The paper has seriously explored the triple meanings of death in western philosophy by taking the instance of Socrates’ death. Comparing to God, the westernphilosophy emphasizes that death is necessary. Comparing to the materials, the western philosophy emphasizes that death is happy. Comparing to the man, the western philosophy emphasizes that death is independent.

Language is central to the interactional nature of the social life within which it is situated. To react or respond in a particular situation, we must be able to recognize the social situation. Growing evidence has demonstrated the negative impact of perceived loneliness on late-life executive functions. Yet little is known about how social factors impact language processing for older people. The current study aims to fill this gap, first by assessing age-related changes in lexical processing during Chinese word reading, (...) second, by examining whether older adults’ individual differences, such as processing speed and verbal abilities, modulate meaning retrieval and, third, by investigating whether perceived loneliness can hinder word reading. The use of compound words in Chinese enables significant sublexical ambiguity, requiring varying executive load during word recognition: when a word’s constituent characters carry multiple meanings, readers must consider the meaning contributions of both constituent characters and use top-down word information to determine the most accurate meaning of the ambiguous character, a process termed “sublexical ambiguity resolution.” In this study, adults read real Chinese words and pseudowords, and they were asked to make lexical decisions. Older adults exhibited greater lexicality effects and similar sublexical ambiguity effects compared with young adults. Among older participants, processing speed could account for their ability to differentiate between words and pseudowords. In contrast, the level of perceived loneliness modulated the efficacy of sublexical ambiguity resolution: the participants with higher perceived loneliness displayed a greater sublexical ambiguity disadvantage effect. These results indicate that perceived loneliness may affect the use of contextual information in meaning retrieval during reading. The findings provide an important link between social connections and language processing. (shrink)

Evidence suggests divergent thinking is the cognitive basis of creative thoughts. Neuroimaging literature using resting-state functional connectivity has revealed network reorganizations during divergent thinking. Recent studies have revealed the changes of network organizations when performing creativity tasks, but such brain reconfigurations may be prolonged after task and be modulated by the trait of creativity. To investigate the dynamic reconfiguration, 40 young participants were recruited to perform consecutive Alternative Uses Tasks for divergent thinking and two resting-state scans were used for mapping (...) the brain reorganizations after AUT. We split participants into high- and low-creative groups based on creative achievement questionnaire and targeted on reconfigurations of the two brain networks: default-mode network and the network seeded at the left inferior frontal gyrus because the between-group difference of AUT-induced brain activation located at the left IFG. The changes of post-AUT RSFCs indicated the prolonged effect of divergent thinking. More specifically, the alterations of RSFCIFG−AG and RSFCIFG−IPL in the high-creative group had positive relationship with their AUT performances, but not found in the low-creative group. Furthermore, the RSFC changes of DMN did not present significant relationships with AUT performances. The findings not only confirmed the possibility of brain dynamic reconfiguration following divergent thinking, but also suggested the distinct IFGN reconfiguration between individuals with different creativity levels. (shrink)

This study aimed at exploring the impact of post-epidemic era on teachers’ behavioral intention of distance education. In this study, purposive sampling method was used to enroll 390 teachers in colleges and universities, high schools and vocational schools, and junior high and elementary schools to be the research subjects for the questionnaire survey. A total of 360 questionnaires were collected for statistics, and AMOS 23.0 statistical software was used to analyze the correlation between variables. Meanwhile, a structural equation model was (...) used to analyze and verify the impact of the technology acceptance model, information system success model, and diffusion of innovations theory. According to the results, the system quality of distance teaching platforms certainly affected perceived usefulness, and perceived usefulness affected teachers’ attitudes toward using distance teaching systems. In addition, perceived ease of use had an impact on perceived usefulness, and trialability had an impact on teachers’ attitudes toward using distance teaching systems. Finally, teachers’ attitude toward using a distance teaching system also affected their behavioral intention. According to the results, suggestions were made in this study to teachers and students for distance teaching. Additionally, the main contribution of this study lies in providing specific strategies for further distance teaching through empirical results in combination with on-site teaching. (shrink)

