Methodological Merits Research Articles

Professional Learning Through Arts-Inspired Collaborative Self-Study: Growing from the Inside Out with Rippling Effect

ABSTRACT Self-study research challenges professionals to closely examine their practices, the decisions and actions that shape them, and their commitment to their own development. Focusing on the self is not about navel-gazing but deepening professional learning to better serve others. We are three teacher educators from research-intensive institutions who have collaborated for over ten years, integrating the arts into self-study methodology to address critical educational challenges in South Africa. This study employed a multilayered approach to explore how and why arts-inspired collaborative self-study as a mode of professional learning both sustains our engagement and motivates us to do more as teacher educators and researchers. Our data sources were a) three published articles demonstrating our self-study research, b) rich pictures we each produced to answer our research questions, and c) voice notes elucidating our drawings. Data analysis involved crafting a collective poem using words and phrases extracted from tweets based on the voice notes. Combining multiple data sources with creative representation and analysis enabled us to depict and view our professional learning in various forms. Dialoguing with each other and critical friends, followed by poetic feedback from a diverse group of conference attendees, expanded our insights. Our creative interactions demonstrated the professional and methodological merit of inviting many perspectives and approaches to self-study. Multiple viewpoints and inventive methods increase self-study research’s potential for enriching professional learning within a creative and resourceful community.

A brief review on quantum computing based drug design

AbstractDesign and development of new drug molecules are essential for the survival of human society. New drugs are designed for therapeutic purposes to combat new diseases. Besides treating new diseases, new drug development is also needed to treat pre‐existing diseases more effectively and reduce the existing drugs' side effects. The design of drugs involves several steps, from the discovery of the drug molecule to its commercialization in the market. One of the most critical steps in drug design is to find the molecular interactions between the target (infected) molecule and the drug molecule. Several complex chemical equations need to be solved to determine the molecular interactions. In the late 20th Century, the advancement of computational technologies has made the solution of chemical equations relatively easier and faster. Moreover, the design of drug molecules involves multi‐criteria optimization. Classical computational methodologies have been used for drug design since the end of the 20th Century. However, nowadays, more advanced computational methodologies are inevitable in designing drugs for new diseases and drugs with fewer side effects. In this context, the quantum computing paradigm has proved beneficial in drug design due to its advanced computational capabilities. This paper presents a state‐of‐the‐art comprehensive review of the quantum computing‐based methodologies involved in drug design. A comparative study is made about the different quantum‐aided drug design methods, stating each methodology's merits and demerits. The review work presented in this manuscript will help new researchers assess the present state‐of‐the‐art concept of quantum‐based drug design.This article is categorized under: Technologies > Structure Discovery and Clustering Technologies > Computational Intelligence Application Areas > Health Care

Interplay of Ethical Leadership and Openness to Experience on Readiness for Change and Outcomes

Ethical leadership influences employee outcomes (creativity) through their readiness to adapt, according to the current study model, which draws inspiration from social learning theory. An ethically led workforce, according to the idea, encourages high levels of innovation and flexibility among workers. This study also provided support for the hypothesis that leaders with high levels of openness to experience are more likely to be ethical leaders, and that this correlation is stronger in leaders with low levels of openness to experience. A quantitative research methodology was used to assess the results. Due to the adoption of a time-lag research strategy, 317 participants were included in the sample. The data came from a variety of sectors in Pakistan. The findings lend support to the idea that employees' flexibility mediates the relationship between moral leadership and creativity. Another noteworthy link between change readiness and ethical leadership is moderated by openness to experience, according to the research. This is the result of the present study's analysis of its theoretical and methodological merits, as well as its implications and future research limitations.

