scholarly journals The Impact Of Lexical Stress Type and Position of a Vowel Within a Phrase on Vowel Formant Bandwidths

Author(s):  
Sergey Batalin

The article sets out to explore the impact of different types of lexical stress and word position within a phrase as well as the interaction of these factors on formant bandwidths. The findings contribute to establishing the role of these formant features as acoustic correlates of the Russian lexical stress. The experimental material for analysis is presented by the Russian sound [a] embedded in a word in a natural language carrier phrase. The word position is changed from phrase initial to the phrase final one and in each position the target word is uttered with a neutral and an emphatic stress by four speakers. The Praat software is used to extract the mean values of the first four formant bandwidths of the target vowel. Two-way ANOVA is carried out to establish the significance of difference between neutrally and emphatically stressed vowels in all the three phrasal positions. The impact of phrasal position and stress type is clearly pronounced and is valid for all the four speakers. Specific trends in bandwidth alterations are hard to identify in most cases because of inconsistent fluctuations of formant bandwidths and a heavy influence of the speakers' idiolects: formant bandwidths expand, contract or remain unchanged. An explanation of the results obtained is suggested.


2004 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 119-137 ◽  
Author(s):  
S.D. Gurney ◽  
D.S.L. Lawrence

Seasonal variations in the stable isotopic composition of snow and meltwater were investigated in a sub-arctic, mountainous, but non-glacial, catchment at Okstindan in northern Norway based on analyses of δ18O and δD. Samples were collected during four field periods (August 1998; April 1999; June 1999 and August 1999) at three sites lying on an altitudinal transect (740–970 m a.s.l.). Snowpack data display an increase in the mean values of δ18O (increasing from a mean value of −13.51 to −11.49‰ between April and August), as well as a decrease in variability through the melt period. Comparison with a regional meteoric water line indicates that the slope of the δ18O–δD line for the snowpacks decreases over the same period, dropping from 7.49 to approximately 6.2.This change points to the role of evaporation in snowpack ablation and is confirmed by the vertical profile of deuterium excess. Snowpack seepage data, although limited, also suggest reduced values of δD, as might be associated with local evaporation during meltwater generation. In general, meltwaters were depleted in δ18O relative to the source snowpack at the peak of the melt (June), but later in the year (August) the difference between the two was not statistically significant. The diurnal pattern of isotopic composition indicates that the most depleted meltwaters coincide with the peak in temperature and, hence, meltwater production.



Author(s):  
Anne Nassauer

This book provides an account of how and why routine interactions break down and how such situational breakdowns lead to protest violence and other types of surprising social outcomes. It takes a close-up look at the dynamic processes of how situations unfold and compares their role to that of motivations, strategies, and other contextual factors. The book discusses factors that can draw us into violent situations and describes how and why we make uncommon individual and collective decisions. Covering different types of surprise outcomes from protest marches and uprisings turning violent to robbers failing to rob a store at gunpoint, it shows how unfolding situations can override our motivations and strategies and how emotions and culture, as well as rational thinking, still play a part in these events. The first chapters study protest violence in Germany and the United States from 1960 until 2010, taking a detailed look at what happens between the start of a protest and the eruption of violence or its peaceful conclusion. They compare the impact of such dynamics to the role of police strategies and culture, protesters’ claims and violent motivations, the black bloc and agents provocateurs. The analysis shows how violence is triggered, what determines its intensity, and which measures can avoid its outbreak. The book explores whether we find similar situational patterns leading to surprising outcomes in other types of small- and large-scale events: uprisings turning violent, such as Ferguson in 2014 and Baltimore in 2015, and failed armed store robberies.



2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 2041
Author(s):  
Lisa Milani ◽  
Norman B. Wood

Falling snow is a key component of the Earth’s water cycle, and space-based observations provide the best current capability to evaluate it globally. The Cloud Profiling Radar (CPR) on board CloudSat is sensitive to snowfall, and other satellite missions and climatological models have used snowfall properties measured by it for evaluating and comparing against their snowfall products. Since a battery anomaly in 2011, the CPR has operated in a Daylight-Only Operations (DO-Op) mode, in which it makes measurements primarily during only the daylit portion of its orbit. This work provides estimates of biases inherent in global snowfall amounts derived from CPR measurements due to this shift to DO-Op mode. We use CloudSat’s snowfall measurements during its Full Operations (Full-Op) period prior to the battery anomaly to evaluate the impact of the DO-Op mode sampling. For multi-year global mean values, the snowfall fraction during DO-Op changes by −10.16% and the mean snowfall rate changes by −8.21% compared with Full-Op. These changes are driven by the changes in sampling in DO-Op and are very little influenced by changes in meteorology between the Full-Op and DO-Op periods. The results highlight the need to sample consistently with the CloudSat observations or to adjust snowfall estimates derived from CloudSat when using DO-Op data to evaluate other precipitation products.



