ObjectiveThis study aimed to investigate the morphometric alterations in the cortical and subcortical structures in multiple system atrophy patients with mild cognitive impairment, and to explore the association with cognitive deficits.MethodsA total of 45 MSA patients and 29 healthy controls were recruited. FreeSurfer software was used to analyze cortical thickness, and voxel-based morphometry was used to analyze the gray matter volumes. Cortical thickness and gray matter volume changes were correlated with cognitive scores.ResultsCompared to healthy controls, both MSA subgroups exhibited widespread (...) morphology alterations of brain structures in the fronto-temporal regions. Direct comparison of MSA-MCI and MSA-only patients showed volume reduction in the left superior and middle temporal gyrus, while cortical thinning was found in the left middle and inferior temporal gyrus in MSA-MCI patients. Cortical thinning in the left middle temporal gyrus correlated with cognitive assessment and disease duration.ConclusionStructural changes in the brain occur in MSA-MCI patients. The alteration of brain structure in the left temporal regions might be a biomarker of cognitive decline in MSA-MCI patients. (shrink)

This study investigated the mediating roles of self-acceptance and self-esteem in the relationship between body image dissatisfaction and impulse buying, and tested the moderating effect of gender on the relationships. A sample of 374 college students and graduate students participated in the study. Results revealed that body image dissatisfaction positively associated with impulse buying; self-esteem plays a mediating role between body image dissatisfaction and impulsive buying; a serial indirect pathway emerged; the mediation path from self-acceptance to self-esteem was stronger for (...) female than that from male. The results underscore the importance of identifying the mechanisms that moderate the mediated path between body image dissatisfaction and impulse buying among students. These findings point to the potential implications about how to reduce impulse buying through improving body image satisfaction. (shrink)

Widespread unethical corporate misconduct in an industry triggers industry-wide crises. This research investigates how industry misconduct affects consumers’ trust in the industry, by incorporating insights from a micro-level psychological aspect of institutions. The conceptual framework proposes that consumer legitimacy judgement lies at the core of industry trust, following an industry-wide crisis. The results demonstrate that perception of normalisation of misconduct affects industry trust through consumer legitimacy judgement. Moreover, the PNM-CLJ-industry trust relationship is stronger during industry-wide crises compared with crises that (...) involve only one firm, and this relationship is not dependent on the frequency of crises. This research contributes to the knowledge of product-harm crisis by deepening understanding of the trust erosion mechanism during industry-wide crises, with a focus on legitimacy judgement. The findings have implications for prevention of industry-wide crises and for boosting ethically desirable business activities. (shrink)

The counterfactual account of physical computation is simple and, for the most part, very attractive. However, it is usually thought to trivialize the notion of physical computation insofar as it implies ‘limited pancomputationalism’, this being the doctrine that every deterministic physical system computes some function. Should we bite the bullet and accept limited pancomputationalism, or reject the counterfactual account as untenable? Jack Copeland would have us do neither of the above. He attempts to thread a path between the two horns (...) of the dilemma by buttressing the counterfactual account with extra conditions intended to block certain classes of deterministic physical systems from qualifying as physical computers. His theory is called the ‘algorithm execution account’. Here we show that the algorithm execution account entails limited pancomputationalism, despite Copeland’s argument to the contrary. We suggest, partly on this basis, that the counterfactual account should be accepted as it stands, pancomputationalist warts and all. (shrink)

The target article by Laacke et al. focuses on the specific context of identifying people in social media with a high risk of depression by using artificial intelligence technologies. I...

Android robots capable of emotional interactions with humans have considerable potential for application to research. While several studies developed androids that can exhibit human-like emotional facial expressions, few have empirically validated androids’ facial expressions. To investigate this issue, we developed an android head called Nikola based on human psychology and conducted three studies to test the validity of its facial expressions. In Study 1, Nikola produced single facial actions, which were evaluated in accordance with the Facial Action Coding System. The (...) results showed that 17 action units were appropriately produced. In Study 2, Nikola produced the prototypical facial expressions for six basic emotions, and naïve participants labeled photographs of the expressions. The recognition accuracy of all emotions was higher than chance level. In Study 3, Nikola produced dynamic facial expressions for six basic emotions at four different speeds, and naïve participants evaluated the naturalness of the speed of each expression. The effect of speed differed across emotions, as in previous studies of human expressions. These data validate the spatial and temporal patterns of Nikola’s emotional facial expressions, and suggest that it may be useful for future psychological studies and real-life applications. (shrink)