“They want you to know who they really are inside of the old visage”—biographical storytelling as a methodological tool to explore emotional challenges in old age

BackgroundGrowing older is often associated with resilience, contentedness and inner growth. Older people however are also at risk of confronting unique emotional challenges as a result of varied ageing-related experiences. By employing a biographical lens, we aim to introduce storytelling as a methodological tool to more holistically explore older people’s emotional challenges and to improve their wellbeing.MethodsBuilding upon theoretical understandings about the narrative construction of identity across the life span, we draw upon a qualitative study about older people’s loneliness as an example to showcase the methodological value and feasibility of biographical storytelling. We aim to better understand the nuanced and sometimes painful emotional experiences that can be encountered alongside ageing.ResultsFindings from the qualitative study we showcase, highlight that unique emotional pains and the (in)ability to deal with such in old age could be deeply rooted in older people’s earlier lives. These findings contextualise people’s emotional challenges and needs within their identity, as a narrative thread that links their past, present and expected future. As such, our example study shows that emotional challenges in old age are not only ageing-related, but can be more fundamentally connected to disruptions to the ongoing flow of narrative identity construction.ConclusionThe highly retrospective and reflexive nature of these findings illustrates the methodological merit of biographical storytelling. We argue that the impact of biographical storytelling can go further than both conventional semi-structured narrative interviews and existing interventional tools. Instead, it is a particularly useful research methodology to explore human experiences and needs in the unique context of ageing. This methodological development thus provides an insightful analytical lens to explore how older people’s earlier life experiences may be carried forward and confronted to shape their emotional stability in the present and future stages of their ageing lives. Beyond the methodological significance, we further demonstrate the benefits of empowering older people to reconstruct their ageing lives in the context of their biography.

Development and validation of a multi-dimensional COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy questionnaire

BackgroundSince the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, vaccines have been developed to tackle the disease. However, many people worldwide were not confident enough to take the vaccines. Developing a questionnaire to measure COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy will give the health authorities and policymakers a clear picture to establish appropriate interventions addressing vaccine hesitancy among the community. MethodsIn this study, we used a mixed-method design over two phases. Phase 1 entailed a qualitative approach to developing the questionnaire, including a literature search, expert panel review, and focus group discussion. Phase 2 used a quantitative method for establishing the content and construct validity of the questionnaire via exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis (EFA & CFA). Internal consistency was checked using Cronbach's Alpha and intraclass correlation coefficient. ResultsWe developed a 50-item instrument designed to measure COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among adults in the state of Qatar. The study involved 545 adult participants. In terms of content validity, our study showed a value of 0.92 for the scale-level content validity index based on the average and a value of 0.76 for the scale-level content validity index - universal agreement. In the EFA, the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy was calculated at 0.78, with statistical significance (P = 0.001). Regarding model fit indices of the seven-factor model, our findings showed an acceptable model-data-fit, with a relative chi-square: 1.7 (<3), Root mean square error of approximation: 0.05 (<0.08), PCLOSE = 0.41, Comparative fit index: 0.909, Tucker-Lewis index: 0.902, Incremental Fit Index: 0.910 and, Standardized Root mean square residual: 0.067 (<0.08). The seven-factor model of the questionnaire met the criterion of good internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha = 0.73). ConclusionThis tool is deemed of methodological merits in terms of validity, reliability, and determining the underlying conceptual structure of COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy and its associating factors.

Online Dating Scam Victims Psychological Impact Analysis

In an era of widespread mass marketing scams on the Internet, many victims have reported varying degrees of financial loss and psychological damage after encountering lottery scams and advance payment scams. Among them, the emotional damage to victims of online dating scams may be even more severe because the whole scam process involves mental attachment, sexual abuse, and relationship breakdown. There is little help and support for victims throughout the scam process and even after the scam is over, which not only makes it difficult for victims to get timely and professional assistance after experiencing online scams, but victims even run the risk of being scammed by criminals again afterward, so timely help and professional psychological treatment for victims is of positive significance. In previous studies, there are fewer reports summarizing and analyzing the psychological conditions of victims. In this paper, we will summarize the psychological problems of victims of online dating scams and compare the psychological treatment needed by victims of online dating scams who experience online aggression with the psychological treatment needed by victims who are actually violated in reality. For example, professional treatment for real victims of sexual assault has methodological merit for victims of online fraud, methods of privacy and psychological protection for victims of online romance fraud, criteria for measuring psychological status, and more. These are all measures to promote enhanced victim care and the prevention of online dating fraud throughout the industry.

