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The moderating factors of neuroticism and extraversion in pain anticipation
No full textThis study investigates the moderator relationship between three psychological variables on pain threshold and tolerance: pain anticipation, neuroticism and extraversion. It is hypothesised that (a) a significant effect of anticipation on both pain threshold and tolerance will exist; wherein high-intensity pain anticipation will predispose lower pain threshold and tolerance, and (b) high neuroticism and low extraversion will moderate this relationship. The study was conducted using 76 participants who completed the cold pressor test under one of three conditions: control condition, intense-pain expectant condition or low-pain expectant. The results of the study showed no significant effect of anticipation and no significant moderator relationship for neuroticism or extraversion on pain threshold and tolerance, thus both hypotheses are not supported. Implications for future research are discussed providing new and unique findings, as no prior research into the moderator relationship between anticipation, personality traits and pain currently exists
The Current Challenges to UK National Security and How They Might be Addressed
No full textThis article offers a qualitative assessment of the current major security challenges facing the UK, as of the first half of 2017. It argues that to address their increased number, the UK’s intelligence-led security community must not only be expanded in terms of size but also of reach. It should seek to generate better actionable intelligence, chiefly but not exclusively from electronic sources, and exploit it more effectively. Intelligence should also be deployed to assist in preventing young British Muslims from being drawn into terrorism. Whilst recognising that good intelligence by itself cannot deliver total security, itself an unrealisable aim, and that many other measures are needed to keep any country as safe as possible, the article concludes that intelligence, and intelligence-led security activity is the best single means of keeping democracies as safe as possible from terrorism whether it is of the Islamist or any other variet
Dickens, Miscellanies, and classical traditions of Satire
Get PDFThe article asks how Dickens in the 1830s orientated himself as a budding humorist against the existing satirical and comic traditions of his day, and in particular how he understood the concept of satire, in the context of periodical publication. An answer is sought--perhaps surprisingly--through a consideration of how Dickens, while no classical scholar, understood neoclassical satirical conventions, particularly those associated with the Horatian and Juvenalian modes. His experience as editor of "Bentley's Miscellany" is considered a formative one in this respect, and passages from "Martin Chuzzlewit" are adduced as further evidence of Dickens's sophisticated and nuanced response to this polarisation of satirical vantage point. However, the interaction of these models with the publishing format of the miscellany itself--given satire's origin in the idea of miscellaneity--leads on to consideration of a third significant satirical mode, the Menippean, which offers both a neoclassial and a Bakhtinian perspective on the question of Dickens's evolving use of satire in his periodical writings. A final coda to the article connects its main themes to a psycho-biographical subtext concerning Dickensian alienation and the writer's lifelong interest in the narrative possibilities of the social and aesthetic boundary between insider and outcast
Developing a Product-Service System through a Productisation Strategy: A Case from the 3PL Industry
Get PDFA Product-Service System (PSS) is created by combing a tangible product and an intangible service into one integrated offering. Thus, a PSS can be achieved by a production company adding intangible services to a product using a servitization strategy. Or, by a service company adding a tangible product to a service by means of a productisation strategy. The focus of this paper is on the latter. Our work demonstrates a significant gap in the literature in this area. To address this, we adapt an existing PSS conceptual framework provided by Oliva and Kallenberg (2003) as a means to identify the driving and restraining forces considered by a service company as it explored the possibility of pursuing a PSS productisation strategy. The conceptual framework is applied in an exploratory case study with a 3PL service provider. Application of the framework reveals new driving and restraining forces not previously discussed in the literature. Furthermore, it allows a preliminary quantification of the driving and restraining forces using a force field analysis approach (Lewin, 1951). Our work contributes towards the expansion of the empirical knowledge base in the area of PSS
Emotion and Insight: The physiological and psychological experience of positive and negative insight through qualitative exploration of everyday experience and quantitative investigation using problem solving tasks
No full textAn insight moment is defined as a sudden new idea, understanding or solution to a problem accompanied by an Aha experience. Typically researchers have described this experience in terms of positive emotions, with a recent shift in focus from purely cognitive aspects to explore the phenomenology of insight. Taking such an approach, this thesis firstly identifies that the historical research focus on cognitive, experimental methods in the study of insight may have led to an incomplete definition. A series of qualitative studies were therefore undertaken to characterise everyday experience of insight.
