Benefiting colleagues but not the city: Localized effects from the relocation of superstar inventors

In this paper I examine episodes in which superstar inventors relocate to a new city. In particular, in order to assess whether the beneficial effects of physical proximity to a superstar have a restricted network dimension or a wider spatial breadth (spillovers), I estimate changes in patterns of patenting activity following these events for two different groups of inventors: the superstar's close collaborators, and all the other inventors in a given urban area, for both the locality where the superstar moves to and for the one that is left behind. In the case of collaborators, I restrict the attention to patents realized independently from the superstar. The results from the event study register a large and persistent positive effect on the collaborators in the city of destination, as well as a simultaneous negative trend affecting those still residing in the previous location. In the long run, these effects translate into an increased difference between the two groups of about 0.16 patents per inventor. Conversely, no city-wide spillover effect can be attested, offering little support to place-based policies aimed at inducing a positive influx of top innovators in urban areas.     

Bayesian network based extreme learning machine for subjectivity detection

Subjectivity detection is a task of natural language processing that aims to remove ‘factual’ or ‘neutral’ content, i.e., objective text that does not contain any opinion, from online product reviews. Such a pre-processing step is crucial to increase the accuracy of sentiment analysis systems, as these are usually optimized for the binary classification task of distinguishing between positive and negative content. In this paper, we extend the extreme learning machine (ELM) paradigm to a novel framework that exploits the features of both Bayesian networks and fuzzy recurrent neural networks to perform subjectivity detection. In particular, Bayesian networks are used to build a network of connections among the hidden neurons of the conventional ELM configuration in order to capture dependencies in high-dimensional data. Next, a fuzzy recurrent neural network inherits the overall structure generated by the Bayesian networks to model temporal features in the predictor. Experimental results confirmed the ability of the proposed framework to deal with standard subjectivity detection problems and also proved its capacity to address portability across languages in translation tasks.     

欧足联前主席米歇尔·普拉蒂尼上诉案的法理分析

国际足联前主席约瑟夫·S.布拉特和欧足联前主席米歇尔·普拉蒂尼腐败案是2016年国际足联的重大事件之一。普拉蒂尼在受到国际足联道德委员会的处罚后,上诉到国际足联上诉委员会,而后上诉到国际体育仲裁院,最后又上诉到瑞士联邦高等法院。本文通过对普拉蒂尼上诉案,尤其是上诉到瑞士联邦高等法院案进行法理分析,并就此案深入地探讨了瑞士法律与基于瑞士法律的国际足联规则和国际体育仲裁规则的适用情况,进一步透视了瑞士法律对于此案件的处理机制,并指出该案判决仍然可能存在罪罚相称性的问题。     

A novel Cervical Spine Protection device for reducing neck injuries in contact sports: design concepts and preliminary in vivo testing*

Abstract

Head and neck injuries are common in contact sports such as American football. Different mechanisms can produce such injuries, including compressive impact forces on the crown of the helmet with the neck in a flexed chin-down position. The aim of this paper was developing and testing a novel Cervical Spine Protection Device (CSPD) designed to keep the neck within its safe physiological range. The cervical spine range of motion (ROM) of ten participants was measured under four conditions: free; wearing a football gear; wearing the CSPD; and wearing the CSPD underneath the gear. The CSPD was tested in terms of passive and active restraint of head motion, and for its capability to improve endurance time of the neck extensor muscles. Wearing the CSPD resulted in a significant 40–60% reduction in ROM across the three anatomical planes, and in increased endurance of the neck extensor muscles (FREE: 114 ± 57 s; CSPD: 214 ± 95 s; p = 0.004). In quasi-static loading conditions the CSPD was capable of keeping the neck within its physiological range, thus it may be used to decrease the risk of severe injuries due to dangerous chin-down positions.     

A Multisystem Psycho-Biological Approach to the Understanding of Parental Dispositions

SYNOPSIS

Does work-family conflict influence parental behaviors and parenting-related emotional states? Through an experimental research approach, River and colleagues showed that work-family conflict influences both emotions and parental behaviors, but the effect is moderated by the quality of the intimate relationship. In this commentary, we offer an interpretation of the results congruent with the recent theoretical approaches that stress the need for a multisystem psycho-biological approach to studying the factors that regulate parenting behaviors. In this perspective, we provide complementary explanations of the observed results and suggest possible future directions for research on these topics.     

The Adult Parental Acceptance–Rejection Questionnaire: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Italian and American Short Forms

Objective. The aims of this article were to test the measurement invariance of the Italian and American versions of the Adult Parental Acceptance–Rejection Questionnaire and to compare adults’ remembrances of parental acceptance–rejection across the two nations. Design. The Adult Parental Acceptance–Rejection Questionnaire was administered to 564 Italian adults (M = 23.04 years) and 509 U.S. American adults (M = 22.09 years), matched by gender and age. The measurement invariance of the Parental Acceptance–Rejection Questionnaire was first established by means of multi-group confirmatory factor analyses. Results. The Parental Acceptance–Rejection Questionnaire is fully invariant across the two cultures, and adults organize their remembrances of mothers’ and fathers’ parenting around the same four classes of behavior in both nations. Italian and American adults tend to remember their parents as having been quite loving, with Italian parents being remembered as slightly less warm and more hostile than American parents. Conclusions. The full invariance of the Parental Acceptance–Rejection Questionnaire across the two populations represents additional strong evidence for the universality of interpersonal acceptance–rejection theory. Measurement invariance also confirmed that the Adult Parental Acceptance–Rejection Questionnaire (short form) can be used to measure adult remembrances of parental acceptance–rejection across these two populations.     

Combination of a Liquid-Dispensing and Micro-Aspiration Device for the Cleaning of Sensitive Painted Surfaces

Many painted surfaces, not necessarily only those with a contemporary binding media, display high sensitivity to water. The resulting damage, including swelling, leaching out of some components, even partial solubility, may lead to a shrunken, impoverished, de-plasticized, more porous paint film. Different approaches to the cleaning of such surfaces have been developed throughout the years, as awareness of this sensitivity grew worldwide. Some deal with the proper physico-chemical conditions of the aqueous solutions, and others with the proper ways of delivering these solutions to the surface. The strategy proposed in this technical note is concerned with the latter, the application stage, and is based on the combined and simultaneous use of a device capable of delivering a constant, precise amount of the aqueous cleaning solution and a surgical micro-aspirator to immediately remove the soiled solution from the surface and speed up its drying. Also, using a different apparatus, non-polar solvents can be delivered, for cleaning surfaces contaminated by non-polar, more lipophilic soiling materials.     

On cross-lingual retrieval with multilingual text encoders

Information Retrieval Journal - Pretrained multilingual text encoders based on neural transformer architectures, such as multilingual BERT (mBERT) and XLM, have recently become a default paradigm...     

Counseling Students’ Experiences in an Islamic-Based Counseling Course

The purpose of this study was to examine the experiences of learning and consequent development of twelve students enrolled in a four-year undergraduate counselling program at a higher institution of learning in Malaysia. The students’ ages ranged from 20 to 24 years. Participants outlined their learning experiences after taking a three-credit semester-long course on Islamic-based counseling, which was an attempt at integrating religion and spirituality into counselor training. An experiential learning theory served as the framework of reference, and a qualitative research design was adopted. Results revealed four major themes: (1) increased understanding of counseling, (2) better understanding in regard to the self and relationship with God, (3) applicability to daily practice, and (4) enhancing professional competence as a counselor. Finally, implications for research, counselor education and training, and clinical practice are discussed.