Visual programming language is a crucial part of learning programming. On this basis, it is essential to use visual programming to lower the learning threshold for students to learn about artificial intelligence to meet current demands in higher education. Therefore, a 3-h AI course with an RGB-to-HSL learning task was implemented; the results of which were used to analyze university students from two different disciplines. Valid data were collected for 65 students in the Science -student group and 39 students in (...) the Humanities -student group. Independent sample t-tests were conducted to analyze the difference between cognitive styles and computational thinking. No significant differences in either cognitive style or computational thinking ability were found after the AI course, indicating that taking visual AI courses lowers the learning threshold for students and makes it possible for them to take more difficult AI courses, which in turn effectively helping them acquire AI knowledge, which is crucial for cultivating talent in the field of AI. (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)

Within the same pathogen-stress framework as proposed by Fincher & Thornhill (F&T), we argue further that pathogen stress promotes matrilocal rather than patrilocal family ties which, in turn, slow down the process of modernity; and that pathogen stress promotes social learning or copying, including the adoption of foreign religions.

This paper theorizes and historicizes the ideas of modern language and translation and challenges the imperialist and nationalistic mode of worlding with the notion of ‘untranslatability’ that is embedded in the linguistic and cultural practices of colonial Taiwan and Korea. I redefine the notion of translation as a bordering system – the knowledge-production of boundaries, discrimination, and classification – that simultaneously creates the translatable and the untranslatable in asymmetrical power relations. With this, I discuss how this ambivalence is embodied in (...) the experiences of colonial writers Wu Yung-fu and Pak T’aewŏn and their novellas ‘Head and Body’ and ‘A Day in the life of Kubo the Novelist’. I illustrate two characteristics of the ambivalent untranslatability embedded in their novellas: the linguistic untranslatability and the experience of ‘unhomeness’. The linguistic untranslatability and unhomeness, I argue, result in the colonized’s dislocation in homogeneous time-space relationships, resulting to the incompletion of the modernization project through colonialism. At the same time untranslatability offers a site to explore the transnational space that crosses linguistic boundaries, and to caution against the legacy of colonialism. (shrink)

ObjectiveBasic combat training is a kind of necessary high-intensity training to help each military recruit convert into a qualified soldier. In China, both the physical fatigue and passive psychological state have been observed in new recruits during BCT. However, after same-intensity training, the degree of fatigue and passive mood vary among recruits. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the effect of BCT on mood state of recruits with different physical fitness levels from a perspective of fatigue.Materials and methodsBefore and after (...) BCT, the degree of fatigue and mood state of participants were evaluated via the Borg Rating of Perceived Exertion Scale and Profile of Mood States Questionnaire immediately after 20 push-ups as RPE and POMS scores [total mood disturbance, passive mood and positive mood ]. The participants were divided into two groups according to the RPE score measured after BCT: group 1: RPE score after BCT < 13 and group 2: RPE score after BCT ≥ 13.ResultA total of 564 recruits were included. After BCT, in group 1, TMD and passive mood Ttension, Tfatigue, Tdepression, Tconfusion declined significantly, but positive mood both increased significantly ; while in group 2, only Tanger and Testeem increased significantly.ConclusionBCT could alleviate passive mood and add to positive mood for recruits with better physical fitness, while had no ameliorative effects on or even deteriorate most of the passive mood for recruits with worse physical fitness. (shrink)

In the expanding field of the gig economy, the interactions between app-workers and customers have become focal areas of academic investigation. Drawing from the conservation of resources (COR) theory, we propose and test a moderated dual mediation model to examine the impact of customer injustice on app-workers’ work outcomes, including withdrawal behaviors and service performance. Employing a mixed-method approach comprising two multi-wave, multisource field studies and an online scenario experiment, our findings provide support for the following hypotheses: customer injustice fosters (...) withdrawal behaviors and undermines service performance by inducing app-workers to experience increased emotional exhaustion and reduced service-oriented self-efficacy. Nevertheless, the impacts of these associations are weakened when app-workers engage more frequently in online community support seeking behaviors. Theoretical implications and practical applications of our findings are discussed in the context of the burgeoning gig economy. (shrink)