Firstly an online questionnaire collected 76 open, qualitative descriptions of everyday insight moments. These were analysed by an adapted qualitative method, Integrative Thematic Analysis (ITA); developed within this thesis to minimise the effects of researcher subjectivity bias. Results identified a typology of insight, with themes describing the Process (Time Away, Active Search, Social Facilitation), Content (Intellectual, Practical, Personal) and Feeling (Positive and Negative) aspects of insight. These findings represent the documentation of negative insight in research for the first time. A follow up study using the same methodology was then conducted to specifically record everyday experiences of negative insight. ITA and Deductive Content Analysis were performed on the 67 insight descriptions collected. Findings suggest a functional role of everyday negative insight as a problem finding process, which is not recognized in current definitions of insight framed as a positive event. As a result, this thesis proposes the development of an updated definition of the insight moment for further experimental testing as:
A sudden new understanding, realisation or idea that is accompanied by a positive feeling Aha moment, or negative feeling Uh-oh moment.
A third qualitative study was then conducted to record everyday insight moments in real-time, using a diary methodology and event contingent sampling in a focused sample of 11 participants. This aimed to explore the prevalence of insight in in real-time in everyday life for the first time. Follow-up semi-structured interviews with participants were then conducted that intended to enable rich accounts of their insight experiences. Insight moments were shown to be rare, with few reports made during the participants' week of recording. This corresponds with researchers expectations in terms of prevalence but was shown to contrast to the participants who were surprised by how few insights they experienced. Furthermore, the de-brief interviews identified some participants who reported never experiencing insight, corroborating other recent research suggesting that the insight moment might not be a universal experience. ITA identified themes, including Individual Differences in insight, where participants suggested that differences in factors such as trait emotionality may affect how people experience insight.
The emotional aspects of insight identified from the qualitative studies were then explored in two laboratory-based experiments. Psychological and physiological aspects implicated in previous insight and emotion research were measured including: emotional expressivity (Berkeley Expressivity Questionnaire), interoceptive accuracy (Heart Beat Counting [HBC] task) and heart rate [HR]. In Study 4, 79 participants completed Compound Remote Associates, an established problem solving task that elicits positive insight and search experiences. No relationship was seen between emotional expressivity or heart beat counting accuracy and performance (proportion of insight and search reported) on the CRA. Different HR changes were shown between insight and search trials, with decreased deceleration in insight. A biphasic HR change response was seen for both solving types that was congruent to HR changes shown in previous research in response to emotional stimuli.
Study 5, then aimed to explore the same measures using a problem solving task that in addition, elicited negative insight. In order to do this, a novel paradigm was developed, using Connect 4 as a naturalistic problem solving task. This was demonstrated to elicit the full range of problem solving experiences, positive and negative, insight and search in a sample of 80 participants. No associations were seen between solving performance and emotional expressivity or heart beat counting accuracy. HR change patterns seen in Study 4 were replicated, with greater HR decreases for search compared to insight trials, although evidence was less clear in terms of the biphasic response.
The utility of Connect 4 as a naturalistic problem solving task was demonstrated by Study 5, however limitations in the computer-based version of the game developed in this thesis were also identified. As such, future research is recommended with an improved version Connect 4 to enable more robust conclusions to be drawn. In addition, the limitations of the proportion of insight, a problem solving performance measure, were also highlighted. Therefore, future work to better validate this measure in laboratory based tasks, and in relation to everyday insight experience are proposed.
The findings in this thesis are discussed in terms of wider impact, in relation to applied fields beyond academic study. For example, in Counselling Psychology where insight is seen as a central process in therapeutic change, there are implications in terms of individuals who do not report having insight. Furthermore, everyday creativity including experiencing insight has been demonstrated elsewhere to relate to flourishing and wellbeing, with this research offering corroboration in terms of the positive experiences reported in relation to insight.
