The travelling salesman problem (TSP) belongs to the class of NP-hard problems, in which an optimal solution to the problem cannot be obtained within a reasonable computational time for large-sized problems. To address TSP, we propose a hybrid algorithm, called GA-TCTIA-LBSA, in which a genetic algorithm (GA), tour construction and tour improvement algorithms (TCTIAs) and a list-based simulated annealing (LBSA) algorithm are used. The TCTIAs are introduced to generate a first population, and after that, a search is continued with the (...) GA. The problem of premature convergence of the GA to local optimum is tackled by a method called social disaster technique. Afterwards, the LBSA is applied to generate a new population based on one of two proposed operators called packing and judgement day. The proposed algorithm is implemented in the MATLAB environment, and its two variants, called GA-TCTIA-LBSA packing and GA-TCTIA-LBSA judgement day, are tested on symmetric and asymmetric instances from TSPLIB. The overall results demonstrate that the proposed GA-TCTIA-LBSAs offer promising results, particularly for small-sized instances. (shrink)

Headache disorders can be considered as the predominant neurological condition. In the field of neurological diseases, migraine was estimated to cost a total of €27 billion per year for the loss through reduced work productivity in the European Community. Medical data and information in turn provide knowledge based on which physicians make scientific decisions for diagnosis and treatments. It is, therefore, very useful to create diagnostic tools to help physicians make better decisions. This paper is focused on a new hybrid (...) clustering system combining analytic hierarchy process and weighted fuzzy c-means clustering method for diagnosing children with primary headache disorder. The proposed three-stage hybrid diagnosing system is tested on data set collected from hospitalized children in the Clinical Centre of Vojvodina, Novi Sad, Serbia. (shrink)

Optimization, in general, is regarded as the process of finding optimal values for the variables of a given problem in order to minimize or maximize one or more objective function(s). Brain storm optimization (BSO) algorithm solves a complex optimization problem by mimicking the human idea generating process, in which a group of people solves a problem together. The aim of this paper is to present hybrid BSO algorithm solutions in the past 5 years. This study could be divided into two (...) parts: strategies and applications. In the first part, different strategies for the hybrid BSO algorithms intended to improve the various ability of the original BSO algorithm are displayed. In the second part, the real-world applications in the past five years in optimization, prediction and feature selection processes are presented. (shrink)

In the past 50 years nurse scheduling has received considerable attention in the research community. There are two cases regarding the nurse scheduling problem : the static and dynamic. Dynamic NSP, is often called nurse rerostering problem, which presents reconstruction or modification of the predetermined roster for the current scheduling horizon. The aim of this paper is to present new hybrid strategy for nurse NRRP problem. The proposed methodology is based on efficient cooperation between fuzzy logic, ordered weighted averaging and (...) variable neighbourhood descent search. Complete system is tested, and experimental results are based on real-world dataset obtained from the Oncology Institute of Vojvodina in Serbia. (shrink)

Clustering is one of the most fundamental and essential data analysis tasks with broad applications. It has been studied in various research fields: data mining, machine learning, pattern recognition and in engineering, economics and biomedical data analysis. Headache is not a disease that typically shortens one’s life, but it can be a serious social as well as a health problem. Approximately 27 billion euros per year are lost through reduced work productivity in the European community. This paper is focused on (...) a new strategy based on a hybrid model for combining fuzzy partition method and maximum likelihood estimation clustering algorithm for diagnosing primary headache disorder. The proposed hybrid system is tested on two data sets for diagnosing headache disorder collected from Clinical Centre of Vojvodina in Serbia. (shrink)

The skin, uniquely positioned at the interface between the human body and the external world, plays a multifaceted immunologic role in human life. In medical practice, early accurate detection of all types of skin tumours is essential to guide appropriate management and improve patients’ survival. The most important issue is to differentiate between malignant skin tumours and benign lesions. The aim of this research is the classification of skin tumours by analysing medical skin tumour dermoscopy images. This paper is focused (...) on a new strategy based on deep convolutional neural networks which have recently shown a state-of-the-art performance to define strategy to automatic classification for skin tumour images. The proposed system is tested on well-known HAM10000 data set. For experimental results, verification is performed and the results are compared with similar researches. (shrink)

