Household Possessions and Parental Support in Mexican Students with High Scientific Competencies in PISA 2015

<p style="text-align:justify">Traditionally secondary studies on achievement on Programme for International Students Assessment (PISA) tests point to the significant impact of socioeconomic status and cultural backgrounds of families as well as the role of parental involvement, which in some cases has had a negative impact on achievement. For this article, a model of structural regression was tested, with structural modelling software. This model included the following factors: domestic and educational assets, parental support for students, parents’ perceptions about science, and science competencies among 214 high performing Mexican students on PISA tests in 2015. This resulted in a structural regression model with a goodness of fit, where science competencies were a positive significant variable, impacted by domestic and educational assets and parental involvement. An additional restricted model with four variables manifested as mediators, revealed that science competencies were predicted positively and significantly by domestic and educational assets, and by the manifest parental emotional support variable. Variables related to ownership of educational and cultural assets and resources, as well as parental support, particularly emotional parental support, have positive and significant impact on science competencies.</p>

PERBANDINGAN MODEL REGRESI BINOMIAL NEGATIF BIVARIAT DENGAN MODEL GEOGRAPHICALLY WEIGHTED NEGATIVE BINOMIAL BIVARIAT REGRESSION (GWNBBR) PADA KASUS ANGKA KEMATIAN BAYI DAN KEMATIAN IBU DI JAWA TENGAH

Infant mortality (0-11 months) and maternal mortality (during pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum) are significant indicators in determining the level of public health. Central Java Province which has 35 regencies/cities is included in the top five regions with the highest number of infant and maternal mortality in Indonesia. The data characteristics of the number of infants and maternal mortality are count data. Therefore, the Poisson Regression method can be used to analyze the factors that influence the number of infants and maternal mortality. In Poisson regression analysis, there must be a fulfilled assumption, called equidispersion. Frequently, the variance of count data is greater than the mean, which is known as the overdispersion. The research, binomial negative bivariate regression is used as a solutions to overcome the problem of overdispersion in poisson regression. This method produce a global model. In reality, the geographical, socio-cultural, and economic conditions of each region will be different. This illustrates the effect of spatial heterogeneity, so it needs to be developed into Geographically Weighted Negative Binomial Bivariate Regression (GWNBBR). The model of GWNBBR provides weighting based on the position or distance from one observation area to another. Significant variables for modeling infant mortality cases included the percentage of obstetric complications treated (X1), the percentage of infants who were exclusively breastfed (X3), and the percentage of poor people (X5). Significant variable for modeling maternal mortality cases is the percentage of poor people (X5). Based on the AIC value, GWNBBR model is better than binomial negatif bivariat regression model because it has a smaller AIC value.

Assessment of Pregnant Women’s Satisfaction with Model of Care Initiative: Antenatal Care Service at Primary Health Care in Cluster One in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

The current study assessed pregnant women’s satisfaction with antenatal care (ANC) services at primary health care centers (PHCs) in Riyadh Cluster One. The study was conducted at 11 PHCs where the ANC initiative has been implemented. A total of 646 pregnant women were enrolled. A questionnaire was completed by participants to measure the level of satisfaction with the provided services, care, and consultation. Subsequently, the data were analyzed to determine the significant differences and conduct regression analysis. The overall satisfaction with initial triage assessment, provided services, consultation, and examination was 93.7%, 87.8%, 71.8%, and 53.9%, respectively. Regarding ANC services, education was the only statistically significant variable that influenced patient satisfaction (p < 0.05). In contrast, satisfaction with the provided care was significantly related to all the variables studied. For consultation, education (p < 0.001) and monthly income (p < 0.05) were the statistically significant role players. In the regression analysis, secondary education was statistically significantly related to the provided services, consultation, and examination. Despite the satisfactory level of ANC at the selected PHCs, higher patient satisfaction could be achieved in the future by improving the consultation and examination practices. Overall satisfaction with the health care workers at PHCs is high. Incorporating implied ameliorations would enhance the quality of services and patient satisfaction.

