Causal Items Research Articles

Analysis on typical characteristics and causes of coal mine gas explosion accidents in China.

Large-scale coal mine gas explosion (CMGE) accidents have occurred occasionally and exerted a devastating effect on society. Therefore, it is essential to systematically identify the characteristics and association rules of causes of CMGE accidents through analysis on large-scale CMGE accident reports. In this study, 298 large-scale CMGE accidents in China from 2000 to 2021 were taken as the data sample, and mathematical statistical methods were adopted to analyze their general characteristics, coupling cross characteristics, and characteristics of gas accumulation and ignition sources. Moreover, the text mining technology and the Apriori algorithm were used for exploring the formation mechanism of CMGE accidents, during which 46 main causal factors were identified and 59 strong association rules were obtained. Furthermore, an accident causation network was constructed based on the co-occurrence matrix. The key causal items and sets of CMGE accidents were clarified through network centrality analysis. According to the research results, electrical equipment failure, cable short circuit, mine lamp misfire, hot-line work, and blasting spark are the key ignition sources of CMGE. Fan failure, airflow short circuit, and local ventilation fan damage are the main causes of gas accumulation. Besides, the confidence levels of two association rules of "static spark-fan failure" and "blasting spark-airflow short circuit" are higher than 70%, indicating that they are the two dominant risk-coupling paths of gas explosions. In addition, six causes appear frequently in the shortest risk paths of gas explosion and are closely related to other causes, i.e., fan failure, local ventilation fan damage, static sparks, electrical equipment failure, self-heating ignition, and friction impact sparks. This study provides a new perspective on identifying causes of accidents and their complex association mechanisms from accident report data for practical guidance in risk assessment and accident prevention.

Board Examination Analytics for Pamantasan ng Cabuyao, Laguna

This study provides a framework for determining board exam probabilistic performances of students through the identification and analysis of indicators that affect student board exam performances. The design and development of the framework are governed by the theoretical and empirical study of factors related to student profiles, academic metrics, and academic support services metrics. The formulation of factors and considerations for the framework revolves around the identification of causal items affecting the board exam performance of examinees. The factors are tested for their perceived causative and relational effects as drawn from related studies and literature. Moreover, this study provides a framework that addresses the issues related to managing board examination course offerings via consideration of university policies, practices, priorities, and programs.

Adaptation and psychometric testing of the Chinese version of the Revised Illness Perception Questionnaire for cervical cancer patients.

Illness perception is an important factor that influences psychological distress, coping behaviors, and illness outcomes, and this factor is often assessed by the Revised Illness Perception Questionnaire (IPQ-R). Data regarding illness perception among cervical cancer patients are limited, especially in China. The study aimed to adapt and psychometrically test the Chinese version of the IPQ-R for Cervical Cancer (CIPQ-R-CC). This was a methodological study. Before the survey, the identity and causal subscales (originally 14 and 18 items, respectively) were adapted. Data were collected from 220 cervical cancer patients (N=220) from June 2018 to February 2019. Psychometric properties were assessed using explanatory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, Pearson correlation coefficients, one-way analysis of variance, t-tests and Cronbach's alpha coefficients. Eight identity items and twenty-six causal items were included in the CIPQ-R-CC, which showed acceptable content validity (I-CVI=0.78-1.00, S-CVI=0.97-0.99). A five-factor solution was obtained from the cause subscale by explanatory factor analysis, and these factors explained 60.19% of the total variance. For Part III of the CIPQ-R-CC, after deleting nine items and respecifying five error covariances, the proposed seven-factor model was confirmed. There were low to moderate correlations between the latent factors (r＜0.52). Known-group validity was demonstrated in some groups with different demographic characteristics. The Cronbach's alpha coefficients were also acceptable (0.60-0.88). The CIPQ-R-CC is a reliable and valid tool for assessing illness perception among Chinese cervical cancer patients. Future studies are needed to verify its factor structure and to confirm its theoretical connotation.

