Given that there is no recent research on decomposition for global inequality, the aim of this study is to fill the gap in the literature by investigating global inequality with decomposition technique. The data of this study were compiled from the World Bank and decomposition by subgroups was conducted to evaluate the driving forces behind the evolution of inequality. Almost all the countries in the world were included in this study, and the study period spans from 2000 to 2017. The (...) analysis was carried out in several stages to evaluate the issue of North–South divide, as well as the impacts of regional and income subgroups. There are several salient findings derived from this study. First, the results show that there was a gradual decline of international inequality within the study period. Second, there was still a large disparity between the developed and developing countries, and the inequality within the developing countries has aggravated further. Third, geographical location has exerted great impacts on global inequality and East Asia contributed about 40% to the overall decline in international inequality. Fourth, decline in inequality amongst the upper-middle-income countries also contributed substantially to the fall in international inequality. The results derived from this paper can provide pertinent information for the formulation of a comprehensive and coherent strategy in coordinating international efforts and managing inequality while promoting human development under the framework of the newly established Sustainable Development Goals. (shrink)

Due to fresh foods' unique characteristics, where quality, freshness, and perishability are the main concerns, consumers are more inclined to choose offline channels for purchasing foods. However, it is not well-understood how these behaviors are affected by the adverse external environment, e.g., smog pollution. Fine particulate matters on smog days would irritate the respiratory tract and pose health risks to people, triggering negative emotions such as sadness and depression. People tend to stay in a clean indoor environment on smog days. (...) An adverse external environment is causing a gradual change in people's habits and emotions. Still, its impact on shopping behaviors is a complex process in need of further study. The study fills this gap by examining the impact of smog pollution on customer channel choice. Based on data from an e-commerce retailer that operates in both online and offline channels. We find that the degree of smog pollution has a significant positive effect on online channel purchasing at aggregated store-, product-, and individual- levels; moreover, the retailer's in-store interactive activities would restrain this positive relationship; variation of product pricing and customers' healthy eating tendency would pronounce the positive association between smog and online purchasing. These results can serve as a reference for retailers to adjust channel strategies in the face of harsh external conditions. (shrink)

With the advent of the era of artificial intelligence, deep reinforcement learning has achieved unprecedented success in high-dimensional and large-scale artificial intelligence tasks. However, the insecurity and instability of the DRL algorithm have an important impact on its performance. The Soft Actor-Critic algorithm uses advanced functions to update the policy and value network to alleviate some of these problems. However, SAC still has some problems. In order to reduce the error caused by the overestimation of SAC, we propose a new (...) SAC algorithm called Averaged-SAC. By averaging the previously learned action-state estimates, it reduces the overestimation problem of soft Q-learning, thereby contributing to a more stable training process and improving performance. We evaluate the performance of Averaged-SAC through some games in the MuJoCo environment. The experimental results show that the Averaged-SAC algorithm effectively improves the performance of the SAC algorithm and the stability of the training process. (shrink)

Electromechanical actuators are more and more widely used as actuation devices in flight control system of aircrafts and helicopters. The reliability of EMAs is vital because it will cause serious accidents if the malfunction of EMAs occurs, so it is significant to detect and diagnose the fault of EMAs timely. However, EMAs often run under variable conditions in realistic environment, and the vibration signals of EMAs are nonlinear and nonstationary, which make it difficult to effectively achieve fault diagnosis. This paper (...) proposed a fault diagnosis method of electromechanical actuators based on variational mode decomposition multifractal detrended fluctuation analysis and probabilistic neural network. First, the vibration signals were decomposed by VMD into a number of intrinsic mode functions. Second, the multifractal features hidden in IMFs were extracted by using MFDFA, and the generalized Hurst exponents were selected as the feature vectors. Then, the principal component analysis was introduced to realize dimension reduction of the extracted feature vectors. Finally, the probabilistic neural network was utilized to classify the fault modes. The experimental results show that this method can effectively achieve the fault diagnosis of EMAs even under diffident working conditions. Simultaneously, the diagnosis performance of the proposed method in this paper has an advantage over that of EMD-MFDFA method for feature extraction. (shrink)