This study investigates the effects of visual mnemonics and the methods of presenting learning materials on learning visually similar characters for Chinese-as-second-language learners. In supporting CSL learners to build robust orthographic representations in Chinese, addressing the challenges of visual similarity of characters is an important issue. Based on prior research on perceptual learning, we tested three strategies that differ in the extent to which they promote interrelated attention to the form and meaning of characters: Stroke Sequence, a form-emphasis strategy, Key-images, (...) a form + meaning strategy utilizing visual code, Pithy Formulas with Key-images, a form + meaning strategy combining visual and verbal codes. A pretest–posttest equivalent-group design was adopted. The independent variables were the learning strategy, the method of presenting character pairs, and testing time. The dependent variables were learners’ proportions of accurate responses to reading and writing Chinese characters through a posttest and a delayed posttest ; a learner experience survey was also administered to investigate learners’ opinions on each strategy. Sixty-six non-beginning learners of Chinese participated; they were randomly assigned to one of the two groups in which participants learned ten characters via the three strategies, respectively, differing between whether the characters were presented in similar pairs or dissimilar pairs. Data were analyzed via three-way ANCOVAs. The Pithy Formulas with Key-images and the Key-images generally yielded higher writing accuracy than Stroke Sequence immediately after learning. Notably, the advantage of the Pithy Formulas with Key-images over the Key-images on writing was specific to the participants that learned with visually similar pairs rather than those that learned with dissimilar pairs. All strategies were effective for reading, yet learners’ experience ratings favored the two form + meaning strategies over the strategy that focused primarily on form. Suggestions for future research and pedagogical implications on learning visually similar characters were offered. (shrink)

In all respects, Mao has succeeded in creatively developing Marxism in such a way that Mao thought seems adequate to the Chinese situation and superior to the Soviet version.

Objective: The objectives of this study are to understand the current functions, structure and operation of hospital ethics committees (HECs) in Shanghai and to facilitate their improvement. Methods: (1) A questionnaire survey, (2) interviews with secretaries and (3) on-site document reviews of HECs in Shanghai were used in the study, which surveyed 33 hospitals. Results: In Shanghai, 57.56% of the surveyed hospitals established HECs from 1998 to 2005. Most HECs used bioethical review of research involving human subjects as well as (...) bioethical review or consultation regarding medical care services and administrative decision- making. Of the surveyed HECs, 14.3% did not provide any formal bioethical training to the HECs’ members and many HECs had no standard operating procedures. Some HECs had no clear definition of what was “conflict of interest” that should be considered by the HECs, while 44.4% of the HECs did not perform continuing review. Discussion: After the issues of related national regulations, more and more hospitals established HECs in Shanghai, but the functions of HECs need to be further developed and formal training on bioethics should be provided to HEC members. To assure the independence and good performance of HECs, the conflict of interest procedure, the standard operating procedures and bioethical review should be improved. Conclusion: HECs in Shanghai had developed in the preceding 10 years and they played great roles in protecting the rights and welfare of human subjects and patients; some areas need improvement. (shrink)

The economical/environmental scheduling problem of the ship integrated energy system has high computational complexity, which includes more than one optimization objective, various types of constraints, and frequently fluctuated load demand. Therefore, the intelligent scheduling strategies cannot be applied to the ship energy management system online, which has limited computing power and storage space. Aiming at realizing green computing on SEMS, in this paper a typical SIES-EESP optimization model is built, considering the form of decision vectors, the economical/environmental optimization objectives, and (...) various types of real-world constraints of the SIES. Based on the complexity of SIES-EESPs, a two-stage offline-to-online multiobjective optimization strategy for SIES-EESP is proposed, which transfers part of the energy dispatch online computing task to the offline high-performance computer systems. The specific constraints handling methods are designed to reduce both continuous and discrete constraints violations of SIES-EESPs. Then, an establishment method of energy scheduling scheme-base is proposed. By using the big data offline, the economical/environmental scheduling solutions of a typical year can be obtained and stored with more computing resources and operation time on land. Thereafter, a short-term multiobjective offline-to-online optimization approach by SEMS is considered, with the application of multiobjective evolutionary algorithm and typical schemes corresponding to the actual SIES-EESPs. Simulation results show that the proposed strategy can obtain enough feasible Pareto solutions in a shorter time and get well-distributed Pareto sets with better convergence performance, which can well adapt to the features of real-world SIES-EESPs and save plenty of operation time and storage space for the SEMS. (shrink)

