Modelization Research Articles

Can Education Save Us From Ourselves? Three Psychological Challenges to Democracy

This review brings social science literature into conversation with education to understand how three psychological challenges—motivated reasoning, misinformation, and conspiracy theories—have been studied in educational research. After describing the challenges, how they function, and how they contribute to democratic backsliding, the authors explore the frequency, orientation, and proposed interventions to these challenges in 59 educational research articles published between 2016 and 2022. We categorize approaches to the challenges as Rational, Affective, or Blended Rational/Affective to describe their framing in educational research. Rational frameworks were the most common, while few studies used Affective frames. The few studies featuring an educational intervention emphasized rational thinking over affective or motivational processes. We suggest ways to bolster understanding of problems created by motivated reasoning, misinformation, and conspiratorial thinking and argue for increased attention to the affective and political nature of these challenges in educational research.

Computational Math Modeling and AI Optimization for Better Decision-Making: Applications in Machine Learning

The integration of computational mathematical modeling, optimization, machine learning (ML), data analysis, and artificial intelligence (AI) offers transformative opportunities to solve complex problems across diverse fields. This paper delves into the development and application of advanced modeling techniques that blend traditional mathematical approaches with advanced AI algorithms to enhance predictive accuracy, optimize resource allocation, and improve decision-making processes in areas such as logistics, finance, engineering, and healthcare. By leveraging data-driven insights, these models can simulate real-world scenarios and identify optimal solutions more effectively than conventional methods. The paper also explores how AI-enhanced modeling can impact broader systems by reshaping industry practices, influencing frameworks, and potentially challenging established societal norms. Eventually, the paper argues for a balanced and informed deployment of AI-driven modeling techniques to maximize their benefits while addressing potential risks and limitations.

Identifying cognitive, affective, and developmental mechanisms linking threat and deprivation with adolescent psychopathology.

The mechanisms linking early-life adversity with psychopathology over the life-course are complex. In this prospective study, we collectively examined cognitive, affective, and developmental mediators previously found to individually link childhood threat and deprivation experiences to adolescent psychopathology to identify the most potent mechanisms. Data came from a community sample of 227 children (mean child age 11.5 ± 0.5 years, 48.5% female) from the Seattle metro area with recruitment designed to reflect diversity in family income. Candidate mechanisms included self-rated pubertal development and task-measured attention bias to threat, emotion regulation, theory of mind, fear learning, inhibitory control, language ability, reasoning, and reward sensitivity. Using a high-dimensional mediation approach, we determined which mediating pathways linking threat and deprivation to psychopathology persisted after controlling for all candidate mechanisms associated with psychopathology. Models additionally controlled for the child's age, sex, early-childhood emotional and behavioral symptoms, poverty, and maternal depression. Blunted reward sensitivity mediated the prospective relationship between threat and internalizing psychopathology, explaining 17.25% (95% CI 1.08%, 69.96%) of this association. Advanced pubertal development was associated with increases in internalizing and externalizing symptoms (standardized associations of 0.16 (95% CI 0.03, 0.29) and 0.17 (95% CI 0.05, 0.29), respectively), but not with adversity. Although deprivation was strongly related to psychopathology, no mechanisms were empirically identified. In a well-characterized community sample, we isolated reward sensitivity as a robust mediator of the prospective association between early-life threat and adolescent internalizing psychopathology. Interventions aimed at bolstering reward sensitivity may mitigate the impact of early-life threat experiences on internalizing problems.

Pelvic Floor Muscle Anatomy and its Contribution to Penile Erection in Olive Baboons.

Despite the number of studies on the contribution of pelvic floor muscles (PFM) to the penile erection process, their significance is still underestimated. The goal of this study was to investigate the role of PFM in the erection process in non-human primates. First, we performed an anatomical study of the penile structures in 12 baboon cadavers. Next, we created chronic electrophysiological models of normal erectile function in 25 olive baboons. We implanted electrodes on the cavernous nerves to control penile blood filling and placed other electrodes on the pudendal nerve to stimulate the ischiocavernosus muscles (ICM) contractions after sufficient blood filling, thus simulating both vascular and muscular phases of penile erection. We controlled the intracavernous pressure (ICP) during nerve stimulations and further performed a mathematical analysis of the collected data. We described the main pro-erectile muscle anatomy and its relationship with penile structures in monkeys. During neurostimulation studies, we showed the key role of ICM in achieving full penile rigidity with suprasystolic ICP up to 120-300 mm Hg. We also developed a math model for calculating the pro-erectile muscle's contraction force with high accuracy. In this study, we demonstrated the crucial role of PFM in the penile erection process using the monkey model, supporting the previous studies' data. We consider these results essential for a better, more complex understanding of the penile erection process and the participating structures in each stage. This is essential for further improving and designing novel erectile dysfunction diagnostics and treatment techniques.

