1,721,176 research outputs found
Early-life predictors of lung function in the Raine Study
Full text linkThe natural history of lung function is characterized by various stages of development. The first phase includes lung function increasing to a peak around young adulthood followed by a plateau phase, and finally a physiological decline with age. Early-life lung function predicts later lung function and events that happened during the lifespan might influence the lung function trajectories of an individual, resulting in poorer lung health. The fetal and the first years of life are considered vulnerable periods in which the lungs undertake rapid and dramatic changes. Investigating early life risk factors and their impact on lung function trajectories from childhood to young adulthood is critically important as a first step in preventing long term lung impairments. Indeed, there is the need to further understand which risk factors are involved in the impairment of lung function trajectories. With this thesis, I aimed to characterize lung function trajectories and investigate early-life predictors related to low lung function trajectories identified. A total of 1512 participants with at least two spirometry measurements were investigated using data from the Raine Study. Lung function trajectories for FEV1, FVC and FEV1/FVC (z-scores) were identified using group-based trajectory modelling for data available at 6, 14- and 22-year follow-ups. Multivariable analysis for childhood, parental and environmental risk factors was assessed using multinomial logistic regression. We identified four lung function trajectories for FEV1, FVC and FEV1/FVC. Associations were found between low lung function trajectories of FVC and asthma (p=0.024), maternal smoking (p=0.015), and parental asthma (p=0.024). Childhood wheeze was associated with the very low trajectory of FEV1 (p=0.042) and females were more likely to belong to the low trajectory of FVC compared with males (p=0.026). Early-life exposures to PM2.5 and NO2 were not associated with lung function trajectories.This study provides evidence of a group of the population that followed a persistently low lung function trajectory, characterized of having asthma, wheeze, mothers smoke in pregnancy and during childhood, parental asthma and that may be partly established before six years of age
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
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
Hydrogeological asset of the Supramonte region (central-east Sardinia, Italy) : analysis of new data.
No full textLe Sorgenti di Su Cologone nel contesto dell'idrostruttura carbonatica del Supramonte: rapporti tra carsismo ed idrogeologia.
No full text- …
