Projection-viewer for microscale aerial photography

Treesearch

Robert C. Aldrich; James von Mosch; Wallace Greentree

1972-01-01

A low-cost projection-viewer has been developed to enlarge portions of microscale aerial photographs. These pictures can be used for interpretation or mapping, or for comparison with existing photographs, maps, and overlays to monitor environmental changes. The projection-viewer can enlarge from 2.5 to 20 times, and can be calibrated so that maps may be drawn with a...

Multi-viewer tracking integral imaging system and its viewing zone analysis.

PubMed

Park, Gilbae; Jung, Jae-Hyun; Hong, Keehoon; Kim, Yunhee; Kim, Young-Hoon; Min, Sung-Wook; Lee, Byoungho

2009-09-28

We propose a multi-viewer tracking integral imaging system for viewing angle and viewing zone improvement. In the tracking integral imaging system, the pickup angles in each elemental lens in the lens array are decided by the positions of viewers, which means the elemental image can be made for each viewer to provide wider viewing angle and larger viewing zone. Our tracking integral imaging system is implemented with an infrared camera and infrared light emitting diodes which can track the viewers' exact positions robustly. For multiple viewers to watch integrated three-dimensional images in the tracking integral imaging system, it is needed to formulate the relationship between the multiple viewers' positions and the elemental images. We analyzed the relationship and the conditions for the multiple viewers, and verified them by the implementation of two-viewer tracking integral imaging system.

Enhancing the Capacity of Policy-Makers to Develop Evidence-Informed Policy Brief on Infectious Diseases of Poverty in Nigeria.

PubMed

Uneke, Chigozie Jesse; Ezeoha, Abel Ebeh; Uro-Chukwu, Henry; Ezeonu, Chinonyelum Thecla; Ogbu, Ogbonnaya; Onwe, Friday; Edoga, Chima

2015-05-20

The lack of effective use of research evidence in policy-making is a major challenge in most low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). There is need to package research data into effective policy tools that will help policy-makers to make evidence-informed policy regarding infectious diseases of poverty (IDP). The objective of this study was to assess the usefulness of training workshops and mentoring to enhance the capacity of Nigerian health policy-makers to develop evidence-informed policy brief on the control of IDP. A modified "before and after" intervention study design was used in which outcomes were measured on the target participants both before the intervention is implemented and after. A 4-point Likert scale according to the degree of adequacy; 1 = "grossly inadequate," 4 = "very adequate" was employed. The main parameter measured was participants' perceptions of their own knowledge/understanding. This study was conducted at subnational level and the participants were the career health policy-makers drawn from Ebonyi State in the South-Eastern Nigeria. A one-day evidence-to-policy workshop was organized to enhance the participants' capacity to develop evidence-informed policy brief on IDP in Ebonyi State. Topics covered included collaborative initiative; preparation and use of policy briefs; policy dialogue; ethics in health policy-making; and health policy and politics. The preworkshop mean of knowledge and capacity ranged from 2.49-3.03, while the postworkshop mean ranged from 3.42-3.78 on 4-point scale. The percentage increase in mean of knowledge and capacity at the end of the workshop ranged from 20.10%-45%. Participants were divided into 3 IDP mentorship groups (malaria, schistosomiasis, lymphatic filariasis [LF]) and were mentored to identify potential policy options/recommendations for control of the diseases for the policy briefs. These policy options were subjected to research evidence synthesis by each group to identify the options that have

First-time viewers' comprehension of films: bridging shot transitions.

PubMed

Ildirar, Sermin; Schwan, Stephan

2015-02-01

Which perceptual and cognitive prerequisites must be met in order to be able to comprehend a film is still unresolved and a controversial issue. In order to gain some insights into this issue, our field experiment investigates how first-time adult viewers extract and integrate meaningful information across film cuts. Three major types of commonalities between adjacent shots were differentiated, which may help first-time viewers with bridging the shots: pictorial, causal, and conceptual. Twenty first-time, 20 low-experienced and 20 high-experienced viewers from Turkey were shown a set of short film clips containing these three kinds of commonalities. Film clips conformed also to the principles of continuity editing. Analyses of viewers' spontaneous interpretations show that first-time viewers indeed are able to notice basic pictorial (object identity), causal (chains of activity), as well as conceptual (links between gaze direction and object attention) commonalities between shots due to their close relationship with everyday perception and cognition. However, first-time viewers' comprehension of the commonalities is to a large degree fragile, indicating the lack of a basic notion of what constitutes a film. © 2014 The British Psychological Society.

A Target Advertisement System Based on TV Viewer's Profile Reasoning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lim, Jeongyeon; Kim, Munjo; Lee, Bumshik; Kim, Munchurl; Lee, Heekyung; Lee, Han-Kyu

With the rapidly growing Internet, the Internet broadcasting and web casting service have been one of the well-known services. Specially, it is expected that the IPTV service will be one of the principal services in the broadband network [2]. However, the current broadcasting environment is served for the general public and requires the passive attitude to consume the TV programs. For the advanced broadcasting environments, various research of the personalized broadcasting is needed. For example, the current unidirectional advertisement provides to the TV viewers the advertisement contents, depending on the popularity of TV programs, the viewing rates, the age groups of TV viewers, and the time bands of the TV programs being broadcast. It is not an efficient way to provide the useful information to the TV viewers from customization perspective. If a TV viewer does not need particular advertisement contents, then information may be wasteful to the TV viewer. Therefore, it is expected that the target advertisement service will be one of the important services in the personalized broadcasting environments. The current research in the area of the target advertisement classifies the TV viewers into clustered groups who have similar preference. The digital TV collaborative filtering estimates the user's favourite advertisement contents by using the usage history [1, 4, 5]. In these studies, the TV viewers are required to provide their profile information such as the gender, job, and ages to the service providers via a PC or Set-Top Box (STB) which is connected to digital TV. Based on explicit information, the advertisement contents are provided to the TV viewers in a customized way with tailored advertisement contents. However, the TV viewers may dislike exposing to the service providers their private information because of the misuse of it. In this case, it is difficult to provide appropriate target advertisement service.

Understanding Producers' Intentions and Viewers' Learning Outcomes in a Science Museum Theater Play on Evolution

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Peleg, R.; Baram-Tsabari, A.

2016-10-01

Science museums often introduce plays to liven up exhibits, attract visitors to specific exhibitions, and help visitors to "digest" difficult content. Most previous research has concentrated on viewers' learning outcomes. This study uses performance and spectator analyses from the field of theater studies to explore the link between producers' intended aims, the written script, and the learning outcomes. We also use the conflict of didactics and aesthetics, common to the design of both educational plays and science museum exhibits, as a lens for understanding our data. "Darwin's journey," a play about evolution, was produced by a major science museum in Israel. The producers' objectives were collected through in-depth interviews. A structural analysis was conducted on the script. Viewer ( n = 103) and nonviewer ( n = 90) data were collected via a questionnaire. The results show strong evidence for the encoding of all of the producers' aims in the script. Explicit and cognitive aims were decoded as intended by the viewers. The evidence was weak for the decoding of implicit and affective aims. While the producers were concerned with the conflict of didactics and aesthetics, this conflict was not apparent in the script. The conflict is discussed within the broader context of science education in informal settings.

The Effects of Intercultural Communication on Viewers' Perceptions.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Pohl, Gayle M.

Three studies explored the impact of the controversial television docudrama "Death of a Princess" on viewers' attitudes, comprehension, and desire to continue viewing the film. Sixty students in undergraduate communication classes participated in Study I, which measured attitude change induced by the film, relative to the viewers' prior…

Communicating Evidence-Based Information on Cancer Prevention to State-Level Policy Makers

PubMed Central

Dodson, Elizabeth A.; Stamatakis, Katherine A.; Casey, Christopher M.; Elliott, Michael B.; Luke, Douglas A.; Wintrode, Christopher G.; Kreuter, Matthew W.

2011-01-01

Background Opportunities exist to disseminate evidence-based cancer control strategies to state-level policy makers in both the legislative and executive branches. We explored factors that influence the likelihood that state-level policy makers will find a policy brief understandable, credible, and useful. Methods A systematic approach was used to develop four types of policy briefs on the topic of mammography screening to reduce breast cancer mortality: data-focused brief with state-level data, data-focused brief with local-level data, story-focused brief with state-level data, and story-focused brief with local-level data. Participants were recruited from three groups of state-level policy makers—legislative staff, legislators, and executive branch administrators— in six states that were randomly chosen after stratifying all 50 states by population size and dominant political party in state legislature. Participants from each of the three policy groups were randomly assigned to receive one of the four types of policy briefs and completed a questionnaire that included a series of Likert scale items. Primary outcomes—whether the brief was understandable, credible, likely to be used, and likely to be shared—were measured by a 5-point Likert scale according to the degree of agreement (1 = strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree). Data were analyzed with analysis of variance and with classification trees. All statistical tests were two-sided. Results Data on response to the policy briefs (n = 291) were collected from February through December 2009 (overall response rate = 35%). All three policy groups found the briefs to be understandable and credible, with mean ratings that ranged from 4.3 to 4.5. The likelihood of using the brief (the dependent variable) differed statistically significantly by study condition for staffers (P = .041) and for legislators (P = .018). Staffers found the story-focused brief containing state-level data most useful, whereas

Evidence summaries tailored to health policy-makers in low- and middle-income countries

PubMed Central

Glenton, Claire; Wiysonge, Charles Shey; Abalos, Edgardo; Mignini, Luciano; Young, Taryn; Althabe, Fernando; Ciapponi, Agustín; Marti, Sebastian Garcia; Meng, Qingyue; Wang, Jian; la Hoz Bradford, Ana Maria De; Kiwanuka, Suzanne N; Rutebemberwa, Elizeus; Pariyo, George W; Flottorp, Signe; Oxman, Andrew D

2011-01-01

Abstract Objective To describe how the SUPPORT collaboration developed a short summary format for presenting the results of systematic reviews to policy-makers in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Methods We carried out 21 user tests in six countries to explore users’ experiences with the summary format. We modified the summaries based on the results and checked our conclusions through 13 follow-up interviews. To solve the problems uncovered by the user testing, we also obtained advisory group feedback and conducted working group workshops. Findings Policy-makers liked a graded entry format (i.e. short summary with key messages up front). They particularly valued the section on the relevance of the summaries for LMICs, which compensated for the lack of locally-relevant detail in the original review. Some struggled to understand the text and numbers. Three issues made redesigning the summaries particularly challenging: (i) participants had a poor understanding of what a systematic review was; (ii) they expected information not found in the systematic reviews and (iii) they wanted shorter, clearer summaries. Solutions included adding information to help understand the nature of a systematic review, adding more references and making the content clearer and the document quicker to scan. Conclusion Presenting evidence from systematic reviews to policy-makers in LMICs in the form of short summaries can render the information easier to assimilate and more useful, but summaries must be clear and easy to read or scan quickly. They should also explain the nature of the information provided by systematic reviews and its relevance for policy decisions. PMID:21346891

Effects of an evidence service on health-system policy makers' use of research evidence: a protocol for a randomised controlled trial.

PubMed

Lavis, John N; Wilson, Michael G; Grimshaw, Jeremy M; Haynes, R Brian; Hanna, Steven; Raina, Parminder; Gruen, Russell; Ouimet, Mathieu

2011-05-27

Health-system policy makers need timely access to synthesised research evidence to inform the policy-making process. No efforts to address this need have been evaluated using an experimental quantitative design. We developed an evidence service that draws inputs from Health Systems Evidence, which is a database of policy-relevant systematic reviews. The reviews have been (a) categorised by topic and type of review; (b) coded by the last year searches for studies were conducted and by the countries in which included studies were conducted; (c) rated for quality; and (d) linked to available user-friendly summaries, scientific abstracts, and full-text reports. Our goal is to evaluate whether a "full-serve" evidence service increases the use of synthesized research evidence by policy analysts and advisors in the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care (MOHLTC) as compared to a "self-serve" evidence service. We will conduct a two-arm randomized controlled trial (RCT), along with a follow-up qualitative process study in order to explore the findings in greater depth. For the RCT, all policy analysts and policy advisors (n = 168) in a single division of the MOHLTC will be invited to participate. Using a stratified randomized design, participants will be randomized to receive either the "full-serve" evidence service (database access, monthly e-mail alerts, and full-text article availability) or the "self-serve" evidence service (database access only). The trial duration will be ten months (two-month baseline period, six-month intervention period, and two month cross-over period). The primary outcome will be the mean number of site visits/month/user between baseline and the end of the intervention period. The secondary outcome will be participants' intention to use research evidence. For the qualitative study, 15 participants from each trial arm (n = 30) will be purposively sampled. One-on-one semi-structured interviews will be conducted by telephone on their views

Effects of an evidence service on health-system policy makers' use of research evidence: A protocol for a randomised controlled trial

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background Health-system policy makers need timely access to synthesised research evidence to inform the policy-making process. No efforts to address this need have been evaluated using an experimental quantitative design. We developed an evidence service that draws inputs from Health Systems Evidence, which is a database of policy-relevant systematic reviews. The reviews have been (a) categorised by topic and type of review; (b) coded by the last year searches for studies were conducted and by the countries in which included studies were conducted; (c) rated for quality; and (d) linked to available user-friendly summaries, scientific abstracts, and full-text reports. Our goal is to evaluate whether a "full-serve" evidence service increases the use of synthesized research evidence by policy analysts and advisors in the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care (MOHLTC) as compared to a "self-serve" evidence service. Methods/design We will conduct a two-arm randomized controlled trial (RCT), along with a follow-up qualitative process study in order to explore the findings in greater depth. For the RCT, all policy analysts and policy advisors (n = 168) in a single division of the MOHLTC will be invited to participate. Using a stratified randomized design, participants will be randomized to receive either the "full-serve" evidence service (database access, monthly e-mail alerts, and full-text article availability) or the "self-serve" evidence service (database access only). The trial duration will be ten months (two-month baseline period, six-month intervention period, and two month cross-over period). The primary outcome will be the mean number of site visits/month/user between baseline and the end of the intervention period. The secondary outcome will be participants' intention to use research evidence. For the qualitative study, 15 participants from each trial arm (n = 30) will be purposively sampled. One-on-one semi-structured interviews will be conducted by

ADFStealthViewer User Manual

DTIC Science & Technology

2013-05-01

environmental objects are used to immerse the user in a 3D visualisation of the simulated war game. ADFStealthViewer has several ADF produced 3D models...OpenGL, audio , and networking devices. Some advanced functionality of the engine relies on modern graphics pixel and vertex shaders. These advanced

NGL Viewer: a web application for molecular visualization

PubMed Central

Rose, Alexander S.; Hildebrand, Peter W.

2015-01-01

The NGL Viewer (http://proteinformatics.charite.de/ngl) is a web application for the visualization of macromolecular structures. By fully adopting capabilities of modern web browsers, such as WebGL, for molecular graphics, the viewer can interactively display large molecular complexes and is also unaffected by the retirement of third-party plug-ins like Flash and Java Applets. Generally, the web application offers comprehensive molecular visualization through a graphical user interface so that life scientists can easily access and profit from available structural data. It supports common structural file-formats (e.g. PDB, mmCIF) and a variety of molecular representations (e.g. ‘cartoon, spacefill, licorice’). Moreover, the viewer can be embedded in other web sites to provide specialized visualizations of entries in structural databases or results of structure-related calculations. PMID:25925569

Molmil: a molecular viewer for the PDB and beyond.

PubMed

Bekker, Gert-Jan; Nakamura, Haruki; Kinjo, Akira R

2016-01-01

We have developed a new platform-independent web-based molecular viewer using JavaScript and WebGL. The molecular viewer, Molmil, has been integrated into several services offered by Protein Data Bank Japan and can be easily extended with new functionality by third party developers. Furthermore, the viewer can be used to load files in various formats from the user's local hard drive without uploading the data to a server. Molmil is available for all platforms supporting WebGL (e.g. Windows, Linux, iOS, Android) from http://gjbekker.github.io/molmil/. The source code is available at http://github.com/gjbekker/molmil under the LGPLv3 licence.

Enhancing the Capacity of Policy-Makers to Develop Evidence-Informed Policy Brief on Infectious Diseases of Poverty in Nigeria

PubMed Central

Uneke, Chigozie Jesse; Ezeoha, Abel Ebeh; Uro-Chukwu, Henry; Ezeonu, Chinonyelum Thecla; Ogbu, Ogbonnaya; Onwe, Friday; Edoga, Chima

2015-01-01

Background: The lack of effective use of research evidence in policy-making is a major challenge in most low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). There is need to package research data into effective policy tools that will help policy-makers to make evidence-informed policy regarding infectious diseases of poverty (IDP). The objective of this study was to assess the usefulness of training workshops and mentoring to enhance the capacity of Nigerian health policy-makers to develop evidence-informed policy brief on the control of IDP. Methods: A modified "before and after" intervention study design was used in which outcomes were measured on the target participants both before the intervention is implemented and after. A 4-point Likert scale according to the degree of adequacy; 1 = "grossly inadequate," 4 = "very adequate" was employed. The main parameter measured was participants’ perceptions of their own knowledge/understanding. This study was conducted at subnational level and the participants were the career health policy-makers drawn from Ebonyi State in the South-Eastern Nigeria. A one-day evidence-to-policy workshop was organized to enhance the participants’ capacity to develop evidence-informed policy brief on IDP in Ebonyi State. Topics covered included collaborative initiative; preparation and use of policy briefs; policy dialogue; ethics in health policy-making; and health policy and politics. Results: The preworkshop mean of knowledge and capacity ranged from 2.49-3.03, while the postworkshop mean ranged from 3.42–3.78 on 4-point scale. The percentage increase in mean of knowledge and capacity at the end of the workshop ranged from 20.10%–45%. Participants were divided into 3 IDP mentorship groups (malaria, schistosomiasis, lymphatic filariasis [LF]) and were mentored to identify potential policy options/recommendations for control of the diseases for the policy briefs. These policy options were subjected to research evidence synthesis by each

Development and formative evaluation of a visual e-tool to help decision makers navigate the evidence around health financing.

PubMed

Skordis-Worrall, Jolene; Pulkki-Brännström, Anni-Maria; Utley, Martin; Kembhavi, Gayatri; Bricki, Nouria; Dutoit, Xavier; Rosato, Mikey; Pagel, Christina

2012-12-21

There are calls for low and middle income countries to develop robust health financing policies to increase service coverage. However, existing evidence around financing options is complex and often difficult for policy makers to access. To summarize the evidence on the impact of financing health systems and develop an e-tool to help decision makers navigate the findings. After reviewing the literature, we used thematic analysis to summarize the impact of 7 common health financing mechanisms on 5 common health system goals. Information on the relevance of each study to a user's context was provided by 11 country indicators. A Web-based e-tool was then developed to assist users in navigating the literature review. This tool was evaluated using feedback from early users, collected using an online survey and in-depth interviews with key informants. The e-tool provides graphical summaries that allow a user to assess the following parameters with a single snapshot: the number of relevant studies available in the literature, the heterogeneity of evidence, where key evidence is lacking, and how closely the evidence matches their own context. Users particularly liked the visual display and found navigating the tool intuitive. However there was concern that a lack of evidence on positive impact might be construed as evidence against a financing option and that the tool might over-simplify the available financing options. Complex evidence can be made more easily accessible and potentially more understandable using basic Web-based technology and innovative graphical representations that match findings to the users' goals and context.

Extended Area Exit Pupil Viewer.

DTIC Science & Technology

1985-08-01

viewing to normal Zoom-500 stereomicroscope viewing. Previous EAEP viewers typically have incorporated a spinning lenticular screen and associated...is uncorrected spherical aberration and astigmatism that limit image resolution. The complex optical path in the microscope also makes it inefficient

Viewer Makes Radioactivity "Visible"

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yin, L. I.

1983-01-01

Battery operated viewer demonstrates feasibility of generating threedimensional visible light simulations of objects that emit X-ray or gamma rays. Ray paths are traced for two pinhold positions to show location of reconstructed image. Images formed by pinholes are converted to intensified visible-light images. Applications range from radioactivity contamination surveys to monitoring radioisotope absorption in tumors.

NGL Viewer: a web application for molecular visualization.

PubMed

Rose, Alexander S; Hildebrand, Peter W

2015-07-01

The NGL Viewer (http://proteinformatics.charite.de/ngl) is a web application for the visualization of macromolecular structures. By fully adopting capabilities of modern web browsers, such as WebGL, for molecular graphics, the viewer can interactively display large molecular complexes and is also unaffected by the retirement of third-party plug-ins like Flash and Java Applets. Generally, the web application offers comprehensive molecular visualization through a graphical user interface so that life scientists can easily access and profit from available structural data. It supports common structural file-formats (e.g. PDB, mmCIF) and a variety of molecular representations (e.g. 'cartoon, spacefill, licorice'). Moreover, the viewer can be embedded in other web sites to provide specialized visualizations of entries in structural databases or results of structure-related calculations. © The Author(s) 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

Historical time in the age of big data: Cultural psychology, historical change, and the Google Books Ngram Viewer.

PubMed

Pettit, Michael

2016-05-01

Launched in 2010, the Google Books Ngram Viewer offers a novel means of tracing cultural change over time. This digital tool offers exciting possibilities for cultural psychology by rendering questions about variation across historical time more quantitative. Psychologists have begun to use the viewer to bolster theories about a historical shift in the United States from a more collectivist to individualist form of selfhood and society. I raise 4 methodological cautions about the Ngram Viewer's use among psychologists: (a) the extent to which print culture can be taken to represent culture as a whole, (b) the difference between viewing the past in terms of trends versus events, (c) assumptions about the stability of a word's meaning over time, and (d) inconsistencies in the scales and ranges used to measure change over time. The aim is to foster discussion about the standards of evidence needed for incorporating historical big data into empirical research. (c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).

NASA-IGES Translator and Viewer

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chou, Jin J.; Logan, Michael A.

1995-01-01

NASA-IGES Translator (NIGEStranslator) is a batch program that translates a general IGES (Initial Graphics Exchange Specification) file to a NASA-IGES-Nurbs-Only (NINO) file. IGES is the most popular geometry exchange standard among Computer Aided Geometric Design (CAD) systems. NINO format is a subset of IGES, implementing the simple and yet the most popular NURBS (Non-Uniform Rational B-Splines) representation. NIGEStranslator converts a complex IGES file to the simpler NINO file to simplify the tasks of CFD grid generation for models in CAD format. The NASA-IGES Viewer (NIGESview) is an Open-Inventor-based, highly interactive viewer/ editor for NINO files. Geometry in the IGES files can be viewed, copied, transformed, deleted, and inquired. Users can use NIGEStranslator to translate IGES files from CAD systems to NINO files. The geometry then can be examined with NIGESview. Extraneous geometries can be interactively removed, and the cleaned model can be written to an IGES file, ready to be used in grid generation.

Visualization for genomics: the Microbial Genome Viewer.

PubMed

Kerkhoven, Robert; van Enckevort, Frank H J; Boekhorst, Jos; Molenaar, Douwe; Siezen, Roland J

2004-07-22

A Web-based visualization tool, the Microbial Genome Viewer, is presented that allows the user to combine complex genomic data in a highly interactive way. This Web tool enables the interactive generation of chromosome wheels and linear genome maps from genome annotation data stored in a MySQL database. The generated images are in scalable vector graphics (SVG) format, which is suitable for creating high-quality scalable images and dynamic Web representations. Gene-related data such as transcriptome and time-course microarray experiments can be superimposed on the maps for visual inspection. The Microbial Genome Viewer 1.0 is freely available at http://www.cmbi.kun.nl/MGV

The Saccharomyces Genome Database Variant Viewer

PubMed Central

Sheppard, Travis K.; Hitz, Benjamin C.; Engel, Stacia R.; Song, Giltae; Balakrishnan, Rama; Binkley, Gail; Costanzo, Maria C.; Dalusag, Kyla S.; Demeter, Janos; Hellerstedt, Sage T.; Karra, Kalpana; Nash, Robert S.; Paskov, Kelley M.; Skrzypek, Marek S.; Weng, Shuai; Wong, Edith D.; Cherry, J. Michael

2016-01-01

The Saccharomyces Genome Database (SGD; http://www.yeastgenome.org) is the authoritative community resource for the Saccharomyces cerevisiae reference genome sequence and its annotation. In recent years, we have moved toward increased representation of sequence variation and allelic differences within S. cerevisiae. The publication of numerous additional genomes has motivated the creation of new tools for their annotation and analysis. Here we present the Variant Viewer: a dynamic open-source web application for the visualization of genomic and proteomic differences. Multiple sequence alignments have been constructed across high quality genome sequences from 11 different S. cerevisiae strains and stored in the SGD. The alignments and summaries are encoded in JSON and used to create a two-tiered dynamic view of the budding yeast pan-genome, available at http://www.yeastgenome.org/variant-viewer. PMID:26578556

Remote Viewer for Maritime Robotics Software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kuwata, Yoshiaki; Wolf, Michael; Huntsberger, Terrance L.; Howard, Andrew B.

2013-01-01

This software is a viewer program for maritime robotics software that provides a 3D visualization of the boat pose, its position history, ENC (Electrical Nautical Chart) information, camera images, map overlay, and detected tracks.

Is Twitter a forum for disseminating research to health policy makers?

PubMed

Kapp, Julie M; Hensel, Brian; Schnoring, Kyle T

2015-12-01

Findings from scientific research largely remain inside the scientific community. Research scientists are being encouraged to use social media, and especially Twitter, for dissemination of evidence. The potential for Twitter to narrow the gap on evidence translated into policy presents new opportunities. We explored the innovative question of the feasibility of Twitter as a tool for the scientific community to disseminate to and engage with health policy makers for research impact. We created a list of federal "health policy makers." In December 2014, we identified members using several data sources, then collected and summarized their Twitter usage data. Nearly all health policy makers had Twitter accounts. Their communication volume varied broadly. Policy makers are more likely to push information via Twitter than engage with constituents, although usage varied broadly. Twitter has the potential to aid the scientific community in dissemination of health-related research to health policy makers, after understanding how to effectively (and selectively) use Twitter. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

CruiseViewer: SIOExplorer Graphical Interface to Metadata and Archives.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sutton, D. W.; Helly, J. J.; Miller, S. P.; Chase, A.; Clark, D.

2002-12-01

We are introducing "CruiseViewer" as a prototype graphical interface for the SIOExplorer digital library project, part of the overall NSF National Science Digital Library (NSDL) effort. When complete, CruiseViewer will provide access to nearly 800 cruises, as well as 100 years of documents and images from the archives of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO). The project emphasizes data object accessibility, a rich metadata format, efficient uploading methods and interoperability with other digital libraries. The primary function of CruiseViewer is to provide a human interface to the metadata database and to storage systems filled with archival data. The system schema is based on the concept of an "arbitrary digital object" (ADO). Arbitrary in that if the object can be stored on a computer system then SIOExplore can manage it. Common examples are a multibeam swath bathymetry file, a .pdf cruise report, or a tar file containing all the processing scripts used on a cruise. We require a metadata file for every ADO in an ascii "metadata interchange format" (MIF), which has proven to be highly useful for operability and extensibility. Bulk ADO storage is managed using the Storage Resource Broker, SRB, data handling middleware developed at the San Diego Supercomputer Center that centralizes management and access to distributed storage devices. MIF metadata are harvested from several sources and housed in a relational (Oracle) database. For CruiseViewer, cgi scripts resident on an Apache server are the primary communication and service request handling tools. Along with the CruiseViewer java application, users can query, access and download objects via a separate method that operates through standard web browsers, http://sioexplorer.ucsd.edu. Both provide the functionability to query and view object metadata, and select and download ADOs. For the CruiseViewer application Java 2D is used to add a geo-referencing feature that allows users to select basemap images

A fisheye viewer for microarray-based gene expression data

PubMed Central

Wu, Min; Thao, Cheng; Mu, Xiangming; Munson, Ethan V

2006-01-01

Background Microarray has been widely used to measure the relative amounts of every mRNA transcript from the genome in a single scan. Biologists have been accustomed to reading their experimental data directly from tables. However, microarray data are quite large and are stored in a series of files in a machine-readable format, so direct reading of the full data set is not feasible. The challenge is to design a user interface that allows biologists to usefully view large tables of raw microarray-based gene expression data. This paper presents one such interface – an electronic table (E-table) that uses fisheye distortion technology. Results The Fisheye Viewer for microarray-based gene expression data has been successfully developed to view MIAME data stored in the MAGE-ML format. The viewer can be downloaded from the project web site . The fisheye viewer was implemented in Java so that it could run on multiple platforms. We implemented the E-table by adapting JTable, a default table implementation in the Java Swing user interface library. Fisheye views use variable magnification to balance magnification for easy viewing and compression for maximizing the amount of data on the screen. Conclusion This Fisheye Viewer is a lightweight but useful tool for biologists to quickly overview the raw microarray-based gene expression data in an E-table. PMID:17038193

Anatomical guidance for functional near-infrared spectroscopy: AtlasViewer tutorial

PubMed Central

Aasted, Christopher M.; Yücel, Meryem A.; Cooper, Robert J.; Dubb, Jay; Tsuzuki, Daisuke; Becerra, Lino; Petkov, Mike P.; Borsook, David; Dan, Ippeita; Boas, David A.

2015-01-01

Abstract. Functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) is an optical imaging method that is used to noninvasively measure cerebral hemoglobin concentration changes induced by brain activation. Using structural guidance in fNIRS research enhances interpretation of results and facilitates making comparisons between studies. AtlasViewer is an open-source software package we have developed that incorporates multiple spatial registration tools to enable structural guidance in the interpretation of fNIRS studies. We introduce the reader to the layout of the AtlasViewer graphical user interface, the folder structure, and user files required in the creation of fNIRS probes containing sources and detectors registered to desired locations on the head, evaluating probe fabrication error and intersubject probe placement variability, and different procedures for estimating measurement sensitivity to different brain regions as well as image reconstruction performance. Further, we detail how AtlasViewer provides a generic head atlas for guiding interpretation of fNIRS results, but also permits users to provide subject-specific head anatomies to interpret their results. We anticipate that AtlasViewer will be a valuable tool in improving the anatomical interpretation of fNIRS studies. PMID:26157991

EOS ODL Metadata On-line Viewer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yang, J.; Rabi, M.; Bane, B.; Ullman, R.

2002-12-01

We have recently developed and deployed an EOS ODL metadata on-line viewer. The EOS ODL metadata viewer is a web server that takes: 1) an EOS metadata file in Object Description Language (ODL), 2) parameters, such as which metadata to view and what style of display to use, and returns an HTML or XML document displaying the requested metadata in the requested style. This tool is developed to address widespread complaints by science community that the EOS Data and Information System (EOSDIS) metadata files in ODL are difficult to read by allowing users to upload and view an ODL metadata file in different styles using a web browser. Users have the selection to view all the metadata or part of the metadata, such as Collection metadata, Granule metadata, or Unsupported Metadata. Choices of display styles include 1) Web: a mouseable display with tabs and turn-down menus, 2) Outline: Formatted and colored text, suitable for printing, 3) Generic: Simple indented text, a direct representation of the underlying ODL metadata, and 4) None: No stylesheet is applied and the XML generated by the converter is returned directly. Not all display styles are implemented for all the metadata choices. For example, Web style is only implemented for Collection and Granule metadata groups with known attribute fields, but not for Unsupported, Other, and All metadata. The overall strategy of the ODL viewer is to transform an ODL metadata file to a viewable HTML in two steps. The first step is to convert the ODL metadata file to an XML using a Java-based parser/translator called ODL2XML. The second step is to transform the XML to an HTML using stylesheets. Both operations are done on the server side. This allows a lot of flexibility in the final result, and is very portable cross-platform. Perl CGI behind the Apache web server is used to run the Java ODL2XML, and then run the results through an XSLT processor. The EOS ODL viewer can be accessed from either a PC or a Mac using Internet

Use of a real-time viewer for endoscopic deployment of capsule endoscope in the pediatric population.

PubMed

Bass, Lee M; Misiewicz, Lawrence

2012-11-01

Wireless capsule endoscopy (WCE) is an increasingly used procedure for visualization of the small intestine. One challenge in pediatric WCE is the placement of the capsule in a population unable to swallow it for a variety of reasons. Here we present a novel use of the real-time (RT) viewer in the endoscopic deployment of the capsule endoscope. We performed a retrospective chart review on all WCE completed at the Children's Memorial Hospital from February 2010 to May 2011. Following a diagnostic upper endoscopy, the RT viewer was attached to the capsule recorder and image was noted before insertion. The endoscope and AdvanCE capsule delivery device were slowly advanced into duodenum while maintaining visualization on the RT viewer. A total of 17 patients who underwent a WCE with endoscopic placement were identified. They ranged in ages from 2 to 19 years. Thirteen patients required endoscopic placement because of the inability to swallow the capsule, whereas 4 were placed during a scheduled procedure to take advantage of sedation and airway protection. All of the 17 patients had successful deployment of the capsule into the duodenal lumen. In each case, the endoscopist was able to confirm capsule location in duodenum during scope withdrawal. There was no evidence of iatrogenic trauma or bleeding in any patient. There were 5 incomplete studies, a completion rate consistent with that described in the literature. The use of the RT viewer for endoscopic deployment of WCE is an effective technique to improve visualization of capsule placement in the pediatric population.

The Saccharomyces Genome Database Variant Viewer.

PubMed

Sheppard, Travis K; Hitz, Benjamin C; Engel, Stacia R; Song, Giltae; Balakrishnan, Rama; Binkley, Gail; Costanzo, Maria C; Dalusag, Kyla S; Demeter, Janos; Hellerstedt, Sage T; Karra, Kalpana; Nash, Robert S; Paskov, Kelley M; Skrzypek, Marek S; Weng, Shuai; Wong, Edith D; Cherry, J Michael

2016-01-04

The Saccharomyces Genome Database (SGD; http://www.yeastgenome.org) is the authoritative community resource for the Saccharomyces cerevisiae reference genome sequence and its annotation. In recent years, we have moved toward increased representation of sequence variation and allelic differences within S. cerevisiae. The publication of numerous additional genomes has motivated the creation of new tools for their annotation and analysis. Here we present the Variant Viewer: a dynamic open-source web application for the visualization of genomic and proteomic differences. Multiple sequence alignments have been constructed across high quality genome sequences from 11 different S. cerevisiae strains and stored in the SGD. The alignments and summaries are encoded in JSON and used to create a two-tiered dynamic view of the budding yeast pan-genome, available at http://www.yeastgenome.org/variant-viewer. © The Author(s) 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

Viewers' perceptions of a YouTube music therapy session video.

PubMed

Gregory, Dianne; Gooding, Lori G

2013-01-01

Recent research revealed diverse content and varying levels of quality in YouTube music therapy videos and prompted questions about viewers' discrimination abilities. This study compares ratings of a YouTube music therapy session video by viewers with different levels of music therapy expertise to determine video elements related to perceptions of representational quality. Eighty-one participants included 25 novices (freshmen and sophomores in an introductory music therapy course), 25 pre-interns (seniors and equivalency students who had completed all core Music Therapy courses), 26 professionals (MT-BC or MT-BC eligibility) with a mean of 1.75 years of experience, and an expert panel of 5 MT-BC professionals with a mean of 11 years of experience in special education. After viewing a music therapy special education video that in previous research met basic competency criteria and professional standards of the American Music Therapy Association, participants completed a 16-item questionnaire. Novices' ratings were more positive (less discriminating) compared to experienced viewers' neutral or negative ratings. Statistical analysis (ANOVA) of novice, pre-intern, and professional ratings of all items revealed significant differences p, .05) for specific therapy content and for a global rating of representational quality. Experienced viewers' ratings were similar to the expert panel's ratings. Content analysis of viewers' reasons for their representational quality ratings corroborated ratings of therapy-specific content. A video that combines and clearly depicts therapy objectives, client improvement, and the effectiveness of music within a therapeutic intervention best represent the music therapy profession in a public social platform like YouTube.

Reactome diagram viewer: data structures and strategies to boost performance.

PubMed

Fabregat, Antonio; Sidiropoulos, Konstantinos; Viteri, Guilherme; Marin-Garcia, Pablo; Ping, Peipei; Stein, Lincoln; D'Eustachio, Peter; Hermjakob, Henning

2018-04-01

Reactome is a free, open-source, open-data, curated and peer-reviewed knowledgebase of biomolecular pathways. For web-based pathway visualization, Reactome uses a custom pathway diagram viewer that has been evolved over the past years. Here, we present comprehensive enhancements in usability and performance based on extensive usability testing sessions and technology developments, aiming to optimize the viewer towards the needs of the community. The pathway diagram viewer version 3 achieves consistently better performance, loading and rendering of 97% of the diagrams in Reactome in less than 1 s. Combining the multi-layer html5 canvas strategy with a space partitioning data structure minimizes CPU workload, enabling the introduction of new features that further enhance user experience. Through the use of highly optimized data structures and algorithms, Reactome has boosted the performance and usability of the new pathway diagram viewer, providing a robust, scalable and easy-to-integrate solution to pathway visualization. As graph-based visualization of complex data is a frequent challenge in bioinformatics, many of the individual strategies presented here are applicable to a wide range of web-based bioinformatics resources. Reactome is available online at: https://reactome.org. The diagram viewer is part of the Reactome pathway browser (https://reactome.org/PathwayBrowser/) and also available as a stand-alone widget at: https://reactome.org/dev/diagram/. The source code is freely available at: https://github.com/reactome-pwp/diagram. fabregat@ebi.ac.uk or hhe@ebi.ac.uk. Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

Combining communication technology utilization and organizational innovation: evidence from Canadian healthcare decision makers.

PubMed

Jbilou, Jalila; Landry, Réjean; Amara, Nabil; El Adlouni, Salaheddine

2009-08-01

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and Organizational Innovation (OI) are seen as the miracle of post-modernity in organizations. In this way, they are supposed to resolve most organizational problems, efficiently and rapidly. OI is highly dependent on the capacity and the investment in knowledge management (internal and external) to support decision making process and to implement significant changes. We know what explains ICT utilization (ICTU) and what determines OI development (OID) in healthcare services. Moreover, the literature tends to link ICTU to OID and vice versa. However, this dependency has never been explored empirically through the lens of roles combination. To identify the existing combined roles profiles of ICTU and OID among healthcare decision makers and determine factors of the shift from a profile to another. We did the following: (1) a structured review of the literature on healthcare management by focusing on ICTU and OID which allowed us to build two indexes and a comprehensive framework; (2) a copula methodology to identify with high precision the thresholds for ICTU and OID; and (3) a cross-sectional study based on a survey done with a sample of 942 decision makers from Canadian healthcare organizations through a multinomial logit model to identify determinants of the shift. ICTU and OID are correlated at 22% (Kendal's Tau). The joint distribution (combination) of ICTU and OID shows that four major profiles exist among decision makers in Canadian healthcare organizations: the traditional decision maker, the innovative decision maker, the technologic decision maker and the contemporary decision maker. We found out that classic factors act as barriers to the shift from one profile to the desired profile (from 1 to 4, from 2 to 4 and from 3 to 4). We have identified that the attitude toward research and relational capital are transversal barriers of shift. We have also found that some factors have a specific impact such as

Image Viewer using Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Baraskar, Trupti N.

2010-11-01

Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine is a standard for handling, storing, printing, and transmitting information in medical imaging. The National Electrical Manufacturers Association holds the copyright to this standard. It was developed by the DICOM Standards committee. The other image viewers cannot collectively store the image details as well as the patient's information. So the image may get separated from the details, but DICOM file format stores the patient's information and the image details. Main objective is to develop a DICOM image viewer. The image viewer will open .dcm i.e. DICOM image file and also will have additional features such as zoom in, zoom out, black and white inverter, magnifier, blur, B/W inverter, horizontal and vertical flipping, sharpening, contrast, brightness and .gif converter are incorporated.

Assessment of policy makers' individual and organizational capacity to acquire, assess, adapt and apply research evidence for maternal and child health policy making in Nigeria: a cross-sectional quantitative survey.

PubMed

Uneke, Chigozie Jesse; Sombie, Issiaka; Keita, Namoudou; Lokossou, Virgil; Johnson, Ermel; Ongolo-Zogo, Pierre; Uro-Chukwu, Henry Chukwuemeka

2017-09-01

Throughout the world, there is increasing awareness and acknowledgement of the value of research evidence in the development of effective health policy and in quality health care practice and administration. Among the major challenges associated with the lack of uptake of research evidence into policy and practice in Nigeria is the capacity constraints of policymakers to use research evidence in policy making. To assess the capacity of maternal and child health policy makers to acquire, access, adapt and apply available research evidence. This cross-sectional quantitative survey was conducted at a national maternal, newborn and child health (MNCH) stakeholders' engagement event. An evidence to policy self-assessment questionnaire was used to assess the capacity of forty MNCH policy makers to acquire, assess, adapt and apply research evidence for policy making. Low mean ratings were observed ranging from 2.68-3.53 on a scale of 5 for knowledge about initiating/conducting research and capacity to assess authenticity, validity, reliability, relevance and applicability of research evidence and for organizational capacity for promoting and using of research for policy making. There is need to institute policy makers' capacity development programmes to improve evidence-informed policymaking.

76 FR 38306 - Digital Television Signals Pursuant to the Satellite Home Viewer Extension and Reauthorization...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2011-06-30

... Television Signals Pursuant to the Satellite Home Viewer Extension and Reauthorization Act of 2004 AGENCY... Satellite Home Viewer Extension Act of 2004. The information collection requirements were approved on June... Measurement Standards for Digital Television Signals pursuant to the Satellite Home Viewer Extension and...

The "Policy-Preferences Model": A New Perspective on How Researchers Can Facilitate the Take-Up of Evidence by Educational Policy Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brown, Chris

2012-01-01

The phrase "knowledge adoption" refers to the often-complicated process by which policy makers "take on board" evidence. While models have been put forward to explain this activity, this paper argues that such models are flawed and fail to fully address those complexities affecting the successful realisation of knowledge…

Psychological and neural responses to art embody viewer and artwork histories.

PubMed

Vartanian, Oshin; Kaufman, James C

2013-04-01

The research programs of empirical aesthetics and neuroaesthetics have reflected deep concerns about viewers' sensitivities to artworks' historical contexts by investigating the impact of two factors on art perception: viewers' developmental (and educational) histories and the contextual histories of artworks. These considerations are consistent with data demonstrating that art perception is underwritten by dynamically reconfigured and evolutionarily adapted neural and psychological mechanisms.

Pavement profile viewer and analyzer : product brief.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2003-06-01

Pavement Profile Viewer and Analyzer, or ProVAL, is a software package that imports, displays, and analyzes the characteristics of pavement profiles from many different sources. ProVAL can analyze pavement profiles using several methods, including In...

Creating Critical Viewers: A Personal Reflection

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cherow-O'Leary, Renee

2014-01-01

This essay is a personal reflection on the implementation of "Creating Critical Viewers," a national media literacy program sponsored by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS), an industry association, in 1995. The television industry's decision to develop a media literacy curriculum in the 1990s was a powerful…

Profiling the Adolescent Soap Opera Viewer.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Alexander, Alison; And Others

Observing that plot and character changes in the daytime television serials has increased the teen and preteen share of soap opera audiences, a study compared demographic, personal experience, and attitudinal variables among adolescent soap opera fans, occasional viewers, and nonviewers. Data were collected from 230 students in the classrooms of…

Watching film for the first time: how adult viewers interpret perceptual discontinuities in film.

PubMed

Schwan, Stephan; Ildirar, Sermin

2010-07-01

Although film, television, and video play an important role in modern societies, the extent to which the similarities of cinematographic images to natural, unmediated conditions of visual experience contribute to viewers' comprehension is largely an open question. To address this question, we compared 20 inexperienced adult viewers from southern Turkey with groups of medium- and high-experienced adult viewers from the same region. In individual sessions, each participant was shown a set of 14 film clips that included a number of perceptual discontinuities typical for film. The viewers' interpretations were recorded and analyzed. The findings show that it is not the similarity to conditions of natural perception but the presence of a familiar line of action that determines the comprehensibility of films for inexperienced viewers. In the absence of such a line of action, extended prior experience is required for appropriate interpretation of cinematographic images such as those we investigated in this study.

Implicit Messages to Teen-Aged Viewers.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Abrahamsson, Ulla B.

Examples from the data of a study of television programing for adolescents in Sweden illustrate some of the differences in the ways programs address their male and female viewers. Whereas boy and girl characters in television programs are roughly equal in number, the distribution changes when only leading roles are considered. A marked imbalance…

SILVA tree viewer: interactive web browsing of the SILVA phylogenetic guide trees.

PubMed

Beccati, Alan; Gerken, Jan; Quast, Christian; Yilmaz, Pelin; Glöckner, Frank Oliver

2017-09-30

Phylogenetic trees are an important tool to study the evolutionary relationships among organisms. The huge amount of available taxa poses difficulties in their interactive visualization. This hampers the interaction with the users to provide feedback for the further improvement of the taxonomic framework. The SILVA Tree Viewer is a web application designed for visualizing large phylogenetic trees without requiring the download of any software tool or data files. The SILVA Tree Viewer is based on Web Geographic Information Systems (Web-GIS) technology with a PostgreSQL backend. It enables zoom and pan functionalities similar to Google Maps. The SILVA Tree Viewer enables access to two phylogenetic (guide) trees provided by the SILVA database: the SSU Ref NR99 inferred from high-quality, full-length small subunit sequences, clustered at 99% sequence identity and the LSU Ref inferred from high-quality, full-length large subunit sequences. The Tree Viewer provides tree navigation, search and browse tools as well as an interactive feedback system to collect any kinds of requests ranging from taxonomy to data curation and improving the tool itself.

FNV: light-weight flash-based network and pathway viewer.

PubMed

Dannenfelser, Ruth; Lachmann, Alexander; Szenk, Mariola; Ma'ayan, Avi

2011-04-15

Network diagrams are commonly used to visualize biochemical pathways by displaying the relationships between genes, proteins, mRNAs, microRNAs, metabolites, regulatory DNA elements, diseases, viruses and drugs. While there are several currently available web-based pathway viewers, there is still room for improvement. To this end, we have developed a flash-based network viewer (FNV) for the visualization of small to moderately sized biological networks and pathways. Written in Adobe ActionScript 3.0, the viewer accepts simple Extensible Markup Language (XML) formatted input files to display pathways in vector graphics on any web-page providing flexible layout options, interactivity with the user through tool tips, hyperlinks and the ability to rearrange nodes on the screen. FNV was utilized as a component in several web-based systems, namely Genes2Networks, Lists2Networks, KEA, ChEA and PathwayGenerator. In addition, FVN can be used to embed pathways inside pdf files for the communication of pathways in soft publication materials. FNV is available for use and download along with the supporting documentation and sample networks at http://www.maayanlab.net/FNV. avi.maayan@mssm.edu.

Advancing Policy Makers' Expertise in Evidence-Use: A New Approach to Enhancing the Role Research Can Have in Aiding Educational Policy Development

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brown, Chris

2014-01-01

This paper explores the notion of evidence-informed policy making and the factors that have hindered its development in the UK to date. It then explores Flyvbjerg's notion of "phronetic" expertise and hypothesises that the learning that accrues from engaging with multiple cases could also lead to policy-makers developing competency in…

An economical wireless cavity-nest viewer

Treesearch

Daniel P. Huebner; Sarah R. Hurteau

2007-01-01

Inspection of cavity nests and nest boxes is often required during studies of cavity-nesting birds, and fiberscopes and pole-mounted video cameras are sometimes used for such inspection. However, the cost of these systems may be prohibitive for some potential users. We describe a user-built, wireless cavity viewer that can be used to access cavities as high as 15 m and...

The connectome viewer toolkit: an open source framework to manage, analyze, and visualize connectomes.

PubMed

Gerhard, Stephan; Daducci, Alessandro; Lemkaddem, Alia; Meuli, Reto; Thiran, Jean-Philippe; Hagmann, Patric

2011-01-01

Advanced neuroinformatics tools are required for methods of connectome mapping, analysis, and visualization. The inherent multi-modality of connectome datasets poses new challenges for data organization, integration, and sharing. We have designed and implemented the Connectome Viewer Toolkit - a set of free and extensible open source neuroimaging tools written in Python. The key components of the toolkit are as follows: (1) The Connectome File Format is an XML-based container format to standardize multi-modal data integration and structured metadata annotation. (2) The Connectome File Format Library enables management and sharing of connectome files. (3) The Connectome Viewer is an integrated research and development environment for visualization and analysis of multi-modal connectome data. The Connectome Viewer's plugin architecture supports extensions with network analysis packages and an interactive scripting shell, to enable easy development and community contributions. Integration with tools from the scientific Python community allows the leveraging of numerous existing libraries for powerful connectome data mining, exploration, and comparison. We demonstrate the applicability of the Connectome Viewer Toolkit using Diffusion MRI datasets processed by the Connectome Mapper. The Connectome Viewer Toolkit is available from http://www.cmtk.org/

The Connectome Viewer Toolkit: An Open Source Framework to Manage, Analyze, and Visualize Connectomes

PubMed Central

Gerhard, Stephan; Daducci, Alessandro; Lemkaddem, Alia; Meuli, Reto; Thiran, Jean-Philippe; Hagmann, Patric

2011-01-01

Advanced neuroinformatics tools are required for methods of connectome mapping, analysis, and visualization. The inherent multi-modality of connectome datasets poses new challenges for data organization, integration, and sharing. We have designed and implemented the Connectome Viewer Toolkit – a set of free and extensible open source neuroimaging tools written in Python. The key components of the toolkit are as follows: (1) The Connectome File Format is an XML-based container format to standardize multi-modal data integration and structured metadata annotation. (2) The Connectome File Format Library enables management and sharing of connectome files. (3) The Connectome Viewer is an integrated research and development environment for visualization and analysis of multi-modal connectome data. The Connectome Viewer's plugin architecture supports extensions with network analysis packages and an interactive scripting shell, to enable easy development and community contributions. Integration with tools from the scientific Python community allows the leveraging of numerous existing libraries for powerful connectome data mining, exploration, and comparison. We demonstrate the applicability of the Connectome Viewer Toolkit using Diffusion MRI datasets processed by the Connectome Mapper. The Connectome Viewer Toolkit is available from http://www.cmtk.org/ PMID:21713110

Television Sex Roles in the 1980s: Do Viewers' Sex and Sex Role Orientation Change the Picture?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dambrot, Faye H.; And Others

1988-01-01

Investigates the viewer perceptions of female and male television characters as a result of viewer sex and sex role orientation, based on the responses of 677 young adults to the Personal Attributes Questionnaire (PAQ). Viewer gender had an impact on the rating of female characters. (FMW)

Ad Layout Students Become "Artists" with Viewer Device

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Engel, Jack

1977-01-01

Suggests that the use of a projection viewer employed by professional art studios to make revised enlargements or reductions of existing art can improve the appearance of layouts done by creative, but artistically unskilled, students. (KS)

What causes the facing-the-viewer bias in biological motion?

PubMed

Weech, Séamas; McAdam, Matthew; Kenny, Sophie; Troje, Nikolaus F

2014-10-13

Orthographically projected biological motion point-light displays are generally ambiguous with respect to their orientation in depth, yet observers consistently prefer the facing-the-viewer interpretation. There has been discussion as to whether this bias can be attributed to the social relevance of biological motion stimuli or relates to local, low-level stimulus properties. In the present study we address this question. In Experiment 1, we compared the facing-the-viewer bias produced by a series of four stick figures and three human silhouettes that differed in posture, gender, and the presence versus absence of walking motion. Using a paradigm in which we asked observers to indicate the spinning direction of these figures, we found no bias when participants observed silhouettes, whereas a pronounced degree of bias was elicited by most stick figures. We hypothesized that the ambiguous surface normals on the lines and dots that comprise stick figures are prone to a visual bias that assumes surfaces to be convex. The local surface orientations of the occluding contours of silhouettes are unambiguous, and as such the convexity bias does not apply. In Experiment 2, we tested the role of local features in ambiguous surface perception by adding dots to the elbows and knees of silhouettes. We found biases consistent with the facing directions implied by a convex body surface. The results unify a number of findings regarding the facing-the-viewer bias. We conclude that the facing-the-viewer bias is established at the level of surface reconstruction from local image features rather than on a semantic level. © 2014 ARVO.

Using a high-speed movie camera to evaluate slice dropping in clinical image interpretation with stack mode viewers.

PubMed

Yakami, Masahiro; Yamamoto, Akira; Yanagisawa, Morio; Sekiguchi, Hiroyuki; Kubo, Takeshi; Togashi, Kaori

2013-06-01

The purpose of this study is to verify objectively the rate of slice omission during paging on picture archiving and communication system (PACS) viewers by recording the images shown on the computer displays of these viewers with a high-speed movie camera. This study was approved by the institutional review board. A sequential number from 1 to 250 was superimposed on each slice of a series of clinical Digital Imaging and Communication in Medicine (DICOM) data. The slices were displayed using several DICOM viewers, including in-house developed freeware and clinical PACS viewers. The freeware viewer and one of the clinical PACS viewers included functions to prevent slice dropping. The series was displayed in stack mode and paged in both automatic and manual paging modes. The display was recorded with a high-speed movie camera and played back at a slow speed to check whether slices were dropped. The paging speeds were also measured. With a paging speed faster than half the refresh rate of the display, some viewers dropped up to 52.4 % of the slices, while other well-designed viewers did not, if used with the correct settings. Slice dropping during paging was objectively confirmed using a high-speed movie camera. To prevent slice dropping, the viewer must be specially designed for the purpose and must be used with the correct settings, or the paging speed must be slower than half of the display refresh rate.

Content analysis of antismoking videos on YouTube: message sensation value, message appeals, and their relationships with viewer responses.

PubMed

Paek, Hye-Jin; Kim, Kyongseok; Hove, Thomas

2010-12-01

Focusing on several message features that are prominent in antismoking campaign literature, this content-analytic study examines 934 antismoking video clips on YouTube for the following characteristics: message sensation value (MSV) and three types of message appeal (threat, social and humor). These four characteristics are then linked to YouTube's interactive audience response mechanisms (number of viewers, viewer ratings and number of comments) to capture message reach, viewer preference and viewer engagement. The findings suggest the following: (i) antismoking messages are prevalent on YouTube, (ii) MSV levels of online antismoking videos are relatively low compared with MSV levels of televised antismoking messages, (iii) threat appeals are the videos' predominant message strategy and (iv) message characteristics are related to viewer reach and viewer preference.

Making Leaders: Leadership Characteristics of Makers and Engineers in the Maker Community

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Oplinger, James; Lande, Micah; Jordan, Shawn; Camarena, Leonor

2016-01-01

This study examines the emergence of leadership characteristics within a new organizational community of individuals: the Maker community. The Maker community is a group of individuals that classify themselves as "Makers" and have become innovators and entrepreneurs through the creation of technological gadgets, artistic projects, and…

Evaluation of DICOM viewer software for workflow integration in clinical trials

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Haak, Daniel; Page, Charles E.; Kabino, Klaus; Deserno, Thomas M.

2015-03-01

The digital imaging and communications in medicine (DICOM) protocol is nowadays the leading standard for capture, exchange and storage of image data in medical applications. A broad range of commercial, free, and open source software tools supporting a variety of DICOM functionality exists. However, different from patient's care in hospital, DICOM has not yet arrived in electronic data capture systems (EDCS) for clinical trials. Due to missing integration, even just the visualization of patient's image data in electronic case report forms (eCRFs) is impossible. Four increasing levels for integration of DICOM components into EDCS are conceivable, raising functionality but also demands on interfaces with each level. Hence, in this paper, a comprehensive evaluation of 27 DICOM viewer software projects is performed, investigating viewing functionality as well as interfaces for integration. Concerning general, integration, and viewing requirements the survey involves the criteria (i) license, (ii) support, (iii) platform, (iv) interfaces, (v) two-dimensional (2D) and (vi) three-dimensional (3D) image viewing functionality. Optimal viewers are suggested for applications in clinical trials for 3D imaging, hospital communication, and workflow. Focusing on open source solutions, the viewers ImageJ and MicroView are superior for 3D visualization, whereas GingkoCADx is advantageous for hospital integration. Concerning workflow optimization in multi-centered clinical trials, we suggest the open source viewer Weasis. Covering most use cases, an EDCS and PACS interconnection with Weasis is suggested.

An Assessment of National Maternal and Child Health Policy-Makers' Knowledge and Capacity for Evidence- Informed Policy-Making in Nigeria.

PubMed

Uneke, Chigozie Jesse; Sombie, Issiaka; Keita, Namoudou; Lokossou, Virgil; Johnson, Ermel; Ongolo-Zogo, Pierre

2016-10-08

There is increasing interest globally in the use of more rigorous processes to ensure that maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH) care recommendations are informed by the best available research evidence use. The purpose of this study was to engage Nigerian MNCH policy-makers and other stakeholders to consider issues around research to policy and practice interface and to assess their existing knowledge and capacity on the use of research evidence for policy-making and practice. The study design is a cross-sectional evaluation of MNCH stakeholders' knowledge as it pertains different dimensions of research to practice. This was undertaken during a national MNCH stakeholders' engagement event convened under the auspices of the West African Health Organization (WAHO) and the Federal Ministry of Health (FMoH) in Abuja, Nigeria. A questionnaire was administered to participants, which was designed to assess participants' knowledge, capacity and organizational process of generation, synthesis and utilization of research evidence in policy-making regarding MNCH. A total of 40 participants signed the informed consent form and completed the questionnaire. The mean ratings (MNRs) of participants' knowledge of electronic databases and capacity to identify and obtain relevant research evidence from electronic databases ranged from 3.62-3.68 on the scale of 5. The MNRs of participants' level of understanding of a policy brief, a policy dialogue and the role of researchers in policy-making ranged from 3.50-3.86. The MNRs of participants' level of understanding of evidence in policy-making context, types and sources of evidence, capacity to identify, select, adapt, and transform relevant evidence into policy ranged from 3.63-4.08. The MNRs of the participants' organization's capacity to cover their geographical areas of operation were generally low ranging from 3.32-3.38 in terms of manpower, logistics, facilities, and external support. The lowest MNR of 2.66 was recorded in

An expectancy-value analysis of viewer interest in television prevention news stories.