PurposeThe aim of this study was to investigate and compare impulsiveness, negative emotion, cognitive function, and P300 components among gamma-hydroxybutyrate -addicted patients, heroin-dependent patients, and methadone maintenance treatment subjects.MethodsA total of 48 men including 17 GHB addicts, 16 heroin addicts, 15 MMT subjects, and 15 male mentally healthy controls were recruited. All subjects were evaluated for symptoms of depression, anxiety, impulsiveness, and cognitive function through the Patient Health Questionnaire, the Generalized Anxiety Disorder 7-item, the Barratt Impulsiveness Scale version II, the (...) Beijing version of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, the behavioral test, and event-related potential P300 detection.Results The mean scores of BIS-II in the GHB addiction group, heroin dependence group, and MMT group were significantly higher than those of the HC group. The total scores of BJ-MOCA in GHB addiction group was the worst among the four groups, followed by heroin addiction, MMT group and HC group. The response time in the GHB addiction group was the longest among the four groups, followed by the heroin addiction, MMT, and HC groups. The amplitude and latency of P300 in GHB addiction subjects were significantly lower and longer than those of the MMT group and the HC group. For the three types of addiction, the P300 amplitudes at Fz, Cz, Pz, T5, and T6 were negatively correlated with the scores of GAD-7, PHQ-9, and BIS-II; the P300 latencies were positively correlated with the response time and negatively correlated with the scores of the BJ-MoCA.ConclusionPeople with an addiction were likely to have increased impulsiveness. The cognitive function of the GHB and heroin-addicted subjects, including the heroin detoxification and the MMT groups, was severely impaired, especially for the GHB-addicted patients. The impairment manifested as abnormalities of BJ-MoCA, response time, and P300 components. (shrink)

Microbial fuel cell is a renewable clean energy. Microorganisms are used as catalysts to convert the chemical energy of organic matter in the sewage into electrical energy to realize sewage treatment and recover energy at the same time. It has good development prospects. However, the output power of MFC is affected by many factors, and it is difficult to achieve a stable voltage output. For the control-oriented single-chamber MFC, a fuzzy integral sliding mode control is designed. The continuous adjustment of (...) the sliding surface ensures that the system only moves on the sliding surface, which eliminates the arrival stage and improves robustness. For chattering existing in the system, the control scheme is further optimized to obtain fuzzy integral sliding mode control, and the fuzzy module adaptively adjusts the control parameters according to the system state, which effectively reduces the system chattering. Experiments prove that the control scheme reduces chattering while ensuring the stable output of the system. (shrink)

Math anxiety (MA) has been suggested to decrease the math performance of students. However, it remains unclear what factors moderate this relationship. The purpose of this study was to analyze the link between MA and math performance. Studies that explored the relationship between MA and math performance, conducted from 2000 to 2019 (84 samples, N = 8680), were identified and statistically integrated with a meta-analysis method. The results indicated a robust negative correlation between MA and math performance. Furthermore, regarding the (...) analysis of moderator variables, this negative link was stronger in the studies that involved Asian students, whereas it was the weakest in the studies that involved European students. Moreover, this negative link was stronger in the studies within a senior high school group, whereas it was the weakest in the studies within an elementary group. Finally, this negative link was strongest among studies that used a custom test and studies that assessed problem-solving skills. Potential explanations and implications for research and practice are discussed. (shrink)