Optimization and Preliminary Physicochemical Characterization of Pectin Extraction from Watermelon Rind (Citrullus lanatus) with Citric Acid

Watermelon rind was used for the pectin extraction with citric acid as the extractant solvent. The effects of pH (2.0-3.0), extraction time (45-75 min), and liquid-solid ratio (10 : 1 to 40 : 1 mL/g) on the pectin yield, degree of esterification, methoxyl content, and anhydrouronic acid content were investigated using Box-Behnken surface response experimental design. The pH was the most significant variable for the pectin yield and properties. The responses optimized separately showed different optimal conditions for each one of the variables studied in this work. Therefore, the desirability function was used to determine the sole theoretical optimum for the highest pectin yield and highest anhydrouronic acid content, which was found to be pH of 2.0, extraction time of 62.31 min, and liquid-solid ratio of 35.07 mL/g. Under this optimal condition, the pectin yield, degree of esterification, methoxyl content, and anhydrouronic acid content were 24.30%, 73.30%, 10.45%, and 81.33%, respectively. At optimal conditions, watermelon rind pectin can be classified as high methoxyl and rapid-set pectin with high quality and high purity. Practical Applications. This study evaluated the pectin extraction from watermelon rind and carried out an optimization of multiple responses as a function of pH, time, and liquid-solid ratio to obtain the best preliminary quality parameters (pectin yield and anhydrouronic acid content). The results revealed that watermelon rind waste can be an inexpensive source to obtain good pectin quality and high purity. According to the chemical characterization and physicochemical properties studied, the extracted pectin from watermelon rind would have a high potential to be used in food industry.

Introduction of adult cats to indirect calorimetry respiration chambers causes increased energy expenditure and respiratory quotient that decrease following acclimation

OBJECTIVE To replicate a previously defined behavioral procedure to acclimate adult cats to temporary restriction in indirect calorimetry chambers and measure energy expenditure and respiratory quotient changes during acclimation. ANIMALS 8 healthy adult cats (4 spayed females, and 4 neutered males; mean ± SEM age, 2.5 ± 1.5 years; mean body weight, 4.8 ± 1.8 kg). PROCEDURES Cats underwent a 13-week incremental acclimation procedure whereby cats were acclimated to the chambers in their home environment (weeks 1 to 3), to the study room (weeks 4 to 6), and to increasing lengths of restriction within their home environment (weeks 7 to 8) and the chambers (weeks 9 to 13). Cat stress score, respiratory rate, fearfulness (assessed with a novel object test), energy expenditure, and respiratory quotient were measured. Data were analyzed by use of a repeated-measures mixed model. RESULTS Stress, based on cat stress scores, fearfulness, and respiration, peaked at weeks 4, 9, and 10 but returned to baseline levels by week 11. Energy expenditure and respiratory quotient peaked at weeks 10 and 11, respectively, but were reduced significantly by weeks 11 and 13, respectively. All cats returned to baseline by the end of the study and were deemed fully acclimated. CLINICAL RELEVANCE Changes in perceived stress level, energy expenditure, and respiratory quotient at various stages of the acclimation procedure suggest that stress should be considered a significant variable in energy balance measurements when indirect calorimetry is used in cats. An incremental acclimation procedure should therefore be used to prepare cats for the temporary space restriction necessary for indirect calorimetry studies.

Teachers’ Characteristics and their Effect on Students’ Mathematical Achievement in the 4th grade: A Comparative Study between Saudi Arabia and the United States of America according to (TIMSS 2019)

The study aims to investigate some characteristics of fourth-grade mathematics teachers in Saudi Arabia and the United States of America, which may affect students’ mathematical achievement. Thus, the research utilized fourth-grade students’ data, as the average score of students was (398) compared to (535) in the Unites States. Post fact design was used with a sample of (4174) students and (170) teachers in Saudi Arabia, and (8353) students and (451) teachers in the United States. Result indicated that teacher’s gender, age, educational level, and qualification are significant variables that impact mathematical achievement in Saudi Arabia. Results also showed that teachers’ years of experience, hours of professional development spent by the teacher during the past two years, and teacher gender are significant variable which impact students’ mathematical achievement in America. As for the teachers’ gender, findings showed significant differences were in favor of students taught by female teachers in both countries.