In all respects, Mao has succeeded in creatively developing Marxism in such a way that Mao thought seems adequate to the Chinese situation and superior to the Soviet version.

Few countries have been so transformed in recent decades as China. With a dynamically growing economy and a rapidly changing social structure, China challenges the West to understand the nature of its modernization. Using postmodernism as both a global frame of periodization and a way to break free from the rigid ideology of westernization as modernity, this volume’s diverse group of contributors argues that the Chinese experience is crucial for understanding postmodernism. Collectively, these essays question the implications of specific phenomena, (...) like literature, architecture, rock music, and film, in a postsocialist society. Some essays address China’s complicity in—as well as its resistance to—the culture of global capitalism. Others evaluate the impact of efforts to redefine national culture in terms of enhanced freedoms and expressions of the imagination in everyday life. Still others discuss the general relaxation of political society in post-Mao China, the emergence of the market and its consumer mass culture, and the fashion and discourse of nostalgia. The contributors make a clear case for both the historical uniqueness of Chinese postmodernism and the need to understand its specificity in order to fully grasp the condition of postmodernity worldwide. Although the focus is on mainland China, the volume also includes important observations on social and cultural realities in Hong Kong and Taiwan, whose postmodernity has so far been confined—in both Chinese and English-speaking worlds—to their economic and consumer activities instead of their political and cultural dynamism. First published as a special issue of boundary 2, Postmodernism and China includes seven new essays. By juxtaposing postmodernism with postsocialism and by analyzing China as a producer and not merely a consumer of the culture of the postmodern, it will contribute to critical discourses on globalism, modernity, and political economics, as well as to cultural and Asian studies. Contributors. Evans Chan, Arif Dirlik, Dai Jinhua, Liu Kang, Anthony D. King, Jeroen de Kloet, Abidin Kusno, Wendy Larson, Chaoyang Liao, Ping-hui Liao, Sebastian Hsien-hao Liao, Sheldon Hsiao-peng Lu, Wang Ning, Xiaobing Tang, Xiaoying Wang, Chen Xiaoming, Xiaobin Yang, Zhang Yiwu, Xudong Zhang. (shrink)

Grit, as an important positive psychological quality, has rarely been studied for its role involved in the mechanism between stress and psychological security. This article explores the moderating and mediating role of grit in the relationship between interpersonal stress and psychological security of freshmen through two studies. In study 1, freshmen from several Chinese universities were recruited to complete a battery of questionnaire, including assessments about interpersonal stress, grit, and psychological security. The moderating effect analysis showed that grit moderated the (...) relationship between interpersonal stress and psychological security. Specifically, grit buffered the negative effects of interpersonal stress on freshmen’s psychological security, but this effect was obvious only when the level of interpersonal stress was relatively low, and decreased when the level of interpersonal stress was high. In study 2, college freshmen from another university apart from above ones were recruited, and we verified the results of study 1 and further explored the mediating role of grit in the relationship between interpersonal stress and security. The moderating effect analysis of study 2 also verified that of study 1. The mediating effect analysis showed that interpersonal stress not only negatively predicted psychological security, but also affected psychological security through the mediation of grit. In general, grit played a mediating and moderating role in the relationship between interpersonal stress and psychological security. This study provides first-hand evidence to explain the multiple roles of grit in the relationship between interpersonal stress and psychological security. (shrink)

