Semantic Validation Research Articles

ADAPTAÇÃO E VALIDAÇÃO DE CHECKLIST DE SEGURANÇA CIRÚRGICA NA CESÁREA

RESUMO Objetivo: adaptar e validar um instrumento de segurança cirúrgica na cesárea, com base em revisão integrativa da literatura, e no protocolo e checklist de segurança cirúrgica da Organização Mundial da Saúde. Método: estudo metodológico, com triangulação de dados, envolvendo um total de 43 participantes, sendo oito juízes para a validação de conteúdo e aparente do instrumento, utilizando-se a técnica Delphi, e para a validação semântica outros 35 profissionais da equipe cirúrgica de um hospital público do Distrito Federal, Brasil. Foi aplicado o coeficiente de confiabilidade ao instrumento. Resultados: o instrumento alcançou índice de validade de conteúdo geral de 0,9 e concordância interavaliadores de 1. O coeficiente total do alfa de Cronbach foi de 0,86, e a média dos escores das dimensões obteve notas elevadas. Conclusão: o instrumento apresentou validade nos três critérios estudados e confiabilidade para ser aplicado em futuros estudos que avaliem a segurança cirúrgica na cesárea.

Instrumento avaliativo de necessidades em saúde de pessoas com deficiência: estudo metodológico

Aim: To describe the semantic validation process of an instrument for assessing health needs for people with physical, hearing and visual impairment (IANS-PcDFAV). Method: This is a methodological study carried out between April and May 2016, regarding the semantic and appearance validation stage. Eight disabled persons, registered in three support institutions, responded to three instruments: general and specific impression questionnaire and the IANS-PcDFAV. Brainstorm technique was used. It was analyzed by descriptive statistics and by the frequency of the presented answers. Results: The instrument was considered important or very important, with items that are easy to understand. Of the 32 original items, eight were changed for the better understanding and four were negativated, one in each dimension. Conclusion: The instrument was comprehensible for all strata of the studied population, confirming it as valid in terms of semantics and appearance.

Translation and adaptation of a questionnaire on the needs of postpartum adolescents.

Describe the processes of translation to the Portuguese language and cultural adaptation of the Postpartum Learning Needs (PLN) to the Portuguese context. Methodological study of an instrument that was constructed and validated in Jordan. Here are presented the procedures referring to linguistic, semantic and cultural validation, involving the stages of translation from English to European Portuguese, synthesis of translations, back-translation to the original language, expert committee, and pre-testing. In the translation process, some vocabulary variations were solved through consensus among translators. The expert committee found that the version translated to Portuguese presented semantic, idiomatic, cultural and conceptual equivalence, while needing some adjustments. Pre-testing was applied to 45 adolescent mothers, of whom 86.6% considered the items comprehensible. Semantic, idiomatic, cultural and conceptual equivalences were conceptually satisfactory among questionnaire versions, which is relevant for the Portuguese culture and easily understandable. It is crucial to assess the psychometric properties of the questionnaire so its adapted version can be made available.

Ethical Mission Definition and Execution for Maritime Robots Under Human Supervision

Experts and practitioners have worked long and hard toward achieving functionally capable robots. While numerous areas of progress have been achieved, ethical control of unmanned systems meeting legal requirements has been elusive and problematic. Common conclusions that treat ethical robots as an always-amoral philosophical conundrum requiring undemonstrated morality-based artificial intelligence are simply not sensible or repeatable. Patterning after successful practice by human teams shows that precise mission definition and task execution using well-defined, syntactically valid vocabularies is a necessary first step. Addition of operational constraints enables humans to place limits on robot activities, even when operating at a distance under gapped communications. Semantic validation can then be provided by a Mission Execution Ontology to confirm that no logical or legal contradictions are present in mission orders. Thorough simulation, testing, and certification of qualified robot responses are necessary to build human authority and trust when directing ethical robot operations at a distance. Together these capabilities can provide safeguards for autonomous robots possessing the potential for lethal force. This approach appears to have broad usefulness for both civil and military application of unmanned systems at sea.

