Terms Of Confusion Research Articles

Using a mosaic-based approach to construct children’s understanding of safe space in school

AimThis participative, creative research aimed to explore the meaning of ‘safe space’ at school, defined as areas which children could access when emotionally dysregulated. This study aimed to answer the research question – how do children and teachers understand the meaning of safe space at school?RationaleSafe space is an overused and conceptually confused term, which has been described as the second-most popular strategy for supporting children’s anxiety in UK schools. However, the scarce research literature documents adult views of the benefits of safe space, with little reference to children’s perceptions.MethodA Mosaic-based approach, which offers child-centred, multi-modal methods for exploring views, was used to enable seven children and their three teachers to construct their understanding of safe space in school. Children designated as users of safe space led the researcher on a school tour and took photos of a puppet in their chosen safe spaces. Teachers participated in a semi-structured interview. Visual data was categorised using content analysis and combined with inductive, reflexive thematic analysis of verbal data to identify themes.FindingsChildren’s multiple, dynamic understandings of safe space generated themes of liberated places, safe bases and belonging, contrasting with teachers’ differing understanding of a static, boundaried, restricted space. The value of psychological safety in school alongside giving children agency to self-regulate according to context and need is emphasised when considering safe space.ImplicationsDiscussing the ‘dilemmas of difference’ regarding teachers’ operationalising of a safe space in school leads to consideration of the potential implications for educational policy and practice. The value of deconstructing dominant adult discourses through visibly listening to children using a humanistic, empowering psychological framework is highlighted.LimitationsChildren’s words, photographs and actions were filtered and interpreted by the researcher which could be conceived as constraining child voice and furthering adult-child power imbalances. The full Mosaic approach where a platform for communication between adults and children is facilitated did not take place due to school closures because of the pandemic.ConclusionsThis research extends, and to a degree challenges previous UK literature which suggests that safe space is a beneficial strategy for managing anxiety, as child participants had a more dynamic and flexible understanding of safe space than their teachers. Concerns were raised about the understanding and awareness teachers have regarding wellbeing interventions and how these have the potential to become stigmatising within a behaviourist-dominated school perspective.

Integrated dual hyperchaotic and Josephus traversing based 3D confusion-diffusion pattern for image encryption

This paper introduces an enhanced image encryption technique that relies on 3D confusion and diffusion patterns, aiming to achieve maximum performance in terms of confusion and diffusion. The proposed encryption method combines four phases: dual hyperchaotic, improved logistic map (ILM), Josephus traversing, and a hash function. The first and second phases utilize improved Chen and Lorentz systems-based 3D patterns to enhance confusion and diffusion. In the third phase, bit-plane permutations are performed through Josephus traversing in three directions: x, y, and z. Lastly, the fourth phase implements diffusion based on ILM to optimize encryption performance. The integration of a hash function in this method serves to heighten key sensitivity. The test results demonstrate the method's exceptional performance across various analyses, including statistical, differential, brute-force, and NIST test suite assessments. Additionally, the proposed method outperforms previous approaches significantly, as indicated by the majority assessment.

VUS: Variant of uncertain significance or very unclear situation?

The advancements in population screening, including newborn screening, enables the identification of disease-causing variants and timely initiation of treatment. However, screening may also identify mild variants, non-disease variants, and variants of uncertain significance (VUS). The identification of a VUS poses a challenge in terms of diagnostic uncertainty and confusion. X-linked adrenoleukodystrophy (ALD) serves as an illustrative example of this complex issue. ALD is a monogenic neurometabolic disease with a complex clinical presentation and a lack of predictive tests for clinical severity. Despite the success of ALD newborn screening, a significant proportion (62%) of missense variants identified through newborn screening exhibit uncertainty regarding their pathogenicity. Resolving this issue requires ongoing efforts to accurately classify variants and refine screening protocols. While it is undisputable that ALD newborn screening greatly benefits boys with the disease, the identification of VUS underscores the need for continuous research and collaboration in improving screening practices.