Objective: This study aimed to explore the relationship among cognitive fusion, experiential avoidance, and obsessive–compulsive symptoms in patients with obsessive–compulsive disorder.Methods: A total of 118 outpatient and inpatient patients with OCD and 109 healthy participants, gender- and age-matched, were selected using cognitive fusion questionnaire, acceptance and action questionnaire−2nd edition, Yale–Brown scale for obsessive–compulsive symptoms, Hamilton anxiety scale, and Hamilton depression scale for questionnaire testing and data analysis.Results: The levels of cognitive fusion and experiential avoidance in the OCD group were significantly (...) higher than those in the healthy control group. Regression analysis results showed that, in predicting the total score of obsessive–compulsive symptoms, AAQ-II and CFQ entered the equation, which explained 17.1% variance. In predicting anxiety, only AAQ-II entered the equation, which explained 13% variance. In the prediction of depression, AAQ-II entered the equation, which explained 17.7% variance.Conclusion: Cognitive fusion and experiential avoidance may be important factors for the maintenance of OCD, and experiential avoidance can positively predict the anxiety and depression of OCD patients. (shrink)

Poverty alleviation through tourism is an important way for China to achieve targeted poverty alleviation and win the battle of poverty alleviation. As a region with deep poverty and great difficulty in poverty alleviation, whether tourism development has injected key impetus into ethnic minority areas needs to be tested by both qualitative analysis and quantitative measurement. This paper takes eight ethnic provinces in China as an example to conduct an empirical study. Based on the Data Envelopment Analysis -BCC model and (...) Malmquist index, it evaluates the tourism investment and tourism poverty alleviation efficiency of the ethnic regions in the two stages of tourism poverty alleviation, and analyzes them by classification. The results of the study show: The pure technical efficiency in the first stage is relatively high, but the total factor productivity of each region is declining; The pure technical efficiency in the second stage is also relatively high, but the scale efficiency is low, and the change rate of total factor productivity of the provinces in China has increased significantly; The “double high” type includes Guangxi, Inner Mongolia, and Guizhou, and the “double low” type includes Qinghai, Yunnan, Tibet, Xinjiang, and Ningxia. The results of the study generally show that tourism poverty alleviation has brought about the improvement of the living standards of residents and the development of local economy, but the efficiency of tourism poverty alleviation needs to be improved. On this basis, the article puts forward corresponding improvement measures, in order to further help the ethnic minority areas get rid of poverty in a comprehensive way by promoting the efficient and sustainable development of tourism. (shrink)

For Viennese artist Florian Pumhösl »abstraction is a method«, not a category. Or rather, if abstraction is the defining category of modernism, the objective is to reproduce modernism's problems and limits and exploit relationships among its parts. Considering what Pumhösl calls the »textile complex« of modernism, this essay examines the artist's work in parallel with Charles Sanders Peirce's diagram concept and Gottfried Semper's use of textile diagrams throughout Style in the Technical and Tectonic Arts. _German_ »Abstraktion« ist für den Wiener (...) Künstler Florian Pumhösl eine »Methode«, keine Kategorie. Oder vielmehr, wenn Abstraktion die bestimmende Kategorie der Moderne ist, dann ist das Ziel, die Probleme und Beschränkungen der Moderne zu reproduzieren und die Beziehungen zwischen ihren Elementen auszunutzen. Vor dem Hintergrund dessen, was Pumhösl den »Gewebekomplex« der Moderne nennt, untersucht dieser Bei trag das Werk des Künstlers und führt es mit Charles Sanders Peirces Diagramm Konzept und Gottfried Sempers Einsatz von »textilen« Diagrammen in seinem Werk Der Stil in den technischen und tektonischen Künsten eng. (shrink)

For Viennese artist Florian Pumhösl »abstraction is a method«, not a category. Or rather, if abstraction is the defining category of modernism, the objective is to reproduce modernism's problems and limits and exploit relationships among its parts. Considering what Pumhösl calls the »textile complex« of modernism, this essay examines the artist's work in parallel with Charles Sanders Peirce's diagram concept and Gottfried Semper's use of textile diagrams throughout Style in the Technical and Tectonic Arts.