Can Emotion Be Transferred?—A Review on Transfer Learning for EEG-Based Emotion Recognition

The issue of electroencephalogram (EEG)-based emotion recognition has great academic and practical significance. Currently, there are numerous research trying to address this issue in the literature. Particularly, transfer learning has gradually become a new methodological trend for the issue in company with the popularity of deep learning. Motivated by capturing the research panorama, summarizing the technological essence, and forecasting the advancement tendency of transfer learning for EEG-based emotion recognition, this article contributes a review work. This work mainly includes five aspects: 1) introducing the issue of EEG-based emotion recognition and expounding the importance of transfer learning for it; 2) analyzing the transfer learning framework and comparing it with the traditional ones; 3) elucidating the issue difficulties and explaining the suitability and capability of transfer learning for this issue; 4) summarizing, categorizing, and exemplifying the typical transfer learning methods for this issue; and 5) clarifying the methodological merits, discussing the challenging problems, and predicting the prospective development of transfer learning for the issue. We expect these contributions can inspire innovation and reformation of the transfer learning methodology for EEG-based emotion recognition as well as other relevant topics in the not-so-far future.

Development of a multi-physic platform OLYMPE for magnet fusion design: Progresses update and applications

In the framework of tokamak design studies, the magnet system dimensioning stands as a crucial point, magnets being strong drivers for reactor performances. In this aim superconducting magnets design path to manufacture and integration should undergo several stages of development, including the detailed analysis for defined operation cases. Those studies are linked to several physic domains (electromagnetics, mechanics, thermohydraulics, thermal) that all show interdependances between each other. In this objective, the platform OLYMPE was developed at CEA, aiming at addressing those complex multi-physic problems in an integrated simulation tool, expected to improve the efficiency of the design workflow involving macroscopic and detailed analyses.The different OLYMPE submodules will be described and their dedicated simulation domain explained, together with the logic that led to the choice of specific modules interconnection. In fact several combinations of those modules are built in coupled mode so to ensure converging design loops. Their major role is to assess the refinement of magnet design at detailed scale in the objective to increase magnet design accuracy. Namely illustrating examples will be given with following loops:- TF system design coupled with thermohydraulics: it ensures the compliance of TF design with temperature margin criterion.- TF system design coupled with electromagnetics: it ensures the compliance of TF design with topologically-induced magnetic field map.- Overall TF design coupled with thermohydraulics and cryogenics: it ensures the optimization of TF design and its operation conditions with overall system merits (e.g. cost factor).- TF system design coupled with mechanics: it ensures the compliance of TF design with local stress criterion.The outcomes and methodological merits of these loops will be illustrated by applications on DEMO configurations, and performances cross-checks or comparisons with simpler models will also be provided to quantify the accuracy enhancement.Furthermore the management of the overall input database and the GUI interface will be presented in the aim of improving tool operability.Finally discussions on this emerging OLYMPE tool qualities will also be exposed, including calculation performances merits and further development perspectives.

“We Have to Survive, First”: Speculative Ethnographies of Chinese Student Experience During COVID-19

Our speculative ethnography of Chinese student experience in the United States during COVID-19 weds the tradition of speculative fiction (exemplified by the likes of Margaret Atwood and Octavia Butler) and digital autoethnography. The study is two-pronged: First, we articulate/map the methodological merits of speculative and digital autoethnography as particularly conducive to the crisis context of COVID-19 and its accompanying social isolation; second, we deploy said methodology within a population of nine Chinese students “trapped” in the United States during the COVID-19 period.