The literature on the interplay between geographic communities and organizations has largely ignored the role of individual residents. In adopting a meso-perspective, we examine a potentially vital relationship between corporate conduct and pro-social behavior demanding sacrifice from individuals. Drawing on Weber ), we theorize that organizations in a community legitimize personal social conduct in three ways—by serving as role models, imparting norms and values, and routinizing forms of interaction. We study the relationship between corporate social responsibility behavior by local firms (...) and the social distancing of citizens in US counties during the Covid-19 pandemic, a core ethical outcome. We argue and find that the residents of communities in which firms exhibit higher levels of CSR engaged in more SD during the Covid-19 pandemic. This was true when firms were long-established, isomorphic in their CSR, and major employers and vendors. Moreover, CSR relating to the treatment of employees as well as positive and negative extremes in CSR bore especially strong relationships with SD. Implications are drawn for the study of business ethics, as modeled by CSR, as a force for ethical personal behavior and public health in communities. (shrink)

There is growing evidence to suggest that employees’ perceptions of their employer’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) positively influences their attitude and behavior. An increasing number of scholars have called for further explorations of the microfoundations of CSR. To that end, this study takes the conservation of resources perspective to examine relationships and the perception of CSR by employees, considering areas such as thriving at work, task significance, and employees taking charge. By analyzing 444 questionnaires completed by employees in China and (...) using the conditional process analysis to test a hypothesis, results showed that the association between employees’ CSR perception and taking charge is significantly and positively correlated, with thriving at work mediating the connection. We also found that task significance negatively moderates the mediating effect between CSR and taking charge, such that the lower the level of task significance of a job, the more positive the effect of CSR on taking charge via thriving at work. These findings have theoretical implications for micro-level CSR research and managerial implications for entrepreneurs. (shrink)

Drawing upon self-determination theory, this study aimed to explore the mechanisms underlying the impact of perceived organizational support on proactive innovation behavior and reveal the serial mediation effects of basic psychological needs. We collected time-lagged data of 481 employees from research institutions in China, and structural equation modeling analyses were carried out to test the hypotheses. The results indicate that perceived organizational support is significantly and positively related to proactive innovation behavior, and this relationship was mediated by the need for (...) autonomy, competence, and relatedness. These findings contribute new knowledge to proactive innovation behavior by providing a new perspective of the satisfaction of psychological needs. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

Previous studies have reported that general or photo-specific social media use was associated with women’s body dissatisfaction and body image disturbance. The current study replicated and expanded upon these findings by identifying the positive association between social media influencer viewing and intentions to change appearance. This study surveyed a sample of 7,015 adult female TikTok users in China regarding their social media influencer viewing frequency, self-objectification, social comparison tendencies when watching short videos, intentions to change appearance, and demographics. The results (...) showed that female TikTok users’ self-objectification mediated the association between their influencer viewing frequency and their intentions to change appearance. Furthermore, social comparison tendencies moderated the association between influencer viewing and intentions to change appearance in that the proposed association was stronger for female TikTok users who had lower social comparison tendencies when watching short videos, compared to female TikTok users who had higher social comparison tendencies. The counter-intuitive finding on social comparison tendencies indicated that women who have higher social comparison tendencies may be more aware of the negative influences and adjust their expectations. The observed association between social media influencer viewing and intentions to change appearance was statistically significant but trivial in terms of effect size. Although the result could warn policymakers and practitioners to design media and health literacy campaigns to cultivate body positivity, caution should be exercised when evaluating the practical implications. (shrink)