A unified algorithm to automatic semantic composition using multilevel workflow orchestration

As a result of state-of-the-art development in service oriented architecture, we need a composition framework and comprehensive algorithm to discover and compose the web services from different environments. In this paper, we present a unified semantic-oriented framework with corresponding algorithm for automatic web service composition that integrates the comprehensive process of modified multistage composition and rigor of web semantics. Our proposed unified algorithm introduces the novel features through modified five stage composition such as transformation of non-functional properties of user requirements to all stages, optimization and semantic validation of abstract workflows using workflow automata, annotating WSDL files with additional ontologies using ontology based service repository, adopting dynamic change of user requirements for discovering candidate services, and selecting most optimal services for concrete composition using non-functional properties are effectively represented. Feasible composition solution obtained for user complex requirements through semantic web service discovery mechanism for discovering and selecting the most suitable service candidates. Furthermore, our unified algorithm can provide a composition solution through wider acceptance of semantics-oriented documents such as web ontology language for services and web service modeling ontology. We evaluate the proposed unified algorithm for automatic generation of composition using our motivating scenario, namely, home loan approval inference process. We also evaluate algorithm for automated and dynamic composition on service repositories of various sizes in increasing the levels of nesting and present the performance results.

ANALISIS MUATAN PENDIDIKAN KARAKTER DALAM BUKU TEKS KURIKULUM 2013 KELAS III SD SEMESTER 1

The aim of this study is to describe character education content of the third grade elementary school curriculum 2013 textbook semester 1. The design of this study was content analysis by qualitative approach. Subject of this study is textbook of curriculum 2013 semester 1 for the third grade of elementary school students. Object of this study is character education content. The data collected by reading and recording of unit analysis. The unit analysis were materials and evaluation that integrated the values of character education in the textbooks. The instrument used in this research was the analysis sheet based on the theories. The validity of the instrument and the data used was semantic validity and expert judgment. The reliability of the data used the stability and reproducibility. The techniques of analyzing data consisted of unitizing, sampling, recording, reducing, inferring, and narrating. The results of this study show that most of the character education value was spread into every theme, although some indicators were not found. Distribution of each character value, by disregarding any indicators, evenly on all themes. However, these findings prove that a particular character value investment is not focused as in the relevant theory. Keywords: analysis, character education content

Discomfort associated with dental extraction surgery and development of a questionnaire (QCirDental). Part I: Impacts and internal consistency

The scope of this study was to develop and validate a questionnaire (QCirDental) to measure the impacts associated with dental extraction surgery. The QCirDental questionnaire was developed in two steps; (1) question and item generation and selection, and (2) pretest of the questionnaire with evaluation of the its measurement properties (internal consistency and responsiveness). The sample was composed of 123 patients. None of the patients had any difficulty in understanding the QCirDental. The instrument was found to have excellent internal consistency with Cronbach's alpha reliability coefficient of 0.83. The principal component analysis (Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy 0,72 and Bartlett's Test of Sphericity with p < 0.001) showed six (6) dimensions explaining 67.5% of the variance. The QCirDental presented excellent internal consistency, being a questionnaire that is easy to read and understand with adequate semantic and content validity. More than 80% of the patients who underwent dental extraction reported some degree of discomfort within the perioperative period which highlights the necessity to assess the quality of care and impacts of dental extraction surgery.

Validation of a Short Version of a Self-rated Instrument Designed to Measure Attitudes towards Domestic Violence

Violence against women has been recognized as an important public health problem. It is present in every culture around the globe but its local manifestations are highly dependent on social and cultural norms of the society which permeates it. Therefore, to provide a more robust assessment of the effectiveness of a domestic violence prevention programmes promoted by Singapore Committee for UN Women, Singapore, semantic and psychometric validation of Attitudes towards domestic violence (ADV) scale was conducted. As the questionnaire was tested in Singapore with English as an official language, translation and back translation steps were omitted. In the subsequent steps 20 multidisciplinary team members provided their feedback on semantic structure of the items to produce the final version. Singaporean version of ADV had an acceptable validity (Cronbach’s coefficient alphas .81 to .98) of scores on the five subscales and satisfactory internal consistency (Cronbach’s coefficient alphas .70 to .85). The ADV Questionnaire proved to be a promising instrument for estimating the effectiveness of domestic abuse prevention programmes.

LSane: Collaborative Validation and Enrichment of Heterogeneous Observation Streams

The increasing amount of publicly available data streams of environmental observation stations opens up new opportunities: domain experts are provided with an extensive amount of observations covering large areas with high density of environmental sensors, which could hardly ever be provided by a single organization. However, these opportunities come at the cost of new challenges regarding trustworthiness and comparability of such observations. In this paper, we address the challenges of semantic validation and enrichment of heterogeneous observation streams by exploiting collaboratively created and curated annotations. For this purpose, we introduce and discuss the Linked Stream Annotation Engine (LSane) to validate observation messages from heterogeneous sensors. We enrich these observation messages with provenance information derived from annotations. We present an implementation of LSane with messages from public and private environmental observation stations, which are mapped to explicit semantics, and validate and enrich the mapped messages based on annotations from the LSane collaboration platform.