PubMed

Cooper, C P; Burgoon, M; Roter, D L

2001-01-01

Understanding what drives viewer interest in television news stories about prevention topics is vital to maximizing the effectiveness of interventions that utilize this medium. Guided by expectancy-value theory, this experiment used regression analysis to identify the salient beliefs associated with viewer attitudes towards these types of news stories. The 458 study participants were recruited over 30 days from a municipal jury pool in an eastern U.S. city. Out of the 22 beliefs included in the experiment, 6 demonstrated salience. Personal relevance, novelty, shock value, and the absence of exaggeration were the core values reflected in the identified salient beliefs. This study highlights the importance of explaining the relevance of prevention stories to viewers and framing these stories with a new spin or a surprising twist. However, such manipulations should be applied with savvy and restraint, as hyping prevention news was found to be counterproductive to educating the public.

Both physical exercise and progressive muscle relaxation reduce the facing-the-viewer bias in biological motion perception.

PubMed

Heenan, Adam; Troje, Nikolaus F

2014-01-01

Biological motion stimuli, such as orthographically projected stick figure walkers, are ambiguous about their orientation in depth. The projection of a stick figure walker oriented towards the viewer, therefore, is the same as its projection when oriented away. Even though such figures are depth-ambiguous, however, observers tend to interpret them as facing towards them more often than facing away. Some have speculated that this facing-the-viewer bias may exist for sociobiological reasons: Mistaking another human as retreating when they are actually approaching could have more severe consequences than the opposite error. Implied in this hypothesis is that the facing-towards percept of biological motion stimuli is potentially more threatening. Measures of anxiety and the facing-the-viewer bias should therefore be related, as researchers have consistently found that anxious individuals display an attentional bias towards more threatening stimuli. The goal of this study was to assess whether physical exercise (Experiment 1) or an anxiety induction/reduction task (Experiment 2) would significantly affect facing-the-viewer biases. We hypothesized that both physical exercise and progressive muscle relaxation would decrease facing-the-viewer biases for full stick figure walkers, but not for bottom- or top-half-only human stimuli, as these carry less sociobiological relevance. On the other hand, we expected that the anxiety induction task (Experiment 2) would increase facing-the-viewer biases for full stick figure walkers only. In both experiments, participants completed anxiety questionnaires, exercised on a treadmill (Experiment 1) or performed an anxiety induction/reduction task (Experiment 2), and then immediately completed a perceptual task that allowed us to assess their facing-the-viewer bias. As hypothesized, we found that physical exercise and progressive muscle relaxation reduced facing-the-viewer biases for full stick figure walkers only. Our results provide

Both Physical Exercise and Progressive Muscle Relaxation Reduce the Facing-the-Viewer Bias in Biological Motion Perception

PubMed Central

Heenan, Adam; Troje, Nikolaus F.

2014-01-01

Biological motion stimuli, such as orthographically projected stick figure walkers, are ambiguous about their orientation in depth. The projection of a stick figure walker oriented towards the viewer, therefore, is the same as its projection when oriented away. Even though such figures are depth-ambiguous, however, observers tend to interpret them as facing towards them more often than facing away. Some have speculated that this facing-the-viewer bias may exist for sociobiological reasons: Mistaking another human as retreating when they are actually approaching could have more severe consequences than the opposite error. Implied in this hypothesis is that the facing-towards percept of biological motion stimuli is potentially more threatening. Measures of anxiety and the facing-the-viewer bias should therefore be related, as researchers have consistently found that anxious individuals display an attentional bias towards more threatening stimuli. The goal of this study was to assess whether physical exercise (Experiment 1) or an anxiety induction/reduction task (Experiment 2) would significantly affect facing-the-viewer biases. We hypothesized that both physical exercise and progressive muscle relaxation would decrease facing-the-viewer biases for full stick figure walkers, but not for bottom- or top-half-only human stimuli, as these carry less sociobiological relevance. On the other hand, we expected that the anxiety induction task (Experiment 2) would increase facing-the-viewer biases for full stick figure walkers only. In both experiments, participants completed anxiety questionnaires, exercised on a treadmill (Experiment 1) or performed an anxiety induction/reduction task (Experiment 2), and then immediately completed a perceptual task that allowed us to assess their facing-the-viewer bias. As hypothesized, we found that physical exercise and progressive muscle relaxation reduced facing-the-viewer biases for full stick figure walkers only. Our results provide

User's guide to Model Viewer, a program for three-dimensional visualization of ground-water model results

USGS Publications Warehouse

Hsieh, Paul A.; Winston, Richard B.

2002-01-01

Model Viewer is a computer program that displays the results of three-dimensional groundwater models. Scalar data (such as hydraulic head or solute concentration) may be displayed as a solid or a set of isosurfaces, using a red-to-blue color spectrum to represent a range of scalar values. Vector data (such as velocity or specific discharge) are represented by lines oriented to the vector direction and scaled to the vector magnitude. Model Viewer can also display pathlines, cells or nodes that represent model features such as streams and wells, and auxiliary graphic objects such as grid lines and coordinate axes. Users may crop the model grid in different orientations to examine the interior structure of the data. For transient simulations, Model Viewer can animate the time evolution of the simulated quantities. The current version (1.0) of Model Viewer runs on Microsoft Windows 95, 98, NT and 2000 operating systems, and supports the following models: MODFLOW-2000, MODFLOW-2000 with the Ground-Water Transport Process, MODFLOW-96, MOC3D (Version 3.5), MODPATH, MT3DMS, and SUTRA (Version 2D3D.1). Model Viewer is designed to directly read input and output files from these models, thus minimizing the need for additional postprocessing. This report provides an overview of Model Viewer. Complete instructions on how to use the software are provided in the on-line help pages.

Gesture Interaction Browser-Based 3D Molecular Viewer.

PubMed

Virag, Ioan; Stoicu-Tivadar, Lăcrămioara; Crişan-Vida, Mihaela

2016-01-01

The paper presents an open source system that allows the user to interact with a 3D molecular viewer using associated hand gestures for rotating, scaling and panning the rendered model. The novelty of this approach is that the entire application is browser-based and doesn't require installation of third party plug-ins or additional software components in order to visualize the supported chemical file formats. This kind of solution is suitable for instruction of users in less IT oriented environments, like medicine or chemistry. For rendering various molecular geometries our team used GLmol (a molecular viewer written in JavaScript). The interaction with the 3D models is made with Leap Motion controller that allows real-time tracking of the user's hand gestures. The first results confirmed that the resulting application leads to a better way of understanding various types of translational bioinformatics related problems in both biomedical research and education.

Speaking "Out of Place": YouTube Documentaries and Viewers' Comment Culture as Political Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Piotrowski, Marcelina

2015-01-01

This article examines the comment culture that accompanies documentary films on YouTube as a site of (geo) political education. It considers how viewers try to teach each other about the proper "place" of critique in response to the global, national, and local rhetoric featured in one environmental documentary film. YouTube viewers use…

Engineering the Ideal Gigapixel Image Viewer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Perpeet, D. Wassenberg, J.

2011-09-01

Despite improvements in automatic processing, analysts are still faced with the task of evaluating gigapixel-scale mosaics or images acquired by telescopes such as Pan-STARRS. Displaying such images in ‘ideal’ form is a major challenge even today, and the amount of data will only increase as sensor resolutions improve. In our opinion, the ideal viewer has several key characteristics. Lossless display - down to individual pixels - ensures all information can be extracted from the image. Support for all relevant pixel formats (integer or floating point) allows displaying data from different sensors. Smooth zooming and panning in the high-resolution data enables rapid screening and navigation in the image. High responsiveness to input commands avoids frustrating delays. Instantaneous image enhancement, e.g. contrast adjustment and image channel selection, helps with analysis tasks. Modest system requirements allow viewing on regular workstation computers or even laptops. To the best of our knowledge, no such software product is currently available. Meeting these goals requires addressing certain realities of current computer architectures. GPU hardware accelerates rendering and allows smooth zooming without high CPU load. Programmable GPU shaders enable instant channel selection and contrast adjustment without any perceptible slowdown or changes to the input data. Relatively low disk transfer speeds suggest the use of compression to decrease the amount of data to transfer. Asynchronous I/O allows decompressing while waiting for previous I/O operations to complete. The slow seek times of magnetic disks motivate optimizing the order of the data on disk. Vectorization and parallelization allow significant increases in computational capacity. Limited memory requires streaming and caching of image regions. We develop a viewer that takes the above issues into account. Its awareness of the computer architecture enables previously unattainable features such as smooth

Changing viewer perspectives reveals constraints to implicit visual statistical learning.

PubMed

Jiang, Yuhong V; Swallow, Khena M

2014-10-07

Statistical learning-learning environmental regularities to guide behavior-likely plays an important role in natural human behavior. One potential use is in search for valuable items. Because visual statistical learning can be acquired quickly and without intention or awareness, it could optimize search and thereby conserve energy. For this to be true, however, visual statistical learning needs to be viewpoint invariant, facilitating search even when people walk around. To test whether implicit visual statistical learning of spatial information is viewpoint independent, we asked participants to perform a visual search task from variable locations around a monitor placed flat on a stand. Unbeknownst to participants, the target was more often in some locations than others. In contrast to previous research on stationary observers, visual statistical learning failed to produce a search advantage for targets in high-probable regions that were stable within the environment but variable relative to the viewer. This failure was observed even when conditions for spatial updating were optimized. However, learning was successful when the rich locations were referenced relative to the viewer. We conclude that changing viewer perspective disrupts implicit learning of the target's location probability. This form of learning shows limited integration with spatial updating or spatiotopic representations. © 2014 ARVO.

National policy-makers speak out: are researchers giving them what they need?

PubMed Central

Hyder, Adnan A; Corluka, Adrijana; Winch, Peter J; El-Shinnawy, Azza; Ghassany, Harith; Malekafzali, Hossein; Lim, Meng-Kin; Mfutso-Bengo, Joseph; Segura, Elsa; Ghaffar, Abdul

2011-01-01

The objective of this empirical study was to understand the perspectives and attitudes of policy-makers towards the use and impact of research in the health sector in low- and middle-income countries. The study used data from 83 semi-structured, in-depth interviews conducted with purposively selected policy-makers at the national level in Argentina, Egypt, Iran, Malawi, Oman and Singapore. The interviews were structured around an interview guide developed based on existing literature and in consultation with all six country investigators. Transcripts were processed using a thematic-analysis approach. Policy-makers interviewed for this study were unequivocal in their support for health research and the high value they attribute to it. However, they stated that there were structural and informal barriers to research contributing to policy processes, to the contribution research makes to knowledge generally, and to the use of research in health decision-making specifically. Major findings regarding barriers to evidence-based policy-making included poor communication and dissemination, lack of technical capacity in policy processes, as well as the influence of the political context. Policy-makers had a variable understanding of economic analysis, equity and burden of disease measures, and were vague in terms of their use in national decisions. Policy-maker recommendations regarding strategies for facilitating the uptake of research into policy included improving the technical capacity of policy-makers, better packaging of research results, use of social networks, and establishment of fora and clearinghouse functions to help assist in evidence-based policy-making. PMID:20547652

Differences in evaluating health technology assessment knowledge translation by researchers and policy makers in China.

PubMed

Liu, Wenbin; Shi, Lizheng; Pong, Raymond W; Dong, Hengjin; Mao, Yiwei; Tang, Meng; Chen, Yingyao

2014-12-01

The aim of this study was to examine the gaps between researchers and policy makers in perceptions and influencing factors of knowledge translation (KT) of health technology assessment (HTA) in China. A sample of 382 HTA researchers and 112 policy makers in China were surveyed using structured questionnaires. The questionnaires contained two sections: perceptions of HTA research and assessments of six-stage KT activities. Wilcoxon rank sum test was applied to compare the differences in these two sections between HTA researchers and policy makers. Multivariate linear regression was performed to explore KT determinants of HTA for researchers and policy makers separately. Policy makers and researchers differed in their perceptions of HTA research in all items except collaboration in research development and presentation of evidence in easy-to-understand language. Significant differences in KT activities existed in all the six stages except academic translation. Regarding KT determinants, close contact between research unit and policy-making department, relevance of HTA to policy making, and importance of HTA on policy making were considered facilitators by both groups. For researchers, practicality of HTA report and presentation of evidence in easy-to-understand language can facilitate KT. Policy makers, on the other hand, considered an overly pedantic nature of HTA research as an obstacle to effective KT. Substantial gaps existed between HTA researchers and policy makers regarding the perceptions of HTA research and KT activities. There are also some differences in KT determinants by these two groups. Enhancing collaboration, promoting practicality and policy relevance of HTA research, and making HTA findings easily understood are likely to further the KT of HTA evidence.

Psychosocial and Health-Related Characteristics of Adolescent Television Viewers.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Page, Randy M.; And Others

1996-01-01

Examined relationship between television viewing frequency and adolescents' health-related and psychosocial characteristics. Found that shyness and exercise frequency predicted television viewing frequency. Among females, exercise frequency, shyness, loneliness, and perceived attractiveness predicted viewing frequency. Light viewers exercised more…

1. SUMMER STREET BRIDGE. DRAW SPAN MOVES TOWARD VIEWER ON ...

Library of Congress Historic Buildings Survey, Historic Engineering Record, Historic Landscapes Survey

1. SUMMER STREET BRIDGE. DRAW SPAN MOVES TOWARD VIEWER ON TRACKS VISIBLE AT CENTER OF PHOTOGRAPH. - Summer Street Retractile Bridge, Spanning Fort Point Channel at Summer Street, Boston, Suffolk County, MA

An Interactive Map Viewer for the Urban Geology of Ottawa (Canada): an Example of Web Publishing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Giroux, D.; Bélanger, R.

2003-04-01

Developed by the Terrain Sciences Division (TSD) of the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC), an interactive map viewer, called GEOSERV (www.geoserv.org), is now available on the Internet. The purpose of this viewer is to provide engineers, planners, decision makers, and the general public with the geoscience information required for sound regional planning in densely populated areas, such as Canada's national capital, Ottawa (Ontario). Urban geology studies rely on diverse branches of earth sciences such as hydrology, engineering geology, geochemistry, stratigraphy, and geomorphology in order to build a three-dimensional model of the character of the land and to explain the geological processes involved in the dynamic equilibrium of the local environment. Over the past few years, TSD has compiled geoscientific information derived from various sources such as borehole logs, geological maps, hydrological reports and digital elevation models, compiled it in digital format and stored it in georeferenced databases in the form of point, linear, and polygonal data. This information constitutes the geoscience knowledge base which is then processed by Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to integrate the various sources of information and produce derived graphics, maps and models describing the geological infrastructure and response of the geological environment to human activities. Urban Geology of Canada's National Capital Area is a pilot project aiming at developing approaches, methodologies and standards that can be applied to other major urban centres of the country, while providing the geoscience knowledge required for sound regional planning and environmental protection of the National Capital Area. Based on an application developed by ESRI (Environmental System Research Institute), namely ArcIMS, the TSD has customized this web application to give free access to geoscience information of the Ottawa/Outaouais (Ontario/Québec) area including geological history

A Psychophysiological Study of Processing HIV/AIDS Public Service Announcements: The Effects of Novelty Appeals, Sexual Appeals, Narrative Versus Statistical Evidence, and Viewer's Sex.

PubMed

Zhang, Jueman Mandy; Chen, Gina Masullo; Chock, T Makana; Wang, Yi; Ni, Liqiang; Schweisberger, Valarie

2016-07-01

This study used self-reports and physiological measures-heart rate (HR) and skin conductance level (SCL)-to examine the effects of novelty appeals, sexual appeals, narrative versus statistical evidence, and viewer's sex on cognitive and emotional processing of HIV/AIDS public service announcements (PSAs) among heterosexually active single college students. Novelty or sexual appeals differently affected self-reported attention and cognitive effort as measured by HR. High- rather than low-novelty HIV/AIDS PSAs, perceived as more attention-eliciting, did not lead to more cognitive effort. High- rather than low-sex HIV/AIDS PSAs, not perceived as more attention-eliciting, led to more cognitive effort as reflected by greater HR deceleration. Novelty or sexual appeals also affected self-reported emotional arousal and SCL differently. HIV/AIDS PSAs with high rather than low levels of novelty or sexual appeals led to greater self-reported arousal, but not greater SCL. Message evidence interacted with message appeals to affect cognitive effort. Participants exerted greater cognitive effort during high- rather than low-novelty narrative HIV/AIDS PSAs, and during low- rather than high-novelty statistical ones. The advantage of high over low sexual appeals was more obvious in statistical than in narrative HIV/AIDS PSAs. Males reported greater emotional arousal than females during high- rather than low-sex HIV/AIDS PSAs.

The Hematopoietic Expression Viewer: expanding mobile apps as a scientific tool.

PubMed

James, Regis A; Rao, Mitchell M; Chen, Edward S; Goodell, Margaret A; Shaw, Chad A

2012-07-15

Many important data in current biological science comprise hundreds, thousands or more individual results. These massive data require computational tools to navigate results and effectively interact with the content. Mobile device apps are an increasingly important tool in the everyday lives of scientists and non-scientists alike. These software present individuals with compact and efficient tools to interact with complex data at meetings or other locations remote from their main computing environment. We believe that apps will be important tools for biologists, geneticists and physicians to review content while participating in biomedical research or practicing medicine. We have developed a prototype app for displaying gene expression data using the iOS platform. To present the software engineering requirements, we review the model-view-controller schema for Apple's iOS. We apply this schema to a simple app for querying locally developed microarray gene expression data. The challenge of this application is to balance between storing content locally within the app versus obtaining it dynamically via a network connection. The Hematopoietic Expression Viewer is available at http://www.shawlab.org/he_viewer. The source code for this project and any future information on how to obtain the app can be accessed at http://www.shawlab.org/he_viewer.

Perceptions of television violence: effects of programme genre and type of violence on viewers' judgements of violent portrayals.

PubMed

Gunter, B; Furnham, A

1984-06-01

This paper reports two studies which examined the mediating effects of programme genre and physical form of violence on viewers' perceptions of violent TV portrayals. In Expt 1, a panel of British viewers saw portrayals from five programme genres: British crime-drama series, US crime-drama series, westerns, science-fiction series and cartoons which feature either fights or shootings. In Expt. 2, the same viewers rated portrayals from British crime-drama and westerns which featured four types of violence, fist-fights, shootings, stabbings and explosions. All scenes were rated along eight unipolar scales. Panel members also completed four subscales of a personal hostility inventory. Results showed that both fictional setting and physical form had significant effects on viewers' perceptions of televised violence. British crime-drama portrayals, and portrayals that featured shootings and stabbings, were rated as most violent and disturbing. Also, there were strong differences between viewers with different self-reported propensities towards either verbal or physical aggression. More physically aggressive individuals tended to perceive physical unarmed violence as less violent than did more verbally aggressive types.

Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV) | Informatics Technology for Cancer Research (ITCR)

Cancer.gov

The Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV) is a high-performance visualization tool for interactive exploration of large, integrated genomic datasets. It supports a wide variety of data types, including array-based and next-generation sequence data, and genomic annotations.

Real-time 3-D X-ray and gamma-ray viewer

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yin, L. I. (Inventor)

1983-01-01

A multi-pinhole aperture lead screen forms an equal plurality of invisible mini-images having dissimilar perspectives of an X-ray and gamma-ray emitting object (ABC) onto a near-earth phosphor layer. This layer provides visible light mini-images directly into a visible light image intensifier. A viewing screen having an equal number of dissimilar perspective apertures distributed across its face in a geometric pattern identical to the lead screen, provides a viewer with a real, pseudoscopic image (A'B'C') of the object with full horizontal and vertical parallax. Alternatively, a third screen identical to viewing screen and spaced apart from a second visible light image intensifier, may be positioned between the first image intensifier and the viewing screen, thereby providing the viewer with a virtual, orthoscopic image (A"B"C") of the object (ABC) with full horizontal and vertical parallax.

The Unidata Integrated Data Viewer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Weber, W. J.; Ho, Y.

2016-12-01

The Unidata Integrated Data Viewer (IDV) is a free and open source, virtual globe, software application that enables three dimensional viewing of earth science data. The Unidata IDV is data agnostic and can display and analyze disparate data in a single view. This capability facilitates cross discipline research and allows for multiple observation platforms to be displayed simultaneously for any given event. The Unidata IDV is a mature application, written in JAVA, and has been serving the earth science community for over 15 years. This demonstration will focus on near real time global satelliteobservations, the integration of the COSMIC radio occultation data set that profiles the atmosphere, and high resolution numerical weather prediction.

Characteristics of Loyal and Non-Loyal Television Newscast Viewers.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Stamm, Keith R.

A study was conducted to determine whether the phenomenon known as "parasocial interaction" (PSI)--the perception of a face-to-face relationship between spectator and media performer--precedes the formation of loyalty to a particular television newscast, or whether viewers see newscasts as a way of reaffirming their ties with the…

Effects of Prosocial Television Programming on Viewer Self-Perceptions.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Smith, Kyle D.

Moderate amounts of self-disclosure and willingness to let others disclose are considered essential in moving from casual to lasting relationships. Self-disclosure, however, is a private behavior which is seldom observed directly. Television provides a unique opportunity for the observation of otherwise personal behaviors, and may affect viewers'…

Pizza makers' contact dermatitis.

PubMed

Lembo, Serena; Lembo, Claudio; Patruno, Cataldo; Balato, Anna; Balato, Nicola; Ayala, Fabio

2014-01-01

Contact eczema to foods, spices, and food additives can occur in occupational and nonoccupational settings in those who grow, handle, prepare, or cook food. Pizza is one of the most eaten foods in every continent, and pizza making is a common work in many countries. We aimed to evaluate the occurrence and the causes of contact dermatitis in pizza makers in Naples. We performed an observational study in 45 pizza makers: all the enrolled subjects had to answer a questionnaire designed to detect personal history of respiratory or cutaneous allergy, atopy; work characteristics and timing were also investigated. Every subject attended the dermatology clinic for a complete skin examination, and when needed, patients were patch tested using the Italian baseline series of haptens integrated with an arbitrary pizza makers series. Our results reported that 13.3% of the enrolled pizza makers (6/45) presented hand eczema, and that 8.9% (4/45) were affected by occupational allergic contact dermatitis. Diallyl disulfide and ammonium persulfate were the responsible substances. Performing patch tests in pizza makers and food handlers affected by hand contact dermatitis is useful. We propose a specific series of haptens for this wide working category.

What is the role of the film viewer? The effects of narrative comprehension and viewing task on gaze control in film.

PubMed

Hutson, John P; Smith, Tim J; Magliano, Joseph P; Loschky, Lester C

2017-01-01

Film is ubiquitous, but the processes that guide viewers' attention while viewing film narratives are poorly understood. In fact, many film theorists and practitioners disagree on whether the film stimulus (bottom-up) or the viewer (top-down) is more important in determining how we watch movies. Reading research has shown a strong connection between eye movements and comprehension, and scene perception studies have shown strong effects of viewing tasks on eye movements, but such idiosyncratic top-down control of gaze in film would be anathema to the universal control mainstream filmmakers typically aim for. Thus, in two experiments we tested whether the eye movements and comprehension relationship similarly held in a classic film example, the famous opening scene of Orson Welles' Touch of Evil (Welles & Zugsmith, Touch of Evil, 1958). Comprehension differences were compared with more volitionally controlled task-based effects on eye movements. To investigate the effects of comprehension on eye movements during film viewing, we manipulated viewers' comprehension by starting participants at different points in a film, and then tracked their eyes. Overall, the manipulation created large differences in comprehension, but only produced modest differences in eye movements. To amplify top-down effects on eye movements, a task manipulation was designed to prioritize peripheral scene features: a map task. This task manipulation created large differences in eye movements when compared to participants freely viewing the clip for comprehension. Thus, to allow for strong, volitional top-down control of eye movements in film, task manipulations need to make features that are important to narrative comprehension irrelevant to the viewing task. The evidence provided by this experimental case study suggests that filmmakers' belief in their ability to create systematic gaze behavior across viewers is confirmed, but that this does not indicate universally similar comprehension of the

What do decision makers learn from public forums on climate-related hazards and resilience?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Weller, N.; Farooque, M.; Sittenfeld, D.

2017-12-01

Public engagement around climate resilience efforts can foster learning for both public audiences and decision makers. On the one hand, public audiences learn about environmental hazards and strategies to increase community resilience through effective public engagement. On the other, decision makers and scientists learn about community members' values and priorities and their relation to environmental hazards and resilience strategies. Evidence from other public engagement efforts involving decision makers suggests that decision maker involvement results in reflection by officials on their own values, capacities, and roles. However, few public engagement exercises evaluate impacts on decision makers. As part of the Science Center Public Forums project, which aims to conduct public forums in eight cities across the country on resiliency to drought, heat, extreme precipitation, and sea level rise, we sought to 1) build partnerships with local decision makers and scientists around public forums and 2) explore how decision makers and scientists interacted with the planning and undertaking of those public forums. We held workshops with decision makers and scientists to inform forum content and identify local resilience issues. We will conduct interviews with local decision makers regarding their involvement in forum planning, their reflections and takeaways from the forum itself, and their perspectives on the value of public engagement for policy making. We will present our model of engagement with decision makers, initial findings from interviews, and lessons learned from connecting decision makers and scientists to public engagement efforts.

A Meeting Place for Policy-Makers and Researchers: The Transatlantic Forum on Inclusive Early Years

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Peeters, Jan; Vandekerckhove, Ankie

2015-01-01

While policy-makers and researchers in the field of early childhood education and care (ECEC) often seem to speak different languages, overwhelming research evidence on how quality ECEC can play a key role in alleviating the effects of disadvantage can be extremely relevant for policy-makers. In this article, we focus on how philanthropic…

JAtlasView: a Java atlas-viewer for browsing biomedical 3D images and atlases.

PubMed

Feng, Guangjie; Burton, Nick; Hill, Bill; Davidson, Duncan; Kerwin, Janet; Scott, Mark; Lindsay, Susan; Baldock, Richard

2005-03-09

Many three-dimensional (3D) images are routinely collected in biomedical research and a number of digital atlases with associated anatomical and other information have been published. A number of tools are available for viewing this data ranging from commercial visualization packages to freely available, typically system architecture dependent, solutions. Here we discuss an atlas viewer implemented to run on any workstation using the architecture neutral Java programming language. We report the development of a freely available Java based viewer for 3D image data, descibe the structure and functionality of the viewer and how automated tools can be developed to manage the Java Native Interface code. The viewer allows arbitrary re-sectioning of the data and interactive browsing through the volume. With appropriately formatted data, for example as provided for the Electronic Atlas of the Developing Human Brain, a 3D surface view and anatomical browsing is available. The interface is developed in Java with Java3D providing the 3D rendering. For efficiency the image data is manipulated using the Woolz image-processing library provided as a dynamically linked module for each machine architecture. We conclude that Java provides an appropriate environment for efficient development of these tools and techniques exist to allow computationally efficient image-processing libraries to be integrated relatively easily.

Embedded Alcohol Messages in Television Series: The Interactive Effect of Warnings and Audience Connectedness on Viewers' Alcohol Beliefs*

PubMed Central

RUSSELL, DALE W.; RUSSELL, CRISTEL ANTONIA

2014-01-01

Objective This research investigates whether warning viewers about the presence of embedded messages in the content of a television episode affects viewers' drinking beliefs and whether audi ence connectedness moderates the warning's impact. Method Two hun dred fifty college students participated in a laboratory experiment approximating a real-life television viewing experience. They viewed an actual television series episode containing embedded alcohol messages, and their subsequent beliefs about alcohol consequences were measured. Experimental conditions differed based on a 2 (Connectedness Level: low vs high) × 2 (Timing of the Warning: before or after the episode) × 2 (Emphasis of Warning: advertising vs health message) design. Connectedness was measured, and the timing and emphasis of the warnings were manipulated. The design also included a control condition where there was no warning. Results The findings indicate that warning view ers about embedded messages in the content of a program can yield sig nificant differences in viewers' beliefs about alcohol. However, the warning's impact differs depending on the viewers' level of connectedness to the program. In particular, in comparison with the no-warning control condition, the advertising prewarning produced lower positive beliefs about alcohol and its consequences but only for the low-connected viewers. Highly connected viewers were not affected by a warning emphasizing advertising messages embedded in the program, but a warning emphasizing health produced significantly higher negative be liefs about drinking than in the control condition. Conclusions The presence of many positive portrayals of drinking and alcohol product placements in television series has led many to suggest ways to counter their influence. However, advocates of warnings should be conscious of their differential impact on high- and low-connected viewers. PMID:18432390

Effects of cautionary messages and vulnerability factors on viewers' perceptions of alcohol advertisements.

PubMed

Proctor, Dwayne C; Babor, Thomas F; Xuan, Ziming

2005-09-01

This study examined how individual difference vulnerability factors affect college students' perceptions of beer commercial actors' age, attractiveness and drinking. We were also interested in whether viewers' exposure to a cautionary message would affect their perceptions of the actors' drinking behavior. Three groups of college students were exposed to the same set of two alcohol advertisements. After watching the ads, each group received a different cautionary message prior to answering questions about the ad's content: (1) a neutral message (viewed by 42% [n = 119] of the sample), (2) a U.S. federal warning (viewed by 31% [n = 89]) and (3) an industry message (viewed by 27% [n = 76]). We also examined three putative vulnerability factors: age (underage 21 or not), gender and family history of alcohol problems (yes or no) as well as the effects of quantity-frequency of alcohol consumption, episodic heavy drinking, severity of alcohol dependence, disinhibition sensation seeking and the eight factors of the Alcohol Expectancy Scale. The cautionary messages had no effect on viewers' perceptions of characters' age, attractiveness and drinking behavior. Although neither of the commercials depicted the physical act of drinking, the student raters nevertheless perceived the characters to be heavy episodic drinkers. Those reporting more alcohol dependence symptoms perceived increased drinking for the male characters, as did females and viewers with expectancies for social and physical pleasure. Perceptions of the drinking in beer commercials are based in part on the character depicted in the ad and in part on the demographic and personal vulnerability factors of the viewer.

When health services researchers and policy makers interact: tales from the tectonic plates.

PubMed

Martens, Patricia J; Roos, Noralou P

2005-09-01

There has been a strong push over the last decade for health services researchers to become "relevant," to work with policy makers to translate evidence into action. What has been learned from this interaction? The pooled experiences of health services researchers across the country, including those at the Manitoba Centre for Health Policy (MCHP), suggest five key lessons. First, policy makers pay more attention to research findings if they have invested their own funds and time. Second, researchers must make major investments in building relationships with policy makers, because there are inevitable tensions between what the two parties need and do. Third, researchers must be able to figure out and communicate the real meaning of their results. Fourth, health services researchers need a "back-pocket" mindset, as they cannot count on immediate uptake of results; because the issues never go away, evidence, if known and easily retrievable, is likely to have an eventual impact. Finally, getting evidence into the policy process does not come cheaply or easily, but it can be done. The overriding lesson learned by health services researchers is the importance of relationship-building, whether in formalizing contractual relationships, building and maintaining personal trust, having a communications strategy or increasing the involvement of users in the research process.

Mobile viewer system for virtual 3D space using infrared LED point markers and camera

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sakamoto, Kunio; Taneji, Shoto

2006-09-01

The authors have developed a 3D workspace system using collaborative imaging devices. A stereoscopic display enables this system to project 3D information. In this paper, we describe the position detecting system for a see-through 3D viewer. A 3D display system is useful technology for virtual reality, mixed reality and augmented reality. We have researched spatial imaging and interaction system. We have ever proposed 3D displays using the slit as a parallax barrier, the lenticular screen and the holographic optical elements(HOEs) for displaying active image 1)2)3)4). The purpose of this paper is to propose the interactive system using these 3D imaging technologies. The observer can view virtual images in the real world when the user watches the screen of a see-through 3D viewer. The goal of our research is to build the display system as follows; when users see the real world through the mobile viewer, the display system gives users virtual 3D images, which is floating in the air, and the observers can touch these floating images and interact them such that kids can make play clay. The key technologies of this system are the position recognition system and the spatial imaging display. The 3D images are presented by the improved parallax barrier 3D display. Here the authors discuss the measuring method of the mobile viewer using infrared LED point markers and a camera in the 3D workspace (augmented reality world). The authors show the geometric analysis of the proposed measuring method, which is the simplest method using a single camera not the stereo camera, and the results of our viewer system.

Engaging policy makers in road safety research in Malaysia: a theoretical and contextual analysis.

PubMed

Tran, Nhan T; Hyder, Adnan A; Kulanthayan, Subramaniam; Singh, Suret; Umar, R S Radin

2009-04-01

Road traffic injuries (RTIs) are a growing public health problem that must be addressed through evidence-based interventions including policy-level changes such as the enactment of legislation to mandate specific behaviors and practices. Policy makers need to be engaged in road safety research to ensure that road safety policies are grounded in scientific evidence. This paper examines the strategies used to engage policy makers and other stakeholder groups and discusses the challenges that result from a multi-disciplinary, inter-sectoral collaboration. A framework for engaging policy makers in research was developed and applied to describe an example of collective road safety research in Malaysia. Key components of this framework include readiness, assessment, planning, implementation/evaluation, and policy development/sustainability. The case study of a collaborative intervention trial for the prevention of motorcycle crashes and deaths in Malaysia serves as a model for policy engagement by road safety and injury researchers. The analytic description of this research process in Malaysia demonstrates that the framework, through its five stages, can be used as a tool to guide the integration of needed research evidence into policy for road safety and injury prevention.

Communicating Scientific Findings to Lawyers, Policy-Makers, and the Public (Invited)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Thompson, W.; Velsko, S. P.

2013-12-01

This presentation will summarize the authors' collaborative research on inferential errors, bias and communication difficulties that have arisen in the area of WMD forensics. This research involves analysis of problems that have arisen in past national security investigations, interviews with scientists from various disciplines whose work has been used in WMD investigations, interviews with policy-makers, and psychological studies of lay understanding of forensic evidence. Implications of this research for scientists involved in nuclear explosion monitoring will be discussed. Among the issues covered will be: - Potential incompatibilities between the questions policy makers pose and the answers that experts can provide. - Common misunderstandings of scientific and statistical data. - Advantages and disadvantages of various methods for describing and characterizing the strength of scientific findings. - Problems that can arise from excessive hedging or, alternatively, insufficient qualification of scientific conclusions. - Problems that can arise from melding scientific and non-scientific evidence in forensic assessments.

It's All in the Lens: Differences in Views on Obesity Prevention between Advocates and Policy Makers

PubMed Central

Jones, Ellen; Nguyen, Leah; Kong, Jooyoung; Brownson, Ross C.; Bailey, Jessica H.

2012-01-01

Abstract Background: Intervention strategies to reduce obesity include policy and environmental changes that are designed to provide opportunities, support, and cues to help people develop healthier behaviors. Policy changes at the state level are one way to influence access, social norms, and opportunities for better nutrition and increased physical activity among the population. Methods: Ten states were selected for a broad variance in obesity rates and number of enacted obesity prevention policies during the years of 2006–2009. Within the selected states, a purely qualitative study of attitudes of childhood obesity policy using semistructured telephone interviews was conducted. Interviews were conducted with state policy makers who serve on public health committees. A set of six states that had more than eight childhood obesity policies enacted were selected for subsequent qualitative interviews with a convenience sample of well-established advocates. Results: Policy makers in states where there was more childhood obesity policy action believed in the evidence behind obesity policy proposals. Policy makers also varied in the perception of obesity as a constituent priority. The major differences between advocates and policy makers included a disconnect in information dissemination, opposition, and effectiveness of these policies. Conclusions: The findings from this study show differences in perceptions among policy makers in states with a greater number of obesity prevention bills enacted. There are differences among policy makers and advocates regarding the role and effectiveness of state policy on obesity prevention. This presents an opportunity for researchers and practitioners to improve communication and translation of evidence to policy makers, particularly in states with low legislation. PMID:22799551

Viewer Perspective Affects Central Bottleneck Requirements in Spatial Translation Tasks

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Franz, Elizabeth A.; Sebastian, Alexandra; Hust, Christina; Norris, Tom

2008-01-01

A psychological refractory period (PRP) approach and the locus of slack logic were applied to examine the novel question of whether spatial translation processes can begin before the central bottleneck when effector or noneffector stimuli are processed from an egocentric (viewer-centered) perspective. In single tasks, trials requiring spatial…

WebChem Viewer: a tool for the easy dissemination of chemical and structural data sets

PubMed Central

2014-01-01

Background Sharing sets of chemical data (e.g., chemical properties, docking scores, etc.) among collaborators with diverse skill sets is a common task in computer-aided drug design and medicinal chemistry. The ability to associate this data with images of the relevant molecular structures greatly facilitates scientific communication. There is a need for a simple, free, open-source program that can automatically export aggregated reports of entire chemical data sets to files viewable on any computer, regardless of the operating system and without requiring the installation of additional software. Results We here present a program called WebChem Viewer that automatically generates these types of highly portable reports. Furthermore, in designing WebChem Viewer we have also created a useful online web application for remotely generating molecular structures from SMILES strings. We encourage the direct use of this online application as well as its incorporation into other software packages. Conclusions With these features, WebChem Viewer enables interdisciplinary collaborations that require the sharing and visualization of small molecule structures and associated sets of heterogeneous chemical data. The program is released under the FreeBSD license and can be downloaded from http://nbcr.ucsd.edu/WebChemViewer. The associated web application (called “Smiley2png 1.0”) can be accessed through freely available web services provided by the National Biomedical Computation Resource at http://nbcr.ucsd.edu. PMID:24886360

PACS viewer interoperability for teleconsultation based on DICOM

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Salant, Eliot; Shani, Uri

2000-05-01

Real-time teleconsultation in radiology enables physicians to perform same-time consultation between remote peers, based on medical images. Since digital medical images are commonly viewed on PACS workstations, it is possible to use one of several methods for remote sharing of the computer screen. For instance, software products such as Microsoft NetMeeting, or IBM SameTime, can be used. However, the amount of image data transmitted can be very high, since even minute changes in an image window/level requires re-transmitting the entire image again and again. This is too inefficient. Looking for better methods, when restricting the problem to the use of same hardware and software of the same vendor, it is easier to develop a solution that employs a proprietary specialized protocol to coordinate the visualization process. Such is a solution that we developed, and which demonstrated an excellent performance advantage by transmitting only the graphical events between the machines, rather than the image pixels. Our solution did not inter-operate with other viewers. It worked only on X11/Motif systems, and only between compatible versions of the same viewer application. Our purpose in this paper is to enable inter-operability between viewers of different platforms, and different vendors. We distinguish three parts: Session control, audiovisual (multimedia) data exchange, and medical image sharing. We intend to deal only with the third component, assuming the use of existing standards for the first two parts. After a session between two or more parties is established, and optional audiovisual data channels are set, the medical consultation is considered as the coordinated exchange of medical image contents. Some requirements for the contents exchange protocol: In the first stage, the parties negotiate the actual set of capabilities to be used during the consultation, using a formal description of these capabilities. The capabilities that one station lacks over the other

Incidental Social Learning Among Black and White Viewers in Relation to Authoritarian Characterizations in Prime-Time Entertainment Programming.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Leckenby, John D.; Surlin, Stuart H.

The nature of incidental social learning in television viewers of "All in the Family" and "Sanford and Son" was the focus of this investigation. Seven hundred and eight-one racially and economically mixed respondents from Chicago and Atlanta provided the data source. Telephone interviews attempted to assess viewer opinions of…

TableViewer for Herschel Data Processing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhang, L.; Schulz, B.

2006-07-01

The TableViewer utility is a GUI tool written in Java to support interactive data processing and analysis for the Herschel Space Observatory (Pilbratt et al. 2001). The idea was inherited from a prototype written in IDL (Schulz et al. 2005). It allows to graphically view and analyze tabular data organized in columns with equal numbers of rows. It can be run either as a standalone application, where data access is restricted to FITS (FITS 1999) files only, or it can be run from the Quick Look Analysis(QLA) or Interactive Analysis(IA) command line, from where also objects are accessible. The graphic display is very versatile, allowing plots in either linear or log scales. Zooming, panning, and changing data columns is performed rapidly using a group of navigation buttons. Selecting and de-selecting of fields of data points controls the input to simple analysis tasks like building a statistics table, or generating power spectra. The binary data stored in a TableDataset^1, a Product or in FITS files can also be displayed as tabular data, where values in individual cells can be modified. TableViewer provides several processing utilities which, besides calculation of statistics either for all channels or for selected channels, and calculation of power spectra, allows to convert/repair datasets by changing the unit name of data columns, and by modifying data values in columns with a simple calculator tool. Interactively selected data can be separated out, and modified data sets can be saved to FITS files. The tool will be very helpful especially in the early phases of Herschel data analysis when a quick access to contents of data products is important. TableDataset and Product are Java classes defined in herschel.ia.dataset.

The Policy Agora: How Power Inequalities Affect the Interaction between Researchers and Policy Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brown, Chris

2014-01-01

This paper examines notions of power in relation to evidence-informed policy making and explores four key areas. First, I outline contemporary conceptualisations of how power operates in society; second, I spotlight the implications of power inequalities for how evidence is used by policy makers (and present the policy "agora"; a…

BrainNet Viewer: a network visualization tool for human brain connectomics.

PubMed

Xia, Mingrui; Wang, Jinhui; He, Yong

2013-01-01

The human brain is a complex system whose topological organization can be represented using connectomics. Recent studies have shown that human connectomes can be constructed using various neuroimaging technologies and further characterized using sophisticated analytic strategies, such as graph theory. These methods reveal the intriguing topological architectures of human brain networks in healthy populations and explore the changes throughout normal development and aging and under various pathological conditions. However, given the huge complexity of this methodology, toolboxes for graph-based network visualization are still lacking. Here, using MATLAB with a graphical user interface (GUI), we developed a graph-theoretical network visualization toolbox, called BrainNet Viewer, to illustrate human connectomes as ball-and-stick models. Within this toolbox, several combinations of defined files with connectome information can be loaded to display different combinations of brain surface, nodes and edges. In addition, display properties, such as the color and size of network elements or the layout of the figure, can be adjusted within a comprehensive but easy-to-use settings panel. Moreover, BrainNet Viewer draws the brain surface, nodes and edges in sequence and displays brain networks in multiple views, as required by the user. The figure can be manipulated with certain interaction functions to display more detailed information. Furthermore, the figures can be exported as commonly used image file formats or demonstration video for further use. BrainNet Viewer helps researchers to visualize brain networks in an easy, flexible and quick manner, and this software is freely available on the NITRC website (www.nitrc.org/projects/bnv/).

Emotional impact of a video-based suicide prevention program on suicidal viewers and suicide survivors.

PubMed

Bryan, Craig J; Dhillon-Davis, Luther E; Dhillon-Davis, Kieran K

2009-12-01

In light of continuing concerns about iatrogenic effects associated with suicide prevention efforts utilizing video-based media, the impact of emotionally-charged videos on two vulnerable subgroups--suicidal viewers and suicide survivors--was explored. Following participation in routine suicide education as a part of the U.S. Air Force Suicide Prevention Program's video-based community briefing, a sample of young active duty airmen demonstrated small decreases in positive emotional states and larger decreases in negative emotional states, especially among suicidal females. No evidence of iatrogenic effects were observed among suicidal or survivor subgroups when compared to controls. Results support the use of video-based media as a safe educational strategy that might actually serve to decrease emotional distress among vulnerable subgroups.

HTML5 PivotViewer: high-throughput visualization and querying of image data on the web.

PubMed

Taylor, Stephen; Noble, Roger

2014-09-15

Visualization and analysis of large numbers of biological images has generated a bottle neck in research. We present HTML5 PivotViewer, a novel, open source, platform-independent viewer making use of the latest web technologies that allows seamless access to images and associated metadata for each image. This provides a powerful method to allow end users to mine their data. Documentation, examples and links to the software are available from http://www.cbrg.ox.ac.uk/data/pivotviewer/. The software is licensed under GPLv2. © The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press.

Manananggal - a novel viewer for alternative splicing events.

PubMed

Barann, Matthias; Zimmer, Ralf; Birzele, Fabian

2017-02-21

Alternative splicing is an important cellular mechanism that can be analyzed by RNA sequencing. However, identification of splicing events in an automated fashion is error-prone. Thus, further validation is required to select reliable instances of alternative splicing events (ASEs). There are only few tools specifically designed for interactive inspection of ASEs and available visualization approaches can be significantly improved. Here, we present Manananggal, an application specifically designed for the identification of splicing events in next generation sequencing data. Manananggal includes a web application for visual inspection and a command line tool that allows for ASE detection. We compare the sashimi plots available in the IGV Viewer, the DEXSeq splicing plots and SpliceSeq to the Manananggal interface and discuss the advantages and drawbacks of these tools. We show that sashimi plots (such as those used by the IGV Viewer and SpliceSeq) offer a practical solution for simple ASEs, but also indicate short-comings for highly complex genes. Manananggal is an interactive web application that offers functions specifically tailored to the identification of alternative splicing events that other tools are lacking. The ability to select a subset of isoforms allows an easier interpretation of complex alternative splicing events. In contrast to SpliceSeq and the DEXSeq splicing plot, Manananggal does not obscure the gene structure by showing full transcript models that makes it easier to determine which isoforms are expressed and which are not.

Integrating all medical records to an enterprise viewer.

PubMed

Li, Haomin; Duan, Huilong; Lu, Xudong; Zhao, Chenhui; An, Jiye

2005-01-01

The idea behind hospital information systems is to make all of a patient's medical reports, lab results, and images electronically available to clinicians, instantaneously, wherever they are. But the higgledy-piggledy evolution of most hospital computer systems makes it hard to integrate all these clinical records. Although several integration standards had been proposed to meet this challenger, none of them is fit to Chinese hospitals. In this paper, we introduce our work of implementing a three-tiered architecture enterprise viewer in Huzhou Central Hospital to integration all existing medical information systems using limited resource.

10 CFR 429.45 - Automatic commercial ice makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... 10 Energy 3 2012-01-01 2012-01-01 false Automatic commercial ice makers. 429.45 Section 429.45... PRODUCTS AND COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT Certification § 429.45 Automatic commercial ice makers. (a... automatic commercial ice makers; and (2) For each basic model of automatic commercial ice maker selected for...

10 CFR 429.45 - Automatic commercial ice makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... 10 Energy 3 2014-01-01 2014-01-01 false Automatic commercial ice makers. 429.45 Section 429.45... PRODUCTS AND COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT Certification § 429.45 Automatic commercial ice makers. (a... automatic commercial ice makers; and (2) For each basic model of automatic commercial ice maker selected for...

10 CFR 429.45 - Automatic commercial ice makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... 10 Energy 3 2013-01-01 2013-01-01 false Automatic commercial ice makers. 429.45 Section 429.45... PRODUCTS AND COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT Certification § 429.45 Automatic commercial ice makers. (a... automatic commercial ice makers; and (2) For each basic model of automatic commercial ice maker selected for...

Original Language Subtitles: Their Effects on the Native and Foreign Viewer

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kruger, Jan-Louis; Doherty, Stephen; Soto-Sanfiel, María-T.

2017-01-01

This study investigates the impact of same-language subtitles on the immersion into audiovisual narratives as a function of the viewer's language (native or foreigner). Students from two universities in Australia and one in Spain were assigned randomly to one of two experimental groups, in which they saw a drama with the original English…

"If it bleeds it leads"? Attributes of TV health news stories that drive viewer attention.

PubMed Central

Cooper, C P; Roter, D L

2000-01-01

OBJECTIVE: Health advocates increasing y use the news media to educate the public. However, little is known about what motivates individuals to pay attention to health news. This study investigated which characteristics of TV health news stories attract viewer interest. METHODS: The authors surveyed airport patrons, the audience of a public health symposium, and municipal jurors, asking which attributes of TV heath news stories encouraged interest and which attributes discouraged interest. The authors ranked mean responses and compared them using Spearman rank correlations, RESULTS: The rankings assigned by the three samples were highly correlated. Respondents reported being most attracted to health stories about personally relevant topics. Interestingly, they also reported that sensational story elements such as "showing a bloody or injured person" and "being action packed" did not substantially influence their attention. CONCLUSIONS: This study suggests that viewers, regardless of their level of health knowledge, value the same attributes in TV health news stories. Emphasizing the personal relevance of health topics appears to be a viable strategy to capture viewer interest. Conversely, the tendency of broadcast news to sensationalize stories may be distracting in the case of health news. PMID:11059426

Three-dimensional reconstruction from serial sections in PC-Windows platform by using 3D_Viewer.

PubMed

Xu, Yi-Hua; Lahvis, Garet; Edwards, Harlene; Pitot, Henry C

2004-11-01

Three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction from serial sections allows identification of objects of interest in 3D and clarifies the relationship among these objects. 3D_Viewer, developed in our laboratory for this purpose, has four major functions: image alignment, movie frame production, movie viewing, and shift-overlay image generation. Color images captured from serial sections were aligned; then the contours of objects of interest were highlighted in a semi-automatic manner. These 2D images were then automatically stacked at different viewing angles, and their composite images on a projected plane were recorded by an image transform-shift-overlay technique. These composition images are used in the object-rotation movie show. The design considerations of the program and the procedures used for 3D reconstruction from serial sections are described. This program, with a digital image-capture system, a semi-automatic contours highlight method, and an automatic image transform-shift-overlay technique, greatly speeds up the reconstruction process. Since images generated by 3D_Viewer are in a general graphic format, data sharing with others is easy. 3D_Viewer is written in MS Visual Basic 6, obtainable from our laboratory on request.

"Harder and Harder"? Is Mainstream Pornography Becoming Increasingly Violent and Do Viewers Prefer Violent Content?

PubMed

Shor, Eran; Seida, Kimberly

2018-04-18

It is a common notion among many scholars and pundits that the pornography industry becomes "harder and harder" with every passing year. Some have suggested that porn viewers, who are mostly men, become desensitized to "soft" pornography, and producers are happy to generate videos that are more hard core, resulting in a growing demand for and supply of violent and degrading acts against women in mainstream pornographic videos. We examined this accepted wisdom by utilizing a sample of 269 popular videos uploaded to PornHub over the past decade. More specifically, we tested two related claims: (1) aggressive content in videos is on the rise and (2) viewers prefer such content, reflected in both the number of views and the rankings for videos containing aggression. Our results offer no support for these contentions. First, we did not find any consistent uptick in aggressive content over the past decade; in fact, the average video today contains shorter segments showing aggression. Second, videos containing aggressive acts are both less likely to receive views and less likely to be ranked favorably by viewers, who prefer videos where women clearly perform pleasure.

"If it bleeds it leads"? Attributes of TV health news stories that drive viewer attention.

PubMed

Cooper, C P; Roter, D L

2000-01-01

Health advocates increasing y use the news media to educate the public. However, little is known about what motivates individuals to pay attention to health news. This study investigated which characteristics of TV health news stories attract viewer interest. The authors surveyed airport patrons, the audience of a public health symposium, and municipal jurors, asking which attributes of TV heath news stories encouraged interest and which attributes discouraged interest. The authors ranked mean responses and compared them using Spearman rank correlations, The rankings assigned by the three samples were highly correlated. Respondents reported being most attracted to health stories about personally relevant topics. Interestingly, they also reported that sensational story elements such as "showing a bloody or injured person" and "being action packed" did not substantially influence their attention. This study suggests that viewers, regardless of their level of health knowledge, value the same attributes in TV health news stories. Emphasizing the personal relevance of health topics appears to be a viable strategy to capture viewer interest. Conversely, the tendency of broadcast news to sensationalize stories may be distracting in the case of health news.

Watching More Closely: Shot Scale Affects Film Viewers' Theory of Mind Tendency But Not Ability.

PubMed

Rooney, Brendan; Bálint, Katalin E

2017-01-01

Recent research debates the effects of exposure to narrative fiction on recognition of mental states in others and self, referred to as Theory of Mind. The current study explores the mechanisms by which such effects could occur in fictional film. Using manipulated film scenes, we conducted a between subject experiment ( N = 136) exploring how film shot-scale affects viewers' Theory of Mind. Specifically, in our methods we distinguish between the trait Theory of Mind abilities (ToM ability), and the state-like tendency to recognize mental states in others and self (ToM tendency). Results showed that close-up shots (compared to long shots) of a character was associated with higher levels of Theory of Mind tendency, when the facial expression was sad but not when it was neutral. And this effect did not transfer to other characters in the film. There was also no observable effect of character depiction on viewers' general Theory of Mind ability. Together the findings suggest that formal and content features of shot scale can elicit Theory of Mind responses by directing attention toward character mental states rather than improving viewers' general Theory of Mind ability.

Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV): high-performance genomics data visualization and exploration

PubMed Central

Thorvaldsdóttir, Helga; Mesirov, Jill P.

2013-01-01

Data visualization is an essential component of genomic data analysis. However, the size and diversity of the data sets produced by today’s sequencing and array-based profiling methods present major challenges to visualization tools. The Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV) is a high-performance viewer that efficiently handles large heterogeneous data sets, while providing a smooth and intuitive user experience at all levels of genome resolution. A key characteristic of IGV is its focus on the integrative nature of genomic studies, with support for both array-based and next-generation sequencing data, and the integration of clinical and phenotypic data. Although IGV is often used to view genomic data from public sources, its primary emphasis is to support researchers who wish to visualize and explore their own data sets or those from colleagues. To that end, IGV supports flexible loading of local and remote data sets, and is optimized to provide high-performance data visualization and exploration on standard desktop systems. IGV is freely available for download from http://www.broadinstitute.org/igv, under a GNU LGPL open-source license. PMID:22517427

Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV): high-performance genomics data visualization and exploration.

PubMed

Thorvaldsdóttir, Helga; Robinson, James T; Mesirov, Jill P

2013-03-01

Data visualization is an essential component of genomic data analysis. However, the size and diversity of the data sets produced by today's sequencing and array-based profiling methods present major challenges to visualization tools. The Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV) is a high-performance viewer that efficiently handles large heterogeneous data sets, while providing a smooth and intuitive user experience at all levels of genome resolution. A key characteristic of IGV is its focus on the integrative nature of genomic studies, with support for both array-based and next-generation sequencing data, and the integration of clinical and phenotypic data. Although IGV is often used to view genomic data from public sources, its primary emphasis is to support researchers who wish to visualize and explore their own data sets or those from colleagues. To that end, IGV supports flexible loading of local and remote data sets, and is optimized to provide high-performance data visualization and exploration on standard desktop systems. IGV is freely available for download from http://www.broadinstitute.org/igv, under a GNU LGPL open-source license.

Street Viewer: An Autonomous Vision Based Traffic Tracking System.

PubMed

Bottino, Andrea; Garbo, Alessandro; Loiacono, Carmelo; Quer, Stefano

2016-06-03

The development of intelligent transportation systems requires the availability of both accurate traffic information in real time and a cost-effective solution. In this paper, we describe Street Viewer, a system capable of analyzing the traffic behavior in different scenarios from images taken with an off-the-shelf optical camera. Street Viewer operates in real time on embedded hardware architectures with limited computational resources. The system features a pipelined architecture that, on one side, allows one to exploit multi-threading intensively and, on the other side, allows one to improve the overall accuracy and robustness of the system, since each layer is aimed at refining for the following layers the information it receives as input. Another relevant feature of our approach is that it is self-adaptive. During an initial setup, the application runs in learning mode to build a model of the flow patterns in the observed area. Once the model is stable, the system switches to the on-line mode where the flow model is used to count vehicles traveling on each lane and to produce a traffic information summary. If changes in the flow model are detected, the system switches back autonomously to the learning mode. The accuracy and the robustness of the system are analyzed in the paper through experimental results obtained on several different scenarios and running the system for long periods of time.

HTML5 PivotViewer: high-throughput visualization and querying of image data on the web

PubMed Central

Taylor, Stephen; Noble, Roger

2014-01-01

Motivation: Visualization and analysis of large numbers of biological images has generated a bottle neck in research. We present HTML5 PivotViewer, a novel, open source, platform-independent viewer making use of the latest web technologies that allows seamless access to images and associated metadata for each image. This provides a powerful method to allow end users to mine their data. Availability and implementation: Documentation, examples and links to the software are available from http://www.cbrg.ox.ac.uk/data/pivotviewer/. The software is licensed under GPLv2. Contact:  stephen.taylor@imm.ox.ac.uk and roger@coritsu.com PMID:24849578

Effects of television weather broadcasters on viewers during severe weather: To be or not to be on-screen

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lea, Amanda Marie

An association was tested between the presence of a television weather broadcaster on-screen and viewers' likelihood to seek shelter, measured via risk perception and preventative behavior. Social networking websites were used to recruit respondents. Four clips of archived severe weather videos, one pair (on-screen and off-screen broadcaster) using the reflectivity product and another pair (on-screen and off-screen broadcaster) using velocity product, were presented to participants. Viewers' trust and weather salience were also quantified for additional interactions. A relationship between viewers' risk perception (preflectivity = 0.821, pvelocity = 0.625) and preventative behavior (preflectivity = 0.217, p velocity = 0.236) and the presence of the broadcaster on-screen was not found. The reflectivity product was associated with higher risk perception and preventative behavior scores than the velocity product (prp = 0.000, ppb = 0.000).

Characterizing the emotional response to art beyond pleasure: Correspondence between the emotional characteristics of artworks and viewers' emotional responses.

PubMed

Tinio, Pablo P L; Gartus, Andreas

2018-01-01

Although emotions are some of the most discussed aspects of the experience of art, we know very little about what emotions people experience during aesthetic encounters. In this chapter, we used emotional heat maps-a novel approach to characterizing art viewers' aesthetic responses to art-to examine the following research questions in two museum studies: (1) What emotions do people experience after encounters with art, and how intense are these emotions? (2) To what extent do museum visitors experience the same emotions to a particular exhibition or artwork? and (3) To what extent is there a correspondence between the emotional characteristics of an art exhibition or artwork and the emotions that viewers experienced? Results showed that there was fairly good agreement among viewers regarding the emotions that they experienced in response to a particular artwork or exhibition and that there were correspondences between art viewers' emotional responses and the emotional characteristics of the exhibition or artwork that they viewed. The use of emotional heat maps was effective in going beyond traditional aesthetics measures of liking and pleasure and allowing a nuanced characterization of the aesthetic experience of art. © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

JS-MS: a cross-platform, modular javascript viewer for mass spectrometry signals.

