Do White Police Officers Unfairly Target Black Suspects?

Using a unique data set we link the race of police officers who kill suspects with the race of those who are killed across the United States. We have data on a total of 2,706 fatal police killings for the years 2013 to 2015. This is 1,333 more killings by police than is provided by the FBI data on justifiable police homicides. We conducted three tests of discrimination. The results of these tests are different. In the first test we find some evidence that white officers are more likely to kill a black suspect who is later found to be unarmed than they are to kill an unarmed white suspect. However, this result could not be confirmed using a fixed effects model on panel data aggregated to the city level. In the second test, we find that white police officers are no more likely to kill an unarmed black suspect than are black or Hispanic officers. The results of this test are confirmed by the panel data version of the test. The third discrimination test indicated that black suspects, whether armed or not, are no more likely to be killed by a white officer than they are to be killed by black or Hispanic officers. Similarly, Hispanic suspects are no more likely to be killed by white offices than officers of other races. These results are also confirmed by panel data analyses. We find that when there is more than one officer on the scene, unarmed black suspects are not more likely to be killed by white police officers than unarmed white suspects. This could be evidence supporting a policy of reducing the number of officers working alone. Also, we find no evidence that body cameras affect either the number of police killings or the racial composition of those killings.

The development of linguistic stimuli for the Swedish Situated Phoneme test

The speech perception ability of people with hearing loss can be efficiently measured using phonemic-level scoring. We aimed to develop linguistic stimuli suitable for a closed-set phonemic discrimination test in the Swedish language called the Situated Phoneme (SiP) test. The SiP test stimuli that we developed consisted of real monosyllabic words with minimal phonemic contrast, realised by phonetically similar phones. The lexical and sublexical factors of word frequency, phonological neighbourhood density, phonotactic probability, and orthographic transparency were similar between all contrasting words. Each test word was recorded five times by two different speakers, including one male and one female. The accuracy of the test-word recordings was evaluated by 28 normal-hearing subjects in a listening experiment with a silent background using a closed-set design. With a few exceptions, all test words could be correctly discriminated. We discuss the results in terms of content- and construct-validity implications for the Swedish SiP test.

Estimation of Tactile Sensation by Two Point Discrimination among 18 Years Old People

Two point discrimination (TPD) is used to distinguish the two point discriminative sense. TPD is most commonly used as neurosensory tests in clinical settings. In tactile sensation, the sensory receptors from the skin reach the somatosensory system and stimulate mechanoreceptors, thermoreceptors, pain receptors, and proprioceptors to give the response to the respective stimuli. The present study was aim to assess the value of tactiles sensation by two point discrimination test among 18 years people. 18 years old people among the normal population were selected, consisting of 17 males and 33 females. 6 sensory areas were selected for the test. Test performed on six regions of the body like fingertips, fingers, palm, forehead, forearm, back of palm. The results were tabulated and statistically analyzed by independent t test. The ability to distinguish the two point discrimination was estimated in millimeters by using a simple hand operated device. The main findings of the study are that females were more sensitive than males in TPD perception.TPD perception was more among 18 years old. The TPD values are more in females when compared to males. The normative values of two point discrimination among 18 years people were established. This study concluded that fingertips in females were more sensitive than other parts of the body.

Reconstruction of Foot and Ankle Defects Using Free Lateral Arm Flap: A Retrospective Review of Its Versatile Application

Background. Successful reconstruction of the feet and ankles remains challenging due to limited quantities of soft tissue and laxity. The free lateral arm flap (LAF) is an alternative to conventional flaps and has been widely used due to advancements in its flap characteristics. This study is aimed at utilizing the advantages of this flap to validate its increased applications for foot and ankle defects. Methods. Twenty patients with various LAF types between May 2011 and May 2020 were enrolled. Clinical data was retrospectively collected, and defect sites were classified according to the subunit principle. We utilized various LAF types, such as LAFs with sensate, extended, osteomyocutaneous, or myocutaneous flaps, as necessary. A two-point discrimination test was performed, and results were statistically compared between flaps. Results. Among the diverse etiologies of skin defects, chronic inflammation was the most common cause of defects. Various LAF types, including LAFs with fasciocutaneous, extended fasciocutaneous, musculocutaneous, and osteomyocutaneous flaps, were used. The versatility of free LAF helped successfully cover various defects in all cases. Results of the two-point discrimination test were statistically significant between groups. Conclusions. Free LAF is a unique soft tissue free flap that is more versatile than other flaps, allowing flaps to be continuously modified and applied to various foot and ankle defects under different clinical conditions.

Heating pad vs. infusion warmer to prevent hypothermia in intraopera-tive patients: which one is more effective?

Background: The use of heating pads and infusion warmers on intraoperative patients has been proven to prevent hypothermia. However, the differences in the effectiveness of the two methods have not been studied.Purpose: This study aims to compare the effectiveness of a heating pad and infusion warmer in preventing hypothermia (decreased body temperature and the incidence of shivering) in intraoperative patients.Methods: This research was a quasi-experimental design by a Posttest-Only Design with Nonequivalent Groups. The populations in this study were surgical patients with regional anesthesia, with a total sample of 64 respondents (32 respondents in the heating pad group and 32 respondents in the infusion warmer group) selected randomly. The incidence of hypothermia was perceived from two indicators: a decrease in body temperature and the prevalence of shivering, which was observed and recorded during the intraoperative period. The data were analyzed by discrimination tests (mean discrimination test and proportion discrimination test) to determine the difference in the effectiveness of the two groups.Results: The average decrease in body temperature during the intraoperative period (0-40 minutes of operation) in the group given the infusion warmer was greater than the group given the heating pad (p<0.001). The group given the infusion warmer was 8.750 times more likely to experience shivering than the group given the heating pad (p<0.001; OR=8.750).Conclusion: Using a heating pad is better in preventing hypothermia in intraoperative patients than using an infusion warmer.