Transcultural adaptation of the Injustice Experience Questionnaire into Brazilian Portuguese

ABSTRACT BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: It has been proposed that some individuals with musculoskeletal pain may perceive themselves as victims of injustice. Perception of injustice can have a significant impact on several pain-related outcomes, major depressive symptoms, disabilities, and absenteeism. The objective of this study consisted of a transcultural adaptation of the original instrument in English, Injustice Experience Questionnaire into a final version to be used in Brazil. METHODS: The whole translation process consisted of translation, back-translation and the review by a committee of experts. The pre-test was applied to 90 participants (41 participants with chronic musculoskeletal pain). For the psychometric analysis, the translated version was applied to 120 participants with chronic musculoskeletal pain. The internal consistency was verified by the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient, and the construct validity was analyzed using factorial exploratory analysis. RESULTS: After the conclusion of the pre-test, there were no difficulties in understanding the translated questionnaire by more than 20% of the sample. The Cronbach alpha calculation for the 12 items of the Injustice Experience Questionnaire/Port-BR was 0.86 [CI (95%) = 0.83 to 0.90; p<0.001]. CONCLUSION: The questionnaire’s Portuguese version proved to be easily understandable showing good semantic validation. Nevertheless, further studies should address other psychometric characteristics of this instrument.

Denotational validation of higher-order Bayesian inference

We present a modular semantic account of Bayesian inference algorithms for probabilistic programming languages, as used in data science and machine learning. Sophisticated inference algorithms are often explained in terms of composition of smaller parts. However, neither their theoretical justification nor their implementation reflects this modularity. We show how to conceptualise and analyse such inference algorithms as manipulating intermediate representations of probabilistic programs using higher-order functions and inductive types, and their denotational semantics. Semantic accounts of continuous distributions use measurable spaces. However, our use of higher-order functions presents a substantial technical difficulty: it is impossible to define a measurable space structure over the collection of measurable functions between arbitrary measurable spaces that is compatible with standard operations on those functions, such as function application. We overcome this difficulty using quasi-Borel spaces, a recently proposed mathematical structure that supports both function spaces and continuous distributions. We define a class of semantic structures for representing probabilistic programs, and semantic validity criteria for transformations of these representations in terms of distribution preservation. We develop a collection of building blocks for composing representations. We use these building blocks to validate common inference algorithms such as Sequential Monte Carlo and Markov Chain Monte Carlo. To emphasize the connection between the semantic manipulation and its traditional measure theoretic origins, we use Kock's synthetic measure theory. We demonstrate its usefulness by proving a quasi-Borel counterpart to the Metropolis-Hastings-Green theorem.

Manual educativo de cuidados no pós-operatório de revascularização miocárdica: uma ferramenta para pacientes e familiares

Elaborou-se um manual educativo para o autocuidado de pacientes revascularizados após a alta hospitalar. Trata-se de um estudo metodológico cuja coleta ocorreu entre fevereiro e abril de 2012 junto a oito peritos em cardiología e 35 pacientes/familiares. Realizou-se a validação de conteúdo e de face junto a oito pacientes/familares e oito peritos. Dos 46 itens propostos, os pacientes/familiares classificaram 26 itens (57%) como muito importante (concordância entre 91,4% e 100%) e os peritos 29 itens (63%) como muito importante (concordância igual ou superior a 75%). Selecionaram-se 36 itens distribuídos em 26 categoriais para o manual final. Houve 100% de concordância de pacientes/familiares e peritos quanto ao conteúdo, linguagem e ilustrações. A ferramenta apresentou validade semântica e adequação de conteúdo para a população, sendo capaz de reduzir complicações decorrentes do despreparo para o autocuidado, reduzindo o número de reinternações e os custos hospitalares, além de sistematizar o ensino pós-operatório.