Many scholars have investigated education management. Scholars in the education field have made significant achievements in contributing to multiple educational reform policies, while other scholars discuss teacher-related issues from the perspective of organizational behavior. The teaching innovation of high school teachers plays a critical role in students’ learning attitude and motivation, especially in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Teachers need to utilize more diversified teaching methods to enable students to carry out effective learning. In order to examine teachers’ teaching (...) innovation, this study explores teaching innovation intentions and performance from the perspective of individual and social factors in combination with goal-oriented behavior and social identity theory. This study conducts questionnaires with a sample of Chinese coastal high school teachers, and obtains a total of 475 responses. The research results show that innovation attitude, positive anticipated emotion, group norms and social identity positively affect teachers’ teaching innovation intention; furthermore, teachers’ teaching innovation intention also positively affects their teaching innovation performance. Based on the comprehensive research findings, this research proposes corresponding theoretical and practical implications. (shrink)

This study explored the correlation between mental toughness and physical activity, and the moderation role between PA intention and subsequent behavior among college students and wage earners. Five hundred ninety-one college students aged from 19 to 24 and 285 wage earners aged from 27 to 58 recruited from seven colleges and five cities in China. A Theory of Planned Behavior questionnaire, MT Inventory, and the International PA Questionnaire was completed online. Results showed that attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control (...) explained 46.5 and 38.3% variance in PA intention among college students and wage earners separately. Intention predicted PA behavior significantly among college students and wage earners. Structural equation modeling indicated that the TPB model and the moderation model have an adequate to good fit except the TPB model among wage earners. MT was positively correlated with PA among college students and wage earners and had a significant moderation role in intention-behavior gap among college students and partially affected the transfer of PA intention to behavior among college students. Individuals with high MT had high levels of PA regardless of intention, while PA of those with low MT was low and unstable. Future research should further explore the correlation between intention and PA and the moderation role of MT in different populations using a longitudinal study in order to better understand the correlation between intention and PA, and the transition from intention to PA and better guidance PA intervention to promote PA. (shrink)

Due to the non-invasiveness and high precision of electroencephalography, the combination of EEG and artificial intelligence is often used for emotion recognition. However, the internal differences in EEG data have become an obstacle to classification accuracy. To solve this problem, considering labeled data from similar nature but different domains, domain adaptation usually provides an attractive option. Most of the existing researches aggregate the EEG data from different subjects and sessions as a source domain, which ignores the assumption that the source (...) has a certain marginal distribution. Moreover, existing methods often only align the representation distributions extracted from a single structure, and may only contain partial information. Therefore, we propose the multi-source and multi-representation adaptation for cross-domain EEG emotion recognition, which divides the EEG data from different subjects and sessions into multiple domains and aligns the distribution of multiple representations extracted from a hybrid structure. Two datasets, i.e., SEED and SEED IV, are used to validate the proposed method in cross-session and cross-subject transfer scenarios, experimental results demonstrate the superior performance of our model to state-of-the-art models in most settings. (shrink)

The pressure control for a liquid nature gas ship is vital for the cargo handling system which is a nonlinear, unstable, and controllable complex system accompanied by the dynamics of time delay. To improve the control effect, this article proposed a robust controller based on closed-loop gain shaping algorithm by mirror-mapping approach. In addition, the complete mechanism models for the system are established to predict the changes of temperature, pressure, and liquid inventory in the cargo tank. The heat exchanges and (...) evaporation of liquid are also considered. By collecting the data from the LNG ship “Dapeng,” the system models are validated. At the same time, the comparative experiment is introduced to verify the reliability and effectiveness. The scheme has been compared with the 2-DOF structure control law of modified Smith predictor. The comparative experimental results show that the scheme proposed in this note has a strong disturbance rejection ability and steady-state performance. The controller designed in this note has advantages of simplified construction method, satisfactory control effect and robustness. (shrink)

The autophagy initiation complex is brought about via a highly ordered and stepwise assembly process. Two crucial signaling molecules, mTORC1 and AMPK, orchestrate this assembly by phosphorylating/dephosphorylating autophagy‐related proteins. Activation of Atg1 followed by recruitment of both Atg9 vesicles and the PI3K complex I to the PAS (phagophore assembly site) are particularly crucial steps in its formation. Ypt1, a small Rab GTPase in yeast cells, also plays an essential role in the formation of the autophagy initiation complex through multiple regulatory (...) pathways. In this review, our primary focus is to discuss how signaling molecules initiate the assembly of the autophagy initiation complex, and highlight the significant roles of Ypt1 in this process. We end by addressing issues that need future clarification. (shrink)