Resumen: La educación musical básica china siempre ha desempeñado un papel importante en el cultivo del gusto estético de los estudiantes y en la mejora de su alfabetización cultural. Sin embargo, en el contexto del rápido desarrollo social y económico y de la diversificación cultural, la educación musical básica también se enfrenta a nuevos retos y oportunidades. En el pasado, la educación musical generalmente prestaba atención a la formación de habilidades y hacía hincapié en la herencia de obras clásicas, pero (...) la demanda de educación musical en la sociedad actual pone más énfasis en la creatividad, la calidad integral y el desarrollo de la personalidad. Por tal motivo, es de gran importancia práctica y teórica estudiar la situación actual y el desarrollo de la educación musical básica en China y debatir los problemas y las perspectivas. Con una investigación a profundidad sobre la situación actual de la educación musical básica en China, podemos comprender de forma exhaustiva las características principales, los problemas existentes, los profesores, los materiales didácticos, las instalaciones y otros aspectos de la educación musical actual. Esto ayudará a revelar los cuellos de botella y las deficiencias del sistema educativo y proporcionará una base para formular políticas educativas más científicas y racionales. La política de educación musical básica en China se está viendo influida por la investigación en filosofía de la educación, sobre todo a la hora de proporcionar apoyo teórico e ideológico a la creación de nuevos estándares curriculares nacionales para la educación musical básica. Esto tendría un efecto significativo en la educación musical básica de China. Por tal motivo, es esencial llevar a cabo una investigación en profundidad sobre el estado de la cuestión y la evolución del concepto educativo fundamental de la música en China. En los últimos años, la educación musical fundamental china ha ido prestando atención al cultivo de la creatividad y la calidad integral de los estudiantes. La música no es sólo una habilidad, sino también un arte que ayuda a cultivar el pensamiento creativo y el desarrollo integral de los alumnos. (shrink)

◎孔子為何周遊列國？因為沒有一個國君想用儒家治國，他只好到處教書遊說。 ◎秦國用法家統一天下，漢高祖劉邦用道家蓄積國力，直到漢武帝登基，儒家才被注意。 ◎儒學為何從沒人理，轉眼變治國工具？這得從董仲舒的「解釋」說起。 ◎儒學就像作業系統，幾千年來更新過四次版本，孔子的儒學不等於現在的儒學。 作者馬大勇，清華大學、上海交通大學國學特聘教授。 曾被推舉為最受歡迎的中文教授。 在本書中，他將儒家文明分為五個時期： 孔子奠基期、孟子成熟期、兩漢經學期、宋代理學期和明代心學期。 解析儒家思維是如何像電腦作業系統一樣，歷經四次的版本更新， 從原本的中庸之道、民為貴、君為輕的民主思想， 一步步變成君權神授，天人感應， 成為各朝代帝王穩固皇權的最佳推手。 就此儒學變成帝王學，開啟了千年以來人民為皇權奴隸的中央集權體制。 ◎孔子的儒學，是教你如何當君子 《論語》中，仁字出現了104次，禮字出現74次， 孔子的重要理念「中庸之道」，更成為宋元以後科舉考試的必讀書。 這個具有人道主義的思維，為何不被當時的統治者如春秋諸侯或秦國採納？ 因為亂世中，做君子的好處太少，當小人能得到的利益比較多。 ◎孟子是民主思想的啟蒙者，但被後代皇帝刪掉了 孟子思想的最大亮點就是「民為貴，社稷次之，君為輕」， 這套民主思維後來為何會消失？ 因為明太祖朱元璋看到「君為輕」三個字，就把《孟子》一書狠狠摔地上， 刪節版《孟子》就此誕生，往後一百年，學生學到的孔孟儒學知識都是不完整的。 ◎因為董仲舒的「特殊解釋」，從此百家遭罷黜，皇帝獨尊儒術 秦國用法家思想滅六國一統天下，漢高祖劉邦用道家治國，修生養息， 兩大皇權都對儒家思維沒興趣，直到漢武帝劉徹時期， 董仲舒為了拍皇帝馬屁，重新解釋，儒術從此轉化帝王術。 他口中的儒教，跟孔孟闡述的儒學，哪裡不一樣？差在造神。 ◎宋元明清重新詮釋儒學，想當官者必讀四書 宋、元之後，孔子的《中庸》又重新被提起， 因為它教你用大學之道維持國家秩序。 儒學家朱熹更讓《四書集注》成為為官者的必讀聖書。 至於為什麼是宋朝與明朝，跳過了大唐盛世？ 因為東漢黨錮之禍殺害許多知識分子，儒家文化走向低谷； 南北朝興盛佛教；至於唐朝則儒、釋、道並重。 直到韓愈寫的《原道》為儒家文明打下基礎，在宋代發揚光大。 打天下靠武力，龍椅要坐穩就靠統治， 儒家思想如何經過五階段改造，從民主思維變中央集權， 而且延續千年「至今」不墜。 本書特色 儒學為何從沒人理，轉眼變治國工具？這得從董仲舒的「解釋」說起。 孔子的儒學，如何經過五階段改造，從民主思維變中央集權。 名人推薦 淡江大學中文系教授／高柏園.