Factors Influencing Primary Teachers' Conceptualisations of Literacy

This chapter tries to discover how primary school teachers understand what literacy is and to what extent this conceptualisation is influenced by factors indicated by previous literature, such as training, previous experiences, or beliefs (see Korthagen, 2001; and Pozo et al., 2006), while also considering whether working in a bilingual context or being a bilingual teacher may be influential to produce certain types of definitions. Data was gathered using an online questionnaire directed to teachers in Years 3 and 4 in the Madrid Autonomous Community. The responses from the participants (n=115) were categorised and analysed using SPSS. The findings indicate that most definitions rarely fulfil the requirements to be considered complete or entirely accurate. Results also show that only age is a significant variable in producing better definitions. Finally, the study recommends reshaping and offering appropriate teacher training on literacy to update teachers' knowledge and ultimately boost leads to better learning in the classrooms.

Age of Acquisition in Psychological Research: Theories, Methods and Application Areas

Age of acquisition refers to the age at which a specific word is learned for the first time. Research shows that age of acquisition is a significant variable in lexical processing tasks. The age of acquisition effect emerges from how information is stored and accessed in the brain and is used to seek answers to theoretical and practical research questions about the mind. For example, studies in the clinical psychology field show that the age of acquisition effect differs in participants with brain damage or neurological disorders (e.g., Alzheimer's disease, aphasia, semantic dementia, and dyslexia) compared to participants without these disorders. Research in neuroscience shows that early and late acquired words are associated with different brain activations. Although it has a long and rich history in international literature, there are very few empirical studies on the age of acquisition effect in Turkish literature. In this review, basic findings and theories are discussed, and the subjective and objective procedures of collecting age of acquisition norms are presented comparatively. After examining the theoretical and methodological issues in the field, the application areas of the age of acquisition, including clinical psychology, neuroscience, and second language acquisition, are discussed, and suggestions for future studies are presented. Keywords: Age of acquisition, norm studies, dyslexia, neuroscience, second language acquisition

Water Symbolism in Yorùbá Folklore and Culture1

Water is not only a physical substance; it is also an intrinsic part of peoples’ identity, cultural perception, religious beliefs and worldviews. Water is a relevant and a significant variable that is also germane to the understanding of Yorùbá peoples’ identity, culture and religion. Hence, this ethnographical and literary study examines the image of water in Yorùbá cosmology using folklore (oral texts) of the people as paradigms. It uses a field investigative method of research to elicit primary data from the people on the uses of water in diverse spheres of life. It supplements oral data with secondary data in the form of books, journal articles and archival materials. The data collected was analysed from the lenses of a hermeneutical-anthropological approach. The study found that water constitutes and creates cultural, social and religious identities among the Yorùbá people of southwestern Nigeria. In addition, it concludes that water represents one of the several ways through which the Yorùbá society can be best understood.

Cardiovascular Health Peaks and Meteorological Conditions: A Quantile Regression Approach

Cardiovascular morbidity and mortality are influenced by meteorological conditions, such as temperature or snowfall. Relationships between cardiovascular health and meteorological conditions are usually studied based on specific meteorological events or means. However, those studies bring little to no insight into health peaks and unusual events far from the mean, such as a day with an unusually high number of hospitalizations. Health peaks represent a heavy burden for the public health system; they are, however, usually studied specifically when they occur (e.g., the European 2003 heatwave). Specific analyses are needed, using appropriate statistical tools. Quantile regression can provide such analysis by focusing not only on the conditional median, but on different conditional quantiles of the dependent variable. In particular, high quantiles of a health issue can be treated as health peaks. In this study, quantile regression is used to model the relationships between conditional quantiles of cardiovascular variables and meteorological variables in Montreal (Canada), focusing on health peaks. Results show that meteorological impacts are not constant throughout the conditional quantiles. They are stronger in health peaks compared to quantiles around the median. Results also show that temperature is the main significant variable. This study highlights the fact that classical statistical methods are not appropriate when health peaks are of interest. Quantile regression allows for more precise estimations for health peaks, which could lead to refined public health warnings.