Care-theoretic semantics

Abstract This paper argues for two claims, one conservative and the other one less so. First is the thesis that the range of linguistic features that can be considered authentically semantic is far wider in breadth than is typically acknowledged. In particular, linguistic phenomena that are entirely orthogonal to veridical considerations—including ethical matters—are sufficiently robust to support e.g. theories of meaning and inference. Second, we aim to argue that philosophy’s prioritization of truth obscures the existence of an important prior concern for care or the reduction of harm. Specifically, we offer a topic-theoretic interpretation of the bounds consequence reading of sequents put forward by Restall and Ripley. We argue that this reading allows us to provide a rigorous semantics using the newly introduced categories of care and harm. An important objection may be that philosophy requires the centrality and priority of truth above all else insofar as truth-like features are necessary to ground theories of meaning or reasoning. Anticipating such an objection, we will argue that care not only is an authentically semantic feature but also that care is sufficient to ground such theories.

What makes citizens participate in government data governance? A study based on Behavioral Reasoning Theory

This study seeks to examine the underlying mechanisms that shape citizens’ intentions to participate in government data governance. By uncovering the multifaceted determinants that facilitate or inhibit such participation, this study provides a theoretical foundation and methodological approach for future related research. Based on the findings, practical strategies to bolster citizen engagement in government data governance are proposed. An integrated higher-order reflective-formative model was constructed using the Behavioral Reasoning theory as a foundational framework. This model amalgamates the Civic Voluntarism Model, the Administrative Burden Theory, and the Ladder of Citizen Participation Theory. We employed PLS-SEM to analyze the influence of value orientation, attitude, participation, and non-participation reasoning on civic participation intention. Simultaneously, we explored the effects of six lower-order factors—motivation, resource, mobilization, psychological cost, compliance cost, and learning cost—on participation and non-participation reasoning. The study found that value orientation significantly and positively influences both participation reasoning and attitudes. Conversely, value orientation has a significant negative effect on non-participation reasoning. Participation reasoning positively impacts attitudes and the willingness to participate. Non-participation reasoning negatively affects attitudes and the willingness to participate. Motivation plays a crucial role in shaping a citizen’s participation reasoning. Compliance cost is also a key factor influencing citizens’ non-participation reasoning.

Social cognition in adults with neurofibromatosis type 1.

Adult patients with the genetic disease neurofibromatosis type 1 (NF1) frequently report social difficulties. To date, however, only two studies have explored whether these difficulties are caused by social cognition deficits, and these yielded contradictory data. The aim of the present study was to exhaustively assess social cognition abilities (emotion, theory of mind, moral reasoning, and social information processing) in adults with NF1, compared with a control group, and to explore links between social cognition and disease characteristics (mode of inheritance, severity, and visibility). We administered a social cognition battery to 20 adults with NF1 (mean age = 26.5 years, SD = 7.4) and 20 healthy adults matched for sociodemographic variables. Patients scored significantly lower than controls on emotion, theory of mind, moral reasoning, and social information processing tasks. No effects of disease characteristics were found. These results appear to confirm that adults with NF1 have a social cognition weaknesses that could explain, at least in part, their social difficulties, although social abilities are not all impaired to the same extent. Regarding the impact of the disease characteristics, the patient sample seemed slightly insufficient for the power analyses performed. Thus, this exploratory study should form the basis of further research, with the objective of replicating these results with larger and more appropriately matched samples.

Social Rationality and Human Reasoning: Logical Expressivism and the Flat Mind.

This paper attempts to reconcile the claims that the mind is both flat (Chater, 2018) and highly rational (Oaksford & Chater, 2020). According to the flat mind hypothesis, the mind is a mass of inconsistent and contradictory fragments of experience. However, standard accounts of rationality from formal epistemology argue that to be rational, our beliefs must be consistent, and we must believe all the logical consequences of our beliefs. A social account of rationality is developed based on Brandom's (1994) logical expressivism, in which respecting the norms of logic and probability theory is still central but where these standards apply to our public commitments in social dialogical contexts rather than to our individual belief systems (Skovgaard-Olsen, 2017). According to this account, even if someone's individual beliefs are inconsistent, they cannot be condemned as irrational if they acknowledge the inconsistency and seek to resolve it. It is shown how this approach interacts with people's fragmented and shallow world knowledge, and its social distribution yields some counterintuitive consequences, such as it sometimes being rational individually not seeking to resolve contradictions. Other consequences of this social expressivist approach are considered, including for dual process theories of reasoning, our view of beliefs, the status of logic, and Fodor's (1983) view of central systems. It is concluded that people can have flat minds and yet be highly rational.

