The societal views for addiction recoverees’ in the UAE Society ’

The aim of this research was to find out how the UAE society views people who have recovered from addiction. The data was gathered using a scale with positive and negative statements based on four fundamental axes: First and foremost, how do community members react to a recovering addict in general? Second, the extent to which recovering addicts are accepted in various social communities. Third, the presence of stigma or rejection by community members when dealing with a recovering addict. And fourth, the effect of the interaction of gender and age level on the attitudes of the sample members toward recovering addicts. In addition, an in-depth interview with ten respondents from addicts who recovered and returned to Al-Amal Private Hospital for treatment or follow-up was conducted. The interviews focused on showing and demonstrating the experiences of those recovering from addiction in dealing with the external community and the extent to which it accepts them, their integration into various "social, environment, professional" aspects and their exposure to stigma and ostracism within their societies. According to recovering addicts' narratives, the attitude of Emirati community members on recovering addicts is relatively positive, with negative indicators about "safety, trust, dealing, and integration" acting as a barrier to their integration into social capital. This result, which contradicted the respondents' accounts and the existence of a declining social perception, regardless of age and gender, was found to be related to demographic factors (gender/age) and attitudes of Emirati community members toward recovering addicts. Furthermore, there is a significant gap between what the recovered believes from societal reality after his recovery and individual society's perceptions and attitudes, which is a totally contradictory gap that reflects a lack of community members' awareness in dealing properly with this recovering addict.

Die mediale Darstellung des Föderalismus während der Corona-Pandemie – Eine Auswertung von Positionen, Konnotationen und Bewertungen in deutschen Tageszeitungen

Die vorliegende Studie stellt die erste umfassende und systematische Analyse der Medienberichterstattung zum deutschen Föderalismus dar. Ausgewertet wurden Positionen, Konnotationen und Bewertungen in 449 Statements aus 14 Tageszeitungen im Zusammenhang mit der Corona-Pandemie für den Zeitraum März bis September 2020. Methodisch werden quantitative und qualitative Ansätze kombiniert, um sowohl Verteilungsmuster als auch Themen und Motive zu erfassen. Die Ergebnisse bestätigen für die Krise, was die Literatur für ‚normale Zeiten‘ annimmt: Eine deutliche Mehrheit aller veröffentlichten Statements zum Föderalismus fällt negativ aus. Dies änderte auch die Phase der Einheitlichkeit der Landesregelungen infolge der Einigung auf einen umfassenden bundesweiten Lockdown nicht. Die erfolgreiche Stabilisierung des Infektionsgeschehens ‚trotz‘ unterschiedlicher Lockerungen in den Ländern führte (absolut) zu weniger negativen Statements, aber nicht zu substantiell positiven. Mehrheitlich negative Statements finden sich in der Gruppe der Bevölkerung, der JournalistInnen und auch der PolitikerInnen insgesamt; mehrheitlich positive Statements finden sich lediglich bei LandespolitikerInnen der CDU/CSU.

A Study on the Types of Perceptions Held by Students Regarding the ‘Classics Reading’ Course as Part of the Liberal Arts Education in University －Focusing on ‘Reading Arete Classics’ of K University

The purpose of this study was to investigate the types of perceptions held by students regarding the ‘Reading Arete Classics’ course, which was offered as a liberal arts program at K University. For this purpose, Q methodological analysis was used to study subjectivity among the students, such as individual perception and belief. The Q population was composed based on literature analysis, in-depth interviews, survey materials on Reading Classics, and after expert reviewing the Q sample was composed of 33 statements. 31 students of ‘Reading Arete Classics’ were selected as P samples, and the data were analyzed using the PQ method 2.35 program. The data analysis based on the most positive statements, negative statements and identification items, along with the types of perceptions concerning ‘Reading Arete Classics’, were classified into the three types. Type 1, which was called “discovering the value of classics”, revealed the value of classics and the pleasure of reading books through ‘Reading Arete Classics’. Type 2, called “discovering the pleasure of discussion”, taught the joy of discussion during the discussion process of ‘Reading Arete Classics’. Type 3 called “discovering the value of collaboration” showed the students the fun and the value of engaging in joint activities while making and solving the problems posed by the questions for discussion through team activities. The results of this study will be used as basic data to improve reading classics classes as liberal arts courses.

Rural youth attitudes towards immigrants

The aim of this study is to research the attitudes towards immigrants among rural Finnish second grade students. The study was carried out in Southern Ostrobothnia region which is strongly countryside and where the number of immigrants is the lowest in Finland. Also, the level of education in the region is the lowest in Finland. During the next decades, immigrants will be an important source of labour, since the population in Finland is getting older - faster than in any other European country. The data (n=275) was collected from colleges and upper secondary schools. The analysis showed that gender, parents level of education and the multicultural connections had an effect on persons attitudes towards immigrants. Youths´ attitudes also varied towards different immigration groups and nationalities. Attitudes towards the immigration of children and labour for example, were more positive than attitudes towards unemployed migrants and refugees. In terms of nationalities, Western immigrants were more positively welcomed than immigrants from war zones and those from the crisis areas. Answers to the open-ended question in the end of the questionnaire showed that the attitudes towards immigration were particularly concerned with refugees and the policy of immigration. Open answers included both racist and negative statements as well as statements to helping refugees. The results of this study may be of use when the new refugee policies are implemented in near future. The increase in immigrant labour requires respect, cooperation and cultural tolerance. To stabilize the economy in Finland and to be able to work in the future, new, more tolerant attitudes are needed.