The relationships between age and the life-supporting treatments use, and between gender and the life-supporting treatments use are still controversial. Using extracorporeal membrane oxygenation as an example of life-supporting treatments, the objectives of this study were: to examine the relationship between age and the extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use; to examine the relationship between age and the extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use; and to deliberate the ethical and societal implications of age and gender disparities in the initiation of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation. This (...) is a population-based, retrospective cohort study. Taiwan’s extracorporeal membrane oxygenation cases from 2000 to 2010 were collected. The annual incidence rate of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use adjusting for both age and gender distribution for each year from 2000 to 2010 was derived using the population of 2000 as the reference population. The trend of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use was examined using time-series linear regression analysis. We conducted joinpoint regression for estimating the trend change of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use. The trends of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use both for different gender groups, and for different age groups have been significantly increasing over time. Men were more likely to be supported by extracorporeal membrane oxygenation than women. Women’s perspectives toward life and death, and women’s perception of well-being may be associated with the phenomenon. In addition, the patients at the age of 65 or older were more likely to be supported by extracorporeal membrane oxygenation than those younger than 65. Family autonomy/family-determination, and the Confucian tradition of filial piety and respecting elders may account for this phenomenon. This study showed gender and age disparities in the initiation of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use in Taiwan, which may be accounted for by the cultural and societal values in Taiwan. For a healthcare professional who deals with patients’/family members’ medical decision-making to initiate life-supporting treatments, he/she should be sensitive not only to the legality, but also the societal and ethical issues involved. (shrink)

What is the role of conscious experience in the epistemology of perceptual knowledge: how should we characterise what is going on in seeing that o is F in order to illuminate the contribution of seeing o to their status as cases of knowing that o is F? My proposal is that seeing o involves conscious acquaintance with o itself, the concrete worldly source of the truth that o is F, in a way that may make it evident to the subject (...) that o is an instance of ‘x is F’ as she understands this, and hence evident that o is F. Seeing that o is F is thus a way of its being evident that o is F and is therefore a way of knowing that o is F. (shrink)

To realize the coordinated and sustainable development of hydropower projects and regional society, comprehensively evaluating hydropower projects’ influence is critical. Usually, hydropower project development has an impact on environmental geology and social and regional cultural development. Based on comprehensive consideration of complicated geological conditions, fragile ecological environment, resettlement of reservoir area, and other factors of future hydropower development in each country, we have constructed a comprehensive evaluation index system of hydropower projects, including 4 first-level indicators of social economy, environment, safety, (...) and fairness, which contain 26 second-level indicators. To solve the problem that existing models cannot evaluate dynamic nonlinear optimization, a projection pursuit model is constructed by using rough set reduction theory to simplify the index. Then, an accelerated genetic algorithm based on real number coding is used to solve the model and empirical study is carried out with the Y hydropower station as a sample. The evaluation results show that the evaluation index system and assessment model constructed in our paper effectively reduce the subjectivity of index weight. Applying our model to the social impact assessment of related international hydropower projects can not only comprehensively analyze the social impact of hydropower projects but also identify important social influencing factors and effectively analyze the social impact level of each dimension. Furthermore, SIA assessment can be conducive to project decision-making, avoiding social risks and social stability. (shrink)