Compte-rendu du numéro Photographie et politique, sous la direction de Christophe David et Joan Grandjean, Tumultes, n° 60-61, Éditions Kimé, oct. 2023, 408 pages. -/- Le titre en dit tout : il ne s'agit pas simplement d'un volume consacré à la photographie, mais de cette intrication spécifique entre le photographique et le politique, ou encore, de ce que la photographie peut faire à la politique et vice-versa. D'une certaine façon, tous les textes de ce numéro posent la même question : (...) la photographie peut-elle être politique et comment ? Ou, pour reformuler cette citation (en réalité une question rhétorique) de D. Levi Strauss : comment l'image en tant qu'apparition pourrait-elle détourner son inclination inhérente à l'illusion vers un engagement politique ? (shrink)

I aim to reconsider some arguments in and about Camera Lucida at face value and afresh in order to clarify their philosophical origin. Since it would be pointless to try to address everything, I focus on three specific issues, which are interconnected and whose analysis should not only do justice to Barthes’s book but also permit, I hope, a more nuanced critique of his work in the future. First, I will briefly revisit his understanding of the problem of the referent (...) (that sticks to the image), or simply, of the real in the image. This step is essential not only because it is still sometimes subject to divergent interpretations, but also because it helps to understand Barthes’s methodological choices – such as his choice of phenomenology. I argue – and this is my second point, which I will try to demonstrate through a detailed analysis – that Camera Lucida is even more phenomenological than Barthes was willing to admit, not only through the influence of Sartre but also of Heidegger, which is nonetheless entirely absent from the references in the book and, as far as I know, from the theoretical reception of Camera Lucida. This serves to reveal, somewhat paradoxically, that the use of the phenomenological method was not only suitable for his personal mourning but also for transforming that personal experience into something universal. The problem of phenomenology is equally important for the third point, which would be inevitable here: the problem of semiology and semiotics. It is commonly accepted (more or less critically) that there is a clear divide between Barthes’s approach to photography before and in Camera Lucida. In other words, between Barthes the semiologist and Barthes the phenomenologist. Contrary to this stance, I will defend the hypothesis that there is, crucially, a continuation of Barthes’s thought on photography – which has always been beyond language and meaning – despite the change in method or the fact that Camera Lucida was somewhat of a work apart. This will also include the comparison of Camera Lucida with the index theory of photography and the critical analysis of some controversial issues in photography studies related to another semiotician, C. S. Peirce. Finally, this will help to demonstrate my hypothesis that photography pushed Barthes to the limits of semiotics, but also to the limits of phenomenology, and that these limits opened the possibility of a new notion of art. (shrink)

The pointwise ergodic theorem is nonconstructive. In this paper, we examine origins of this non-constructivity, and determine the logical strength of the theorem and of the auxiliary statements used to prove it. We discuss properties of integrable functions and of measure preserving transformations and give three proofs of the theorem, though mostly focusing on the one derived from the mean ergodic theorem. All the proofs can be carried out in ACA₀; moreover, the pointwise ergodic theorem is equivalent to (ACA) over (...) the base theory RCA₀. (shrink)

The idea that the mind, i.e., common sense, is not an inherent human structure but a cultural system, has become a general assumption taken for granted by many. Richard Rorty’s post-Philosophical culture serves as an illustrative example. One of the most renowned representatives of the radical critique of the mind, i.e., of common sense, is the cultural anthropologist Clifford Geertz. He believes that we are in need of an ethnography based on the “thick description”. Geertz’s insights have strongly influenced the (...) postliberal theologians. Consequently, the centre of the theology—the faith—has once again been obscured. Therefore, this article seeks to emphasize the importance of faith, based on Josef Pieper’s sagacious insights. (shrink)