Naděje jako most mezi etikou a filosofií náboženství v díle Immanuela Kanta

The paper focuses on the motif of hope, which plays an important role in Immanuel Kant’s practical philosophy. Hope builds a bridge between ethics and the philosophy of religion, and it does so as part of the highest good. I examine the notion of hope in Kant’s thought in three steps, based on three texts: Critique of Pure Reason (Canon of Pure Reason), Critique of Practical Reason (Postulates of Pure Practical Reason; Ethico-Theology), and Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason (Theory of Radical Evil in Human Nature). I provide arguments to show that, for Kant, hope is a necessary motive. Hope is understood as an attitude of reason, rather than as an emotion. I further demonstrate that in the concept of hope, the desire for happiness intersects with the desire to live well morally. The function of hope, in the context of a lifetime of moral practice, is to help remove obstacles to leading a moral life. Hope is not needed to know what to do. Hope is necessary as a component of the meaningfulness of the whole. The impossibility or loss of hope for the ultimate meaning, as including the achievement of one’s own bliss, would make the lifelong pursuit of morality impossible. Finally, hope turns out to be necessary as a response to the thesis of radical evil in human nature.

Modulation and control scheme for DC-link current minimization of an improved current source inverter

The traditional three-phase current source inverter (CSI) cannot maintain a constant DC-link current, the charging and discharging process under different operating modes will lead to the DC-link current being discontinuous or continuously increasing. To address this issue, the topology of CSI is improved, and a modulation scheme without additional losses is proposed in this paper to control the DC-link current. Then, based on the analysis of the DC-link ripple under all switching states, the calculation expression for the optimal reference of the DC-link current is derived, under the premise of meeting the current demand for the AC load, the minimum loss and harmonic distortion can be obtained by reducing the DC-link current. Finally, the math model of the AC-side is established, and the closed-loop control system including the voltage outer loop and the current inner loop is designed. The feasibility and correctness of the proposed modulation strategy and control method are validated by the simulation and experimental results, the minimum and stable DC-link current with the ripple below ± 1 A is obtained, and the high steady-state and dynamic control performances are achieved. The total harmonic distortion of the load current is less than 4 %, and the dynamic response time is 0.3 s.

ChatGPT Adoption in Marketing: Exploring Drivers and Barriers through Behavioral Reasoning Theory

Recent advancements in Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) have paved the way for developing sophisticated language models such as ChatGPT, which are widely employed across various areas, including marketing. However, despite its benefits in marketing, little attention has been paid to understanding the factors influencing ChatGPT adoption among marketing professionals. Also, existing literature tends to focus more on the advantages of ChatGPT, while there is a paucity of studies focusing on potential barriers to its adoption. To fill these gaps, a framework was developed using Behavioral Reasoning Theory and validated through a survey of 390 marketing experts. The study finds that marketers’ reasons for (against) positively (negatively) influence their attitude and adoption intention toward ChatGPT, and uncertainty avoidance as a cultural value significantly affects marketers’ attitudes and reasoning. Furthermore, this study highlights digital literacy’s moderating role, intensifying the negative relationship between “reasons against” and the intention to adopt ChatGPT, though it does not significantly affect the association between “reasons against” and attitude. Additionally, the findings offer managerial guidance for facilitating the adoption of GAI tools.

Behavioural Reasoning Theory Perspectives: Hospitality Accounting System Adoption

This study delves into the behavioural intention to adopt Hospitality Accounting Systems (HAS) in Bali's villa accommodation sector, employing the Behavioral Reasoning Theory (BRT) framework. Through a representative sample of 363 villa owners or managers, utilising the PLS-SEM technique, it explores how personal values, reasons for and against, and attitudes influence HAS adoption intentions. The findings underscore the significant impact of attitude on adoption intentions, with values significantly affecting attitude and reasons for and against. Interestingly, while reasons for directly influence intention, reasons against have the opposite effect. Future research avenues could explore additional factors influencing technology adoption and delve into the long-term implications of technology integration on organisational performance and user satisfaction. This study enriches theoretical frameworks and offers actionable insights for enhancing technology adoption in the hospitality industry and beyond.

