equity returns are conditionally heteroskedastic, the paper includes in the conditional variance the lag of the squared residual from the mean equation (i.e. autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity term introduced by Engle) and the previous period\u27s forecast variance (i.e. the generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity term introduced by Bollerslev). Also, the paper controls for the different impact of good and bad news on the conditional variance following Glosten, Jaganathan, and Runkle. Findings – It is found that the anomaly is widely distributed among large firms, not just confined to a few firms. The finding suggests that the anomaly at the index level is not driven by the extreme returns of a few firms. The paper also finds that the anomaly at the firm level is not evenly distributed across the weeks of the month. Furthermore, trading volume and illiquidity of individual firms can only partially explain the seasonal anomaly. Originality/value – This paper extends the study of the reverse weekend effect in individual firms
A note on optimal solutions to quadratic knapsack problems
No full textIn this note we report our success in applying CPLEX\u27s mixed integer quadratic programming (MIQP) solver to a set of standard quadratic knapsack test problems. The results we give show that this general purpose, commercial code outperformed a leading special purpose method reported in the literature by a wide margin. © 2010 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd
Comunicación y democracia: Una agenda para su investigación
No full textEn este artículo el autor presenta una agenda de temas a considerar en el abordaje de la relación entre la comunicación mediática y la democracia a partir de la interacción de aspectos tales como la mediatización de las campañas políticas, la regulación de las mismas en las legislaciones electorales y los efectos que los anteriores aspectos tienen sobre la calidad democrática de los procesos políticos. La propuesta desemboca en la presentación de cuatro ejes de investigación de los cuales se ofrece un breve pero sustancioso estado de la cuestión
Boom to bust or bust to boom? following the effects of weed and seed zoning in New Britain, Connecticut, from 1995 to 2000
No full textThis article addresses the effects of weed and seed zoning operations on arrests and calls for assistance in New Britain, Connecticut, during the 24-month before and 36-month after the inception of operations. Data are taken from New Britain police dispatch statistics and applied to a study of arrests and citizen calls for assistance across 738 U.S. Census block collection units (BCUs). The article employs tests of significance to assess the overall effects of zoning on these police activities across pre- and post-intervention periods and uses both weighted displacement quotient (WDQ) and exploratory spatial data analysis (ESDA) models to test for possible displacement associated with zoning. Results indicate that weed and seed zoning was significantly associated with displacement of arrest activity in pre- and post-intervention time periods but displayed no relationship with displacement of calls for assistance (CFAs). Though WDQ analyses do not indicate proximity effects, local indicators of spatial association (LISA) maps show noteworthy changes in the spatial clustering of arrest activity over time. Of principal concern here is the idea that weed and seed may prompt changes in the geography of crime without actually reducing crime rates. An ancillary concern is whether significantly higher arrest rates within weed and seed zones represent advances in community policing. © 2010 SAGE Publications
