scholarly journals The Effect of Visual Sort and Rate Versus Visual Analog Scales on the Reliability of Judgments of Dysphonia

Author(s):  
Mara R. Kapsner-Smith ◽  
Amanda Opuszynski ◽  
Cara E. Stepp ◽  
Tanya L. Eadie

Purpose The reliability of auditory-perceptual judgments between listeners is a long-standing problem in the assessment of voice disorders. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a relatively novel experimental scaling method, called visual sort and rate (VSR), yielded stronger reliability than the more frequently used method of visual analog scales (VAS) for ratings of overall severity (OS) and breathiness (BR) in speakers with voicedisorders. Method Fifty speech samples were selected from a database of speakers with voice disorders. Twenty-two inexperienced listeners provided ratings of OS or BR in four rating blocks: VSR-OS, VSR-BR, VAS-OS, and VSR-BR. For the VAS task, listeners rated each speaker for BR or OS using a vertically oriented 100-mm VAS. For the VSR task, stimuli were distributed into sets of samples with a range of speaker severities in each set. Listeners sorted and ranked samples for OS or BR within each set, and final ratings were captured on a vertically oriented 100-mm VAS. Interrater variability, defined as the mean of the squared differences between a listener's ratings and group mean ratings, and intrarater reliability (Pearson r ) were compared across rating tasks for OS and BR using paired t tests. Results Results showed that listeners had significantly less interrater variability (better reliability) when using VSR methods compared to VAS for judgments of both OS and BR. Intrarater reliability was high across rating tasks and dimensions; however, ratings of BR were significantly more consistent within individual listeners when using VAS than when using VSR. Conclusions VSR is an experimental method that decreases variability of auditory-perceptual judgments between inexperienced listeners when rating speakers with a range of dysphonic severities and disorders. Future research should determine whether a clinically viable tool may be developed based on VSR principles and whether such benefits extend to experienced listeners.

1985 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas J. DeGregorio ◽  
Nancy Gross Polow

The present study was designed to investigate the effect of teacher training sessions on listener perception of voice disorders. Three ASHA certified speech-language pathologists provided the criteria mean. Thirty randomly selected teachers from a Bergen County school system, randomly placed into two groups, served as subjects. The experimental group received three training sessions on consecutive weeks. Three weeks after the end of training, both groups were given a posttest. Listener perception scores were significantly higher for the experimental group. The implications of these results for in-service workshops, teacher/speech-language pathologist interaction and future research are discussed.


Author(s):  
Tomasz Kuligowski ◽  
Anna Skrzek ◽  
Błażej Cieślik

The aim of this study was to describe and update current knowledge of manual therapy accuracy in treating cervical and lumbar radiculopathy, to identify the limitations in current studies, and to suggest areas for future research. The study was conducted according to PRISMA guidelines for systematic reviews. A comprehensive literature review was conducted using PubMed and Web of Science databases up to April 2020. The following inclusion criteria were used: (1) presence of radiculopathy; (2) treatment defined as manual therapy (i.e., traction, manipulation, mobilization); and (3) publication defined as a Randomized Controlled Trial. The electronic literature search resulted in 473 potentially relevant articles. Finally, 27 articles were accepted: 21 on cervical (CR) and 6 in lumbar radiculopathy (LR). The mean PEDro score for CR was 6.6 (SD 1.3), and for LR 6.7 (SD 1.6). Traction-oriented techniques are the most frequently chosen treatment form for CR and are efficient in reducing pain and improving functional outcomes. In LR, each of the included publications used a different form of manual therapy, which makes it challenging to summarize knowledge in this group. Of included publications, 93% were either of moderate or low quality, which indicates that quality improvement is necessary for this type of research.


2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-38
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Margaret Stovold