Autor podrazumijeva činjenicu da su Crkva i kršćanstvo nastali, razvijali se i širili u ozračju grčko-rimske ili helenističke kulture u koju su, navješćujući vjeru u Krista, Otkupitelja i Spasitelja, unijeli određene sastojke tadašnje židovske kulture, omogućujući tako razvoj europske culture. U misionarskom djelovanju, posebno nakon otkrića Amerike, Crkva susreće i prihvaća i druge kulture. U novom vijeku Crkva sve više postaje svjesna važnosti tih kultura, da bi počevši s II. vatikanskim saborom počela govoriti o pluralizmu kultura, o važnosti autohtonih kultura (...) trećeg svijeta, tražeći načine kako ih plodonosno povezati s navještajem Evanđelja. Autor iznosi kako Crkva u dokumentima II. Vatikanskog Sabora, posebno u pastoralnoj konstituciji Gaudium et spes, naširoko govori o kulturi , prihvaćajući također činjenicu pluralizma kulturâ. U spomenutoj saborskoj konstituciji susrećemo definiciju kulture u br. 53. Govoreći o poslije-saborskom govoru Crkve o kulturi, autor analizira različite papinske dokumente i govore poslije II. vatikanskog sabora, dokumente različitih vatikanskih ureda, kao i one biskupa iz Latinske Amerike. Autor posebno analizira crkveni govor o problematici kulture i inkulturacije u navještaju vjere, želeći pokazati kako je Crkva u svojem djelovanju nakon Sabora susretala i prihvaćala nove izazove, posebno antropološki pristup kulturi i inkulturaciji, koji su je poticali da još jasnije progovori o kulturi, o pluralizmu kultura, i o inkulturaciji vjere na kraju dvadesetog stoljeća.The author comprehends the fact that the Church and Christianity emerged , developed and spread in the atmosphere of the Greek-Roman or Hellenistic culture in wich they brought, by proclamation the faith in Jesus Christ, the Redeemer and Savior, the certain ingredients of Jewish cultur, making in such way possible the developement of European culture. In missionary work, especially after the discovery of America, the Church meets and accepts the other cultures. In the modern world Church more and more becomes conscious of these cultures. Beginning with the Second Vatican Council the Church speaks of a plurality of cultures and the importance of authentic cultures of the third world in order to find the ways how to fertile connect cultures with the proclamation of Gospel. The author brings out that the Church in the documents of Second Vatican Council, particularly in the Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et spes, widely speaks of culture accepting the fact of a plurality of cultures. The same pastoral constitution brings the definition of the word ‘culture’ in the number 53. Based on the topic of culture after the Second Vatican Council the author analyzes the different papal document and speeches, the document of various Vatican offices, as well as documents of bishops from Latin America. The author particularly analyzes the Church’s speech founded on the problem of culture and inculturation in the proclamation of faith, in order to show how Church, in its work after the Second Vatican Council, met and accepted new challenges, especially anthropological admission to culture and inculturation, that gave an impulse to the Church to speak more clearly of culture, of a plurality of cultures and of inculturation of faith at the end of 20th century. (shrink)