Compare with other professions, teachers are reported to have a higher risk of poor mental health. This study examined the relationships between emotional intelligence, perceived organizational justice, and mental health among Chinese high school teachers. Three hundred and eighty-one high school teachers, with their age range between 21 and 50 years, were administered the Emotional Intelligence Scale, Perceived Organizational Justice Scale, and Mental Health Scale. The result found that emotional intelligence and perceived organizational justice directly influence the mental health of (...) high school teachers. In addition, perceived organizational justice mediated the association between emotional intelligence and mental health. Moreover, the present study analyzes the different role of subtypes of perceived organizational justice on the relationships between emotional intelligence and mental health, and the results showed that the mediating effects of perceived distributive justice and interactive justice on emotional intelligence and mental health are not significant, only the perceived procedural justice mediated the relationships between emotional intelligence and teachers’ mental health. The results are discussed in a conceptual context. (shrink)

Teaching research activities in China are practical and reflective research of teachers on teaching. These required activities are meant to ensure quality education and facilitate the professional development of teachers. However, in TRA, teachers encounter many challenges such as low efficiency and weak team collaboration. These problems make it hard to achieve the expected outcomes. W Primary School reformed its activities using Change Laboratory, a formative intervention approach to workplace learning and development based on activity theory. The data collected included (...) seven recorded meetings in the Change Laboratory. The conversations in the meetings were then transcribed into texts. A deductive method of content analysis was used to code the data, focusing on categorizing comments of teachers about the transformative agency. The findings showed the following: There were five types of transformative agencies, namely, resisting, criticizing, explicating, envisioning, and committing to actions. Resisting and criticizing were represented less frequently, and taking action did not emerge as a type of transformative agency. The comments about transformative agency about tools were more frequent than comments about other elements in the activity system. There were some differences in the expression of transformative agency across participants. At the end of this study, the implications for the development of TRA are discussed. (shrink)

The neural underpinnings of decision-making are critical to understanding and predicting human behavior. However, findings from decision neuroscience are limited in their practical applicability due to the gap between experimental decision-making paradigms and real-world choices. The present manuscript investigates the neural markers of buying decisions in a fully natural purchase setting: participants are asked to use their favorite online shopping applications to buy common goods they are currently in need of. Their electroencephalography is recorded while they view the product page (...) for each item. EEG responses to pages for products that are eventually bought are compared to those that are discarded. Study 1 repeats this procedure in three batches with different participants, product types, and time periods. In an explorative analysis, two neural markers for buying compared to no-buying decisions are discovered over all three batches: frontal alpha asymmetry peak and frontal theta power peak. Occipital alpha power at alpha asymmetry peaks differs in only one of the three batches. No further significant markers are found. Study 2 compares the natural product search to a design in which subjects are told which product pages to view. In both settings, the frontal alpha asymmetry peak is increased for buying decisions. Frontal theta peak increase is replicated only when subjects search through product pages by themselves. The present study series represents an attempt to find neural markers of real-world decisions in a fully natural environment and explore how those markers can change due to small adjustments for the sake of experimental control. Limitations and practical applicability of the real-world approach to studying decision-making are discussed. (shrink)

Students’ learning engagement is recognized as one of the main components of effective instruction and a necessary prerequisite for learning, but students’ learning engagement in flipped classroom poses some pedagogical challenges. This study aimed to promote students’ learning engagement via the flipped classroom approach. Design-based research was adopted in this study to conduct an experiment involving three iterations in a Modern Educational Technology course in a Chinese university. The participants included 36 third-year pre-service teacher undergraduates. Classroom observations and a learning (...) engagement questionnaire were used to measure the effectiveness of the flipped instruction in terms of students’ learning engagement. Data analysis applied descriptive statistics, ANOVA, and paired samples t tests. The results showed that after three rounds of iterative experiments, students’ learning engagement significantly improved. Several principles are provided as guidelines for instructors to implement flipped classroom approach to promote students’ learning engagement. (shrink)