Bakha’s Identity Dilemma in Mulk Raj Anand’s <i>Untouchable</i>: An Exploration of Dalit Psychology


 
 
 The Indian English-language writer Mulk Raj Anand depicts psychological crises of the subaltern through the character of Bakha in his masterpiece, Untouchable (1935). He attempts to portray the psychological vulnerability of the outcastes of society through the depiction of the Dalit community. This study explores the true nature of Dalit psychology through discussing Bakha’s equivocal status as a result of social discrimination and racial binary. It analyses the multifaceted dominations that the so-called elite class imposes on the subordinates who have taken these appalling social conditions for granted. Although not drawn from Dalit literature, a theoretical and critical reading reveals that William Shakespeare’s Shylock, Othello, and Caliban, Emily Bronte’s Heathcliff, Khaled Hosseini’s Ali, Hassan, and Sohrab bear significant resemblance to Bakha in terms of identity confusion. Using analytical methods drawn from post- colonialism and psychoanalysis, this article seeks to discuss Bakha’s psyche as a representation of the plight of the oppressed and Dalit people.
 
 

연령주류화의 개념과 정책적 기반 마련을 위한 담론

In recent years, attention has been paid to the mainstreaming issues in the process of policy to achieve equality among members of society. In this context, this study aimed to make practical suggestions to achieve successful age mainstreaming suitable for the context of Korean society while critically examining gender mainstreaming, which is being introduced and applied. Based on critical voices of gender mainstreaming, the practical limitations of gender mainstreaming as a government policy were observed in terms of confusion in the concept and policy process, and it was reviewed how to plan and implement age mainstreaming in Korean society. It also introduced the concepts and discussions of age mainstreaming raised by the UN and examined the operation of tools for successful age mainstreaming. In addition, overseas cases, where age mainstreaming has been introduced as a policy, settled as a government policy, and implemented socially and culturally, were briefly introduced and policy proposals that can be considered as age mainstreaming in Korea were reviewed. Finally, some important suggestions were made to establish the foundation for evaluating policy implementation and performance from the age perspectives, and to settle down successful age mainstreaming.

Meanings Expressed by Primary Schoolchildren When Solving a Partitioning Task

This study entailed an in-depth exploration of the meanings identified by a group of 105 fourth year primary schoolchildren when solving a task involving partitioning. The research was based on a semantic triangle consisting of a conceptual structure, representation systems, and sense. The content of children’s answers was analysed qualitatively. One of the most prominent findings was that purposes or usages were recognised based on multiple strategies, new categories of which, not envisaged in earlier research, were defined. Most of the students deployed graphic, verbal, and numerical representation and established relationships among them. Concepts such as the part-whole relationship and fractioning appeared in their description of conceptual structure, although errors were detected in terms of inequities and confusion between numerator and denominator.

Quasi judicial institutions in the civilization space for labor dispute resolution

This article examines conciliatory forms of proceedings for complaints and disputes related to the application of labor legislation or conditions of certain contracts that echo the past and modern period of extrajudicial forms; it also emphasizes that the period of the new economic policy was due to the phenomenon of rationalization and individualization of consciousness. The normative base of the conciliation and intermediary institutions of the early Soviet period is analyzed, and the competence of the assessment and conflict commissions is shown. The first norms of labor legislation emphasized democracy and attention to the literal mathematical equality of the parties during procedures for resolving conflicts and resolving cases, which has reference to the classical judicial principles of openness, publicity, transparency, and parity in proceedings, and allows us to make a reservation in terms of confusion and inconsistency and rationing the activities of all quasi-judicial institutions. Conciliation and mediation institutions, on the one hand, were built into the system of labor relations, and on the other hand, they are qualified as quasi-judicial, with all the signs of judicial activity. The relevance of the study lies in the fact that conciliatory activity in the civilizational space has been poorly studied, and in this regard, the study has historical significance, and has parallels with the practice of modern labor dispute commissions, conciliation commission, mediator, labor arbitration, arbitration court, mediator, lawyer, notary, and other conciliatory and intermediary institutions. Also, the parallels of the past years against the background of the reconstruction of archival materials and files according to the reports of the craft department of the workshop against the background of the industrial panorama of Belarusian cities in the 19th — early 20th centuries, the industrial appearance of the city of Minsk.