Using the DEMATEL model to expose core causal items of LibQUAL for improving library service quality: from the perspective of big data

This study aims to expose the “causal core” items of LibQUAL+™ from professional librarians’ views. The objective is to prioritize limited resources to improve the most influential factors affecting the library service quality. Valid LibQUAL+™ questionnaires from thirty-two university library administrators in Taiwan are collected for analysis. The Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL) technique is employed to build causal maps that can clearly locate the twenty-two LibQUAL+™ question items into four quadrants: core causal, inferior causal, inferior effect, and core effect. The DEMATEL causal maps can facilitate the library administrators to prioritize the limited resources for improvement. Five “causal core” items of LibQUAL+™ are identified, including the library staff should be motivated with high willingness to help users and giving users individual attention; the library amenities should provide a quiet space for individual activities; the library Web site should allow users to locate and access information easily and individually. The survey data represent what professional librarians’ think of the service quality in their libraries. The findings may serve as useful guidance to allocate limited budgets for library service improvement. This paper has pinpointed the “core causal” items of LibQUAL+™ for advancing library administration. It is the first of its kind in the literature to use the DEMATEL technique to identify the “core causal” items of LibQUAL+™ for improving library service quality.

Psychometric Testing of an Arabic Translation of the Revised-Illness Perception Questionnaire (IPQ-R) for Chronic Illness Patients.

Researchers lack a properly validated instrument to measure perceptions of chronic disease in Arabic language contexts. This study aimed to adapt and validate the Revised-Illness Perception Questionnaire (IPQ-R) for Arabic speaking chronic illness patients. A cross-sectional design was conducted to examine the psychometric properties of the adapted English version of the IPQ-R for Arabic speaking chronic illness patients. The study instrument was an Arabic version of the IPQ-R prepared through a translation process. The reliability and validity of the instrument were assessed using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and Cronbach's alpha coefficient. Three hundred and sixteen participants (ages 16-79) from the Batna region in Algeria completed the IPQ-R. A total of 316 (100%) patients responded to this study. Regarding internal consistency, Cronbach's alpha a coefficient was consistently higher than 0.45. Several areas of fit were identified and substantial changes to the measurement model were made, such as the deletion of 22 items from the original 38-item IPQ-R and two items from the original 18 causal items this accounted for 64.63% of the total variance, and the respecification of indicators had to be applied to achieve acceptable model fit. The final model consists of two sections: The 16-item Arabic IPQ-R, which had a good fit; (CMIN/Df = 1.30, P < 0.001, CFI = 0.93, RMSEA = 0.08, SRMR = 0.03), and was similar to the Arabic 16 causal items (CMIN/DF = 1.11, P < 0.001, CFI = 0.95, RMSEA = 0.080, SRMR = 0.02). The factor structure concurred with prior finding despite differences to the type of sample and cultural considerations that might explain these findings. Replication of this study in Algerian patients with specific illness, such as silicosis, breast cancer and multiple sclerosis. Further psychometric testing on other large samples is recommended.

Utility of paediatric quality of life and revised illness perception questionnaires in adolescents with sickle cell disease

ABSTRACTQuality of life (QOL) and illness perceptions are important considerations when managing adolescents with sickle cell disease (SCD). This study aims to assess the psychometric properties of the SCD-specific paediatric quality of life (PedsQL™-SCD) and the revised illness perception questionnaires (IPQ-R) in Jamaican adolescents with SCD. One hundred and fifty Jamaican adolescents (M: 74, F: 76; mean age 16.1 ± 1.9 years, range: 13–19 years) completed the IPQ-R, PedsQL™-SCD (teen and parent forms) and a knowledge questionnaire. Socio-demographic and clinical data were also collected and the latter were used to create a severity index. Instruments’ structure, feasibility, reliability and construct validity were assessed. The Cronbach’s alpha for the 24-item knowledge questionnaire was 0.85; IPQ-R domains from 0.56 to 0.79 (except ‘treatment control’: 0.34); PedsQL teen-form domains from 0.70 to 0.93 and PedsQL parent-form domains from 0.72 to 0.95. All scales and subscales had low floor effects but some teen subscales yielded high ceiling effects. The SCD-specific scale and subscales showed high sensitivity as they varied significantly by severity of illness. Factor analysis of causal items on IPQ-R yielded a three-factor structure, explaining a total variance of 52.1%. The factors could be labelled as ‘psychological’, ‘physical’ and ‘innate/behavioural risk factors’. The teen QOL scores had significant negative correlations with the severity score (r: −0.46, p-value <0.001); IPQ identity domain (r: −0.42, p-value <0.001); IPQ consequences subscale (r: −0.36, p-value <0.001); IPQ cyclical timeline subscale (r: −0.31, p-value <0.001) and IPQ emotional representation subscale (r: −0.29, p-value <0.01). The severity index also had significant correlation with the QOL parent form (r: −0.44, p-value <0.001); IPQ identity domain (r: 0.43, p-value <0.01) and IPQ consequences domain (r: 0.35, p-value <0.001).In conclusion, both the IPQ-R and PedsQL™-SCD demonstrate robust psychometric properties in adolescents with SCD. Continuing longitudinal study will provide further assessment of the instruments such as ‘responsiveness to change’.