Rules of Islamic creed ''Aqidah'' Between Theory and Practical (A Study of creed Issues According to Ash'arites)

The attention to the deductive method began with Imam Al-Ash’ari and the establishment of the rules of theorizing from the first moment of the emergence of the Ash’ari school of thought at the hands of the founder of the school of thought, Abu Al-Hasan Al-Ash’ari, and the scholars who followed after him who wrote theological works. This reflects the great care of the Ash’arism in rooting and theorizing the methods of theory, and setting the methodological rules of reasoning, so he dealt with The research examines the most important comprehensive theological rules through which the Ash’ari reasoned in the doctrinal issues on which Ash’ari theological thought was founded, taking into account the extent of stability or change that occurred in some of these rules along the path of the Ash’ari doctrine. The aim of this study was to answer an important methodological question in formulating the verbal thinking curriculum: It is: What is the impact of comprehensive verbal rules in achieving intellectual consistency and methodological consistency in the theory of verbal reasoning according to the Ash’arism between theory and application? The answer to the nature of this research required delving into the journey of exploring the idea of comprehensive verbal grammar in the theological heritage. It was appropriate for this task to adopt the historical approach in collecting the material and searching for comprehensive grammar in its context from the verbal works approved in the Ash’arite school. It was necessary to study the origins of the theory of verbal grammar. Comprehensive and anticipating the methodological features governing inference, adopting the analytical approach; The approach adopted in this study was a combined approach of the two approaches: historical and analytical, in order to reach the impact of comprehensive verbal rules in both theoretical and applied studies.

Domain effects on interpretations of general conditionals: The case of mathematics

Mathematics is often thought to have a unique association with certainty. The present study investigated a possible consequence of this association, namely that general conditionals are interpreted more deterministically in math than in other domains. To test this hypothesis, in two studies (Ns = 146 and 117), adults were presented general conditionals involving fictional categories in math and science and were asked to judge whether the conditionals were compatible with various frequencies of exceptions to them. Participants indicated that even rare exceptions (e.g., 1 exception per 99 confirming cases) would falsify a conditional (Studies 1 and 2), that a conditional could not be true and rare exceptions to it at the same time exist (Study 1), and that the truth of a conditional precluded the existence of even rare exceptions (Study 2), more when the conditionals involved math than science. The findings are consistent with the hypothesis that mathematical context is particularly likely to elicit deterministic interpretations of general conditionals. Implications of the findings for theories of conditional reasoning, and for individual differences in conditional reasoning, are discussed.

Reinforcing mindware or supporting cognitive reflection: Testing two strategies for addressing a persistent learning challenge in the context of air resistance

In this study, we have explored the effectiveness of two instructional approaches in the context of the motion of objects falling at terminal speed in the presence of air resistance. We ground these instructional approaches in dual-process theories of reasoning, which assert that human cognition relies on two thinking processes. Dual-process theories suggest multiple possible avenues by which instruction might impact student reasoning. In this paper, we compare two possible instructional approaches: one designed to reinforce the normative approach (improving the outputs of the intuitive process) and another that guides students to reflect on and analyze their initial ideas (supporting the analytic process). The results suggest that for students who have already demonstrated a minimum level of requisite knowledge, instruction that supports analysis of their likely intuitive mental model leads to greater learning benefits in the short term than instruction that focuses solely on providing practice with the normative mindware. These results have implications for the design of instructional materials and help to demonstrate how dual-process theories can be leveraged to explain the success of existing research-based materials. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Extending a rational process model of causal reasoning: Assessing Markov violations and explaining away with inhibitory causal relations.

Causes sometimes decrease rather increase the probability of an effect, as when drinking coffee lowers the probability of sleep or an aspirin eliminates a headache. This research tests how two causal reasoning errors that have influenced the development of theories of human causal reasoning manifest themselves in the presence of inhibitory causal relations. Past research with generative causal relations (a cause makes its effect more probable) has shown that people violate the Markov condition, the pattern of independence that should obtain among causally related variables. And it has shown that they explain away-the phenomenon in which one should lower likelihood of one event when another is discovered to have occurred (e.g., exonerating one murder suspect when evidence against another is found)-too little or not at all. The new empirical findings reported here reveal that both sorts of errors manifest themselves when inhibitory causal relations are present although, unexpectedly, the direction of those errors sometimes reverses. Only the mutation sampler, a rational process model of human causal reasoning, correctly predicted these novel empirical findings. These results support the view that causal reasoning errors can be understood as arising from rational inference constrained by limited cognitive resources. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Antecedent research on cross-border E-commerce consumer purchase decision-making: The moderating role of platform-recommended advertisement characteristics

