There is a growing need for automated tools which make predictions about the positivity or negativity of sentiment conveyed by text. Such tools have a number of important applications in game user ...research. They are useful for understanding users generally, as they may give Big Data researchers access to a new source of information about player learning environments. Sentiment analysis methods are also applicable to the detection of toxicity, and the identification of players or player messages that are a potential threat to the player experience. A major challenge in sentiment analysis, however, is developing portable models that can be applied to new domains with relatively little effort. In the present study we extend a lexicon-based sentiment extractor, SO-CAL, to the analysis of instant messages across 1000 games of StarCraft 2. We show that, with updates to dictionary entries that are tailored to the classification task at hand, SO-CAL constitutes a respectable classifier of sentiment and toxicity that is robust across differences in player region and league. We verify the performance of our toxicity detector against a sample of 2025 additional games. Our results support the proposal that lexicon-based sentiment extraction is a useful and portable method of sentiment analysis, and that it can be deployed to identify toxicity.
OBJECTIVE—Cyclosporin A (CsA) is an immunosuppressant commonly used to prevent organ rejection but is associated with hyperlipidemia and an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. Although studies ...suggest that CsA-induced hyperlipidemia is mediated by inhibition of low-density lipoprotein receptor (LDLr)–mediated lipoprotein clearance, the data supporting this are inconclusive. We therefore sought to investigate the role of the LDLr in CsA-induced hyperlipidemia by using Ldlr-knockout mice (Ldlr).
APPROACH AND RESULTS—Ldlr and wild-type (wt) C57Bl/6 mice were treated with 20 mg/kg per d CsA for 4 weeks. On a chow diet, CsA caused marked dyslipidemia in Ldlr but not in wt mice. Hyperlipidemia was characterized by a prominent increase in plasma very low–density lipoprotein and intermediate-density lipoprotein/LDL with unchanged plasma high-density lipoprotein levels, thus mimicking the dyslipidemic profile observed in humans. Analysis of specific lipid species by liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry suggested a predominant effect of CsA on increased very low–density lipoprotein–IDL/LDL lipoprotein number rather than composition. Mechanistic studies indicated that CsA did not alter hepatic lipoprotein production but did inhibit plasma clearance and hepatic uptake of Ccholesteryl oleate and glycerol triHoleate-double-labeled very low–density lipoprotein–like particles. Further studies showed that CsA inhibited plasma lipoprotein lipase activity and increased levels of apolipoprotein C-III and proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9.
CONCLUSIONS—We demonstrate that CsA does not cause hyperlipidemia via direct effects on the LDLr. Rather, LDLr deficiency plays an important permissive role for CsA-induced hyperlipidemia, which is associated with abnormal lipoprotein clearance, decreased lipoprotein lipase activity, and increased levels of apolipoprotein C-III and proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9. Enhancing LDLr and lipoprotein lipase activity and decreasing apolipoprotein C-III and proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9 levels may therefore provide attractive treatment targets for patients with hyperlipidemia receiving CsA.
This study compared the findings of cervical cytology screening by ThinPrep Papanicolaou (Pap) tests (TP) with the findings of screening by conventional cervical smears (CS) in a screening population ...involving what to the authors' knowledge is the largest sample of ThinPrep Pap tests published to date.
Data from 191,581 CS that were screened in the period from March 1, 1998 to February 28, 2000 were compared with data from 190,667 TP performed from March 1, 2000 to February 28, 2002 and that were obtained from the same sources.
With TP, the unsatisfactory rate was reduced from 0.48% to 0.32%. Fewer cases were considered to be suboptimal (19.12% vs. 12.97%). The detection rates of squamous cell carcinomas, adenocarcinomas, and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions (HSIL) were essentially unchanged in the TP group (0.005%, 0.003%, and 0.25%, respectively) compared with the rates for the CS group (0.01%, 0.006%, and 0.25%, respectively). There was an increase in the detection of atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance (ASCUS; 3.74% vs. 3.19%) and low-grade SIL (LSIL; 1.67% vs. 1.01%) with a decrease in the ASCUS-to-LSIL ratio from 3.15 for CS to 2.33 for TP. The detection of atypical glandular cells of undetermined significance (AGUS) increased slightly from 0.07% to 0.09%. The proportion of cells reported to have reactive atypia dropped from 2.71% to 1.48%. Limited biopsy correlation (range, 73.2-76.2%) confirmed the increased sensitivity of TP. More actinomyces (1.07% vs. 0.52%) were detected in TP samples despite of a similar portion of intrauterine-device users. The average primary screening and rapid rescreening time of each slide were reduced from 8 minutes to 4 minutes and from 2 minutes to less than 1 minute, respectively.