Partner selection is the primary aspect of the formation of knowledge collaboration teams. We propose a method of partner selection for KCTs based on a weighted social network analysis method in which the individual knowledge competence and the collaboration performance of candidates are both considered. To select the desired partners, a biobjective 0-1 model is built, integrating the knowledge competence and collaboration performance, which is an NP-hard problem. Then, a multiobjective genetic algorithm is developed to solve the proposed model. Finally, (...) a real-world example is provided to illustrate the applicability of the model, and the MOGA is implemented to search for Pareto solutions of partner selection for KCT in this case. Moreover, some simulation examples are used to test the efficiency of the algorithm. The results suggest that the proposed method can support effective and practical partner selection. (shrink)

Member selection to form an effective collaboration new product development team is crucial for a successful NPD. Existing researches on member selection mostly focus on the individual attributes of candidates. However, under the background of collaboration, knowledge complementarity and collaboration performance among candidates are important but overlooked. In this paper, we propose a multi-objective optimization model for member selection of a Co-NPD team, considering comprehensively the individual knowledge competence, knowledge complementarity, and collaboration performance. Then, to solve the model, an improved (...) adaptive genetic algorithm is developed. Finally, a real case is provided to illustrate the application of the model, and the IAGA is implemented to select the desired team members for optimal team composition. Additionally, the standard generic algorithm and particle swarm optimization are used to compare with the IAGA to further verify the effectiveness of the IAGA. (shrink)

The high-tech industry is the main force promoting the development of China’s national economy. As its industrial economic strength grows, China’s high-tech industry is increasingly using cross-border mergers and acquisitions as an important way to “go out.” To explore the rules governing the process and operation mechanism of reverse knowledge transfer through the CBM&A of China’s high-tech industry under government intervention, a tripartite evolutionary game model of the government, the parent company, and the subsidiary as the main subjects is constructed (...) in this paper. The strategies adopted by the three subjects in the RKT game process are analysed, and the factors influencing RKT through CBM&A under government intervention are simulated and analysed using Python 3.7 software. The results show that, under government intervention, the parent company and subsidiary have different degrees of influence on each other. Subsidiaries are highly sensitive to the compensation rate of RKT. Positive intervention by the government tends to foster stable cooperation between the parent company and the subsidiary. However, over time, the government gradually relaxes its intervention in the RKT and innovation of multinational companies. (shrink)

This study investigates the sampled-data admissibility problem for a singular system. The objective of this paper is to design a sampled-data controller to ensure the admissibility of a singular system and to construct an appropriate Lyapunov–Krasovskii functional to get less conservative results for the sampled-data singular system. To accomplish these objectives, the system is converted into a time-delay system by the input delay approach firstly, and both lower and upper bounds of the delay are considered. Secondly, by introducing a suitable (...) LKF, the admissibility criteria are obtained. Then, when estimating the derivative of the LKF, a relaxation variable is introduced by the method of reciprocally convex inequality, and it is proved that the conservatism is reduced. Finally, two numerical examples are given to prove that the designed sampled-data controller can ensure the states of the systems under the influence of external interference. (shrink)

This study investigates whether firms with fraudulent financial reporting time their earnings announcements strategically and finds that fraudulent firms are more likely to disclose their earnings in the after-market hours during their fraud periods to postpone fraud detection. Cross-sectional tests show that firms with lower visibility are more likely to adopt and benefit from this timing strategy. In addition, fraudulent firms are found to time their conference calls strategically and package their earning news with forecasts to flood the market with (...) information and lower the fraud detection rate. Results also show that unethical managers may benefit from insider trading when their firms use a timing strategy to lower the detection rate. This study sheds light on a potential strategy that unethical managers may adopt to camouflage their fraudulent financial reporting. These results are robust to a variety of settings of samples and model specifications. (shrink)

We experimentally investigate whether donation motive attribution influences individual investors' judgments of the donating firm's future earnings prospects and whether individual moral orientation, that is, perceived importance of social goodwill (PISG), moderates this effect. We find that investors forecast higher future earnings per share (EPS) when the donation motive is believed to be altruistic or win–win rather than egoistic; the EPS forecasts for altruistic and win–win motives are not different. However, this motive attribution effect holds only for higher-PISG investors. A (...) further examination finds that when the donation motive is believed to be egoistic and/or when investors have lower PISG, doing good is no better than doing nothing, but no backfire effect occurs. Our findings indicate that the positive effect of corporate donation on investors' judgments is generated only when higher-PISG investors believe that the donation motive is not purely egoistic; corporate donation will not generate negative effects on investors' judgments even under less favorable conditions. (shrink)