There is increasing interest in the role played by testosterone in economic decision-making and social cognition. However, despite the growing body of findings in this field of research, no empirical study to date has tested whether testosterone modulates decision-making when an asymmetrically dominated decoy option is introduced in a choice set. Within a choice set that comprises two options, an asymmetrically dominated decoy option is a third option that, when introduced in the choice set, is much worse than one of (...) the existing options, but comparable to the other existing option. Introduction of a decoy option leads to a preference toward the dominating option (i.e., decoy effect). Healthy male participants (n = 63) received a single-dose of 150 mg testosterone gel in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, between-subjects design. At 180 min post-administration, participants took part in a decision-making task to elicit decoy effect. Results showed that participants in the testosterone group made less consistent choices and more target choices (i.e., decoy effect) than participants in the placebo group. These findings are interpreted in light of the dual-process theory and are in line with existing evidence suggesting that testosterone promotes more intuitive and automatic judgments in human decision-making. (shrink)

The concept of self-efficacy has been widely studied and shown to contribute to individuals’ job satisfaction. For counselors, the concept measures their belief in their ability to conduct counseling sessions. However, it is an understudied area. As Bandura states, self-efficacy and its sources should be investigated and measured within its domain, which in this case is school counseling. This study examined the impact on school counselors’ self-efficacy and job satisfaction of the personal and environmental factors: mastery experience, social persuasion, vicarious (...) learning, physiological and affective state, the access to training, and perceived supervisor support of training. The cross-sectional study involved 541 Malaysian secondary school counselors nationwide via a random sampling-distributed questionnaire. Results which were analyzed using PLS-SEM, with importance-performance functionality embedded in it, indicated that mastery experience, access to training, and perceived supervisor support of training explained 45.6% variance in counseling self-efficacy and together with counseling self-efficacy, contributed 13.2% variance in job satisfaction among the school counselors. The importance-performance map analysis revealed supervisor support of training as of greatest importance in shaping counseling self-efficacy. Counseling self-efficacy partially mediated the relationship between mastery experience, access to training, supervisor support toward training, and job satisfaction Arising from this finding is a proposed theoretical framework in which efficacy information, environmental determinants and cognitive determinant corresponded together congruently and lead to higher job satisfaction. Suggestions are also made for training providers, content developers, and policymakers to include these factors in professional development training and continuous education, to sustain the wellbeing of school counselors. (shrink)

We find that agency problems are embedded in firm's excess and abnormal equity investments that are mainly dictated by controlling shareholder's motives and ethical choices manifested in ownership and board structure. The excess equity investment is gauged with respect to industry average. The abnormal equity investment is specifically referred to the number of nominal investment companies that are fully controlled by the controlling owners while subject to little governance. Our empirical evidences of 345 Taiwanese non-financial listed firms show that firm's (...) excess and abnormal equity investments are negatively correlated with controlling shareholder's cash flow rights while are positively correlated with the control-cash flow deviation, and board affiliation. The results are supportive of the positive incentive hypothesis and the negative entrenchment hypothesis put forth by La Porta et al. and Claessen et al.. The negative relation between equity investment and firm's value further supports the agency postulation that corporate excess and abnormal equity investments represent a leeway for controlling shareholder to exploit wealth of minority shareholders. This study potentially contributes to the literature of business ethics by portraying an empirically testable linkage from controlling owner's ethical choices to his actions and therefore firm's value. (shrink)

The present study examined gender differences in the distribution of creative abilities through the lens of the greater male variability hypothesis, which postulated that men showed greater interindividual variability than women in both physical and psychological attributes. Two hundred and six undergraduate students in Hong Kong completed two creativity measures that evaluated different aspects of creativity, including: a divergent thinking test that aimed to assess idea generation and a creative problem-solving test that aimed to assess restructuring ability. The present findings (...) extended the research of greater male variability in creativity by showing that men generally exhibited greater variance than women in the overall distribution of the creativity scores in both divergent thinking and creative problem solving, despite trivial gender differences in mean scores. The findings further enriched the discourse of the greater male variability hypothesis by showing interesting domain-specific gendered patterns: greater male variability was more likely to occur in figural forms of creativity, with larger effect sizes, when compared to the variability in verbal forms of creativity; and mixed gendered patterns were found in the upper tails of the creativity score distribution with respect to the verbal domain but not the figural one, despite greater male representation being consistently observed in the lower tail of the distribution. Possible underlying mechanisms and implications were discussed. (shrink)