Eliminating Terms of Confusion: Resolving the Liberal–Republican Dispute

John Rawls thinks republicanism is compatible with his political liberalism. Philip Pettit insists that the two conflict in important ways. In this paper, I make sense of this dispute by employing David Chalmers’s method of elimination to reveal the meaning underlying key terms in Rawls’s political liberalism and Pettit’s republicanism. This procedure of disambiguating terms will show how the two theories defend the same institutional arrangement on the same grounds. The procedure thus vindicates Rawls’s view of the two theories being compatible. The reason for this compatibility is that both theories are politicized—that is, they are constructed to attract the compliance of all reasonable members of a modern, pluralistic society.

Patients with acute heart failure treated with the CARRESS-HF diuretic protocol in association with canrenoate potassium: Tolerance of high doses of canrenoate potassium

Oral mineralocorticoid receptor antagonists have failed to prove their efficacy for decongestion and potassium homeostasis in acute heart failure. Intravenous mineralocorticoid receptor antagonists have yet to be studied. The aim of this study was to confirm the safety of high-dose potassium canrenoate in association with classic diuretics in acute heart failure. This retrospective single-centre study included consecutive patients who were hospitalized with acute heart failure between 2013 and 2018. One hundred patients with overload treated with the standardized diuretic protocol from the CARRESS-HF trial were included. There were no exclusion criteria relating to creatinine or kalaemia at the time of admission. Two groups were constituted on the basis of potassium canrenoate posology: a low-dose group (<300mg/day) and a high-dose group (≥300mg/day); the groups were similar in terms of baseline characteristics. Mean daily potassium canrenoate doses were 198mg/day (range 100-280mg/day) in the low-dose group and 360mg/day (range 300-600mg/day) in the high-dose group. There was no significant difference between the high-dose and low-dose groups in terms of mortality, dialysis, renal function, hyperkalaemia, haemorrhage, sepsis or confusion. Potassium canrenoate at high doses can be used safely in association with standard diuretics in acute heart failure, even in patients with altered renal function. A prospective study is required to evaluate the efficacy of high-dose potassium canrenoate in preventing hypokalaemia and improving decongestion.

Zoopharmacology: A Way to Discover New Cancer Treatments.

Zoopharmacognosy is the multidisciplinary approach of the self-medication behavior of many kinds of animals. Recent studies showed the presence of antitumoral secondary metabolites in some of the plants employed by animals and their use for the same therapeutic purposes in humans. Other related and sometimes confused term is Zootherapy, which consists on the employment of animal parts and/or their by-products such as toxins, venoms, etc., to treat different human ailments. Therefore, the aim of this work is to provide a brief insight for the use of Zoopharmacology (comprising Zoopharmacognosy and Zootherapy) as new paths to discover drugs studying animal behavior and/or using compounds derived from animals. This work is focused on the approaches related to cancer, in order to propose a new promising line of research to overcome multidrug resistance (MDR). This novel subject will encourage the use of new alternative prospective ways to find new medicines.

Ethical challenges in family caregivers of patients with advanced cancer \u2013 a qualitative study

BackgroundCaring for patients with advanced or terminal diseases can confront family caregivers (FC) with ethical challenges. The present study aims at tracing paths connected to ethical challenges among FC of advanced cancer patients by exploring morally troubling situations and related burden, as well as strategies to handle the situation and experience of moral distress from the grieving FC’s perspective.MethodsWithin a qualitative design, interviews with 12 grieving FC were conducted using a semi-structured interview guide. Data were analysed using grounded theory and abductive reasoning.ResultsCore phenomena identified were two paths connected to ethical challenges among FC. Ethical challenges occurred in the context of difficult decision-making (Path 1) and in the context of lacking decision-making options when no decision was to be made by FC (Path 2). We found each path to be triggered by distinct sets of morally troubling situations that occurred during the patient’s disease trajectory. In the course of difficult decision-making (Path 1), detrimental external factors could add emotional stress, thus making the decision-making process burdensome. FC used various proactive strategies to overcome those detrimental factors and/or to make the decision. Decisions in conflict with FCs' own moral expectations and values led to moral distress, generating painful emotions. When no decision was to be made by FC (Path 2), FC felt powerless and overrun, which was associated with major emotionality in terms of anxiety and confusion. Either detrimental factors aggravated these feelings to paralyzing shock, or internal resources enabled FC to accept the situation. While acceptance prevented moral distress, paralyzing shock often caused a sense of not meeting their their own moral expectations and values, resulting in moral distress. In both paths, factors were identified that helped FC finding closure and prevented moral residue. Nevertheless, some FC experienced residual moral distress months after the morally troubling situation had occurred.ConclusionFindings provide first information towards understanding paths leading to ethical challenges in FC and can help clinicians to minimize associated emotional burden and moral distress.

