Context Strengthens Initial Misinterpretations of Text

Three self-paced reading experiments examined the effect of context on interpreting subsequent sentences and in the difficulty of revising initial misinterpretations of subsequent temporarily ambiguous sentences. Target sentences containing noun phrase/sentence (NP/S) coordination ambiguities were preceded by contexts that either did or did not support the preferred, incorrect “NP and NP” interpretation. Online reading times and offline comprehension question responses were the dependent variables. Results suggest that when propositional content of incoming text is consistent with propositional content of the context, readers often hang on to the resulting coherent interpretation even when subsequent input contradicts it. Results also suggest that (a) context affects reading times and final interpretation; (b) when context and comprehension questions bias readers toward the incorrect interpretation, even unambiguous sentences are regularly misinterpreted; and (c) both semantic content and syntactic form of context influence how the context and subsequent text are integrated in memory.     

A Longitudinal Analysis of the Relations Among Professional Development,Educators’ Beliefs and Perceived Skills,and Response-to-Intervention Implementation

ABSTRACT

Professional development is a critical systems-level intervention thought to facilitate Response-to-Intervention (RtI) implementation. The current study examined the relations between professional development, educator outcomes, and problem-solving implementation within an RtI framework using growth curve modeling. School leadership teams from pilot schools (n = 34) participated in 3 years of training. Pilot schools also received job-embedded coaching. Comparison schools (n = 27) provided a referent group. Results indicated that problem-solving implementation increased faster at pilot schools (β = 0.10, SE = 0.05, t = 2.03, p < .05). In addition, beliefs regarding data-based decision-making (β = 0.36, SE = 0.17, t = 2.13, p < .05) and perceived problem-solving skills applied to academics (β = 0.30, SE = 0.10, t = 3.07, p < .01) positively related to implementation. Implications include the needs to further explore professional development activities and for consultants to utilize evidence-based professional development principles when supporting RtI implementation.     

Reading Occupied Istanbul: Turkish Subject-Formation from Historical Trauma to Literary Trope

Abstract

The Allied occupation of Istanbul is a little-known historical event outside of Turkey and the Middle East. European powers occupied Istanbul between 1918 and 1923 to enforce the partition of the Ottoman Empire after WWI in the construction of the Modern Middle East. Almost 100 Turkish novels that address occupied Istanbul have appeared over the last ninety years, beginning even before Allied armies left Istanbul in 1923. Turkey's present Middle Eastern re-emergence and post-Kemalist reassessment of secular modernity has also led writers and intellectuals back to the occupation of Istanbul. To examine why Turkish authors return repeatedly to the trope of occupied Istanbul, this essay surveys the first canonised novels about occupied Istanbul written during the Kemalist monoparty period (1923–50): Shirt of Flame by the exiled feminist and nationalist Halide Edib (1884–1964), Sodom and Gomorrah by the Kemalist ideologue Yakup Kadri Karaosmano?lu (1889–1974) and Outside the Scene by Turkey's first experimental, modernist author Ahmet Hamdi Tanp?nar (1902–62). As bilingual Istanbul intellectuals, all three made occupied Istanbul a central drama in their fictions. However, each represented it differently as a formative event in the construction and critique of the nation-state and of modern Turkish subject-formation.     

Distributed optimization with information-constrained population dynamics

In a multi-agent framework, distributed optimization problems are generally described as the minimization of a global objective function, where each agent can get information only from a neighborhood defined by a network topology. To solve the problem, this work presents an information-constrained strategy based on population dynamics, where payoff functions and tasks are assigned to each node in a connected graph. We prove that the so-called distributed replicator equation (DRE) converges to an optimal global outcome by means of the local-information exchange subject to the topological constraints of the graph. To show the application of the proposed strategy, we implement the DRE to solve an economic dispatch problem with distributed generation. We also present some simulation results to illustrate the theoretic optimality and stability of the equilibrium points and the effects of typical network topologies on the convergence rate of the algorithm.     

Destination buffer analysis for packets rejection obliteration in multi-channel networks

In this paper we study a multi-channel network, each station of which is equipped with a network interface that has a receiver buffer of multiple packets. In this way, each station is able to receive multiple packets per time instant. We adopt a synchronous access protocol which is affected by the collisions over the multiple channels and the destination conflicts. The proposed protocol performance crucially depends on the size of the receiver buffer since it determines the packet rejection probability at destination. An analytical probabilistic model based on a Markovian process is adopted for the performance measures derivation by means of closed mathematical formulas. The proposed protocol is compared to relative ones that either totally ignore the receiver collisions or assume a receiver buffer of a single packet capacity. The numerical results show that the increase of the receiver buffer size improves the performance decisively, resulting in higher throughput and lower delay and rejection probability. Also, it is shown that the appropriate receiver buffer size per station in order for the rejections at destination to be effectively eliminated is not unlimited but is limited to three packets for 0.1% accepted maximum level of rejection probability.     

Measuring business performance: A conceptual framework with focus on improvement

Managers look for measures that represent an integrated performance. These should lead to an analysis of unsatisfactory performance. Performance measurement and its evaluation is the first step toward formulating any plan for improvement. This article examines the imperatives of a good measurement system and presents a framework to measure business performance.