2021 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Davide Vittori

Abstract Scholars have long debated whether populism harms or improves the quality of democracy. This article contributes to this debate by focusing on the impact of populist parties in government. In particular, it inquires: (1) whether populists in government are more likely than non-populists to negatively affect the quality of democracies; (2) whether the role of populists in government matters; and (3) which type of populism is expected to negatively affect the quality of liberal-democratic regimes. The results find strong evidence that the role of populists in government affects several qualities of democracy. While robust, the findings related to (2) are less clear-cut than those pertaining to (1). Finally, regardless of their role in government, different types of populism have different impacts on the qualities of democracy. The results show that exclusionary populist parties in government tend to have more of a negative impact than other forms of populism.



2021 ◽  
pp. 003329412110021
Author(s):  
Sizhe Liu ◽  
Wei Zhang ◽  
Xianyou He ◽  
Xiaoxiang Tang ◽  
Shuxian Lai ◽  
...  

There is evidence that greater aesthetic experience can be linked to artworks when their corresponding meanings can be successfully inferred and understood. Modern cultural-expo architecture can be considered a form of artistic creation and design, and the corresponding design philosophy may be derived from representational objects or abstract social meanings. The present study investigates whether cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design is perceived as more beautiful and how architectural photographs and different types of descriptions of architectural appearance designs interact and produce higher aesthetic evaluations. The results showed an obvious aesthetic preference for cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design (Experiment 1). Moreover, we found that the aesthetic rating score of architectural photographs accompanied by an abstract description was significantly higher than that of those accompanied by a representational description only under the difficult-to-understand design condition (Experiment 2). The results indicated that people preferred cultural-expo architecture with an easy-to-understand architectural appearance design due to a greater understanding of the design, providing further evidence that abstract descriptions can provide supplementary information and explanation to enhance the sense of beauty of abstract cultural-expo architecture.



2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 74-74
Author(s):  
Lun Li ◽  
Yeonjung Lee ◽  
Daniel W L Lai

Abstract Compared to men, women undertake more family caregiving responsibilities, and thus take more toll in health and wellbeing when they are employed. The current study examined the gender difference in mental health among employed family caregivers, focusing on the role of workplace support in balancing work and caregiving roles. Guided by the social role theory and the moderated-mediation model of employment adjustment and mental health, we analyzed a nationally representative data from the 2012 Canada General Social Survey - Caregiving and Care Receiving with a sample of 2,426 participants selected. Moderated-mediation analysis based on the SPSS macro PROCESS 3.3 was used. Women employed family caregivers are more likely to undertake higher intensive caregiving, make more employment adjustment, and further report worse mental health status than their men counterparts. Gender difference was apparent in regards to the workplace support. For women, the moderating effect of workplace support is significant only when there are at least 5 different types of workplace support available at their workplaces, while for men, the moderating effect is significant when there are at least 2-3 different types of workplace support available. Women employed family caregivers experience worse mental health when employment adjustment is needed for their care responsibility. Findings have implications for providing workplace support for family caregivers given that women benefit less from workplace support compared to men. Further study is needed to explore the impact of various types of workplace support for women employed family caregivers, and to provide tailored support to them.