Procesi globalizacije događali su se mnogo puta u povijesti, daleko prije pojave riječi ‘globalizacija’ u drugoj polovici 20. st. Suvremena globalizacija podrazumijeva društvene, gospodarske i političke procese usmjerene na prelaženje državnih granica i stvaranje globalnog svjetskog poretka. No ona se ne smije svesti samo na to, budući da njeni procesi pogađaju sva područja ljudskog života i djelovanja: medije i komunikacije, gospodarstvo, politiku, pravo, kulturu, ekologiju, etiku, religije i crkve. Posljedice globalizacije jesu nova iskustva na društvenoj, političkoj i gospodarskoj razini – (...) povezivanje i umrežavanje kroz procese internacionalizacije i transnacionalizacije, kroz skupove poput G7 i Međunarodnog gospodarskog foruma u Davosu, ali i brojni društveni lomovi i gospodarska recesija. Globalizacija potiče religije na približavanje, na jačanje suradnje i na zauzimanje zajedničkog stava. Religije to i čine kroz postojeće zajedničke institucije, poput Svjetskog parlamenta religija i Svjetske konferencije religija za mir , tražeći nove oblike približavanja, dijaloga, solidarnosti, suživota, suradnje i ostvarenja etičkog konsenzusa, vodeći računa o zaštiti vlastitog identiteta u vremenu pluralizma i multikulturalnosti. Religije su svjesne da je etičko pitanje postalo pitanje planetarne odgovornosti koje zahtijeva globalnu etiku oko koje se trebaju složiti svi subjekti na svjetskoj razini, a u kojoj će čovjek biti aktivni subjekt. Kršćanske crkve uzimaju u obzir određene pozitivne zakonitosti procesa globalizacije tako da možemo govoriti o »kršćanskoj globalizaciji«. Kršćanstvo je od svojih početaka bilo usmjereno na određenu vrstu globalizacijskih procesa – daleko prije nego li se pojavio naziv ‘globalizacija’. Crkve su svjesne svoje zadaće zajednički braniti u vremenu globalizacije dostojanstvo svakog čovjeka, svake tradicije i kulture. One to čine preko brojnih postojećih međucrkvenih institucija na svjetskoj razini kao što su Ekumensko vijeće crkava , Ekumensko vijeće mladih u Europi . Katolička Crkva je od početka bila globalna i iz te je perspektive kroz stoljeća misijski djelovala. Nakon II. vatikanskog sabora to će djelovanje pojačati osnivanjem Papinskog vijeća za jedinstvo kršćana koje je nastalo iz Tajništva za jedinstvo kršćana , zatim Svjetskog dana mladih i Caritasa internationalisa.Processes of globalization have been happening numerous times through history, long prior to the appearance of the word ‘globalization’ in the second half of 20th century. Modern globalization includes the social, economic and political processes headed to crossing national boundaries and creating a global world order. However, globalization cannot be attributed simply to that issue, for its processes deal with all dimensions of human life and activity: media and communications, economy, politics, law, culture, ecology, ethics, religions, and churches. The consequences of globalization are new experiences related to social, political and economical sphere – interconnection and networking through processes of internationalization and transnationalization, through the meetings of the members of G7 and International Economic Forum in Davos, and also the numerous social breaks and economic recession. Globalization inspires religions to aim at the approaching, the stronger cooperation and the intercession for the common attitude. For realization of this purpose religions act through the existing common institutions like The World Parliament of Religions and World conference of religions for peace , asking for a new way of approaching, dialogue, solidarity, coexistence, cooperation and realization of ethic consensus, taking into account the protection of its own identity in time of pluralism and multiculture. Religions are aware of how ethic question has become the question of world’s responsibility. That issue requires global ethical principles around which all subjects on the world scale are to agree with. In that global ethic the human being will be respected as an active subject. The Christian Churches take into consideration the certain positive lawfulness of globalization process, thus we can speak of “Christian globalization”. Christianity has been headed to globalization process from the earliest days of the faith – prior to the process has emerged known as globalization. The Churches became aware of its responsibility in order to protect in the time of globalization the dignity of every person, every tradition, and culture. The Churches respond to this phenomenon through numerous existing interchurch institutions on world domain such as The World Council of Churches , Ecumenical Youth Council in Europe . The Catholic Church from the beginning has been global and based on this perspective the Catholic Church through centuries has been carrying out its missionary work. After the Second Vatican Council the Catholic Church has strengthened its activity by establishing Pontifical Council for Christian Unity , which has emerged from Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity , World Youth Day and Caritas internationalis. (shrink)

This article aims to give a survey of preparations conducted by Spartan king Agis III before he commenced his war against Macedonians. Based on the remaining narrative sources, mostly Arrian, Diodorus, Curtius Rufus and Justin, the author gives an account of king Agis’ doings up until the very beginning of his war. The author argues also why is that a real, full open war, not a "rebellion" as it is dubbed in some of the literature. Author gives his opinion about (...) the beginning of the preparations for the open war and concludes that they began in November 333 BC, at latest. This article also tackles the question of mercenaries which Agis took after the Battle of Issus. Due to the uncertainty of the sources themselves it can be concluded at best that Agis hired a great number of them after Issus. (shrink)