The preliminary experience of the authors of the current study appears to support the use of the ThinPrep Pap test to enhance the efficiency of cervical cytology screening.
Diabetes is a global public health problem. Maintaining optimal glycemic control is critical for minimizing associated long-term complications and achieving better quality of life. Effective diabetes ...self-management education is one key component to enhance diabetes clients’ self-management capabilities. The research team established a “Caring for Yourself—Managing Your Diabetes” Web site, which contained 35 video clips about diabetes management. The aim of this study was to evaluate user satisfaction with the Web-based diabetes self-management education program. A convenience sample of 100 diabetes clients (mean age, 61.5 SD, 10.7 years) was invited to view one of the video clips via a laptop computer. A modified version of the Computer-Aided Learning Evaluation Questionnaire and the End-User Computing Satisfaction Questionnaire was used to evaluate participants’ satisfaction with the program. The results indicate that participants were satisfied with the format, content, and accuracy of the Web-based diabetes education program. Some participants suggested adding different types of exercises that are specific to the needs of client groups and more explanation of diabetes medications. The results of this study support the use of computer-assisted learning as a promising method for delivering diabetes self-management education, which is satisfactory to diabetes clients.
Under the current taxi licensing system in Hong Kong, holders of taxi licenses are given perpetual operating right in the taxi business. Since 1995, the government has not issued any new taxi ...licenses. Against this background, the freely traded taxi licenses are often held as an investment asset. When there are active speculative activities, the taxi license premium may be affected more by the general economic conditions than the demand for taxi services and/or changes in the levels of taxi services. In this paper, we use the backward and forward multiple regression methods to develop the level-of-taxi-services (LOTS) and economy-wide (EW) models for understanding fluctuations in the premiums of urban and New Territories (NT) taxis from 1986 to 2002. The results suggest that variations of both urban and NT taxi license premiums can be better accounted for by factors of the EW than the LOTS models. When the policymakers review policy with regard to the taxi license, it is important for them to take a closer look not only at taxi-related factors but also at the economy-wide factors.
Students in biomedical disciplines require understanding of normal and abnormal microscopic appearances of human tissues (histology and histopathology). For this purpose, practical classes in these ...disciplines typically use virtual microscopy, viewing digitised whole slide images in web browsers. To enhance engagement, tools have been developed to enable individual or collaborative annotation of whole slide images within web browsers. To date, there have been no studies that have critically compared the impact on learning of individual and collaborative annotations on whole slide images.
Junior and senior students engaged in Pathology practical classes within Medical Science and Medicine programs participated in cross-over trials of individual and collaborative annotation activities. Students' understanding of microscopic morphology was compared using timed online quizzes, while students' perceptions of learning were evaluated using an online questionnaire.
For senior medical students, collaborative annotation of whole slide images was superior for understanding key microscopic features when compared to individual annotation; whilst being at least equivalent to individual annotation for junior medical science students. Across cohorts, students agreed that the annotation activities provided a user-friendly learning environment that met their flexible learning needs, improved efficiency, provided useful feedback, and helped them to set learning priorities. Importantly, these activities were also perceived to enhance motivation and improve understanding.
Collaborative annotation improves understanding of microscopic morphology for students with sufficient background understanding of the discipline. These findings have implications for the deployment of annotation activities in biomedical curricula, and potentially for postgraduate training in Anatomical Pathology.
While early studies on the Korean long distance anaphor caki describe it to be subject-oriented in that it can only take subject antecedents, similarly to long distance anaphors in many other ...languages, more recent studies observe that it can take non-subject antecedents as well, especially in the context of certain verbs. This paper presents a visual-world eye-tracking study that tested whether the antecedent potential of caki in an embedded subject position is a function of the matrix subject, the matrix verb, or both, and whether the subject and the verb effects constrain the interpretation of caki in the same way as null pronouns, a commonly used pronominal form in Korean. These questions were addressed through an investigation of how the subject effect and the verb effect were manifested in processing these pronouns. We found that when caki, but not null pronouns, was first processed, there were more fixations to the images representing the matrix subject than the images representing the matrix object regardless of the matrix verb. We further found that the proportions of fixations to the images in both caki and null trials changed after the processing of some sentential verbs. These findings demonstrate that while null pronoun interpretation is a function of the verb effect only, caki-interpretation is a function of both the subject and the verb effect, supporting a multiple-constraints approach to anaphor resolution.
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