MEdit4CEP-CPN: An approach for complex event processing modeling by prioritized colored petri nets

Complex Event Processing (CEP) is an event-based technology that allows us to process and correlate large data streams in order to promptly detect meaningful events or situations and respond to them appropriately. CEP implementations rely on the so-called Event Processing Languages (EPLs), which are used to implement the specific event types and event patterns to be detected for a particular application domain. To spare domain experts this implementation, the MEdit4CEP approach provides them with a graphical modeling editor for CEP domain, event pattern and action definition. From these graphical models, the editor automatically generates a corresponding Esper EPL code. Nevertheless, the generated code is syntactically but not semantically validated. To address this problem, MEdit4CEP is extended in this paper by Prioritized Colored Petri Net (PCPN) formalism, resulting in the MEdit4CEP-CPN approach. This approach provides both a novel PCPN domain-specific modeling language and a graphical editor. By using model transformations, event pattern models can be automatically transformed into PCPN models, and then into the corresponding PCPN code executable by CPN Tools. In addition, by using PCPNs we can compare the expected output with the actual output and can even conduct a quantitative analysis of the scenarios of interest. To illustrate our approach, we have conducted an air quality level detection case study and we show how this novel approach facilitates the modeling, simulation, analysis and semantic validation of complex event-based systems.

Translation and cultural adaptation of the Needs of Parents Questionnaire (NPQ) to be used in Brazil

Abstract Objective: To translate, culturally adapt, and assess the internal consistency of the adapted version of the Needs of Parents Questionnaire (NPQ) to be used in Brazil with a sample of parents of hospitalized children. Method: Methodological study, essentially based on the DISABKIDS® method and conducted in a public university hospital. The stages included translation, assessment by an expert committee, back translation, semantic validation, and pilot study. Results: After the original instrument was translated into Brazilian Portuguese and then back-translated, the semantic validation was performed with 30 parents and adjustments were implemented until the translated version was understandable by most participants. Afterwards, a pilot test was implemented with another 59 parents, the internal consistency of which was satisfactory. Conclusions: The Brazilian version of the NPQ proved to be reliable and, after assessing other psychometric properties in the field study, it will be useful to assess the needs of parents of hospitalized children, qualifying nursing care.

Cross-cultural adaptation and content and semantic validation of the Difficult Intravenous Access Score for pediatric use in Brazil

ABSTRACTObjective:present the cross-cultural adaptation and content and semantic validation of the Difficult Intravenous Access Score for current use in Brazil. Method:cross-cultural adaptation and validation study, structured in six phases: initial translation, synthesis of translations, back-translation, assessment of documents by expert committee of specialized judges, pretest and presentation of the documents to the expert judges and to the author of the original instrument. Twenty health professionals were randomly recruited from a public hospital in the South of Brazil, working in pediatrics, in order to assess the agreement level with the variables in the instrument. In addition, a convenience sample of 30 pediatric patients was selected for the face validation of the same instrument. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient, simple and percentage frequencies, the Shapiro-Wilk and Fisher’s exact tests were used for the data analysis and reliability measures. Results:the cross-cultural adaptation phases were executed with totally clear translated variables, demonstrating satisfactory results in the content and semantic validation process. Conclusions:the Difficult Intravenous Access Score was adapted and its content and semantics were validated. External clinical validity, measuring equivalence and reproducibility analyses are needed.

Translation and validation of translation in cross-cultural research: Strategies used in a study of cervical cancer screening among ethnic minorities.

A discussion of the challenges encountered during instrument translation and validation while researching cervical cancer screening among ethnic minorities and the strategies used to overcome them. Given the increasing ethnic and cultural diversity of populations in different countries, culturally sensitive instruments are needed to evaluate people's attitudes, perceptions, and health practices. Often, such instruments are lacking in the study population's language. Discussion paper. The discussion is based on our previous experience including the challenges encountered in the translation process and in the semantic and content validation and the strategies used to overcome them. Seeking help from community centres or translation agencies to use translators with a health care background and of the same cultural origins as the target participants is effective. Actively contacting potential experts through email addresses obtained from published research articles is another effective way to find suitable experts. Field testing of the study questionnaire is important in validation, as it uncovers difficulties that go beyond translation. Good planning and preparation before the translation and validation work begins is always required. Working closely with translators and experts through discussion is the key to success.

Psychometric Properties of the Chinese Version of the Acceptance of Chronic Health Conditions (Stoma) Scale for Patients With Stoma.