A systematic review and meta-analysis of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire

Objective: This paper aims to systematically review the use and performance of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (Brief IPQ).Design: Electronic databases were searched for papers administering the Brief IPQ published in peer-reviewed journals. Data were extracted from the results for meta-analysis.Main outcome measures: Use by illness population, country, language and study design. The questionnaire’s concurrent validity, predictive validity, sensitivity to change, discriminant validity and mean scores for different populations were summarised.Results: The review included 188 papers. The Brief IPQ has been administered to patients from age 8 to over 80, with a wide range of illnesses, in 26 languages from 36 countries. Pooled correlations between illness perceptions and depression, anxiety, blood glucose levels and quality of life were consistent with previous research and theory (range .25–.49 for consequences, identity and emotional representations; −.12 to −.27 for personal control). All items were able to predict some outcomes up to one-year follow-up. Each subscale demonstrated sensitivity to change after intervention in randomised controlled trials with the personal control and causal items showing most frequent change.Conclusions: The Brief IPQ is widely used and has good psychometric properties. More studies should include and analyse the causal item.

A note on interpreting damn expressives: transferring the blame

abstractExpressives like damn convey a negative attitude toward an entity or toward a situation. What is particularly interesting about such expressions is the looseness of the relation between their syntax, which is the syntax of normal attribute adjectives, and their interpretation (Potts 2005, 2007). An experiment on various negative expressives manipulated the placement of the expressive as a prior utterance, or inside the subject or inside an object of the verb or preposition. Experimental participants were asked what the speaker was most likely to have a negative attitude towards − the subject, the object, or the entire situation. The test items were of two types, ‘non-causal’ and ‘causal’, exemplified by The holiday is on the damn weekend and The dog is on the damn couch. In the non-causal items, the subject (holiday) cannot plausibly be taken as being responsible for the state of affairs described. However, in the causal items, the subject might be responsible for the state of affairs described. The same range of interpretations was observed for all placements of damn. The prior utterance condition (Damn. The dog is on the couch.) yielded more entire situation interpretations than the sentence-internal damn items. Overall, subject damn items yielded more subject interpretations than object damn items. However, as predicted by the hypothesis that blame would devolve on a potentially responsible agent (the culprit hypothesis), there were more subject interpretations in the causal items than in the non-causal items. The results suggest that considerable pragmatic inferencing is involved in the interpretation of expressives, consistent with a proposal that an expressive constitutes a separate speech act.

The relationship between awareness of intellectual disability, causal and intervention beliefs and social distance in Kuwait and the UK

Evidence on lay beliefs and stigma associated with intellectual disability in an Arab context is almost non-existent. This study examined awareness of intellectual disability, causal and intervention beliefs and social distance in Kuwait. These were compared to a UK sample to examine differences in lay conceptions across cultures. 537 university students in Kuwait and 571 students in the UK completed a web-based survey asking them to respond to a diagnostically unlabelled vignette of a man presenting with symptoms of mild intellectual disability. They rated their agreement with 22 causal items as possible causes for the difficulties depicted in the vignette, the perceived helpfulness of 22 interventions, and four social distance items using a 7-point Likert scale. Only 8% of Kuwait students, yet 33% of UK students identified possible intellectual disability in the vignette. Medium to large differences between the two samples were observed on seven of the causal items, and 10 of the intervention items. Against predictions, social distance did not differ. Causal beliefs mediated the relationship between recognition of intellectual disability and social distance, but their mediating role differed by sample. The findings are discussed in relation to cultural practices and values, and in relation to attribution theory. In view of the apparent positive effect of awareness of the symptoms of intellectual disability on social distance, both directly and through the mediating effects of causal beliefs, promoting increased awareness of intellectual disability and inclusive practices should be a priority, particularly in countries such as Kuwait where it appears to be low.