Confused Terms in Ordinary Language

Confused terms appear to signify more than one entity. Carnap (Meaning and necessity, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1956) maintained that any putative name that is associated with more than one object in a relevant universe of discourse fails to be a genuine name. Although many philosophers have agreed with Carnap, they have not always agreed among themselves about the truth-values of atomic sentences containing such terms. Some hold that such atomic sentences are always false, and others claim they are always truth-valueless. Field (J Philos 70:462–481, 1973) maintained that confused terms can still refer, albeit partially, and offered a supervaluational account of their semantic properties on which some atomic sentences with confused terms can be true. After outlining many of the most important theoretical considerations for and against various semantic theories for such terms, we report the results of a study designed to investigate which of these accounts best accords with the truth-value judgments of ordinary language users about sentences containing these terms. We found that naive participants view confused names as capable of successfully referring to one or more objects. Thus, semantic theories that judge them to involve total reference failure do not comport well with patterns of ordinary usage.

Decoding listener’s attention :Can it be improved with behavioural measure of selective attention?

During the past decade, there has been growing interest in the neural correlates of selective attention to speech. In these studies, listeners were instructed to focus their attention on one of two concurrent speech streams. However, in everyday-life situations, a listener's attention can switch rapidly between different voices. Thus, we have developed a behavioural protocol to infer the dynamics of auditory attention over time. After listening to two simultaneous stories—a target and an interferer—the participants have to find, among a set of words, those present in the target story. The participant’s responses are then used to estimate, retrospectively, when their attention was directed toward the target, or toward the interferer. Neural data, recorded with EEG, and behavioural measures are combined to extract the brain's temporal response function in response to these stimuli. Moreover, to promote attention switches between the two voices, the interferers were uttered by the same talker as the target stories, but the voice parameters were manipulated to parametrically control the similarity of the two voices. We will discuss the results in terms of attentional selection and voice confusion, and suggest possible applications of this dynamic behavioral test of selective auditory attention.

Foregrounding ecojustice in conservation

Justice for nature remains a confused term. In recent decades justice has predominantly been limited to humanity, with a strong focus on social justice, and its spin-off – environmental justice for people. We first examine the formal rationale for ecocentrism and ecological ethics, as this underpins attitudes towards justice for nature, and show how justice for nature has been affected by concerns about dualisms and by strong anthropocentric bias. We next consider the traditional meaning of social justice, alongside the recent move by some scholars to push justice for nature into social justice, effectively weakening any move to place ecojustice centre-stage. This, we argue, is both unethical and doomed to failure as a strategy to protect life on Earth. The dominant meaning of ‘environmental justice’ – in essence, justice for humans in regard to environmental issues – is also explored. We next discuss what ecological justice (ecojustice) is, and how academia has ignored it for many decades. The charge of ecojustice being ‘antihuman’ is refuted. We argue that distributive justice can also apply to nature, including an ethic of bio-proportionality, and also consider how to reconcile social justice and ecojustice, arguing that ecojustice must now be foregrounded to ensure effective conservation. After suggesting a ‘Framework for implementing ecojustice’ for conservation practitioners, we conclude by urging academia to foreground ecojustice.

Predicting effects of hearing-instrument signal processing on consonant perception.