PubMed

Rosen, Jebediah; Handy, Kyle; Gillan, André; Smith, Rob

2017-11-06

Despite the ubiquity of mass spectrometry (MS), data processing tools can be surprisingly limited. To date, there is no stand-alone, cross-platform 3-D visualizer for MS data. Available visualization toolkits require large libraries with multiple dependencies and are not well suited for custom MS data processing modules, such as MS storage systems or data processing algorithms. We present JS-MS, a 3-D, modular JavaScript client application for viewing MS data. JS-MS provides several advantages over existing MS viewers, such as a dependency-free, browser-based, one click, cross-platform install and better navigation interfaces. The client includes a modular Java backend with a novel streaming.mzML parser to demonstrate the API-based serving of MS data to the viewer. JS-MS enables custom MS data processing and evaluation by providing fast, 3-D visualization using improved navigation without dependencies. JS-MS is publicly available with a GPLv2 license at github.com/optimusmoose/jsms.

A full-parallax 3D display with restricted viewing zone tracking viewer's eye

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Beppu, Naoto; Yendo, Tomohiro

2015-03-01

The Three-Dimensional (3D) vision became widely known as familiar imaging technique now. The 3D display has been put into practical use in various fields, such as entertainment and medical fields. Development of 3D display technology will play an important role in a wide range of fields. There are various ways to the method of displaying 3D image. There is one of the methods that showing 3D image method to use the ray reproduction and we focused on it. This method needs many viewpoint images when achieve a full-parallax because this method display different viewpoint image depending on the viewpoint. We proposed to reduce wasteful rays by limiting projector's ray emitted to around only viewer using a spinning mirror, and to increase effectiveness of display device to achieve a full-parallax 3D display. We propose a method by using a tracking viewer's eye, a high-speed projector, a rotating mirror that tracking viewer (a spinning mirror), a concave mirror array having the different vertical slope arranged circumferentially (a concave mirror array), a cylindrical mirror. About proposed method in simulation, we confirmed the scanning range and the locus of the movement in the horizontal direction of the ray. In addition, we confirmed the switching of the viewpoints and convergence performance in the vertical direction of rays. Therefore, we confirmed that it is possible to realize a full-parallax.

Interactive and Stereoscopic Hybrid 3D Viewer of Radar Data with Gesture Recognition

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Goenetxea, Jon; Moreno, Aitor; Unzueta, Luis; Galdós, Andoni; Segura, Álvaro

This work presents an interactive and stereoscopic 3D viewer of weather information coming from a Doppler radar. The hybrid system shows a GIS model of the regional zone where the radar is located and the corresponding reconstructed 3D volume weather data. To enhance the immersiveness of the navigation, stereoscopic visualization has been added to the viewer, using a polarized glasses based system. The user can interact with the 3D virtual world using a Nintendo Wiimote for navigating through it and a Nintendo Wii Nunchuk for giving commands by means of hand gestures. We also present a dynamic gesture recognition procedure that measures the temporal advance of the performed gesture postures. Experimental results show how dynamic gestures are effectively recognized so that a more natural interaction and immersive navigation in the virtual world is achieved.

Obesity prevention programs and policies: practitioner and policy-maker perceptions of feasibility and effectiveness.

PubMed

Cleland, Verity; McNeilly, Briohny; Crawford, David; Ball, Kylie

2013-09-01

The aims of this study were to map obesity prevention activity being implemented by government, non-government, and community-based organizations; to determine practitioner and policy-maker perceptions of the feasibility and effectiveness of a range of evidence-based obesity prevention strategies; and to determine practitioner and policy-maker perceptions of preferred settings for obesity prevention strategies. This study involved a cross-sectional survey of 304 public health practitioners and policy-makers from government, non-government, and community organizations across Victoria, Australia. Participants reported their organizations' current obesity prevention programs and policies, their own perceptions of the feasibility and effectiveness of strategies to prevent obesity and their preferred settings for obesity prevention. Thirty-nine percent had an obesity prevention policy, and 92% were implementing obesity prevention programs. The most common programs focused on education, skill-building, and increasing access to healthy eating/physical activity opportunities. School curriculum-based initiatives, social support for physical activity, and family-based programs were considered the most effective strategies, whereas curriculum-based initiatives, active after-school programs, and providing access to and information about physical activity facilities were deemed the most feasible strategies. Schools were generally perceived as the most preferred setting for obesity prevention. Many organizations had obesity prevention programs, but far fewer had obesity prevention policies. Current strategies and those considered feasible and effective are often mismatched with the empirical literature. Systems to ensure better alignment between researchers, practitioners, and policy-makers, and identifying effective methods of translating empirical evidence into practice and policy are required. Copyright © 2012 The Obesity Society.

Learning through Making and Maker Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hsu, Yu-Chang; Baldwin, Sally; Ching, Yu-Hui

2017-01-01

In this paper, we provide an overview of the current efforts in maker education, supported by a review of empirical studies. Our synthesis will inform the community about learning outcomes, potential and common issues, challenges, resources, and future research direction regarding maker education.

Increasing the scale and adoption of population health interventions: experiences and perspectives of policy makers, practitioners, and researchers

PubMed Central

2014-01-01

Background Decisions to scale up population health interventions from small projects to wider state or national implementation is fundamental to maximising population-wide health improvements. The objectives of this study were to examine: i) how decisions to scale up interventions are currently made in practice; ii) the role that evidence plays in informing decisions to scale up interventions; and iii) the role policy makers, practitioners, and researchers play in this process. Methods Interviews with an expert panel of senior Australian and international public health policy-makers (n = 7), practitioners (n = 7), and researchers (n = 7) were conducted in May 2013 with a participation rate of 84%. Results Scaling up decisions were generally made through iterative processes and led by policy makers and/or practitioners, but ultimately approved by political leaders and/or senior executives of funding agencies. Research evidence formed a component of the overall set of information used in decision-making, but its contribution was limited by the paucity of relevant intervention effectiveness research, and data on costs and cost effectiveness. Policy makers, practitioners/service managers, and researchers had different, but complementary roles to play in the process of scaling up interventions. Conclusions This analysis articulates the processes of how decisions to scale up interventions are made, the roles of evidence, and contribution of different professional groups. More intervention research that includes data on the effectiveness, reach, and costs of operating at scale and key service delivery issues (including acceptability and fit of interventions and delivery models) should be sought as this has the potential to substantially advance the relevance and ultimately usability of research evidence for scaling up population health action. PMID:24735455

Authenticity in Obesity Public Service Announcements: Influence of Spokesperson Type, Viewer Weight, and Source Credibility on Diet, Exercise, Information Seeking, and Electronic Word-of-Mouth Intentions.

PubMed

Phua, Joe; Tinkham, Spencer

2016-01-01

This study examined the joint influence of spokesperson type in obesity public service announcements (PSAs) and viewer weight on diet intention, exercise intention, information seeking, and electronic word-of-mouth (eWoM) intention. Results of a 2 (spokesperson type: real person vs. actor) × 2 (viewer weight: overweight vs. non-overweight) between-subjects experiment indicated that overweight viewers who saw the PSA featuring the real person had the highest diet intention, exercise intention, information seeking, and eWoM intention. Parasocial interaction was also found to mediate the relationships between spokesperson type/viewer weight and two of the dependent variables: diet intention and exercise intention. In addition, viewers who saw the PSA featuring the real person rated the spokesperson as significantly higher on source credibility (trustworthiness, competence, and goodwill) than those who saw the PSA featuring the actor.

MethylViewer: computational analysis and editing for bisulfite sequencing and methyltransferase accessibility protocol for individual templates (MAPit) projects.

PubMed

Pardo, Carolina E; Carr, Ian M; Hoffman, Christopher J; Darst, Russell P; Markham, Alexander F; Bonthron, David T; Kladde, Michael P

2011-01-01

Bisulfite sequencing is a widely-used technique for examining cytosine DNA methylation at nucleotide resolution along single DNA strands. Probing with cytosine DNA methyltransferases followed by bisulfite sequencing (MAPit) is an effective technique for mapping protein-DNA interactions. Here, MAPit methylation footprinting with M.CviPI, a GC methyltransferase we previously cloned and characterized, was used to probe hMLH1 chromatin in HCT116 and RKO colorectal cancer cells. Because M.CviPI-probed samples contain both CG and GC methylation, we developed a versatile, visually-intuitive program, called MethylViewer, for evaluating the bisulfite sequencing results. Uniquely, MethylViewer can simultaneously query cytosine methylation status in bisulfite-converted sequences at as many as four different user-defined motifs, e.g. CG, GC, etc., including motifs with degenerate bases. Data can also be exported for statistical analysis and as publication-quality images. Analysis of hMLH1 MAPit data with MethylViewer showed that endogenous CG methylation and accessible GC sites were both mapped on single molecules at high resolution. Disruption of positioned nucleosomes on single molecules of the PHO5 promoter was detected in budding yeast using M.CviPII, increasing the number of enzymes available for probing protein-DNA interactions. MethylViewer provides an integrated solution for primer design and rapid, accurate and detailed analysis of bisulfite sequencing or MAPit datasets from virtually any biological or biochemical system.

JET2 Viewer: a database of predicted multiple, possibly overlapping, protein-protein interaction sites for PDB structures.

PubMed

Ripoche, Hugues; Laine, Elodie; Ceres, Nicoletta; Carbone, Alessandra

2017-01-04

The database JET2 Viewer, openly accessible at http://www.jet2viewer.upmc.fr/, reports putative protein binding sites for all three-dimensional (3D) structures available in the Protein Data Bank (PDB). This knowledge base was generated by applying the computational method JET 2 at large-scale on more than 20 000 chains. JET 2 strategy yields very precise predictions of interacting surfaces and unravels their evolutionary process and complexity. JET2 Viewer provides an online intelligent display, including interactive 3D visualization of the binding sites mapped onto PDB structures and suitable files recording JET 2 analyses. Predictions were evaluated on more than 15 000 experimentally characterized protein interfaces. This is, to our knowledge, the largest evaluation of a protein binding site prediction method. The overall performance of JET 2 on all interfaces are: Sen = 52.52, PPV = 51.24, Spe = 80.05, Acc = 75.89. The data can be used to foster new strategies for protein-protein interactions modulation and interaction surface redesign. © The Author(s) 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

SURVIAC Bulletin: AFRL Research Audit Trail Viewer (ATV). Volume 19, Issue 1, 2003

DTIC Science & Technology

2003-01-01

Trail Viewer, the analyst obtained a close up view of the detailed aircraft model using the Orbit View, enabled the SkyBox , enabled fictional ter...trails and element projections, several simulated terrain types and Skybox environments to help the user maintain perspective, file based

White House Maker Faire

NASA Image and Video Library

2014-06-18

The Maker Faire trailer is seen outside the rose garden during the first ever White House Maker Faire, which brings together students, entrepreneurs, and everyday citizens who are using new tools and techniques to launch new businesses, learn vital skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), and fuel the renaissance in American manufacturing, at the White House, Wednesday, June 18, 2014 in Washington. The President announced new steps the Administration and its partners are taking to support the ability of more Americans, young and old, to have to access to these tools and techniques and brings their ideas to life. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Learning to Program with Game Maker

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Johnson, Claire

2017-01-01

"Game Maker" is widely used in UK secondary schools, yet under-researched in that context. This paper presents the findings of a qualitative case study that explores how authoring computer games using "Game Maker" can support the learning of basic programming concepts in a mainstream UK secondary setting. The research draws on…

An Examination of Cognitive Processing of Multimedia Information Based on Viewers' Eye Movements

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Liu, Han-Chin; Chuang, Hsueh-Hua

2011-01-01

This study utilized qualitative and quantitative designs and eye-tracking technology to understand how viewers process multimedia information. Eye movement data were collected from eight college students (non-science majors) while they were viewing web pages containing different types of text and illustrations depicting the mechanism of…

Viewers' Interpretations of Associational Montage: The Influence of "Visual Literacy" and Educational Background.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Messaris, Paul; Nielsen, Karen O.

A study examined the influence of viewers' backgrounds on their interpretation of "associational montage" in television advertising (editing which seeks to imply an analogy between the product and a juxtaposed image possessing desirable qualities). Subjects, 32 television professionals from two urban television stations and 95 customers…

Food-Related Advertising on Preschool Television: Building Brand Recognition in Young Viewers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Connor, Susan M.

2007-01-01

Objectives: This study used content analysis to explore how much and what type of advertising is present in television programming aimed at toddlers and preschool-aged children and what methods of persuasion are being used to sell products and to promote brands to the youngest viewers. Methods: Four randomly selected, 4-hour blocks (9 AM to 1 PM)…

Reading Reception: Mediation and Transparency in Viewers' Accounts of a TV Programme.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Richardson, Kay; Corner, John

This paper addresses questions about the processes involved when viewers "make sense" out of the diverse visual and aural signs of a television program and then render that sense in a spoken account. A pilot study was conducted to explore the manner in which modes of viewing, and talk about viewing, include or exclude recognition of…

A study of the connection between TV meteorologists and their viewers during severe weather broadcasts

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ebner, Daniel M.

After the devastating tornadoes in Joplin, MO and in the Deep South in 2011, it seemed appropriate to look at the impact that broadcast meteorologists (and their TV coverage) have on their viewers during severe weather events. Broadcast meteorologists play a vital role in the severe weather warning process and in persuading the public to take the appropriate actions during severe weather. This research was done by developing a survey that addressed the following questions: 1) Is the media doing everything they can persuade viewers to take shelter and protect themselves and their property?; 2) What do you do when a tornado warning is issued?; 3) Is there anything broadcast meteorologists can do or say that will make you take immediate action during severe weather? The survey was disseminated through television markets in Missouri. The goal of this research was to find new, improved and different ways of "connecting" with viewing during severe weather coverage. After looking at the results, we want to see if there are specific words, images or anything else a broadcaster can do that will trigger a response by viewers to take cover. It is my hope the results and analyses from this survey will provide broadcast meteorologists with new and improved techniques to connect with the public and to assist them in making an informed decision during severe weather events.

An alcohol message beneath the surface of ER: how implicit memory influences viewers' health attitudes and intentions using entertainment-education.

PubMed

Kim, Kyongseok; Lee, Mina; Macias, Wendy

2014-01-01

While previous research on entertainment-education has assessed its effectiveness, primarily at the conscious level (e.g., free recall and self-reported change in knowledge), few studies have explored its effect on viewers' implicit knowledge. To fill this gap, this study examined the mechanism through which viewers form implicit memory of short health messages inserted in a primetime TV show and its preconscious effects on viewers' health attitudes and intentions. An experiment was conducted using a 3-group (health message: present vs. absent vs. control), posttest-only design with additional planned analyses of differences by subject variables (past experience and involvement). Overall, findings supported the hypothesized effects of implicit memory of a brief antialcohol message embedded in an ER episode on college students' attitudes and intentions against binge drinking. Results showed that participants who were exposed to the health message reported less positive attitudes toward binge drinking and lower intentions to binge drink, compared with those who were not exposed; the causal relations among viewers' implicit memory, attitudes, and intentions were also validated. Results also showed that individuals' past experience and involvement moderated the effects of the health message on attitudes and intentions. Theoretical explanations and practical implications are discussed.

School Maker Faires

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Harlow, Danielle; Hansen, Alexandria

2018-01-01

The Maker Movement (Dougherty 2012) highlights innovation and creativity through "activities focused on designing, building, modifying, and/or repurposing material objects, for playful or useful ends, oriented toward making a 'product' of some sort that can be used, interacted with, or demonstrated" (Martin 2015, p. 31). When engaged in…

Geomatic Archaeological Reconstruction and a Hybrid Viewer for the Archaelogical Site of CÁPARRA (spain)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tejeda-Sánchez, C.; Muñoz-Nieto, A.; Rodríguez-Gonzálvez, P.

2018-05-01

Visualization and analysis use to be the final steps in Geomatics. This paper shows the workflow followed to set up a hybrid 3D archaeological viewer. Data acquisition of the site survey was done by means of low-cost close-range photogrammetric methods. With the aim not only to satisfy the general public but also the technicians, a large group of Geomatic products has been obtained (2d plans, 3d models, orthophotos, CAD models coming from vectorization, virtual anastylosis, and cross sections). Finally, all these products have been integrated into a three-dimensional archaeological information system. The hybrid archaeological viewer designed allows a metric and quality approach to the scientific analysis of the ruins, improving, thanks to the implementation of a database, and its potential for queries, the benefits of an ordinary topographic survey.

Strategic Assessment for Arctic Observing, and the New Arctic Observing Viewer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kassin, A.; Cody, R. P.; Manley, W. F.; Gaylord, A. G.; Dover, M.; Score, R.; Lin, D. H.; Villarreal, S.; Quezada, A.; Tweedie, C. E.

2013-12-01

Although a great deal of progress has been made with various Arctic Observing efforts, it can be difficult to assess that progress. What data collection efforts are established or under way? Where? By whom? To help meet the strategic needs of SEARCH-AON, SAON, and related initiatives, a new resource has been released: the Arctic Observing Viewer (AOV; http://ArcticObservingViewer.org). This web mapping application covers the 'who', 'what', 'where', and 'when' of data collection sites - wherever marine or terrestrial data are collected. Hundreds of sites are displayed, providing an overview as well as details. Users can visualize, navigate, select, search, draw, print, and more. This application currently showcases a subset of observational activities and will become more comprehensive with time. The AOV is founded on principles of interoperability, with an emerging metadata standard and compatible web service formats, such that participating agencies and organizations can use the AOV tools and services for their own purposes. In this way, the AOV will complement other cyber-resources, and will help science planners, funding agencies, PI's, and others to: assess status, identify overlap, fill gaps, assure sampling design, refine network performance, clarify directions, access data, coordinate logistics, collaborate, and more to meet Arctic Observing goals.

Are scientific research outputs aligned with national policy makers' priorities? A case study of tuberculosis in Cambodia.

PubMed

Boudarene, Lydia; James, Richard; Coker, Richard; Khan, Mishal S

2017-10-01

With funding for tuberculosis (TB) research decreasing, and the high global disease burden persisting, there are calls for increased investment in TB research. However, justification of such investments is questionable, when translation of research outputs into policy and health care improvements remains a challenge for TB and other diseases. Using TB in Cambodia as a case study, we investigate how evidence needs of national policy makers are addressed by topics covered in research publications. We first conducted a systematic review to compile all studies on TB in Cambodia published since 2000. We then identified priority areas in which evidence for policy and programme planning are required from the perspective of key national TB control stakeholders. Finally, results from the literature review were analysed in relation to the priority research areas for national policy makers to assess overlap and highlight gaps in evidence. Priority research areas were: TB-HIV co-infection; childhood TB; multidrug resistant TB (MDR-TB); and universal and equitable access to quality diagnosis and treatment. On screening 1687 unique papers retrieved from our literature search, 253 were eligible publications focusing on TB in Cambodia. Of these, only 73 (29%) addressed one of the four priority research areas. Overall, 30 (11%), five (2%), seven (2%) and 37 (14%) studies reported findings relevant to TB-HIV, childhood TB, MDR-TB and access to quality diagnosis and treatment respectively. Our analysis shows that a small proportion of the research outputs in Cambodia address priority areas for informing policy and programme planning. This case study illustrates that there is substantial room for improvement in alignment between research outputs and evidence gaps that national policy makers would like to see addressed; better coordination between researchers, funders and policy makers' on identifying priority research topics may increase the relevance of research findings to health

Onboard Short Term Plan Viewer

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hall, Tim; LeBlanc, Troy; Ulman, Brian; McDonald, Aaron; Gramm, Paul; Chang, Li-Min; Keerthi, Suman; Kivlovitz, Dov; Hadlock, Jason

2011-01-01

Onboard Short Term Plan Viewer (OSTPV) is a computer program for electronic display of mission plans and timelines, both aboard the International Space Station (ISS) and in ISS ground control stations located in several countries. OSTPV was specifically designed both (1) for use within the limited ISS computing environment and (2) to be compatible with computers used in ground control stations. OSTPV supplants a prior system in which, aboard the ISS, timelines were printed on paper and incorporated into files that also contained other paper documents. Hence, the introduction of OSTPV has both reduced the consumption of resources and saved time in updating plans and timelines. OSTPV accepts, as input, the mission timeline output of a legacy, print-oriented, UNIX-based program called "Consolidated Planning System" and converts the timeline information for display in an interactive, dynamic, Windows Web-based graphical user interface that is used by both the ISS crew and ground control teams in real time. OSTPV enables the ISS crew to electronically indicate execution of timeline steps, launch electronic procedures, and efficiently report to ground control teams on the statuses of ISS activities, all by use of laptop computers aboard the ISS.

EpitopeViewer: a Java application for the visualization and analysis of immune epitopes in the Immune Epitope Database and Analysis Resource (IEDB).

PubMed

Beaver, John E; Bourne, Philip E; Ponomarenko, Julia V

2007-02-21

Structural information about epitopes, particularly the three-dimensional (3D) structures of antigens in complex with immune receptors, presents a valuable source of data for immunology. This information is available in the Protein Data Bank (PDB) and provided in curated form by the Immune Epitope Database and Analysis Resource (IEDB). With continued growth in these data and the importance in understanding molecular level interactions of immunological interest there is a need for new specialized molecular visualization and analysis tools. The EpitopeViewer is a platform-independent Java application for the visualization of the three-dimensional structure and sequence of epitopes and analyses of their interactions with antigen-specific receptors of the immune system (antibodies, T cell receptors and MHC molecules). The viewer renders both 3D views and two-dimensional plots of intermolecular interactions between the antigen and receptor(s) by reading curated data from the IEDB and/or calculated on-the-fly from atom coordinates from the PDB. The 3D views and associated interactions can be saved for future use and publication. The EpitopeViewer can be accessed from the IEDB Web site http://www.immuneepitope.org through the quick link 'Browse Records by 3D Structure.' The EpitopeViewer is designed and been tested for use by immunologists with little or no training in molecular graphics. The EpitopeViewer can be launched from most popular Web browsers without user intervention. A Java Runtime Environment (RJE) 1.4.2 or higher is required.

Appropriateness for Total Joint Replacement: Perspectives of Decision-Makers

PubMed Central

Clavel, Nathalie; De coster, Carolyn; Pomey, Marie-Pascale; Sanmartin, Claudia; Bohm, Éric; Dunbar, Michael J.; Frank, CY; Hawker, Gillian; Noseworthy, Tom

2016-01-01

Background: Improving access to total joint replacement (TJR) has been a priority. Without robust mechanisms to ensure appropriateness, these procedures may be overused, incurring substantial costs. In that context, decision-makers are particularly concerned with the appropriateness of TJR. Objective: While our previous research focused on the appropriateness of TJR from clinical and patient perspectives, this study is aimed at understanding decision-makers' perspectives. Methods: Using a semi-structured guide, we interviewed a convenience sample of decision-makers in four Canadian provinces (Alberta, Manitoba, Nova Scotia and Quebec) between February and March 2013. For the purposes of this study, a decision-maker was defined as a manager, institutional leader or policy maker. Results: Fifteen interviews were conducted with decision-makers at ministry (n = 3), regional (n = 6) and institutional levels (n = 8). Decision-makers see themselves as having a key role in the appropriateness discourse, that of optimizing resource allocation and efficient delivery of services for TJR, to improve population outcomes. Conclusion: The decision-makers' view of appropriateness recognizes the importance of the clinical view, but it offers a very different input into the appropriateness discourse, more closely aligned with appropriateness of setting, which refers to cost-effectiveness considerations. PMID:27027795

Variant Review with the Integrative Genomics Viewer.

PubMed

Robinson, James T; Thorvaldsdóttir, Helga; Wenger, Aaron M; Zehir, Ahmet; Mesirov, Jill P

2017-11-01

Manual review of aligned reads for confirmation and interpretation of variant calls is an important step in many variant calling pipelines for next-generation sequencing (NGS) data. Visual inspection can greatly increase the confidence in calls, reduce the risk of false positives, and help characterize complex events. The Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV) was one of the first tools to provide NGS data visualization, and it currently provides a rich set of tools for inspection, validation, and interpretation of NGS datasets, as well as other types of genomic data. Here, we present a short overview of IGV's variant review features for both single-nucleotide variants and structural variants, with examples from both cancer and germline datasets. IGV is freely available at https://www.igv.org Cancer Res; 77(21); e31-34. ©2017 AACR . ©2017 American Association for Cancer Research.

What's so appealing? An examination of emotional appeals and viewer engagement in safe-sex PSAs and condom advertisements.

PubMed

Stevens, Elise M

2018-01-01

Whereas advertisements strive to increase revenue, PSAs work to educate and inform. Even though both share the similar goal of persuasion, advertising tends to lead to more effective sales, unlike PSAs, which can have little effect on audience behaviors. Using a systematic, quantitative content analysis, this study examines emotional appeals and viewer engagement in safe-sex PSAs and condom advertisements in online videos (N = 132). PSAs with humor appeals received more viewer attention in terms of views, comments, and ratings than humorous advertisements. Recommendations for designing public health campaigns are discussed in terms of specific appeals for garnering audience attention.

10 CFR 431.132 - Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-01-01

... 10 Energy 3 2014-01-01 2014-01-01 false Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers... CERTAIN COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT Automatic Commercial Ice Makers § 431.132 Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers. Automatic commercial ice maker means a factory-made assembly (not...

10 CFR 431.132 - Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-01-01

... 10 Energy 3 2012-01-01 2012-01-01 false Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers... CERTAIN COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT Automatic Commercial Ice Makers § 431.132 Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers. Automatic commercial ice maker means a factory-made assembly (not...

10 CFR 431.132 - Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-01-01

... 10 Energy 3 2010-01-01 2010-01-01 false Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers... CERTAIN COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT Automatic Commercial Ice Makers § 431.132 Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers. Automatic commercial ice maker means a factory-made assembly (not...

10 CFR 431.132 - Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-01-01

... 10 Energy 3 2011-01-01 2011-01-01 false Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers... CERTAIN COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT Automatic Commercial Ice Makers § 431.132 Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers. Automatic commercial ice maker means a factory-made assembly (not...

10 CFR 431.132 - Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-01-01

... 10 Energy 3 2013-01-01 2013-01-01 false Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers... CERTAIN COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL EQUIPMENT Automatic Commercial Ice Makers § 431.132 Definitions concerning automatic commercial ice makers. Automatic commercial ice maker means a factory-made assembly (not...

"It feels more like a parody": Canadian Queer as Folk viewers and the show they love to complain about.

PubMed

Peters, Wendy

2009-01-01

The nighttime television series Queer as Folk (U.S.) was set in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but was filmed in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Beginning with a brief textual analysis of the representation of lesbians on Queer as Folk, this audience reception study outlines how Canadian viewers who claimed a wide range of sexualities interpreted the representations of lesbians on the series in vastly different ways. While some viewers described the lesbian characters, Melanie and Lindsay, as "an embarrassment" and "more like a parody of lesbians," others enjoyed the "accuracy" and "realism" of these characters.

Chain of Custody Item Monitor Message Viewer v.1.0 Beta

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Schwartz, Steven Robert; Fielder, Laura; Hymel, Ross W.

The CoCIM Message Viewer software allows users to connect to and download messages from a Chain of Custody Item Monitor (CoCIM) connected to a serial port on the user’s computer. The downloaded messages are authenticated and displayed in a Graphical User Interface that allows the user a limited degree of sorting and filtering of the downloaded messages as well as the ability to save downloaded files or to open previously downloaded message history files.

Getting Research to the Policy Table: A Qualitative Study With Public Health Researchers on Engaging With Policy Makers

PubMed Central

Dodson, Elizabeth A.; Fleischhacker, Sheila; Siddiqi, Sameer; Quinn, Emilee L.

2015-01-01

Introduction Little attention has been given to how researchers can best provide evidence to policy makers so that it informs policy making. The objectives of this study were to increase understanding about the current state of public health nutrition and obesity researcher practices, beliefs, barriers, and facilitators to communicating and engaging with policy makers, and to identify best practices and suggest improvements. Methods Eighteen semistructured interviews were conducted from 2011 to 2013 with public health nutrition and obesity researchers who were highly involved in communicating research to policy makers. Interviews were transcribed verbatim, coded, and analyzed to identify common themes. Results Study participants described wide variation in practices for communicating and engaging with policy makers and had mixed beliefs about whether and when researchers should engage. Besides a lack of formal policy communication training, barriers noted were promotion and tenure processes and a professional culture that does not value communicating and engaging with policy makers. Study participants cited facilitators to engaging with policy makers as ranging from the individual level (eg, desire to make a difference, relationships with collaborators) to the institutional level (eg, training/mentorship support, institutional recognition). Other facilitators identified were research- and funding-driven. Promising strategies suggested to improve policy engagement were more formal training, better use of intermediaries, and learning how to cultivate relationships with policy makers. Conclusion Study findings provide insights into the challenges that will need to be overcome and the strategies that might be tried to improve communication and engagement between public health researchers and policy makers. PMID:25927604

Getting research to the policy table: a qualitative study with public health researchers on engaging with policy makers.

PubMed

Otten, Jennifer J; Dodson, Elizabeth A; Fleischhacker, Sheila; Siddiqi, Sameer; Quinn, Emilee L

2015-04-30

Little attention has been given to how researchers can best provide evidence to policy makers so that it informs policy making. The objectives of this study were to increase understanding about the current state of public health nutrition and obesity researcher practices, beliefs, barriers, and facilitators to communicating and engaging with policy makers, and to identify best practices and suggest improvements. Eighteen semistructured interviews were conducted from 2011 to 2013 with public health nutrition and obesity researchers who were highly involved in communicating research to policy makers. Interviews were transcribed verbatim, coded, and analyzed to identify common themes. Study participants described wide variation in practices for communicating and engaging with policy makers and had mixed beliefs about whether and when researchers should engage. Besides a lack of formal policy communication training, barriers noted were promotion and tenure processes and a professional culture that does not value communicating and engaging with policy makers. Study participants cited facilitators to engaging with policy makers as ranging from the individual level (eg, desire to make a difference, relationships with collaborators) to the institutional level (eg, training/mentorship support, institutional recognition). Other facilitators identified were research- and funding-driven. Promising strategies suggested to improve policy engagement were more formal training, better use of intermediaries, and learning how to cultivate relationships with policy makers. Study findings provide insights into the challenges that will need to be overcome and the strategies that might be tried to improve communication and engagement between public health researchers and policy makers.

Concordance Between Veterans' Self-Report and Documentation of Surrogate Decision Makers: Implications for Quality Measurement.

PubMed

Garner, Kimberly K; Dubbert, Patricia; Lensing, Shelly; Sullivan, Dennis H

2017-01-01

The Measuring What Matters initiative of the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine and the Hospice and Palliative Nurses Association identified documentation of a surrogate decision maker as one of the top 10 quality indicators in the acute hospital and hospice settings. To better understand the potential implementation of this Measuring What Matters quality measure #8, Documentation of Surrogate in outpatient primary care settings by describing primary care patients' self-reported identification and documentation of a surrogate decision maker. Examination of patient responses to self-assessment questions from advance health care planning educational groups conducted in one medical center primary care clinic and seven community-based outpatient primary care clinics. We assessed the concordance between patient reports of identifying and naming a surrogate decision maker and having completed an advance directive (AD) with presence of an AD in the electronic medical record. Of veterans without a documented AD on file, more than half (66%) reported that they had talked with someone they trusted and nearly half (52%) reported that they had named someone to communicate their preferences. Our clinical project data suggest that many more veterans may have initiated communications with surrogate decision makers than is evident in the electronic medical record. System changes are needed to close the gap between veterans' plans for a surrogate decision maker and the documentation available to acute care health care providers. Published by Elsevier Inc.

What Can Evidence-Use in Practice Learn from Evidence-Use in Policy?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rickinson, Mark; de Bruin, Kate; Walsh, Lucas; Hall, Matthew

2017-01-01

Background: This paper approaches evidence-informed practice from the perspective of evidence-informed policy-making. Using the findings of a recent study of evidence-use by educational policy-makers to raise questions about evidence-use by educational practitioners, it seeks to explore what such a study might tell us about how to understand and…

Maker Cultures and the Prospects for Technological Action.

PubMed

Nascimento, Susana; Pólvora, Alexandre

2018-06-01

Supported by easier and cheaper access to tools and expanding communities, maker cultures are pointing towards the ideas of (almost) everyone designing, creating, producing and distributing renewed, new and improved products, machines, things or artefacts. A careful analysis of the assumptions and challenges of maker cultures emphasizes the relevance of what may be called technological action, that is, active and critical interventions regarding the purposes and applications of technologies within ordinary lives, thus countering the deterministic trends of current directions of technology. In such transformative potential, we will explore a set of elements what is and could be technological action through snapshots of maker cultures based on the empirical research conducted in three particular contexts: the Fab Lab Network, Maker Media core outputs and initiatives such as Maker Faires, and the Open Source Hardware Association (OSHWA). Elements such as control and empowerment through material engagement, openness and sharing, and social, cultural, political and ethical values of the common good in topics such as diversity, sustainability and transparency, are critically analysed.

Statins: antimicrobial resistance breakers or makers?

PubMed Central

Lareu, Ricky R.; Dix, Brett R.; Hughes, Jeffery D.

2017-01-01

statins’ mechanism of antibacterial activity involves interference of bacterial cell regulatory functions via binding and disrupting cell surface structures such as wall teichoic acids, lipoteichoic acids, lipopolysaccharides, and/or surface proteins. The widespread use of statins for cardiovascular protection may favor selective pressures or co-selection for resistance, including dysbiosis of the human gut microbiota, sublethal plasma concentrations in bacteremic patients, and statin persistence in the environment, all possibly culminating in AMR. Conclusion Simvastatin appears to be the most suitable statin for repurposing as a novel adjuvant antibiotic. Current evidence better supports statins as potential AMR breakers, but their role as plausible AMR makers cannot be excluded. Elucidating the mechanism of statins’ antibacterial activity is perhaps the most important knowledge gap to address as this will likely clarify statins’ role as AMR breakers or makers. PMID:29085751

How is the New Public Management applied in the occupational health care system? - decision-makers' and OH personnel's views in Finland

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background In many countries occupational health care system is in change. Occupational health studies are mainly focused on occupational health substance and content. This study offers new perspectives on municipal OHS and its operations from management perspective. Aim The aim of this study is to analyse how New Public Management (NPM) doctrines are applied in the Finnish occupational health care system (OHS). The main focus is to describe and compare the views of decision-makers' and OH workers within the framework of NPM. Methods The data were collected by semi-structured interviews from 17 municipal decision-makers' and 26 municipal OH workers. Data was analyzed by examining coded data in a theory-driven way according to Hood's doctrine of NPM. Results The doctrines were not as compatible with the OH personnel view as with the decision-makers' view. Decision-makers and OH personnel highlighted the strict criteria required for operation evaluation. Moreover, decision-makers strongly accentuated professional management in the public sector and the reorganization of public sector units. These were not equally relevant in OH personnel views. In OH personnel views, other doctrines (more attention to performance and accomplishments, emphasizing and augmentation of the competition and better control of public expense and means test) were not similarly in evidence, only weak evidence was observed when their importance viewed as medium by decision-makers. Neither of the respondents group kept the doctrine of management models of the private sector relevant. Conclusions The NPM and Hoods doctrine fitted well with OH research. The doctrine brought out view differences and similarities between decision-makers and OH personnel. For example, policymakers highlighted more strongly the structural change by emphasizing professional management compared to OH personnel. The need for reorganization of municipal OH, regardless of different operational preconditions, was obvious

Some Effects of Television Screen Size and Viewer Distance on Recognition of Short Sentences.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lewin, Earl P.

A study investigated changes in recognition time for short sentences presented on television screens of varying sizes with viewers at varying distances. In a posttest only control group design, subjects in several different groups viewed a series of similar sentences under conditions where screen size and distance from the screen were varied. The…

Pilot Study for the Active TV Viewer Scholar Education. Final Report. Years 1984-1985.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Torres, Miguel Reyes

The purposes of the "Pilot Study for the Active TV Viewer Scholar Education" project were to find low cost teaching methods that developed critical television viewing skills among elementary and secondary students, and to develop a parallel program of family education in an effort to modify family viewing practices to encourage critical…

Priority setting in the provincial health services authority: survey of key decision makers

PubMed Central

Teng, Flora; Mitton, Craig; MacKenzie, Jennifer

2007-01-01

Background In recent years, decision makers in Canada and elsewhere have expressed a desire for more explicit, evidence-based approaches to priority setting. To achieve this aim within health care organizations, knowledge of both the organizational context and stakeholder attitudes towards priority setting are required. The current work adds to a limited yet growing body of international literature describing priority setting practices in health organizations. Methods A qualitative study was conducted using in-depth, face-to-face interviews with 25 key decision makers of the Provincial Health Services Authority (PHSA) of British Columbia. Major themes and sub-themes were identified through content analysis. Results Priorities were described by decision makers as being set in an ad hoc manner, with resources generally allocated along historical lines. Participants identified the Strategic Plan and a strong research base as strengths of the organization. The main areas for improvement were a desire to have a more transparent process for priority setting, a need to develop a culture which supports explicit priority setting, and a focus on fairness in decision making. Barriers to an explicit allocation process included the challenge of providing specialized services for disparate patient groups, and a lack of formal training in priority setting amongst decision makers. Conclusion This study identified factors important to understanding organizational context and informed next steps for explicit priority setting for a provincial health authority. While the PHSA is unique in its organizational structure in Canada, lessons about priority setting should be transferable to other contexts. PMID:17565691

Viewing the Viewers: Viewing Behaviors by Children and Adults during Television Programs and Commercials.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schmitt, Kelly L.; Woolf, Kimberly Duyck; Anderson, Daniel R.

2003-01-01

Reveals that 46% of the time with television was spent in some activity instead of or in addition to looking at the TV. Notes that social interaction was the most common nonviewing activity for all viewers, followed by playing and eating for children and reading for adults. Considers how nonviewing behaviors occurred most often during programming…

Understanding Producers' Intentions and Viewers' Learning Outcomes in a Science Museum Theater Play on Evolution

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Peleg, R.; Baram-Tsabari, A.

2016-01-01

Science museums often introduce plays to liven up exhibits, attract visitors to specific exhibitions, and help visitors to "digest" difficult content. Most previous research has concentrated on viewers' learning outcomes. This study uses performance and spectator analyses from the field of theater studies to explore the link between…

Does the market maker stabilize the market?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zhu, Mei; Chiarella, Carl; He, Xue-Zhong; Wang, Duo

2009-08-01

The market maker plays an important role in price formation, but his/her behavior and stabilizing impact on the market are relatively unclear, in particular in speculative markets. This paper develops a financial market model that examines the impact on market stability of the market maker, who acts as both a liquidity provider and an active investor in a market consisting of two types of boundedly rational speculative investors-the fundamentalists and trend followers. We show that the market maker does not necessarily stabilize the market when he/she actively manages the inventory to maximize profits, and that rather the market maker’s impact depends on the behavior of the speculators. Numerical simulations show that the model is able to generate outcomes for asset returns and market inventories that are consistent with empirical findings.

Predicting Moves-on-Stills for Comic Art Using Viewer Gaze Data.

PubMed

Jain, Eakta; Sheikh, Yaser; Hodgins, Jessica

2016-01-01

Comic art consists of a sequence of panels of different shapes and sizes that visually communicate the narrative to the reader. The move-on-stills technique allows such still images to be retargeted for digital displays via camera moves. Today, moves-on-stills can be created by software applications given user-provided parameters for each desired camera move. The proposed algorithm uses viewer gaze as input to computationally predict camera move parameters. The authors demonstrate their algorithm on various comic book panels and evaluate its performance by comparing their results with a professional DVD.

Emotional Impact of a Video-Based Suicide Prevention Program on Suicidal Viewers and Suicide Survivors

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bryan, Craig J.; Dhillon-Davis, Luther E.; Dhillon-Davis, Kieran K.

2009-01-01

In light of continuing concerns about iatrogenic effects associated with suicide prevention efforts utilizing video-based media, the impact of emotionally-charged videos on two vulnerable subgroups--suicidal viewers and suicide survivors--was explored. Following participation in routine suicide education as a part of the U.S. Air Force Suicide…

mzResults: An Interactive Viewer for Interrogation and Distribution of Proteomics Results*

PubMed Central

Webber, James T.; Askenazi, Manor; Marto, Jarrod A.

2011-01-01

The growing use of mass spectrometry in the context of biomedical research has been accompanied by an increased demand for distribution of results in a format that facilitates rapid and efficient validation of claims by reviewers and other interested parties. However, the continued evolution of mass spectrometry hardware, sample preparation methods, and peptide identification algorithms complicates standardization and creates hurdles related to compliance with journal submission requirements. Moreover, the recently announced Philadelphia Guidelines (1, 2) suggest that authors provide native mass spectrometry data files in support of their peer-reviewed research articles. These trends highlight the need for data viewers and other tools that work independently of manufacturers' proprietary data systems and seamlessly connect proteomics results with original data files to support user-driven data validation and review. Based upon our recently described API1-based framework for mass spectrometry data analysis (3, 4), we created an interactive viewer (mzResults) that is built on established database standards and enables efficient distribution and interrogation of results associated with proteomics experiments, while also providing a convenient mechanism for authors to comply with data submission standards as described in the Philadelphia Guidelines. In addition, the architecture of mzResults supports in-depth queries of the native mass spectrometry files through our multiplierz software environment. We use phosphoproteomics data to illustrate the features and capabilities of mzResults. PMID:21266631

Mutual Distrust: Perspectives From Researchers and Policy Makers on the Research to Policy Gap in 2013 and Recommendations for the Future

PubMed Central

Gollust, Sarah E.; Seymour, Jane W.; Pany, Maximilian J.; Goss, Adeline; Meisel, Zachary F.; Grande, David

2017-01-01

The production of health policy-relevant research is necessary, but not sufficient, to promote its utilization in policy. Our objective was to understand the perspectives of United States’ state-level policy makers and health researchers on the barriers and facilitators to the translation of health evidence into the policy process, with a particular focus on issues related to relationship building. We conducted interviews with 215 US health services and health policy researchers and 40 state-level staffers and legislators. Researchers and policy makers faced the same major barrier to research translation: lack of dedicated time to do so. Some policy makers questioned the credibility of research, and researchers questioned policy makers’ authentic desire to use evidence in decision making. For some study participants, a mutual mistrust of the other group challenges stronger relationship formation. Interventions are needed to help both groups understand a broader role that research plays in policy making and to increase personal contact, and ultimately trusted relationships, across various actors in the policy process. PMID:28452251

Characteristics of community health organizations and decision-makers considering the adoption of motivational interviewing.

PubMed

Williams, Jessica Roberts; Dusablon, Tracy; Williams, Weston O; Blais, Marissa Puckett; Hennessy, Kevin D

2014-07-01

Research related to the adoption of comparative effectiveness research (CER) in mental health practice is limited. This study explores the factors that influence decisions to adopt motivational interviewing (MI)-an evidence-based practice (EBP) grounded in CER-among decision-makers (n = 311) in community health organizations (n = 92). Descriptive analyses focus on organization and decision-maker characteristics and processes that may influence the decision to adopt an EBP, including demographics, structure and operations, readiness, attitudes, barriers, and facilitators. Within-group agreement is examined to determine the degree to which participants within each organization gave similar responses. Results show characteristics differed according to type of organization (community health versus community behavioral health) and position (directors versus staff). Within-group agreement was also influenced by position. These findings indicate different strategies may be needed to best disseminate CER to the two groups.

Teacher as Decision-Maker.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Smith, Carl B.

The teacher as decisionmaker is a fairly new concept, and yet the choices teachers make--among alternative approaches--afffect the attitudes, knowledge, and skills students carry into adult life. This booklet's chapter titles are as follows: (1) New Image for Teachers--Decision-Maker; (2) Decisions Teachers Make; (3) A Rational Model; (4) Planning…

The Use of Research Evidence in Public Health Decision Making Processes: Systematic Review

PubMed Central

Orton, Lois; Lloyd-Williams, Ffion; Taylor-Robinson, David; O'Flaherty, Martin; Capewell, Simon

2011-01-01

Background The use of research evidence to underpin public health policy is strongly promoted. However, its implementation has not been straightforward. The objectives of this systematic review were to synthesise empirical evidence on the use of research evidence by public health decision makers in settings with universal health care systems. Methods To locate eligible studies, 13 bibliographic databases were screened, organisational websites were scanned, key informants were contacted and bibliographies of included studies were scrutinised. Two reviewers independently assessed studies for inclusion, extracted data and assessed methodological quality. Data were synthesised as a narrative review. Findings 18 studies were included: 15 qualitative studies, and three surveys. Their methodological quality was mixed. They were set in a range of country and decision making settings. Study participants included 1063 public health decision makers, 72 researchers, and 174 with overlapping roles. Decision making processes varied widely between settings, and were viewed differently by key players. A range of research evidence was accessed. However, there was no reliable evidence on the extent of its use. Its impact was often indirect, competing with other influences. Barriers to the use of research evidence included: decision makers' perceptions of research evidence; the gulf between researchers and decision makers; the culture of decision making; competing influences on decision making; and practical constraints. Suggested (but largely untested) ways of overcoming these barriers included: research targeted at the needs of decision makers; research clearly highlighting key messages; and capacity building. There was little evidence on the role of research evidence in decision making to reduce inequalities. Conclusions To more effectively implement research informed public health policy, action is required by decision makers and researchers to address the barriers identified in

Maker Principles and Technologies in Teacher Education: A National Survey

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cohen, Jonathan

2017-01-01

Broadly speaking, the maker movement is characterized by people who engage in the construction, deconstruction, and reconstruction of physical artifacts, and who share both the process of making and their physical products with the broader community of makers. There is growing sentiment that elements of the maker movement have the capability of…

Developing a rapid-response program for health system decision-makers in Canada: findings from an issue brief and stakeholder dialogue.

PubMed

Wilson, Michael G; Lavis, John N; Gauvin, Francois-Pierre

2015-03-11

There is currently no mechanism in place outside of government to provide rapid syntheses of the best available research evidence about problems, options and/or implementation considerations related to a specific health system challenge that Canadian health system decision-makers need to address in a timely manner. A 'rapid-response' program could address this gap by providing access to optimally packaged, relevant and high-quality research evidence over short periods of time (i.e. days or weeks). We prepared an issue brief that describes the best available research evidence related to the problem, three broad features of a program that addresses the problem and implementation considerations. We identified systematic reviews by searching for organization-targeted implementation strategies in Health Systems Evidence ( www.healthsystemsevidence.org ) and drew on an existing analytical framework for how knowledge-brokering organizations can organize themselves to operationalize the program features. The issue brief was then used to inform a half-day stakeholder dialogue about whether and how to develop a rapid-response program for health system decision-makers in Canada. We thematically synthesized the deliberations. We found very few relevant systematic reviews but used frameworks and examples from existing programs to 1) outline key considerations for organizing a rapid-response program,, 2) determine what can be done in timelines ranging from 3 to 10 and 30 business days, and 3) define success and measure it. The 11 dialogue participants from across Canada largely agreed with the content presented in the brief, but noted two key challenges to consider: securing stable, long-term funding and finding a way to effectively and equitably manage the expected demand. Recommendations and suggestions for next steps from dialogue participants included taking an 'organic' approach to developing a pan-Canadian network and including jurisdictional scans as a type of product to

The Effect of Background Music in Shark Documentaries on Viewers' Perceptions of Sharks.

PubMed

Nosal, Andrew P; Keenan, Elizabeth A; Hastings, Philip A; Gneezy, Ayelet

2016-01-01

Despite the ongoing need for shark conservation and management, prevailing negative sentiments marginalize these animals and legitimize permissive exploitation. These negative attitudes arise from an instinctive, yet exaggerated fear, which is validated and reinforced by disproportionate and sensationalistic news coverage of shark 'attacks' and by highlighting shark-on-human violence in popular movies and documentaries. In this study, we investigate another subtler, yet powerful factor that contributes to this fear: the ominous background music that often accompanies shark footage in documentaries. Using three experiments, we show that participants rated sharks more negatively and less positively after viewing a 60-second video clip of swimming sharks set to ominous background music, compared to participants who watched the same video clip set to uplifting background music, or silence. This finding was not an artifact of soundtrack alone because attitudes toward sharks did not differ among participants assigned to audio-only control treatments. This is the first study to demonstrate empirically that the connotative attributes of background music accompanying shark footage affect viewers' attitudes toward sharks. Given that nature documentaries are often regarded as objective and authoritative sources of information, it is critical that documentary filmmakers and viewers are aware of how the soundtrack can affect the interpretation of the educational content.

Licensing Surrogate Decision-Makers.

PubMed

Rosoff, Philip M

2017-06-01

As medical technology continues to improve, more people will live longer lives with multiple chronic illnesses with increasing cumulative debilitation, including cognitive dysfunction. Combined with the aging of society in most developed countries, an ever-growing number of patients will require surrogate decision-makers. While advance care planning by patients still capable of expressing their preferences about medical interventions and end-of-life care can improve the quality and accuracy of surrogate decisions, this is often not the case, not infrequently leading to demands for ineffective, inappropriate and prolonged interventions. In 1980 LaFollette called for the licensing of prospective parents, basing his argument on the harm they can do to vulnerable people (children). In this paper, I apply his arguments to surrogate decision-makers for cognitively incapacitated patients, rhetorically suggesting that we require potential surrogates to qualify for this position by demonstrating their ability to make reasonable and rational decisions for others. I employ this theoretical approach to argue that the loose criteria by which we authorize surrogates' generally unchallenged power should be reconsidered.

The change-makers of West Africa.

PubMed

Godt, Sue; Mhatre, Sharmila; Schryer-Roy, Anne-Marie

2017-07-12

windows of opportunity.Vibrant West African-led collaborations amongst researchers, decision-makers and civil society, which are effectively supported by national, regional and global funding, need to foster, strengthen and use locally-generated evidence to ensure that efforts to strengthen health systems and improve regional health outcomes are successful. The solutions are clearly not to be found in the 'travelling models' of standardised interventions.

Proxy decision making and dementia: Using Construal Level Theory to analyse the thoughts of decision makers.

PubMed

Convey, Helen; Holt, Janet; Summers, Barbara

2018-07-01

This study explored the feasibility of using Construal Level Theory to analyse proxy decision maker thinking about a hypothetical ethical dilemma, relating to a person who has dementia. Proxy decision makers make decisions on behalf of individuals who are living with dementia when dementia affects that individual's decision making ability. Ethical dilemmas arise because there is a need to balance the individual's past and contemporary values and views. Understanding of how proxy decision makers respond is incomplete. Construal Level Theory contends that individuals imagine reactions and make predications about the future by crossing psychological distance. This involves abstract thinking, giving meaning to decisions. There is no empirical evidence of Construal Level Theory being used to analyse proxy decision maker thinking. Exploring the feasibility of using Construal Level Theory to understand dementia carer thinking regarding proxy decisions may provide insights which inform the support given. Descriptive qualitative research with semi-structured interviews. Seven participants were interviewed using a hypothetical dementia care scenario in February 2016. Interview transcripts were analysed for themes. Construal Level Theory was applied to analyse participant responses within themes using the Linguistic Category Model. Participants travelled across psychological distance, using abstract thinking to clarify goals and provide a basis for decisions. When thinking concretely participants established boundaries regarding the ethical dilemma. Construal Level Theory gives insight into proxy decision maker thinking and the levels of abstraction used. Understanding what dementia carers think about when making proxy decisions may help nurses to understand their perspectives and to provide appropriate support. © 2018 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Electrophysiological evidence of perceived sexual attractiveness for human female bodies varying in waist-to-hip ratio.

PubMed

Del Zotto, Marzia; Pegna, Alan J

2017-06-01

The dynamics of brain activation reflecting attractiveness in humans are unclear. Among the different features affecting attractiveness of the female body, the waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) is considered to be crucial. To date, however, no event-related potential (ERP) study has addressed the question of its associated pattern of brain activation. We carried out two different experiments: (a) a behavioural study, to judge the level of attractiveness of female realistic models depicting 4 different WHRs (0.6, 0.7, 0.8, 0.9) with and without clothes; (b) an EEG paradigm, to record brain activity while participants (heterosexual men and women) viewed these same models. Behavioural results showed that WHRs of 0.7 were considered more attractive than the others. ERP analyses revealed a different pattern of activation for male and female viewers. The 0.7 ratio elicited greater positivity at the P1 level in male viewers but not females. Naked bodies increased the N190 in both groups and peaked earlier for the 0.7 ratio in the male viewers. Finally, the late positive component (LPC) was found to be greater in male than in female viewers and was globally more marked for naked bodies as well as WHRs of 0.7 in both groups of viewers. These results provide the first electrophysiological evidence of specific time periods linked to the processing of a body feature denoting attractiveness and therefore playing a role in mate choice.

Dynamic lens and monovision 3D displays to improve viewer comfort.

PubMed

Johnson, Paul V; Parnell, Jared Aq; Kim, Joohwan; Saunter, Christopher D; Love, Gordon D; Banks, Martin S

2016-05-30

Stereoscopic 3D (S3D) displays provide an additional sense of depth compared to non-stereoscopic displays by sending slightly different images to the two eyes. But conventional S3D displays do not reproduce all natural depth cues. In particular, focus cues are incorrect causing mismatches between accommodation and vergence: The eyes must accommodate to the display screen to create sharp retinal images even when binocular disparity drives the eyes to converge to other distances. This mismatch causes visual discomfort and reduces visual performance. We propose and assess two new techniques that are designed to reduce the vergence-accommodation conflict and thereby decrease discomfort and increase visual performance. These techniques are much simpler to implement than previous conflict-reducing techniques. The first proposed technique uses variable-focus lenses between the display and the viewer's eyes. The power of the lenses is yoked to the expected vergence distance thereby reducing the mismatch between vergence and accommodation. The second proposed technique uses a fixed lens in front of one eye and relies on the binocularly fused percept being determined by one eye and then the other, depending on simulated distance. We conducted performance tests and discomfort assessments with both techniques and compared the results to those of a conventional S3D display. The first proposed technique, but not the second, yielded clear improvements in performance and reductions in discomfort. This dynamic-lens technique therefore offers an easily implemented technique for reducing the vergence-accommodation conflict and thereby improving viewer experience.

Safety of clinical and non-clinical decision makers in telephone triage: a narrative review.

PubMed

Wheeler, Sheila Q; Greenberg, Mary E; Mahlmeister, Laura; Wolfe, Nicole

2015-09-01

Patient safety is a persistent problem in telephone triage research; however, studies have not differentiated between clinicians' and non-clinicians' respective safety. Currently, four groups of decision makers perform aspects of telephone triage: clinicians (physicians, nurses), and non-clinicians (emergency medical dispatchers (EMD) and clerical staff). Using studies published between 2002-2012, we applied Donabedian's structure-process-outcome model to examine groups' systems for evidence of system completeness (a minimum measure of structure and quality). We defined system completeness as the presence of a decision maker and four additional components: guidelines, documentation, training, and standards. Defining safety as appropriate referrals (AR) - (right time, right place with the right person), we measured each groups' corresponding AR rate percentages (outcomes). We analyzed each group's respective decision-making process as a safe match to the telephone triage task, based on each group's system structure completeness, process and AR rates (outcome). Studies uniformly noted system component presence: nurses (2-4), physicians (1), EMDs (2), clerical staff (1). Nurses had the highest average appropriate referral (AR) rates (91%), physicians' AR (82% average). Clerical staff had no system and did not perform telephone triage by standard definitions; EMDs may represent the use of the wrong system. Telephone triage appears least safe after hours when decision makers with the least complete systems (physicians, clerical staff) typically manage calls. At minimum, telephone triage decision makers should be clinicians; however, clinicians' safety calls for improvement. With improved training, standards and CDSS quality, the 24/7 clinical call center has potential to represent the national standard. © The Author(s) 2015.

Bridging the gap between the economic evaluation literature and daily practice in occupational health: a qualitative study among decision-makers in the healthcare sector.

PubMed

van Dongen, Johanna M; Tompa, Emile; Clune, Laurie; Sarnocinska-Hart, Anna; Bongers, Paulien M; van Tulder, Maurits W; van der Beek, Allard J; van Wier, Marieke F

2013-06-03

Continued improvements in occupational health can only be ensured if decisions regarding the implementation and continuation of occupational health and safety interventions (OHS interventions) are based on the best available evidence. To ensure that this is the case, scientific evidence should meet the needs of decision-makers. As a first step in bridging the gap between the economic evaluation literature and daily practice in occupational health, this study aimed to provide insight into the occupational health decision-making process and information needs of decision-makers. An exploratory qualitative study was conducted with a purposeful sample of occupational health decision-makers in the Ontario healthcare sector. Eighteen in-depth interviews were conducted to explore the process by which occupational health decisions are made and the importance given to the financial implications of OHS interventions. Twenty-five structured telephone interviews were conducted to explore the sources of information used during the decision-making process, and decision-makers' knowledge on economic evaluation methods. In-depth interview data were analyzed according to the constant comparative method. For the structured telephone interviews, summary statistics were prepared. The occupational health decision-making process generally consists of three stages: initiation stage, establishing the need for an intervention; pre-implementation stage, developing an intervention and its business case in order to receive senior management approval; and implementation and evaluation stage, implementing and evaluating an intervention. During this process, information on the financial implications of OHS interventions was found to be of great importance, especially the employer's costs and benefits. However, scientific evidence was rarely consulted, sound ex-post program evaluations were hardly ever performed, and there seemed to be a need to advance the economic evaluation skill set of

Information processing by networks of quantum decision makers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yukalov, V. I.; Yukalova, E. P.; Sornette, D.