Background and PurposeTranscranial direct current stimulation is an emerging non-invasive neuromodulation technique for focal epilepsy. Because epilepsy is a disease affecting the brain network, our study was aimed to evaluate and predict the treatment outcome of cathodal tDCS by analyzing the ctDCS-induced functional network alterations.MethodsEither the active 5-day, −1.0 mA, 20-min ctDCS or sham ctDCS targeting at the most active interictal epileptiform discharge regions was applied to 27 subjects suffering from focal epilepsy. The functional networks before and after ctDCS were (...) compared employing graph theoretical analysis based on the functional magnetic resonance imaging data. A support vector machine prediction model was built to predict the treatment outcome of ctDCS using the graph theoretical measures as markers.ResultsOur results revealed that the mean clustering coefficient and the global efficiency decreased significantly, as well as the characteristic path length and the mean shortest path length at the stimulation sites in the fMRI functional networks increased significantly after ctDCS only for the patients with response to the active ctDCS. Our prediction model achieved the mean prediction accuracy of 68.3% after the nested cross validation. The mean area under the receiver operating curve was 0.75, which showed good prediction performance.ConclusionThe study demonstrated that the response to ctDCS was related to the topological alterations in the functional networks of epilepsy patients detected by fMRI. The graph theoretical measures were promising for clinical prediction of ctDCS treatment outcome. (shrink)

马忠林(1914~ ),东北师范大学数学系教授,中国数学会会员,吉林省数学会常务理事,日本三大学数学教育学研究会名誉会长.

Military metaphors are pervasive in biomedicine, including HIV research. Rooted in the mind set that regards pathogens as enemies to be defeated, terms such as “shock and kill” have become widely accepted idioms within HIV cure research. Such language and symbolism must be critically examined as they may be especially problematic when used to express scientific ideas within emerging health-related fields. In this article, philosophical analysis and an interdisciplinary literature review utilizing key texts from sociology, anthropology, history, and Chinese and (...) African studies were conducted to investigate the current proliferation of military metaphors. We found the use of these metaphors to be ironic, unfortunate, and unnecessary. To overcome military metaphors we propose to give them less aggressive meanings, and/or replace them with more peaceful metaphors. Building on previous authors' work, we argue for the increased use of “journey” metaphors as meaningful, cross-culturally app... (shrink)

In his recent works on daily face-to-face encounters, Zahavi claims that the phenomenon of sharing involves reciprocity. Following Zahavi’s line of thought, we wonder what exactly reciprocity amounts to and how the shared experience emerges from the dynamic process of interaction. By turning to the highly specialized field of elite sports dance, we aim at exploring the way in which reciprocity unfolds in intensive deliberate practices of movement. In our analysis, we specifically argue that the ongoing dynamics of two separate (...) flows of movement constitute a shared experience of dancing together. In this sense, moving together, in sports dance, is a practical way of understanding each other. In agreement with Zahavi, our analysis emphasizes the bi-directed nature of sharing. However, at the same time, we contribute to Zahavi’s ongoing endeavour as the special case of sports dance reveals how reciprocity can be deliberately shaped through the mutual coordination and affective bound dynamics of movement. Our article thus both pursues the methodological point that qualitative research of expert competences can constructively enrich phenomenological analysis and indicates how movement can be fundamental to the reciprocity of shared experience. (shrink)