Decreased Facial Emotion Recognition in Elderly Patients With Hearing Loss Reflects Diminished Social Cognition

Objective: The main objective of this research was to evaluate the correlation between the severity of hearing loss and the facial emotional recognition as a critical part of social cognition in elderly patients. Methods: The prospective study was comprised of 85 individuals. The participants were divided into 3 groups. The first group consisted of 30 subjects older than 65 years with a bilateral pure-tone average mean >30 dB HL. The second group consisted of 30 subjects older than 65 years with a PTA mean ≤30 dB HL. The third group consisted of 25 healthy subjects with ages ranging between 18 and 45 years and a PTA mean ≤25 dB HL. A Facial Emotion Identification Test and a Facial Emotion Discrimination Test were administered to all groups. Results: Elderly subjects with hearing loss performed significantly worse than the other 2 groups on the facial emotion identification and discrimination tests ( P < .05). Appealingly, they identified a positive emotion, “happiness,” more accurately in comparison to the other negative emotions. Conclusions: Our results suggest that increased age might be associated with decreased facial emotion identification and discrimination scores, which could be deteriorated in the presence of significant hearing loss.

Flavor Enhancement in Daily Life of Patients with Olfactory Dysfunction

Introduction Patients with olfactory dysfunction report deterioration of taste due to loss of flavor, leading to less food enjoyment, alterations in dietary behaviors and stress. The aim of this study was to introduce flavor enhancement to investigate its acceptance and possible effects on quality of life. Methods In this prospective, controlled, randomized, single-blinded, cross-over pilot study, we recruited 30 olfactory dysfunction patients, of which 16 were hyposmic and 14 anosmic. After single-blinded triangle flavor discrimination test, flavor drops were randomized either in high or low concentration for 14 days and vice versa for another 14 days. Records included a daily diary and the questionnaire of olfactory disorders. Results Usage rates were excellent with 82.2% of all days, while drops were mainly used for breakfast (44.6%, p < 0.05). Hyposmics used flavor enhancement on significantly more days (median = 14) compared to anosmics (median = 11, p = 0.0094). QOD improved in 12 patients to a meaningful extent. Conclusions In this pilot study, we show that flavor enhancement is feasible accompanied by high compliance and acceptance in olfactory dysfunction patients. Flavor drops were used regardless of low or high concentrations with no adverse events noted. Implications Our findings give rise to further studies illuminating the possible advantages of flavor enhancement in patients with olfactory disorders.

Examining group differences in between-participant variability in non-native speech sound learning

Many studies on non-native speech sound learning report a large amount of between-participant variability. This variability allows us to ask interesting questions about non-native speech sound learning, such as whether certain training paradigms give rise to more or less between-participant variability. This study presents a reanalysis of Fuhrmeister and Myers (Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics, 82(4), 2049-2065, 2020) and tests whether different types of phonetic training lead to group differences in between-participant variability. The original study trained participants on a non-native speech sound contrast in two different phonological (vowel) contexts and tested for differences in means between a group that received blocked training (one vowel context at a time) and interleaved training (vowel contexts were randomized). No statistically significant differences in means were found between the two groups in the original study on a discrimination test (a same-different judgment). However, the current reanalysis tested group differences in between-participant variability and found greater variability in the blocked training group immediately after training because this group had a larger proportion of participants with higher-than-average scores. After a period of offline consolidation, this group difference in variability decreased substantially. This suggests that the type and difficulty of phonetic training (blocked vs. interleaved) may initially give rise to differences in between-participant variability, but offline consolidation may attenuate that variability and have an equalizing effect across participants. This reanalysis supports the view that examining between-participant variability in addition to means when analyzing data can give us a more complete picture of the effects being tested.

Analysis items of the four-tier immune system multiple choice test instrument using rasch model

The purpose of this study was to analyze the feasibility of the items of the four-tier multiple-choice test immune system instrument that had been developed. The development of the instrument using the Treagust (1988) model, namely defining content, collecting student misconceptions information, and developing a diagnostic test. A total of 25 items have been developed. The results of the instrument development were tested on 142 students of grade XI from several high schools in Surakarta who were selected by simple random sampling. The data analysis technique was performed using Rasch analysis in the Winstep application. The results of the construct validity test showed items number 5, 7, and 9 did not fit the validity standards. The reliability test shows that the value of Cronbach Alpha reliability is bad (n = 0.51), the value of the reliability item is special (no = 0.97), the value of person reliability is sufficient (n = 0.68), the value of person separation is weak (n = 1.44), and the item separation value is special (n = 5.38). The person discrimination test showed student 056P31 has the highest ability and student 098P51 has the lowest ability. The item discrimination test shows item number 1 is the best item and the bad item is number 14. The item difficulty analysis showed less proportionality because there were too many items in the easy and difficult categories. An expansion of the sample is needed to see a more comprehensive and diverse range of responses to instruments.