1,720,963 research outputs found
Higher maternal plasma folate but not vitamin B-12 concentrations during pregnancy are associated with better cognitive function scores in 9-10 year old children in south-india.
No full textFolate and vitamin B-12 are essential for normal brain development. Few studies have examined the relationship of maternal folate and vitamin B-12 status during pregnancy and offspring cognitive function. To test the hypothesis that lower maternal plasma folate and vitamin B-12 concentrations and higher plasma homocysteine concentrations during pregnancy are associated with poorer neurodevelopment, 536 children (aged 9–10 y) from the Mysore Parthenon birth cohort underwent cognitive function assessment during 2007–2008 using 3 core tests from the Kaufman Assessment Battery, and additional tests measuring learning, long-term storage/retrieval, attention and concentration, and visuo-spatial and verbal abilities. Maternal folate, vitamin B-12, and homocysteine concentrations were measured at 30 ± 2 wk gestation. During pregnancy, 4% of mothers had low folate concentrations (<7 nmol/L), 42.5% had low vitamin B-12 concentrations (<150 pmol/L), and 3% had hyperhomocysteinemia (>10 µmol/L). The children's cognitive test scores increased by 0.1–0.2 SD per SD increase across the entire range of maternal folate concentrations (P < 0.001 for all), with no apparent associations at the deficiency level. The associations with learning, long-term storage/retrieval, visuo-spatial ability, attention, and concentration were independent of the parents' education, socioeconomic status, religion, and the child's sex, age, current size, and folate and vitamin B-12 concentrations. There were no consistent associations of maternal vitamin B-12 and homocysteine concentrations with childhood cognitive performance. In this Indian population, higher maternal folate, but not vitamin B-12, concentrations during pregnancy predicted better childhood cognitive ability. It also suggests that, in terms of neurodevelopment, the concentration used to define folate deficiency may be set too low
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Infant feeding practice and childhood cognitive performance in South India
No full textAim: several studies have suggested a beneficial effect of infant breastfeeding on childhood cognitive function. The main objective was to examine whether duration of breastfeeding and age at introduction of complementary foods are related to cognitive performance in 9- to 10-year-old school-aged children in South India. Methods: the authors examined 514 children from the Mysore Parthenon birth cohort for whom breastfeeding duration (six categories from <3 to ?18 months) and age at introduction of complementary foods (four categories from <4 to ?6 months) were collected at the first-, second- and third-year annual follow-up visits. Their cognitive function was assessed at a mean age of 9.7 years using three core tests from the Kaufman Assessment Battery for children and additional tests measuring long-term retrieval/storage, attention and concentration, visuo-spatial and verbal abilities. Results: all the children were initially breastfed. The mode for duration of breastfeeding was 12–17 months (45.7%) and for age at introduction of complementary foods 4 months (37.1%). There were no associations between longer duration of breastfeeding, or age of introduction of complementary foods, and cognitive function at 9–10 years, either unadjusted or after adjustment for age, sex, gestation, birth size, maternal age, parity, socio-economic status, parents' attained schooling and rural/urban residence. Conclusions: within this cohort, in which prolonged breastfeeding was the norm (90% breastfed ?6 months and 65% breastfed for ?12 months), there was no evidence suggesting a beneficial effect of longer duration of breastfeeding on later cognitive ability
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Association of birthweight and head circumference at birth to cognitive performance in 9- to 10-year-old children in South India: prospective birth cohort study
No full textTo examine whether birthweight and head circumference at birth are associated with childhood cognitive ability in South India, cognitive function was assessed using three core tests from the Kaufman Assessment Battery for children and additional tests measuring long-term retrieval/storage, attention and concentration, and visuospatial and verbal abilities among 505 full-term born children (mean age 9.7 y). In multiple linear regression adjusted for age, sex, gestation, socioeconomic status, parent's education, maternal age, parity, body mass index, height, rural/urban residence, and time of testing, Atlantis score (learning ability/long-term storage and retrieval) rose by 0.1 SD per SD increase in newborn weight and head circumference, respectively (p < 0.05 for all), and Kohs' block design score (visuospatial ability) increased by 0.1 SD per SD increase in birthweight (p < 0.05). The associations were reduced after further adjustment for current head circumference. There were no associations of birthweight and/or head circumference with measures of short-term memory, fluid reasoning, verbal abilities, and attention and concentration. In conclusion, higher birthweight and larger head circumference at birth are associated with better childhood cognitive ability. The effect may be specific to learning, long-term storage and retrieval, and visuospatial abilities, but this requires confirmation by further research
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