How do we become moral persons? What about children's active learning in contrast to parenting? What can children teach us about knowledge-making more broadly? Answer these questions by delving into the groundbreaking ethnographic fieldwork conducted by anthropologists Arthur and Margery Wolf in a martial law era Taiwanese village (1958-60), marking the first-ever study of ethnic Han children. Jing Xu skillfully reinterprets the Wolfs' extensive fieldnotes, employing a unique blend of humanistic interpretation, natural language processing, and machine-learning techniques. Through a (...) lens of social cognition, this book unravels the complexities of children's moral growth, exposing instances of disobedience, negotiation, and peer dynamics. Writing through and about fieldnotes, the author connects the two themes, learning morality and making ethnography, in light of social cognition, and invites all of us to take children seriously. This book is ideal for graduate and undergraduate students of anthropology and educational studies. (shrink)

Shame is frequently viewed as a destructive emotion; but it can also be understood in terms of change and growth. This essay highlights the problematic values that cause pervasive and frequent shame and the importance of resisting and changing these values. Using Confucian insights, I situate shame in an interactive process between the individual's values and that of their society, thus, being vulnerable to shame represents both one's connection to a community and an openness to others’ negative feedback. This process (...) provides an important arena where personal values interact with communal ones. The Confucian tradition, I argue, affords individuals a degree of autonomy in internalization through urging them to cultivate and maintain a keen sense of shame. My discussion also offers resources for understanding the various aspects of this interactive process—how individuals with similar experiences of shame may, through channeling their experiences, influence social values and propel moral progress. (shrink)

This book presents a variety of discussions from different countries about regulations and applications of ethics in business practice. It demonstrates how Ethics, both in the world of business and in academic life, is consistently a central and unavoidable issue that institutions must devise new regulations on a regular basis to address. Given that applying such regulations becomes complicated in a global business landscape and that International companies have lost large amounts of revenues due to fraudulent activities, the book provides (...) insights for professionals in business world to teach, learn, apply, measure and report on companies' daily business. Business and Professional Ethics: Theories, Standards, and Analysis is essential reading for researchers and students in business schools around the world. (shrink)

One stable marker of face perception appears to be left-side bias, the tendency to rely more on information conveyed by the left side of the face than the right. Previous studies have shown that left-side bias is influenced by familiarity and prior experience with face stimuli. Since other-race facial recognition is characterized by reduced familiarity, in contrast to own-race facial recognition, the phenomenon of left-side bias is expected to be weaker for other-race faces. Among Chinese participants, face inversion has been (...) found to eliminate the left-side bias associated with own-race faces. Therefore, it is of interest to know whether face inversion influences left-side bias for non-Chinese research participants and can be generalized across own- and other-race faces. This study assessed 65 Caucasian participants using upright and inverted chimeric Caucasian and Asian faces in an identity similarity-judgment task. Although a significant left-side bias was observed for upright own-race faces, this bias was eliminated by facial inversion, indicating that such a bias depends on the applicability of configural processing strategies. For other-race faces, there was no left-side bias in the upright condition. Interestingly, the inverted presentation yielded a right-side bias. These results show that while left-side bias is affected by familiarity differences between own- and other-race faces, it is a universal phenomenon for upright faces. Inverted presentation strongly reduces left-side bias and may even cause it to revert to right-side bias, suggesting that left-side bias depends on configural face processing. (shrink)

Previous studies have explored children’s intergroup resource allocation in the context of preexisting intergroup resource inequality. However, resource inequality between social groups often originates from different factors. This study explored the role of the origins of resource inequality on children’s intergroup resource allocations. In experiment 1, when there was no explicit origin of the intergroup inequality, children of different ages mainly allocated resources in an equal way and 5- to 6-year-olds showed ingroup bias. In experiment 2, we examined the influence (...) of different origins of intergroup inequality and found that 5- to 6-year-olds perpetuated intergroup inequality when resource inequality was based on either a structural or an internal factor. However, 10- to 11-year-olds rectified inequality or allocated equally when intergroup inequality was based on regional disparity and perpetuated resource inequality when intergroup inequality was based on performance difference. The origins of inequality appear to play an important role in children’s intergroup resource allocations, and older children can distinguish different origins of intergroup inequality in resource allocation. (shrink)