CORRELATION BETWEEN STUDENTS' INTEREST AND THEIR ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT

This study focuses on students’ interest in English, and how it influences students’ achievement. The aim of this study is to figure out whether there is a correlation between students’ interest and their academic achievement in learning English. The number of the sample in this research are 87 students at the second grade of SMA Negeri 1 Tomohon. This study used quantitative research design which is non-experimental research. The data collected with questionnaire to obtain the information about students’ interest and students’ achievement in learning English. The questionnaire consists of 31 items divided into positive and negative statements. The items were tested with SPPS to determent the validity and the reliability of each items. The data was analysed by using the formula of Pearson Product Moment Correlation. It was found that the correlation score was 0.424. The significance value was 0.217 showed in the r table. The score of correlation 0.424 was higher than the significance value 0.217, means that the alternative hypothesis was accepted. Based on the result, it can be concluded that there was a positive correlation between students’ interest and their academic achievement in learning English. The researcher suggests that the case interest is very important particularly in affecting students’ achievement, therefore it must be improved.

Validity and Reliability of the French Short Version of the Questionnaire of Olfactory Disorders-Negative Statements (sQOD-NS)

Objective: To develop a French Short Version of the Questionnaire of Olfactory Disorders-Negative Statements (Fr-sQOD) to assess the quality of life impairments of patients with olfactory dysfunction (OD). Methods: Patients with OD and controls were enrolled from 2 academic centers. Individuals completed the Fr-sQOD, an OD visual analog scale severity, and the French version of the sinonasal outcome tool-22 (SNOT-22). Cronbach α was used to measure the internal consistency of Fr-sQOD. The reliability and the external validity of Fr-sQOD were assessed through a test–retest approach and by correlating Fr-sQOD with SNOT-22 scores, respectively. The external validity was assessed by correlation analysis between Fr-sQOD and the result of an assessment of the severity of OD on a visual analog scale. Results: Eighty patients completed the evaluations. The internal consistency was adequate (Cronbach α .96), and the test–retest reliability was high in the entire cohort (rs = 0.877, P < .001). The correlation between Fr-sQOD total scores and the severity of OD was moderate but significant (rs = −0.431; P = .001) supporting an acceptable external validity. Patients with OD had a significantly higher score of Fr-sQOD than healthy individuals ( P < .001), indicating a high internal validity. Conclusion: The Fr-sQOD is a reliable and valid self-administered tool in the evaluation of the impact of OD on quality of life of French-speaking patients.

A qualitative and quantitative analysis of open citations to retracted articles: the Wakefield 1998 et al.'s case

In this article, we show the results of a quantitative and qualitative analysis of open citations on a popular and highly cited retracted paper: “Ileal-lymphoid-nodular hyperplasia, non-specific colitis and pervasive developmental disorder in children” by Wakefield et al., published in 1998. The main purpose of our study is to understand the behavior of the publications citing one retracted article and the characteristics of the citations the retracted article accumulated over time. Our analysis is based on a methodology which illustrates how we gathered the data, extracted the topics of the citing articles and visualized the results. The data and services used are all open and free to foster the reproducibility of the analysis. The outcomes concerned the analysis of the entities citing Wakefield et al.’s article and their related in-text citations. We observed a constant increasing number of citations in the last 20 years, accompanied with a constant increment in the percentage of those acknowledging its retraction. Citing articles have started either discussing or dealing with the retraction of Wakefield et al.’s article even before its full retraction happened in 2010. Articles in the social sciences domain citing the Wakefield et al.’s one were among those that have mostly discussed its retraction. In addition, when observing the in-text citations, we noticed that a large number of the citations received by Wakefield et al.’s article has focused on general discussions without recalling strictly medical details, especially after the full retraction. Medical studies did not hesitate in acknowledging the retraction of the Wakefield et al.’s article and often provided strong negative statements on it.

Prospective Memory and Positivity Bias in the COVID-19 Health Crisis: The Effects of Aging

This study aimed to determine whether the observed tendency to remember more positive than negative past events (positivity phenomena) also appears when recalling hypothetical events about the future. In this study, young, middle-aged, and older adults were presented with 28 statements about the future associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, half positive and half negative. In addition, half of these statements were endowed with personal implications while the other half had a more social connotations. Participants rated their agreement/disagreement with each statement and, after a distraction task, they recalled as many statements as possible. There was no difference in the agreement ratings between the three age groups, but the participants agreed with positive statements more than with negative ones and they identified more with statements of social content than of personal content. The younger and older individuals recalled more statements than the middle-aged people. More importantly, older participants recalled more positive than negative statements (positivity effect), and showed a greater tendency to turn negative statements into more positive or neutral ones (positivity bias). These findings showed that the positivity effect occurs in even such complex and situations as the present pandemic, especially in older adults. The results are discussed by reference to the notion of commission errors and false memories resulting from the activation of cognitive biases.

Time-dependent Dijkstra’s algorithm under bipolar neutrosophic fuzzy environment

Determining the shortest path and calculating the shortest travel time of a complex networks are important for transportation problems. Numerous approaches has been developed to search shortest path on graphs, and one of the well-known is the Dijkstra’s label correcting algorithm. Dijkstra’s approach is capable of determining shortest path of directed or undirected graph with non-negative weighted arcs. To handle with uncertainty in real-life, the Dijkstra’s algorithm should be adapted to fuzzy environment. The weight of arc -which is the vague travel time between two nodes- can be expressed in bipolar neutrosophic fuzzy sets containing positive and negative statements. In addition, the weights of arcs in bipolar neutrosophic fuzzy graphs can be affected by time. This study proposes the extended Dijkstra’s algorithm to search the shortest path and calculate the shortest travel time on a single source time-dependent network of bipolar neutrosophic fuzzy weighted arcs. The proposed approach is illustrated, and the results demonstrate the validity of the extended algorithm. This article is intended to guide future shortest path algorithms on time-dependent fuzzy graphs.