Relying on the development of big data, internet technology, and digital trade, consumers are seeking cross-border e-commerce platforms increasingly. Platform-based advertising communication, characterized by low cost and wide coverage, is notable as one of the marketing strategies favored most within general cross-border e-commerce platforms. It furnishes consumers with abundant shopping options while it exerts influence on their purchasing decisions concurrently. Using Behavioral Reasoning Theory to explore in-platform advertisements' effect on consumer purchasing decisions in cross-border e-commerce platforms, this study introduces advertising features as moderating variables. From the perspectives of self-efficacy, behavioral rationality, and inclusiveness, a behavioral reasoning model for consumer purchasing decisions is constructed. This paper focuses on cross-border e-commerce platform consumers as the research object, and uses Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) to analyze the data and validate the model. The results show that self-efficacy and behavioral rationality can have a direct effect on consumers' purchase decision-making behaviors, while self-efficacy plays a significant mediating role between behavioral reasonableness and purchase decision-making behaviors. Inclusiveness has a significant direct effect on self-efficacy and behavioral reasonableness; moreover, advertisement characteristics have a significant negative moderating effect on inclusiveness and behavioral reasonableness-adoption. This study revealed the influencing mechanisms of consumers' purchasing decision behavior on cross-border e-commerce platforms, and expands the scope of Behavioral Reasoning Theory's application. Further, it provides valuable insights for the development of cross-border e-commerce platforms that have both theoretical and practical significance.

The steady-state solution of wave–current interaction based on the third-order Stokes wave theory

This manuscript reports on the interaction of a current-free monochromatic surface wave field with a wave-free uniform current field. The existing reasonable theories of wave–current interactions are primarily based on weak current assumptions and derived from linear theory, resulting in calculation bias in the analysis of nonlinear wave–current interactions. Moreover, experimental data on high-order wave–current interactions still need to be collected. Thus, steady-state solutions named the third-order wave–current theory based on the third-order wave dispersion relationship and the principle of wave–current energy conservation were derived. The wave–current interaction experiment was set up to cover 164 sets of experimental conditions, including 33 types of periodic waves from the second to the fifth order and six different current velocities. The effects of water depth, current velocity, wave period, and height on the wave height and wavelength in the wave–current interaction field were investigated. A comparison of the mean relative error (MRE) and the determination coefficient (R2) of the wavelength with the experimental data revealed that the third-order wave–current theory outperformed the traditional linear theory, with an optimal reduction of 75% and an enhancement of 25%, respectively. Additionally, the third-order wave–current theory reduces the MRE by 25%–40% in the wave height calculation, with R2 consistently outperforming the linear theory. The third-order wave–current theory can significantly improve the calculation accuracy of the theoretical method in solving nonlinear wave–current interactions.

Failing to utilize potentially effective focal points: Prominence can stymie coordination on distinct actions

Are people skillful in utilizing potential focal points? We find a class of situations for which the answer is negative: the presence of prominent actions appears to stymie the use of distinct actions for coordination. Across several experimental games, we consistently observe that players readily coordinate on a categorically distinct action when all available actions are non-prominent but not when some actions are prominent. For instance, given the action set {Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, Tianjin}, most players select the Chinese city Tianjin. Yet, given {Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Tianjin}, they are roughly equally likely to select either American president and unlikely to select Tianjin, and given {Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Shanghai}, their choices are distributed approximately uniformly. The observation that prominence stymies reliance on distinctiveness informs cognitive hierarchy and team reasoning theories of how people recognize focality.

Validation of Math Model Using Porous Media for Determining Alveolar CO 2 in Ventilated Patients.

To validate a mathematical model using porous media theory for alveolar CO2 determination in ventilated patients. Mathematical modeling study with prospective clinical validation to simulate CO2 exchange from bloodstream to airway entrance. ICU. Thirteen critically ill patients without chronic or acute lung disease. None. Model outcomes compared with patient data showed correlations for end-tidal CO2 (EtCO 2 ), area under the CO2 curve, and Pa CO2 of 0.918, 0.954, and 0.995. Determination coefficients ( R2 ) were 0.843, 0.910, and 0.990, indicating precision and predictive power. The mathematical model shows potential in pulmonary critical care. Although promising, practical application demands further validation, clinician training, and patient-specific adjustments. The path to clinical use will be iterative, involving validation and education.