Emoji appear to be an important cue to judge whether a statement is sarcastic in computer-mediated communication. In this study, we investigated whether the smiling emoji, an indicator of sarcastic intention in the Chinese culture, exerts an influence on sarcasm interpretation across the lifespan. Statements accompanied with or without a smiling emoji were compared in unambiguous (Experiment 1) and ambiguous (Experiment 2) contexts. The results of Experiment 1 illustrated that for teenagers and the 20-year-olds the smiling emoji enhanced the perceived (...) sarcasm of sarcastic statements significantly. However, there was no difference in interpreting sarcastic statements with or without a smiling emoji in other age groups. Experiment 2 replicated the results of Experiment 1. We found both teenagers and the 20-year-olds were more likely to arrive at a sarcastic interpretation of the ambiguous statement followed by a smiling emoji, which were less frequent in participants aged in their 30s, 40s, 50s and individuals over 60 years old. This might be because people of varying ages differ in decoding the emotions of the emoji. Age-related differences in the use of sarcasm and participants’ experiences with using emoji might be possible factors that were closely related to the interpretation of emoji-based sarcasm. (shrink)

Scholars have made great efforts to investigate the antecedents of knowledge sharing. In the current study, we applied the proactive motivation model (Parker, Bindl, and Strauss, 2010) to propose a theoretical model to advance this research line and examined the relationship between coaching and knowledge sharing. A total of 197 supervisor–subordinate dyads from a logistics company completed the survey questionnaire. Our results show that leaders’ coaching behavior positively relates to employees’ knowledge sharing behavior via psychological availability. Furthermore, our results show (...) that team psychological safety climate moderates the relationship between psychological availability and employees’ knowledge sharing behavior, as well as the indirect effect between leaders’ coaching behavior and employees’ knowledge sharing. (shrink)

Drawing from a wide range of primary historical and sociological sources, this book presents medical ethics in China from a Chinese-Western comparative perspective, and in doing so it provides a fascinating exploration of cultural differences and commonalities exhibited by China and the West in medicine and medical ethics. The book focuses on a number of key issues in medical ethics including: attitudes towards foetuses; disclosure of information by medical professionals; informed consent; professional medical ethics; and human rights. This careful examination (...) not only provides insights into Chinese viewpoints, but also sheds light on the appropriate methods for comparative culture and ethical research. Through its analysis, Jing-Bao Nie seeks to put forward a theory of "transcultural bioethics", an ethical paradigm which upholds the primacy of morality whilst resisting cultural stereotypes, and appreciating the internal plurality, richness, dynamism and openness of medical ethics in any culture. Medical Ethics in China will be of particular interest to students and academics in the fields of Medical Law, Bioethics and Medical Ethics as well as Chinese/Asian Studies and Comparative (Chinese-Western) Cultural Studies. (shrink)

In recent years, with the development of society and the rapid development of the animation industry, people are paying more and more attention to and requirements for animation production. As an indispensable part of animation production, picture composition plays a major role in animation production. It can give full play to the application of color matching and light and shadow design and enhance the depth and space of the animation screen. Tone space conversion refers to the conversion or representation of (...) color data in one color space into corresponding data in another color space. Its purpose is to distinguish and process color components such as hue and saturation in an image. This article first introduces the domestic and foreign research status of digital image preprocessing and analyzes the basic principles of several color space conversions in detail. Then, several color space conversion algorithms are studied, and the performance of the algorithms is compared and analyzed. The paper focuses on the hardware implementation and optimization of the algorithm for converting RGB color space into HSI color space to meet the real-time requirements. This article focuses on the mutual conversion between the RGB tone space and the HSI tone space and describes in detail how each color component in the HSI tone space is converted from the three RGB color components from a geometric perspective, and then the conversion is derived, and several general conversion methods of RGB to HSI tone space are introduced; two conversion methods of geometric derivation method and standard modulus algorithm are implemented in the software, and the comparison verification is carried out, and the comparison is made from the perspective of hardware implementation. The pros and cons of the two methods are discussed. Finally, the paper summarizes the shortcomings in the design and proposes further research directions in the future. (shrink)

本书对处于社会转型期中国的审美文化特性以及其中出现的种种让人困惑的问题,从不同角度、不同层面作了阐述。.