Crustal strain-rate fields estimated from GNSS data with a Bayesian approach and its correlation to seismic activity in Mainland China

We propose a new Bayesian approach to estimate continuous crustal strain-rate fields from spatially discrete displacement-rate data, based on Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) observations, under the prior constraint on spatial flatness of the strain-rate fields. The optimal values of the hyperparameters in the model of strain-rate fields are determined by using Akaike's Bayesian Information Criterion. A methodological merit of this approach is that, by introducing a two-layer Delaunay tessellation technique, the time-consuming computation of strain rates can be omitted through the model estimation process. We apply the Bayesian approach to GNSS displacement-rate data in Mainland China to obtain a unique GNSS velocity field for sub-regions with different tectonic backgrounds. We also examine the correlation between the estimated strain-rate fields and seismic activity by using the Molchan Error Diagram. The results show that the rate of maximum shear strain is positively correlated with the occurrence of earthquakes, indicating the strain rate can be used to augment probabilistic earthquake models for background seismicity forecasting.

Exploring associations with mathematics dispositions: a novel perspective combining measurement and set-theoretic analytical approaches

ABSTRACT In this paper, we approach modelling mathematics dispositions from a different methodological perspective in order to shed more light into the complex interplay between teaching practices and students’ learning outcomes. We draw on survey data from around 5000 students from Year 7–11 (age 11–16) from 40 Secondary schools in England. Our methodological approach includes Rasch modelling to produce measures of attitudinal outcomes as well as students’ perceptions of pedagogic practices. We then employ fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fs/QCA) to explore the relationships between students’ characteristics and the perceived type of teaching they receive in mathematics. We use two measures of ‘transmissionist teaching’ which aim to quantify the degree to which teaching practices are perceived as ‘teacher-centred’. One measure gives the students’ perceptions and the other gives the teacher’s perspective. We find that different configurations of student and teacher perceptions of transmissionist teaching are associated with high and low mathematical dispositions for different year groups and for boys and girls. We discuss the methodological merits of this approach along with the substantive educational implications of these findings.

Livelihood intervention and mental well-being among women living with HIV in Delhi

ABSTRACT Poverty-alleviation programmes aimed to improved mental well-being among persons living with HIV (PLWH) in low and middle income countries have underscored the importance of understanding how and why such programmes work. We present findings from a six-month ethnographic process evaluation of Kiran, an economic livelihood programme locally designed to improve mental well-being among women affected by HIV in Delhi, India. In addition to benefits of improved economic standing, we found that supportive relationships cultivated among participants (n = 9) and with providers (n = 3) provided respite from worry about their illness and reframed what was relationally and practically possible in the context of living with HIV. In acquiring marketable craft skills with peers, participants challenged internalized scripts of being socially devalued and regained agency about their abilities to contribute to their community and support their children’s immediate and future needs. We found that the benefits of Kiran weighed less on the direct alleviation of mental distress and more on the instillation of hope for their children. Our findings exemplify the importance of re-visiting a priori theories that inform interventions for PLWH and highlight the methodological merits of ethnographic approaches that underscore how theory and intervention praxis are bidirectionally informed.

Inside the black box: A micro-sociological analysis of sport for development

Sport for development research increasingly seeks to move beyond a focus on evidence of sport for development outcomes to better understand the mechanisms and contexts that underpin these outcomes. Building on recent innovations in micro-sociology, which highlight the role of emotions and bodily entrainment in face-to-face interactions, this paper critically examines, and aims to progress, efforts to open the ‘black box’ of sport for development outcomes and impacts. The authors argue that the theoretical and methodological merits of radical micro-sociology, and interaction ritual theory in particular, enable important advances in the field of sport for development. The paper proposes micro-sociological questions and practical directions for sport for development research but also outlines the limitations of this approach.