Existing studies mainly explored the detrimental effect of employee credit claiming, and little is known about how leader credit claiming can affect employees. Based on affective events theory and relative deprivation theory, we explore how leader credit claiming affects employee work outcomes by the research methods of literature review, interview, and empirical questionnaire. With a sample of 418 matched leader–employee pairs from a large manufacturing company, we find that leader credit claiming influences employee work outcomes through the mediating role of (...) employee anger and perceived unfairness. Additionally, we determine that leader credit-claiming attribution has a moderating influence on the relationship between credit claiming and anger and between credit claiming and perceived unfairness. The results support all hypotheses. Furthermore, we discuss the theoretical and practical implications of the findings. (shrink)

This study was designed to investigate the impact of self-relevance between preschool children and recipients on children’s sharing behavior in dictator games using a forced-choice resource distribution paradigm. Experiment 1: A total of 75 children aged 3-6 years were evaluated in a first-party situation in which they were distributed as recipients and dictators and shared resources with distracting recipients with different extents of self-relevance under three different payoff structures, including non-costly, costly and envy structures. Children could choose between a sharing (...) option and a non-sharing option. The results showed that, in a first-party situation, children aged 3-6 years old typically share more resources with highly self-relevant recipients (friends) than with moderately self-relevant recipients (acquaintances) and lowly self-relevant recipients (strangers) and that they share more resources with moderately self-relevant recipients (acquaintances) than lowly self-relevant recipients (strangers). Experiment 2: A total of 62 children aged 3-6 years old were evaluated in a third-party situation in which they were distributed not as recipients but only dictators, making decisions between the options of sharing more or sharing less with distracting recipients who had different extents of self-relevance under three different payoff structures, such as non-bias, high self-bias and low self-bias. The results showed that, in a third-party situation, children typically share in a similar manner to that of Experiment 1, meaning that children display selective generosity and that the self-relevance between the children and recipients played a key role. Across age groups, this study of preschool children (total N = 137) demonstrates a degree of effect of self-relevance on preschool children’s sharing in first-party and third-party situations, with highly self-relevant recipients receiving a more preferential share in the dictator game than those with low self-relevance, although this effect was stronger in the older preschool children. (shrink)

The target article (Nelson et al. 2023) offers a valuable contribution to the “paradox of experience,” which was illustrated by using examples about access to unproven medical products and disabili...

Building a flexible supply chain can enable the firms to manage their supply chains to adapt effectively to dynamic market demand changes and thus guarantee their accelerated growth in the future. In this vein, this study aims to address several important issues in supply chain management by considering two characteristics of blockchain technology and exploring the specific conditions under which firms are likely to develop trust in supply chain management. Furthermore, we argue that such supply chain trust is vital to (...) the success of achieving and increasing supply chain flexibility. In addition, we propose that top management teams’ digital leadership within the firms plays a vital role in moderating the contribution of each dimension of blockchain technology to supply chain trust. Using data from a large sample of 338 firms in China, we perform structural equation modeling to examine our conceptual framework empirically. Our results highlight and support the idea that blockchain technology’s information transparency and security influence the trust-building in a supply chain and supply chain flexibility and articulate the particular importance of digital leadership in explaining the contribution of different blockchain technology characteristics to trust-building. Our study advances the theoretical, empirical, and managerial analysis of critical factors to build trust and achieve flexibility in supply chains. (shrink)

This paper presents an adaptive neural tracking control approach for a two-joint robotic manipulator with unknown time-varying delays. In order to work out the effect of unknown time-varying delays on the two-joint robotic manipulator, the appropriate Lyapunov–Krasovskii functionals and separation technology are chosen to settle this matter. The neural networks work as an approximator that has the advantage of estimating the unknown function in the system. In this paper, Lyapunov stability analysis can prove that all signals of the closed-loop system (...) are semiglobal uniformly ultimately bounded and the tracking error can converge to a compact neighborhood with respect to zero. The simulation consequences demonstrate the availability of the feedforward control approach. (shrink)

The political environment has a significant impact on the sustainable development of enterprises. This manuscript aims to investigate the effect of policy uncertainty and official social capital on enterprises’ effective tax rate due to the change of officials. Based on the panel data from the Chinese Industrial Enterprise Database from 1998 to 2009, it is shown that the policy uncertainty caused by the change of local government officials significantly increases the ETR of enterprises. Meanwhile, municipal officials who have social ties (...) with provincial officials in their province also tend to raise the ETR of industrial enterprises, and this tendency is more evident when the officials take office. Further research shows that the effects vary in many aspects for policy uncertainty and social capital on the ETR of enterprises. The findings of this manuscript provide support for a deeper understanding of the change in local government fiscal policies and give suggestions to strengthen political environmental governance for the sustainable development of enterprises. (shrink)