2018-02-01

We suggest a model of a multi-agent society of decision makers taking decisions being based on two criteria, one is the utility of the prospects and the other is the attractiveness of the considered prospects. The model is the generalization of quantum decision theory, developed earlier for single decision makers realizing one-step decisions, in two principal aspects. First, several decision makers are considered simultaneously, who interact with each other through information exchange. Second, a multistep procedure is treated, when the agents exchange information many times. Several decision makers exchanging information and forming their judgment, using quantum rules, form a kind of a quantum information network, where collective decisions develop in time as a result of information exchange. In addition to characterizing collective decisions that arise in human societies, such networks can describe dynamical processes occurring in artificial quantum intelligence composed of several parts or in a cluster of quantum computers. The practical usage of the theory is illustrated on the dynamic disjunction effect for which three quantitative predictions are made: (i) the probabilistic behavior of decision makers at the initial stage of the process is described; (ii) the decrease of the difference between the initial prospect probabilities and the related utility factors is proved; (iii) the existence of a common consensus after multiple exchange of information is predicted. The predicted numerical values are in very good agreement with empirical data.

Bridging the Gap: Tailor-made Information Products for Decision Makers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mandler, B. E.; Rose, C. A.; Gonzales, L. M.; Boland, M. A.

2016-12-01

The American Geosciences Institute (AGI) is launching a new information platform designed to link decision makers with information generated by geoscientific research. Decision makers, especially those at the state and local level, frequently need scientific information but do not always have easy access to it, while scientists create new knowledge but often lack opportunities to communicate this knowledge more broadly to the people who need it the most. Major differences in communication styles and language can also hinder the use of scientific information by decision makers. AGI is building an online portfolio of case studies and fact sheets that are based on cutting-edge research presented in a format and style that meets the needs and expectations of decision makers. Based on discussions with state and local decision makers around the country, AGI has developed a template for these products. Scientists are invited to write short (500-700-word) summaries of their research and the ways in which it provides useful tools and information to decision makers. We are particularly interested in showcasing actionable information derived from basic or applied research. Researchers are encouraged to contact AGI to discuss topics that may be an appropriate basis for case studies or fact sheets, and AGI may also contact researchers based on scientific needs identified during our discussions with decision makers. All submissions will be edited and reviewed by AGI staff and an external peer review team before being published online and made available to decision makers through AGI's Critical Issues web platform and extensive professional networks. Publicizing the results of scientific research to key legislative, regulatory, advisory, and engaged citizen groups and individuals broadens the impact of scientists' research and highlights the value and importance of the geosciences to society. By presenting the information in a format that is designed with the end-user in mind

LST CGM Generator and Viewer Final Report CRADA No. TSB-1558-98

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Vickers, Don; Larson, Don

The purpose of this project was to jointly develop and test a software plug-in that would convert native Pro /ENGINEER digital engineering drawings to Computer Graphics Metafile (CGM) format. If it was not feasible to convert the Pro/ENGINEER files, we planned to develop and test a similar conversion of native AutoCAD engineering drawings to CGM. CGM viewer plug-ins were developed as needed. There were four main tasks in this project: 1. Requirements for CGM Plug-in 2. Product Evaluation 3. Product Development Feasibility Study 4. Developing a "Plug-In" Application.

PhAst: A Flexible IDL Astronomical Image Viewer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rehnberg, Morgan; Crawford, R.; Trueblood, M.; Mighell, K.

2012-01-01

We present near-Earth asteroid data analyzed with PhAst, a new IDL astronomical image viewer based on the existing application ATV. PhAst opens, displays, and analyzes an arbitrary number of FITS images. Analysis packages include image calibration, photometry, and astrometry (provided through an interface with SExtractor, SCAMP, and missFITS). PhAst has been designed to generate reports for Minor Planet Center reporting. PhAst is cross platform (Linux/Mac OSX/Windows for image viewing and Linux/Mac OSX for image analysis) and can be downloaded from the following website at NOAO: http://www.noao.edu/staff/mighell/phast/. Rehnberg was supported by the NOAO/KPNO Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Program which is funded by the National Science Foundation Research Experiences for Undergraduates Program and the Department of Defense ASSURE program through Scientific Program Order No. 13 (AST-0754223) of the Cooperative Agreement No. AST-0132798 between the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) and the NSF.

Does Product Placement Change Television Viewers' Social Behavior?

PubMed

Paluck, Elizabeth Levy; Lagunes, Paul; Green, Donald P; Vavreck, Lynn; Peer, Limor; Gomila, Robin

2015-01-01

To what extent are television viewers affected by the behaviors and decisions they see modeled by characters in television soap operas? Collaborating with scriptwriters for three prime-time nationally-broadcast Spanish-language telenovelas, we embedded scenes about topics such as drunk driving or saving money at randomly assigned periods during the broadcast season. Outcomes were measured unobtrusively by aggregate city- and nation-wide time series, such as the number of Hispanic motorists arrested daily for drunk driving or the number of accounts opened in banks located in Hispanic neighborhoods. Results indicate that while two of the treatment effects are statistically significant, none are substantively large or long-lasting. Actions that could be taken during the immediate viewing session, like online searching, and those that were relatively more integrated into the telenovela storyline, specifically reducing cholesterol, were briefly affected, but not behaviors requiring sustained efforts, like opening a bank account or registering to vote.

Evidence for Agile Policy Makers: The Contribution of Transformative Realism

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Room, Graham

2013-01-01

Advocates of evidence-based policy making (EBPM) are typically concerned with the impact of particular interventions. This implicit ontology of the policy world, as disaggregated into a variety of independent interventions, has been challenged by Pawson (2006), in terms of the contingencies that activate, inhibit or reshape the impact of any…

Validation of Prototype Continuous Real-Time Vital Signs Video Analytics Monitoring System CCATT Viewer

DTIC Science & Technology

2018-01-26

attitude toward the use of the viewer. Clinicians may have different receptiveness to the new tool and various way to manage information during rounding...any patented invention that may relate to them. Qualified requestors may obtain copies of this report from the Defense Technical Information Center...This report is published in the interest of scientific and technical information exchange, and its publication does not constitute the Government’s

Approaching Science by Watching TV: What Do Entertainment Programs Contribute to Viewers' Competence in Genetic Engineering?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Weinmann, Carina; Löb, Charlotte; Mattheiß, Tamara; Vorderer, Peter

2013-01-01

This study examined the potential of entertainment-education (E-E) for promoting engagement with a science issue. It was assumed that certain entertaining features of a media experience increase viewers' perceived knowledge about an issue. Drawing on different theoretical models of E-E and on persuasive effects of narrative media messages, three…

Policy Makers' Perceptions on the Use of Evidence from Evaluations

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cameron, Ailsa; Salisbury, Chris; Lart, Rachel; Stewart, Kate; Peckham, Stephen; Calnan, Michael; Purdy, Sarah; Thorp, Helen

2011-01-01

Using data from the Department of Health funded study "Making the most of policy evaluations", this paper explores the views of those working within the policy process about the role of evidence. It highlights a tension between formative and summative uses of research, which appeared to be exacerbated by a lack of clarity surrounding the…

Case study: physicians develop results viewer amid Y2K commotion.

PubMed

Wurz, J A; Manis, J L

2000-01-01

Amid a flurry of Y2K preparations, which included converting patient accounting and order processing systems for six of its eight hospitals, Advocate Health Care needed to address physician complaints that the compliant software was awkward. By partnering with physicians, information systems (IS) rapidly developed a solution that met both the need for compliance and the demand for an easy-to-use, patient-centric clinical information system. A robust, browser-based results viewer provides physician access to information from patient accounting, order processing, and several clinical ancillary systems. Advocate anticipates greater challenges as the system is promoted to other sites and clinical communities.

AlliedSignal driver's viewer enhancement (DVE) for paramilitary and commercial applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Emanuel, Michael; Caron, Hubert; Kovacevic, Branislav; Faina-Cherkaoui, Marcela; Wrobel, Leslie; Turcotte, Gilles

1999-07-01

AlliedSignal Driver's Viewer Enhancement (DVE) system is a thermal imager using a 320 X 240 uncooled microbolometer array. This high performance system was initially developed for military combat and tactical wheeled vehicles. It features a very small sensor head remotely mounted from the display, control and processing module. The sensor head has a modular design and is being adapted to various commercial applications such as truck and car-driving aid, using specifically designed low cost optics. Tradeoffs in the system design, system features and test results are discussed in this paper. A short video shows footage of the DVE system while driving at night.

NGL Viewer: Web-based molecular graphics for large complexes.

PubMed

Rose, Alexander S; Bradley, Anthony R; Valasatava, Yana; Duarte, Jose M; Prlic, Andreas; Rose, Peter W

2018-05-29

The interactive visualization of very large macromolecular complexes on the web is becoming a challenging problem as experimental techniques advance at an unprecedented rate and deliver structures of increasing size. We have tackled this problem by developing highly memory-efficient and scalable extensions for the NGL WebGL-based molecular viewer and by using MMTF, a binary and compressed Macromolecular Transmission Format. These enable NGL to download and render molecular complexes with millions of atoms interactively on desktop computers and smartphones alike, making it a tool of choice for web-based molecular visualization in research and education. The source code is freely available under the MIT license at github.com/arose/ngl and distributed on NPM (npmjs.com/package/ngl). MMTF-JavaScript encoders and decoders are available at github.com/rcsb/mmtf-javascript. asr.moin@gmail.com.

The Arctic Observing Viewer (AOV): Visualization, Data Discovery, Strategic Assessment, and Decision Support for Arctic Observing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kassin, A.; Cody, R. P.; Barba, M.; Escarzaga, S. M.; Villarreal, S.; Manley, W. F.; Gaylord, A. G.; Habermann, T.; Kozimor, J.; Score, R.; Tweedie, C. E.

2017-12-01

To better assess progress in Arctic Observing made by U.S. SEARCH, NSF AON, SAON, and related initiatives, an updated version of the Arctic Observing Viewer (AOV; http://ArcticObservingViewer.org) has been released. This web mapping application and information system conveys the who, what, where, and when of "data collection sites" - the precise locations of monitoring assets, observing platforms, and wherever repeat marine or terrestrial measurements have been taken. Over 13,000 sites across the circumarctic are documented including a range of boreholes, ship tracks, buoys, towers, sampling stations, sensor networks, vegetation plots, stream gauges, ice cores, observatories, and more. Contributing partners are the U.S. NSF, NOAA, the NSF Arctic Data Center, ADIwg, AOOS, a2dc, CAFF, GINA, IASOA, INTERACT, NASA ABoVE, and USGS, among others. Users can visualize, navigate, select, search, draw, print, view details, and follow links to obtain a comprehensive perspective of environmental monitoring efforts. We continue to develop, populate, and enhance AOV. Recent updates include: a vastly improved Search tool with free text queries, autocomplete, and filters; faster performance; a new clustering visualization; heat maps to highlight concentrated research; and 3-D represented data to more easily identify trends. AOV is founded on principles of interoperability, such that agencies and organizations can use the AOV Viewer and web services for their own purposes. In this way, AOV complements other distributed yet interoperable cyber resources and helps science planners, funding agencies, investigators, data specialists, and others to: assess status, identify overlap, fill gaps, optimize sampling design, refine network performance, clarify directions, access data, coordinate logistics, and collaborate to meet Arctic Observing goals. AOV is a companion application to the Arctic Research Mapping Application (armap.org), which is focused on general project information at a

Speed, Space, Kids and the Television Cyclops: Viewers' Perceptions of Velocity and Distance in Televised Events.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Acker, Stephen R.

Television wide-angle lenses expand distances and increase apparent velocity, while long lenses compress space and reduce apparent velocity. Based on these assumptions, a study was conducted (1) to examine the ability of viewers of different ages to recognize how lenses change the "real world" they project and (2) to extend Jean Piaget's…

VPV--The velocity profile viewer user manual

USGS Publications Warehouse

Donovan, John M.

2004-01-01

The Velocity Profile Viewer (VPV) is a tool for visualizing time series of velocity profiles developed by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). The USGS uses VPV to preview and present measured velocity data from acoustic Doppler current profilers and simulated velocity data from three-dimensional estuarine, river, and lake hydrodynamic models. The data can be viewed as an animated three-dimensional profile or as a stack of time-series graphs that each represents a location in the water column. The graphically displayed data are shown at each time step like frames of animation. The animation can play at several different speeds or can be suspended on one frame. The viewing angle and time can be manipulated using mouse interaction. A number of options control the appearance of the profile and the graphs. VPV cannot edit or save data, but it can create a Post-Script file showing the velocity profile in three dimensions. This user manual describes how to use each of these features. VPV is available and can be downloaded for free from the World Wide Web at http://ca.water.usgs.gov/program/sfbay/vpv.

Helping decision makers frame, analyze, and implement decisions

USGS Publications Warehouse

Runge, Michael C.; McDonald-Madden, Eve

2018-01-01

All decisions have the same recognizable elements. Context, objectives, alternatives, consequences, and deliberation. Decision makers and analysts familiar with these elements can quickly see the underlying structure of a decision.There are only a small number of classes of decisions. These classes differ in the cognitive and scientific challenge they present to the decision maker; the ability to recognize the class of decision leads a decision maker to tools to aid in the analysis.Sometimes we need more information, sometimes we don’t. The role of science in a decision-making process is to provide the predictions that link the alternative actions to the desired outcomes. Investing in more science is only valuable if it helps to choose a better action.Implementation. The successful integration of decision analysis into environmental decisions requires careful attention to the decision, the people, and the institutions involved.

Automated update, revision, and quality control of the maize genome annotations using MAKER-P improves the B73 RefGen_v3 gene models and identifies new genes.

PubMed

Law, MeiYee; Childs, Kevin L; Campbell, Michael S; Stein, Joshua C; Olson, Andrew J; Holt, Carson; Panchy, Nicholas; Lei, Jikai; Jiao, Dian; Andorf, Carson M; Lawrence, Carolyn J; Ware, Doreen; Shiu, Shin-Han; Sun, Yanni; Jiang, Ning; Yandell, Mark

2015-01-01

The large size and relative complexity of many plant genomes make creation, quality control, and dissemination of high-quality gene structure annotations challenging. In response, we have developed MAKER-P, a fast and easy-to-use genome annotation engine for plants. Here, we report the use of MAKER-P to update and revise the maize (Zea mays) B73 RefGen_v3 annotation build (5b+) in less than 3 h using the iPlant Cyberinfrastructure. MAKER-P identified and annotated 4,466 additional, well-supported protein-coding genes not present in the 5b+ annotation build, added additional untranslated regions to 1,393 5b+ gene models, identified 2,647 5b+ gene models that lack any supporting evidence (despite the use of large and diverse evidence data sets), identified 104,215 pseudogene fragments, and created an additional 2,522 noncoding gene annotations. We also describe a method for de novo training of MAKER-P for the annotation of newly sequenced grass genomes. Collectively, these results lead to the 6a maize genome annotation and demonstrate the utility of MAKER-P for rapid annotation, management, and quality control of grasses and other difficult-to-annotate plant genomes. © 2015 American Society of Plant Biologists. All Rights Reserved.

Viewer-centered and body-centered frames of reference in direct visuomotor transformations.

PubMed

Carrozzo, M; McIntyre, J; Zago, M; Lacquaniti, F

1999-11-01

It has been hypothesized that the end-point position of reaching may be specified in an egocentric frame of reference. In most previous studies, however, reaching was toward a memorized target, rather than an actual target. Thus, the role played by sensorimotor transformation could not be disassociated from the role played by storage in short-term memory. In the present study the direct process of sensorimotor transformation was investigated in reaching toward continuously visible targets that need not be stored in memory. A virtual reality system was used to present visual targets in different three-dimensional (3D) locations in two different tasks, one with visual feedback of the hand and arm position (Seen Hand) and the other without such feedback (Unseen Hand). In the Seen Hand task, the axes of maximum variability and of maximum contraction converge toward the mid-point between the eyes. In the Unseen Hand task only the maximum contraction correlates with the sight-line and the axes of maximum variability are not viewer-centered but rotate anti-clockwise around the body and the effector arm during the move from the right to the left workspace. The bulk of findings from these and previous experiments support the hypothesis of a two-stage process, with a gradual transformation from viewer-centered to body-centered and arm-centered coordinates. Retinal, extra-retinal and arm-related signals appear to be progressively combined in superior and inferior parietal areas, giving rise to egocentric representations of the end-point position of reaching.

White House Maker Faire

NASA Image and Video Library

2014-06-18

Joey Hudy demonstrates his Intel Galileo-based 10x10x10 LED Cube during the first ever White House Maker Faire which brings together students, entrepreneurs, and everyday citizens who are using new tools and techniques to launch new businesses, learn vital skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), and fuel the renaissance in American manufacturing, at the White House, Wednesday, June 18, 2014 in Washington. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Film Makers On Film Making.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Geduld, Harry M., Ed.

This collection includes essays by and interviews with more than 30 film-makers, both classic and contemporary, on the subjects of their major interests and procedures in making films. The directors are: Louis Lumiere, Cecil Hepworth, Edwin S. Porter, Mack Sennett, David W. Griffith, Robert Flaherty, Charles Chaplin, Eric von Stroheim, Dziga…

Communicating the Needs of Climate Change Policy Makers to Scientists

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Brown, Molly E.; Escobar, Vanessa M.; Lovell, Heather

2012-01-01

This chapter will describe the challenges that earth scientists face in developing science data products relevant to decision maker and policy needs, and will describe strategies that can improve the two-way communication between the scientist and the policy maker. Climate change policy and decision making happens at a variety of scales - from local government implementing solar homes policies to international negotiations through the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Scientists can work to provide data at these different scales, but if they are not aware of the needs of decision makers or understand what challenges the policy maker is facing, they are likely to be less successful in influencing policy makers as they wished. This is because the science questions they are addressing may be compelling, but not relevant to the challenges that are at the forefront of policy concerns. In this chapter we examine case studies of science-policy partnerships, and the strategies each partnership uses to engage the scientist at a variety of scales. We examine three case studies: the global Carbon Monitoring System pilot project developed by NASA, a forest biomass mapping effort for Silvacarbon project, and a forest canopy cover project being conducted for forest management in Maryland. In each of these case studies, relationships between scientists and policy makers were critical for ensuring the focus of the science as well as the success of the decision-making.

Maker Movement Spreads Innovation One Project at a Time

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Peppler, Kylie; Bender, Sophia

2013-01-01

The maker movement consists of a growing culture of hands-on making, creating, designing, and innovating. A hallmark of the maker movement is its do-it-yourself (or do-it-with-others) mindset that brings individuals together around a range of activities, both high- and low-tech, all involving some form of creation or repair. The movement's…

Optimal global value of information trials: better aligning manufacturer and decision maker interests and enabling feasible risk sharing.

PubMed

Eckermann, Simon; Willan, Andrew R

2013-05-01

Risk sharing arrangements relate to adjusting payments for new health technologies given evidence of their performance over time. Such arrangements rely on prospective information regarding the incremental net benefit of the new technology, and its use in practice. However, once the new technology has been adopted in a particular jurisdiction, randomized clinical trials within that jurisdiction are likely to be infeasible and unethical in the cases where they would be most helpful, i.e. with current evidence of positive while uncertain incremental health and net monetary benefit. Informed patients in these cases would likely be reluctant to participate in a trial, preferring instead to receive the new technology with certainty. Consequently, informing risk sharing arrangements within a jurisdiction is problematic given the infeasibility of collecting prospective trial data. To overcome such problems, we demonstrate that global trials facilitate trialling post adoption, leading to more complete and robust risk sharing arrangements that mitigate the impact of costs of reversal on expected value of information in jurisdictions who adopt while a global trial is undertaken. More generally, optimally designed global trials offer distinct advantages over locally optimal solutions for decision makers and manufacturers alike: avoiding opportunity costs of delay in jurisdictions that adopt; overcoming barriers to evidence collection; and improving levels of expected implementation. Further, the greater strength and translatability of evidence across jurisdictions inherent in optimal global trial design reduces barriers to translation across jurisdictions characteristic of local trials. Consequently, efficiently designed global trials better align the interests of decision makers and manufacturers, increasing the feasibility of risk sharing and the expected strength of evidence over local trials, up until the point that current evidence is globally sufficient.

Shifting attention in viewer- and object-based reference frames after unilateral brain injury.

PubMed

List, Alexandra; Landau, Ayelet N; Brooks, Joseph L; Flevaris, Anastasia V; Fortenbaugh, Francesca C; Esterman, Michael; Van Vleet, Thomas M; Albrecht, Alice R; Alvarez, Bryan D; Robertson, Lynn C; Schendel, Krista

2011-06-01

The aims of the present study were to investigate the respective roles that object- and viewer-based reference frames play in reorienting visual attention, and to assess their influence after unilateral brain injury. To do so, we studied 16 right hemisphere injured (RHI) and 13 left hemisphere injured (LHI) patients. We used a cueing design that manipulates the location of cues and targets relative to a display comprised of two rectangles (i.e., objects). Unlike previous studies with patients, we presented all cues at midline rather than in the left or right visual fields. Thus, in the critical conditions in which targets were presented laterally, reorienting of attention was always from a midline cue. Performance was measured for lateralized target detection as a function of viewer-based (contra- and ipsilesional sides) and object-based (requiring reorienting within or between objects) reference frames. As expected, contralesional detection was slower than ipsilesional detection for the patients. More importantly, objects influenced target detection differently in the contralesional and ipsilesional fields. Contralesionally, reorienting to a target within the cued object took longer than reorienting to a target in the same location but in the uncued object. This finding is consistent with object-based neglect. Ipsilesionally, the means were in the opposite direction. Furthermore, no significant difference was found in object-based influences between the patient groups (RHI vs. LHI). These findings are discussed in the context of reference frames used in reorienting attention for target detection. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Building the capacity of policy-makers and planners to strengthen mental health systems in low- and middle-income countries: a systematic review.

PubMed

Keynejad, Roxanne; Semrau, Maya; Toynbee, Mark; Evans-Lacko, Sara; Lund, Crick; Gureje, Oye; Ndyanabangi, Sheila; Courtin, Emilie; Abdulmalik, Jibril O; Alem, Atalay; Fekadu, Abebaw; Thornicroft, Graham; Hanlon, Charlotte

2016-10-21

Little is known about the interventions required to build the capacity of mental health policy-makers and planners in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). We conducted a systematic review with the primary aim of identifying and synthesizing the evidence base for building the capacity of policy-makers and planners to strengthen mental health systems in LMICs. We searched MEDLINE, Embase, PsycINFO, Web of Knowledge, Web of Science, Scopus, CINAHL, LILACS, ScieELO, Google Scholar and Cochrane databases for studies reporting evidence, experience or evaluation of capacity-building of policy-makers, service planners or managers in mental health system strengthening in LMICs. Reports in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French or German were included. Additional papers were identified by hand-searching references and contacting experts and key informants. Database searches yielded 2922 abstracts and 28 additional papers were identified. Following screening, 409 full papers were reviewed, of which 14 fulfilled inclusion criteria for the review. Data were extracted from all included papers and synthesized into a narrative review. Only a small number of mental health system-related capacity-building interventions for policy-makers and planners in LMICs were described. Most models of capacity-building combined brief training with longer term mentorship, dialogue and/or the establishment of networks of support. However, rigorous research and evaluation methods were largely absent, with studies being of low quality, limiting the potential to separate mental health system strengthening outcomes from the effects of associated contextual factors. This review demonstrates the need for partnership approaches to building the capacity of mental health policy-makers and planners in LMICs, assessed rigorously against pre-specified conceptual frameworks and hypotheses, utilising longitudinal evaluation and mixed quantitative and qualitative approaches.

LookSeq: a browser-based viewer for deep sequencing data.

PubMed

Manske, Heinrich Magnus; Kwiatkowski, Dominic P

2009-11-01

Sequencing a genome to great depth can be highly informative about heterogeneity within an individual or a population. Here we address the problem of how to visualize the multiple layers of information contained in deep sequencing data. We propose an interactive AJAX-based web viewer for browsing large data sets of aligned sequence reads. By enabling seamless browsing and fast zooming, the LookSeq program assists the user to assimilate information at different levels of resolution, from an overview of a genomic region to fine details such as heterogeneity within the sample. A specific problem, particularly if the sample is heterogeneous, is how to depict information about structural variation. LookSeq provides a simple graphical representation of paired sequence reads that is more revealing about potential insertions and deletions than are conventional methods.

Assessment of 3D Viewers for the Display of Interactive Documents in the Learning of Graphic Engineering

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Barbero, Basilio Ramos; Pedrosa, Carlos Melgosa; Mate, Esteban Garcia

2012-01-01

The purpose of this study is to determine which 3D viewers should be used for the display of interactive graphic engineering documents, so that the visualization and manipulation of 3D models provide useful support to students of industrial engineering (mechanical, organizational, electronic engineering, etc). The technical features of 26 3D…

All-CMOS night vision viewer with integrated microdisplay

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Goosen, Marius E.; Venter, Petrus J.; du Plessis, Monuko; Faure, Nicolaas M.; Janse van Rensburg, Christo; Rademeyer, Pieter

2014-02-01

The unrivalled integration potential of CMOS has made it the dominant technology for digital integrated circuits. With the advent of visible light emission from silicon through hot carrier electroluminescence, several applications arose, all of which rely upon the advantages of mature CMOS technologies for a competitive edge in a very active and attractive market. In this paper we present a low-cost night vision viewer which employs only standard CMOS technologies. A commercial CMOS imager is utilized for near infrared image capturing with a 128x96 pixel all-CMOS microdisplay implemented to convey the image to the user. The display is implemented in a standard 0.35 μm CMOS process, with no process alterations or post processing. The display features a 25 μm pixel pitch and a 3.2 mm x 2.4 mm active area, which through magnification presents the virtual image to the user equivalent of a 19-inch display viewed from a distance of 3 meters. This work represents the first application of a CMOS microdisplay in a low-cost consumer product.

"Observation Obscurer" - Time Series Viewer, Editor and Processor

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Andronov, I. L.

The program is described, which contains a set of subroutines suitable for East viewing and interactive filtering and processing of regularly and irregularly spaced time series. Being a 32-bit DOS application, it may be used as a default fast viewer/editor of time series in any compute shell ("commander") or in Windows. It allows to view the data in the "time" or "phase" mode, to remove ("obscure") or filter outstanding bad points; to make scale transformations and smoothing using few methods (e.g. mean with phase binning, determination of the statistically opti- mal number of phase bins; "running parabola" (Andronov, 1997, As. Ap. Suppl, 125, 207) fit and to make time series analysis using some methods, e.g. correlation, autocorrelation and histogram analysis: determination of extrema etc. Some features have been developed specially for variable star observers, e.g. the barycentric correction, the creation and fast analysis of "OC" diagrams etc. The manual for "hot keys" is presented. The computer code was compiled with a 32-bit Free Pascal (www.freepascal.org).

3D Viewer Platform of Cloud Clustering Management System: Google Map 3D

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Choi, Sung-Ja; Lee, Gang-Soo

The new management system of framework for cloud envrionemnt is needed by the platfrom of convergence according to computing environments of changes. A ISV and small business model is hard to adapt management system of platform which is offered from super business. This article suggest the clustering management system of cloud computing envirionments for ISV and a man of enterprise in small business model. It applies the 3D viewer adapt from map3D & earth of google. It is called 3DV_CCMS as expand the CCMS[1].

Evidence-based Sensor Tasking for Space Domain Awareness

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jaunzemis, A.; Holzinger, M.; Jah, M.

2016-09-01

Space Domain Awareness (SDA) is the actionable knowledge required to predict, avoid, deter, operate through, recover from, and/or attribute cause to the loss and/or degradation of space capabilities and services. A main purpose for SDA is to provide decision-making processes with a quantifiable and timely body of evidence of behavior(s) attributable to specific space threats and/or hazards. To fulfill the promise of SDA, it is necessary for decision makers and analysts to pose specific hypotheses that may be supported or refuted by evidence, some of which may only be collected using sensor networks. While Bayesian inference may support some of these decision making needs, it does not adequately capture ambiguity in supporting evidence; i.e., it struggles to rigorously quantify 'known unknowns' for decision makers. Over the past 40 years, evidential reasoning approaches such as Dempster Shafer theory have been developed to address problems with ambiguous bodies of evidence. This paper applies mathematical theories of evidence using Dempster Shafer expert systems to address the following critical issues: 1) How decision makers can pose critical decision criteria as rigorous, testable hypotheses, 2) How to interrogate these hypotheses to reduce ambiguity, and 3) How to task a network of sensors to gather evidence for multiple competing hypotheses. This theory is tested using a simulated sensor tasking scenario balancing search versus track responsibilities.

Designing evaluation studies to optimally inform policy: what factors do policy-makers in China consider when making resource allocation decisions on healthcare worker training programmes?

PubMed

Wu, Shishi; Legido-Quigley, Helena; Spencer, Julia; Coker, Richard James; Khan, Mishal Sameer

2018-02-23

In light of the gap in evidence to inform future resource allocation decisions about healthcare provider (HCP) training in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), and the considerable donor investments being made towards training interventions, evaluation studies that are optimally designed to inform local policy-makers are needed. The aim of our study is to understand what features of HCP training evaluation studies are important for decision-making by policy-makers in LMICs. We investigate the extent to which evaluations based on the widely used Kirkpatrick model - focusing on direct outcomes of training, namely reaction of trainees, learning, behaviour change and improvements in programmatic health indicators - align with policy-makers' evidence needs for resource allocation decisions. We use China as a case study where resource allocation decisions about potential scale-up (using domestic funding) are being made about an externally funded pilot HCP training programme. Qualitative data were collected from high-level officials involved in resource allocation at the national and provincial level in China through ten face-to-face, in-depth interviews and two focus group discussions consisting of ten participants each. Data were analysed manually using an interpretive thematic analysis approach. Our study indicates that Chinese officials not only consider information about the direct outcomes of a training programme, as captured in the Kirkpatrick model, but also need information on the resources required to implement the training, the wider or indirect impacts of training, and the sustainability and scalability to other settings within the country. In addition to considering findings presented in evaluation studies, we found that Chinese policy-makers pay close attention to whether the evaluations were robust and to the composition of the evaluation team. Our qualitative study indicates that training programme evaluations that focus narrowly on direct training

Do They Believe It When They See It?: Video News Release Effects on Viewer Recall and Attitudes.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Owen, Anne; Karrh, James A.

A study tested responses of viewers (as opposed to news organizations and sponsoring firms) to video news releases (VNRs). Subjects, 81 undergraduate students enrolled in an introductory advertising course, viewed a 30-second message about McDonald's and the Big Mac in a VNR format or an advertisement about the Big Mac special "Meal…

The colors of paintings and viewers' preferences.

PubMed

Nascimento, Sérgio M C; Linhares, João M M; Montagner, Cristina; João, Catarina A R; Amano, Kinjiro; Alfaro, Catarina; Bailão, Ana

2017-01-01

One hypothesis to explain the aesthetics of paintings is that it depends on the extent to which they mimic natural image statistics. In fact, paintings and natural scenes share several statistical image regularities but the colors of paintings seem generally more biased towards red than natural scenes. Is the particular option for colors in each painting, even if less naturalistic, critical for perceived beauty? Here we show that it is. In the experiments, 50 naïve observers, unfamiliar with the 10 paintings tested, could rotate the color gamut of the paintings and select the one producing the best subjective impression. The distributions of angles obtained are described by normal distributions with maxima deviating, on average, only 7 degrees from the original gamut orientation and full width at half maximum just above the threshold to perceive a chromatic change in the paintings. Crucially, for data pooled across observers and abstract paintings the maximum of the distribution was at zero degrees, i.e., the same as the original. This demonstrates that artists know what chromatic compositions match viewers' preferences and that the option for less naturalistic colors does not constrain the aesthetic value of paintings. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

jsNMR: an embedded platform-independent NMR spectrum viewer.

PubMed

Vosegaard, Thomas

2015-04-01

jsNMR is a lightweight NMR spectrum viewer written in JavaScript/HyperText Markup Language (HTML), which provides a cross-platform spectrum visualizer that runs on all computer architectures including mobile devices. Experimental (and simulated) datasets are easily opened in jsNMR by (i) drag and drop on a jsNMR browser window, (ii) by preparing a jsNMR file from the jsNMR web site, or (iii) by mailing the raw data to the jsNMR web portal. jsNMR embeds the original data in the HTML file, so a jsNMR file is a self-transforming dataset that may be exported to various formats, e.g. comma-separated values. The main applications of jsNMR are to provide easy access to NMR data without the need for dedicated software installed and to provide the possibility to visualize NMR spectra on web sites. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Automated Update, Revision, and Quality Control of the Maize Genome Annotations Using MAKER-P Improves the B73 RefGen_v3 Gene Models and Identifies New Genes1[OPEN

PubMed Central

Law, MeiYee; Childs, Kevin L.; Campbell, Michael S.; Stein, Joshua C.; Olson, Andrew J.; Holt, Carson; Panchy, Nicholas; Lei, Jikai; Jiao, Dian; Andorf, Carson M.; Lawrence, Carolyn J.; Ware, Doreen; Shiu, Shin-Han; Sun, Yanni; Jiang, Ning; Yandell, Mark

2015-01-01

The large size and relative complexity of many plant genomes make creation, quality control, and dissemination of high-quality gene structure annotations challenging. In response, we have developed MAKER-P, a fast and easy-to-use genome annotation engine for plants. Here, we report the use of MAKER-P to update and revise the maize (Zea mays) B73 RefGen_v3 annotation build (5b+) in less than 3 h using the iPlant Cyberinfrastructure. MAKER-P identified and annotated 4,466 additional, well-supported protein-coding genes not present in the 5b+ annotation build, added additional untranslated regions to 1,393 5b+ gene models, identified 2,647 5b+ gene models that lack any supporting evidence (despite the use of large and diverse evidence data sets), identified 104,215 pseudogene fragments, and created an additional 2,522 noncoding gene annotations. We also describe a method for de novo training of MAKER-P for the annotation of newly sequenced grass genomes. Collectively, these results lead to the 6a maize genome annotation and demonstrate the utility of MAKER-P for rapid annotation, management, and quality control of grasses and other difficult-to-annotate plant genomes. PMID:25384563

Evaluation of the Monroe Slurry Maker.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2009-05-01

In early February, 2009, the Maine Department of Transportation (MaineDOT) installed a Monroe Slurry : Maker on one of its 2009 Volvo Wheelers (see Photos 1 and 2). This truck was equipped with a : Henderson Utility Body. An 18 gallon per minute spoo...

The meaning of craft: craft makers' descriptions of craft as an occupation.

PubMed

Pöllänen, Sinikka

2013-05-01

The aim of this study is to examine how craft makers describe the meaning of craft as an activity in relation to their well-being. The study is based on an analysis of the written narratives of 92 textile craft makers aged 16 to 84. Based on the results, the well-being enhancing nature of craft as a meaningful occupation for those interested in crafting is evident. The significance of craft making as an occupation is described by the following three themes: (a) "the meaning and value of crafts", (b) "the feelings experienced during craft activity", and (c) "the holisticity and intentionality of craft-making". As an activity and a metaphor, craft making helped the participants to adjust to life situations. Elements of craft that enhance well-being can be traced to both the artefacts and the sense of achievement gained in producing them. The effects of craft include personal growth, development of physical and cognitive skills, control of one's body, thoughts, and feelings, as well as cultural and social awareness. The results indicate that the participants noticed the significance of craft as an agony- and stress-reducing and mind-calming activity. Holistic craft and ordinary craft played different roles in maintaining well-being.

The Arctic Observing Viewer (AOV): Visualization, Data Discovery, Strategic Assessment, and Decision Support for Arctic Observing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cody, R. P.; Manley, W. F.; Gaylord, A. G.; Kassin, A.; Villarreal, S.; Barba, M.; Dover, M.; Escarzaga, S. M.; Habermann, T.; Kozimor, J.; Score, R.; Tweedie, C. E.

2016-12-01

To better assess progress in Arctic Observing made by U.S. SEARCH, NSF AON, SAON, and related initiatives, an updated version of the Arctic Observing Viewer (AOV; http://ArcticObservingViewer.org) has been released. This web mapping application and information system conveys the who, what, where, and when of "data collection sites" - the precise locations of monitoring assets, observing platforms, and wherever repeat marine or terrestrial measurements have been taken. Over 8000 sites across the circum-arctic are documented including a range of boreholes, ship tracks, buoys, towers, sampling stations, sensor networks, vegetation plots, stream gauges, ice cores, observatories, and more. Contributing partners are the U.S. NSF, ACADIS, ADIwg, AOOS, a2dc, AON, CAFF, GINA, IASOA, INTERACT, NASA ABoVE, and USGS, among others. Users can visualize, navigate, select, search, draw, print, view details, and follow links to obtain a comprehensive perspective of environmental monitoring efforts. We continue to develop, populate, and enhance AOV. Recent improvements include: a more intuitive and functional search tool, a modern cross-platform interface using javascript and HTML5, and hierarchical ISO metadata coupled with RESTful web services & metadata XLinks to span the data life cycle (from project planning to establishment of data collection sites to release of scientific datasets). Additionally, through collaborations with the Barrow Area Information Database (BAID, www.barrowmapped.org) we are exploring linkages with datacenters and have developed a prototype dashboard application that allows users to explore data services in the AOV application. AOV is founded on principles of interoperability, such that agencies and organizations can use the AOV Viewer and web services for their own purposes. In this way, AOV complements other distributed yet interoperable cyber resources and helps science planners, funding agencies, investigators, data specialists, and others to: assess

What Do Social Media Say About Makeovers? A Content Analysis of Cosmetic Surgery Videos and Viewers' Responses on YouTube.

PubMed

Wen, Nainan; Chia, Stella C; Hao, Xiaoming

2015-01-01

This study examines portrayals of cosmetic surgery on YouTube, where we found a substantial number of cosmetic surgery videos. Most of the videos came from cosmetic surgeons who appeared to be aggressively using social media in their practices. Except for videos that explained cosmetic surgery procedures, most videos in our sample emphasized the benefits of cosmetic surgery, and only a small number of the videos addressed the involved risks. We also found that tactics of persuasive communication-namely, related to message source and message sensation value (MSV)-have been used in Web-based social media to attract viewers' attention and interests. Expert sources were used predominantly, although typical-consumer sources tended to generate greater viewer interest in cosmetic surgery than other types of message sources. High MSV, moreover, was found to increase a video's popularity.

Whose Evidence Base? The Dynamic Effects of Ownership, Receptivity and Values on Collaborative Evidence-Informed Policy Making

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shine, Kasey Treadwell; Bartley, Brendan

2011-01-01

This paper explores questions of ownership of and receptivity to research-based evidence and, in combination with often competing values, their effect on collaborative evidence-informed policy making (EIPM). We propose that these issues generate a "dynamo" of push-pull factors for policy makers, researchers and research managers. Through…

Gaining Momentum: How Media Influences Public Opinion To Push Civil-Military Decision Makers Into Formulating Foreign Policy

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-02-09

1 AIR WAR COLLEGE AIR UNIVERSITY GAINING MOMENTUM: HOW MEDIA INFLUENCES PUBLIC OPINION TO PUSH CIVIL-MILITARY DECISION MAKERS INTO...engagements from the past, evidence suggest the media or press does have an influence over public opinion, especially during times of war and humanitarian...changes and that leaders must take into consideration that public opinion and the media may provide a large amount of influence over how the nation

Study protocol: DEcisions in health Care to Introduce or Diffuse innovations using Evidence (DECIDE).

PubMed

Turner, Simon; Morris, Stephen; Sheringham, Jessica; Hudson, Emma; Fulop, Naomi J

2016-04-05

A range of evidence informs healthcare decision-making, from formal research findings to 'soft intelligence' or local data, as well as practical experience or tacit knowledge. However, cultural and organisational factors often prevent the translation of such evidence into practice. Using a multi-level framework, this project will analyse how interactions between the evidence available and processes at the micro (individual/group) and meso (organisational/system) levels influence decisions to introduce or diffuse innovations in acute and primary care within the National Health Service in the UK. This study will use a mixed methods design, combining qualitative and quantitative methods, and involves four interdependent work streams: (1) rapid evidence synthesis of relevant literature with stakeholder feedback; (2) in-depth case studies of 'real-world' decision-making in acute and primary care; (3) a national survey and discrete choice experiment; and (4) development of guidance for decision-makers and evaluators to support the use of evidence in decision-making. This study will enhance the understanding of decision-makers' use of diverse forms of evidence. The findings will provide insights into how and why some evidence does inform decisions to introduce healthcare innovations, and why barriers persist in other cases. It will also quantify decision-makers' preferences, including the 'tipping point' of evidence needed to shift stakeholders' views. Practical guidance will be shared with healthcare decision-makers and evaluators on uses of evidence to enable the introduction and diffusion of innovation.

m6aViewer: software for the detection, analysis, and visualization of N6-methyladenosine peaks from m6A-seq/ME-RIP sequencing data.

PubMed

Antanaviciute, Agne; Baquero-Perez, Belinda; Watson, Christopher M; Harrison, Sally M; Lascelles, Carolina; Crinnion, Laura; Markham, Alexander F; Bonthron, David T; Whitehouse, Adrian; Carr, Ian M

2017-10-01

Recent methods for transcriptome-wide N 6 -methyladenosine (m 6 A) profiling have facilitated investigations into the RNA methylome and established m 6 A as a dynamic modification that has critical regulatory roles in gene expression and may play a role in human disease. However, bioinformatics resources available for the analysis of m 6 A sequencing data are still limited. Here, we describe m6aViewer-a cross-platform application for analysis and visualization of m 6 A peaks from sequencing data. m6aViewer implements a novel m 6 A peak-calling algorithm that identifies high-confidence methylated residues with more precision than previously described approaches. The application enables data analysis through a graphical user interface, and thus, in contrast to other currently available tools, does not require the user to be skilled in computer programming. m6aViewer and test data can be downloaded here: http://dna2.leeds.ac.uk/m6a. © 2017 Antanaviciute et al.; Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press for the RNA Society.

The Art of Influencing Decision Makers.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Diegmueller, Karen

1992-01-01

Influencing educational decision makers requires creating ongoing relationships, keeping everyone informed, and developing persuasive skills. Persuasion requires preparation, refinement, hard work, and a sound understanding of the people being lobbied. Lobbying must be factual and relevant to the audience. The article looks at influence from the…

ENVIRONMENTAL PLANNING FOR SMALL COMMUNITIES: A GUIDE FOR LOCAL DECISION-MAKERS

EPA Science Inventory

Environmental Planning for Small Communities - A Guide for Local Decision-Makers presents a process for creating and implementing a community environmental plan. With a comprehensive environmental plan, local decision-makers can create an integrated approach to protecting the env...

The "Good Governance" of Evidence in Health Policy

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hawkins, Benjamin; Parkhurst, Justin

2016-01-01

Calls for evidence-based policy often fail to recognise the fundamentally political nature of policy making. Policy makers must identify, evaluate and utilise evidence to solve policy problems in the face of competing priorities and political agendas. Evidence should inform but cannot determine policy choices. This paper draws on theories of…

The other-race effect does not rely on memory: Evidence from a matching task.

PubMed

Megreya, Ahmed M; White, David; Burton, A Mike

2011-08-01

Viewers are typically better at remembering faces from their own race than from other races; however, it is not yet established whether this effect is due to memorial or perceptual processes. In this study, UK and Egyptian viewers were given a simultaneous face-matching task, in which the target faces were presented upright or upside down. As with previous research using face memory tasks, participants were worse at matching other-race faces than own-race faces and showed a stronger face inversion effect for own-race faces. However, subjects' performance on own and other-race faces was highly correlated. These data provide strong evidence that difficulty in perceptual encoding of unfamiliar faces contributes substantially to the other-race effect and that accounts based entirely on memory cannot capture the full data. Implications for forensic settings are also discussed.

Bedside patient data viewer using RFID and e-Ink technology.

PubMed

Nikodijevic, Aleksandar; Pichler, Patrick; Forjan, Mathias; Sauermann, Stefan

2014-01-01

In the daily routine of hospitals, which work with paper based medical records, the staff has to find the appropriate patient file if it needs information about the patient. With the introduction of ELGA the Austrian hospitals have to use specific standards for their clinical documentation. These structured documents can be used to feed an e-Ink reader with information about every patient in a hospital. Combined with RFID and security measures, the clinical staff is supported during the patient file searching process. The developed experimental setup of the Bedside Patient Data Viewer demonstrates a prototype of such a system. An Amazon Kindle Paperwhite is used to display processed data, supplied by a Raspberry Pi with an attached RFID module for identification purposes. Results show that such a system can be implemented, however a lot of organizational and technical issues remain to be solved.

Modelling a Network of Decision Makers

DTIC Science & Technology

2004-06-01

DATES COVERED 00-00-2004 to 00-00-2004 4. TITLE AND SUBTITLE Modelling a Netowrk of Decision Makers (Briefing Charts) 5a. CONTRACT NUMBER 5b...contains color images. 14. ABSTRACT 15. SUBJECT TERMS 16. SECURITY CLASSIFICATION OF: 17. LIMITATION OF ABSTRACT 18. NUMBER OF PAGES 31 19a

The Cloud-Based Integrated Data Viewer (IDV)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fisher, Ward

2015-04-01

Maintaining software compatibility across new computing environments and the associated underlying hardware is a common problem for software engineers and scientific programmers. While there are a suite of tools and methodologies used in traditional software engineering environments to mitigate this issue, they are typically ignored by developers lacking a background in software engineering. The result is a large body of software which is simultaneously critical and difficult to maintain. Visualization software is particularly vulnerable to this problem, given the inherent dependency on particular graphics hardware and software API's. The advent of cloud computing has provided a solution to this problem, which was not previously practical on a large scale; Application Streaming. This technology allows a program to run entirely on a remote virtual machine while still allowing for interactivity and dynamic visualizations, with little-to-no re-engineering required. Through application streaming we are able to bring the same visualization to a desktop, a netbook, a smartphone, and the next generation of hardware, whatever it may be. Unidata has been able to harness Application Streaming to provide a tablet-compatible version of our visualization software, the Integrated Data Viewer (IDV). This work will examine the challenges associated with adapting the IDV to an application streaming platform, and include a brief discussion of the underlying technologies involved. We will also discuss the differences between local software and software-as-a-service.

On avoiding framing effects in experienced decision makers.

PubMed

Garcia-Retamero, Rocio; Dhami, Mandeep K

2013-01-01

The present study aimed to (a) demonstrate the effect of positive-negative framing on experienced criminal justice decision makers, (b) examine the debiasing effect of visually structured risk messages, and (c) investigate whether risk perceptions mediate the debiasing effect of visual aids on decision making. In two phases, 60 senior police officers estimated the accuracy of a counterterrorism technique in identifying whether a known terror suspect poses an imminent danger and decided whether they would recommend the technique to policy makers. Officers also rated their confidence in this recommendation. When information about the effectiveness of the counterterrorism technique was presented in a numerical format, officers' perceptions of accuracy and recommendation decisions were susceptible to the framing effect: The technique was perceived to be more accurate and was more likely to be recommended when its effectiveness was presented in a positive than in a negative frame. However, when the information was represented visually using icon arrays, there were no such framing effects. Finally, perceptions of accuracy mediated the debiasing effect of visual aids on recommendation decisions. We offer potential explanations for the debiasing effect of visual aids and implications for communicating risk to experienced, professional decision makers.

Inside the Agenda-Setting Process: How Political Advertising and TV News Prime Viewers Think about Issues and Candidates.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Schleuder, Joan; And Others

A study of the agenda-setting influence of the mass media on adult viewers explored (in a series of five experiments) how political knowledge stored in long term memory can be activated by the media, leading to decisions about issue salience. Spreading activation theory formed the basis for the study, and priming--the concept that the activation…

James Henry Marriott: New Zealand's first professional telescope-maker

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Orchiston, Wayne; Romick, Carl; Brown, Pendreigh.

2015-11-01

James Henry Marriott was born in London in 1799 and trained as an optician and scientific instrument- maker. In 1842 he emigrated to New Zealand and in January 1843 settled in the newly-established town of Wellington. He was New Zealand's first professional telescope-maker, but we have only been able to locate one telescope made by him while in New Zealand, a brass 1-draw marine telescope with a 44-mm objective, which was manufactured in 1844. In 2004 this marine telescope was purchased in Hawaii by the second author of this paper. In this paper we provide biographical information about Marriott, describe his 1844 marine telescope and speculate on its provenance. We conclude that although he may have been New Zealand's first professional telescope-maker Marriot actually made very few telescopes or other scientific instruments. As such, rather than being recognised as a pioneer of telescope-making in New Zealand he should be remembered as the founder of New Zealand theatre.

White House Maker Faire

NASA Image and Video Library

2014-06-18

President Barack Obama delivers his remarks at the first ever White House Maker Faire, which brings together students, entrepreneurs, and everyday citizens who are using new tools and techniques to launch new businesses, learn vital skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), and fuel the renaissance in American manufacturing, at the White House, Wednesday, June 18, 2014 in Washington. The President announced new steps the Administration and its partners are taking to support the ability of more Americans, young and old, to have to access to these tools and techniques and brings their ideas to life. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

New Hampshire Sugar Makers Participate in Climate Change Study of Acer Saccharum

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rock, B. N.; Carlson, M.

2012-12-01

A dozen maple sugar producers in New Hampshire have participated for the past three years in a study of sugar maple (Acer saccharum) and its response to climate-related and other stress agents. A dominant tree in the northeastern temperate forest, the sugar maple is projected to lose 52% of its range in the United States due to climate change stresses in this century. The species is already severely stressed by acid deposition as well as a wide array of environmental predators and pathogens. Engaging the public in studies of climate change is of pressing importance. Climate change is ubiquitous and is expressed in a wide variety of phenomena—changing patterns of seasonal temperature and precipitation, more severe storms, changing atmospheric chemistry, phenologic chemistry change, ecotone shifts and new invasive competitors and predators. Scientists need citizen partners who are trained observers and who are familiar with protocols for monitoring, reporting and questioning what they observe. There is also a growing need for a public that is informed about climate change and variability so citizens can understand and support policy changes as needed to address climate change. In New Hampshire, sugar makers have collected maple sap samples at four times early in the sap season each year since 2010. The samples are collected and stored according to strict chemical protocols. The sugar makers have provided UNH and U.S. Forest Service chemists with significant numbers of sap samples for analysis of their phenolic chemistry. Correlating the sap chemistry with high spectral resolution reflectance measures of maple foliage, we are exploring whether changes in sap phenolics may signal distress or of long-term health of the trees. In addition, the sugar makers have provided access to their sugar orchards for monthly sampling of leaves and buds, beginning in May and continuing through the Fall. The three years of data are building long-term evidence of changes in maple

The Morality of University Decision-Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hatier, Cécile

2014-01-01

Ethical failures in UK higher education have recently made the news but are not a recent development. University decision-makers can, in order to adopt an ethical way of reasoning, resort to several ethical traditions. This article focuses, through the use of concrete examples, on three which have had a significant impact in recent higher…

When There Is Not Enough Evidence and When Evidence Is Not Enough: An Australian Indigenous Smoking Policy Study.

PubMed

Vujcich, Daniel; Rayner, Mike; Allender, Steven; Fitzpatrick, Ray

2016-01-01

The Indigenous Tobacco Control Initiative and Tackling Indigenous Smoking Measure were both announced by the Australian Government at a time when its rhetoric around the importance of evidence-based policy making was strong. This article will (1) examine how the Rudd Government used evidence in Indigenous tobacco control policy making and (2) explore the facilitators of and barriers to the use of evidence. Data were collected through (1) a review of primary documents largely obtained under the Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Commonwealth of Australia) and (2) interviews with senior politicians, senior bureaucrats, government advisors, Indigenous health advocates, and academics. Through the Freedom of Information Act process, 24 previously undisclosed government documents relevant to the making of Indigenous tobacco control policies were identified. Interviewees ( n  = 31, response rate 62%) were identified through both purposive and snowball recruitment strategies. The Framework Analysis method was used to analyze documentary and interview data. Government policy design was heavily influenced by the recommendations presented in government authored/commissioned literature reviews. Resulting policies were led by equivocal evidence for improved tobacco control outcomes among Indigenous Australians. Many of the cited studies had methodological limitations. In the absence of high-quality evidence, some policy makers supported policy recommendations that were perceived to be popular among the Indigenous community. Other policy makers recognized that there were barriers to accumulating rigorous, generalizable evidence; in the absence of such evidence, the policy makers considered that the "need for action" could be combined with the "need for research" by introducing innovative strategies and evaluating them. Despite the absence of high-quality evidence, the formulation and adoption of Indigenous tobacco policy was neither irrational nor reckless. The decision to

Energy-Water Nexus: Balancing the Tradeoffs between Two-Level Decision Makers

DOE PAGES

Zhang, Xiaodong; Vesselinov, Velimir Valentinov

2016-09-03

Energy-water nexus has substantially increased importance in the recent years. Synergistic approaches based on systems-analysis and mathematical models are critical for helping decision makers better understand the interrelationships and tradeoffs between energy and water. In energywater nexus management, various decision makers with different goals and preferences, which are often conflicting, are involved. These decision makers may have different controlling power over the management objectives and the decisions. They make decisions sequentially from the upper level to the lower level, challenging decision making in energy-water nexus. In order to address such planning issues, a bi-level decision model is developed, which improvesmore » upon the existing studies by integration of bi-level programming into energy-water nexus management. The developed model represents a methodological contribution to the challenge of sequential decisionmaking in energy-water nexus through provision of an integrated modeling framework/tool. An interactive fuzzy optimization methodology is introduced to seek a satisfactory solution to meet the overall satisfaction of the two-level decision makers. The tradeoffs between the two-level decision makers in energy-water nexus management are effectively addressed and quantified. Application of the proposed model to a synthetic example problem has demonstrated its applicability in practical energy-water nexus management. Optimal solutions for electricity generation, fuel supply, water supply including groundwater, surface water and recycled water, capacity expansion of the power plants, and GHG emission control are generated. In conclusion, these analyses are capable of helping decision makers or stakeholders adjust their tolerances to make informed decisions to achieve the overall satisfaction of energy-water nexus management where bi-level sequential decision making process is involved.« less

Energy-Water Nexus: Balancing the Tradeoffs between Two-Level Decision Makers

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Zhang, Xiaodong; Vesselinov, Velimir Valentinov

Energy-water nexus has substantially increased importance in the recent years. Synergistic approaches based on systems-analysis and mathematical models are critical for helping decision makers better understand the interrelationships and tradeoffs between energy and water. In energywater nexus management, various decision makers with different goals and preferences, which are often conflicting, are involved. These decision makers may have different controlling power over the management objectives and the decisions. They make decisions sequentially from the upper level to the lower level, challenging decision making in energy-water nexus. In order to address such planning issues, a bi-level decision model is developed, which improvesmore » upon the existing studies by integration of bi-level programming into energy-water nexus management. The developed model represents a methodological contribution to the challenge of sequential decisionmaking in energy-water nexus through provision of an integrated modeling framework/tool. An interactive fuzzy optimization methodology is introduced to seek a satisfactory solution to meet the overall satisfaction of the two-level decision makers. The tradeoffs between the two-level decision makers in energy-water nexus management are effectively addressed and quantified. Application of the proposed model to a synthetic example problem has demonstrated its applicability in practical energy-water nexus management. Optimal solutions for electricity generation, fuel supply, water supply including groundwater, surface water and recycled water, capacity expansion of the power plants, and GHG emission control are generated. In conclusion, these analyses are capable of helping decision makers or stakeholders adjust their tolerances to make informed decisions to achieve the overall satisfaction of energy-water nexus management where bi-level sequential decision making process is involved.« less

Communicating Prevention Messages to Policy Makers: The Role of Stories in Promoting Physical Activity

PubMed Central

Stamatakis, Katherine A.; McBride, Timothy D.; Brownson, Ross C.

2014-01-01

Background While effective interventions to promote physical activity have been identified, efforts to translate these interventions into policy have lagged behind. In order to improve the translation of evidence into policy, researchers and public health practitioners need to consider new ways for communicating health promoting messages to state and local policymakers. Methods In this article, we describe issues related to the translation of evidence supporting physical activity promotion, and offer some communication approaches and tools that are likely to be beneficial in translating research to policy. Results We discuss the use of narrative (i.e., stories) and describe its potential role in improving communication of research in policy-making settings. In addition, we provide an outline for the development and design of policy briefs on physical activity, and for how to target these briefs effectively to policy-oriented audiences. Conclusions Improvements in researchers' and practitioners' abilities to translate the evidence they generate into high-quality materials for policy makers can greatly enhance efforts to enact policies that promote physical activity. PMID:20440020

Strengthening capacity to apply health research evidence in policy making: experience from four countries

PubMed Central

Hawkes, Sarah; K Aulakh, Bhupinder; Jadeja, Nidhee; Jimenez, Michelle; Buse, Kent; Anwar, Iqbal; Barge, Sandhya; Odubanjo, M Oladoyin; Shukla, Abhay; Ghaffar, Abdul; Whitworth, Jimmy

2016-01-01

Increasing the use of evidence in policy making means strengthening capacity on both the supply and demand sides of evidence production. However, little experience of strengthening the capacity of policy makers in low- and middle- income countries has been published to date. We describe the experiences of five projects (in Bangladesh, Gambia, India and Nigeria), where collaborative teams of researchers and policy makers/policy influencers worked to strengthen policy maker capacity to increase the use of evidence in policy. Activities were focused on three (interlinked) levels of capacity building: individual, organizational and, occasionally, institutional. Interventions included increasing access to research/data, promoting frequent interactions between researchers and members of the policy communities, and increasing the receptivity towards research/data in policy making or policy-implementing organizations. Teams were successful in building the capacity of individuals to access, understand and use evidence/data. Strengthening organizational capacity generally involved support to infrastructure (e.g. through information technology resources) and was also deemed to be successful. There was less appetite to address the need to strengthen institutional capacity—although this was acknowledged to be fundamental to promoting sustainable use of evidence, it was also recognized as requiring resources, legitimacy and regulatory support from policy makers. Evaluation across the three spheres of capacity building was made more challenging by the lack of agreed upon evaluation frameworks. In this article, we propose a new framework for assessing the impact of capacity strengthening activities to promote the use of evidence/data in policy making. Our evaluation concluded that strengthening the capacity of individuals and organizations is an important but likely insufficient step in ensuring the use of evidence/data in policy-cycles. Sustainability of evidence

Strengthening capacity to apply health research evidence in policy making: experience from four countries.