A Review of: Schaferm, S., Sulflow, M., & Muller, P. (2017). The special taste of snack news: an application of niche theory to understand the appeal of Facebook as a source for political news. First Monday, 22(4-3). http://dx.doi.org/10.5210/fm.v22i4.7431 Abstract Objective – To investigate Facebook as a source of exposure to political news stories and to compare the reasons for using Facebook as a news source and the gratifications obtained, compared with other news sources. Design – Survey questionnaire. Setting – Facebook. Subjects – 422 German Facebook users. Methods – An online survey was developed to investigate the use of Facebook as a news source compared with other sources. Specific research questions were informed by the ‘theory of niche’ (Dimmick, 2003) which examines the coexistence and competition between different media outlets by examining the breadth, overlap and superiority of one platform over another. The survey was distributed using a ‘snowball’ technique between July and August 2015. The survey was shared by 52 student research assistants on their Facebook profiles. They asked their friends to complete the survey and share it with their own networks. Main results – The mean (M) age of the 422 respondents was 23.5 years (SD=8.25). The majority were female (61%) with a high school degree (89%). TV news and news websites were the most frequently used sources of political news. Facebook ranked third, ahead of newspapers, search engines, magazines, email provider websites, and Twitter. The mean score for the importance of Facebook as a news sources was 2.46 (SD=1.13) on a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 is low and 5 is high. This fell in the middle of the range when compared with the top ranked source assessed by importance (TV news, M 4.40, SD=0.88) and the lowest (email providers, M 1.92, SD=0.97). Users rarely visited Facebook with the purpose of finding news (M 1.59, SD=0.73). However, they estimated around 24% of the posts they see were concerned with political news, and when encountered, these stories are frequently read (M 3.53, SD=1.18). However, the level of interaction as measured by liking, commenting, sharing or status updates was low (M 1.94 SD=1.09; M 1.37, SD=0.79; M 1.51, SD=0.85 and M 1.4, SD=0.78 respectively). The ‘gratification’ categories where Facebook as a news source scored the highest were for killing time (M 2.97, SD=1.29), entertainment (M 2.92, SD=1.05), and surveillance (M 2.77, SD=1.01). When compared to newspapers and TV news, it was found that Facebook has a lower score for niche breadth, meaning that it serves a specific rather than general news function. Facebook also had a lower overlap score when compared with the other media, thereby performing a complementary function, while TV news and newspapers perform similarly. TV news scored better for providing balanced information, surveillance and social utility while Facebook scored highest for killing time. There was no difference in the category of entertainment. There was a similar picture when comparing Facebook with newspapers. Conclusion – The authors conclude that while users do not actively seek political news through Facebook, they are exposed to political news through this medium. Respondents did not consider the news to be well balanced, and that currently Facebooks’ niche is restricted to entertainment and killing time. The authors note that this may be disappointing for news organisations, but there is potential to expose large audiences to political news when they are not actively seeking it. The findings represent a specific time point in a changing landscape and future research will need to take these changes into account. Comparisons with other online news sources and the use of objective measures to validate self-reported data would be valuable areas for future research.


2020 ◽  
Vol 125 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-78
Author(s):  
Victor Pop ◽  
Johannes Krabbe ◽  
Wolfgang Maret ◽  
Margaret Rayman

AbstractThe present study reports on first-trimester reference ranges of plasma mineral Se/Zn/Cu concentration in relation to free thyroxine (FT4), thyrotropin (TSH) and thyroid peroxidase antibodies (TPO-Ab), assessed at 12 weeks’ gestation in 2041 pregnant women, including 544 women not taking supplements containing Se/Zn/Cu. The reference range (2·5th–97·5th percentiles) in these 544 women was 0·72–1·25 µmol/l for Se, 17·15–35·98 µmol/l for Cu and 9·57–16·41 µmol/l for Zn. These women had significantly lower mean plasma Se concentration (0·94 (sd 0·12) µmol/l) than those (n 1479) taking Se/Zn/Cu supplements (1·03 (sd 0·14) µmol/l; P < 0·001), while the mean Cu (26·25 µmol/l) and Zn (12·55 µmol/l) concentrations were almost identical in these sub-groups. Women with hypothyroxinaemia (FT4 below reference range with normal TSH) had significantly lower plasma Zn concentrations than euthyroid women. After adjusting for covariates including supplement intake, plasma Se (negatively), Zn and Cu (positively) concentrations were significantly related to logFT4; Se and Cu (but not Zn) were positively and significantly related to logTSH. Women taking additional Se/Zn/Cu supplements were 1·46 (95 % CI 1·09, 2·04) times less likely to have elevated titres of TPO-Ab at 12 weeks of gestation. We conclude that first-trimester Se reference ranges are influenced by Se-supplement intake, while Cu and Zn ranges are not. Plasma mineral Se/Zn/Cu concentrations are associated with thyroid FT4 and TSH concentrations. Se/Zn/Cu supplement intake affects TPO-Ab status. Future research should focus on the impact of trace mineral status during gestation on thyroid function.


2013 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 239-259 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wolfgang Tschacher ◽  
Fabian Ramseyer ◽  
Claudia Bergomi

Time is a basic dimension in psychology, underlying behavior and experience. Timing and time perception constitute implicit processes that are often inaccessible to the individual person. Research in this field has shown that timing is involved in many areas of clinical significance. In the projects presented here, we combine timing with seemingly different fields of research, such as psychopathology, perceptual grouping, and embodied cognition. Focusing on the time scale of the subjective present, we report findings from three different clinical studies: (1) We studied perceived causality in schizophrenia patients, finding that perceptual grouping (‘binding’, ‘Gestalt formation’), which leads to visual causality perceptions, did not distinguish between patients and healthy controls. Patients however did integrate context (provided by the temporal distribution of auditory context stimuli) less into perceptions, in significant contrast to controls. This is consistent with reports of higher inaccuracy in schizophrenia patients’ temporal processing. (2) In a project on auditory Gestalt perception we investigated auditory perceptual grouping in schizophrenia patients. The mean dwell time was positively related to how much patients were prone to auditory hallucinations. Dwell times of auditory Gestalts may be regarded as operationalizations of the subjective present; findings thus suggested that patients with hallucinations had a shorter present. (3) The movement correlations of interacting individuals were used to study the non-verbal synchrony between therapist and patient in psychotherapy sessions. We operationalized the duration of an embodied ‘social present’ by the statistical significance of such associations, finding a window of roughly 5.7 seconds in conversing dyads. We discuss that temporal scales of nowness may be modifiable, e.g., by mindfulness. This yields promising goals for future research on timing in the clinical context: psychotherapeutic techniques may alter binding processes, hence the subjective present of individuals, and may affect the social present in therapeutic interactions.