PurposeThe aims of the study were first to investigate the association between illness perception and psychological distress and second to determine whether mindfulness affects psychological distress via illness perception and perceived stress in patients with lung cancer.MethodsAmong 300 patients with lung cancer who participated in this cross-sectional study, 295 patients made valid responses to distress thermometer, the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire, the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire, and the Perceived Stress Scale between January and July 2021. The possible pathways of mindfulness (...) affecting psychological distress were analyzed based on the structural equation modeling analysis.ResultsA total of 24.4% patients with lung cancer had DT > 4. Illness perception and perceived stress had a direct effect on psychological distress. Mindfulness had a direct effect on illness perception and mindfulness indirectly influenced psychological distress through affecting illness perception alone or simultaneously affecting both the illness perception and perceived stress in patients with lung cancer.ConclusionLung cancer suffered from varying levels of psychological distress. Mindfulness may alleviate psychological distress by reducing the level of illness perception and perceived stress. We suggest developing a comprehensive factor model to clarify potential mechanisms of mindfulness on psychological distress due to the very low effect of mindfulness on psychological distress via illness perception and perceived stress. (shrink)

Importance Informed consent is essential to ethical, rigorous research and is important to recruitment and retention in cancer trials.Objective To examine cancer clinical trial (CCT) participants’ perceptions of informed consent processes and variations in perceptions by cancer type.Design and Setting and Participants Cross-sectional survey from mixed-methods study at National Cancer Institute–designated Northeast comprehensive cancer center. Open-ended and forced-choice items addressed: (1) enrollment and informed consent experiences and (2) decision-making processes, including risk-benefit assessment. Eligibility: CCT participant with gastro-intestinal or genitourinary, hematologic-lymphatic (...) malignancies, lung cancer, and breast or gynecological cancer (N = 334).Main Outcome Measures Percentages satisfied with consent process and information provided; and assessing participation’s perceptions of risks/benefits. Multivariable logistic or ordinal regression examined differences by cancer type.Results Most patient-participants felt well informed by the consent process (more than 90% overall and by cancer type) and. most (87.4%) reported that the consent form provided all the information they wanted, although nearly half (44.8%) reported that they read the form somewhat carefully or less. More than half (57.9%) said that talking to research staff (i.e., the consent process) had a greater impact on participation decisions than reading the consent form (2.1%). A third (31.1%) were very sure of joining in research studies before the informed consent process (almost half of lung cancer patients did—47.1%). Most patients personally assessed the risks and benefits before consenting. However, trust in physicians played an important role in the decision to enroll in CCT.Conclusions and Relevance Cancer patients rely less on written features of the informed consent process than on information obtained from the research staff and their own physicians. Research should focus on information and communication strategies that support informed consent from referring physicians, researchers, and others to improve patient risk-benefit assessment and decision-making. (shrink)

System justification theory holds that disadvantaged groups rationalize the current social system, even if it is unfavorable to them. Epistemic, relational, and existential needs are factors that explain this phenomenon. However, the literature has not yet examined and explained when disadvantaged groups no longer rationalize current social systems. This study uses a questionnaire survey method to study the moderating effect of collectivism on disadvantaged mindset and system-justifying beliefs. It found that collectivism can influence the predictive effect of disadvantaged mindset on (...) system-justifying beliefs. For people who scored low in collectivism, a disadvantaged mindset can significantly negatively predict system-justifying beliefs; for those who scored high in collectivism, a disadvantaged mindset no longer predicts system-justifying beliefs. Therefore, these results show that collectivist values are important for explaining system justification in disadvantaged groups. When collectivist values decline, the level of rationalization of the social system by disadvantaged groups also decreases. (shrink)

Type 2 diabetes mellitus is related to a variety of cognitive impairments that may even progress to dementia. Studies have found the angular gyrus is a cross-modal integration hub that is involved in a variety of cognitive processes. However, few studies have focused on the patterns of resting-state functional connections of the AG in patients with T2DM. This study explored the functional connection between the AG and the whole brain and the relationship between the FC and clinical/cognitive variables in patients (...) with T2DM. 44 patients with T2DM and 43 sex-, age-, and education-matched healthy controls underwent resting-state fMRI and received neuropsychological assessments. Compared with the control group, the T2DM group showed abnormal rsFCs between the AG and multiple brain regions. The FC between the left AG and the left medial temporal lobe in the T2DM group was positively correlated with scores on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, after a Bonferroni correction. Collectively, patients with T2DM have abnormal FCs between the AG and extensive brain regions that may be related to various cognitive processes. (shrink)