PubMed

Hawkes, Sarah; K Aulakh, Bhupinder; Jadeja, Nidhee; Jimenez, Michelle; Buse, Kent; Anwar, Iqbal; Barge, Sandhya; Odubanjo, M Oladoyin; Shukla, Abhay; Ghaffar, Abdul; Whitworth, Jimmy

2016-03-01

Increasing the use of evidence in policy making means strengthening capacity on both the supply and demand sides of evidence production. However, little experience of strengthening the capacity of policy makers in low- and middle- income countries has been published to date. We describe the experiences of five projects (in Bangladesh, Gambia, India and Nigeria), where collaborative teams of researchers and policy makers/policy influencers worked to strengthen policy maker capacity to increase the use of evidence in policy. Activities were focused on three (interlinked) levels of capacity building: individual, organizational and, occasionally, institutional. Interventions included increasing access to research/data, promoting frequent interactions between researchers and members of the policy communities, and increasing the receptivity towards research/data in policy making or policy-implementing organizations. Teams were successful in building the capacity of individuals to access, understand and use evidence/data. Strengthening organizational capacity generally involved support to infrastructure (e.g. through information technology resources) and was also deemed to be successful. There was less appetite to address the need to strengthen institutional capacity-although this was acknowledged to be fundamental to promoting sustainable use of evidence, it was also recognized as requiring resources, legitimacy and regulatory support from policy makers. Evaluation across the three spheres of capacity building was made more challenging by the lack of agreed upon evaluation frameworks. In this article, we propose a new framework for assessing the impact of capacity strengthening activities to promote the use of evidence/data in policy making. Our evaluation concluded that strengthening the capacity of individuals and organizations is an important but likely insufficient step in ensuring the use of evidence/data in policy-cycles. Sustainability of evidence-informed policy

Bridging the gap between the economic evaluation literature and daily practice in occupational health: a qualitative study among decision-makers in the healthcare sector

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Continued improvements in occupational health can only be ensured if decisions regarding the implementation and continuation of occupational health and safety interventions (OHS interventions) are based on the best available evidence. To ensure that this is the case, scientific evidence should meet the needs of decision-makers. As a first step in bridging the gap between the economic evaluation literature and daily practice in occupational health, this study aimed to provide insight into the occupational health decision-making process and information needs of decision-makers. Methods An exploratory qualitative study was conducted with a purposeful sample of occupational health decision-makers in the Ontario healthcare sector. Eighteen in-depth interviews were conducted to explore the process by which occupational health decisions are made and the importance given to the financial implications of OHS interventions. Twenty-five structured telephone interviews were conducted to explore the sources of information used during the decision-making process, and decision-makers’ knowledge on economic evaluation methods. In-depth interview data were analyzed according to the constant comparative method. For the structured telephone interviews, summary statistics were prepared. Results The occupational health decision-making process generally consists of three stages: initiation stage, establishing the need for an intervention; pre-implementation stage, developing an intervention and its business case in order to receive senior management approval; and implementation and evaluation stage, implementing and evaluating an intervention. During this process, information on the financial implications of OHS interventions was found to be of great importance, especially the employer’s costs and benefits. However, scientific evidence was rarely consulted, sound ex-post program evaluations were hardly ever performed, and there seemed to be a need to advance the economic

Viewing multiple sequence alignments with the JavaScript Sequence Alignment Viewer (JSAV)

PubMed Central

Martin, Andrew C. R.

2014-01-01

The JavaScript Sequence Alignment Viewer (JSAV) is designed as a simple-to-use JavaScript component for displaying sequence alignments on web pages. The display of sequences is highly configurable with options to allow alternative coloring schemes, sorting of sequences and ’dotifying’ repeated amino acids. An option is also available to submit selected sequences to another web site, or to other JavaScript code. JSAV is implemented purely in JavaScript making use of the JQuery and JQuery-UI libraries. It does not use any HTML5-specific options to help with browser compatibility. The code is documented using JSDOC and is available from http://www.bioinf.org.uk/software/jsav/. PMID:25653836

Viewing multiple sequence alignments with the JavaScript Sequence Alignment Viewer (JSAV).

PubMed

Martin, Andrew C R

2014-01-01

The JavaScript Sequence Alignment Viewer (JSAV) is designed as a simple-to-use JavaScript component for displaying sequence alignments on web pages. The display of sequences is highly configurable with options to allow alternative coloring schemes, sorting of sequences and 'dotifying' repeated amino acids. An option is also available to submit selected sequences to another web site, or to other JavaScript code. JSAV is implemented purely in JavaScript making use of the JQuery and JQuery-UI libraries. It does not use any HTML5-specific options to help with browser compatibility. The code is documented using JSDOC and is available from http://www.bioinf.org.uk/software/jsav/.

BMDExpress Data Viewer: A Visualization Tool to Analyze ...

EPA Pesticide Factsheets

Regulatory agencies increasingly apply benchmark dose (BMD) modeling to determine points of departure in human risk assessments. BMDExpress applies BMD modeling to transcriptomics datasets and groups genes to biological processes and pathways for rapid assessment of doses at which biological perturbations occur. However, graphing and analytical capabilities within BMDExpress are limited, and the analysis of output files is challenging. We developed a web-based application, BMDExpress Data Viewer, for visualization and graphical analyses of BMDExpress output files. The software application consists of two main components: ‘Summary Visualization Tools’ and ‘Dataset Exploratory Tools’. We demonstrate through two case studies that the ‘Summary Visualization Tools’ can be used to examine and assess the distributions of probe and pathway BMD outputs, as well as derive a potential regulatory BMD through the modes or means of the distributions. The ‘Functional Enrichment Analysis’ tool presents biological processes in a two-dimensional bubble chart view. By applying filters of pathway enrichment p-value and minimum number of significant genes, we showed that the Functional Enrichment Analysis tool can be applied to select pathways that are potentially sensitive to chemical perturbations. The ‘Multiple Dataset Comparison’ tool enables comparison of BMDs across multiple experiments (e.g., across time points, tissues, or organisms, etc.). The ‘BMDL-BM

Coping Strategies and Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms in Post-ICU Family Decision Makers.

PubMed

Petrinec, Amy B; Mazanec, Polly M; Burant, Christopher J; Hoffer, Alan; Daly, Barbara J

2015-06-01

To assess the coping strategies used by family decision makers of adult critical care patients during and after the critical care experience and the relationship of coping strategies to posttraumatic stress symptoms experienced 60 days after hospitalization. A single-group descriptive longitudinal correlational study. Medical, surgical, and neurological ICUs in a large tertiary care university hospital. Consecutive family decision makers of adult critical care patients from August 2012 to November 2013. Study inclusion occurred after the patient's fifth day in the ICU. None. Family decision makers of incapacitated adult ICU patients completed the Brief COPE instrument assessing coping strategy use 5 days after ICU admission and 30 days after hospital discharge or death of the patient and completed the Impact of Event Scale-Revised assessing posttraumatic stress symptoms 60 days after hospital discharge. Seventy-seven family decision makers of the eligible 176 completed all data collection time points of this study. The use of problem-focused (p=0.01) and emotion-focused (p<0.01) coping decreased over time while avoidant coping (p=0.20) use remained stable. Coping strategies 30 days after hospitalization (R2=0.50, p<0.001) were better predictors of later posttraumatic stress symptoms than coping strategies 5 days after ICU admission (R2=0.30, p=0.001) controlling for patient and decision-maker characteristics. The role of decision maker for a parent and patient death were the only noncoping predictors of posttraumatic stress symptoms. Avoidant coping use 30 days after hospitalization mediated the relationship between patient death and later posttraumatic stress symptom severity. Coping strategy use is a significant predictor of posttraumatic stress symptom severity 60 days after hospitalization in family decision makers of ICU patients.

Acquisition Guide for Interactive Electronic Technical Manuals

DTIC Science & Technology

2000-04-01

6.1 ASCII Editors A𔄂 A.6.2 ADEPT*Editor.... Aŝ A.6.3 FrameMaker +SGML (FM+SGML) A൒ A.6.4 IADS A_n A.7 Developing and Editing...Interface A-9 Figure A-6. FrameMaker +SGML Authoring Environment A-l 1 Figure A-7. IADS Reader Aൔ Figure A-8. TechSight Viewer A_13 Figure A-9...errors should be corrected before importing an SGML-tagged file into ADEPT. A.6.3 FrameMaker +SGML (FM+SGML) FM+SGML is an Adobe System product and

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information

PubMed Central

Wheeler, David L.; Barrett, Tanya; Benson, Dennis A.; Bryant, Stephen H.; Canese, Kathi; Chetvernin, Vyacheslav; Church, Deanna M.; DiCuccio, Michael; Edgar, Ron; Federhen, Scott; Geer, Lewis Y.; Helmberg, Wolfgang; Kapustin, Yuri; Kenton, David L.; Khovayko, Oleg; Lipman, David J.; Madden, Thomas L.; Maglott, Donna R.; Ostell, James; Pruitt, Kim D.; Schuler, Gregory D.; Schriml, Lynn M.; Sequeira, Edwin; Sherry, Stephen T.; Sirotkin, Karl; Souvorov, Alexandre; Starchenko, Grigory; Suzek, Tugba O.; Tatusov, Roman; Tatusova, Tatiana A.; Wagner, Lukas; Yaschenko, Eugene

2006-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank(R) nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through NCBI's Web site. NCBI resources include Entrez, the Entrez Programming Utilities, MyNCBI, PubMed, PubMed Central, Entrez Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link (BLink), Electronic PCR, OrfFinder, Spidey, Splign, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, Cancer Chromosomes, Entrez Genomes and related tools, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Clusters of Orthologous Groups, Retroviral Genotyping Tools, HIV-1, Human Protein Interaction Database, SAGEmap, Gene Expression Omnibus, Entrez Probe, GENSAT, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals, the Molecular Modeling Database, the Conserved Domain Database, the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool and the PubChem suite of small molecule databases. Augmenting many of the Web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized datasets. All of the resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at: . PMID:16381840

Effects of a classroom intervention with spatial play materials on children's object and viewer transformation abilities.

PubMed

Vander Heyden, Karin M; Huizinga, Mariette; Jolles, Jelle

2017-02-01

Children practice their spatial skills when playing with spatial toys, such as construction materials, board games, and puzzles. Sex and SES differences are observed in the engagement in such spatial play activities at home, which relate to individual differences in spatial performance. The current study investigated the effects of explicitly providing spatial play activities in the school setting on different types of spatial ability. We presented 8- to 10-year-old children with a short and easy-to-adopt classroom intervention comprising a set of different spatial play materials. The design involved a pretest-posttest comparison between the intervention group (n = 70) and a control group without intervention (n = 70). Effects were examined on object transformation ability (i.e., a paper-and-pencil mental rotation and paper folding task) and viewer transformation ability (i.e., a hands-on 3D spatial perspective-taking task). Results showed specific effects: there were no differences between the intervention and control group in progress on the two object transformation tasks. Substantial improvements were found for the intervention group compared to the control group on the viewer transformation task. Training progress was not related to sex and socioeconomic background of the child. These findings support the value of spatial play in the classroom for the spatial development of children between 8 and 10 years of age. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2017 APA, all rights reserved).

The Maker Movement, the Promise of Higher Education, and the Future of Work

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wigner, Aubrey

The 21st century will be the site of numerous changes in education systems in response to a rapidly evolving technological environment where existing skill sets and career structures may cease to exist or, at the very least, change dramatically. Likewise, the nature of work will also change to become more automated and more technologically intensive across all sectors, from food service to scientific research. Simply having technical expertise or the ability to process and retain facts will in no way guarantee success in higher education or a satisfying career. Instead, the future will value those educated in a way that encourages collaboration with technology, critical thinking, creativity, clear communication skills, and strong lifelong learning strategies. These changes pose a challenge for higher education's promise of employability and success post-graduation. Addressing how to prepare students for a technologically uncertain future is challenging. One possible model for education to prepare students for the future of work can be found within the Maker Movement. However, it is not fully understood what parts of this movement are most meaningful to implement in education more broadly, and higher education in particular. Through the qualitative analysis of nearly 160 interviews of adult makers, young makers and young makers' parents, this dissertation unpacks how makers are learning, what they are learning, and how these qualities are applicable to education goals and the future of work in the 21st century. This research demonstrates that makers are learning valuable skills to prepare them for the future of work in the 21st century. Makers are learning communication skills, technical skills in fabrication and design, and developing lifelong learning strategies that will help prepare them for life in an increasingly technologically integrated future. This work discusses what aspects of the Maker Movement are most important for integration into higher education.

The Effect of Age of Viewer and Gender of the Narrator on Children's Visual Attention and Recall of Story Ideas.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Klein, James D.; And Others

1987-01-01

Reviews study that investigated the interaction between the age of the viewer and the gender of the narrator of a film. Visual attention to the program by second and fifth graders is described, and recall of story ideas as measured by a multiple-choice test is analyzed. (21 references) (LRW)

Change Makers: The Struggle for Consumer Rights.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Nelson, Helen E.; And Others

1995-01-01

"Video Documentary Project: A Brief History" (Nelson, Clark) describes "Change Makers: The Struggle for Consumer Rights," a documentary that tells stories of ordinary people who participated in the struggle to obtain fairness in the marketplace. "An Appraisal" (Mayer) offers a review of the film. (JOW)

Make Energy at the Bay Area Maker Faire

ScienceCinema

None

2018-01-16

Think. Make. Innovate. A festival of invention, creativity and resourcefulness that gathers makers of all kinds. Scientists are seeking to find innovative solutions to the energy challenges in the world.

Educating to Use Evidence in Thinking about Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Newcombe, Nora S.

2013-01-01

There is an increasing emphasis on evidence-based education, and the sciences of learning are progressing rapidly. But are reports, guidelines, and outreach enough to disseminate this knowledge and affect educational practice? In fact, policy makers and the public often resist evidence-based recommendations about education. This article suggests…

Web access and dissemination of Andalusian coastal erosion rates: viewers and standard/filtered map services.

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Álvarez Francoso, Jose; Prieto Campos, Antonio; Ojeda Zujar, Jose; Guisado-Pintado, Emilia; Pérez Alcántara, Juan Pedro

2017-04-01

The accessibility to environmental information via web viewers using map services (OGC or proprietary services) has become more frequent since newly information sources (ortophotos, LIDAR, GPS) are of great detailed and thus generate a great volume of data which barely can be disseminated using either analogue (paper maps) or digital (pdf) formats. Moreover, governments and public institutions are concerned about the need of facilitates provision to research results and improve communication about natural hazards to citizens and stakeholders. This information ultimately, if adequately disseminated, it's crucial in decision making processes, risk management approaches and could help to increase social awareness related to environmental issues (particularly climate change impacts). To overcome this issue, two strategies for wide dissemination and communication of the results achieved in the calculation of beach erosion for the 640 km length of the Andalusian coast (South Spain) using web viewer technology are presented. Each of them are oriented to different end users and thus based on different methodologies. Erosion rates has been calculated at 50m intervals for different periods (1956-1977-2001-2011) as part of a National Research Project based on the spasialisation and web-access of coastal vulnerability indicators for Andalusian region. The 1st proposal generates WMS services (following OGC standards) that are made available by Geoserver, using a geoviewer client developed through Leaflet. This viewer is designed to be used by the general public (citizens, politics, etc) by combining a set of tools that give access to related documents (pdfs), visualisation tools (panoramio pictures, geo-localisation with GPS) are which are displayed within an user-friendly interface. Further, the use of WMS services (implemented on Geoserver) provides a detailed semiology (arrows and proportional symbols, using alongshore coastaline buffers to represent data) which not only

Physical Computing for STEAM Education: Maker-Educators' Experiences in an Online Graduate Course

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hsu, Yu-Chang; Ching, Yu-Hui; Baldwin, Sally

2018-01-01

This research explored how K-16 educators learned physical computing, and developed as maker-educators in an online graduate course. With peer support and instructor guidance, these educators designed maker projects using Scratch and Makey Makey, and developed educational maker proposals with plans of teaching the topics of their choice in STEAM…

Targeting Continuing Medical Education on Decision Makers: Who Decides to Transfuse Blood?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Goodnough, Lawrence T.; And Others

1992-01-01

Staff communication patterns were observed during 13 open-heart surgeries to identify the transfusion decision makers. It was determined that targeting decision makers for continuing medical education would improve the quality of transfusion practice and increase the efficiency of continuing education. (SK)

[Attitudes and opinions of Palestinian decision-makers about premarital examination law].

PubMed

El Sharif, Nuha; Rifai, Ayshea; Assi, Sana'a; Al Hmidat, Amjad

2006-11-01

We explored the attitudes and opinions of 90 Palestinian decision-makers about the draft law on premarital examination. The findings revealed that decision-makers were aware of the spread of genetic diseases but not infectious diseases. The majority agreed on the draft law; however, they differed on the mode of its application. Half believed that the law is not ready yet for application due to insufficient financial support to establish the needed infrastructure. The most significant recommendations made by the decision-makers were to: enhance community awareness of the law, ensure proper coordination among the concerned ministries and institutions, and establish a national organization to work on endorsement of the tests and issuance of the appropriate application strategies and regulations.

Characteristics and use of urban health indicator tools by municipal built environment policy and decision-makers: a systematic review protocol.

PubMed

Pineo, Helen; Glonti, Ketevan; Rutter, Harry; Zimmermann, Nicole; Wilkinson, Paul; Davies, Michael

2017-01-13

There is wide agreement that there is a lack of attention to health in municipal environmental policy-making, such as urban planning and regeneration. Explanations for this include differing professional norms between health and urban environment professionals, system complexity and limited evidence for causality between attributes of the built environment and health outcomes. Data from urban health indicator (UHI) tools are potentially a valuable form of evidence for local government policy and decision-makers. Although many UHI tools have been specifically developed to inform policy, there is poor understanding of how they are used. This study aims to identify the nature and characteristics of UHI tools and their use by municipal built environment policy and decision-makers. Health and social sciences databases (ASSIA, Campbell Library, EMBASE, MEDLINE, Scopus, Social Policy and Practice and Web of Science Core Collection) will be searched for studies using UHI tools alongside hand-searching of key journals and citation searches of included studies. Advanced searches of practitioner websites and Google will also be used to find grey literature. Search results will be screened for UHI tools, and for studies which report on or evaluate the use of such tools. Data about UHI tools will be extracted to compile a census and taxonomy of existing tools based on their specific characteristics and purpose. In addition, qualitative and quantitative studies about the use of these tools will be appraised using quality appraisal tools produced by the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and synthesised in order to gain insight into the perceptions, value and use of UHI tools in the municipal built environment policy and decision-making process. This review is not registered with PROSPERO. This systematic review focuses specifically on UHI tools that assess the physical environment's impact on health (such as transport, housing, air quality and greenspace

White House Maker Faire

NASA Image and Video Library

2014-06-18

A prototype model of the Made In Space 3D printer is on display during the first ever White House Maker Faire which brings together students, entrepreneurs, and everyday citizens who are using new tools and techniques to launch new businesses, learn vital skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), and fuel the renaissance in American manufacturing, at the White House, Wednesday, June 18, 2014 in Washington. The Made In Space 3D printer was just approved by NASA to be tested onboard the International Space Station (ISS), and NASA announced a challenge for students to design items that would be printed by this first 3D printer to fly in space. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

An Overview of Evidence-Based Program Registers (EBPRs) for Behavioral Health

PubMed Central

Burkhardt, Jason T.; Schröter, Daniela C.; Magura, Stephen; Means, Stephanie N.; Coryn, Chris L.S.

2015-01-01

Evaluations of behavioral health interventions have identified many that are potentially effective. However, clinicians and other decision makers typically lack the time and ability to effectively search and synthesize the relevant research literature. In response to this opportunity, and to increasing policy and funding pressures for the use of evidence-based practices, a number of “what works” websites have emerged to assist decision makers in selecting interventions with the highest probability of benefit. However, these registers as a whole are not well understood. This article, which represents phase one of a concurrent mixed methods study, presents a review of the scopes, structures, dissemination strategies, uses, and challenges faced by evidence-based registers in the behavioral health disciplines. The major findings of this study show that in general, registers of evidence-based practices are able, to a degree, to identify the most effective practices and meet the needs of decision makers. However, much needs to be done to improve the ability of the registers to fully realize their purpose. PMID:25450777

A Reward-Maximizing Spiking Neuron as a Bounded Rational Decision Maker.

PubMed

Leibfried, Felix; Braun, Daniel A

2015-08-01

Rate distortion theory describes how to communicate relevant information most efficiently over a channel with limited capacity. One of the many applications of rate distortion theory is bounded rational decision making, where decision makers are modeled as information channels that transform sensory input into motor output under the constraint that their channel capacity is limited. Such a bounded rational decision maker can be thought to optimize an objective function that trades off the decision maker's utility or cumulative reward against the information processing cost measured by the mutual information between sensory input and motor output. In this study, we interpret a spiking neuron as a bounded rational decision maker that aims to maximize its expected reward under the computational constraint that the mutual information between the neuron's input and output is upper bounded. This abstract computational constraint translates into a penalization of the deviation between the neuron's instantaneous and average firing behavior. We derive a synaptic weight update rule for such a rate distortion optimizing neuron and show in simulations that the neuron efficiently extracts reward-relevant information from the input by trading off its synaptic strengths against the collected reward.

The ReproGenomics Viewer: an integrative cross-species toolbox for the reproductive science community

PubMed Central

Darde, Thomas A.; Sallou, Olivier; Becker, Emmanuelle; Evrard, Bertrand; Monjeaud, Cyril; Le Bras, Yvan; Jégou, Bernard; Collin, Olivier; Rolland, Antoine D.; Chalmel, Frédéric

2015-01-01

We report the development of the ReproGenomics Viewer (RGV), a multi- and cross-species working environment for the visualization, mining and comparison of published omics data sets for the reproductive science community. The system currently embeds 15 published data sets related to gametogenesis from nine model organisms. Data sets have been curated and conveniently organized into broad categories including biological topics, technologies, species and publications. RGV's modular design for both organisms and genomic tools enables users to upload and compare their data with that from the data sets embedded in the system in a cross-species manner. The RGV is freely available at http://rgv.genouest.org. PMID:25883147

CAS-viewer: web-based tool for splicing-guided integrative analysis of multi-omics cancer data.

PubMed

Han, Seonggyun; Kim, Dongwook; Kim, Youngjun; Choi, Kanghoon; Miller, Jason E; Kim, Dokyoon; Lee, Younghee

2018-04-20

The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) project is a public resource that provides transcriptomic, DNA sequence, methylation, and clinical data for 33 cancer types. Transforming the large size and high complexity of TCGA cancer genome data into integrated knowledge can be useful to promote cancer research. Alternative splicing (AS) is a key regulatory mechanism of genes in human cancer development and in the interaction with epigenetic factors. Therefore, AS-guided integration of existing TCGA data sets will make it easier to gain insight into the genetic architecture of cancer risk and related outcomes. There are already existing tools analyzing and visualizing alternative mRNA splicing patterns for large-scale RNA-seq experiments. However, these existing web-based tools are limited to the analysis of individual TCGA data sets at a time, such as only transcriptomic information. We implemented CAS-viewer (integrative analysis of Cancer genome data based on Alternative Splicing), a web-based tool leveraging multi-cancer omics data from TCGA. It illustrates alternative mRNA splicing patterns along with methylation, miRNAs, and SNPs, and then provides an analysis tool to link differential transcript expression ratio to methylation, miRNA, and splicing regulatory elements for 33 cancer types. Moreover, one can analyze AS patterns with clinical data to identify potential transcripts associated with different survival outcome for each cancer. CAS-viewer is a web-based application for transcript isoform-driven integration of multi-omics data in multiple cancer types and will aid in the visualization and possible discovery of biomarkers for cancer by integrating multi-omics data from TCGA.

An evaluation of National Health Service England's Care Maker Programme: A mixed-methods analysis.

PubMed

Zubairu, Kate; Christiansen, Angela; Kirkcaldy, Andrew; Kirton, Jennifer A; Kelly, Carol A; Simpson, Paul; Gillespie, Andrea; Brown, Jeremy M

2017-12-01

To investigate the impact and sustainability of the Care Maker programme across England from the perspective of those involved in its delivery. The Care Maker programme was launched in England in 2013. It aims to support the "Compassion in Practice" strategy, with particular emphasis on the 6Cs of care, compassion, competence, communication, courage and commitment. Care Makers were recruited in an ambassadorial role. The intention was to inspire individuals throughout the National Health Service in England to bridge national policy with those delivering care. A mixed methods design was chosen, but this article focuses on two of the four distinct empirical data collection phases undertaken as part of this evaluation: a questionnaire with Care Makers; and two case studies of separate National Health Service trust sites. Data were collected for this evaluation in 2015. An online questionnaire was distributed to the total population of Care Makers across the National Health Service in England. It included a combination of open and closed questions. The case studies involved semistructured telephone interviews with a range of professionals engaged with the Care Maker programme across the trust sites. Care Makers reported that participation in the programme had offered opportunities in terms of improving the quality-of-care provision in the workplace as well as contributing towards their own professional development. The Care Maker programme has supported and helped underpin the nursing, midwifery and care strategy "Compassion in Practice". This model of using volunteers to embed strategy and policy could potentially be used in other areas of clinical practice and indeed in other countries. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

High-performance web viewer for cardiac images

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

dos Santos, Marcelo; Furuie, Sergio S.

2004-04-01

With the advent of the digital devices for medical diagnosis the use of the regular films in radiology has decreased. Thus, the management and handling of medical images in digital format has become an important and critical task. In Cardiology, for example, the main difficulty is to display dynamic images with the appropriated color palette and frame rate used on acquisition process by Cath, Angio and Echo systems. In addition, other difficulty is handling large images in memory by any existing personal computer, including thin clients. In this work we present a web-based application that carries out these tasks with robustness and excellent performance, without burdening the server and network. This application provides near-diagnostic quality display of cardiac images stored as DICOM 3.0 files via a web browser and provides a set of resources that allows the viewing of still and dynamic images. It can access image files from the local disks, or network connection. Its features include: allows real-time playback, dynamic thumbnails image viewing during loading, access to patient database information, image processing tools, linear and angular measurements, on-screen annotations, image printing and exporting DICOM images to other image formats, and many others, all characterized by a pleasant user-friendly interface, inside a Web browser by means of a Java application. This approach offers some advantages over the most of medical images viewers, such as: facility of installation, integration with other systems by means of public and standardized interfaces, platform independence, efficient manipulation and display of medical images, all with high performance.

Makification: Towards a Framework for Leveraging the Maker Movement in Formal Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cohen, Jonathan; Jones, W. Monty; Smith, Shaunna; Calandra, Brendan

2017-01-01

Maker culture is part of a burgeoning movement in which individuals leverage modern digital technologies to produce and share physical artifacts with a broader community. Certain components of the maker movement, if properly leveraged, hold promise for transforming formal education in a variety of contexts. The authors here work towards a…

Facilitating access to pre-processed research evidence in public health

PubMed Central

2010-01-01

Background Evidence-informed decision making is accepted in Canada and worldwide as necessary for the provision of effective health services. This process involves: 1) clearly articulating a practice-based issue; 2) searching for and accessing relevant evidence; 3) appraising methodological rigor and choosing the most synthesized evidence of the highest quality and relevance to the practice issue and setting that is available; and 4) extracting, interpreting, and translating knowledge, in light of the local context and resources, into practice, program and policy decisions. While the public health sector in Canada is working toward evidence-informed decision making, considerable barriers, including efficient access to synthesized resources, exist. Methods In this paper we map to a previously developed 6 level pyramid of pre-processed research evidence, relevant resources that include public health-related effectiveness evidence. The resources were identified through extensive searches of both the published and unpublished domains. Results Many resources with public health-related evidence were identified. While there were very few resources dedicated solely to public health evidence, many clinically focused resources include public health-related evidence, making tools such as the pyramid, that identify these resources, particularly helpful for public health decisions makers. A practical example illustrates the application of this model and highlights its potential to reduce the time and effort that would be required by public health decision makers to address their practice-based issues. Conclusions This paper describes an existing hierarchy of pre-processed evidence and its adaptation to the public health setting. A number of resources with public health-relevant content that are either freely accessible or requiring a subscription are identified. This will facilitate easier and faster access to pre-processed, public health-relevant evidence, with the intent of

A Description of Similarity of Personality between Selected Groups of Television Viewers and Certain Television Roles Regularly Viewed by Them.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Perrow, Maxwell Vermilyea

The aim of this study was to provide quantitative measurement of the degree of identification, or lack of identification, that takes place between the viewers of television and the television roles they like and view regularly and those they dislike and view infrequently. Participants in the study were asked to keep a Television Viewing Diary and…

[The effects of media violence on affective, cognitive, and physiological reactions of viewers].

PubMed

Yukawa, S; Yoshida, F

1998-06-01

The present study investigated the effects of media violence on affective, cognitive, and physiological reactions of viewers. Eighty undergraduate student (male = 40, female = 40) participated in the experiment. First, subjects were exposed to one of four violent films whose levels of violence and entertainment were based on ratings taken in a previous study (Yoshida & Yukawa, 1996). Immediately after viewing the film, subjects described their thoughts which occurred during watching the film and rated their affective reactions toward the film. Heart rate and eyeblink rate as indicators of physiological arousal were measured continuously before, during, and after the film. Results showed that the film high in violence elicited more negative and empty-powerless affects, while the film high in entertainment evoked more positive affects.

Budget-makers and health care systems.

PubMed

White, Joseph

2013-10-01

Health programs are shaped by the decisions made in budget processes, so how budget-makers view health programs is an important part of making health policy. Budgeting in any country involves its own policy community, with key players including budgeting professionals and political authorities. This article reviews the typical pressures on and attitudes of these actors when they address health policy choices. The worldview of budget professionals includes attitudes that are congenial to particular policy perspectives, such as the desire to select packages of programs that maximize population health. The pressures on political authorities, however, are very different: most importantly, public demand for health care services is stronger than for virtually any other government activity. The norms and procedures of budgeting also tend to discourage adoption of some of the more enthusiastically promoted health policy reforms. Therefore talk about rationalizing systems is not matched by action; and action is better explained by the need to minimize blame. The budget-maker's perspective provides insight about key controversies in healthcare policy such as decentralization, competition, health service systems as opposed to health insurance systems, and dedicated vs. general revenue finance. It also explains the frequency of various "gaming" behaviors. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Factors That Impact How Civil Society Intermediaries Perceive Evidence

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Allen, William L.

2017-01-01

Civil society organisations increasingly mediate the creation and exchange of evidence in their activities with policy-makers and practitioners. This article extends knowledge on evidence in policy-making settings to civil society contexts. As an exploratory and qualitative study, it shows how nine UK-based organisations working on issues…

Learning from the Parallel Pathways of Makers to Broaden Pathways to Engineering

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Foster, Christina; Wigner, Aubrey; Lande, Micah; Jordan, Shawn S.

2018-01-01

Background: Makers are a growing community of STEM-minded people who bridge technical and non-technical backgrounds to imagine, build and fabricate engineering systems. Some have engineering training, some do not. This paper presents a study to explore the educational pathways of adult Makers and how they intersect with engineering. This research…

Trusted Advisors, Decision Models and Other Keys to Communicating Science to Decision Makers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Webb, E.

2006-12-01

Water resource management decisions often involve multiple parties engaged in contentious negotiations that try to navigate through complex combinations of legal, social, hydrologic, financial, and engineering considerations. The standard approach for resolving these issues is some form of multi-party negotiation, a formal court decision, or a combination of the two. In all these cases, the role of the decision maker(s) is to choose and implement the best option that fits the needs and wants of the community. However, each path to a decision carries the risk of technical and/or financial infeasibility as well as the possibility of unintended consequences. To help reduce this risk, decision makers often rely on some type of predictive analysis from which they can evaluate the projected consequences of their decisions. Typically, decision makers are supported in the analysis process by trusted advisors who engage in the analysis as well as the day to day tasks associated with multi-party negotiations. In the case of water resource management, the analysis is frequently a numerical model or set of models that can simulate various management decisions across multiple systems and output results that illustrate the impact on areas of concern. Thus, in order to communicate scientific knowledge to the decision makers, the quality of the communication between the analysts, the trusted advisor, and the decision maker must be clear and direct. To illustrate this concept, a multi-attribute decision analysis matrix will be used to outline the value of computer model-based collaborative negotiation approaches to guide water resources decision making and communication with decision makers. In addition, the critical role of the trusted advisor and other secondary participants in the decision process will be discussed using examples from recent water negotiations.

White House Maker Faire

NASA Image and Video Library

2014-06-18

Lindsay Lawlor, of San Diego, Calif., left, demonstrates his creation, a 17-foot-tall, robotic giraffe that "walks" on wheels and is powered by a 12-horsepower hybrid fuel-engine motor, during the first ever White House Maker Faire, which brings together students, entrepreneurs, and everyday citizens who are using new tools and techniques to launch new businesses, learn vital skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), and fuel the renaissance in American manufacturing, at the White House, Wednesday, June 18, 2014 in Washington. The President announced new steps the Administration and its partners are taking to support the ability of more Americans, young and old, to have to access to these tools and techniques and brings their ideas to life. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

White House Maker Faire

NASA Image and Video Library

2014-06-18

The Made In Space company displays some of the tools that can be made by their 3D printer during the first ever White House Maker Faire which brings together students, entrepreneurs, and everyday citizens who are using new tools and techniques to launch new businesses, learn vital skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), and fuel the renaissance in American manufacturing, at the White House, Wednesday, June 18, 2014 in Washington. The Made In Space 3D printer was just approved by NASA to be tested onboard the International Space Station (ISS), and NASA announced a challenge for students to design items that would be printed by this first 3D printer to fly in space. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

White House Maker Faire

NASA Image and Video Library

2014-06-18

Sara Ann Wylie of Public Lab shows the do to yourself Balloon Mapping Kit, during the first ever White House Maker Faire, which brings together students, entrepreneurs, and everyday citizens who are using new tools and techniques to launch new businesses, learn vital skills in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), and fuel the renaissance in American manufacturing, at the White House, Wednesday, June 18, 2014 in Washington. The Balloon Mapping Kit enables you to take your own aerial photos from 1000 ft or higher. The President announced new steps the Administration and its partners are taking to support the ability of more Americans, young and old, to have to access to these tools and techniques and brings their ideas to life. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Focusing biodiversity research on the needs of decision makers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Smythe, Katie D.; Bernabo, J. Christopher; Carter, Thomas B.; Jutro, Peter R.

1996-11-01

The project on Biodiversity Uncertainties and Research Needs (BURN) ensures the advancement of usable knowledge on biodiversity by obtaining input from decision makers on their priority information needs about biodiversity and then using this input to engage leading scientists in designing policy-relevant research. Decision makers articulated concerns related to four issues: significance of biodiversity; status and trends of biodiversity; management for biodiversity; and the linkage of social, cultural, economic, legal, and biological objectives. Leading natural and social scientists then identified the research required to address the decision makers' needs and determined the probability of success. The diverse group of experts reached consensus on several fundamental issues, helping to clarify the role of biodiversity in land and resource management. The BURN participants identified several features that should be incorporated into policy-relevant research plans and management strategies for biodiversity. Research and assessment efforts should be: multidisciplinary and integrative, participatory with stakeholder involvement, hierarchical (multiple scales), and problem- and region-specific. The activities should be focused regionally within a global perspective. Meta-analysis of existing data is needed on all fronts to assess the state of the science. More specifically, the scientists recommended six priority research areas that should be pursued to address the information needs articulated by decision makers: (1) characterization of biodiversity, (2) environmental valuation, (3) management for sustainability—for humans and the environment (adaptive management), (4) information management strategies, (5) governance and stewardship issues, and (6) communication and outreach. Broad recommendations were developed for each research area to provide direction for research planning and resource management strategies. The results will directly benefit those groups that

Understanding Mali: Lessons for Policy Makers

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-06-01

and health care . By the same token, the corruption and ethnic inequalities that are rampant in weak and failed states show an obvious lack of social ...one of the means used to take care of the terrorist threat. However, conflicts against terrorists groups such as in Afghanistan have proven long and...instability that led to the present situation in Mali, this study aspires to provide decision makers with concrete factors that should deserve careful

Integrating research evidence and physical activity policy making-REPOPA project.

PubMed

Aro, Arja R; Bertram, Maja; Hämäläinen, Riitta-Maija; Van De Goor, Ien; Skovgaard, Thomas; Valente, Adriana; Castellani, Tommaso; Chereches, Razvan; Edwards, Nancy

2016-06-01

Evidence shows that regular physical activity is enhanced by supporting environment. Studies are needed to integrate research evidence into health enhancing, cross-sector physical activity (HEPA) policy making. This article presents the rationale, study design, measurement procedures and the initial results of the first phase of six European countries in a five-year research project (2011-2016), REsearch into POlicy to enhance Physical Activity (REPOPA). REPOPA is programmatic research; it consists of linked studies; the first phase studied the use of evidence in 21 policies in implementation to learn more in depth from the policy making process and carried out 86 qualitative stakeholder interviews. The second, ongoing phase builds on the central findings of the first phase in each country; it consists of two sets of interventions: game simulations to study cross-sector collaboration and organizational change processes in the use of evidence and locally tailored interventions to increase knowledge integration. The results of the first two study phases will be tested and validated among policy makers and other stakeholders in the third phase using a Delphi process. Initial results from the first project phase showed the lack of explicit evidence use in HEPA policy making. Facilitators and barriers of the evidence use were the availability of institutional resources and support but also networking between researchers and policy makers. REPOPA will increase understanding use of research evidence in different contexts; develop guidance and tools and establish sustainable structures such as networks and platforms between academics and policy makers across relevant sectors. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

The Researcher's Agenda for Evidence

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Oakley, Ann

2004-01-01

Policy makers and researchers may have different agendas as to what constitutes "evidence". This paper reviews some of the issues currently debated in the UK and elsewhere about researchers' understandings of how social research can usefully inform the policy-making process, and their techniques for making it available. Using examples…

Fiber optic diffraction grating maker

DOEpatents

Deason, Vance A.; Ward, Michael B.

1991-01-01

A compact and portable diffraction grating maker comprised of a laser beam, optical and fiber optics devices coupling the beam to one or more evanescent beam splitters, and collimating lenses or mirrors directing the split beam at an appropriate photosensitive material. The collimating optics, the output ends of the fiber optic coupler and the photosensitive plate holder are all mounted on an articulated framework so that the angle of intersection of the beams can be altered at will without disturbing the spatial filter, collimation or beam quality, and assuring that the beams will always intersect at the position of the plate.

[Hospital self-management policy in Chile: perceptions of decision-makers].

PubMed

Méndez, Claudio A; Miranda, Christian; Torres, M Cristina; Márquez, Myriam

2013-01-01

To learn the perceptions of decision-makers concerning the imple-men-t-ation stage of a hospital self-management policy in two highly complex hospitals in southern Chile. A descriptive, exploratory, qualitative study based on semi-structured in-depth interviews of decision-makers at the Regional Hospital of Valdivia and the Hospital San José de Osorno from August 2010 to December 2011. A convenience sample of 26 decision-makers was selected. The 26 interviews were recorded and transcribed verbatim. The information was analyzed using inductive content analysis. The interviewees consider the concept of self-management to be determined by autonomy in decision-making about resource allocation and the financing of health service delivery in the hospitals. They also stated that human resources and financing policies should be included to improve the implementation stage. They related weaknesses with the lack of organizational capabilities and managerial skills in the health teams implementing the changes. Conceptually, the hospital self-management policy is based on financial autonomy, and implementation is affected by persistent capacity gaps in policy design.

Evidence, Interpretation, and Persuasion: Instructional Decision Making at the District Central Office

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Coburn, Cynthia E.; Toure, Judith; Yamashita, Mika

2009-01-01

Background/Context: Calls for evidence-based decision making have become increasingly prominent on the educational landscape. School district central offices increasingly experience these demands. Yet there are few empirical studies of evidence use at the district level. Furthermore, research on evidence use among policy makers in noneducation…

GCView: the genomic context viewer for protein homology searches

PubMed Central

Grin, Iwan; Linke, Dirk

2011-01-01

Genomic neighborhood can provide important insights into evolution and function of a protein or gene. When looking at operons, changes in operon structure and composition can only be revealed by looking at the operon as a whole. To facilitate the analysis of the genomic context of a query in multiple organisms we have developed Genomic Context Viewer (GCView). GCView accepts results from one or multiple protein homology searches such as BLASTp as input. For each hit, the neighboring protein-coding genes are extracted, the regions of homology are labeled for each input and the results are presented as a clear, interactive graphical output. It is also possible to add more searches to iteratively refine the output. GCView groups outputs by the hits for different proteins. This allows for easy comparison of different operon compositions and structures. The tool is embedded in the framework of the Bioinformatics Toolkit of the Max-Planck Institute for Developmental Biology (MPI Toolkit). Job results from the homology search tools inside the MPI Toolkit can be forwarded to GCView and results can be subsequently analyzed by sequence analysis tools. Results are stored online, allowing for later reinspection. GCView is freely available at http://toolkit.tuebingen.mpg.de/gcview. PMID:21609955

Global Forum 2015 dialogue on "From evidence to policy - thinking outside the box": perspectives to improve evidence uptake and good practices in the African Region.

PubMed

Kirigia, Joses Muthuri; Pannenborg, Charles Ok; Amore, Luis Gabriel Cuervo; Ghannem, Hassen; IJsselmuiden, Carel; Nabyonga-Orem, Juliet

2016-07-18

The Global Forum 2015 panel session dialogue entitled "From evidence to policy - thinking outside the box" was held on 26 August 2015 in the Philippines to debate why evidence was not fully translated into policy and practice and what could be done to increase its uptake. This paper reports the reasons and possible actions for increasing the uptake of evidence, and highlights the actions partners could take to increase the use of evidence in the African Region. The Global Forum 2015 debate attributed African Region's low uptake of evidence to the big gap in incentives and interests between research for health researchers and public health policy-makers; limited appreciation on the side of researchers that public health decisions are based on multiple and complex considerations; perception among users that research evidence is not relevant to local contexts; absence of knowledge translation platforms; sub-optimal collaboration and engagement between industry and research institutions; lack of involvement of civil society organizations; lack of engagement of communities in the research process; failure to engage the media; limited awareness and debate in national and local parliaments on the importance of investing in research and innovation; and dearth of research and innovation parks in the African Region. The actions needed in the Region to increase the uptake of evidence in policy and practice include strengthening NHRS governance; bridging the motivation gap between researchers and health policy-makers; restoring trust between researchers and decision-makers; ensuring close and continuous intellectual intercourse among researchers, ministry of health policy-makers and technocrats during the life course of research projects or programmes; proactive collaboration between academia and industry; regular briefings of civil society, media, relevant parliamentary committees and development partners; development of vibrant knowledge translation platforms; development of

Separation of the pace-maker and plateau components of delayed rectification in cardiac Purkinje fibres

PubMed Central

Hauswirth, O.; Noble, D.; Tsien, R. W.

1972-01-01

1. Experiments on sheep Purkinje fibres were designed to determine whether the current mechanisms responsible for delayed rectification at the pace-maker (negative to -50 mV) and plateau (positive to -50 mV) ranges of potential are kinetically separable and independent. 2. Hyperpolarizations from the plateau range were shown to produce decay of a single component of outward current within the plateau range, but two components were evident when the hyperpolarizations entered the pace-maker range. 3. The time courses of recovery of the two components were too similar at -25 mV to allow temporal resolution at this potential. Clear temporal resolution was, however, possible at potentials between -55 and -95 mV. An indirect method of resolving the two components at -25 mV was used. 4. The kinetic properties of the two components correspond to those previously described for the pace-maker potassium current, iK2, and the outward plateau current, ix1 (Noble & Tsien, 1968, 1969a). 5. The instantaneous (fully activated) current—voltage relation for iK2 was reconstructed from the analysed current records. It was found that this relation shows a negative slope conductance at all potentials positive to -75 mV and that the current tends towards zero at zero membrane potential. 6. The results are compared with those predicted by two reaction models of the iK2 and ix1 mechanisms. It is concluded that iK2 and ix1 are kinetically separable but that it is not possible with present techniques to decide whether they are controlled by the same or completely independent membrane structures. It is also shown that the instantaneous current—voltage relation calculated for iK2 does not depend on whether the controlling mechanisms are assumed to be independent or linked. PMID:4679715

An exploratory study identifying where local government public health decision makers source their evidence for policy.

PubMed

Stoneham, Melissa; Dodds, James

2014-08-01

The Western Australian (WA) Public Health Bill will replace the antiquated Health Act 1911. One of the proposed clauses of the Bill requires all WA local governments to develop a Public Health Plan. The Bill states that Public Health Plans should be based on evidence from all levels, including national and statewide priorities, community needs, local statistical evidence, and stakeholder data. This exploratory study, which targeted 533 WA local government officers, aimed to identify the sources of evidence used to generate the list of public health risks to be included in local government Public Health Plans. The top four sources identified for informing local policy were: observation of the consequences of the risks in the local community (24.5%), statewide evidence (17.6%), local evidence (17.6%) and coverage in local media (16.2%). This study confirms that both hard and soft data are used to inform policy decisions at the local level. Therefore, the challenge that this study has highlighted is in the definition or constitution of evidence. SO WHAT? Evidence is critical to the process of sound policy development. This study highlights issues associated with what actually constitutes evidence in the policy development process at the local government level. With the exception of those who work in an extremely narrow field, it is difficult for local government officers, whose role includes policymaking, to read the vast amount of information that has been published in their area of expertise. For those who are committed to the notion of evidence-based policymaking, as advocated within the WA Public Health Bill, this presents a considerable challenge.

Guilt leads to enhanced facing-the-viewer bias

PubMed Central

Shen, Mowei; Zhu, Chengfeng; Liao, Huayu; Zhang, Haihang; Zhou, Jifan

2018-01-01

As an important moral emotion, guilt plays a critical role in social interaction. It has been found that people tended to exhibit prosocial behavior under circumstances of guilt. However, all extant studies have predominantly focused on the influence of guilt on macro-level behavior. So far, no study has investigated whether guilt affects people’s micro-level perception. The current study closes this gap by examining whether guilt affects one’s inclination to perceive approaching motion. We achieved this aim by probing a facing-the-viewer bias (FTV bias). Specifically, when an ambiguous walking biological motion display is presented to participants via the point-light display technique, participants tend to perceive a walking agent approaching them. We hypothesized that guilt modulated FTV bias. To test this hypothesis, we adopted a two-person situation induction task to induce guilt, whereby participants were induced to feel that because of their poor task performance, their partner did not receive a satisfactory payment. We found that when participants were told that the perceived biological motion was motion-captured from their partner, the FTV bias was significantly increased for guilty participants relative to neutral participants. However, when participants were informed that the perceived biological motion was from a third neutral agent, the FTV bias was not modulated by guilt. These results suggest that guilt influences one’s inclination to perceive approaching motion, but this effect is constrained to the person towards whom guilt is directed. PMID:29649338

Nurturing Responsible Behavior: A Foundation for Guidance. Preventing Discipline Problems, Unit 3. [Teaching Video, Practice Video, Facilitator's Guide, and Viewer's Guide].

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

2000

As children learn to practice responsible behaviors, discipline problems in the early childhood classroom can be reduced. As Part 3 of a 3-part video series designed to help adults working with 3- to 8-year-olds use a proactive approach to prevent discipline problems, this video training package is comprised of a Facilitators' Guide, a Viewers'…

Family Communication about End-of-Life Decisions and the Enactment of the Decision-Maker Role.

PubMed

Trees, April R; Ohs, Jennifer E; Murray, Meghan C

2017-06-07

End-of-life (EOL) decisions in families are complex and emotional sites of family interaction necessitating family members coordinate roles in the EOL decision-making process. How family members in the United States enact the decision-maker role in EOL decision situations was examined through in-depth interviews with 22 individuals who participated in EOL decision-making for a family member. A number of themes emerged from the data with regard to the enactment of the decision-maker role. Families varied in how decision makers enacted the role in relation to collective family input, with consulting, informing and collaborating as different patterns of behavior. Formal family roles along with gender- and age-based roles shaped who took on the decision-maker role. Additionally, both family members and medical professionals facilitated or undermined the decision-maker's role enactment. Understanding the structure and enactment of the decision-maker role in family interaction provides insight into how individuals and/or family members perform the decision-making role within a cultural context that values autonomy and self-determination in combination with collective family action in EOL decision-making.

Implementation of a SenseMaker® research project among Syrian refugees in Lebanon

PubMed Central

Bakhache, Nour; Michael, Saja; Roupetz, Sophie; Garbern, Stephanie; Bergquist, Harveen; Davison, Colleen; Bartels, Susan

2017-01-01

ABSTRACT The Syrian conflict has displaced over 1.2 million Syrians into Lebanon. As a result of displacement, some Syrian families are turning to child marriage as a coping mechanism. The prevalence of early marriage has reportedly increased and the average age of marriage decreased during the crisis. The aim of the project was to understand the underlying factors contributing to child marriage among Syrian refugees in Lebanon using Cognitive Edge’s SenseMaker®. This manuscript explores the process of implementing this novel research tool in a humanitarian setting. Twelve interviewers conducted SenseMaker® interviews with married and unmarried Syrian girls, Syrian parents, as well as married and unmarried men. Participants were asked to share a story about the lives of Syrian girls in Lebanon and to self-interpret the narratives by answering follow-up questions in relation to the story provided. Data collection occurred across three locations: Beirut, Beqaa, and Tripoli. In total 1422 narratives from 1346 unique participants were collected over 7 weeks. Data collection using SenseMaker® was efficient, capable of electronically capturing a large volume of quantitative and qualitative data. SenseMaker® limitations from a research perspective include lack of skip logic and inability to adjust font size on the iOS app. SenseMaker® was an efficient mixed methods data collection tool that was well received by participants in a refugee setting in Lebanon. The utility of SenseMaker® for research could be improved by adding skip logic and by being able to adjust font size on the iOS app. PMID:28857014

Fiber optic diffraction grating maker

DOEpatents

Deason, V.A.; Ward, M.B.

1991-05-21

A compact and portable diffraction grating maker is comprised of a laser beam, optical and fiber optics devices coupling the beam to one or more evanescent beam splitters, and collimating lenses or mirrors directing the split beam at an appropriate photosensitive material. The collimating optics, the output ends of the fiber optic coupler and the photosensitive plate holder are all mounted on an articulated framework so that the angle of intersection of the beams can be altered at will without disturbing the spatial filter, collimation or beam quality, and assuring that the beams will always intersect at the position of the plate. 4 figures.

Assessing School Turnaround: Evidence from Ohio

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Player, Daniel; Katz, Veronica

2016-01-01

Policy makers have struggled to find successful approaches to address concentrated, persistent low school achievement. While NCLB and the School Improvement Grant (SIG) program have devoted significant time and attention to turnaround, very little empirical evidence substantiates whether and how these efforts work. This study employs a comparative…

Investigation of holmium-doped zirconium oxide ceramic phosphor as an ultraviolet wavelength-discriminating laser beam viewer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yamanoi, Kohei; Hori, Tatsuhiro; Minami, Yuki; Empizo, Melvin John F.; Luong, Mui Viet; Shiro, Atsushi; Watanabe, Jun; Iwano, Keisuke; Iwasa, Yuki; Cadatal-Raduban, Marilou; Gabayno, Jacque Lynn; Shimizu, Toshihiko; Sarukura, Nobuhiko; Norimatsu, Takayoshi

2018-01-01

We report the fluorescence spectra of ZrO2 and trivalent Ho-doped ZrO2 ceramics under ultraviolet (UV) excitation at 213, 266, and 355 nm wavelengths. The Ho3+-doped ZrO2 ceramics exhibited varying fluorescence color tones depending on the excitation wavelength used. The different color tones match the fluorescence spectrum characteristics at each excitation wavelength. Our results demonstrate that Ho3+-doped ZrO2 ceramics can discriminate between UV light, specifically the third, fourth, and fifth harmonics of a Nd:YAG laser. It can potentially be used for developing UV laser beam viewers to aid laser alignment.

Providing Climate Policy Makers With a Strong Scientific Base (Invited)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Struzik, E.

2009-12-01

Scientists can and should inform public policy decisions in the Arctic. But the pace of climate change in the polar world has been occurring far more quickly than most scientists have been able to predict. This creates problems for decision-makers who recognize that difficult management decisions have to be made in matters pertaining to wildlife management, cultural integrity and economic development. With sea ice melting, glaciers receding, permafrost thawing, forest fires intensifying, and disease and invasive species rapidly moving north, the challenge for scientists to provide climate policy makers with a strong scientific base has been daunting. Clashing as this data sometimes does with the “traditional knowledge” of indigenous peoples in the north, it can also become very political. As a result the need to effectively communicate complex data is more imperative now than ever before. Here, the author describes how the work of scientists can often be misinterpreted or exploited in ways that were not intended. Examples include the inappropriate use of scientific data in decision-making on polar bears, caribou and other wildlife populations; the use of scientific data to debunk the fact that greenhouse gases are driving climate change, and the use of scientific data to position one scientist against another when there is no inherent conflict. This work will highlight the need for climate policy makers to increase support for scientists working in the Arctic, as well as illustrate why it is important to find new and more effective ways of communicating scientific data. Strategies that might be considered by granting agencies, scientists and climate policy decision-makers will also be discussed.

Reader and story, viewer and film: on transference and interpretation.

PubMed

Berman, Emanuel

2003-02-01

Two sides in Freud's attitude towards literature and art are presented: Freud the sensitive listener, whose interest in art is a potential springboard for a rich interdisciplinary dialogue; and Freud the conquistador, whose wish for power in 'invaded' territories is related to troublesome aspects of 'pathography' and 'applied analysis'. The unique contribution of psychoanalysis may not be discovering objectively the true unconscious content of works of art, but rather enriching the exploration of the potential transitional space evolving between artist, work of art and readers or viewers, enhancing our sensitivity to multiple meanings and complex emotional influences of art. This requires exploring our own subjective experiences of art, which may be described as transferences (when art is mostly perceived as a source of insight) or countertransferences (when artists and their work are basically experienced as troubled patients). Transference (broadly defined) and interpretation tend to intermingle, both in the clinical analytic encounter, and in any reading/viewing of art, be it by laymen, analysts or other scholars. Several examples from the psychoanalytic study of literature and film are given, and three pairs of contrasting interpretations are studied, concerning Kafka's The metamorphosis, Minghella's The English Patient and Polanski's Chinatown.

MAKER-P: a tool-kit for the creation, management, and quality control of plant genome annotations

USDA-ARS?s Scientific Manuscript database

We have optimized and extended the widely used annotation-engine MAKER for use on plant genomes. We have benchmarked the resulting software, MAKER-P, using the A. thaliana genome and the TAIR10 gene models. Here we demonstrate the ability of the MAKER-P toolkit to generate de novo repeat databases, ...

Constructing Perceptions of Climate Change: a case study of regional political decision makers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bray, D.

2012-12-01

This case study of climate change communications assesses the salient means of communication and the message adopted by regional political decision makers on the German Baltic coast. Realizing that cultural factors and local values (and not simply knowledge) are significant influences in explaining attitudes towards climate change, this analysis draws from the records of regional weather, from scientists with a specific focus on the region, from the political decision makers for that region, and the media message reaching the decision makers, ensuring all elements of the analysis are drawn from the same socioeconomic, geophysical, political and cultural context. This is important as the social dynamics surrounding the trust in science is of critical importance and, as such, all elements of the case study are specifically contained within a common context. If the utility of climate change knowledge is to prompt well conceived adaptation/mitigation strategies then the political decision process, or at least the perceptions shaping it, can best be understood by locating it within the world view of the decision makers involved in the production process. Using the results of two survey questionnaires, one of regional climate scientists and one of regional political decision makers, ten years of local weather records, and a summary of the message from mass media circulation, the discord in perceptions of regional climate change are quantitatively explored. The conclusions drawn from the analysis include, compared to the scientific assessment: The decision makers' perceptions of recent past differ from actual observations. The decision makers' perceptions of the future differ from scientific assessments. The decision makers tend to over estimate the magnitude of regional climate change and its impacts. The decision makers tend to over estimate the sense of immediacy for adaptation measures. The conclusions drawn suggest that in the regional political realm, it is often a

Graphical viewer for displaying locations and logs of selected wells and test holes in Putnam County, New York

USGS Publications Warehouse

Wolcott, Stephen W.

2005-01-01

Aquifers (water bearing geologic units) are the primary source of drinking water in most of Putnam County, N.Y. The principal sources of data used to define the geometry and hydraulic characteristics of aquifers are the logs of wells and test holes within the county. This report explains how to use a graphical viewer, available on the World Wide Web (http://ny.water.usgs.gov/pubs/of/of051198), to locate selected wells and test holes in Putnam County and display their logs.

A new 3D viewer as an interface between the ASDEX Upgrade CAD models and data from plasma modelling and experiment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lunt, T.; Fuchs, J. C.; Mank, K.; Feng, Y.; Brochard, F.; Herrmann, A.; Rohde, V.; Endstrasser, N.; ASDEX Upgrade Team

2010-11-01

A generally available and easy-to-use viewer for the simultaneous visualisation of the ASDEX Upgrade vacuum vessel computer aided design models, diagnostics and magnetic geometry, solutions of 3D plasma simulation codes and 2D camera images was developed. Here we report on the working principle of this software and give several examples of its technical and scientific application.