This study investigated the influence of hearing-aid (HA) and cochlear-implant (CI) processing on consonant perception in normal-hearing (NH) listeners. Measured data were compared to predictions obtained with a speech perception model [Zaar and Dau (2017). J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 141, 1051-1064] that combines an auditory processing front end with a correlation-based template-matching back end. In terms of HA processing, effects of strong nonlinear frequency compression and impulse-noise suppression were measured in 10 NH listeners using consonant-vowel stimuli. Regarding CI processing, the consonant perception data from DiNino et al. [(2016). J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 140, 4404-4418] were considered, which were obtained with noise-vocoded vowel-consonant-vowel stimuli in 12 NH listeners. The inputs to the model were the same stimuli as were used in the corresponding experiments. The model predictions obtained for the two data sets showed a large agreement with the perceptual data both in terms of consonant recognition and confusions, demonstrating the model's sensitivity to supra-threshold effects of hearing-instrument signal processing on consonant perception. The results could be useful for the evaluation of hearing-instrument processing strategies, particularly when combined with simulations of individual hearing impairment.

Do Exercisers With Musculoskeletal Injuries Report Symptoms of Depression and Stress?

Sports injuries in athletes can lead to negative emotional responses in terms of anger, anxiety, confusion, and sadness. Severe injuries can be understood as a stressful life event with increased levels of psychological distress, but injury assessment and rehabilitation typically focus on somatic symptoms. The primary aim of this study was to estimate the prevalence of depression and emotional stress and to measure self-rated health in regular exercisers presenting to a sports medicine clinic with musculoskeletal injury. The secondary aim was to identify psychosocial factors associated with depression in injured exercisers and the potential need for psychological counseling. A cross-sectional survey study. A sports medicine clinic for injuries of the foot, knee, or shoulder. Regular exercisers with present injuries (N = 694) and exercisers without injuries (N = 494). Regular exercisers were defined as those undertaking moderate exercise at least once a week. A questionnaire survey completed on paper by patients in a sports medicine clinic and a web-based version completed by online sports communities. Participants completed the Major Depression Inventory, Perceived Stress Scale, health-related quality of life, and questions on sociodemographics, exercise habits, and injury history. Symptoms of depression were reported by 12% of injured exercisers and 5% of noninjured controls (P < .001). Clinical stress was found in 30% of injured exercisers and 22% of controls (P = .002), and the EQ-5D-5L Visual Analog Scale score was lower for injured (69 [SD = 19]) than noninjured exercisers (87 [SD = 13], P < .001). Injured exercisers with symptoms of depression reported high stress levels and impaired daily functioning, were younger, and were more likely to have over 10 days injury-related work absence. The authors recommend psychological assessment of exercisers attending a sports medicine clinic for musculoskeletal injury and a supplemental clinical psychological interview for suspected depression or stress-related psychopathology.

Predicting consonant recognition and confusions using a microscopic speech perception model

The perception of consonants has been investigated in various studies and shown to critically depend on fine details in the stimuli. The present study proposes a microscopic speech perception model that combines an auditory processing front end with a correlation-based template-matching back end to predict consonant recognition and confusions. The model represents an extension of the auditory signal processing model by Dau et al. [(1997), J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 102, 2892-2905] toward predicting microscopic speech perception data. Model predictions were computed for the extensive consonant perception data set provided by Zaar and Dau [(2015), J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 138, 1253-1267], obtained with consonant-vowels (CVs) in white noise. The predictions were in good agreement with the perceptual data both in terms of consonant recognition and confusions. The model was further evaluated with respect to perceptual artifacts induced by (i) different hearing-aid signal processing strategies and (ii) simulated cochlear-implant processing, based on data from DiNino et al. [(2016), J. Acoust. Soc. Am., 140, 4404-4418]. The model successfully predicted the strong consonant confusions measured in these conditions. Overall, the results suggest that the proposed model may provide a valuable framework for assessing acoustic transmission channels and hearing-instrument signal processing.