Origins of Kazakhstan identity and modernization of public consciousness

One of the most important priorities in the formation and development of multinational Kazakhstan as an independent and competitive state was the promotion of the idea of interethnic harmony and stability in the young state. The first President – Elbasy N.A. Nazarbayev has repeatedly emphasized that harmony in society, unity of the people and stability are the main assets that form the basis of Kazakhstan’s statehood. Kazakhstan, being a unique example of interethnic harmony, peace and stability in the Central Asian region and the world space, has managed to attract the attention of public and state figures, scientists from many foreign countries with its achievements in the field of interethnic relations. This is evidenced by various articles and works of many well-known foreign figures who draw attention to the Kazakhstani model of interethnic harmony, rightly called the model of Nursultan Nazarbayev. In this article, the authors tried to find key arguments in favor of the methodological merits of the First President of the Republic of Kazakhstan – N. Nazarbayev’s Kazakhtani model of interethnic harmony and civil unity. Gives the author’s definition and concept of «identity». The authors assigns a special role to the Assembly of the People of Kazakhstan, as the most important institution for instilling Kazakh patriotism among our youth. The authors concludes: «the civilizational choice made by Kazakhstan in favor of preserving cultural diversity turned out to be deeply thought out». He draws an interesting analogy between the concepts of «identity» and the concept of «civilization». Another advantage of this article is the assertion of its author about the indisputable role of N. Nazarbayev’s programmatic article – «Course towards the future: modernization of Kazakhstan’s identity». Today, according to him, the modernization of the consciousness of Kazakhstan is the formation of a modern perception of the world is the most important task. Without the implementation of this presidential task, it is impossible to carry out economic reforms, political modernization and, of course, it is impossible to create the foundations of Kazakhstani identity

Exploring sources of China's CO2 emission: Decomposition analysis under different technology changes

This study proposes a decomposition approach based upon data envelopment analysis that identifies various sources of CO2 emission. In addition to the previously identified seven sources, we propose three new ones. As an empirical application, this study applies the proposed approach to examine ten sources of CO2 emission across Chinese provinces from 2008 to 2015. In the empirical study, we overcome methodological difficulties related to (a) what methodological merits of technology change indexes are and how to measure them in a separated manner and (b) how to separate effects of various sources and how to identify the annual shift of those sources of CO2 emission changes. This study finds three empirical implications. First, three sources may increase the amount of CO2 emission. They include an economic activity, a technology change on a desirable output and a potential energy intensity change. Second, two sources are important in reducing the amount of CO2 emission. They are an operational efficiency change on a desirable output and a change in energy saving technology. Finally, conflicting results exist in some sources in the manner that they increase CO2 emission in some provinces but decrease it in the other provinces.

Roles of cardiac sympathetic neuroimaging in autonomic medicine.

Sympathetic neuroimaging is based on the injection of compounds that either radiolabel sites of the cell membrane norepinephrine transporter (NET) or that are taken up into sympathetic nerves via the NET and radiolabel intra-neuronal catecholamine storage sites. Detection of the radioactivity is by planar or tomographic radionuclide imaging. The heart stands out among body organs in terms of the intensity of radiolabeling of sympathetic nerves, and virtually all of sympathetic neuroimaging focuses on the left ventricular myocardium. The most common cardiac sympathetic neuroimaging method worldwide is 123I-metaiodobenzylguanidine (123I-MIBG) scanning. 123I-MIBG scanning is used routinely in Europe and East Asia in the diagnostic evaluation of neurogenic orthostatic hypotension (nOH), to distinguish Lewy body diseases (e.g., Parkinson disease with orthostatic hypotension (OH), pure autonomic failure) from non-Lewy body diseases (e.g., multiple system atrophy) and to distinguish dementia with Lewy bodies from Alzheimer's disease. In the USA, 123I-MIBG scanning has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration for the evaluation of pheochromocytoma and some forms of heart failure-but not for the above-mentioned differential diagnoses. Positron emission tomographic methods based on imaging agents such as 18F-dopamine are categorized as research tools, despite more than a quarter century of clinical experience with these modalities. Considering that 123I-MIBG scanning is available at most academic medical centers in the USA, cardiac sympathetic neuroimaging by this methodology merits consideration as an autonomic test, especially in patients with nOH.

Should Metaphysics Care About Linguistics?