This paper analyses the role of remorse and apology in international criminal trials by juxtaposing two prominent cases of convicted war criminals Biljana Plavšić and Esad Landžo. Plavšić was the first and only Bosnian Serb political leader to plead guilty before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. Her acknowledgement of guilt and purported remorse expressed during her ICTY proceedings was celebrated as a milestone for both the ICTY and the Balkans. However, she later retracted her remorse while serving (...) her prison sentence. Landžo was a guard at the notorious Čelebići detention camp and did not acknowledge his guilt publicly during his ICTY trial. Seven years after his release from prison, Landžo personally confronted survivors and apologised to them. Through comparison of these two widely different cases, we illustrate varying roles criminal trials can play in offender’s reflection on his/her crimes and how relevance and resonance of war criminal’s remorse in and outside of the courtroom depend on how remorse is expressed and to whom. (shrink)

A growing body of work has highlighted the importance of political beliefs and attitudes in predicting endorsement and engagement in prosocial behavior. Individuals with right-wing political orientation are less likely to behave prosocially than their left-wing counterparts due to high levels of Right-wing authoritarianism. Here, we aimed to extend prior work by testing how political values relate to COVID-19 discretionary behavioral intentions. Furthermore, we tested whether identification with the national group would influence the relationship between RWA and prosocial behavior. A (...) cross-sectional study conducted on 350 Italian participants showed that right-wing political orientation had a negative effect on COVID-19 discretionary behavioral intentions via RWA. Furthermore, a moderated mediation model revealed that this effect was only significant for participants who are lowly identified with the national group. The results suggest that highlighting group belongingness might effectively motivate more conservative individuals to engage in prosocial behavior. (shrink)

‘Feminist competency’ is a nascent term that has been identified in three general critiques of contemporary feminism that emerged in the course of research for The Great Feminist Denial (2008), a book on feminist debates in Australia that I co-authored with Monica Dux. The first critique highlights the importance of feminist knowledge, typically generated through the academy, to feminist identification. The second posits a perceived lack of feminist competency as an obstacle to feminist affiliation. The third assessment insists that spokespeople (...) for feminism should be sufficiently competent. Using these responses to feminism as a starting point, combined with a reflection on my own framing as an academic feminist in the public sphere, I make a case for the potential value of ‘feminist competency’ as a means to assess the impact of academic feminism, in Australia and elsewhere. (shrink)

This paper will analyse what it takes to conduct feminist and sensitive research in countries that have seen mass human rights violations. Transitional justice research involves critical examination of difficult topics which raises a number of ethical and methodological issues for both the participants and the researchers. Although empirical research has been a facet of the studies produced in the field, researchers’ accounts of undertaking research in often politically sensitive environments is largely missing from published books and research reports. This (...) paper is informed by personal experiences of doing research in wartime rape in the ethnically and politically divided country of Bosnia and Herzegovina. I argue that the researcher’s profile and positionality directly affects the fieldwork and that fieldwork is a dialogical process which is structured by the researcher and the wider political processes in the country. (shrink)

Cilj istraživanja bio je ispitati iskustva stresa kod odgojitelja i nastavnika tijekom COVID-19 pandemije te ispitati prediktivnu vrijednost nekih osobnih obilježja odgojitelja/nastavnika, izvora stresa, strategija suočavanja i socijalne podrške u objašnjenju doživljaja stresa, sagorijevanja na poslu i nade u budućnost. Online upitnik primijenjen je na uzorcima od 491 nastavnika i 316 odgojitelja. Rezultati su pokazali da su odgojitelji i nastavnici najvišu razinu stresa doživljavali tijekom prvog vala pandemije korona virusa te da je razina doživljenog stresa tijekom pandemije veća nego prije (...) pandemije. Odgojitelji uobičajene izvore stresa doživljavaju snažnijim nego specifične izvore stresa vezane za pandemiju korona virusa, dok je kod nastavnika obrnuto. Osobna obilježja odgojitelja/nastavnika, izvori stresa, strategije suočavanja i socijalna podrška povezani su s razinom stresa i sagorijevanjem na poslu te nadom u budućnost, ali se prediktivna vrijednost odnosno značajni prediktori razlikuju ovisno o kriteriju i skupini ispitanika. Rezultati ukazuju na pozitivan doprinos samoefikasnosti, strategija suočavanja i socijalne podrške u doživljaju stresa kod odgojitelja i nastavnika tijekom pandemije korona virusa. (shrink)