A Fuzzy Graph Framework for Initializing k-Means

k-Means is among the most significant clustering algorithms for vectors chosen from an underlying space S. Its applications span a broad range of fields including machine learning, image and signal processing, and Web mining. Since the introduction of k-Means, two of its major design parameters remain open to research. The first is the number of clusters to be formed and the second is the initial vectors. The latter is also inherently related to selecting a density measure for S. This article presents a two-step framework for estimating both parameters. First, the underlying vector space is represented as a fuzzy graph. Afterwards, two algorithms for partitioning a fuzzy graph to non-overlapping communities, namely Fuzzy Walktrap and Fuzzy Newman-Girvan, are executed. The former is a low complexity evolving heuristic, whereas the latter is deterministic and combines a graph communication metric with an exhaustive search principle. Once communities are discovered, their number is taken as an estimate of the true number of clusters. The initial centroids or seeds are subsequently selected based on the density of S. The proposed framework is modular, allowing thus more initialization schemes to be derived. The secondary contributions of this article are HI, a similarity metric for vectors with numerical and categorical entries and the assessment of its stochastic behavior, and TD, a metric for assessing cluster confusion. The aforementioned framework has been implemented mainly in C# and partially in C++ and its performance in terms of efficiency, accuracy, and cluster confusion was experimentally assessed. Post-processing results conducted with MATLAB indicate that the evolving community discovery algorithm approaches the performance of its deterministic counterpart with considerably less complexity.

Spatiotemporal proximity effects in visual short-term memory examined by target-nontarget analysis.

Visual short-term memory (VSTM) is a limited-capacity system that holds a small number of objects online simultaneously, implying that competition for limited storage resources occurs (Phillips, 1974). How the spatial and temporal proximity of stimuli affects this competition is unclear. In this 2-experiment study, we examined the effect of the spatial and temporal separation of real-world memory targets and erroneously selected nontarget items examined during location-recognition and object-recall tasks. In Experiment 1 (the location-recognition task), our test display comprised either the picture or name of 1 previously examined memory stimulus (rendered above as the stimulus-display area), together with numbered square boxes at each of the memory-stimulus locations used in that trial. Participants were asked to report the number inside the square box corresponding to the location at which the cued object was originally presented. In Experiment 2 (the object-recall task), the test display comprised a single empty square box presented at 1 memory-stimulus location. Participants were asked to report the name of the object presented at that location. In both experiments, nontarget objects that were spatially and temporally proximal to the memory target were confused more often than nontarget objects that were spatially and temporally distant (i.e., a spatiotemporal proximity effect); this effect generalized across memory tasks, and the object feature (picture or name) that cued the test-display memory target. Our findings are discussed in terms of spatial and temporal confusion "fields" in VSTM, wherein objects occupy diffuse loci in a spatiotemporal coordinate system, wherein neighboring locations are more susceptible to confusion. (PsycINFO Database Record

Legacies and Memorializations in the Intergenerational Transmission of Psychic Life: Psychoanalytic Notes on Some of the Ways in Which Sons Assume Their Father's Mantle.

The intergenerational transmission of psychic life has been difficult to explore psychoanalytically given that a treatment of both parent and child is rarely, if ever, feasible. Here the issue is explored in terms of father-son relationships. Three legendary fathers (Abraham, Laius, Shiva) are discussed as illustrating the filicidal legacy they imposed psychically and corporeally on their sons. Three contemporary case vignettes are then presented, indicating ways in which sons ambivalently memorialize their fathers. This material provides a model as to some of the ways in which sons assume the mantle of the father's conscious and unconscious dynamics in the course of their personal history. Paternal legacies generate "memorializations" that express profound and poignant conflicts animating the son's psychic life. In the context of this investigation, the significance of the distinction between actual fathers or father figures (who are mortal, who possess some sort of gendered qualities, and who may be present or absent, emotionally and physically) and the "symbolic father" (who is the locus of the phallus that organizes the possibility of representational discourse) is discussed. It is suggested that boys and men typically develop in terms of confusions around this distinction. The oedipal conundrum and challenge of the boy's passage into manhood is then formulated as follows: Masculinity involves both the integration of patricidal desire (in response to the paternal legacy) and the mourning of actual fathers or father figures. It also involves the acceptance of the human condition, which is both that of mortality and of our "castratedness" in relation to the "symbolic father" as the locus of the phallus (the only one who knows whereof "He" speaks and acts, and who can neither be mourned nor surpassed).