Naturalized metaphysics is based on the idea that philosophy should be guided by the sciences. The paradigmatic science that is relevant for metaphysics is physics because physics tells us what fundamental reality is ultimately like. There are other sciences, however, that de facto play a role in philosophical inquiries about what there is, one of them being the science of language, i.e. linguistics. In this paper I will be concerned with the question what role linguistics should and does play for the metametaphysical question of how our views about fundamental reality can be reconciled with the everyday truisms about what there is. I will present several examples of two kinds of approaches to this question, linguistics-based accounts and purely philosophical accounts, and will discuss their respective methodological merits and shortcomings. In the end I will argue that even proponents of a purely philosophical answer to the metametaphysical question should take the results of linguistics seriously.

An ontology-driven, case-based clinical decision support model for removable partial denture design.

We present the initial work toward developing a clinical decision support model for specific design of removable partial dentures (RPDs) in dentistry. We developed an ontological paradigm to represent knowledge of a patient’s oral conditions and denture component parts. During the case-based reasoning process, a cosine similarity algorithm was applied to calculate similarity values between input patients and standard ontology cases. A group of designs from the most similar cases were output as the final results. To evaluate this model, the output designs of RPDs for 104 randomly selected patients were compared with those selected by professionals. An area under the curve of the receiver operating characteristic (AUC-ROC) was created by plotting true-positive rates against the false-positive rate at various threshold settings. The precision at position 5 of the retrieved cases was 0.67 and at the top of the curve it was 0.96, both of which are very high. The mean average of precision (MAP) was 0.61 and the normalized discounted cumulative gain (NDCG) was 0.74 both of which confirmed the efficient performance of our model. All the metrics demonstrated the efficiency of our model. This methodology merits further research development to match clinical applications for designing RPDs. This paper is organized as follows. After the introduction and description of the basis for the paper, the evaluation and results are presented in Section 2. Section 3 provides a discussion of the methodology and results. Section 4 describes the details of the ontology, similarity algorithm, and application.

Regarding realities: Using photo-based projective techniques to elicit normative and alternative discourses on gender, relationships, and sexuality in Mozambique

ABSTRACTThis paper argues for the methodological merit of photo-based projective techniques (PT) in formative HIV communication research. We used this technique in Mozambique to study multiple sexual partnerships (MSPs) and the roles of social and gender norms in promoting or discouraging these behaviours. Facilitators used ambiguous photographs and vignettes to ease adult men and women into discussions of sexual risk behaviour and HIV transmission. Visuals upheld a third-person perspective in discussions, enabling participants to safely project their worldviews onto the photographed characters, and indirectly share their attitudes, normative environments, personal and peer experiences, perceived risks and benefits, and theories about motivations for extramarital sex. Visually grounded storylines contained rich detail about the circumstances and interpersonal conversations that contextualise MSP behaviour and norms. The research yielded findings about conflicting social practices of public encouragement and private disapproval. Despite concerns around the verifiability of PTs, the repetition and convergence in the elicited conversations – and confirmation through subsequent campaign design and evaluation – suggest these techniques can reliably elicit information for formative public health and communication research on psychosocial and normative factors.

A Systematic Review of Suicidality in People with Intellectual Disabilities.

Suicidality in people with intellectual disability has not been extensively researched. To identify the nature of the research that has actually been conducted on this topic. A search of research databases was conducted according to predefined criteria. Key information was extracted and rated for methodological merit. Twenty-four studies met the inclusion criteria for this systematic review. The aspects of suicidality investigated, which varied among studies, included suicidal attempts, behavior, ideation, and completed suicide. Thirteen studies highlighted risk factors for suicidality in this population. The most frequently noted risk factors were a concurrent mental health difficulty and the level of intellectual disability. Eight studies referred to people with intellectual disabilities' understanding of the concept of death or suicide. Various methodological issues were identified in the studies included. In what we believe to be first systematic review of suicidality in people with intellectual disabilities, it was apparent that well-designed, standardized research studies on the topic are scarce. There is consequently limited evidence to guide prevention and intervention strategies for suicidality in this population.