With a focus in the financial market, stock market dynamics forecasting has received much attention. Predicting stock market fluctuations is usually challenging due to the nonlinear and nonstationary time series of stock prices. The Elman recurrent network is renowned for its capability of dealing with dynamic information, which has made it a successful application to predicting. We developed a hybrid approach which combined Elman recurrent network with factorization machine technique, i.e., the FM-Elman neural network, to predict stock market volatility. In (...) this paper, the Standard & Poor’s 500 Composite Stock Price index, the Dow Jones industrial average index, the Shanghai Stock Exchange Composite index, and the Shenzhen Securities Component Index were used to demonstrate the validity of our proposed FM-Elman model in time-series prediction. The results were compared with predictions obtained from the other two models which are basic BP neural network and the Elman neural network. Some experiments showed that the FM-Elman model outperforms others through different accuracy measures. Furthermore, the effects of volatility degree on prediction performance from different stock indexes were investigated. An interesting phenomenon had been found through some numerical experiments on the effects of different user-specified dimensions on the proposed FM-Elman neural network. (shrink)

Recent advances in neuroscience indicate that analysis of bio-signals such as rest state electroencephalogram and eye-tracking data can provide more reliable evaluation of children autism spectrum disorder than traditional methods of behavior measurement relying on scales do. However, the effectiveness of the new approaches still lags behind the increasing requirement in clinical or educational practices as the “bio-marker” information carried by the bio-signal of a single-modality is likely insufficient or distorted. This study proposes an approach to joint analysis of EEG (...) and eye-tracking for children ASD evaluation. The approach focuses on deep fusion of the features in two modalities as no explicit correlations between the original bio-signals are available, which also limits the performance of existing methods along this direction. First, the synchronization measures, information entropy, and time-frequency features of the multi-channel EEG are derived. Then a random forest applies to the eye-tracking recordings of the same subjects to single out the most significant features. A graph convolutional network model then naturally fuses the two group of features to differentiate the children with ASD from the typically developed subjects. Experiments have been carried out on the two types of the bio-signals collected from 42 children. The results indicate that the proposed approach can achieve an accuracy of 95% in ASD detection, and strong correlations exist between the two bio-signals collected even asynchronously, in particular the EEG synchronization against the face related/joint attentions in terms of covariance. (shrink)

BackgroundChildhood experiences can exert a huge impact on adult psychological conditions. Previous studies have confirmed the effects of adverse childhood experiences and benevolent childhood experiences on psychological distress separately, but few studies explored a combined effect of ACEs and BCEs on psychological distress. The aim of this study was to explore a combined effect of ACEs and BCEs on psychological distress among Chinese undergraduates.MethodsParticipants were undergraduates aged 17–24 years and completed a self-reported questionnaire. A series of regression analyses were conducted (...) to examine the association between childhood experiences and psychological distress.ResultsA total of 65.7% of undergraduates had BCEs, 27.1% of undergraduates had ACEs, and 12.9% of undergraduates had ACEs and BCEs simultaneously. Logistic regression analysis indicated that undergraduates who experienced high ACEs were more likely to have a high risk of psychological distress [odds ratio = 1.46, 1.84, and 3.15 for uncertainty stress, depressive symptoms, and suicidal ideation, respectively], while undergraduates who experienced High BCEs were less likely to have psychological distress compared with Low-Both group. The combined effect of ACEs and BCEs could also play as a protective factor in uncertainty stress and depressive symptoms.ConclusionOur findings suggested that ACEs and BCEs could not only predict the psychological distress independently, but also BCEs could counteract the negative effect of ACEs in psychological problems. There is an even greater need to identify and support the victims of ACEs and to increase BCEs in early childhood. (shrink)