The role of speed of processing, rapid naming, and phonological awareness in reading achievement

This study investigated the role of speed of processing, rapid naming, and phonological awareness in reading achievement. Measures of response time in motor, visual, lexical, grammatical, and phonological tasks were administered to 279 children in third grade. Measures of rapid object naming, phonological awareness, and reading achievement were given in second and fourth grades. Reading group comparisons indicated that poor readers were proportionally slower than good readers across response time measures and on the rapid object naming task. These results suggest that some poor readers have a general deficit in speed of processing and that their problems in rapid object naming are in part a reflection of this deficit. Hierarchical regression analyses further showed that when considered along with IQ and phonological awareness, speed of processing explained unique variance in reading achievement. This finding suggests that a speed of processing deficit may be an "extraphonological" factor in some reading disabilities.     

Development and validation of a brief screening version of the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire

OBJECTIVE: The goal of this study was to develop and validate a short form of the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (the CTQ-SF) as a screening measure for maltreatment histories in both clinical and nonreferred groups. METHOD: Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses of the 70 original CTQ items were used to create a 28-item version of the scale (25 clinical items and three validity items) and test the measurement invariance of the 25 clinical items across four samples: 378 adult substance abusing patients from New York City, 396 adolescent psychiatric inpatients, 625 substance abusing individuals from southwest Texas, and 579 individuals from a normative community sample (combined N=1978). RESULTS: Results showed that the CTQ-SF's items held essentially the same meaning across all four samples (i.e., measurement invariance). Moreover, the scale demonstrated good criterion-related validity in a subsample of adolescents on whom corroborative data were available. CONCLUSIONS: These findings support the viability of the CTQ-SF across diverse clinical and nonreferred populations.     

Simple operated multipurpose temperature control cryostat

A suitable simple optical cryostat for optical, magneto-optical, electrical and thermo-electrical measurements was designed. It is suitable for use in a magnetic pool gap as narrow as less than 1 cm. Throughout a long period of time, the heat diffusion process of the cryostat can be easily operated at slow increase in sample temperature in a range 1.25 K/min at 200 K that will be reduced gradually to 0.66 K at room temperature. Liquid nitrogen was used to cool down the temperature. During the operation, the change in the measured energy gap of a semiconductor sample and other physical parameters resulting from the change of temperature can be corrected through the temperature coefficient of that parameter at the corresponding temperature. The cryostat was successfully used for all experiments mentioned above to measure the properties of a single crystal of GaP (Gallium Phosphate) semiconductor.     

The relations of effortful control and impulsivity to children's resiliency and adjustment

The unique relations of effortful control and impulsivity to resiliency and adjustment were examined when children were 4.5 to 8 years old, and 2 years later. Parents and teachers reported on all constructs and children's attentional persistence was observed. In concurrent structural equation models, effortful control and impulsivity uniquely and directly predicted resiliency and externalizing problems and indirectly predicted internalizing problems (through resiliency). Teacher-reported anger moderated the relations of effortful control and impulsivity to externalizing problems. In the longitudinal model, all relations held at T2 except for the path from impulsivity to externalizing problems. Evidence of bidirectional effects also was obtained. The results indicate that effortful control and impulsivity are distinct constructs with some unique prediction of resiliency and adjustment.     

Influence of surface treatments on fatigue life of a two-stroke free piston linear engine component using random loading

INTRODUCTION Fatigue durability has long been important issues in the design of a two-stroke free piston linear engine structure (Torres and Voorwald, 2002; Rahman et al., 2005a; 2005b). Durability assessment is traditionally done in the later part of the product development stage when prototypes are available, and heavily re- lied on in confirming ground durability tests. This process is very time consuming and often results in over-design with weight penalties, which is the major obsta…     

Organization and use of the mental lexicon by deaf and hearing individuals

Two experiments explored the taxonomic organization of mental lexicons in deaf and hearing college students. Experiment 1 used a single-word association task to examine relations between categories and their members. Results indicated that both groups' lexical knowledge is similar in terms of overall organization, with associations between category names and exemplars stronger for hearing students; only the deaf students showed asymmetrical exemplar-category relations. Experiment 2 used verbal analogies to explore the application of taxonomic knowledge in an academically relevant task. Significant differences between deaf and hearing students were obtained for six types of analogies, although deaf students who were better readers displayed response patterns more like hearing students'. Hearing students' responses reflected their lexical organization; deaf students' did not. These findings implicate the interaction of word knowledge, world knowledge, and literacy skills, emphasizing the need to adapt instructional methods to student knowledge in educational contexts.     

"Do I need to know this for the exam?" Using popular media, inquiry-based laboratories, and a community of scientific practice to motivate students to learn developmental biology

One of the greatest challenges instructors face is getting students to connect with the subject in a manner that encourages them to learn. In this essay, we describe the redesign of our Developmental Biology course to foster a deeper connection between students and the field of developmental biology. In our approach, we created a community of scientific practice focused on the investigation of environmental impacts on embryonic development and informed by popular and scientific media, the students' own questions, and the instructor. Our goals were to engage students in meaningful ways with the material, to develop students' science process skills, and to enhance students' understanding of broad principles of developmental biology. Though significant challenges arose during implementation, assessments indicate using this approach to teach undergraduate developmental biology was successful.     

如临深渊

６５０年前，那妖魔来了！在印第安的土地上！酋长闻到了浓烈的烟味，他尖叫着：“离开！快离开！往深山里跑啊！”所有的人都开始行动，人们看到草地在移动，空气中弥漫着焦味，大家只有用尽力气远离这个妖魔，因为没有什么武器可以抵御它！突然，妖魔捅破了地面，酋长知道自己根本不是它的对手，但他还是用长矛抵抗着，他要为他的族人留下宝贵的时间！渐渐地，酋长消失了……等到妖魔饱餐以后，回过头再寻找的时候，它才意识到，所有的人都已经远离了它的视线！酋长用自己的生命，为大家赢得了时间。妖魔狂叫着，异常愤怒！它抱怨自己太心…