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information

PubMed Central

Sayers, Eric W.; Barrett, Tanya; Benson, Dennis A.; Bolton, Evan; Bryant, Stephen H.; Canese, Kathi; Chetvernin, Vyacheslav; Church, Deanna M.; DiCuccio, Michael; Federhen, Scott; Feolo, Michael; Fingerman, Ian M.; Geer, Lewis Y.; Helmberg, Wolfgang; Kapustin, Yuri; Krasnov, Sergey; Landsman, David; Lipman, David J.; Lu, Zhiyong; Madden, Thomas L.; Madej, Tom; Maglott, Donna R.; Marchler-Bauer, Aron; Miller, Vadim; Karsch-Mizrachi, Ilene; Ostell, James; Panchenko, Anna; Phan, Lon; Pruitt, Kim D.; Schuler, Gregory D.; Sequeira, Edwin; Sherry, Stephen T.; Shumway, Martin; Sirotkin, Karl; Slotta, Douglas; Souvorov, Alexandre; Starchenko, Grigory; Tatusova, Tatiana A.; Wagner, Lukas; Wang, Yanli; Wilbur, W. John; Yaschenko, Eugene; Ye, Jian

2012-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank® nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through the NCBI Website. NCBI resources include Entrez, the Entrez Programming Utilities, MyNCBI, PubMed, PubMed Central (PMC), Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link (BLink), Primer-BLAST, COBALT, Splign, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, dbVar, Epigenomics, Genome and related tools, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Trace Archive, Sequence Read Archive, BioProject, BioSample, Retroviral Genotyping Tools, HIV-1/Human Protein Interaction Database, Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), Probe, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals (OMIA), the Molecular Modeling Database (MMDB), the Conserved Domain Database (CDD), the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool (CDART), Biosystems, Protein Clusters and the PubChem suite of small molecule databases. Augmenting many of the Web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized data sets. All of these resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. PMID:22140104

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

PubMed

Sayers, Eric W; Barrett, Tanya; Benson, Dennis A; Bolton, Evan; Bryant, Stephen H; Canese, Kathi; Chetvernin, Vyacheslav; Church, Deanna M; Dicuccio, Michael; Federhen, Scott; Feolo, Michael; Fingerman, Ian M; Geer, Lewis Y; Helmberg, Wolfgang; Kapustin, Yuri; Krasnov, Sergey; Landsman, David; Lipman, David J; Lu, Zhiyong; Madden, Thomas L; Madej, Tom; Maglott, Donna R; Marchler-Bauer, Aron; Miller, Vadim; Karsch-Mizrachi, Ilene; Ostell, James; Panchenko, Anna; Phan, Lon; Pruitt, Kim D; Schuler, Gregory D; Sequeira, Edwin; Sherry, Stephen T; Shumway, Martin; Sirotkin, Karl; Slotta, Douglas; Souvorov, Alexandre; Starchenko, Grigory; Tatusova, Tatiana A; Wagner, Lukas; Wang, Yanli; Wilbur, W John; Yaschenko, Eugene; Ye, Jian

2012-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank® nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through the NCBI Website. NCBI resources include Entrez, the Entrez Programming Utilities, MyNCBI, PubMed, PubMed Central (PMC), Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link (BLink), Primer-BLAST, COBALT, Splign, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, dbVar, Epigenomics, Genome and related tools, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Trace Archive, Sequence Read Archive, BioProject, BioSample, Retroviral Genotyping Tools, HIV-1/Human Protein Interaction Database, Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), Probe, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals (OMIA), the Molecular Modeling Database (MMDB), the Conserved Domain Database (CDD), the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool (CDART), Biosystems, Protein Clusters and the PubChem suite of small molecule databases. Augmenting many of the Web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized data sets. All of these resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov.

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank® nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through the NCBI web site. NCBI resources include Entrez, the Entrez Programming Utilities, MyNCBI, PubMed, PubMed Central, Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link (BLink), Primer-BLAST, COBALT, Splign, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, dbVar, Epigenomics, the Genetic Testing Registry, Genome and related tools, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Trace Archive, Sequence Read Archive, BioProject, BioSample, Retroviral Genotyping Tools, HIV-1/Human Protein Interaction Database, Gene Expression Omnibus, Probe, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals, the Molecular Modeling Database, the Conserved Domain Database, the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool, Biosystems, Protein Clusters and the PubChem suite of small molecule databases. Augmenting many of the web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized data sets. All of these resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page. PMID:23193264

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

PubMed

Sayers, Eric W; Barrett, Tanya; Benson, Dennis A; Bryant, Stephen H; Canese, Kathi; Chetvernin, Vyacheslav; Church, Deanna M; DiCuccio, Michael; Edgar, Ron; Federhen, Scott; Feolo, Michael; Geer, Lewis Y; Helmberg, Wolfgang; Kapustin, Yuri; Landsman, David; Lipman, David J; Madden, Thomas L; Maglott, Donna R; Miller, Vadim; Mizrachi, Ilene; Ostell, James; Pruitt, Kim D; Schuler, Gregory D; Sequeira, Edwin; Sherry, Stephen T; Shumway, Martin; Sirotkin, Karl; Souvorov, Alexandre; Starchenko, Grigory; Tatusova, Tatiana A; Wagner, Lukas; Yaschenko, Eugene; Ye, Jian

2009-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through the NCBI web site. NCBI resources include Entrez, the Entrez Programming Utilities, MyNCBI, PubMed, PubMed Central, Entrez Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link (BLink), Electronic PCR, OrfFinder, Spidey, Splign, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, Cancer Chromosomes, Entrez Genomes and related tools, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COGs), Retroviral Genotyping Tools, HIV-1/Human Protein Interaction Database, Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), Entrez Probe, GENSAT, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM), Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals (OMIA), the Molecular Modeling Database (MMDB), the Conserved Domain Database (CDD), the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool (CDART) and the PubChem suite of small molecule databases. Augmenting many of the web applications is custom implementation of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized data sets. All of the resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov.

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information

PubMed Central

Wheeler, David L.; Barrett, Tanya; Benson, Dennis A.; Bryant, Stephen H.; Canese, Kathi; Chetvernin, Vyacheslav; Church, Deanna M.; DiCuccio, Michael; Edgar, Ron; Federhen, Scott; Feolo, Michael; Geer, Lewis Y.; Helmberg, Wolfgang; Kapustin, Yuri; Khovayko, Oleg; Landsman, David; Lipman, David J.; Madden, Thomas L.; Maglott, Donna R.; Miller, Vadim; Ostell, James; Pruitt, Kim D.; Schuler, Gregory D.; Shumway, Martin; Sequeira, Edwin; Sherry, Steven T.; Sirotkin, Karl; Souvorov, Alexandre; Starchenko, Grigory; Tatusov, Roman L.; Tatusova, Tatiana A.; Wagner, Lukas; Yaschenko, Eugene

2008-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank(R) nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data available through NCBI's web site. NCBI resources include Entrez, the Entrez Programming Utilities, My NCBI, PubMed, PubMed Central, Entrez Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link, Electronic PCR, OrfFinder, Spidey, Splign, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, Cancer Chromosomes, Entrez Genome, Genome Project and related tools, the Trace, Assembly, and Short Read Archives, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Clusters of Orthologous Groups, Influenza Viral Resources, HIV-1/Human Protein Interaction Database, Gene Expression Omnibus, Entrez Probe, GENSAT, Database of Genotype and Phenotype, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals, the Molecular Modeling Database, the Conserved Domain Database, the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool and the PubChem suite of small molecule databases. Augmenting the web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized data sets. These resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. PMID:18045790

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology

PubMed Central

Wheeler, David L.; Church, Deanna M.; Federhen, Scott; Lash, Alex E.; Madden, Thomas L.; Pontius, Joan U.; Schuler, Gregory D.; Schriml, Lynn M.; Sequeira, Edwin; Tatusova, Tatiana A.; Wagner, Lukas

2003-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank(R) nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides data analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through NCBI's Web site. NCBI resources include Entrez, PubMed, PubMed Central (PMC), LocusLink, the NCBITaxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link (BLink), Electronic PCR (e-PCR), Open Reading Frame (ORF) Finder, References Sequence (RefSeq), UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, Database of Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (dbSNP), Human/Mouse Homology Map, Cancer Chromosome Aberration Project (CCAP), Entrez Genomes and related tools, the Map Viewer, Model Maker (MM), Evidence Viewer (EV), Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COGs) database, Retroviral Genotyping Tools, SAGEmap, Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM), the Molecular Modeling Database (MMDB), the Conserved Domain Database (CDD), and the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool (CDART). Augmenting many of the Web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized data sets. All of the resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. PMID:12519941

The evidence-policy divide: a 'critical computational linguistics' approach to the language of 18 health agency CEOs from 9 countries.

PubMed

Bell, Erica; Seidel, Bastian M

2012-10-30

There is an emerging body of literature suggesting that the evidence-practice divide in health policy is complex and multi-factorial but less is known about the processes by which health policy-makers use evidence and their views about the specific features of useful evidence. This study aimed to contribute to understandings of how the most influential health policy-makers view useful evidence, in ways that help explore and question how the evidence-policy divide is understood and what research might be supported to help overcome this divide. A purposeful sample of 18 national and state health agency CEOs from 9 countries was obtained. Participants were interviewed using open-ended questions that asked them to define specific features of useful evidence. The analysis involved two main approaches 1)quantitative mapping of interview transcripts using Bayesian-based computational linguistics software 2)qualitative critical discourse analysis to explore the nuances of language extracts so identified. The decision-making, conclusions-oriented world of policy-making is constructed separately, but not exclusively, by policy-makers from the world of research. Research is not so much devalued by them as described as too technical- yet at the same time not methodologically complex enough to engage with localised policy-making contexts. It is not that policy-makers are negative about academics or universities, it is that they struggle to find complexity-oriented methodologies for understanding their stakeholder communities and improving systems. They did not describe themselves as having a more positive role in solving this challenge than academics. These interviews do not support simplistic definitions of policy-makers and researchers as coming from two irreconcilable worlds. They suggest that qualitative and quantitative research is valued by policy-makers but that to be policy-relevant health research may need to focus on building complexity-oriented research methods for

Climate modeling with decision makers in mind

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jones, Andrew; Calvin, Katherine; Lamarque, Jean -Francois

The need for regional- and local-scale climate information is increasing rapidly as decision makers seek to anticipate and manage a variety of context-specific climate risks over the next several decades. Furthermore, global climate models are not developed with these user needs in mind, and they typically operate at resolutions that are too coarse to provide information that could be used to support regional and local decisions.

Climate modeling with decision makers in mind

DOE PAGES

Jones, Andrew; Calvin, Katherine; Lamarque, Jean -Francois

2016-04-27

The need for regional- and local-scale climate information is increasing rapidly as decision makers seek to anticipate and manage a variety of context-specific climate risks over the next several decades. Furthermore, global climate models are not developed with these user needs in mind, and they typically operate at resolutions that are too coarse to provide information that could be used to support regional and local decisions.

Understanding Narratives of Nationhood: Film-Makers and Culloden

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gold, John R.; Gold, Margaret M.

2002-01-01

Film audiences have long been invited to view Scotland and Scottish life through a historic lens. Influenced by the pre-existing literary traditions of tartanry and kailyard, film-makers have focused nostalgically on the myths and legends of the Highland and pre-industrial Scotland, with the implications that this approach has for representations…

The Promise of the Maker Movement for Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Martin, Lee

2015-01-01

The Maker Movement is a community of hobbyists, tinkerers, engineers, hackers, and artists who creatively design and build projects for both playful and useful ends. There is growing interest among educators in bringing making into K-12 education to enhance opportunities to engage in the practices of engineering, specifically, and STEM more…

Computerized clinical decision support systems for chronic disease management: a decision-maker-researcher partnership systematic review.

PubMed

Roshanov, Pavel S; Misra, Shikha; Gerstein, Hertzel C; Garg, Amit X; Sebaldt, Rolf J; Mackay, Jean A; Weise-Kelly, Lorraine; Navarro, Tamara; Wilczynski, Nancy L; Haynes, R Brian

2011-08-03

The use of computerized clinical decision support systems (CCDSSs) may improve chronic disease management, which requires recurrent visits to multiple health professionals, ongoing disease and treatment monitoring, and patient behavior modification. The objective of this review was to determine if CCDSSs improve the processes of chronic care (such as diagnosis, treatment, and monitoring of disease) and associated patient outcomes (such as effects on biomarkers and clinical exacerbations). We conducted a decision-maker-researcher partnership systematic review. We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, Ovid's EBM Reviews database, Inspec, and reference lists for potentially eligible articles published up to January 2010. We included randomized controlled trials that compared the use of CCDSSs to usual practice or non-CCDSS controls. Trials were eligible if at least one component of the CCDSS was designed to support chronic disease management. We considered studies 'positive' if they showed a statistically significant improvement in at least 50% of relevant outcomes. Of 55 included trials, 87% (n = 48) measured system impact on the process of care and 52% (n = 25) of those demonstrated statistically significant improvements. Sixty-five percent (36/55) of trials measured impact on, typically, non-major (surrogate) patient outcomes, and 31% (n = 11) of those demonstrated benefits. Factors of interest to decision makers, such as cost, user satisfaction, system interface and feature sets, unique design and deployment characteristics, and effects on user workflow were rarely investigated or reported. A small majority (just over half) of CCDSSs improved care processes in chronic disease management and some improved patient health. Policy makers, healthcare administrators, and practitioners should be aware that the evidence of CCDSS effectiveness is limited, especially with respect to the small number and size of studies measuring patient outcomes.

Computerized clinical decision support systems for chronic disease management: A decision-maker-researcher partnership systematic review

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background The use of computerized clinical decision support systems (CCDSSs) may improve chronic disease management, which requires recurrent visits to multiple health professionals, ongoing disease and treatment monitoring, and patient behavior modification. The objective of this review was to determine if CCDSSs improve the processes of chronic care (such as diagnosis, treatment, and monitoring of disease) and associated patient outcomes (such as effects on biomarkers and clinical exacerbations). Methods We conducted a decision-maker-researcher partnership systematic review. We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, Ovid's EBM Reviews database, Inspec, and reference lists for potentially eligible articles published up to January 2010. We included randomized controlled trials that compared the use of CCDSSs to usual practice or non-CCDSS controls. Trials were eligible if at least one component of the CCDSS was designed to support chronic disease management. We considered studies 'positive' if they showed a statistically significant improvement in at least 50% of relevant outcomes. Results Of 55 included trials, 87% (n = 48) measured system impact on the process of care and 52% (n = 25) of those demonstrated statistically significant improvements. Sixty-five percent (36/55) of trials measured impact on, typically, non-major (surrogate) patient outcomes, and 31% (n = 11) of those demonstrated benefits. Factors of interest to decision makers, such as cost, user satisfaction, system interface and feature sets, unique design and deployment characteristics, and effects on user workflow were rarely investigated or reported. Conclusions A small majority (just over half) of CCDSSs improved care processes in chronic disease management and some improved patient health. Policy makers, healthcare administrators, and practitioners should be aware that the evidence of CCDSS effectiveness is limited, especially with respect to the small number and size of studies measuring patient outcomes

Evaluation of TransTech joint maker and precompaction screed.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2000-09-01

The primary objective of this evaluation is to determine the effectiveness of the Joint Maker and Precompaction : Screed, both developed by TransTech Systems, Inc., in achieving higher and more uniform density across the mat of : a rehabilitated Hot ...

Knowledge and Attitudes of a Number of Iranian Policy-makers towards Abortion

PubMed Central

Shamshiri-Milani, Hourieh; Pourreza, Abolghasem; Akbari, Feizollah

2010-01-01

Introduction Unsafe and illegal abortions are the third leading cause of maternal death. It affects physical, emotional and social health of women and their families. Abortion is a multi-dimensional phenomenon with several social, legal, and religious implications. The views of policy-makers affect the approach to abortion in every society. Understanding the attitudes and knowledge of high-ranking decision makers towards abortion was the purpose of this study. Materials and Methods A qualitative research was implemented by carrying out individual interviews with 29 out of a selection of 80 presidents of medical sciences universities, senior executive managers in the legal system, forensic medicine and decision-makers in the health system and a number of top Muslim clerics, using a semi-structured questionnaire for data gathering. Content analysis revealed the results. Results There were considerable unwillingness and reluctance among the interviewees to participate in the study. The majority of participants fairly knew about the prevalence of illegal abortions and their complications. There was strong agreement on abortion when health of the mother or the fetus was at risk. Abortion for reproductive health reasons was supported by a minority of the respondents. The majority of them disagreed with abortion when pregnancy was the result of a rape, temporary marriage or out of wedlock affairs. Making decision for abortion by the pregnant mother, as a matter of her right, did not gain too much approval. Conclusion It seemed that physical health of the mother or the fetus was of more importance to the respondents than their mental or social health. The mother's hardship was not any indication for induced abortion in the viewpoints of the interviewed policy-makers. Strengthening family planning programs, making appropriate laws in lines with religious orders and advocacy programs targeting decision makers are determined as strategies for improving women's health rights

Knowledge and Attitudes of a Number of Iranian Policy-makers towards Abortion.

PubMed

Hourieh, Shamshiri-Milani; Abolghasem, Pourreza; Feizollah, Akbari

2010-10-01

Unsafe and illegal abortions are the third leading cause of maternal death. It affects physical, emotional and social health of women and their families. Abortion is a multi-dimensional phenomenon with several social, legal, and religious implications. The views of policy-makers affect the approach to abortion in every society. Understanding the attitudes and knowledge of high-ranking decision makers towards abortion was the purpose of this study. A qualitative research was implemented by carrying out individual interviews with 29 out of a selection of 80 presidents of medical sciences universities, senior executive managers in the legal system, forensic medicine and decision-makers in the health system and a number of top Muslim clerics, using a semi-structured questionnaire for data gathering. Content analysis revealed the results. There were considerable unwillingness and reluctance among the interviewees to participate in the study. The majority of participants fairly knew about the prevalence of illegal abortions and their complications. There was strong agreement on abortion when health of the mother or the fetus was at risk. Abortion for reproductive health reasons was supported by a minority of the respondents. The majority of them disagreed with abortion when pregnancy was the result of a rape, temporary marriage or out of wedlock affairs. Making decision for abortion by the pregnant mother, as a matter of her right, did not gain too much approval. It seemed that physical health of the mother or the fetus was of more importance to the respondents than their mental or social health. The mother's hardship was not any indication for induced abortion in the viewpoints of the interviewed policy-makers. Strengthening family planning programs, making appropriate laws in lines with religious orders and advocacy programs targeting decision makers are determined as strategies for improving women's health rights.

High Throughput Protein Quantitation using MRM Viewer Software and Dynamic MRM on a Triple Quadruple Mass Spectrometer

PubMed Central

Miller, C.; Waddell, K.; Tang, N.

2010-01-01

RP-122 Peptide quantitation using Multiple Reaction Monitoring (MRM) has been established as an important methodology for biomarker verification andvalidation.This requires high throughput combined with high sensitivity to analyze potentially thousands of target peptides in each sample.Dynamic MRM allows the system to only acquire the required MRMs of the peptide during a retention window corresponding to when each peptide is eluting. This reduces the number of concurrent MRM and therefore improves quantitation and sensitivity. MRM Selector allows the user to generate an MRM transition list with retention time information from discovery data obtained on a QTOF MS system.This list can be directly imported into the triple quadrupole acquisition software.However, situations can exist where a) the list of MRMs contain an excess of MRM transitions allowable under the ideal acquisition conditions chosen ( allowing for cycle time and chromatography conditions), or b) too many transitions in a certain retention time region which would result in an unacceptably low dwell time and cycle time.A new tool - MRM viewer has been developed to help users automatically generate multiple dynamic MRM methods from a single MRM list.In this study, a list of 3293 MRM transitions from a human plasma sample was compiled.A single dynamic MRM method with 3293 transitions results in a minimum dwell time of 2.18ms.Using MRM viewer we can generate three dynamic MRM methods with a minimum dwell time of 20ms which can give a better quality MRM quantitation.This tool facilitates both high throughput and high sensitivity for MRM quantitation.

Use of Evidence from Systematic Reviews to Inform Commissioning Decisions: A Case Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chambers, Duncan; Grant, Rod; Warren, Erica; Pearson, Sally-Anne; Wilson, Paul

2012-01-01

Systematic reviews provide high-level evidence but there are barriers to their use by policy makers. This paper reports the preparation and evaluation of an evidence briefing, using systematic reviews and other existing sources of synthesised evidence, to support a possible reorganisation of services for young people with eating disorders in an…

Evidence-informed decision making for nutrition: African experiences and way forward.

PubMed

Aryeetey, Richmond; Holdsworth, Michelle; Taljaard, Christine; Hounkpatin, Waliou Amoussa; Colecraft, Esi; Lachat, Carl; Nago, Eunice; Hailu, Tesfaye; Kolsteren, Patrick; Verstraeten, Roos

2017-11-01

Although substantial amount of nutrition research is conducted in Africa, the research agenda is mainly donor-driven. There is a clear need for a revised research agenda in Africa which is both driven by and responding to local priorities. The present paper summarises proceedings of a symposium on how evidence can guide decision makers towards context-appropriate priorities and decisions in nutrition. The paper focuses on lessons learnt from case studies by the Evidence Informed Decision Making in Nutrition and Health Network implemented between 2015 and 2016 in Benin, Ghana and South Africa. Activities within these countries were organised around problem-oriented evidence-informed decision-making (EIDM), capacity strengthening and leadership and horizontal collaboration. Using a combination of desk-reviews, stakeholder influence-mapping, semi-structured interviews and convening platforms, these country-level studies demonstrated strong interest for partnership between researchers and decision makers, and use of research evidence for prioritisation and decision making in nutrition. Identified capacity gaps were addressed through training workshops on EIDM, systematic reviews, cost-benefit evaluations and evidence contextualisation. Investing in knowledge partnerships and development of capacity and leadership are key to drive appropriate use of evidence in nutrition policy and programming in Africa.

MovieMaker: a web server for rapid rendering of protein motions and interactions

PubMed Central

Maiti, Rajarshi; Van Domselaar, Gary H.; Wishart, David S.

2005-01-01

MovieMaker is a web server that allows short (∼10 s), downloadable movies of protein motions to be generated. It accepts PDB files or PDB accession numbers as input and automatically calculates, renders and merges the necessary image files to create colourful animations covering a wide range of protein motions and other dynamic processes. Users have the option of animating (i) simple rotation, (ii) morphing between two end-state conformers, (iii) short-scale, picosecond vibrations, (iv) ligand docking, (v) protein oligomerization, (vi) mid-scale nanosecond (ensemble) motions and (vii) protein folding/unfolding. MovieMaker does not perform molecular dynamics calculations. Instead it is an animation tool that uses a sophisticated superpositioning algorithm in conjunction with Cartesian coordinate interpolation to rapidly and automatically calculate the intermediate structures needed for many of its animations. Users have extensive control over the rendering style, structure colour, animation quality, background and other image features. MovieMaker is intended to be a general-purpose server that allows both experts and non-experts to easily generate useful, informative protein animations for educational and illustrative purposes. MovieMaker is accessible at . PMID:15980488

MovieMaker: a web server for rapid rendering of protein motions and interactions.

PubMed

Maiti, Rajarshi; Van Domselaar, Gary H; Wishart, David S

2005-07-01

MovieMaker is a web server that allows short ( approximately 10 s), downloadable movies of protein motions to be generated. It accepts PDB files or PDB accession numbers as input and automatically calculates, renders and merges the necessary image files to create colourful animations covering a wide range of protein motions and other dynamic processes. Users have the option of animating (i) simple rotation, (ii) morphing between two end-state conformers, (iii) short-scale, picosecond vibrations, (iv) ligand docking, (v) protein oligomerization, (vi) mid-scale nanosecond (ensemble) motions and (vii) protein folding/unfolding. MovieMaker does not perform molecular dynamics calculations. Instead it is an animation tool that uses a sophisticated superpositioning algorithm in conjunction with Cartesian coordinate interpolation to rapidly and automatically calculate the intermediate structures needed for many of its animations. Users have extensive control over the rendering style, structure colour, animation quality, background and other image features. MovieMaker is intended to be a general-purpose server that allows both experts and non-experts to easily generate useful, informative protein animations for educational and illustrative purposes. MovieMaker is accessible at http://wishart.biology.ualberta.ca/moviemaker.

Using Cognitive Conflict to Promote the Use of Dialectical Learning for Strategic Decision-Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Woods, Jeffrey G.

2012-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to develop a conceptual model that uses dialectical inquiry (DI) to create cognitive conflict in strategic decision-makers for the purpose of improving strategic decisions. Activation of the dialectical learning process using DI requires strategic decision-makers to integrate conflicting information causing…

Visualization of RNA structure models within the Integrative Genomics Viewer.

PubMed

Busan, Steven; Weeks, Kevin M

2017-07-01

Analyses of the interrelationships between RNA structure and function are increasingly important components of genomic studies. The SHAPE-MaP strategy enables accurate RNA structure probing and realistic structure modeling of kilobase-length noncoding RNAs and mRNAs. Existing tools for visualizing RNA structure models are not suitable for efficient analysis of long, structurally heterogeneous RNAs. In addition, structure models are often advantageously interpreted in the context of other experimental data and gene annotation information, for which few tools currently exist. We have developed a module within the widely used and well supported open-source Integrative Genomics Viewer (IGV) that allows visualization of SHAPE and other chemical probing data, including raw reactivities, data-driven structural entropies, and data-constrained base-pair secondary structure models, in context with linear genomic data tracks. We illustrate the usefulness of visualizing RNA structure in the IGV by exploring structure models for a large viral RNA genome, comparing bacterial mRNA structure in cells with its structure under cell- and protein-free conditions, and comparing a noncoding RNA structure modeled using SHAPE data with a base-pairing model inferred through sequence covariation analysis. © 2017 Busan and Weeks; Published by Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press for the RNA Society.

Designing "Real-World" trials to meet the needs of health policy makers at marketing authorization.

PubMed

Calvert, Melanie; Wood, John; Freemantle, Nick

2011-07-01

There is increasing interest in conducting "Real-World" trials that go beyond traditional assessment of efficacy and safety to examine market access and value for money questions before marketing authorization of a new pharmaceutical product or health technology. This commentary uses practical examples to demonstrate how high-quality evidence of the cost-effectiveness of an intervention may be gained earlier in the development process. Issues surrounding the design and analysis of "Real-World" trials to demonstrate relative cost-effectiveness early in the life of new technologies are discussed. The modification of traditional phase III trial designs, de novo trial designs, the combination of trial-based and epidemiological data, and the use of simulation model-based approaches to address reimbursement questions are described. Modest changes to a phase III trial protocol and case report form may be undertaken at the design stage to provide valid estimates of health care use and the benefits accrued; however, phase III designs often preclude "real-life" practice. Relatively small de novo trials may be used to address adherence to therapy or patient preference, although simply designed studies with active comparators enrolling large numbers of patients may provide evidence on long-term safety and rare adverse events. Practical examples demonstrate that it is possible to provide high-quality evidence of the cost-effectiveness of an intervention earlier in the development process. Payers and decision makers should preferentially adopt treatments with such evidence than treatments for which evidence is lacking or of lower quality. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Key Policy Makers' Awareness of Tobacco Taxation Effectiveness through a Sensitization Program.

PubMed

Heydari, Gholamreza; Ebn Ahmady, Arezoo; Lando, Harry A; Chamyani, Fahimeh; Masjedi, Mohammadreza; Shadmehr, Mohammad B; Fadaizadeh, Lida

2015-12-01

The implementation of 5 of the 6 WHO MPOWER program in Iran is satisfactory; the only notable shortcoming is the lack of tobacco taxation increases. This study was designed to increase key policy makers' awareness of tobacco taxation effectiveness through a sensitization program in Iran. This analytical and semi-experimental study in 2014 included 110 tobacco control key policy makers, who were trained and received educational materials on the importance of tobacco taxation. A valid and reliable questionnaire was completed before and three months after intervention. Data were analyzed using mean (SD), t-Test and analysis of variance. The mean (SD) scores at pre- and post-test were 2.7 ± 3 and 8.8 ± 1 out of 10, respectively. Paired t-tests demonstrated a significant difference in the pre- post-test knowledge scores. Increasing knowledge and promoting favorable attitudes of policy makers can lead to greater attention which could in turn change tobacco taxation policies.

Connecting Evidence and Policy: Bringing Researchers and Policy Makers Together for Effective Evidence-Based Health Policy in the Netherlands: A Case Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Van Egmond, Stans; Bekker, Marleen; Bal, Roland; van der Grinten, Tom

2011-01-01

The use of evidence in health promotion has become the gold standard, and obliges rethinking how to increase the (often limited) use of evidence in public health policy. Recently calls have been made to reconceptualise science policy relations as dynamic, interactive and co-constructive practices. Building on a qualitative investigation of an…

Fashion advertisements: a comparison of viewers' perceptual and affective responses to illustrated and photographed stimuli.

PubMed

Kimle, P A; Fiore, A M

1992-12-01

The perceptual and affective responses of 44 women to actual illustrated and photographed fashion advertisements during focused interviews were explored. Content analysis methods identified categories of response; frequency of response categories for the two media were compared using Fisher's z tests. Significant differences in perceptual responses included greater visual interest created by the use of color in photographs, greater interest in layout and design features of the illustrations, and interest in characteristics of the models in the photographs. Affective response differences included greater preference for photographic advertisements and the garments in them. Contrary to suggestions from professionals in fashion advertising, no significant differences were found in viewers' perceptions of information about the products in the advertisements or perceptions of meaning and aesthetic response.

Natural Hazards and Climate Change: Making the Link for Policy Makers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Folger, P.

2003-04-01

Debate about global warming in the U.S. Congress often deteriorates when proposals for restricting consumption of fossil fuels, and thus curtailing carbon dioxide emissions, is mentioned. The negative economic implications of curtailing CO2 emissions often stifle Congressional thinking about strategies to deal with climate change. Some policy makers often malign climate change research as irrelevant to their citizens, e.g. why is simulating temperature trends 100 years into the future meaningful to their voters? An alternative approach is to connect climate change with ongoing natural events such as severe weather, drought and floods. These extreme events may or may not be exacerbated by anthropogenic CO2 emissions, but policy makers can debate and legislate approaches to mitigate against natural hazards now without mentioning carbon. What strategy might connect research results on understanding climate change and natural hazards mitigation in their minds? 1. Identify a specific situation where a key legislator's voters are threatened or affected by extreme natural phenomena, 2. Suggest a policy approach that provides protection or relief for those constituents, 3. Help the policy maker vet the idea within and without the scientific community, 4.Turn that idea into legislation and advocate for its passage.

Coco Nut Meets the Gadget Maker. Volume 1.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Thomson, P.

The adventures of Coco Nut, a coconut which has fallen from a palm tree in Florida, are illustrated in this booklet for elementary school students. His fall into a canal and ensuing encounters with dead and alive fish and a gadget maker (industry) are used to portray the effects of water pollution. What man can do to stop such pollution and…

Economic impact of off-line PC viewer for private folder management

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Song, Koun-Sik; Shin, Myung J.; Lee, Joo Hee; Auh, Yong H.

1999-07-01

We developed a PC-based clinical workstation and implemented at Asan Medical Center in Seoul, Korea, Hardwares used were Pentium-II, 8M video memory, 64-128 MB RAM, 19 inch color monitor, and 10/100Mbps network adaptor. One of the unique features of this workstation is management tool for folders reside both in PACS short-term storage unit and local hard disk. Users can copy the entire study or part of the study to local hard disk, removable storages, or CD recorder. Even the images in private folders in PACS short-term storage can be copied to local storage devices. All images are saved as DICOM 3.0 file format with 2:1 lossless compression. We compared the prices of copy films and storage medias considering the possible savings of expensive PACS short- term storage and network traffic. Price savings of copy film is most remarkable in MR exam. Price savings arising from minimal use of short-term unit was 50,000 dollars. It as hard to calculate the price savings arising from the network usage. Off-line PC viewer is a cost-effective way of handling private folder management under the PACS environment.

Disorganized attachment in infancy: a review of the phenomenon and its implications for clinicians and policy-makers.

PubMed

Granqvist, Pehr; Sroufe, L Alan; Dozier, Mary; Hesse, Erik; Steele, Miriam; van Ijzendoorn, Marinus; Solomon, Judith; Schuengel, Carlo; Fearon, Pasco; Bakermans-Kranenburg, Marian; Steele, Howard; Cassidy, Jude; Carlson, Elizabeth; Madigan, Sheri; Jacobvitz, Deborah; Foster, Sarah; Behrens, Kazuko; Rifkin-Graboi, Anne; Gribneau, Naomi; Spangler, Gottfried; Ward, Mary J; True, Mary; Spieker, Susan; Reijman, Sophie; Reisz, Samantha; Tharner, Anne; Nkara, Frances; Goldwyn, Ruth; Sroufe, June; Pederson, David; Pederson, Deanne; Weigand, Robert; Siegel, Daniel; Dazzi, Nino; Bernard, Kristin; Fonagy, Peter; Waters, Everett; Toth, Sheree; Cicchetti, Dante; Zeanah, Charles H; Lyons-Ruth, Karlen; Main, Mary; Duschinsky, Robbie

2017-12-01

Disorganized/Disoriented (D) attachment has seen widespread interest from policy makers, practitioners, and clinicians in recent years. However, some of this interest seems to have been based on some false assumptions that (1) attachment measures can be used as definitive assessments of the individual in forensic/child protection settings and that disorganized attachment (2) reliably indicates child maltreatment, (3) is a strong predictor of pathology, and (4) represents a fixed or static "trait" of the child, impervious to development or help. This paper summarizes the evidence showing that these four assumptions are false and misleading. The paper reviews what is known about disorganized infant attachment and clarifies the implications of the classification for clinical and welfare practice with children. In particular, the difference between disorganized attachment and attachment disorder is examined, and a strong case is made for the value of attachment theory for supportive work with families and for the development and evaluation of evidence-based caregiving interventions.

Disorganized attachment in infancy: a review of the phenomenon and its implications for clinicians and policy-makers

PubMed Central

Granqvist, Pehr; Sroufe, L. Alan; Dozier, Mary; Hesse, Erik; Steele, Miriam; van Ijzendoorn, Marinus; Solomon, Judith; Schuengel, Carlo; Fearon, Pasco; Bakermans-Kranenburg, Marian; Steele, Howard; Cassidy, Jude; Carlson, Elizabeth; Madigan, Sheri; Jacobvitz, Deborah; Foster, Sarah; Behrens, Kazuko; Rifkin-Graboi, Anne; Gribneau, Naomi; Spangler, Gottfried; Ward, Mary J; True, Mary; Spieker, Susan; Reijman, Sophie; Reisz, Samantha; Tharner, Anne; Nkara, Frances; Goldwyn, Ruth; Sroufe, June; Pederson, David; Pederson, Deanne; Weigand, Robert; Siegel, Daniel; Dazzi, Nino; Bernard, Kristin; Fonagy, Peter; Waters, Everett; Toth, Sheree; Cicchetti, Dante; Zeanah, Charles H; Lyons-Ruth, Karlen; Main, Mary; Duschinsky, Robbie

2017-01-01

ABSTRACT Disorganized/Disoriented (D) attachment has seen widespread interest from policy makers, practitioners, and clinicians in recent years. However, some of this interest seems to have been based on some false assumptions that (1) attachment measures can be used as definitive assessments of the individual in forensic/child protection settings and that disorganized attachment (2) reliably indicates child maltreatment, (3) is a strong predictor of pathology, and (4) represents a fixed or static “trait” of the child, impervious to development or help. This paper summarizes the evidence showing that these four assumptions are false and misleading. The paper reviews what is known about disorganized infant attachment and clarifies the implications of the classification for clinical and welfare practice with children. In particular, the difference between disorganized attachment and attachment disorder is examined, and a strong case is made for the value of attachment theory for supportive work with families and for the development and evaluation of evidence-based caregiving interventions. PMID:28745146

MapMaker and PathTracer for tracking carbon in genome-scale metabolic models

PubMed Central

Tervo, Christopher J.; Reed, Jennifer L.

2016-01-01

Constraint-based reconstruction and analysis (COBRA) modeling results can be difficult to interpret given the large numbers of reactions in genome-scale models. While paths in metabolic networks can be found, existing methods are not easily combined with constraint-based approaches. To address this limitation, two tools (MapMaker and PathTracer) were developed to find paths (including cycles) between metabolites, where each step transfers carbon from reactant to product. MapMaker predicts carbon transfer maps (CTMs) between metabolites using only information on molecular formulae and reaction stoichiometry, effectively determining which reactants and products share carbon atoms. MapMaker correctly assigned CTMs for over 97% of the 2,251 reactions in an Escherichia coli metabolic model (iJO1366). Using CTMs as inputs, PathTracer finds paths between two metabolites. PathTracer was applied to iJO1366 to investigate the importance of using CTMs and COBRA constraints when enumerating paths, to find active and high flux paths in flux balance analysis (FBA) solutions, to identify paths for putrescine utilization, and to elucidate a potential CO2 fixation pathway in E. coli. These results illustrate how MapMaker and PathTracer can be used in combination with constraint-based models to identify feasible, active, and high flux paths between metabolites. PMID:26771089

Policy-Oriented Foresight as Evidence for Policy Making: Conditions of (Mis)Match

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fobé, Ellen; Brans, Marleen

2013-01-01

This article approaches policy-oriented foresight as a particular kind of evidence aimed at supporting and developing policies. Through a comparative case study, the article investigates the different ways in which evidence from policy-oriented foresight is used by policy makers. In explaining the factors behind differences in use between the…

3. BARREL VIEW, LOOKING DOWN LENGTH OF BRIDGE, SHOWING MAKER'S ...

Library of Congress Historic Buildings Survey, Historic Engineering Record, Historic Landscapes Survey

3. BARREL VIEW, LOOKING DOWN LENGTH OF BRIDGE, SHOWING MAKER'S PLATE, DECORATIVE SCROLLWORK AND URN FINIALS ON NORTHEAST PORTAL - "Forder" Pratt Through Truss Bridge, Spanning Maumee River at County Route 73, Antwerp, Paulding County, OH

3. VIEW OF MAKERS PLATE ATTACHED TO UPPER CHORD MEMBER ...

Library of Congress Historic Buildings Survey, Historic Engineering Record, Historic Landscapes Survey

3. VIEW OF MAKERS PLATE ATTACHED TO UPPER CHORD MEMBER WHICH STATES 'HUSTON AND CLEVELAND CONTRACTORS, COLUMBUS, OHIO, 1904.' - Main Street Parker Pony Truss Bridge, Main Street (Route 170) spanning Yellow Creek, Poland, Mahoning County, OH

Testing information to improve communication with communities and decision makers.

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

2011-09-01

This work focuses on important concepts in making information available to decision makers and the : public, specifically focused on the Transportation Industry. The emphasis is on the PowerPoint : presentation and enhancing the message through this ...

M1A2 tank commander's independent thermal viewer optics: system engineering perspective

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ratcliff, David D.

1993-08-01

As successful as the M1A1 Abrams tank was in the Gulf War, a program has been under way for several years to improve and modernize the M1A1 to keep pace with new threats and to take advantage of new technology. This program has resulted in the M1A2 upgrade program which significantly improves the survivability and lethality of the tank. First, the point-to-point wiring and analog signal processing was replaced with digital processing and control with a modern, aircraft-style digital data bus. Additional command and control aspects of the upgrade greatly improved the situational awareness of the M1A2 commander. Finally, an additional thermal imaging system was added for the commander. This system, the M1A2 Commander's Independent Thermal Viewer (CITV) is the topic of the following paper, which details the design from a system engineering perspective, and a companion paper that presents the optical design perspective.

Metadyn View: Fast web-based viewer of free energy surfaces calculated by metadynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hošek, Petr; Spiwok, Vojtěch

2016-01-01

Metadynamics is a highly successful enhanced sampling technique for simulation of molecular processes and prediction of their free energy surfaces. An in-depth analysis of data obtained by this method is as important as the simulation itself. Although there are several tools to compute free energy surfaces from metadynamics data, they usually lack user friendliness and a build-in visualization part. Here we introduce Metadyn View as a fast and user friendly viewer of bias potential/free energy surfaces calculated by metadynamics in Plumed package. It is based on modern web technologies including HTML5, JavaScript and Cascade Style Sheets (CSS). It can be used by visiting the web site and uploading a HILLS file. It calculates the bias potential/free energy surface on the client-side, so it can run online or offline without necessity to install additional web engines. Moreover, it includes tools for measurement of free energies and free energy differences and data/image export.

The SRS-Viewer: A Software Tool for Displaying and Evaluation of Pyroshock Data

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Eberl, Stefan

2014-06-01

For the evaluation of the success of a pyroshock, the time domain and the corresponding Shock-Response- Spectra (SRS) have to be considered. The SRS-Viewer is an IABG developed software tool [1] to read data in Universal File format (*.unv) and either display or plot for each accelerometer the time domain, corresponding SRS and the specified Reference-SRS with tolerances in the background.The software calculates the "Average (AVG)", "Maximum (MAX)" and "Minimum (MIN)" SRS of any selection of accelerometers. A statistical analysis calculates the percentages of measured SRS above the specified Reference-SRS level and the percentage within the tolerance bands for comparison with the specified success criteria.Overlay plots of single accelerometers of different test runs enable to monitor the repeatability of the shock input and the integrity of the specimen. Furthermore the difference between the shock on a mass-dummy and the real test unit can be examined.

Educational Goods and Values: A Framework for Decision Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Brighouse, Harry; Ladd, Helen F.; Loeb, Susanna; Swift, Adam

2016-01-01

This article articulates a framework suitable for use when making decisions about education policy. Decision makers should establish what the feasible options are and evaluate them in terms of their contribution to the development, and distribution, of educational goods in children, balanced against the negative effect of policies on important…

Imaginative Thinking: Addressing Social Justice Issues through MovieMaker

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Boske, Christa A.

2009-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the experiences of aspiring school leaders who utilized artmaking in this case, photography, poetry, music, collage, and short films through Microsoft MovieMaker as a means for addressing injustices within surrounding school communities. The paper aims to explore how aspiring school leaders…

46 CFR 113.25-5 - Location of contact makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-10-01

... the navigating bridge; and (2) At the feeder distribution panel if the general alarm power supply is not in or next to the navigating bridge. (b) Tank vessels. Each tank vessel must have a manually operated contact maker for the general emergency alarm system: (1) In the navigating bridge; (2) At the...

46 CFR 113.25-5 - Location of contact makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-10-01

... the navigating bridge; and (2) At the feeder distribution panel if the general alarm power supply is not in or next to the navigating bridge. (b) Tank vessels. Each tank vessel must have a manually operated contact maker for the general emergency alarm system: (1) In the navigating bridge; (2) At the...

46 CFR 113.25-5 - Location of contact makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

... the navigating bridge; and (2) At the feeder distribution panel if the general alarm power supply is not in or next to the navigating bridge. (b) Tank vessels. Each tank vessel must have a manually operated contact maker for the general emergency alarm system: (1) In the navigating bridge; (2) At the...

46 CFR 113.25-5 - Location of contact makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-10-01

... the navigating bridge; and (2) At the feeder distribution panel if the general alarm power supply is not in or next to the navigating bridge. (b) Tank vessels. Each tank vessel must have a manually operated contact maker for the general emergency alarm system: (1) In the navigating bridge; (2) At the...

46 CFR 113.25-5 - Location of contact makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

... the navigating bridge; and (2) At the feeder distribution panel if the general alarm power supply is not in or next to the navigating bridge. (b) Tank vessels. Each tank vessel must have a manually operated contact maker for the general emergency alarm system: (1) In the navigating bridge; (2) At the...

Possibilities and hindrances for prevention of intimate partner violence: perceptions among professionals and decision makers in a Swedish medium-sized town.

PubMed

Jakobsson, A; von Borgstede, C; Krantz, G; Spak, F; Hensing, G

2013-09-01

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a major public health problem, but few evidence-based prevention programs have yet been implemented. This study explored the perceptions and beliefs of local-level decision makers, social and health-care professionals, and representatives from the police force regarding the possibilities and hindrances for prevention of IPV. An explorative qualitative approach was used, and participants were strategically selected for focus group discussions. The participants, 19 men and 23 women, were professionals or decision makers within health-care services, social welfare, municipal administration, the police force, local industry, and local politicians in a Swedish town of 54,000 inhabitants. The focus group discussions were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim, and thematically analyzed. A manifest content analysis was performed on the text. Preschools, schools, sports associations, workplaces, and the mass media were suggested as possible arenas for prevention measures. The proposed activities included norm building and improved social support structures. Hindrances were conceptualized as societal beliefs and attitudes, shame, silence, gender inequality, the counteracting influence of the media, and lack of resources. The participants demonstrated closeness and distance to IPV, expressed as acceptance or referral of responsibility to others regarding where and by whom prevention measures should be executed. This study gave new insights in the prevailing perceptions of professionals and decision makers of a medium-sized Swedish town, which can be a useful knowledge in future preventive work and contribute to bridge the gap between research and practice.

Ethical challenges related to elder care. High level decision-makers' experiences.

PubMed

Mamhidir, Anna-Greta; Kihlgren, Mona; Sorlie, Venke

2007-04-10

Few empirical studies have been found that explore ethical challenges among persons in high public positions that are responsible for elder care. The aim of this paper was to illuminate the meaning of being in ethically difficult situations related to elder care as experienced by high level decision-makers. A phenomenological-hermeneutic method was used to analyse the eighteen interviews conducted with political and civil servant high level decision-makers at the municipality and county council level from two counties in Sweden. The participants worked at a planning and control as well as executive level and had both budget and quality of elder care responsibilities. Both ethical dilemmas and the meaning of being in ethically difficult situations related to elder care were revealed. No differences were seen between the politicians and the civil servants. The ethical dilemmas mostly concerned dealings with extensive care needs and working with a limited budget. The dilemmas were associated with a lack of good care and a lack of agreement concerning care such as vulnerable patients in inappropriate care settings, weaknesses in medical support, dissimilar focuses between the caring systems, justness in the distribution of care and deficient information. Being in ethically difficult situations was challenging. Associated with them were experiences of being exposed, having to be strategic and living with feelings such as aloneness and loneliness, uncertainty, lack of confirmation, the risk of being threatened or becoming a scapegoat and difficult decision avoidance. Our paper provides further insight into the ethical dilemmas and ethical challenges met by high level decision-makers', which is important since the overall responsibility for elder care that is also ethically defensible rests with them. They have power and their decisions affect many stakeholders in elder care. Our results can be used to stimulate discussions between high level decision-makers and health

Ethical challenges related to elder care. High level decision-makers' experiences

PubMed Central

Mamhidir, Anna-Greta; Kihlgren, Mona; Sorlie, Venke

2007-01-01

Background Few empirical studies have been found that explore ethical challenges among persons in high public positions that are responsible for elder care. The aim of this paper was to illuminate the meaning of being in ethically difficult situations related to elder care as experienced by high level decision-makers. Methods A phenomenological-hermeneutic method was used to analyse the eighteen interviews conducted with political and civil servant high level decision-makers at the municipality and county council level from two counties in Sweden. The participants worked at a planning and control as well as executive level and had both budget and quality of elder care responsibilities. Results Both ethical dilemmas and the meaning of being in ethically difficult situations related to elder care were revealed. No differences were seen between the politicians and the civil servants. The ethical dilemmas mostly concerned dealings with extensive care needs and working with a limited budget. The dilemmas were associated with a lack of good care and a lack of agreement concerning care such as vulnerable patients in inappropriate care settings, weaknesses in medical support, dissimilar focuses between the caring systems, justness in the distribution of care and deficient information. Being in ethically difficult situations was challenging. Associated with them were experiences of being exposed, having to be strategic and living with feelings such as aloneness and loneliness, uncertainty, lack of confirmation, the risk of being threatened or becoming a scapegoat and difficult decision avoidance. Conclusion Our paper provides further insight into the ethical dilemmas and ethical challenges met by high level decision-makers', which is important since the overall responsibility for elder care that is also ethically defensible rests with them. They have power and their decisions affect many stakeholders in elder care. Our results can be used to stimulate discussions between

5. DETAIL VIEW OF UPPER CHORD MEMBER, SHOWING MAKER'S PLATE ...

Library of Congress Historic Buildings Survey, Historic Engineering Record, Historic Landscapes Survey

5. DETAIL VIEW OF UPPER CHORD MEMBER, SHOWING MAKER'S PLATE STATING 'KING IRON BRIDGE & MFG. CO., K & F & Z KING PATENT, CLEVELAND, O.' - Smith Road Bowstring Arch Bridge, Spanning Sycamore Creek at Smith Road (TR 62), Lykens, Crawford County, OH

The Arctic Observing Viewer: A Web-mapping Application for U.S. Arctic Observing Activities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Cody, R. P.; Manley, W. F.; Gaylord, A. G.; Kassin, A.; Villarreal, S.; Barba, M.; Dover, M.; Escarzaga, S. M.; Habermann, T.; Kozimor, J.; Score, R.; Tweedie, C. E.

2015-12-01

Although a great deal of progress has been made with various arctic observing efforts, it can be difficult to assess such progress when so many agencies, organizations, research groups and others are making such rapid progress over such a large expanse of the Arctic. To help meet the strategic needs of the U.S. SEARCH-AON program and facilitate the development of SAON and other related initiatives, the Arctic Observing Viewer (AOV; http://ArcticObservingViewer.org) has been developed. This web mapping application compiles detailed information pertaining to U.S. Arctic Observing efforts. Contributing partners include the U.S. NSF, USGS, ACADIS, ADIwg, AOOS, a2dc, AON, ARMAP, BAID, IASOA, INTERACT, and others. Over 7700 observation sites are currently in the AOV database and the application allows users to visualize, navigate, select, advance search, draw, print, and more. During 2015, the web mapping application has been enhanced by the addition of a query builder that allows users to create rich and complex queries. AOV is founded on principles of software and data interoperability and includes an emerging "Project" metadata standard, which uses ISO 19115-1 and compatible web services. Substantial efforts have focused on maintaining and centralizing all database information. In order to keep up with emerging technologies, the AOV data set has been structured and centralized within a relational database and the application front-end has been ported to HTML5 to enable mobile access. Other application enhancements include an embedded Apache Solr search platform which provides users with the capability to perform advance searches and an administration web based data management system that allows administrators to add, update, and delete information in real time. We encourage all collaborators to use AOV tools and services for their own purposes and to help us extend the impact of our efforts and ensure AOV complements other cyber-resources. Reinforcing dispersed but

The Arctic Observing Viewer: A Web-mapping Application for U.S. Arctic Observing Activities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kassin, A.; Gaylord, A. G.; Manley, W. F.; Villarreal, S.; Tweedie, C. E.; Cody, R. P.; Copenhaver, W.; Dover, M.; Score, R.; Habermann, T.

2014-12-01

Although a great deal of progress has been made with various arctic observing efforts, it can be difficult to assess such progress when so many agencies, organizations, research groups and others are making such rapid progress. To help meet the strategic needs of the U.S. SEARCH-AON program and facilitate the development of SAON and related initiatives, the Arctic Observing Viewer (AOV; http://ArcticObservingViewer.org) has been developed. This web mapping application compiles detailed information pertaining to U.S. Arctic Observing efforts. Contributing partners include the U.S. NSF, USGS, ACADIS, ADIwg, AOOS, a2dc, AON, ARMAP, BAID, IASOA, INTERACT, and others. Over 6100 sites are currently in the AOV database and the application allows users to visualize, navigate, select, advance search, draw, print, and more. AOV is founded on principles of software and data interoperability and includes an emerging "Project" metadata standard, which uses ISO 19115-1 and compatible web services. In the last year, substantial efforts have focused on maintaining and centralizing all database information. In order to keep up with emerging technologies and demand for the application, the AOV data set has been structured and centralized within a relational database; furthermore, the application front-end has been ported to HTML5. Porting the application to HTML5 will now provide access to mobile users utilizing tablets and cell phone devices. Other application enhancements include an embedded Apache Solr search platform which provides users with the capability to perform advance searches throughout the AOV dataset, and an administration web based data management system which allows the administrators to add, update, and delete data in real time. We encourage all collaborators to use AOV tools and services for their own purposes and to help us extend the impact of our efforts and ensure AOV complements other cyber-resources. Reinforcing dispersed but interoperable resources in this

SUPPORT Tools for evidence-informed health Policymaking (STP) 1: What is evidence-informed policymaking?

PubMed Central

2009-01-01

This article is part of a series written for people responsible for making decisions about health policies and programmes and for those who support these decision makers. In this article, we discuss the following three questions: What is evidence? What is the role of research evidence in informing health policy decisions? What is evidence-informed policymaking? Evidence-informed health policymaking is an approach to policy decisions that aims to ensure that decision making is well-informed by the best available research evidence. It is characterised by the systematic and transparent access to, and appraisal of, evidence as an input into the policymaking process. The overall process of policymaking is not assumed to be systematic and transparent. However, within the overall process of policymaking, systematic processes are used to ensure that relevant research is identified, appraised and used appropriately. These processes are transparent in order to ensure that others can examine what research evidence was used to inform policy decisions, as well as the judgements made about the evidence and its implications. Evidence-informed policymaking helps policymakers gain an understanding of these processes. PMID:20018099

Taking off the white coat: can family members who are physicians be good surrogate decision-makers?

PubMed

Issa, Amalia M

2002-05-01

The challenges inherent in physicians treating members of their own families are well known. However, the issues related to physicians acting as surrogate decision-makers on behalf of relatives have not been addressed. The growing number of older persons will increase the need not only for healthcare resources, but also for physicians to act on behalf of incapacitated family members as surrogate decision-makers. In this paper, some of the clinical and ethical tensions evoked by physicians serving as surrogate decision-makers for family members are explored. Some recommendations for managing these tensions are suggested.

RiboMaker: computational design of conformation-based riboregulation.

PubMed

Rodrigo, Guillermo; Jaramillo, Alfonso

2014-09-01

The ability to engineer control systems of gene expression is instrumental for synthetic biology. Thus, bioinformatic methods that assist such engineering are appealing because they can guide the sequence design and prevent costly experimental screening. In particular, RNA is an ideal substrate to de novo design regulators of protein expression by following sequence-to-function models. We have implemented a novel algorithm, RiboMaker, aimed at the computational, automated design of bacterial riboregulation. RiboMaker reads the sequence and structure specifications, which codify for a gene regulatory behaviour, and optimizes the sequences of a small regulatory RNA and a 5'-untranslated region for an efficient intermolecular interaction. To this end, it implements an evolutionary design strategy, where random mutations are selected according to a physicochemical model based on free energies. The resulting sequences can then be tested experimentally, providing a new tool for synthetic biology, and also for investigating the riboregulation principles in natural systems. Web server is available at http://ribomaker.jaramillolab.org/. Source code, instructions and examples are freely available for download at http://sourceforge.net/projects/ribomaker/. © The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

The Reddy maker

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nof, Doron; Paldor, Nathan; Gorder, Stephen Van

2002-09-01

the (sometimes significantly greater) equilibrium depth corresponding to the point where the outflow's density equals the environmental density.] Most of the time, the outflow descent is accompanied by a reduction in the bottom slope S, and an entrainment which causes both a reduction in g' and an increase in H. All of these alterations bring the outflow closer and closer to the critical condition and it is, therefore, argued that all outflows ultimately reach the critical point (unless diffusion and mixing destroy them prior to that stage). It is suggested that Reddies (i.e., isolated lenses containing Red Sea water) are formed by the above processes. Namely, we propose that the "Reddy maker" is a combination of three processes, the natural reduction in the bottom slope which the outflow senses as it approaches the bottom of the ocean, the entrainment-induced increase in the outflow's thickness, and the entrainment-induced decrease in the outflow's density. An animation of the eddy generation process can be viewed at http://doronnof.net/features.html#video (click on "Reddy maker video").

Mapping a Research Agenda for Home Care Safety: Perspectives from Researchers, Providers, and Decision Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Macdonald, Marilyn; Lang, Ariella; MacDonald, Jo-Anne

2011-01-01

The purpose of this qualitative interpretive design was to explore the perspectives of researchers, health care providers, policy makers, and decision makers on key risks, concerns, and emerging issues related to home care safety that would inform a line of research inquiry. Defining safety specifically in this home care context has yet to be…

The Education of the Film-Maker: An International View.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, Paris (France).

This book presents a world view of trends, needs, and potentials concerning the education of film and television directors, who are perceived as image makers who play a central role in the present and future sociocultural development of all societies. Work is based on the papers and discussions of a 1972 meeting, organized by UNESCO, on the…

Creativity Assessment in the Context of Maker-Based Projects

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lille, Benjamin; Romero, Margarida

2017-01-01

Creativity is a key competence in 21st century education. Among the active learning pedagogies which aims to develop creativity, learning by making is an emerging approach in which the students are engaged in the co-creation of a shared artefact. In this study, we aim to analyse the creativity competency through a maker-based projects.…

The Roles of Decision Makers in Special Operations

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-12-01

question and hypotheses. 9 II. CASE STUDIES A. OPERATION THUNDERBOLT (THE RAID ON ENTEBBE) The Israeli Special Forces’ hostage rescue operation...Operations Warfare, 338. 28 Herzog, “The War Against Terrorism: Entebbe,” 338. 29 Chaitanya Arun Sathe, “A Case Study on Crisis Management with a...Assessment of the Roles of Decision Makers This assessment is based on this case study , and the decision makers’ roles in the three phases of a

MoleCoolQt – a molecule viewer for charge-density research

PubMed Central

Hübschle, Christian B.; Dittrich, Birger

2011-01-01

MoleCoolQt is a molecule viewer for charge-density research. Features include the visualization of local atomic coordinate systems in multipole refinements based on the Hansen and Coppens formalism as implemented, for example, in the XD suite. Residual peaks and holes from XDfft are translated so that they appear close to the nearest atom of the asymmetric unit. Critical points from a topological analysis of the charge density can also be visualized. As in the program MolIso, color-mapped isosurfaces can be generated with a simple interface. Apart from its visualization features the program interactively helps in assigning local atomic coordinate systems and local symmetry, which can be automatically detected and altered. Dummy atoms – as sometimes required for local atomic coordinate systems – are calculated on demand; XD system files are updated after changes. When using the invariom database, potential scattering factor assignment problems can be resolved by the use of an interactive dialog. The following file formats are supported: XD, MoPro, SHELX, GAUSSIAN (com, FChk, cube), CIF and PDB. MoleCoolQt is written in C++ using the Qt4 library, has a user-friendly graphical user interface, and is available for several flavors of Linux, Windows and MacOS. PMID:22477783

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

PubMed

Sayers, Eric W; Barrett, Tanya; Benson, Dennis A; Bolton, Evan; Bryant, Stephen H; Canese, Kathi; Chetvernin, Vyacheslav; Church, Deanna M; DiCuccio, Michael; Federhen, Scott; Feolo, Michael; Fingerman, Ian M; Geer, Lewis Y; Helmberg, Wolfgang; Kapustin, Yuri; Landsman, David; Lipman, David J; Lu, Zhiyong; Madden, Thomas L; Madej, Tom; Maglott, Donna R; Marchler-Bauer, Aron; Miller, Vadim; Mizrachi, Ilene; Ostell, James; Panchenko, Anna; Phan, Lon; Pruitt, Kim D; Schuler, Gregory D; Sequeira, Edwin; Sherry, Stephen T; Shumway, Martin; Sirotkin, Karl; Slotta, Douglas; Souvorov, Alexandre; Starchenko, Grigory; Tatusova, Tatiana A; Wagner, Lukas; Wang, Yanli; Wilbur, W John; Yaschenko, Eugene; Ye, Jian

2011-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank® nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through the NCBI Web site. NCBI resources include Entrez, the Entrez Programming Utilities, MyNCBI, PubMed, PubMed Central (PMC), Entrez Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link (BLink), Primer-BLAST, COBALT, Electronic PCR, OrfFinder, Splign, ProSplign, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, dbVar, Epigenomics, Cancer Chromosomes, Entrez Genomes and related tools, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Trace Archive, Sequence Read Archive, Retroviral Genotyping Tools, HIV-1/Human Protein Interaction Database, Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), Entrez Probe, GENSAT, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM), Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals (OMIA), the Molecular Modeling Database (MMDB), the Conserved Domain Database (CDD), the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool (CDART), IBIS, Biosystems, Peptidome, OMSSA, Protein Clusters and the PubChem suite of small molecule databases. Augmenting many of the Web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized data sets. All of these resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov.