In this paper, we compare reparation policies in Australia and Argentina. We analyse the difference between the reparations given by their respective governments to the Argentinian victims of the ‘Dirty War’ and to the ‘Stolen Generations’ in Australia. The aim of this paper is to compare the experience of victims in Argentina and Australia in relation to reparations to demonstrate that using only one type of reparations, either material or symbolic, is unsatisfactory for victims and does not repair the harm (...) done. We also argue that the timing and the context in which reparations are offered can play a role in the victims’ satisfaction with the governments’ reparation policies. (shrink)

A large part of technological advances, especially in the field of industry, have been focused on the optimization of productive processes. However, the detection of anomalies has turned out to be a great challenge in fields like industry, medicine or stock markets. The present work addresses anomaly detection on a control level plant. We propose the application of different intelligent techniques, which allow to obtain one-class classifiers using real data taken from the correct plant operation. The performance of each classifier (...) is assessed and validated with real created faults, achieving successful overall results. (shrink)

Over recent years, brain-computer interface (BCI) has emerged as an alternative communication system between the human brain and an output device. Deciphered intents, after detecting electrical signals from the human scalp, are translated into control commands used to operate external devices, computer displays and virtual objects in the real-time. BCI provides an augmentative communication by creating a muscle-free channel between the brain and the output devices, primarily for subjects having neuromotor disorders, or trauma to nervous system, notably spinal cord injuries (...) (SCI), and subjects with unaffected sensorimotor functions but disarticulated or amputated residual limbs. This review identifies the potentials of electroencephalography (EEG) based BCI applications for locomotion and mobility rehabilitation. Patients could benefit from its advancements such as wearable lower-limb (LL) exoskeletons, orthosis, prosthesis, wheelchairs, and assistive-robot devices. The EEG communication signals employed by the aforementioned applications that also provide feasibility for future development in the field are sensorimotor rhythms (SMR), event-related potentials (ERP) and visual evoked potentials (VEP). The review is an effort to progress the development of user’s mental task related to LL for BCI reliability and confidence measures. As a novel contribution, the reviewed BCI control paradigms for wearable LL and assistive-robots are presented by a general control framework fitting in hierarchical layers. It reflects informatic interactions, between the user, the BCI operator, the shared controller, the robotic device and the environment. Each sub layer of the BCI operator is discussed in detail, highlighting the feature extraction, classification and execution methods employed by the various systems. All applications’ key features and their interaction with the environment are reviewed for the EEG-based activity mode recognition, and presented in form of a table. It is suggested to structure EEG-BCI controlled LL assistive devices within the presented framework, for future generation of intent-basedmultifunctional controllers. Despite the development of controllers, for BCI-based wearable or assistive devices that can seamlessly integrate user intent, practical challenges associated with such systems exist and have been discerned, which can be constructive for future developments in the field. (shrink)

A dimensional reduction algorithm is applied to an intelligent classification model with the purpose of improving the efficiency and accuracy. The proposed classification model, used to distinguish the operating mode: Hard- and Soft-Switching, is presented and an analysis of the synchronized rectified step-down converter is done. With the aim of improving the accuracy and reducing the computational cost of the model, three different methods for dimensional reduction are applied to the input dataset of the model: self-organizing maps, principal component analysis (...) and correlation matrix. The obtained results show how the number of variable is highly reduced and the performance of the classification model is boosted: the results manifest an improve in the accuracy and efficiency of the classification. (shrink)

In 1923, Sir Arthur Keith proposed that many common back problems are due to the stresses caused by our evolutionarily novel form of locomotion, bipedalism. In this article, we introduce an updated version of Keith’s hypothesis with a focus on acquired spinal conditions. We begin by outlining the main ways in which the human spine differs from those of our closest living relatives, the great apes. We then review evidence suggesting there is a link between spinal and vertebral shape on (...) the one hand and acquired spinal conditions on the other. Next, we discuss recent studies that not only indicate that two common acquired spinal conditions—intervertebral disc herniation and spondylolysis—are associated with vertebral shape, but also suggest that the pathology-prone vertebral shapes can be understood in terms of the shift from quadrupedalism to bipedalism in the course of human evolution. Subsequently, we place the aforementioned findings under an umbrella hypothesis, which we call the “Evolutionary Shape Hypothesis.” This hypothesis contends that individuals differ in their propensity to develop different acquired spinal conditions because of differences in vertebral shape that relate to the evolutionary history of our species. We end the article with some possible directions for future research. (shrink)