In this study, the levels of knowledge, awareness, and acceptance of research misconduct were investigated among the Pharmacy academics and students in Malaysia. A cross-sectional study using an online questionnaire was carried out. A total of 393 pharmacy academics and students in Malaysia were involved. Perceived research misconduct, as defined in this study as the perception of any research misconduct performed or observed by the respondents at their institution, was captured and further analyzed. The data was analysed using PLS-SEM to (...) assess the hypotheses which were formulated prior to the survey. The findings show that there is a statistically significant positive relationship between the awareness of terminologies regarding research misconduct and perceived research misconduct in the workplace of respondents. However, the acceptance of unethical practices in research demonstrates a negative correlation with perceived research misconduct. Knowledge and awareness regarding research misconduct have no statistically significant relationship with perceived research misconduct in this study. Both awareness of terminologies and acceptance of unethical practices explained a 10.8% variance in perceived research misconduct. Therefore, our study indicates that the awareness, knowledge, and acceptance of research misconduct might not be the main predictors of questionable conduct of research among pharmacy academics and students. Future study on the relationship between other factors which might contribute to research misconduct is highly recommended to investigate the significant contributing factors of irresponsible conduct of research among the Pharmacy academics and students in Malaysia. (shrink)

BackgroundCoronary heart disease is closely associated with cognitive impairment, especially in severe cases of heart failure. However, it is unclear whether cardiac systolic function plays a role in the relationship between pre-existing CHD and cognitive impairment in subjects without clinical heart failure.MethodsIn total, 208 subjects from the First Affiliated Hospital of Xi’an Jiaotong University were recruited from June 2014 to January 2015, and were divided into CHD and non-CHD groups according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The global cognitive function (...) of all subjects was assessed by the Mini-Mental State Examination and cognitive impairment was defined as the score lower than the cutoff value. Left ventricular ejection fraction was measured using transthoracic echocardiograms. The relationship among pre-existing CHD, LVEF, and cognitive impairment was analyzed by multivariate logistic regression.ResultsIn total, 34 subjects met the criteria of cognitive impairment. Univariate analysis showed that the cognitive impairment prevalence in the CHD group was significantly higher than that in the non-CHD group. Multivariate logistic analysis revealed that CHD was significantly associated with a higher risk of cognitive impairment after adjusting for confounds except for LVEF. However, the OR of CHD decreased when LVEF was further corrected as a continuous variable, and LVEF was negatively associated with the risk of cognitive impairment.ConclusionPre-existing CHD is associated with a higher risk of cognitive impairment, and such an association can be considerably explained by reduced LVEF. An impaired cardiac systolic function may play a key role in the relationship between CHD and cognitive impairment among patients with pre-heart failure conditions. (shrink)

The present study aimed to conduct a cross-cultural comparison of creative thinking among Chinese middle school students from the rice- and wheat-growing areas in China through the lens of the rice theory, which postulates that there are major psychological differences among the individuals in these agricultural regions. Differences in cultural mindsets and creativity between the rice group and the wheat group were identified using the Chinese version of the Auckland Individualism and Collectivism Scale and the Test for Creative Thinking–Drawing Production, (...) respectively. Interesting findings were obtained. The results of latent mean analyses indicate that the rice group showed significantly more collectivism and adaptive creativity than the wheat group but less individualism and innovative and boundary-breaking creativity. However, the two groups showed no significant differences in their overall creative performance, as reflected in the TCT–DP composite score. Moreover, results of hierarchical multiple regression analyses revealed that collectivism was positively related to adaptive creativity but negatively related to innovative and boundary-breaking creativity; however, a reverse pattern was found for individualism. These findings enrich the discourse regarding the rice theory and shed important light on the effect of culture on creativity. (shrink)