Database resources of the National Center for Biotechnology Information.

PubMed

Wheeler, David L; Barrett, Tanya; Benson, Dennis A; Bryant, Stephen H; Canese, Kathi; Chetvernin, Vyacheslav; Church, Deanna M; DiCuccio, Michael; Edgar, Ron; Federhen, Scott; Geer, Lewis Y; Kapustin, Yuri; Khovayko, Oleg; Landsman, David; Lipman, David J; Madden, Thomas L; Maglott, Donna R; Ostell, James; Miller, Vadim; Pruitt, Kim D; Schuler, Gregory D; Sequeira, Edwin; Sherry, Steven T; Sirotkin, Karl; Souvorov, Alexandre; Starchenko, Grigory; Tatusov, Roman L; Tatusova, Tatiana A; Wagner, Lukas; Yaschenko, Eugene

2007-01-01

In addition to maintaining the GenBank nucleic acid sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and other biological data made available through NCBI's Web site. NCBI resources include Entrez, the Entrez Programming Utilities, My NCBI, PubMed, PubMed Central, Entrez Gene, the NCBI Taxonomy Browser, BLAST, BLAST Link(BLink), Electronic PCR, OrfFinder, Spidey, Splign, RefSeq, UniGene, HomoloGene, ProtEST, dbMHC, dbSNP, Cancer Chromosomes, Entrez Genome, Genome Project and related tools, the Trace and Assembly Archives, the Map Viewer, Model Maker, Evidence Viewer, Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COGs), Viral Genotyping Tools, Influenza Viral Resources, HIV-1/Human Protein Interaction Database, Gene Expression Omnibus (GEO), Entrez Probe, GENSAT, Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM), Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals (OMIA), the Molecular Modeling Database (MMDB), the Conserved Domain Database (CDD), the Conserved Domain Architecture Retrieval Tool (CDART) and the PubChem suite of small molecule databases. Augmenting many of the Web applications are custom implementations of the BLAST program optimized to search specialized data sets. These resources can be accessed through the NCBI home page at www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov.

Rapid Reviews in Health Policy: A Study of Intended Use in the New South Wales' Evidence Check Programme

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Moore, Gabriel Mary; Redman, Sally; Turner, Tari; Haines, Mary

2016-01-01

Rapid reviews of research are a key way in which policy makers use research. This paper examines 74 rapid reviews commissioned by health policy agencies through the Sax Institute's Evidence Check programme. We examine what prompted policy makers to commission rapid reviews, their purpose, how and when they intended to use them, and how this varied…

Developing a service platform definition to promote evidence-based planning and funding of the mental health service system.

PubMed

Lee, Yong Yi; Meurk, Carla S; Harris, Meredith G; Diminic, Sandra; Scheurer, Roman W; Whiteford, Harvey A

2014-11-26

Ensuring that a mental health system provides 'value for money' requires policy makers to allocate resources to the most cost-effective interventions. Organizing cost-effective interventions into a service delivery framework will require a concept that can guide the mapping of evidence regarding disorder-level interventions to aggregations of services that are meaningful for policy makers. The 'service platform' is an emerging concept that could be used to this end, however no explicit definition currently exists in the literature. The aim of this study was to develop a service platform definition that is consistent with how policy makers conceptualize the major elements of the mental health service system and to test the validity and utility of this definition through consultation with mental health policy makers. We derived a provisional definition informed by existing literature and consultation with experienced mental health researchers. Using a modified Delphi method, we obtained feedback from nine Australian policy makers. Respondents provided written answers to a questionnaire eliciting their views on the acceptability, comprehensibility and usefulness of a service platform definition which was subject to qualitative analysis. Overall, respondents understood the definition and found it both acceptable and useful, subject to certain conditions. They also provided suggestions for its improvement. Our findings suggest that the service platform concept could be a useful way of aggregating mental health services as a means for presenting priority setting evidence to policy makers in mental health. However, further development and testing of the concept is required.

Infants and Toddlers as Members, Makers, Interpreters: A Philosophical Journey.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Handler, June Moss

This book explores how young children, within their cultural imperatives, struggle to discover who they are as cultural "members" interacting with others, as "makers" trying out and creating, and as "interpreters" making meaning and making new connections. Chapters in Part 1 emphasize the significance of a…

Gaining perspective: the effects of message frame on viewer attention to and recall of osteoporosis prevention print advertisements.

PubMed

O'Malley, Deborah A; Latimer-Cheung, Amy E

2013-11-01

This study examined how framed messages affect viewer attention to and cognitive processing of osteoporosis prevention print ads. Attention was measured with eye tracking technology. Cognitive processing was assessed through masked recall. A total of 60 college-aged women viewed 12 gain-framed, 12 loss-framed, and 12 neutral-framed ads. Number of fixations, dwell time, and recall of gain-framed osteoporosis prevention ads were higher than loss-framed or neutral-framed ads, p < .01. Message recall was positively correlated with the number of fixations and dwell time for the gain-framed and neutral-framed messages, p < .01. These findings provide preliminary insight into potential mechanisms underlying message framing effects.

Health care decision makers' use of comparative effectiveness research: report from a series of focus groups.

PubMed

Villa, Lorenzo; Warholak, Terri L; Hines, Lisa E; Taylor, Ann M; Brown, Mary; Hurwitz, Jason; Brixner, Diana; Malone, Daniel C

2013-01-01

Comparative effectiveness research (CER) is a helpful approach to improve health outcomes by developing and disseminating evidence-based information to patients, clinicians, and other decision makers about the most effective interventions. To (a) identify the factors necessary to increase the use of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality's (AHRQ) CER reviews in hospitals and managed care organizations; (b) assess current awareness and implementation of CER materials in these facilities and organizations; and (c) inform development of content for a workshop on CER. Pharmacy and therapeutics (PT) committee members and supportive personnel were recruited to participate in focus groups conducted at national health professional meetings. Prior to the sessions, each participant completed a prefocus group questionnaire evaluating the organization and process of the respondent's PT committee, as well as the respondent's role in the PT committee and awareness of AHRQ CER reports. Each session consisted of a focused discussion about CER and sources of evidence for PT monographs, and each participant completed a ballot to rank topics of importance for inclusion in a CER workshop for health care professionals involved in the PT process. Overarching themes were later identified using qualitative analysis of the transcripts of the focus group sessions. Thirty-nine (68%) pharmacists and 18 (32%) physicians involved in the PT process participated in 1 of 7 focus groups. Almost half of the participants had 6-15 years experience with the PT process. Participants represented health plans, hospitals, and health care systems. Two-thirds indicated they were aware of AHRQ's Effective Health Care Program's CER reviews, yet only 26% reported using the reviews in their organizations. The overarching themes reflected the need for timely and conclusive CER information; the role of the pharmacist as central to evidence synthesis for the PT process; and the need for educational programs

GRADE guidelines: 10. Considering resource use and rating the quality of economic evidence.

PubMed

Brunetti, Massimo; Shemilt, Ian; Pregno, Silvia; Vale, Luke; Oxman, Andrew D; Lord, Joanne; Sisk, Jane; Ruiz, Francis; Hill, Suzanne; Guyatt, Gordon H; Jaeschke, Roman; Helfand, Mark; Harbour, Robin; Davoli, Marina; Amato, Laura; Liberati, Alessandro; Schünemann, Holger J

2013-02-01

In this article, we describe how to include considerations about resource utilization when making recommendations according to the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation (GRADE) approach. We focus on challenges with rating the confidence in effect estimates (quality of evidence) and incorporating resource use into evidence profiles and Summary of Findings (SoF) tables. GRADE recommends that important differences in resource use between alternative management strategies should be included along with other important outcomes in the evidence profile and SoF table. Key steps in considering resources in making recommendations with GRADE are the identification of items of resource use that may differ between alternative management strategies and that are potentially important to decision makers, finding evidence for the differences in resource use, making judgments regarding confidence in effect estimates using the same criteria used for health outcomes, and valuing the resource use in terms of costs for the specific setting for which recommendations are being made. With our framework, decision makers will have access to concise summaries of recommendations, including ratings of the quality of economic evidence, and better understand the implications for clinical decision making. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Development of health policy and systems research in Nigeria: lessons for developing countries' evidence-based health policy making process and practice.

PubMed

Uneke, Chigozie J; Ezeoha, Abel E; Ndukwe, Chinwendu D; Oyibo, Patrick G; Onwe, Friday

2010-08-01

Health policy and systems research (HPSR), which aims to produce reliable and rigorous evidence to inform the many critical decisions that must be made about health systems, is a new concept in Nigeria. In this study, policy makers and other stakeholders in the health sector identified the challenges and the potential intervention strategies to HPSR evidence use in policy making in Nigeria. The major challenges identified included capacity constraints at individual and organizational levels, communication gaps and poor networking between policy makers and researchers, and the non-involvement of healthcare recipients in identifying and planning care delivery needs. The main solutions suggested included promotion of strategies to encourage partnership between researchers and policy makers, improvement of staff incentives and facilities for research activities, improved budgetary provision for research, and sustainable institutional capacity development. These strategies have been shown to improve evidence-based policy making in developed countries and are likely to produce better outcomes in the developing world.

Development of Health Policy and Systems Research in Nigeria: Lessons for Developing Countries' Evidence-Based Health Policy Making Process and Practice

PubMed Central

Uneke, Chigozie J.; Ezeoha, Abel E.; Ndukwe, Chinwendu D.; Oyibo, Patrick G.; Onwe, Friday

2010-01-01

Health policy and systems research (HPSR), which aims to produce reliable and rigorous evidence to inform the many critical decisions that must be made about health systems, is a new concept in Nigeria. In this study, policy makers and other stakeholders in the health sector identified the challenges and the potential intervention strategies to HPSR evidence use in policy making in Nigeria. The major challenges identified included capacity constraints at individual and organizational levels, communication gaps and poor networking between policy makers and researchers, and the non-involvement of healthcare recipients in identifying and planning care delivery needs. The main solutions suggested included promotion of strategies to encourage partnership between researchers and policy makers, improvement of staff incentives and facilities for research activities, improved budgetary provision for research, and sustainable institutional capacity development. These strategies have been shown to improve evidence-based policy making in developed countries and are likely to produce better outcomes in the developing world. PMID:21804832

Attitudes of Educational Decision Makers toward AVTI Governance and the Local Tax Levy. An Independent Paper.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

LiaBraaten, James Clayton

A study investigated the attitudes of vocational education decision makers toward the governance of Minnesota's Area Vocational Technical Institutes (AVTIs) and the impact removal of a local tax to support the AVTIs might have on governance. Five categories of individuals, all considered vocational education decision makers, were surveyed: AVTI…

Ego depletion in visual perception: Ego-depleted viewers experience less ambiguous figure reversal.

PubMed

Wimmer, Marina C; Stirk, Steven; Hancock, Peter J B

2017-10-01

This study examined the effects of ego depletion on ambiguous figure perception. Adults (N = 315) received an ego depletion task and were subsequently tested on their inhibitory control abilities that were indexed by the Stroop task (Experiment 1) and their ability to perceive both interpretations of ambiguous figures that was indexed by reversal (Experiment 2). Ego depletion had a very small effect on reducing inhibitory control (Cohen's d = .15) (Experiment 1). Ego-depleted participants had a tendency to take longer to respond in Stroop trials. In Experiment 2, ego depletion had small to medium effects on the experience of reversal. Ego-depleted viewers tended to take longer to reverse ambiguous figures (duration to first reversal) when naïve of the ambiguity and experienced less reversal both when naïve and informed of the ambiguity. Together, findings suggest that ego depletion has small effects on inhibitory control and small to medium effects on bottom-up and top-down perceptual processes. The depletion of cognitive resources can reduce our visual perceptual experience.

Recent advances in evidence-based psychiatry.

PubMed

Geddes, J; Carney, S

2001-06-01

There is increasing interest in the potential contribution of evidence-based medicine to clinical decision making in psychiatry. In this article, we describe some of the recent advances in evidence-based psychiatry and outline future challenges. Narrative review. The successful introduction of evidence-based practice into psychiatry requires the acquisition of new skills by clinicians. It is also important that policy statements that aim to be evidence-based, such as clinical practice guidelines, use rigorous methods to synthesize the primary evidence and do not overlook its limitations. One result of the systematic reviewing of evidence is the identification of important residual clinical uncertainties. Primary research can then be focused on these questions. For questions regarding therapy in psychiatry, it will be necessary to undertake some large, simple randomized trials. Making the best available evidence readily accessible in a clinical setting, however, remains a significant challenge. Collaboration between clinicians, researchers, policy-makers, and those involved in information technology is required to optimize the contribution of evidence-based medicine in psychiatry.

The Virtual Workplace Ethnography: Positioning Student Writers as Knowledge Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sommers, Jeff

2015-01-01

The Virtual Workplace Ethnography is a first-year composition assignment that positions students as knowledge makers by requiring them to apply a theoretical lens ("Working Knowledge") to a video representation of a workplace. The lens provides multiple terms for analysis of workplace behaviors in context, providing a scaffolding for…

Effectiveness of Pearson's SuccessMaker Mathematics for Students with Disabilities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McKissick, Steven K.

2017-01-01

SuccessMaker mathematics is an instructional learning system rooted in behaviorist instructional theory. Previous research efforts have left much to be desired and have produced inconsistent results. Recent research for this program appears to be tapering off, despite advances in technology signaling integration of concepts from other theoretical…

46 CFR 196.37-5 - General alarm bell contact makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

....37-5 Shipping COAST GUARD, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY (CONTINUED) OCEANOGRAPHIC RESEARCH VESSELS OPERATIONS Markings for Fire and Emergency Equipment, etc. § 196.37-5 General alarm bell contact makers. (a... (Electrical Engineering Regulations) of this chapter. [CGD 74-125a, 47 FR 15279, Apr. 8, 1982] Cross Reference...

46 CFR 196.37-5 - General alarm bell contact makers.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-10-01

....37-5 Shipping COAST GUARD, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY (CONTINUED) OCEANOGRAPHIC RESEARCH VESSELS OPERATIONS Markings for Fire and Emergency Equipment, etc. § 196.37-5 General alarm bell contact makers. (a... (Electrical Engineering Regulations) of this chapter. [CGD 74-125a, 47 FR 15279, Apr. 8, 1982] Cross Reference...

K-12 Voucher Programs and Education Policy: An Exploratory Study of Policy Maker Attitudes and Opinions.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Laitsch, Dan

2002-01-01

Studied policy maker attitudes toward education and education reform in general, focusing on educational vouchers. Survey responses from 89 state legislators from 6 states show that policy makers generally accept the market arguments used by voucher supporters but are sympathetic to equity concerns and funding issues raised by voucher opponents.…

National policy development for cotrimoxazole prophylaxis in Malawi, Uganda and Zambia: the relationship between Context, Evidence and Links

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background Several frameworks have been constructed to analyse the factors which influence and shape the uptake of evidence into policy processes in resource poor settings, yet empirical analyses of health policy making in these settings are relatively rare. National policy making for cotrimoxazole (trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole) preventive therapy in developing countries offers a pertinent case for the application of a policy analysis lens. The provision of cotrimoxazole as a prophylaxis is an inexpensive and highly efficacious preventative intervention in HIV infected individuals, reducing both morbidity and mortality among adults and children with HIV/AIDS, yet evidence suggests that it has not been quickly or evenly scaled-up in resource poor settings. Methods Comparative analysis was conducted in Malawi, Uganda and Zambia, using the case study approach. We applied the ‘RAPID’ framework developed by the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), and conducted a total of 47 in-depth interviews across the three countries to examine the influence of context (including the influence of donor agencies), evidence (both local and international), and the links between researcher, policy makers and those seeking to influence the policy process. Results Each area of analysis was found to have an influence on the creation of national policy on cotrimoxazole preventive therapy (CPT) in all three countries. In relation to context, the following were found to be influential: government structures and their focus, donor interest and involvement, healthcare infrastructure and other uses of cotrimoxazole and related drugs in the country. In terms of the nature of the evidence, we found that how policy makers perceived the strength of evidence behind international recommendations was crucial (if evidence was considered weak then the recommendations were rejected). Further, local operational research results seem to have been taken up more quickly, while randomised controlled

Evidence-based decision-making 7: Knowledge translation.

PubMed

Manns, Braden J

2015-01-01

There is a significant gap between what is known and what is implemented by key stakeholders in practice (the evidence to practice gap). The primary purpose of knowledge translation is to address this gap, bridging evidence to clinical practice. The knowledge to action cycle is one framework for knowledge translation that integrates policy-makers throughout the research cycle. The knowledge to action cycle begins with the identification of a problem (usually a gap in care provision). After identification of the problem, knowledge creation is undertaken, depicted at the center of the cycle as a funnel. Knowledge inquiry is at the wide end of the funnel, and moving down the funnel, the primary data is synthesized into knowledge products in the form of educational materials, guidelines, decision aids, or clinical pathways. The remaining components of the knowledge to action cycle refer to the action of applying the knowledge that has been created. This includes adapting knowledge to local context, assessing barriers to knowledge use, selecting, tailoring implementing interventions, monitoring knowledge use, evaluating outcomes, and sustaining knowledge use. Each of these steps is connected by bidirectional arrows and ideally involves healthcare decision-makers and key stakeholders at each transition.

Improving utility of evidence synthesis for healthy public policy: the three Rs (relevance, rigor, and readability [and resources]).

PubMed

Thomson, Hilary

2013-08-01

Systematic reviews have the potential to promote knowledge exchange between researchers and decision-makers. Review planning requires engagement with evidence users to ensure preparation of relevant reviews, and well-conducted reviews should provide accessible and reliable synthesis to support decision-making. Yet, systematic reviews are not routinely referred to by decision-makers, and innovative approaches to improve the utility of reviews is needed. Evidence synthesis for healthy public policy is typically complex and methodologically challenging. Although not lessening the value of reviews, these challenges can be overwhelming and threaten their utility. Using the interrelated principles of relevance, rigor, and readability, and in light of available resources, this article considers how utility of evidence synthesis for healthy public policy might be improved.

Improving Utility of Evidence Synthesis for Healthy Public Policy: the Three Rs (Relevance, Rigor, and Readability [and Resources])

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Systematic reviews have the potential to promote knowledge exchange between researchers and decision-makers. Review planning requires engagement with evidence users to ensure preparation of relevant reviews, and well-conducted reviews should provide accessible and reliable synthesis to support decision-making. Yet, systematic reviews are not routinely referred to by decision-makers, and innovative approaches to improve the utility of reviews is needed. Evidence synthesis for healthy public policy is typically complex and methodologically challenging. Although not lessening the value of reviews, these challenges can be overwhelming and threaten their utility. Using the interrelated principles of relevance, rigor, and readability, and in light of available resources, this article considers how utility of evidence synthesis for healthy public policy might be improved. PMID:23763400

Issues in Distance Education: A Primer for Higher Education Decision Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Beaudoin, Michael

2016-01-01

This chapter presents an overview of current issues related to distance learning in higher education. It identifies central questions, issues, challenges, and opportunities that must be addressed by decision makers, as well as key attributes of effective leaders.

Evidence of underage targeting of alcohol advertising on television in the United States: Lessons from the Lockyer v. Reynolds decisions

PubMed Central

Ostroff, Joshua; Jernigan, David H.

2016-01-01

Underage alcohol use is a global public health problem and alcohol advertising has been associated with underage drinking. The alcohol industry regulates itself and is the primary control on alcohol advertising in many countries around the world, advising trade association members to advertise only in adult-oriented media. Despite high levels of compliance with these self-regulatory guidelines, in several countries youth exposure to alcohol advertising on television has grown faster than adult exposure. In the United States, we found that exposure for underage viewers ages 18–20 grew from 2005 through 2011 faster than any adult age group. Applying a method adopted from a court in the US to identify underage targeting of advertising, we found evidence of targeting of alcohol advertising to underage viewers ages 18–20. The court's rule appeared in Lockyer v. Reynolds (The People ex rel. Bill Lockyer v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, GIC764118, 2002). We demonstrated that alcohol companies were able to modify their advertising practices to maintain current levels of adult advertising exposure while reducing youth exposure. PMID:24424494

Evidence of underage targeting of alcohol advertising on television in the United States: lessons from the Lockyer v. Reynolds decisions.

PubMed

Ross, Craig S; Ostroff, Joshua; Jernigan, David H

2014-02-01

Underage alcohol use is a global public health problem and alcohol advertising has been associated with underage drinking. The alcohol industry regulates itself and is the primary control on alcohol advertising in many countries around the world, advising trade association members to advertise only in adult-oriented media. Despite high levels of compliance with these self-regulatory guidelines, in several countries youth exposure to alcohol advertising on television has grown faster than adult exposure. In the United States, we found that exposure for underage viewers ages 18-20 grew from 2005 through 2011 faster than any adult age group. Applying a method adopted from a court in the US to identify underage targeting of advertising, we found evidence of targeting of alcohol advertising to underage viewers ages 18-20. The court's rule appeared in Lockyer v. Reynolds (The People ex rel. Bill Lockyer v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, GIC764118, 2002). We demonstrated that alcohol companies were able to modify their advertising practices to maintain current levels of adult advertising exposure while reducing youth exposure.

Television and the Young Viewer.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fakouri, M. Embrahim

1984-01-01

Television viewing has negative effects and positive potential for young children. It is evident that children need to be educated in television viewing in order to understand the differences between fantasy and reality, and sponsor motives. (DF)

Implementation of a Tool to Enhance Evidence-Informed Decision Making in Public Health: Identifying Barriers and Facilitating Factors

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

van der Heide, Iris; van der Noordt, Maaike; Proper, Karin I.; Schoemaker, Casper; van den Berg, Matthijs; Hamberg-van Reenen, Heleen H.

2016-01-01

One of the barriers regarding evidence-informed decision making is the gap between the needs of policy makers and the ways researchers present evidence. This pilot study evaluates the barriers and facilitators to the implementation of a tool to enhance transparent and unambiguous communication on scientific evidence by knowledge workers.…

A New Perspective on Design Education: A "Creative Production-Manufacturing Model" in "The Maker Movement" Context

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zhong, Xiang-Ming; Fan, Kuo-Kuang

2016-01-01

When "The Maker Movement" started, it made a great impact and influence on many aspects of society. "The Maker Movement" has transformed industries as well as people's way of life and thinking. For this reason, many people decided to create something by turning their ideas to tangible products. Media has become a bridge that…

CCDLAB: A Graphical User Interface FITS Image Data Reducer, Viewer, and Canadian UVIT Data Pipeline

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Postma, Joseph E.; Leahy, Denis

2017-11-01

CCDLAB was originally developed as a FITS image data reducer and viewer, and development was then continued to provide ground support for the development of the UVIT detector system provided by the Canadian Space Agency to the Indian Space Research Organization’s ASTROSAT satellite and UVIT telescopes. After the launch of ASTROSAT and during UVIT’s first-light and PV phase starting in 2015 December, necessity required the development of a data pipeline to produce scientific images out of the Level 1 format data produced for UVIT by ISRO. Given the previous development of CCDLAB for UVIT ground support, the author provided a pipeline for the new Level 1 format data to be run through CCDLAB with the additional satellite-dependent reduction operations required to produce scientific data. Features of the pipeline are discussed with focus on the relevant data-reduction challenges intrinsic to UVIT data.

Overcoming Fear: Helping Decision Makers Understand Risk in Outdoor Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Haras, Kathy

2010-01-01

The long history of outdoor education does little to alleviate the fears of many parents, teachers, principals and superintendents who believe that outdoor education is too risky. These decision makers often lack both the knowledge to make informed decisions and the time and resources to investigate their assumptions. Pair these circumstances with…

Teacher Education Research and Education Policy-Makers: An Australian Perspective

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

White, Simone

2016-01-01

As teacher educators, we want our research to be influential in contributing to educational policy and practice, but there remains little understanding about ways in which teacher educators might more productively engage with each other and policy-makers so as to maximise their research impact. Drawing on an empirical study and policy document…

Developing a Service Platform Definition to Promote Evidence-Based Planning and Funding of the Mental Health Service System

PubMed Central

Lee, Yong Yi; Meurk, Carla S.; Harris, Meredith G.; Diminic, Sandra; Scheurer, Roman W.; Whiteford, Harvey A.

2014-01-01

Ensuring that a mental health system provides ‘value for money’ requires policy makers to allocate resources to the most cost-effective interventions. Organizing cost-effective interventions into a service delivery framework will require a concept that can guide the mapping of evidence regarding disorder-level interventions to aggregations of services that are meaningful for policy makers. The ‘service platform’ is an emerging concept that could be used to this end, however no explicit definition currently exists in the literature. The aim of this study was to develop a service platform definition that is consistent with how policy makers conceptualize the major elements of the mental health service system and to test the validity and utility of this definition through consultation with mental health policy makers. We derived a provisional definition informed by existing literature and consultation with experienced mental health researchers. Using a modified Delphi method, we obtained feedback from nine Australian policy makers. Respondents provided written answers to a questionnaire eliciting their views on the acceptability, comprehensibility and usefulness of a service platform definition which was subject to qualitative analysis. Overall, respondents understood the definition and found it both acceptable and useful, subject to certain conditions. They also provided suggestions for its improvement. Our findings suggest that the service platform concept could be a useful way of aggregating mental health services as a means for presenting priority setting evidence to policy makers in mental health. However, further development and testing of the concept is required. PMID:25431877

Diagnostic accuracy of an iPhone DICOM viewer for the interpretation of magnetic resonance imaging of the knee.

PubMed

De Maio, Peter; White, Lawrence M; Bleakney, Robert; Menezes, Ravi J; Theodoropoulos, John

2014-07-01

To evaluate the diagnostic performance of viewing magnetic resonance (MR) images on a handheld mobile device compared with a conventional radiology workstation for the diagnosis of intra-articular knee pathology. Prospective comparison study. Tertiary care center. Fifty consecutive subjects who had MR imaging of the knee followed by knee arthroscopy were prospectively evaluated. Two musculoskeletal radiologists independently reviewed each MR study using 2 different viewers: the OsiriX DICOM viewer software on an Apple iPhone 3GS device and eFilm Workstation software on a conventional picture archiving and communications system workstation. Sensitivity and specificity of the iPhone and workstation interpretations was performed using knee arthroscopy as the reference standard. Intraobserver concordance and agreement between the iPhone and workstation interpretations were determined. There was no statistically significant difference between the 2 devices for each paired comparison of diagnostic performance. For the iPhone interpretations, sensitivity ranged from 77% (13 of 17) for the lateral meniscus to 100% (17 of 17) for the anterior cruciate ligament. Specificity ranged from 74% (14 of 19) for cartilage to 100% (50 of 50) for the posterior cruciate ligament. There was a very high level of interobserver and intraobserver agreement between devices and readers. The iPhone reads took longer than the corresponding workstation reads, with a significant mean difference between the iPhone and workstation reads of 3.98 minutes (P < 0.001). The diagnostic performance of interpreting MR images on a handheld mobile device for the assessment of intra-articular knee pathology is similar to that of a conventional radiology workstation, however, requires a longer viewing time. Timely and accurate interpretation of complex medical images using mobile device solutions could result in new workflow efficiencies and ultimately improve patient care.

Visualizing NetCDF Files by Using the EverVIEW Data Viewer

USGS Publications Warehouse

Conzelmann, Craig; Romañach, Stephanie S.

2010-01-01

Over the past few years, modelers in South Florida have started using Network Common Data Form (NetCDF) as the standard data container format for storing hydrologic and ecologic modeling inputs and outputs. With its origins in the meteorological discipline, NetCDF was created by the Unidata Program Center at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, in conjunction with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and other organizations. NetCDF is a portable, scalable, self-describing, binary file format optimized for storing array-based scientific data. Despite attributes which make NetCDF desirable to the modeling community, many natural resource managers have few desktop software packages which can consume NetCDF and unlock the valuable data contained within. The U.S. Geological Survey and the Joint Ecosystem Modeling group, an ecological modeling community of practice, are working to address this need with the EverVIEW Data Viewer. Available for several operating systems, this desktop software currently supports graphical displays of NetCDF data as spatial overlays on a three-dimensional globe and views of grid-cell values in tabular form. An included Open Geospatial Consortium compliant, Web-mapping service client and charting interface allows the user to view Web-available spatial data as additional map overlays and provides simple charting visualizations of NetCDF grid values.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of Evidence-Based Practice

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bouffard, Marcel; Reid, Greg

2012-01-01

The evidence-based practice (EBP) movement has been extremely influential over the last 20 years. Fields like medicine, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, nursing, psychology, and education have adopted the idea that policy makers and practitioners should use interventions that have demonstrated efficiency and effectiveness. This apparently…

Canadian policy makers' views on pharmaceutical reimbursement contracts involving confidential discounts from drug manufacturers.

PubMed

Morgan, Steven G; Thomson, Paige A; Daw, Jamie R; Friesen, Melissa K

2013-10-01

Pharmaceutical policy makers are increasingly negotiating reimbursement contracts that include confidential price terms that may be affected by drug utilization volumes, patterns, or outcomes. Though such contracts may offer a variety of benefits, including the ability to tie payment to the actual performance of a product, they may also create potential policy challenges. Through telephone interviews about this type of contract, we studied the views of officials in nine of ten Canadian provinces. Use of reimbursement contracts involving confidential discounts is new in Canada and ideas about power and equity emerged as cross-cutting themes in our interviews. Though confidential rebates can lower prices and thereby increase coverage of new medicines, several policy makers felt they had little power in the decision to negotiate rebates. Study participants explained that the recent rise in the use of rebates had been driven by manufacturers' pricing tactics and precedent set by other jurisdictions. Several policy makers expressed concerns that confidential rebates could result in inter-jurisdictional inequities in drug pricing and coverage. Policy makers also noted un-insured and under-insured patients must pay inflated "list prices" even if rebates are negotiated by drug plans. The establishment of policies for disciplined negotiations, inter-jurisdictional cooperation, and provision of drug coverage for all citizens are potential solutions to the challenges created by this new pharmaceutical pricing paradigm. Copyright © 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd.. All rights reserved.

Training conservation practitioners to be better decision makers

USGS Publications Warehouse

Johnson, Fred A.; Eaton, Mitchell J.; Williams, James H.; Jensen, Gitte H.; Madsen, Jesper

2015-01-01

Traditional conservation curricula and training typically emphasizes only one part of systematic decision making (i.e., the science), at the expense of preparing conservation practitioners with critical skills in values-setting, working with decision makers and stakeholders, and effective problem framing. In this article we describe how the application of decision science is relevant to conservation problems and suggest how current and future conservation practitioners can be trained to be better decision makers. Though decision-analytic approaches vary considerably, they all involve: (1) properly formulating the decision problem; (2) specifying feasible alternative actions; and (3) selecting criteria for evaluating potential outcomes. Two approaches are available for providing training in decision science, with each serving different needs. Formal education is useful for providing simple, well-defined problems that allow demonstrations of the structure, axioms and general characteristics of a decision-analytic approach. In contrast, practical training can offer complex, realistic decision problems requiring more careful structuring and analysis than those used for formal training purposes. Ultimately, the kinds and degree of training necessary depend on the role conservation practitioners play in a decision-making process. Those attempting to facilitate decision-making processes will need advanced training in both technical aspects of decision science and in facilitation techniques, as well as opportunities to apprentice under decision analysts/consultants. Our primary goal should be an attempt to ingrain a discipline for applying clarity of thought to all decisions.

Bayesian techniques for analyzing group differences in the Iowa Gambling Task: A case study of intuitive and deliberate decision-makers.

PubMed

Steingroever, Helen; Pachur, Thorsten; Šmíra, Martin; Lee, Michael D

2018-06-01

The Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) is one of the most popular experimental paradigms for comparing complex decision-making across groups. Most commonly, IGT behavior is analyzed using frequentist tests to compare performance across groups, and to compare inferred parameters of cognitive models developed for the IGT. Here, we present a Bayesian alternative based on Bayesian repeated-measures ANOVA for comparing performance, and a suite of three complementary model-based methods for assessing the cognitive processes underlying IGT performance. The three model-based methods involve Bayesian hierarchical parameter estimation, Bayes factor model comparison, and Bayesian latent-mixture modeling. We illustrate these Bayesian methods by applying them to test the extent to which differences in intuitive versus deliberate decision style are associated with differences in IGT performance. The results show that intuitive and deliberate decision-makers behave similarly on the IGT, and the modeling analyses consistently suggest that both groups of decision-makers rely on similar cognitive processes. Our results challenge the notion that individual differences in intuitive and deliberate decision styles have a broad impact on decision-making. They also highlight the advantages of Bayesian methods, especially their ability to quantify evidence in favor of the null hypothesis, and that they allow model-based analyses to incorporate hierarchical and latent-mixture structures.

Applications of "Integrated Data Viewer'' (IDV) in the classroom

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Nogueira, R.; Cutrim, E. M.

2006-06-01

Conventionally, weather products utilized in synoptic meteorology reduce phenomena occurring in four dimensions to a 2-dimensional form. This constitutes a road-block for non-atmospheric-science majors who need to take meteorology as a non-mathematical and complementary course to their major programs. This research examines the use of Integrated Data Viewer-IDV as a teaching tool, as it allows a 4-dimensional representation of weather products. IDV was tested in the teaching of synoptic meteorology, weather analysis, and weather map interpretation to non-science students in the laboratory sessions of an introductory meteorology class at Western Michigan University. Comparison of student exam scores according to the laboratory teaching techniques, i.e., traditional lab manual and IDV was performed for short- and long-term learning. Results of the statistical analysis show that the Fall 2004 students in the IDV-based lab session retained learning. However, in the Spring 2005 the exam scores did not reflect retention in learning when compared with IDV-based and MANUAL-based lab scores (short term learning, i.e., exam taken one week after the lab exercise). Testing the long-term learning, seven weeks between the two exams in the Spring 2005, show no statistically significant difference between IDV-based group scores and MANUAL-based group scores. However, the IDV group obtained exam score average slightly higher than the MANUAL group. Statistical testing of the principal hypothesis in this study, leads to the conclusion that the IDV-based method did not prove to be a better teaching tool than the traditional paper-based method. Future studies could potentially find significant differences in the effectiveness of both manual and IDV methods if the conditions had been more controlled. That is, students in the control group should not be exposed to the weather analysis using IDV during lecture.

Audience reach of science on television in 10 European countries: An analysis of people-meter data.

PubMed

Lehmkuhl, Markus; Boyadjieva, Pepka; Cunningham, Yvonne; Karamanidou, Christina; Mörä, Tuomo

2016-02-01

Beginning with a differentiation of science programmes into five different editorial concepts, this article explores the audience reach of science on television in 10 European countries with a special emphasis on young audiences aged between 14 and 29 years. In relation to the share of this age group in the entire population, science programmes in all countries reach a considerably smaller proportion of younger viewers. Specific preferences for science content on television do not seem to be relevant in explaining aggregated viewing behaviours especially of young audiences. Unlike all other segments, the young science viewer segment is almost intangible as an aggregated group, as a definable segment of a mass audience that can be targeted by science programme makers. © The Author(s) 2014.

Education Resources Needed to Support the Teaching of Evidence-Based Practices

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Edmundson, Eldon; Gallon, Steve; Porter, John

2007-01-01

The Northwest Frontier Addiction Technology Transfer Center surveyed addiction educators, providers and policy makers in Northwest states and Hawaii to define teaching resources and barriers in the teaching of evidence-based practices for the preparation of addiction professionals. The top three teaching resource needs were example student…

Non-Market Values in a Cost-Benefit World: Evidence from a Choice Experiment

PubMed Central

Eppink, Florian V.; Winden, Matthew; Wright, Will C. C.; Greenhalgh, Suzie

2016-01-01

In support of natural resource and ecosystem service policy, monetary value estimates are often presented to decision makers along with other types of information. There is some evidence that, presented with such ‘mixed’ information, people prioritise monetary over non-monetary information. We conduct a discrete choice experiment among New Zealand decision makers in which we manipulate the information presented to participants. We find that providing explicit monetary information strengthens the pursuit of economic benefits as well as the avoidance of environmental damage. Cultural impacts, of which we provided only qualitative descriptions, did not affect respondents’ choices. Our study provides further evidence that concerns regarding the use of monetary information in decisions with complex, multi-value impacts are valid. Further research is needed to validate our results and find ways to reduce any bias in monetary and non-market information. PMID:27783657

Non-Market Values in a Cost-Benefit World: Evidence from a Choice Experiment.

PubMed

Eppink, Florian V; Winden, Matthew; Wright, Will C C; Greenhalgh, Suzie

2016-01-01

In support of natural resource and ecosystem service policy, monetary value estimates are often presented to decision makers along with other types of information. There is some evidence that, presented with such 'mixed' information, people prioritise monetary over non-monetary information. We conduct a discrete choice experiment among New Zealand decision makers in which we manipulate the information presented to participants. We find that providing explicit monetary information strengthens the pursuit of economic benefits as well as the avoidance of environmental damage. Cultural impacts, of which we provided only qualitative descriptions, did not affect respondents' choices. Our study provides further evidence that concerns regarding the use of monetary information in decisions with complex, multi-value impacts are valid. Further research is needed to validate our results and find ways to reduce any bias in monetary and non-market information.

Respiratory morbidity of pattern and model makers exposed to wood, plastic, and metal products

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Robins, T.G.; Haboubi, G.; Demers, R.Y.

Pattern and model makers are skilled tradespersons who may be exposed to hardwoods, softwoods, phenol-formaldehyde resin-impregnated woods, epoxy and polyester/styrene resin systems, and welding and metal-casting fumes. The relationship of respiratory symptoms (wheezing, chronic bronchitis, dyspnea) and pulmonary function (FVC% predicted, FEV1% predicted, FEV1/FVC% predicted) with interview-derived cumulative exposure estimates to specific workplace agents and to all work with wood, plastic, or metal products was investigated in 751 pattern and model makers in southeast Michigan. In stratified analyses and age- and smoking-adjusted linear and logistic regression models, measures of cumulative wood exposures were associated with decrements in pulmonary function andmore » dyspnea, but not with other symptoms. In similar analyses, measures of cumulative plastic exposures were associated with wheezing, chronic bronchitis, and dyspnea, but not with decrements in pulmonary function. Prior studies of exposure levels among pattern and model makers and of respiratory health effects of specific agents among other occupational groups support the plausibility of wood-related effects more strongly than that of plastic-related effects.« less

Lightweight genome viewer: portable software for browsing genomics data in its chromosomal context

PubMed Central

Faith, Jeremiah J; Olson, Andrew J; Gardner, Timothy S; Sachidanandam, Ravi

2007-01-01

Background Lightweight genome viewer (lwgv) is a web-based tool for visualization of sequence annotations in their chromosomal context. It performs most of the functions of larger genome browsers, while relying on standard flat-file formats and bypassing the database needs of most visualization tools. Visualization as an aide to discovery requires display of novel data in conjunction with static annotations in their chromosomal context. With database-based systems, displaying dynamic results requires temporary tables that need to be tracked for removal. Results lwgv simplifies the visualization of user-generated results on a local computer. The dynamic results of these analyses are written to transient files, which can import static content from a more permanent file. lwgv is currently used in many different applications, from whole genome browsers to single-gene RNAi design visualization, demonstrating its applicability in a large variety of contexts and scales. Conclusion lwgv provides a lightweight alternative to large genome browsers for visualizing biological annotations and dynamic analyses in their chromosomal context. It is particularly suited for applications ranging from short sequences to medium-sized genomes when the creation and maintenance of a large software and database infrastructure is not necessary or desired. PMID:17877794

Lightweight genome viewer: portable software for browsing genomics data in its chromosomal context.

PubMed

Faith, Jeremiah J; Olson, Andrew J; Gardner, Timothy S; Sachidanandam, Ravi

2007-09-18

Lightweight genome viewer (lwgv) is a web-based tool for visualization of sequence annotations in their chromosomal context. It performs most of the functions of larger genome browsers, while relying on standard flat-file formats and bypassing the database needs of most visualization tools. Visualization as an aide to discovery requires display of novel data in conjunction with static annotations in their chromosomal context. With database-based systems, displaying dynamic results requires temporary tables that need to be tracked for removal. lwgv simplifies the visualization of user-generated results on a local computer. The dynamic results of these analyses are written to transient files, which can import static content from a more permanent file. lwgv is currently used in many different applications, from whole genome browsers to single-gene RNAi design visualization, demonstrating its applicability in a large variety of contexts and scales. lwgv provides a lightweight alternative to large genome browsers for visualizing biological annotations and dynamic analyses in their chromosomal context. It is particularly suited for applications ranging from short sequences to medium-sized genomes when the creation and maintenance of a large software and database infrastructure is not necessary or desired.

Networking Industry and Academia: Evidence from FUSION Projects in Ireland

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Stephens, Simon; Onofrei, George

2009-01-01

Graduate development programmes such as FUSION continue to be seen by policy makers, higher education institutions and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) as primary means of strengthening higher education-business links and in turn improving the match between graduate output and the needs of industry. This paper provides evidence from case…

Factors influencing decision regret regarding placement of a PEG among substitute decision-makers of older persons in Japan: a prospective study.

PubMed

Kuraoka, Yumiko; Nakayama, Kazuhiro

2017-06-28

A tube feeding decision aid designed at the Ottawa Health Research Institute was specifically created for substitute decision-makers who must decide whether to allow placement of a percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG) tube in a cognitively impaired older person. We developed a Japanese version and found that the decision aid promoted the decision-making process of substitute decision-makers to decrease decisional conflict and increase knowledge. However, the factors that influence decision regret among substitute decision-makers were not measured after the decision was made. The objective of this study was to explore the factors that influence decision regret among substitute decision-makers 6 months after using a decision aid for PEG placement. In this prospective study, participants comprised substitute decision-makers for 45 inpatients aged 65 years and older who were being considered for placement of a PEG tube in hospitals, nursing homes and patients' homes in Japan. The Decisional Conflict Scale (DCS) was used to evaluate decisional conflict among substitute decision-makers immediately after deciding whether to introduce tube feeding and the Decision Regret Scale (DRS) was used to evaluate decisional regret among substitute decision-makers 6 months after they made their decision. Normalized scores were evaluated and analysis of variance was used to compare groups. The results of the multiple regression analysis suggest that PEG placement (P < .01) and decision conflict (P < .001) are explanatory factors of decision regret regarding placement of a PEG among substitute decision-makers. PEG placement and decision conflict immediately after deciding whether to allow PEG placement have an influence on decision regret among substitute decision-makers after 6 months.

Apollo2Go: a web service adapter for the Apollo genome viewer to enable distributed genome annotation.

PubMed

Klee, Kathrin; Ernst, Rebecca; Spannagl, Manuel; Mayer, Klaus F X

2007-08-30

Apollo, a genome annotation viewer and editor, has become a widely used genome annotation and visualization tool for distributed genome annotation projects. When using Apollo for annotation, database updates are carried out by uploading intermediate annotation files into the respective database. This non-direct database upload is laborious and evokes problems of data synchronicity. To overcome these limitations we extended the Apollo data adapter with a generic, configurable web service client that is able to retrieve annotation data in a GAME-XML-formatted string and pass it on to Apollo's internal input routine. This Apollo web service adapter, Apollo2Go, simplifies the data exchange in distributed projects and aims to render the annotation process more comfortable. The Apollo2Go software is freely available from ftp://ftpmips.gsf.de/plants/apollo_webservice.

Apollo2Go: a web service adapter for the Apollo genome viewer to enable distributed genome annotation

PubMed Central

Klee, Kathrin; Ernst, Rebecca; Spannagl, Manuel; Mayer, Klaus FX

2007-01-01

Background Apollo, a genome annotation viewer and editor, has become a widely used genome annotation and visualization tool for distributed genome annotation projects. When using Apollo for annotation, database updates are carried out by uploading intermediate annotation files into the respective database. This non-direct database upload is laborious and evokes problems of data synchronicity. Results To overcome these limitations we extended the Apollo data adapter with a generic, configurable web service client that is able to retrieve annotation data in a GAME-XML-formatted string and pass it on to Apollo's internal input routine. Conclusion This Apollo web service adapter, Apollo2Go, simplifies the data exchange in distributed projects and aims to render the annotation process more comfortable. The Apollo2Go software is freely available from . PMID:17760972

Clarity versus complexity: land-use modeling as a practical tool for decision-makers

USGS Publications Warehouse

Sohl, Terry L.; Claggett, Peter

2013-01-01

The last decade has seen a remarkable increase in the number of modeling tools available to examine future land-use and land-cover (LULC) change. Integrated modeling frameworks, agent-based models, cellular automata approaches, and other modeling techniques have substantially improved the representation of complex LULC systems, with each method using a different strategy to address complexity. However, despite the development of new and better modeling tools, the use of these tools is limited for actual planning, decision-making, or policy-making purposes. LULC modelers have become very adept at creating tools for modeling LULC change, but complicated models and lack of transparency limit their utility for decision-makers. The complicated nature of many LULC models also makes it impractical or even impossible to perform a rigorous analysis of modeling uncertainty. This paper provides a review of land-cover modeling approaches and the issues causes by the complicated nature of models, and provides suggestions to facilitate the increased use of LULC models by decision-makers and other stakeholders. The utility of LULC models themselves can be improved by 1) providing model code and documentation, 2) through the use of scenario frameworks to frame overall uncertainties, 3) improving methods for generalizing key LULC processes most important to stakeholders, and 4) adopting more rigorous standards for validating models and quantifying uncertainty. Communication with decision-makers and other stakeholders can be improved by increasing stakeholder participation in all stages of the modeling process, increasing the transparency of model structure and uncertainties, and developing user-friendly decision-support systems to bridge the link between LULC science and policy. By considering these options, LULC science will be better positioned to support decision-makers and increase real-world application of LULC modeling results.

The medical decision model and decision maker tools for management of radiological and nuclear incidents.

PubMed

Koerner, John F; Coleman, C Norman; Murrain-Hill, Paula; FitzGerald, Denis J; Sullivan, Julie M

2014-06-01

Effective decision making during a rapidly evolving emergency such as a radiological or nuclear incident requires timely interim decisions and communications from onsite decision makers while further data processing, consultation, and review are ongoing by reachback experts. The authors have recently proposed a medical decision model for use during a radiological or nuclear disaster, which is similar in concept to that used in medical care, especially when delay in action can have disastrous effects. For decision makers to function most effectively during a complex response, they require access to onsite subject matter experts who can provide information, recommendations, and participate in public communication efforts. However, in the time before this expertise is available or during the planning phase, just-in-time tools are essential that provide critical overview of the subject matter written specifically for the decision makers. Recognizing the complexity of the science, risk assessment, and multitude of potential response assets that will be required after a nuclear incident, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, in collaboration with other government and non-government experts, has prepared a practical guide for decision makers. This paper illustrates how the medical decision model process could facilitate onsite decision making that includes using the deliberative reachback process from science and policy experts and describes the tools now available to facilitate timely and effective incident management.

Economic assessment of flood forecasts for a risk-averse decision-maker

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Matte, Simon; Boucher, Marie-Amélie; Boucher, Vincent; Fortier-Filion, Thomas-Charles

2017-04-01

A large effort has been made over the past 10 years to promote the operational use of probabilistic or ensemble streamflow forecasts. It has also been suggested in past studies that ensemble forecasts might possess a greater economic value than deterministic forecasts. However, the vast majority of recent hydro-economic literature is based on the cost-loss ratio framework, which might be appealing for its simplicity and intuitiveness. One important drawback of the cost-loss ratio is that it implicitly assumes a risk-neutral decision maker. By definition, a risk-neutral individual is indifferent to forecasts' sharpness: as long as forecasts agree with observations on average, the risk-neutral individual is satisfied. A risk-averse individual, however, is sensitive to the level of precision (sharpness) of forecasts. This person is willing to pay to increase his or her certainty about future events. In fact, this is how insurance companies operate: the probability of seeing one's house burn down is relatively low, so the expected cost related to such event is also low. However, people are willing to buy insurance to avoid the risk, however small, of loosing everything. Similarly, in a context where people's safety and property is at stake, the typical decision maker is more risk-averse than risk-neutral. Consequently, the cost-loss ratio is not the most appropriate tool to assess the economic value of flood forecasts. This presentation describes a more realistic framework for assessing the economic value of such forecasts for flood mitigation purposes. Borrowing from economics, the Constant Absolute Risk Aversion utility function (CARA) is the central tool of this new framework. Utility functions allow explicitly accounting for the level of risk aversion of the decision maker and fully exploiting the information related to ensemble forecasts' uncertainty. Three concurrent ensemble streamflow forecasting systems are compared in terms of quality (comparison with

Use of modified Delphi to plan knowledge translation for decision makers: an application in the field of advanced practice nursing.

PubMed

Carter, Nancy; Lavis, John N; MacDonald-Rencz, Sandra

2014-01-01

Disseminating research to decision makers is difficult. Interaction between researchers and decision makers can identify key messages and processes for dissemination. To gain agreement on the key findings from a synthesis on the integration of advanced practice nurses, we used a modified Delphi process. Nursing decision makers contributed ideas via e-mail, discussed and clarified ideas face to face, and then prioritized statements. Sixteen (89%) participated and 14 (77%) completed the final phase. Priority key messages were around access to care and outcomes. The majority identified "NPs increase access to care" and "NPs and CNSs improve patient and system outcomes" as priority messaging statements. Participants agreed policy makers and the public were target audiences for messages. Consulting with policy makers provided the necessary context to develop tailored policy messages and is a helpful approach for research dissemination. © The Author(s) 2014 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav.

Tools to support evidence-informed public health decision making

PubMed Central

2014-01-01

Background Public health professionals are increasingly expected to engage in evidence-informed decision making to inform practice and policy decisions. Evidence-informed decision making involves the use of research evidence along with expertise, existing public health resources, knowledge about community health issues, the local context and community, and the political climate. The National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools has identified a seven step process for evidence-informed decision making. Tools have been developed to support public health professionals as they work through each of these steps. This paper provides an overview of tools used in three Canadian public health departments involved in a study to develop capacity for evidence-informed decision making. Methods As part of a knowledge translation and exchange intervention, a Knowledge Broker worked with public health professionals to identify and apply tools for use with each of the steps of evidence-informed decision making. The Knowledge Broker maintained a reflective journal and interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of decision makers and public health professionals. This paper presents qualitative analysis of the perceived usefulness and usability of the tools. Results Tools were used in the health departments to assist in: question identification and clarification; searching for the best available research evidence; assessing the research evidence for quality through critical appraisal; deciphering the ‘actionable message(s)’ from the research evidence; tailoring messages to the local context to ensure their relevance and suitability; deciding whether and planning how to implement research evidence in the local context; and evaluating the effectiveness of implementation efforts. Decision makers provided descriptions of how the tools were used within the health departments and made suggestions for improvement. Overall, the tools were perceived as valuable for advancing

Tools to support evidence-informed public health decision making.

PubMed

Yost, Jennifer; Dobbins, Maureen; Traynor, Robyn; DeCorby, Kara; Workentine, Stephanie; Greco, Lori

2014-07-18

Public health professionals are increasingly expected to engage in evidence-informed decision making to inform practice and policy decisions. Evidence-informed decision making involves the use of research evidence along with expertise, existing public health resources, knowledge about community health issues, the local context and community, and the political climate. The National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools has identified a seven step process for evidence-informed decision making. Tools have been developed to support public health professionals as they work through each of these steps. This paper provides an overview of tools used in three Canadian public health departments involved in a study to develop capacity for evidence-informed decision making. As part of a knowledge translation and exchange intervention, a Knowledge Broker worked with public health professionals to identify and apply tools for use with each of the steps of evidence-informed decision making. The Knowledge Broker maintained a reflective journal and interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of decision makers and public health professionals. This paper presents qualitative analysis of the perceived usefulness and usability of the tools. Tools were used in the health departments to assist in: question identification and clarification; searching for the best available research evidence; assessing the research evidence for quality through critical appraisal; deciphering the 'actionable message(s)' from the research evidence; tailoring messages to the local context to ensure their relevance and suitability; deciding whether and planning how to implement research evidence in the local context; and evaluating the effectiveness of implementation efforts. Decision makers provided descriptions of how the tools were used within the health departments and made suggestions for improvement. Overall, the tools were perceived as valuable for advancing and sustaining evidence

49 CFR 1503.659 - Petition to reconsider or modify a final decision and order of the TSA decision maker on appeal.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-10-01

... and order of the TSA decision maker on appeal. 1503.659 Section 1503.659 Transportation Other... Practice in TSA Civil Penalty Actions § 1503.659 Petition to reconsider or modify a final decision and order of the TSA decision maker on appeal. (a) General. Any party may petition the TSA decision maker to...

Decision makers' experiences of prioritisation and views about how to finance healthcare costs.

PubMed

Werntoft, Elisabet; Edberg, Anna-Karin

2009-10-01

Prioritisation in healthcare is an issue of growing importance due to scarcity of resources. The aims of this study were firstly to describe decision makers' experience of prioritisation and their views concerning willingness to pay and how to finance healthcare costs. An additional aim was to compare the views of politicians and physicians. The study was a cross-sectional study based on a questionnaire administered to 700 Swedish politicians and physicians. This was analysed using both quantitative and qualitative methods. A majority of the decision makers (55%) suggested that increasing costs should be financed through higher taxation but more physicians than politicians thought that higher patient fees, private health insurance and a reduction in social expenditure were better alternatives. Prioritisation aroused anxiety; politicians were afraid of displeasing voters while physicians were afraid of making medically incorrect decisions. This study do not answer the question about how to make prioritisation in health care but the result highlights the different ways that the decision makers view the subject and thereby elicit that publicly elected politicians and physicians perhaps not always work with the same goal ahead. There are needs for more research but also more media focus on the subject so the citizens will be aware and take part in the debate.

Television as a Socialization Factor: A Study on the Effects of Television with Special Reference to the Portrayal of Violence and to Viewers' Behaviour. Report No. III (Final Report).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kellner, Hella

1979-01-01

Reanalyzes previously reported data (EBU Review; v27, n6, Nov 1976 and v29, n2, Mar 1978) on television viewing among 85 families in the Federal Republic of Germany to answer questions concerning aspects of viewer behavior in families, adult self-image, and children's daily viewing patterns. (RAO)

'Holding the line': a qualitative study of the role of evidence in early phase decision-making in the reconfiguration of stroke services in London.

PubMed

Fraser, Alec; Baeza, Juan I; Boaz, Annette

2017-06-09

Health service reconfigurations are of international interest but remain poorly understood. This article focuses on the use of evidence by senior managerial decision-makers involved in the reconfiguration of stroke services in London 2008-2012. Recent work comparing stroke service reconfiguration in London and Manchester emphasises the ability of senior managerial decision-makers in London to 'hold the line' in the crucial early phases of the stroke reconfiguration programme. In this article, we explore in detail how these decision-makers 'held the line' and ask what the broader power implications of doing so are for the interaction between evidence, health policy and system redesign. The research combined semi-structured interviews (n = 20) and documentary analysis of historically relevant policy papers and contemporary stroke reconfiguration documentation published by NHS London and other interested parties (n = 125). We applied a critical interpretive and reflexive approach to the analysis of the data. We identified two forms of power which senior managerial decision-makers drew upon in order to 'hold the line'. Firstly, discursive power, which through an emphasis on evidence, better patient outcomes, professional support and clinical credibility alongside a tightly managed consultation process, helped to set an agenda that was broadly receptive to the overall decision to change stroke services in the capital in a radical way. Secondly, once the essential parameters of the decision to change services had been agreed, senior managerial decision-makers 'held the line' through hierarchical New Public Management style power to minimise the traditional pressures to de-radicalise the reconfiguration through 'top down' decision-making. We problematise the concept of 'holding the line' and explore the power implications of such managerial approaches in the early phases of health service reconfiguration. We highlight the importance of evidence for senior managerial

Use of evidence to support healthy public policy: a policy effectiveness–feasibility loop

PubMed Central

Bowman, Sarah; Critchley, Julia; Capewell, Simon; Husseini, Abdullatif; Maziak, Wasim; Zaman, Shahaduz; Ben Romdhane, Habiba; Fouad, Fouad; Phillimore, Peter; Unal, Belgin; Khatib, Rana; Shoaibi, Azza; Ahmad, Balsam

2012-01-01

Abstract Public policy plays a key role in improving population health and in the control of diseases, including non-communicable diseases. However, an evidence-based approach to formulating healthy public policy has been difficult to implement, partly on account of barriers that hinder integrated work between researchers and policy-makers. This paper describes a “policy effectiveness–feasibility loop” (PEFL) that brings together epidemiological modelling, local situation analysis and option appraisal to foster collaboration between researchers and policy-makers. Epidemiological modelling explores the determinants of trends in disease and the potential health benefits of modifying them. Situation analysis investigates the current conceptualization of policy, the level of policy awareness and commitment among key stakeholders, and what actually happens in practice, thereby helping to identify policy gaps. Option appraisal integrates epidemiological modelling and situation analysis to investigate the feasibility, costs and likely health benefits of various policy options. The authors illustrate how PEFL was used in a project to inform public policy for the prevention of cardiovascular diseases and diabetes in four parts of the eastern Mediterranean. They conclude that PEFL may offer a useful framework for researchers and policy-makers to successfully work together to generate evidence-based policy, and they encourage further evaluation of this approach. PMID:23226897

Evidence-informed decision-making by professionals working in addiction agencies serving women: a descriptive qualitative study.