Background: The aim of this study was to investigate associations between demographic and clinical variables and duration of untreated psychosis (DUP) in a sample of cases of psychosis across an adult early intervention in psychosis service and a child and adolescent community team. Method: Cross-sectional baseline data for cases of psychosis across the two teams on the caseload at a given time point were collected, including age of onset, gender, ethnicity, referral route, and DUP. Results: The median DUP across the (...) entire sample was 91 days, while those patients with initial treatment for psychosis from the child and adolescent team had a median DUP of 69 days. Using multiple linear regression, there were two variables that showed a significant association with DUP: referral route (p < .001), and age of onset, with earlier age of onset associated with shorter DUP (p = .015). Conclusion: These findings are discussed in relation to possible explanatory factors, with particular focus on service-level variables and pathways to care. It is suggested that the involvement of child and adolescent teams is vital to the work of early intervention in psychosis services. (shrink)

Closed-loop administration of propofol for the control of hypnosis in anesthesia has evidenced an outperformance when comparing it with manual administration in terms of drug consumption and post-operative recovery of patients. Unlike other systems, the success of this strategy lies on the availability of a feedback variable capable of quantifying the current hypnotic state of the patient. However, the appearance of anomalies during the anesthetic process may result in inaccurate actions of the automatic controller. These anomalies may come from the (...) monitors, the syringe pumps, the actions of the surgeon or even from alterations in patients. This could produce adverse side effects that can affect the patient postoperative and reduce the safety of the patient in the operating room. Then, the use of anomaly detection techniques plays a significant role to avoid this undesirable situations. This work assesses different one-class intelligent techniques to detect anomalies in patients undergoing general anesthesia. Due to the difficulty of obtaining real data from anomaly situations, artificial outliers are generated to check the performance of each classifier. The final model presents successful performance. (shrink)

People with anorexia nervosa commonly exhibit social difficulties, which may be related to problems with understanding the perspectives of others, commonly known as Theory of Mind processing. However, there is a dearth of literature investigating the neural basis of these differences in ToM and at what age they emerge. This study aimed to test for differences in the neural correlates of ToM processes in young women with AN, and young women weight-restored from AN, as compared to healthy control participants. Based (...) on previous findings in AN, we hypothesized that young women with current or prior AN, as compared to HCs, would exhibit a reduced neural response in the medial prefrontal cortex, the inferior frontal gyrus, and the temporo-parietal junction whilst completing a ToM task. We recruited 73 young women with AN, 45 WR young women, and 70 young women without a history of AN to take part in the current study. Whilst undergoing a functional magnetic resonance imaging scan, participants completed the Frith-Happé task, which is a commonly used measure of ToM with demonstrated reliability and validity in adult populations. In this task, participants viewed the movements of triangles, which depicted either action movements, simple interactions, or complex social interactions. Viewing trials with more complex social interactions in the Frith-Happé task was associated with increased brain activation in regions including the right TPJ, the bilateral mPFC, the cerebellum, and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. There were no group differences in neural activation in response to the ToM contrast. Overall, these results suggest that the neural basis of spontaneous mentalizing is preserved in most young women with AN. (shrink)

Lexical Semantics is about the meaning of words. Although obviously a central concern of linguistics, the semantic behaviour of words has been unduly neglected in the current literature, which has tended to emphasize sentential semantics and its relation to formal systems of logic. In this textbook D. A. Cruse establishes in a principled and disciplined way the descriptive and generalizable facts about lexical relations that any formal theory of semantics will have to encompass. Among the topics covered in depth are (...) idiomaticity, lexical ambiguity, synonymy, hierarchical relations such as hyponymy and meronymy, and various types of oppositeness. Syntagmatic relations are also treated in some detail. The discussions are richly illustrated by examples drawn almost entirely from English. Although a familiarity with traditional grammar is assumed, readers with no technical linguistic background will find the exposition always accessible. All readers with an interest in semantics will find in this original text not only essential background but a stimulating new perspective on the field. (shrink)