2016 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 257-285 ◽  
Author(s):  
Özgür Parlak ◽  
Nicole Ziegler

Although previous research has demonstrated the efficacy of recasts on second language (L2) morphology and lexis (e.g., Li, 2010; Mackey & Goo, 2007), few studies have examined their effect on learners’ phonological development (although see Saito, 2015; Saito & Lyster, 2012). The current study investigates the impact of recasts on the development of lexical stress, defined as the placement of emphasis on a particular syllable within a word by making it louder and longer, in oral synchronous computer-mediated communication (SCMC) and face-to-face (FTF) interaction. Using a pretest-posttest design, intermediate learners of English were randomly assigned to one of four groups: FTF recast, SCMC recast, FTF control, or SCMC control. Pre- and posttests consisted of sentence-reading and information-exchange tasks, while the treatment was an interactive role-play task. Syllable duration, intensity, and pitch were used to analyze learners’ development of stress placement. The statistical analyses of the acoustic correlates did not yield significant differences. However, the observed patterns suggest that there is need for further investigation to understand the relationship between recasts and development of lexical stress.



Author(s):  
A.-L. Montreuil ◽  
M. Chen ◽  
A. Esquerré ◽  
R. Houthuys ◽  
R. Moelans ◽  
...  

<p><strong>Abstract.</strong> Sustainable management of the coastal resources requires a better understanding of the processes that drive coastline change. The coastline is a highly dynamic sea-terrestrial interface. It is affected by forcing factors such as water levels, waves, winds, and the highest and most severe changes occur during storm surges. Extreme storms are drivers responsible for rapid and sometimes dramatic changes of the coastline. The consequences of the impacts from these events entail a broad range of social, economic and natural resource considerations from threats to humans, infrastructure and habitats. This study investigates the impact of a severe storm on coastline response on a sandy multi-barred beach at the Belgian coast. Airborne LiDAR surveys acquired pre- and post-storm covering an area larger than 1 km<sup>2</sup> were analyzed and reproducible monitoring solutions adapted to assess beach morphological changes were applied. Results indicated that the coast retreated by a maximum of 14.7 m where the embryo dunes in front of the fixed dunes were vanished and the foredune undercut. Storm surge and wave attacks were probably the most energetic there. However, the response of the coastline proxies associated with the mean high water line (MHW) and dunetoe (DuneT) was spatially variable. Based on the extracted beach features, good correlations (r>0.73) were found between coastline, berm and inner intertidal bar morphology, while it was weak with the most seaward bars covered in the surveys. This highlights the role of the upper features on the beach to protect the coastline from storm erosion by reducing wave energy. The findings are of critical importance in improving our knowledge and forecasting of coastline response to storms, and also in its translation into management practices.</p>



2020 ◽  
Vol 23 (03) ◽  
pp. 2050007
Author(s):  
SEAN ELVIDGE

This paper further investigates the Talent versus Luck (TvL) model described by [Pluchino et al. Talent versus luck: The role of randomness in success and failure, Adv. Complex Syst. 21 (2018) 1850014] which models the relationship between ‘talent’ and ‘luck’ on the impact of an individuals career. It is shown that the model is very sensitive to both random sampling and the choice of value for the input parameters. Running the model repeatedly with the same set of input parameters gives a range of output values of over 50% of the mean value. The sensitivity of the inputs of the model is analyzed using a variance-based approach based upon generating Sobol sequences of quasi-random numbers. When using the model to look at the talent associated with an individual who has the maximum capital over a model run it has been shown that the choice for the standard deviation of the talent distribution contributes to 67% of the model variability. When investigating the maximum amount of capital returned by the model the probability of a lucky event at any given epoch has the largest impact on the model, almost three times more than any other individual parameter. Consequently, during the analysis of the model results one must keep in mind the impact that only small changes in the input parameters can have on the model output.



Author(s):  
Zerrin Doganca Kucuk ◽  
Defne Yabas ◽  
Hayriye Sinem Boyaci ◽  
Mehmet Sencer Corlu

This research aimed to investigate and compare teachers’ conceptualizations of their students’ and their own outcomes of our earlySTEM program at the K4 level in two distinct roles: practitioners only and practitioners and program developers jointly. The study group included 66 teachers, 26 of whom had actively contributed to the development of the earlySTEM program. Teachers in both roles were supported by teacher guides, student books and workshops throughout the 8-month long academic year. Data was collected at the end of the academic year through an open-ended survey. The program developer teachers identified more student outcomes under more diverse categories while the practitioner teachers mainly concentrated on cognitive outcomes and limited their conceptualizations to the national curriculum. In addition, the program developer teachers valued their involvement in the program development process and expressed more diverse professional outcomes referring to different types of teacher knowledge.



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