Formation of a stoma is a common outcome in surgical treatment of colorectal cancer. A higher acceptance of stoma was shown to improve quality of life of patients. No instrument in Chinese is available that can be used to measure the acceptance of stoma among patients with colorectal cancer. The aims of this study were to translate and test the psychometric properties of Chinese version of Acceptance of Chronic Health Conditions (ACHC) (Stoma) scale. A sample of 100 Chinese-speaking patients with stoma was recruited from a public tertiary care hospital in Singapore. The scale was translated into Chinese and reviewed by an expert panel for semantic equivalence and content validity testing. Convergent validity was established by exploring correlations between scores of the Chinese version of the ACHC (Stoma) scale and those of the 5-level version of European Quality of Life Questionnaire-5 Dimensions. Reliability was assessed by internal consistency and test-retest reliability. The newly translated scale had high content validity (content validity index = 94%) and acceptable internal consistency (Cronbach's α = .846). The test-retest reliability was satisfactory with an intraclass coefficient of 0.997. A positive correlation was found between both scores on ACHC (Stoma) scale and EQ-5D utility score (r = 0.63, P < .01) and EQ-5D global visual analog scale (r = 0.70, P < .01). The Chinese version of the ACHC (Stoma) scale demonstrated satisfactory content validity, good convergent validity, and adequate internal consistency and stability. This scale can be used as a convenient screening tool in clinical settings to assess the level of acceptance in Chinese-speaking patients with stoma.

Um modelo de maturidade colaborativa: proposta inicial e validaçao de conteúdo

Este trabalho busca: a) desenvolver um conceito de maturidade colaborativa, a partir da sistematização ajustada do conceito de governança colaborativa elaborada por Emerson e outros (2015), aperfeiçoando o modelo anteriormente elaborado por Costa (2016), e de elementos e questões usualmente presentes em modelos consagrados de maturidade; e b) operacionalizar o conceito, por meio da construção de um instrumento de mensuração da maturidade colaborativa; e c) testar a validade de conteúdo da operacionalização a partir da validade semântica do instrumento vis-à-vis o modelo de Emerson. O texto está divido em cinco partes. Uma introdução trata de apresentar as questões metodológicas que pertinem à construção de modelos. A parte dois trata de governança colaborativa e apresenta a sistematização elaborada por Emerson e outros (2012). A parte três trata de maturidade e apresenta questões metodológicas relacionadas à construção de modelos de maturidade. A parte quatro trata da construção do modelo de maturidade colaborativa e sua validação de conteúdo. A última parte elabora considerações sobre limitações e prosseguimentos.

Semantically Enhanced Mapping Algorithm for Affinity-Constrained Service Function Chain Requests

Network function virtualization (NFV) and software defined networking (SDN) have been proposed to increase the cost-efficiency, flexibility, and innovation in network service provisioning. This is achieved by leveraging IT virtualization techniques and combining them with programmable networks. By doing so, NFV and SDN are able to decouple the network functionality from the physical devices on which they are deployed. Service function chains (SFCs) composed out of virtual network functions (VNFs) can now be deployed on top of the virtualized infrastructure to create new value-added services. Current NFV approaches are limited to mapping the different VNF to the physical substrate subject to resource capacity constraints. They do not provide the possibility to define location requirements with a certain granularity and constraints on the colocation of VNF and virtual edges. Nevertheless, many scenarios can be envisioned in which a service provider (SP) would like to attach placement constraints for efficiency, resilience, legislative, privacy, and economic reasons. Therefore, we propose a set of affinity and anti-affinity constraints, which can be used by SP to define such placement restrictions. Furthermore, a semantic SFC validation framework is proposed that allows the virtual network function infrastructure provider (VNFInP) to check the validity of a set of constraints and provide feedback to the SPs. This allows the VNFInP to filter out any non-valid SFC requests before sending them to the mapping algorithm, significantly reducing the mapping time.

Reusing simulation experiment specifications in developing models by successive composition — a case study of the Wnt/β-catenin signaling pathway

With the increasing size and complexity of models, developing models by composing existing ones becomes more important. We exploit the idea of reusing simulation experiments of individual models for composition to automatically generate experiments for the composed model. First, we illustrate the process of modeling based on composition and discuss the role simulation experiments can play in this process. Our focus is on semantic validation of the composed model. We explicitly specify simulation experiments in simulation experiment specification via a Scala layer, including the desired model behavioral properties and their required experiment set-ups. Models are annotated with experiment specifications, and upon composition, these specifications are adapted and automatically executed for the composed model. The approach is applied in a case study of developing a Wnt/ β-catenin signaling pathway model by successively composing three individual models, where we exploit metric interval temporal logic to describe model behavioral properties and check averages of stochastic simulation results against these properties.