Musculoskeletal pain illness perceptions: Factor structure of the Illness Perceptions Questionnaire-Revised

Background: The Revised Illness Perceptions Questionnaire (IPQ-R) is commonly used to measure illness perceptions. We tested whether the structure of the IPQ-R was appropriate for use with primary care musculoskeletal pain patients. Methods: Confirmatory (C) and exploratory (E) factor analyses (FA) were used to test whether the structure of the IPQ-R was supported for patients with knee pain (n = 393), hand pain (n = 2113) and back pain (n = 1591). CFA was used to test whether the timeline acute/chronic, timeline cyclical, consequences, personal control, treatment control, illness coherence and emotional representation dimensions of the IPQ-R were distinct; EFA was used to explore potential structure for patients’ views on the cause of their condition. Results: Goodness-of-fit indices for the CFA were below our criteria for good model fit. Removal of six items from the model improved model fit, but our criteria for good model fit was still not achieved. An interpretable factor solution could not be determined for the causal items on the questionnaire. Conclusions: Our data show limited evidence that the seven dimensions of the IPQ-R are distinct. A clear structure for the causal items was not determined. Further work is needed to develop the IPQ-R for use with primary care musculoskeletal pain patients.

The factor structure of the revised illness perception questionnaire (IPQ-R) in end-stage renal disease patients

The purpose of this study was to examine the factor structure of the Revised Illness Perceptions Questionnaire (IPQ-R) in a sample of 374 end-stage renal disease (ESRD) patients. A confirmatory factor analysis of the IPQ-R, including the illness identity subscale, demonstrated adequate model fit for the factor structure as originally defined by (Moss-Morris, R., Weinman, J., Petrie, K. J., Horne, R., Cameron, L. D., & Buick, D. (2002). The revised Illness Perception Questionnaire (IPQ-R). Psychology & Health, 17 (1), 1–16.) Modifying the a-priori IPQ-R factor structure by removing two items with low factor loadings and specifying a path between personal control and item 23 had marginally better fit. A separate exploratory factor analysis of the causal items indicated three factors relating to Biological, Psychological and Behavioural causes. These findings provide evidence towards the validity and reliability of the IPQ-R as a suitable measure of illness perceptions in the context of ESRD.

孤独感の原因帰属に関する研究 自己の場合と他者の場合

This study examined (1) the applicability of Weiner (1979)'s model of causal attributions to explain causes of loneliness, a domain of affiliational behavior, (2) attributional styles of lonely persons about themselves and about others, and (3) the effect of the antecedent attribution. Three hundred and twenty-four male students were given the revised UCLA Loneliness Scale and asked to rate the causes of their own loneliness and the loneliness of others. The main results obtained here were as follows: 1) For each self- and others-rating, the factor analysis on sixteen causal items found four factors which corresponded with four elements that were obtained by internality and stability dimensions. 2) Lonely persons made less internal and stable attributions about themselves, and made more internal and stable attributions about others than non-lonely persons. 3) In the cases with the antecedent attribution, lonely persons made more internal and stable attributions about themselves, and made more external and stable attributions about others. Non-lonely persons made much more external and stable attributions about themselves.

THE INFLUENCE OF TRANSITIVITY ON LEARNING IN HEARING AND DEAF CHILDREN

Hearing children at three grade levels were trained to associate three neutral stimuli one to another on a cause-effect paradigm. When these causal items were arranged in accord with logical transitivity versus when they were not, acquisition was facilitated for the two higher grade levels. Deaf children comparable in age to the highest grade performed in accord with their hearing counterparts. These findings confirmed the thesis that arbitrary transitive arrangements of items influenced learning as would be expected from Piaget's developmental theory of logical operations. It was concluded that even when an objective basis for transitivity was minimized concreteoperational children imposed a transitive principle onto the task and that this behavior appeared to be unrelated to verbal sophistication.