2020 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Troy V. Mumford ◽  
M. Travis Maynard

Abstract Research on teams in organizations tends to focus on understanding the causes of team performance with a focus on how to enjoy the benefits of team success and avoid the negative consequences of team failure. This paper instead asks the question, ‘what are some of the negative consequences of team success?’ A review of the literature on teams is augmented with research from cognitive science, sociology, occupational psychology, and psychology to explore the potential negative long-term consequences of teamwork success. The general topics of groupthink, overconfidence bias, regression to the mean, role overload, and strategy calcification are reviewed while discussing the implications for future research streams and practical team management.


2003 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 386-400 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sally M. Barton-Arwood ◽  
Joseph H. Wehby ◽  
Philip L. Gunter ◽  
Kathleen L. Lane

This study evaluated the intrarater reliability of two functional behavior assessment rating scales: the Motivation Assessment Scale and the Problem Behavior Questionnaire. Teachers rated 30 students from 10 self-contained classrooms for students with emotional or behavioral disorders on three separate occasions using both rating scales. Pearson correlation coefficients and exact and adjacent agreement percentages indicated variable and inconsistent ratings across administrations and rating scales. The authors discuss possible reasons for inconsistencies, as well as implications for practice and future research.


Kybernetes ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 446-460 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaka Vadnjal ◽  
Predrag Ljubotina

Purpose – Family businesses represent the largest share of small-sized firms in majority of economies around the world. Having in mind the global economic situation this trend is expected to be continued. With the goal of better understanding of the process of transferring the business to the next generation, which ensures a long-term success, the purpose of this paper is to investigate expectations of student’s with family business background. Design/methodology/approach – The research addresses the issue of an individual’s perception of entrepreneurship and the related factors that influence individual’s decision on whether to build a career as an employee, become a successor of family business or start own business as an independent entrepreneur. The authors separately analyzed West European (data from another study), East European and Slovenian senior student population for the purpose of comparative study. Students were surveyed and binominal regression was used for statistics. Findings – The results show differences between investigated populations and positions Slovenian students in the mean. The authors anticipate that differences are caused by historical, cultural and educational backgrounds. This challenging area is raising a lot of sub-questions for possible future research. Originality/value – The value of the study is in the replication of the existing methodology from the benchmarking study and result comparison.


2009 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 378-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zan Gao ◽  
Amelia M. Lee ◽  
Melinda A. Solmon ◽  
Tao Zhang

This study investigated the relationships and mean-level changes of middle school students’ motivation (expectancy-related beliefs, task values, self-efficacy, and outcome expectancy) toward physical education over time, and how gender affected students’ motivation. Participants (N = 206) completed questionnaires over a 1-year period: once in the sixth and seventh grades and again in the seventh and eighth grades. Results yielded that self-efficacy and task values were positive predictors of students’ intention across cohorts. The mean levels of self-efficacy decreased over time for students in Cohort 1 (across sixth and seventh grades). However, results revealed a consistent decline in the mean levels of other motivational variables for both cohorts. No gender differences emerged for the variables. The findings are discussed in regard to the implications for educational practice, and future research areas are presented.


ENTRAMADO ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 298-310
Author(s):  
Sonia Esperanza Aguirre-Forero ◽  
Nelson  Virgilio Piraneque-Gambasica ◽  
José Rafael Vásquez-Polo

Cocoa (Theobroma cacao L.) is a species originating from the humid tropics. Over 70,000 km2 worldwide is dedicated to growing cocoa, and approximately 30% of its global production is concentrated in the equatorial regions of Central and South America, the Antilles and tropical Asia. The demand for cocoa is growing significantly, but the presence of cadmium (Cd) in the species is a potential problem limiting its commercialization. The present study determined the Cd, Ni, Pb and Cr content in two cocoa-producing regions in northern Colombia. Foliage (leaf, bean and shell) and soil were analyzed. The mean Ni, Pb and Cr content in the plant tissue did not exceed the maximum permissible limits set by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The mean Cd content in the beans was 0.51 mg kg-1 in region 1 and 0.66 mg kg-1 in region 2, which are considered risky per reports from the European Union and restrict the product’s export. These results serve as a reference for future research on cocoa.  


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