Screening for Chinese Children with Dyslexia in Hong Kong: The use of the Teachers' Behaviour Checklist

Primary school teachers rated the frequency of occurrence of 65 reading‐related behavioural characteristics in a sample of 251 Grade 1 to Grade 6 Chinese school children in Hong Kong. These behavioural characteristics were in the areas of general performance, reading, dictation, writing, mathematics, language, memory, concentration, sequential ability, motor co‐ordination, spatial orientation, and social/emotional adjustment. Of these 12 areas, 10 yielded scale scores that could distinguish children with dyslexia from those without dyslexia, identified on the basis of their performance in five domains of literacy and cognitive skills. Using a summary score derived from the 10 relevant scales, an optimal cut‐off score was suggested to arrive at a balance between high sensitivity and an acceptable rate of false positives in screening for children with dyslexia. The need for cross‐replication in screening children with dyslexia using the behaviour checklist with different samples of school students is emphasised.     

Ripple structure-generated hybrid electrokinetics for on-chip mixing and separating of functionalized beads

We present an electrokinetics-based microfluidic platform that is capable of on-chip manipulating, mixing, and separating microparticles through adjusting the interrelated magnitudes of dielectrophoresis and AC electroosmosis. Hybrid electrokinetic phenomenon is generated from an electric field-induced micro-ripple structure made of ultraviolet-curable glue. Size-dependent particle separation and selective removal over the ripple structure is demonstrated successfully. Varying the waveform from sine-wave to square-wave allows generating a fluid convection at specific positions to mix the antibody-functionalized beads and antigen. Potential application in the bead-based immunoassay was also demonstrated for immuno-reaction and subsequently separating the bead-bead aggregate and non-binding beads on-chip.     

An economic valuation study of public libraries in Korea

The economic value of public libraries for local residents in Korea was measured. An economic-value measurement model that enables the estimation of diverse types of public library services was designed, using a conditional-value measurement method. Benefits were taken as the value of the main services provided by public libraries, such as accessibility to informational materials, facilities, and programs. Costs included the total amount of expenses at libraries such as personnel expenses, materials purchasing expenses, and other operational costs. Data were collected from 1220 users from 22 public libraries in the province of Seoul/Gyeonggi-do and the other seven Korean provinces. The return on investment (ROI) was calculated to be 3.66.     

Children can represent complex social status hierarchies: Evidence from Indonesia

Children's ethnicity-status associations are often studied in societies where one ethnic group possesses status across multiple dimensions, such as political influence and wealth. This study examined children's (6–12 years) and adults' representations of more complex hierarchies in Indonesia (N = 341; 38% Native Indonesian, 33% Chinese Indonesian, and 27% other ethnicities; 55% female, 36% male; 2021–2022), a society where ethnic groups hold distinct forms of status (on average, Native Indonesians have political influence; Chinese Indonesians have wealth). By 6.5 years, children associated Native Indonesians with political influence and Chinese Indonesians with wealth. Intersectional analyses indicated that ethnicity-status associations were stronger for male than female targets. Children of all ethnicities preferred Chinese Indonesians and preferences were predicted by wealth judgments.