PubMed

Jack, Susan M; Dobbins, Maureen; Sword, Wendy; Novotna, Gabriela; Brooks, Sandy; Lipman, Ellen L; Niccols, Alison

2011-11-07

Effective approaches to the prevention and treatment of substance abuse among mothers have been developed but not widely implemented. Implementation studies suggest that the adoption of evidence-based practices in the field of addictions remains low. There is a need, therefore, to better understand decision making processes in addiction agencies in order to develop more effective approaches to promote the translation of knowledge gained from addictions research into clinical practice. A descriptive qualitative study was conducted to explore: 1) the types and sources of evidence used to inform practice-related decisions within Canadian addiction agencies serving women; 2) how decision makers at different levels report using research evidence; and 3) factors that influence evidence-informed decision making. A purposeful sample of 26 decision-makers providing addiction treatment services to women completed in-depth qualitative interviews. Interview data were coded and analyzed using directed and summative content analysis strategies as well as constant comparison techniques. Across all groups, individuals reported locating and using multiple types of evidence to inform decisions. Some decision-makers rely on their experiential knowledge of addiction and recovery in decision-making. Research evidence is often used directly in decision-making at program management and senior administrative levels. Information for decision-making is accessed from a range of sources, including web-based resources and experts in the field. Individual and organizational facilitators and barriers to using research evidence in decision making were identified. There is support at administrative levels for integrating EIDM in addiction agencies. Knowledge transfer and exchange strategies should be focussed towards program managers and administrators and include capacity building for locating, appraising and using research evidence, knowledge brokering, and for partnering with universities

Evidence-informed decision-making by professionals working in addiction agencies serving women: a descriptive qualitative study

PubMed Central

2011-01-01

Background Effective approaches to the prevention and treatment of substance abuse among mothers have been developed but not widely implemented. Implementation studies suggest that the adoption of evidence-based practices in the field of addictions remains low. There is a need, therefore, to better understand decision making processes in addiction agencies in order to develop more effective approaches to promote the translation of knowledge gained from addictions research into clinical practice. Methods A descriptive qualitative study was conducted to explore: 1) the types and sources of evidence used to inform practice-related decisions within Canadian addiction agencies serving women; 2) how decision makers at different levels report using research evidence; and 3) factors that influence evidence-informed decision making. A purposeful sample of 26 decision-makers providing addiction treatment services to women completed in-depth qualitative interviews. Interview data were coded and analyzed using directed and summative content analysis strategies as well as constant comparison techniques. Results Across all groups, individuals reported locating and using multiple types of evidence to inform decisions. Some decision-makers rely on their experiential knowledge of addiction and recovery in decision-making. Research evidence is often used directly in decision-making at program management and senior administrative levels. Information for decision-making is accessed from a range of sources, including web-based resources and experts in the field. Individual and organizational facilitators and barriers to using research evidence in decision making were identified. Conclusions There is support at administrative levels for integrating EIDM in addiction agencies. Knowledge transfer and exchange strategies should be focussed towards program managers and administrators and include capacity building for locating, appraising and using research evidence, knowledge brokering, and

Self-transcendence and depression among AIDS Memorial Quilt panel makers.

PubMed

Kausch, Kurt D; Amer, Kim

2007-06-01

Self-transcendence is a process that can help individuals reestablish well-being after experiencing a significant, life-altering event. In this study, we sought to identify the relationship between self-transcendence and depression in individuals who lost loved ones to HIV/AIDS and to describe and compare self-transcendence, self-transcendence variables of acceptance and spirituality, and depression among bereaved individuals who created AIDS Memorial Quilt panels with those who did not. The findings support Reed's self-transcendence theory, with inverse correlations between self-transcendence and depression obtained from both the total group and the panel makers. Significant differences were also found between certain self-transcendence variables and depression among the study participants related to gender and ethnicity. In addition, thematic analysis of panel maker interviews revealed five themes: Quilt panel making provides validation, Quilt panel making creates a living memory, liberating acceptance of loss, community of survivors, and connection to a higher power. These findings assist in understanding the complexities of the grief process and support the usefulness of Quilt panel making as an intervention for coping with grief related to HIV/AIDS.

Design for a Simple and Inexpensive Cylinder-within-a-Cylinder Gradient Maker for the Undergraduate Biochemistry Laboratory

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sims, Paul A.; O'Mealey, Gary B.; Khan, Nabeel A.; Larabee, Chelsea M.

2011-01-01

A design for a simple and inexpensive gradient maker is described. The gradient maker is assembled by (i) cutting the tops off two plastic bottles of differing diameters to produce two cylinders with intact bottoms; (ii) drilling a small hole toward the bottom of the smaller diameter cylinder and plugging the hole with a size 00 cork stopper; and…

Comparative analysis of decision maker preferences for equity/efficiency attributes in reimbursement decisions in three European countries.

PubMed

Baji, Petra; García-Goñi, Manuel; Gulácsi, László; Mentzakis, Emmanouil; Paolucci, Francesco

2016-09-01

In addition to cost-effectiveness, national guidelines often include other factors in reimbursement decisions. However, weights attached to these are rarely quantified, thus decisions can depend strongly on decision-maker preferences. To explore the preferences of policymakers and healthcare professionals involved in the decision-making process for different efficiency and equity attributes of interventions and to analyse cross-country differences. Discrete choice experiments (DCEs) were carried out in Austria, Hungary, and Norway with policymakers and other professionals working in the health industry (N = 153 respondents). Interventions were described in terms of different efficiency and equity attributes (severity of disease, target age of the population and willingness to subsidise others, potential number of beneficiaries, individual health benefit, and cost-effectiveness). Parameter estimates from the DCE were used to calculate the probability of choosing a healthcare intervention with different characteristics, and to rank different equity and efficiency attributes according to their importance. In all three countries, cost-effectiveness, individual health benefit and severity of the disease were significant and equally important determinants of decisions. All countries show preferences for interventions targeting young and middle aged populations compared to those targeting populations over 60. However, decision-makers in Austria and Hungary show preferences more oriented to efficiency than equity, while those in Norway show equal preferences for equity and efficiency attributes. We find that factors other than cost-effectiveness seem to play an equally important role in decision-making. We also find evidence of cross-country differences in the weight of efficiency and equity attributes.

Before You Decide: What Families Would Like Policy Makers to Know.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Clark, Marsha J.; Kendrick, Martie; Chamberlain, Linda; Chesley, Esther; Clement, Stacie; Cummings, Dawn; Henri-Mackenzie, Sue; Labbe, Tonya; MacDonald, Janice; McNally, Diana; Niles, Nancy; Raymond, Roberta; Russell, Candice

This booklet, developed by parents of children with developmental disabilities, is intended to help policy makers understand major parental concerns about raising a child with a disability. The specific issues addressed are: (1) the special needs of families with a disabled child; (2) the right to community integration; (3) the continuing…

Students as Rational Decision-Makers: The Question of Beliefs and Attitudes

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sullivan, Alice

2006-01-01

Rational choice theorists have analysed rates of participation in post-compulsory education, and, in particular, class differentials in these rates. Various claims have been made about the motivations of student decision-makers, but these claims have not been grounded empirically. This paper will assess the question of whether students' attitudes…

The AECT HistoryMakers Project: Conversations with Leaders in Educational Technology

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lockee, Barbara B.; Song, Kibong; Li, Wei

2014-01-01

The early beginnings and evolution of the field of educational technology (ET) have been documented by various scholars in the field. Recently, another form of historical documentation has been undertaken through a project of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT). The AECT HistoryMakers Project is a collaborative…

Engaging policy-makers, heath system managers, and policy analysts in the knowledge synthesis process: a scoping review.

PubMed

Tricco, Andrea C; Zarin, Wasifa; Rios, Patricia; Nincic, Vera; Khan, Paul A; Ghassemi, Marco; Diaz, Sanober; Pham, Ba'; Straus, Sharon E; Langlois, Etienne V

2018-02-12

It is unclear how to engage a wide range of knowledge users in research. We aimed to map the evidence on engaging knowledge users with an emphasis on policy-makers, health system managers, and policy analysts in the knowledge synthesis process through a scoping review. We used the Joanna Briggs Institute guidance for scoping reviews. Nine electronic databases (e.g., MEDLINE), two grey literature sources (e.g., OpenSIGLE), and reference lists of relevant systematic reviews were searched from 1996 to August 2016. We included any type of study describing strategies, barriers and facilitators, or assessing the impact of engaging policy-makers, health system managers, and policy analysts in the knowledge synthesis process. Screening and data abstraction were conducted by two reviewers independently with a third reviewer resolving discrepancies. Frequency and thematic analyses were conducted. After screening 8395 titles and abstracts followed by 394 full-texts, 84 unique documents and 7 companion reports fulfilled our eligibility criteria. All 84 documents were published in the last 10 years, and half were prepared in North America. The most common type of knowledge synthesis with knowledge user engagement was a systematic review (36%). The knowledge synthesis most commonly addressed an issue at the level of national healthcare system (48%) and focused on health services delivery (17%) in high-income countries (86%). Policy-makers were the most common (64%) knowledge users, followed by healthcare professionals (49%) and government agencies as well as patients and caregivers (34%). Knowledge users were engaged in conceptualization and design (49%), literature search and data collection (52%), data synthesis and interpretation (71%), and knowledge dissemination and application (44%). Knowledge users were most commonly engaged as key informants through meetings and workshops as well as surveys, focus groups, and interviews either in-person or by telephone and emails

Factors affecting evidence-use in food policy-making processes in health and agriculture in Fiji.

PubMed

Waqa, Gade; Bell, Colin; Snowdon, Wendy; Moodie, Marj

2017-01-09

There is limited research on the use of evidence to inform policy-making in the Pacific. This study aims to identify and describe factors that facilitate or limit the use of evidence in food-related policy-making in the Health and Agriculture Ministries in Fiji. Semi-structured face-to-face interviews were conducted with selected policy-makers in two government ministries that were instrumental in the development of food-related policies in Fiji designed to prevent Non-Communicable Diseases (NCDs). Snowball sampling was used to recruit, as key informants, senior policy-makers in management positions such as national advisors and directors who were based at either the national headquarters or equivalent. Interviewees were asked about their experiences in developing food-related or other policies, barriers or facilitators encountered in the policy development and implementation process and the use of evidence. Each interview lasted approximately 45-60 minutes, and was conducted in English. Audio-recorded interviews were transcribed, thematically coded and analyzed using N-Vivo 8.0 software. Thirty-one policy-makers from the Ministry of Health and Medical Services (MoHMS n = 18) and the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA n = 13) in Fiji participated in the study. Whilst evidence is sometimes used in food-related policy-making in both the Health and Agriculture Ministries (including formal evidence such as published research and informal evidence such as personal experiences and opinions), it is not yet embedded as an essential part of the process. Participants indicated that a lack of resources, poor technical support in terms of training, the absence of clear strategies for improving competent use of evidence, procedures regarding engagement with other stakeholders across sectors, varying support from senior managers and limited consultation across sectors were barriers to evidence use. The willingness of organizations to create a culture of using evidence was

The limitations of 'evidence-based' public health.

PubMed

Kemm, John

2006-06-01

This paper examines how the concept of the 'evidence-based' approach has transferred from clinical medicine to public health and has been applied to health promotion and policy making. In policy making evidence has always been interpreted broadly to cover all types of reasoned enquiry and after some debate the same is now true for health promotion. Taking communities rather than individuals as the unit of intervention and the importance of context means that frequently randomized controlled trials are not appropriate for study of public health interventions. Further, the notion of a 'best solution' ignores the complexity of the decision making process. Evidence 'enlightens' policy makers shaping how policy problems are framed rather than providing the answer to any particular problem. There are lessons from the way that evidence-based policy is being applied in public health that could usefully be taken back into medicine.

Validation of surrogate endpoints in advanced solid tumors: systematic review of statistical methods, results, and implications for policy makers.

PubMed

Ciani, Oriana; Davis, Sarah; Tappenden, Paul; Garside, Ruth; Stein, Ken; Cantrell, Anna; Saad, Everardo D; Buyse, Marc; Taylor, Rod S

2014-07-01

Licensing of, and coverage decisions on, new therapies should rely on evidence from patient-relevant endpoints such as overall survival (OS). Nevertheless, evidence from surrogate endpoints may also be useful, as it may not only expedite the regulatory approval of new therapies but also inform coverage decisions. It is, therefore, essential that candidate surrogate endpoints be properly validated. However, there is no consensus on statistical methods for such validation and on how the evidence thus derived should be applied by policy makers. We review current statistical approaches to surrogate-endpoint validation based on meta-analysis in various advanced-tumor settings. We assessed the suitability of two surrogates (progression-free survival [PFS] and time-to-progression [TTP]) using three current validation frameworks: Elston and Taylor's framework, the German Institute of Quality and Efficiency in Health Care's (IQWiG) framework and the Biomarker-Surrogacy Evaluation Schema (BSES3). A wide variety of statistical methods have been used to assess surrogacy. The strength of the association between the two surrogates and OS was generally low. The level of evidence (observation-level versus treatment-level) available varied considerably by cancer type, by evaluation tools and was not always consistent even within one specific cancer type. Not in all solid tumors the treatment-level association between PFS or TTP and OS has been investigated. According to IQWiG's framework, only PFS achieved acceptable evidence of surrogacy in metastatic colorectal and ovarian cancer treated with cytotoxic agents. Our study emphasizes the challenges of surrogate-endpoint validation and the importance of building consensus on the development of evaluation frameworks.

Disease management in healthcare organizations: results of in-depth interviews with disease management decision makers.

PubMed

Whellan, David J; Cohen, Elizabeth J; Matchar, David B; Califf, Robert M

2002-07-01

Despite the widening use of disease management (DM) programs throughout the country, little is understood about the "state of DM" in healthcare systems and managed care organizations. To better characterize the range of users of DM in healthcare and to identify critical issues, both present and future, for DM. Qualitative survey. Forty-seven healthcare systems (n = 22) and managed care organizations (n = 25) were randomly selected. Decision makers were identified and interviewed between January 1, 2000, and March 31, 2000. We limited quantitative analysis to tabulations of suitable responses, without statistical testing. Responses were organized around 3 themes: models for DM, implementation strategies, and measurements of success. Of 47 decision makers surveyed, 42 (89%) reported that their organizations currently have (75%) or are working to develop (14%) DM programs. Although the goals of DM programs were similar, organizations took a variety of approaches to achieving these ends. There were typically 3 steps in implementing a DM program: analysis of patient data, external analysis, and organizational analysis. Decision makers believed that DM programs had only achieved partial success in reaching the 2 main goals of improved quality of care and cost savings. Given the variety of DM programs, there is a need to develop a classification scheme to allow for better comparison between programs. Further quantitative studies of decision makers' opinions would be helpful in developing programs and in designing necessary studies of patient management strategies.

Getting from Here to There: The Roles of Policy Makers and Principals in Increasing Science Teacher Quality

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shen, Ji; Gerard, Libby; Bowyer, Jane

2010-04-01

In this study we investigate how federal and state policy makers, and school principals are working to improve science teacher quality. Interviews, focused discussions, and policy documents serve as the primary data source. Findings suggest that both policy makers and principals prioritize increasing incentives for teachers entering the science teaching profession, providing professional development for new teachers, and using students’ data to evaluate and improve instruction. Differences between the two leadership groups emerged in terms of the grain size and practicality of their concerns. Our findings indicate that the complexity of educational challenges to improve science teacher quality call for the co-construction of policy by multiple constituent groups including school principals, federal and state policy makers, and science education researchers.

Epistemonikos: a free, relational, collaborative, multilingual database of health evidence.

PubMed

Rada, Gabriel; Pérez, Daniel; Capurro, Daniel

2013-01-01

Epistemonikos (www.epistemonikos.org) is a free, multilingual database of the best available health evidence. This paper describes the design, development and implementation of the Epistemonikos project. Using several web technologies to store systematic reviews, their included articles, overviews of reviews and structured summaries, Epistemonikos is able to provide a simple and powerful search tool to access health evidence for sound decision making. Currently, Epistemonikos stores more than 115,000 unique documents and more than 100,000 relationships between documents. In addition, since its database is translated into 9 different languages, Epistemonikos ensures that non-English speaking decision-makers can access the best available evidence without language barriers.

Touching the base: heart-warming ads from the 2016 U.S. election moved viewers to partisan tears.

PubMed

Seibt, Beate; Schubert, Thomas W; Zickfeld, Janis H; Fiske, Alan P

2018-03-07

Some political ads used in the 2016 U.S. election evoked feelings colloquially known as being moved to tears. We conceptualise this phenomenon as a positive social emotion that appraises and motivates communal relations, is accompanied by physical sensations (including lachrymation, piloerection, chest warmth), and often labelled metaphorically. We surveyed U.S. voters in the fortnight before the 2016 U.S. election. Selected ads evoked the emotion completely and reliably, but in a partisan fashion: Clinton voters were moved to tears by three selected Clinton ads, and Trump voters were moved to tears by two Trump ads. Viewers were much less moved by ads of the candidate they did not support. Being moved to tears predicted intention to vote for the candidate depicted. We conclude that some contemporary political advertising is able to move its audience to tears, and thereby motivates support.

Preservice Teachers' Beliefs about Using Maker Activities in Formal K-12 Educational Settings: A Multi-Institutional Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Jones, W. Monty; Smith, Shaunna; Cohen, Jonathan

2017-01-01

This qualitative study examined preservice teachers' beliefs about using maker activities in formal educational settings. Eighty-two preservice and early-career teachers at three different universities in the United States took part in one-time workshops designed to introduce them to various maker tools and activities applicable to K-12…

Health System Decision Makers' Feedback on Summaries and Tools Supporting the Use of Systematic Reviews: A Qualitative Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ellen, Moriah E.; Lavis, John N.; Wilson, Michael G.; Grimshaw, Jeremy; Haynes, R. Brian; Ouimet, Mathieu; Raina, Parminder; Gruen, Russell

2014-01-01

Health system managers and policy makers need timely access to high quality, policy-relevant systematic reviews. Our objectives were to obtain managers' and policy makers' feedback about user-friendly summaries of systematic reviews and about tools related to supporting or assessing their use. Our interviews identified that participants prefer key…

How do researchers influence decision-makers? Case studies of Mexican policies.

PubMed

Trostle, J; Bronfman, M; Langer, A

1999-06-01

Though the problems translating or applying research in policy-making are legion, solutions are rare. As developing countries increase their capacities to develop effective local solutions to their health problems, they confront the research/policy dilemma. Yet few descriptive studies of research-policy links can be found from developing countries, and the relevance of European and North American models and data is questionable. We report the results of a descriptive study from Mexico of the relationship between health research and policy in four vertical programmes (AIDS, cholera, family planning, immunization). We interviewed 67 researchers and policy-makers from different institutions and levels of responsibility. We analyzed interviewee responses looking for factors that promoted or impeded exchanges between researchers and policy-makers. These were, in turn, divided into emphases on content, actors, process, and context. Many of the promoting factors resembled findings from studies in industrialized countries. Some important differences across the four programmes, which also distinguish them from industrialized country programmes, included extent of reliance on formal communication channels, role of the mass media in building social consensus or creating discord, levels of social consensus, role of foreign donors, and extent of support for biomedical versus social research. We recommend various ways to increase the impact of research on health policy-making in Mexico. Some of the largest challenges include the fact that researchers are but one of many interest groups, and research but one input among many equally legitimate elements to be considered by policy-makers. Another important challenge in Mexico is the relatively small role played by the public in policy-making. Further democratic changes in Mexico may be the most important incentive to increase the use of research in policy-making.

Adopting Cut Scores: Post-Standard-Setting Panel Considerations for Decision Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Geisinger, Kurt F.; McCormick, Carina M.

2010-01-01

Standard-setting studies utilizing procedures such as the Bookmark or Angoff methods are just one component of the complete standard-setting process. Decision makers ultimately must determine what they believe to be the most appropriate standard or cut score to use, employing the input of the standard-setting panelists as one piece of information…

Quantum decision-maker theory and simulation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zak, Michail; Meyers, Ronald E.; Deacon, Keith S.

2000-07-01

A quantum device simulating the human decision making process is introduced. It consists of quantum recurrent nets generating stochastic processes which represent the motor dynamics, and of classical neural nets describing the evolution of probabilities of these processes which represent the mental dynamics. The autonomy of the decision making process is achieved by a feedback from the mental to motor dynamics which changes the stochastic matrix based upon the probability distribution. This feedback replaces unavailable external information by an internal knowledge- base stored in the mental model in the form of probability distributions. As a result, the coupled motor-mental dynamics is described by a nonlinear version of Markov chains which can decrease entropy without an external source of information. Applications to common sense based decisions as well as to evolutionary games are discussed. An example exhibiting self-organization is computed using quantum computer simulation. Force on force and mutual aircraft engagements using the quantum decision maker dynamics are considered.

Supporting decision-making processes for evidence-based mental health promotion.

PubMed

Jané-Llopis, Eva; Katschnig, Heinz; McDaid, David; Wahlbeck, Kristian

2011-12-01

The use of evidence is critical in guiding decision-making, but evidence from effect studies will be only one of a number of factors that will need to be taken into account in the decision-making processes. Equally important for policymakers will be the use of different types of evidence including implementation essentials and other decision-making principles such as social justice, political, ethical, equity issues, reflecting public attitudes and the level of resources available, rather than be based on health outcomes alone. This paper, aimed to support decision-makers, highlights the importance of commissioning high-quality evaluations, the key aspects to assess levels of evidence, the importance of supporting evidence-based implementation and what to look out for before, during and after implementation of mental health promotion and mental disorder prevention programmes.

Production of red mold rice using a modified Nagata type koji maker.

PubMed

Chiu, Chiu-Hsia; Ni, Kuang-Huei; Guu, Yuan-Kuang; Pan, Tzu-Ming

2006-11-01

In this research, a commercial koji maker with a rotary perforated bed of 5-m diameter was modified for red mold rice production. Monascus purpureus BCRC 31499 was selected for its high production capacities of monacolin K and red pigment. The selected strain was first cultivated in a 120-l submerged type fermentor at 34 degrees C and 2 vvm aeration rate with 60 rpm agitation for 5 days using 20% liquefied rice porridge as carbon source. The high concentration red mold rice broth (>3.5 g/ml) was harvested for inocula and well mixed with cooked rice to an initial concentration of 2% v/w. The inoculated cooked rice then was directed into the modified koji maker, in which temperature and humidity profiles were kept at varied levels at different stages, respectively. Air was circulated to remove fermentation heat while the perforated bed rotated slowly for providing mild agitation. Lag phase of the Monascus sp. in the modified koji maker was determined to be 16 h by the time the koji temperature raised rapidly. Water was added into the koji bed by a water curtain at the 36th hour to keep the moisture content of the rice koji at 50% or above. At the final stage, temperature was adjusted to 34 degrees C to direct red pigment production. After 7 days, 1,200-kg high quality red mold rice was harvested per batch. Labor costs, space, and fermentation time were reduced tremendously compared with those made by traditional methods.

What criteria do decision makers in Thailand use to set priorities for vaccine introduction?

PubMed

Pooripussarakul, Siriporn; Riewpaiboon, Arthorn; Bishai, David; Muangchana, Charung; Tantivess, Sripen

2016-08-02

There is a need to identify rational criteria and set priorities for vaccines. In Thailand, many licensed vaccines are being considering for introduction into the Expanded Program on Immunization; thus, the government has to make decisions about which vaccines should be adopted. This study aimed to set priorities for new vaccines and to facilitate decision analysis. We used a best-worst scaling study for rank-ordering of vaccines. The candidate vaccines were determined by a set of criteria, including burden of disease, target age group, budget impact, side effect, effectiveness, severity of disease, and cost of vaccine. The criteria were identified from a literature review and by in-depth, open-ended interviews with experts. The priority-setting model was conducted among three groups of stakeholders, including policy makers, healthcare professionals and healthcare administrators. The vaccine data were mapped and then calculated for the probability of selection. From the candidate vaccines, the probability of hepatitis B vaccine being selected by all respondents (96.67 %) was ranked first. This was followed, respectively, by pneumococcal conjugate vaccine-13 (95.09 %) and Haemophilus influenzae type b vaccine (90.87 %). The three groups of stakeholders (policy makers, healthcare professionals and healthcare administrators) showed the same ranking trends. Most severe disease, high fever rate and high disease burden showed the highest coefficients for criterion levels being selected by all respondents. This result can be implied that a vaccine which can prevent most severe disease with high disease burden and has low safety has a greater chance of being selected by respondents in this study. The priority setting of vaccines through a multiple-criteria approach could contribute to transparency and accountability in the decision-making process. This is a step forward in the development of an evidence-based approach that meets the need of developing country. The

Taking Legislators to the Field: Communicating with Policy Makers about Natural Resource Issues

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sawin, R. S.; Buchanan, R. C.

2006-12-01

Policy makers are among the most important audiences for scientific information. In particular, legislators, legislative staff, governmental agency staff, business leaders, environmental leaders, and others need accurate, objective natural-resource information to make policy decisions. This audience is busy and difficult to reach with technical information. As part of its public outreach program, the Kansas Geological Survey (a division of the University of Kansas) communicates directly with policy makers through an annual field conference. Operated since 1995, the conference presents information by combining field experiences, presentations by experts, and participant interaction. The primary objective is to give policy makers first-hand, unbiased information about the state's natural resource issues. The field conference takes policy makers to locations where natural resources are produced or used, or where there are important environmental issues, introducing them to experts and others who carry out (or are affected by) their decisions. The conference consists of three days of site visits, presentations, hands-on activities, and panel discussions. Participation is by invitation. Participants pay a small fee, but most costs are covered by co-sponsors, usually other state or local agencies, that are recruited to help defray expenses. Participants receive a guidebook before the trip. Travel is by chartered bus; lodging and meals are provided. Conferences have focused on topics (such as energy or water) or regions of the state. The most recent conference focused on cross-boundary issues and included stops in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Missouri. Written, post-conference evaluations are extremely positive. Legislators report that they regularly use conference information and contacts during the law-making process; conference information played a direct role in decisions related to underground natural-gas storage rules, water-rights by-back legislation, and sand and gravel

Creating a High-Skills Society during Recession: Issues for Policy Makers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Panagiotakopoulos, Antonios

2015-01-01

The present study looks at the skill formation policies adopted by policy makers in Greece in order to create a high-skills society. It examines empirically the demand side of the skill creation process within 300 small enterprises in order to understand how far supply-side measures have influenced the demand for well-trained staff within small…

The Effect of Background Music in Shark Documentaries on Viewers' Perceptions of Sharks

PubMed Central

Hastings, Philip A.; Gneezy, Ayelet

2016-01-01

Despite the ongoing need for shark conservation and management, prevailing negative sentiments marginalize these animals and legitimize permissive exploitation. These negative attitudes arise from an instinctive, yet exaggerated fear, which is validated and reinforced by disproportionate and sensationalistic news coverage of shark ‘attacks’ and by highlighting shark-on-human violence in popular movies and documentaries. In this study, we investigate another subtler, yet powerful factor that contributes to this fear: the ominous background music that often accompanies shark footage in documentaries. Using three experiments, we show that participants rated sharks more negatively and less positively after viewing a 60-second video clip of swimming sharks set to ominous background music, compared to participants who watched the same video clip set to uplifting background music, or silence. This finding was not an artifact of soundtrack alone because attitudes toward sharks did not differ among participants assigned to audio-only control treatments. This is the first study to demonstrate empirically that the connotative attributes of background music accompanying shark footage affect viewers’ attitudes toward sharks. Given that nature documentaries are often regarded as objective and authoritative sources of information, it is critical that documentary filmmakers and viewers are aware of how the soundtrack can affect the interpretation of the educational content. PMID:27487003

Bridging the gap: exploring the barriers to using economic evidence in healthcare decision making and strategies for improving uptake.

PubMed

Merlo, Gregory; Page, Katie; Ratcliffe, Julie; Halton, Kate; Graves, Nicholas

2015-06-01

Evidence from economic evaluations is often not used to inform healthcare policy despite being well regarded by policy makers and physicians. This article employs the accessibility and acceptability framework to review the barriers to using evidence from economic evaluation in healthcare policy and the strategies used to overcome these barriers. Economic evaluations are often inaccessible to policymakers due to the absence of relevant economic evaluations, the time and cost required to conduct and interpret economic evaluations, and lack of expertise to evaluate quality and interpret results. Consistently reported factors that limit the translation of findings from economic evaluations into healthcare policy include poor quality of research informing economic evaluations, assumptions used in economic modelling, conflicts of interest, difficulties in transferring resources between sectors, negative attitudes to healthcare rationing, and the absence of equity considerations. Strategies to overcome these barriers have been suggested in the literature, including training, structured abstract databases, rapid evaluation, reporting checklists for journals, and considering factors other than cost effectiveness in economic evaluations, such as equity or budget impact. The factors that prevent or encourage decision makers to use evidence from economic evaluations have been identified, but the relative importance of these factors to decision makers is uncertain.

Educational Research for Professional Practice: More than Providing Evidence for Doing "x Rather than y" or Finding the "Size of the Effect of A on B"

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rogers, Bev

2003-01-01

Educational research has been criticised by governments and practitioners. For some politicians and policy makers, there is a tendency to look for direct links between research and successful, effective and efficient practice. Research is needed to inform their evidence-based practice as policy makers, and to provide the kind of research teachers…

Making Cultures: Politics of Inclusion, Accessibility, and Empowerment at the Margins of the Maker Movement

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Foster, Ellen Kathleen

Historically an elite, formally-trained, and Western-centric population has dominated technology development, creating an inequity in who decides what roles technoscience will play, and how it will affect different publics. More recently, tactics to counter observed inequities have taken the form of citizen science, "civic science", science shops, science for the people, as well as Do It Yourself (DIY) movements such as the "Maker Movement". This dissertation joins the growing body of scholarly explorations into the development of such technoscientific practices and analyses of whether and how they open up the stage for "technological citizenship". While it stands to be seen if these interests or shifts are permanent and what impact they might have, if the Maker Movement is poised to make any kind of change in the realms of democratizing technology innovation and production, re-industrializing the US, and changing educational practices, STS will be a helpful touchstone for critically-engaging and informing such transformations. In highlighting the sociocultural underpinnings of makerspaces and hackerspaces, STS scholarship will bring a reconstructivist edge to the maker landscape. By examining the margins, I trouble the Maker Movement label, the people who hold sway over this categorization, and consider both proponents as well as dissenters from within and without its bounds. I question claims that it's focus is beholden to re-industrialization and the fostering of a cadre of globally competitive engineers. I then focus on characterizing the root mechanisms behind groups trying to make visible the oft implicit barriers facing certain marginalized groups in the technological landscape.

Nurses and Lifelong Learning: Creating "Makers and Shapers" or "Users and Choosers"?

PubMed

Butcher, Diane; Bruce, Anne

2016-04-01

How have the meaning and goals of lifelong learning for nurses shifted under neoliberal political policy? This article critically scrutinizes the political undercurrents of lifelong learning. While the original intent of lifelong learning was to foster intellectual, critical, social, and political citizen engagement (creating "makers and shapers" of social policy), instrumental learning-learning to meet practical economic ends-has taken priority and is instead creating marketable workers (creating "users and choosers"). International educational neoliberal policy reform has altered the very nature of education. Under pervasive neoliberal political influence, lifelong learning has become distorted as the goals of learning have shifted towards creating marketable workers who are expected, while unsupported, to engage in learning to ensure ongoing employability in an open market. By examining new understandings of lifelong learning, nurses can make informed choices as to whether they aspire to be a "user and chooser" or "maker and shaper" of lifelong learning in their workplaces. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Indirect contact freeze water desalination for an ice maker machine - CFD simulation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jayakody, Harith; Al-Dadah, Raya; Mahmoud, Saad

2017-11-01

To offer for potable water shortages, sea water desalination is a potential solution for the global rising demand for fresh water. The latent heat of fusion is about one-seventh the latent heat of vaporisation, thus indicating the benefit of lower energy consumption for the freeze desalination process. Limited literature is reported on computational fluid dynamics (CFD) on freeze desalination. Therefore, analysing and investigating thermodynamic processes are easily conducted by the powerful tool of CFD. A single unit of ice formation in an ice maker machine was modelled using ANSYS Fluent software three-dimensionally. Energy, species transport and solidification/melting modules were used in building the CFD model. Parametric analysis was conducted using the established CFD model to predict the effects of freezing temperature and the geometry of the ice maker machine; on ice production and the freezing time. Lower freezing temperatures allowed more ice production and faster freezing. Increasing the diameter and the length of the freezing tube enabled more ice to be produced.

Biological Evidence Regarding Psychopathy Does Not Affect Mock Jury Sentencing.

PubMed

Remmel, Rheanna J; Glenn, Andrea L; Cox, Jennifer

2018-02-22

Research on the biological factors influencing criminal behavior is increasingly being introduced into court, necessitating research on how such evidence is perceived and influences decision makers. Research on how this evidence influences sentencing recommendations is inconclusive. In this study, we focus on biological evidence related to psychopathy, a construct commonly associated with criminal behavior. Approximately 800 community members were presented with a case vignette detailing an individual who is described as having a high level of psychopathic traits. Participants received either psychological information about psychopathy (i.e., no biological evidence), evidence the defendant had genetic risk factors for psychopathy, or written neuroimaging evidence the defendant had brain deficits associated with psychopathy. Participants then recommended a sentence. Overall, recommended sentence lengths did not differ between evidence conditions. These findings add to a growing body of research suggesting that biological evidence may not have as much of an influence on jurors as previously thought.

New Global Art Connection: Paying Tribute to the Wave-Makers (1910-2010)

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kan, Koon Hwee

2013-01-01

This paper highlights "Wave-Makers (1910--2010)", a collaborative timeline redesign project, which involves interactive and advanced web-based technology to connect and complement arts curricula at two higher education institutions, one located in China and another in the United States. Through in-depth research, video-conferencing,…

The effectiveness of evidence summaries on health policymakers and health system managers use of evidence from systematic reviews: a systematic review.

PubMed

Petkovic, Jennifer; Welch, Vivian; Jacob, Maria Helena; Yoganathan, Manosila; Ayala, Ana Patricia; Cunningham, Heather; Tugwell, Peter

2016-12-09

Systematic reviews are important for decision makers. They offer many potential benefits but are often written in technical language, are too long, and do not contain contextual details which make them hard to use for decision-making. There are many organizations that develop and disseminate derivative products, such as evidence summaries, from systematic reviews for different populations or subsets of decision makers. This systematic review aimed to (1) assess the effectiveness of evidence summaries on policymakers' use of the evidence and (2) identify the most effective summary components for increasing policymakers' use of the evidence. We present an overview of the available evidence on systematic review derivative products. We included studies of policymakers at all levels as well as health system managers. We included studies examining any type of "evidence summary," "policy brief," or other products derived from systematic reviews that presented evidence in a summarized form. The primary outcomes were the (1) use of systematic review summaries in decision-making (e.g., self-reported use of the evidence in policymaking and decision-making) and (2) policymakers' understanding, knowledge, and/or beliefs (e.g., changes in knowledge scores about the topic included in the summary). We also assessed perceived relevance, credibility, usefulness, understandability, and desirability (e.g., format) of the summaries. Our database search combined with our gray literature search yielded 10,113 references after removal of duplicates. From these, 54 were reviewed in full text, and we included six studies (reported in seven papers) as well as protocols from two ongoing studies. Two studies assessed the use of evidence summaries in decision-making and found little to no difference in effect. There was also little to no difference in effect for knowledge, understanding or beliefs (four studies), and perceived usefulness or usability (three studies). Summary of findings tables

Attunement and alignment of people with schizophrenia and their preferred alternative decision-makers: An exploratory pilot study comparing treatment and research decisions.

PubMed

Roberts, Laura Weiss; Kim, Jane Paik

2015-12-01

Schizophrenia is a serious mental disorder that may affect the decisional capacity, and as a consequence, preferred alternative decision-makers may be engaged to help with clinical care and research-related choices. Ideally, alternative decision-makers will seek to make decisions that fit with the views and preferences of the ill individual. Few data exist, however, comparing the views of alternative decision-makers to those of individuals with schizophrenia. We conducted a written survey with individuals with schizophrenia living in a community setting, and a parallel survey with the person whom the ill individual identified as being a preferred alternative decision-maker. Complete data were obtained on 20 pairs (n = 40, total). Domains queried included (a) burden, happiness, and safety of the ill individual and of his or her family in treatment and research decisions and (b) importance of ethical principles in every day life. Two-sided paired t-tests and graphical summaries were used to compare responses. Individuals with schizophrenia and their linked preferred alternative decision-makers were attuned on four of six aspects of treatment decision-making and on all six aspects of research decision-making that we queried. The preferred alternative decision-makers overall demonstrated attunement to the views of the ill individuals in this small study. Ill individuals and their preferred alternative decision-makers were aligned in their views of ethically-salient aspects of every day life. These novel findings suggest that alternative decision-makers identified by ill individuals may be able to guide choices based on an accurate understanding of the ill individuals' views and values. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Interventions to improve the use of systematic reviews in decision-making by health system managers, policy makers and clinicians.

PubMed

Murthy, Lakshmi; Shepperd, Sasha; Clarke, Mike J; Garner, Sarah E; Lavis, John N; Perrier, Laure; Roberts, Nia W; Straus, Sharon E

2012-09-12

Systematic reviews provide a transparent and robust summary of existing research. However, health system managers, national and local policy makers and healthcare professionals can face several obstacles when attempting to utilise this evidence. These include constraints operating within the health system, dealing with a large volume of research evidence and difficulties in adapting evidence from systematic reviews so that it is locally relevant. In an attempt to increase the use of systematic review evidence in decision-making a number of interventions have been developed. These include summaries of systematic review evidence that are designed to improve the accessibility of the findings of systematic reviews (often referred to as information products) and changes to organisational structures, such as employing specialist groups to synthesise the evidence to inform local decision-making. To identify and assess the effects of information products based on the findings of systematic review evidence and organisational supports and processes designed to support the uptake of systematic review evidence by health system managers, policy makers and healthcare professionals. We searched The Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, Web of Science, and Health Economic Evaluations Database. We also handsearched two journals (Implementation Science and Evidence and Policy), Cochrane Colloquium abstracts, websites of key organisations and reference lists of studies considered for inclusion. Searches were run from 1992 to March 2011 on all databases, an update search to March 2012 was run on MEDLINE only. Randomised controlled trials (RCTs), interrupted time-series (ITS) and controlled before-after studies (CBA) of interventions designed to aid the use of systematic reviews in healthcare decision-making were considered. Two review authors independently extracted the data and assessed the study quality. We extracted the median value across similar outcomes for each study and

The GRADE Evidence to Decision (EtD) framework for health system and public health decisions.

PubMed

Moberg, Jenny; Oxman, Andrew D; Rosenbaum, Sarah; Schünemann, Holger J; Guyatt, Gordon; Flottorp, Signe; Glenton, Claire; Lewin, Simon; Morelli, Angela; Rada, Gabriel; Alonso-Coello, Pablo

2018-05-29

To describe a framework for people making and using evidence-informed health system and public health recommendations and decisions. We developed the GRADE Evidence to Decision (EtD) framework for health system and public health decisions as part of the DECIDE project, in which we simultaneously developed frameworks for these and other types of healthcare decisions, including clinical recommendations, coverage decisions and decisions about diagnostic tests. Building on GRADE EtD tables, we used an iterative approach, including brainstorming, consultation of the literature and with stakeholders, and an international survey of policy-makers. We applied the framework to diverse examples, conducted workshops and user testing with health system and public health guideline developers and policy-makers, and observed and tested its use in real-life guideline panels. All the GRADE EtD frameworks share the same basic structure, including sections for formulating the question, making an assessment and drawing conclusions. Criteria listed in the assessment section of the health system and public health framework cover the important factors for making these types of decisions; in addition to the effects and economic impact of an option, the priority of the problem, the impact of the option on equity, and its acceptability and feasibility are important considerations that can inform both whether and how to implement an option. Because health system and public health interventions are often complex, detailed implementation considerations should be made when making a decision. The certainty of the evidence is often low or very low, but decision-makers must still act. Monitoring and evaluation are therefore often important considerations for these types of decisions. We illustrate the different components of the EtD framework for health system and public health decisions by presenting their application in a framework adapted from a real-life guideline. This framework provides a

Reported Influence of Evaluation Data on Decision Makers' Actions: An Empirical Examination

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Christie, Christina A.

2007-01-01

Using a set of scenarios derived from actual evaluation studies, this simulation study examines the reported influence of evaluation information on decision makers' potential actions. Each scenario described a context where one of three types of evaluation information (large-scale study data, case study data, or anecdotal accounts) is presented…

Healthy School Meals...Healthy Kids! A Leadership Guide for School Decision-Makers.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Food and Consumer Service (USDA), Washington, DC.

The School Meals Initiative for Healthy Children was launched in June 1994 to improve the health and education of children through better nutrition. This leadership guide provides information to school decision-makers on using materials and resources developed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and describes Team Nutrition, an implementation…

PUMP-AND-TREAT GROUND-WATER REMEDIATION: A GUIDE FOR DECISION MAKERS AND PRACTITIONERS

EPA Science Inventory

This guide presents decision makers with a foundation for evaluating the appropriateness of conventional or innovative approaches. An introduction to pump-and-treat ground-water remediation, the guide addresses the following questions: When is pump-and-treat an appropriate remedi...

Evidence & Gap Maps: A tool for promoting evidence informed policy and strategic research agendas.

PubMed

Snilstveit, Birte; Vojtkova, Martina; Bhavsar, Ami; Stevenson, Jennifer; Gaarder, Marie

2016-11-01

A range of organizations are engaged in the production of evidence on the effects of health, social, and economic development programs on human welfare outcomes. However, evidence is often scattered around different databases, web sites, and the gray literature and is often presented in inaccessible formats. Lack of overview of the evidence in a specific field can be a barrier to the use of existing research and prevent efficient use of limited resources for new research. Evidence & Gap Maps (EGMs) aim to address these issues and complement existing synthesis and mapping approaches. EGMs are a new addition to the tools available to support evidence-informed policymaking. To provide an accessible resource for researchers, commissioners, and decision makers, EGMs provide thematic collections of evidence structured around a framework which schematically represents the types of interventions and outcomes of relevance to a particular sector. By mapping the existing evidence using this framework, EGMs provide a visual overview of what we know and do not know about the effects of different programs. They make existing evidence available, and by providing links to user-friendly summaries of relevant studies, EGMs can facilitate the use of existing evidence for decision making. They identify key "gaps" where little or no evidence from impact evaluations and systematic reviews is available and can be a valuable resource to inform a strategic approach to building the evidence base in a particular sector. The article will introduce readers to the concept and methods of EGMs and present a demonstration of the EGM tool using existing examples. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Development of measurable indicators to enhance public health evidence-informed policy-making.

PubMed

Tudisca, Valentina; Valente, Adriana; Castellani, Tommaso; Stahl, Timo; Sandu, Petru; Dulf, Diana; Spitters, Hilde; Van de Goor, Ien; Radl-Karimi, Christina; Syed, Mohamed Ahmed; Loncarevic, Natasa; Lau, Cathrine Juel; Roelofs, Susan; Bertram, Maja; Edwards, Nancy; Aro, Arja R

2018-05-31

Ensuring health policies are informed by evidence still remains a challenge despite efforts devoted to this aim. Several tools and approaches aimed at fostering evidence-informed policy-making (EIPM) have been developed, yet there is a lack of availability of indicators specifically devoted to assess and support EIPM. The present study aims to overcome this by building a set of measurable indicators for EIPM intended to infer if and to what extent health-related policies are, or are expected to be, evidence-informed for the purposes of policy planning as well as formative and summative evaluations. The indicators for EIPM were developed and validated at international level by means of a two-round internet-based Delphi study conducted within the European project 'REsearch into POlicy to enhance Physical Activity' (REPOPA). A total of 82 researchers and policy-makers from the six European countries (Denmark, Finland, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania, the United Kingdom) involved in the project and international organisations were asked to evaluate the relevance and feasibility of an initial set of 23 indicators developed by REPOPA researchers on the basis of literature and knowledge gathered from the previous phases of the project, and to propose new indicators. The first Delphi round led to the validation of 14 initial indicators and to the development of 8 additional indicators based on panellists' suggestions; the second round led to the validation of a further 11 indicators, including 6 proposed by panellists, and to the rejection of 6 indicators. A total of 25 indicators were validated, covering EIPM issues related to human resources, documentation, participation and monitoring, and stressing different levels of knowledge exchange and involvement of researchers and other stakeholders in policy development and evaluation. The study overcame the lack of availability of indicators to assess if and to what extent policies are realised in an evidence-informed manner

Effects of Behavioral Genetic Evidence on Perceptions of Criminal Responsibility and Appropriate Punishment.

PubMed

Appelbaum, Paul S; Scurich, Nicholas; Raad, Raymond

2015-05-01

Demonstrations of a link between genetic variants and criminal behavior have stimulated increasing use of genetic evidence to reduce perceptions of defendants' responsibility for criminal behavior and to mitigate punishment. However, because only limited data exist regarding the impact of such evidence on decision makers and the public at large, we recruited a representative sample of the U.S. adult population (n=960) for a web-based survey. Participants were presented with descriptions of three legal cases and were asked to: determine the length of incarceration for a convicted murderer; adjudicate an insanity defense; and decide whether a defendant should receive the death penalty. A fully crossed, between-participants, factorial design was used, varying the type of evidence (none, genetic, neuroimaging, both), heinousness of the crime, and past criminal record, with sentence or verdict as the primary outcome. Also assessed were participants' apprehension of the defendant, belief in free will, political ideology, and genetic knowledge. Across all three cases, genetic evidence had no significant effects on outcomes. Neuroimaging data showed an inconsistent effect in one of the two cases in which it was introduced. In contrast, heinousness of the offense and past criminal record were strongly related to participants' decisions. Moreover, participants' beliefs about the controllability of criminal behavior and political orientations were significantly associated with their choices. Our findings suggest that neither hopes that genetic evidence will modify judgments of culpability and punishment nor fears about the impact of genetic evidence on decision makers are likely to come to fruition.

Effects of Behavioral Genetic Evidence on Perceptions of Criminal Responsibility and Appropriate Punishment

PubMed Central

Appelbaum, Paul S.; Scurich, Nicholas; Raad, Raymond

2015-01-01

Demonstrations of a link between genetic variants and criminal behavior have stimulated increasing use of genetic evidence to reduce perceptions of defendants’ responsibility for criminal behavior and to mitigate punishment. However, because only limited data exist regarding the impact of such evidence on decision makers and the public at large, we recruited a representative sample of the U.S. adult population (n=960) for a web-based survey. Participants were presented with descriptions of three legal cases and were asked to: determine the length of incarceration for a convicted murderer; adjudicate an insanity defense; and decide whether a defendant should receive the death penalty. A fully crossed, between-participants, factorial design was used, varying the type of evidence (none, genetic, neuroimaging, both), heinousness of the crime, and past criminal record, with sentence or verdict as the primary outcome. Also assessed were participants’ apprehension of the defendant, belief in free will, political ideology, and genetic knowledge. Across all three cases, genetic evidence had no significant effects on outcomes. Neuroimaging data showed an inconsistent effect in one of the two cases in which it was introduced. In contrast, heinousness of the offense and past criminal record were strongly related to participants’ decisions. Moreover, participants’ beliefs about the controllability of criminal behavior and political orientations were significantly associated with their choices. Our findings suggest that neither hopes that genetic evidence will modify judgments of culpability and punishment nor fears about the impact of genetic evidence on decision makers are likely to come to fruition. PMID:26240516

Examination of the "CSI Effect" on Perceptions of Scientific and Testimonial Evidence in a Hong Kong Chinese Sample.

PubMed

Hui, Cora Y T; Lo, T Wing

2017-05-01

Television is a powerful medium through which to convey information and messages to the public. The recent proliferation of forensic science and criminal justice information throughout all forms of media, coupled with raised expectations toward forensic evidence, has led some to suspect that a "CSI effect" ( Crime Scene Investigation effect) is taking place. The present study contributes to the literature addressing the CSI effect in two ways. First, it examines whether the CSI effect exists in the Chinese population of Hong Kong. Second, using a mock-jury paradigm, it empirically examines a more integrative perspective of the CSI effect. It was found that, although the amount of media coverage involving forensic evidence does influence participants' perception of legal evidence to some degree, such a perception does not affect participants' legal decision making. Viewers of forensic dramas were not more likely to convict the defendant when forensic evidence was presented and not less likely to convict when only testimonial evidence was presented. The only significant predictor of the defendant's culpability when scientific evidence was presented was participants' ratings of the reliability of scientific evidence. Results from the present study lend no support to the existence of the CSI effect in Hong Kong.

[The Intentions Affecting the Medical Decision-Making Behavior of Surrogate Decision Makers of Critically Ill Patients and Related Factors].

PubMed

Su, Szu-Huei; Wu, Li-Min

2018-04-01

The severity of diseases and high mortality rates that typify the intensive care unit often make it difficult for surrogate decision makers to make decisions for critically ill patients regarding whether to continue medical treatments or to accept palliative care. To explore the behavioral intentions that underlie the medical decisions of surrogate decision makers of critically ill patients and the related factors. A cross-sectional, correlation study design was used. A total of 193 surrogate decision makers from six ICUs in a medical center in southern Taiwan were enrolled as participants. Three structured questionnaires were used, including a demographic datasheet, the Family Relationship Scale, and the Behavioral Intention of Medical Decisions Scale. Significantly positive correlations were found between the behavioral intentions underlying medical decisions and the following variables: the relationship of the participant to the patient (Eta = .343, p = .020), the age of the patient (r = .295, p < .01), and whether the patient had signed a currently valid advance healthcare directive (Eta = .223, p = .002). Furthermore, a significantly negative correlation was found between these intentions and length of stay in the ICU (r = -.263, p < .01). Patient age, whether the patient had signed a currently valid advance healthcare directive, and length of stay in the ICU were all predictive factors for the behavioral intentions underlying the medical decisions of the surrogate decision makers, explaining 13.9% of the total variance. In assessing the behavioral intentions underlying the medical decisions of surrogate decision makers, health providers should consider the relationship between critical patients and their surrogate decision makers, patient age, the length of ICU stay, and whether the patient has a pre-signed advance healthcare directive in order to maximize the effectiveness of medical care provided to critically ill patients.

How Evidence-Based Teaching Practices Are Challenged by a Deweyan Approach to Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Webster, R. Scott

2009-01-01

The claim is made in this paper that the discourse of education offers a challenge to evidence-based practices because this latter approach is embedded in the discourse of management. Although claiming the status of being "scientific", this latter development is drawn upon problematically by policy makers to provide the warrant for stipulating…

Changing the hearts and minds of policy makers: an exploratory study associated with the West Virginia Walks campaign.

PubMed

Leyden, Kevin M; Reger-Nash, Bill; Bauman, Adrian; Bias, Tom

2008-01-01

To pilot test whether West Virginia Walks changed local policy makers' awareness of walking-related issues. A quasi-experimental design with preintervention and postintervention mail surveys. Morgantown, WV (intervention community), and Huntington, WV (comparison community). One hundred thirty-three and 134 public officials in Morgantown and 120 and 116 public officials in Huntington at baseline and at follow-up, respectively. An 8-week mass media social ecological campaign designed to encourage moderate-intensity walking among insufficiently active persons aged 40 to 65 years. Policy makers listed three problems they believed needed to be addressed in their community. They then rated the severity of several problems that many communities face using a Likert scale, with 1 representing "not a problem" and 5 representing "an extremely important problem." Independent sample t-tests were used to examine differences in mean responses at baseline and at follow-up. Statistically significant increases in the perceived importance of walking-related issues were observed among policy makers in Morgantown but not in the comparison community. Integrated communitywide health promotion campaigns designed to influence the public can also affect the perceptions of policy makers. Future research should examine this linkage and determine whether resource allocation and policy changes follow such interventions.

LesionTracker: Extensible Open-Source Zero-Footprint Web Viewer for Cancer Imaging Research and Clinical Trials.

PubMed

Urban, Trinity; Ziegler, Erik; Lewis, Rob; Hafey, Chris; Sadow, Cheryl; Van den Abbeele, Annick D; Harris, Gordon J

2017-11-01

Oncology clinical trials have become increasingly dependent upon image-based surrogate endpoints for determining patient eligibility and treatment efficacy. As therapeutics have evolved and multiplied in number, the tumor metrics criteria used to characterize therapeutic response have become progressively more varied and complex. The growing intricacies of image-based response evaluation, together with rising expectations for rapid and consistent results reporting, make it difficult for site radiologists to adequately address local and multicenter imaging demands. These challenges demonstrate the need for advanced cancer imaging informatics tools that can help ensure protocol-compliant image evaluation while simultaneously promoting reviewer efficiency. LesionTracker is a quantitative imaging package optimized for oncology clinical trial workflows. The goal of the project is to create an open source zero-footprint viewer for image analysis that is designed to be extensible as well as capable of being integrated into third-party systems for advanced imaging tools and clinical trials informatics platforms. Cancer Res; 77(21); e119-22. ©2017 AACR . ©2017 American Association for Cancer Research.

An analytical framework to assist decision makers in the use of forest ecosystem model predictions

USGS Publications Warehouse

Larocque, Guy R.; Bhatti, Jagtar S.; Ascough, J.C.; Liu, J.; Luckai, N.; Mailly, D.; Archambault, L.; Gordon, Andrew M.

2011-01-01

The predictions from most forest ecosystem models originate from deterministic simulations. However, few evaluation exercises for model outputs are performed by either model developers or users. This issue has important consequences for decision makers using these models to develop natural resource management policies, as they cannot evaluate the extent to which predictions stemming from the simulation of alternative management scenarios may result in significant environmental or economic differences. Various numerical methods, such as sensitivity/uncertainty analyses, or bootstrap methods, may be used to evaluate models and the errors associated with their outputs. However, the application of each of these methods carries unique challenges which decision makers do not necessarily understand; guidance is required when interpreting the output generated from each model. This paper proposes a decision flow chart in the form of an analytical framework to help decision makers apply, in an orderly fashion, different steps involved in examining the model outputs. The analytical framework is discussed with regard to the definition of problems and objectives and includes the following topics: model selection, identification of alternatives, modelling tasks and selecting alternatives for developing policy or implementing management scenarios. Its application is illustrated using an on-going exercise in developing silvicultural guidelines for a forest management enterprise in Ontario, Canada.

A framework for production of systematic review based briefings to support evidence-informed decision-making.

PubMed

Chambers, Duncan; Wilson, Paul

2012-07-09

We have developed a framework for translating existing sources of synthesized and quality-assessed evidence, primarily systematic reviews, into actionable messages in the form of short accessible briefings. The service aims to address real-life problems in response to requests from decision-makers.Development of the framework was based on a scoping review of existing resources and our initial experience with two briefing topics, including models of service provision for young people with eating disorders. We also drew on previous experience in dissemination research and practice. Where appropriate, we made use of the SUPporting POlicy relevant Reviews and Trials (SUPPORT) tools for evidence-informed policymaking. To produce a product that it is fit for this purpose it has been necessary to go beyond a traditional summary of the available evidence relating to effectiveness. Briefings have, therefore, included consideration of cost effectiveness, local applicability, implications relating to local service delivery, budgets, implementation and equity. Our first evidence briefings produced under this framework cover diagnostic endoscopy by specialist nurses and integrated care pathways in mental healthcare settings. The framework will enable researchers to present and contextualize evidence from systematic reviews and other sources of synthesized and quality-assessed evidence. The approach is designed to address the wide range of questions of interest to decision-makers, especially those commissioning services or managing service delivery and organization in primary or secondary care. Evaluation of the use and usefulness of the evidence briefings we produce is an integral part of the framework and will help to fill a gap in the literature.

Incorporating uncertainty regarding applicability of evidence from meta-analyses into clinical decision making.

PubMed

Kriston, Levente; Meister, Ramona

2014-03-01

Judging applicability (relevance) of meta-analytical findings to particular clinical decision-making situations remains challenging. We aimed to describe an evidence synthesis method that accounts for possible uncertainty regarding applicability of the evidence. We conceptualized uncertainty regarding applicability of the meta-analytical estimates to a decision-making situation as the result of uncertainty regarding applicability of the findings of the trials that were included in the meta-analysis. This trial-level applicability uncertainty can be directly assessed by the decision maker and allows for the definition of trial inclusion probabilities, which can be used to perform a probabilistic meta-analysis with unequal probability resampling of trials (adaptive meta-analysis). A case study with several fictitious decision-making scenarios was performed to demonstrate the method in practice. We present options to elicit trial inclusion probabilities and perform the calculations. The result of an adaptive meta-analysis is a frequency distribution of the estimated parameters from traditional meta-analysis that provides individually tailored information according to the specific needs and uncertainty of the decision maker. The proposed method offers a direct and formalized combination of research evidence with individual clinical expertise and may aid clinicians in specific decision-making situations. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.