In this prospective study, we investigated the effects of socioenvironmental conditions on adjustment during early adolescence. Participants (
N
= 339) were assessed at the beginning of the school ...year and at follow-up approximately 7 months later. Both stressful events and social support made significant contributions to the prediction of psychological distress and conduct problems at follow-up, controlling for initial levels of adjustment in each of these areas. Conditions related to socioeconomic disadvantage predicted poorer academic performance and higher levels of absences and disciplinary problems at school. Youths who experienced multiple conditions of socioeconomic disadvantage were found to demonstrate heightened vulnerability to stressful events (daily hassles) as well as a greater potential to benefit from social support received from adults in the school setting.
The contribution of Lotfi Zadeh to the development of fuzzy logic goes far beyond the introduction of the seminal concept of a fuzzy set, and has multiple facets. This article, as a small tribute ...to the corpus of ideas, notions and results brought together over almost five decades by Zadeh, singles out and illustrates two of his most stimulating, thought-provoking and fruitful creations: fuzzy rules, on the one hand, and possibility theory, on the other. Indeed, the modeling of conditional statements of the form, "if x is A, then y is B", plays a crucial role in any attempt at formalizing human reasoning. Starting from the expression of different forms of fuzzy rules that have been identified in the setting of possibility theory, we study their counterparts in the extensions of possibilistic logic. A distinction between rules and meta-rules is especially emphasized in the representational setting of possibility theory. It amounts to viewing rules as pieces of knowledge that contribute to the partial specification of a unique epistemic state, while meta-rules characterize constraints between specified epistemic states, as in possibilistic answer set programming. PUBLICATION ABSTRACT
Objectives We sought to evaluate the clinical outcomes with a novel platinum chromium everolimus-eluting stent (PtCr-EES) compared with a predicate cobalt chromium everolimus-eluting stent (CoCr-EES) ...in patients undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Background Randomized trials have demonstrated an excellent safety and efficacy profile for the CoCr-EES. The PtCr-EES uses the identical antiproliferative agent and polymer but with a novel platinum chromium scaffold designed for enhanced deliverability, vessel conformability, side-branch access, radiopacity, radial strength, and fracture resistance. Methods A total of 1,530 patients undergoing PCI of 1 or 2 de novo native lesions were randomized at 132 worldwide sites to CoCr-EES (n = 762) or PtCr-EES (n = 768). The primary endpoint was the 12-month rate of target lesion failure (TLF), the composite of target vessel-related cardiac death, target vessel-related myocardial infarction (MI), or ischemia-driven target lesion revascularization (TLR) in the per-protocol population (patients who received ≥1 assigned study stent), powered for noninferiority. Results The 12-month rate of TLF in the per-protocol population occurred in 2.9% versus 3.4% of patients assigned to CoCr-EES versus PtCr-EES, respectively (difference: 0.5%, 95% confidence interval: −1.3% to 2.3%, pnoninferiority = 0.001, psuperiority = 0.60). By intention-to-treat, there were no significant differences between CoCr-EES and PtCr-EES in the 12-month rates of TLF (3.2% vs. 3.5%, p = 0.72), cardiac death or MI (2.5% vs. 2.0%, p = 0.56), TLR (1.9% vs. 1.9%, p = 0.96), or Academic Research Consortium definite or probable stent thrombosis (0.4% vs. 0.4%, p = 1.00). Conclusions In this large-scale, prospective, single-blind randomized trial, a novel PtCr-EES was noninferior to the predicate CoCr-EES for TLF, with nonsignificant differences in measures of safety and efficacy through 12-month follow-up after PCI. (A Prospective, Randomized, Multicenter Trial to Assess an Everolimus-Eluting Coronary Stent System PROMUS Element for the Treatment of up to Two De Novo Coronary Artery Lesions: NCT00823212 )
Toddlers' ability to use cues such as eye gaze and gestures to infer the meaning of novel action words was examined. In Experiment 1, 21- and 27-month-olds were taught labels for pairs of videotaped ...actions that were either similar or dissimilar in appearance. Similar actions differed mainly in the presence of behavioral cues related to the agents' intentions (e.g., extended arms). Only the older children were able to learn the labels for the similar actions. In Experiment 2, 3 new pairs of labels (2 similar, 1 dissimilar) were taught to children in the same age range. Eye gaze and gestures were the main features distinguishing the similar events. The same developmental effect was observed, with only the older children showing learning of both types of verbs and the younger children being impeded by the appearance of the actions. The results show that by the middle of the 2nd year, children begin to consider intentions-in-action when acquiring the meaning of novel action verbs.
Silicoaluminophosphate (SAPO)-34 molecular sieves modified with transition metals Co, Mn, and Ni were investigated for their activity, selectivity, and lifetime in the methanol to olefins (MTO) ...reaction and compared with that of unmodified SAPO-34. The electronic state and location of the metal ions in these materials were determined by magnetic measurements (temperature and magnetic field variations of magnetization). These magnetic studies show that for MnSAPO-34 and CoSAPO-34 metal ions are incorporated into the SAPO framework with concentrations ≃0.12 and 0.17 wt.%, respectively. Nickel modified SAPO-34 samples were prepared by two different procedures. For Ni-SAPO-34 prepared by one procedure (
Method I), the magnetic studies show the presence of nanoparticles (Ni or NiO) outside the SAPO framework. For NiSAPO-34 prepared by a second procedure (
Method II), these studies show that the nickel ions are incorporated into the SAPO framework. Although the total C
2–C
4 olefins activity on these materials was comparable to that of unmodified SAPO-34, significant variations in the deactivation behavior were observed among various metal-modified catalysts. MnSAPO-34 was found to be the best catalyst based on catalyst lifetime. In the case of Ni-SAPO-34 (
Method I), unusually high amounts of methane were observed in the products due to the presence of nanoparticles outside the SAPO framework.
We introduce a new method for computing functions of fuzzy intervals under various monotonicity assumptions on the concerned functions. Our method makes exact computation for all possibility degrees, ...without resorting to /spl alpha/-cuts. We formally present the notion of left and right profiles of fuzzy intervals as a tool for fuzzy interval computation. Several results show that interval analysis methods can be directly adapted to fuzzy interval computation where end point of intervals are changed into left and right profiles. Our approach is illustrated by numerous simple examples all along the paper, and a special section is devoted to the application of these concepts to different known problems.
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