This thesis contributes to our knowledge in first offering an updated and ecologically validated definition of insight. Furthermore it highlights the role of emotion in insight experience and corroborates the phenomenological approach that is now being seen in insight research. Finally, it identifies a possible somatic marker in HR, to distinguish insight and search solving. In addition, novel methods of qualitative analysis (ITA) and a naturalistic experimental problem solving (Connect 4) have been developed
Instantons and special geometry
Get PDFWe survey and discuss constructions of instantons on non-compact complete manifolds of special holonomy from the viewpoint of evolution equations and give several explicit examples
Multi-level Trainable Segmentation for Measuring Gestational and Yolk Sacs from Ultrasound Images
No full textAs a non-hazardous and non-invasive approach to medical diagnostic imaging, ultrasound serves as an ideal candidate for tracking and monitoring pregnancy development. One critical assessment during the first trimester of the pregnancy is the size measurements of the Gestation Sac (GS) and the Yolk Sac (YS) from ultrasound images. Such measurements tend to give a strong indication on the viability of the pregnancy. This paper proposes a novel multi-level trainable segmentation method to achieve three objectives in the following order: (1) segmenting and measuring the GS, (2) automatically identifying the stage of pregnancy, and (3) segmenting and measuring the YS. The first level segmentation employs a trainable segmentation technique based on the histogram of oriented gradients to segment the GS and estimate its size. This is then followed by an automatic identification of the pregnancy stage based on histogram analysis of the content of the segmented GS. The second level segmentation is used after that to detect the YS and extract its relevant size measurements. A trained neural network classifier is employed to perform the segmentation at both levels. The effectiveness of the proposed solution has been evaluated by comparing the automatic size measurements of the GS and YS against the ones obtained gynaecologist. Experimental results on 199 ultrasound images demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposal in producing accurate measurements as well as identifying the correct stage of pregnancy
Key exchange using biometric identity based encryption for sharing encrypted data in cloud environment
No full textThe main problem associated with using symmetric/ asymmetric keys is how to securely store and exchange the keys between the parties over open networks particularly in the open environment such as cloud computing. Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) have been providing a practical solution for session key exchange for loads of web services. The key limitation of PKI solution is not only the need for a trusted third partly (e.g. certificate authority) but also the absent link between data owner and the encryption keys. The latter is arguably more important where accessing data needs to be linked with identify of the owner. Currently available key exchange protocols depend on using trusted couriers or secure channels, which can be subject to man-in-the-middle attack and various other attacks. This paper proposes a new protocol for Key Exchange using Biometric Identity Based Encryption (KE-BIBE) that enables parties to securely exchange cryptographic keys even an adversary is monitoring the communication channel between the parties. The proposed protocol combines biometrics with IBE in order to provide a secure way to access symmetric keys based on the identity of the users in unsecure environment. In the KE-BIOBE protocol, the message is first encrypted by the data owner using a traditional symmetric key before migrating it to a cloud storage. The symmetric key is then encrypted using public biometrics of the users selected by data owner to decrypt the message based on Fuzzy Identity-Based Encryption. Only the selected users will be able to decrypt the message by providing a fresh sample of their biometric data. The paper argues that the proposed solution eliminates the needs for a key distribution centre in traditional cryptography. It will also give data owner the power of fine-grained sharing of encrypted data by control who can access their data
Satisficing Data Envelopment Analysis: A Bayesian approach for peer mining in the banking sector
Get PDFOver the past few decades, the banking sectors in Latin America have undergone rapid structural changes to improve the efficiency and resilience of their financial systems. The up-to-date literature shows that all the research studies conducted to analyze the above-mentioned efficiency are based on a deterministic data envelopment analysis (DEA) model or econometric frontier approach. Nevertheless, the deterministic DEA model suffers from a possible lack of statistical power, especially in a small sample. As such, the current research paper develops the technique of satisficing DEA to examine the still less explored case of Peru. We propose a Satisficing DEA model applied to 14 banks operating in Peru to evaluate the bank-level efficiency under a stochastic environment, which is free from any theoretical distributional assumption. The proposed model does not only report the bank efficiency, but also proposes a new framework for peer mining based on the Bayesian analysis and potential improvements with the bias-corrected and accelerated confidence interval. Our study is the first of its kind in the literature to perform a peer analysis based on a probabilistic approach
Origins and early development of the concept that brown adipose tissue thermogenesis is linked to energy balance and obesity
Get PDFBrown adipose tissue (BAT) was identified as a thermogenic organ in 1961, and in 1978 shown to be the major site of thermoregulatory non-shivering thermogenesis in rats acclimated to the cold. Investigations in the mid-late 1970s established the uncoupling of oxidative phosphorylation through a proton conductance pathway across the mitochondrial inner membrane as the mechanism for heat production in BAT, this being regulated by UCP1 which was first discovered as a 32,000 Mr cold-inducible protein. These developments came when those concerned with nutritional energetics were proposing that thermogenesis is a significant factor in energy balance and the aetiology of obesity. A link with BAT was first demonstrated in obese
ob/ob mice, which were shown to have decreased thermogenic activity in the tissue, and in rats exhibiting diet-induced thermogenesis (DIT) during overfeeding on a cafeteria diet where an activation of brown fat was evident. These pioneering observations led to extensive studies on BAT in different animal models of obesity, both genetic (particularly ob/ob and db/db mice, fa/fa rats) and experimentally-induced. In each case, indices of BAT activity and capacity (mitochondrial content, GDP binding, amount of UCP1) indicated that the tissue plays a role in
DIT and that obesity is characterised by reduced thermogenesis. Links between BAT and wholebody energetics were also made in physiological situations such as lactation and fasting. Studies in the 1980s also provided clear evidence for the presence of BAT in adult humans, particularly through the detection of UCP1, and its activation in patients with phaeochromocytoma. Interest
in BAT in energetics and obesity waned by the 1990s; the current major renewal of interest has undoubtedly been contingent on the pioneering developments that emerged some 40 years ago