Family Sense of Coherence Scale: A Confirmatory Factor Analysis in a Portuguese Sample

Background: Family sense of coherence (FSOC) can be defined as the cognitive map of a family that enables the family to deal with stress during their lifetime. FSOC is the degree to which a family perceives family life as comprehensible, manageable, and meaningful. To the best of our knowledge, few studies have used this scale, and very few have evaluated FSOC Scale psychometric properties.Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the original FSOC Scale in a sample of Portuguese caregivers of children aged between 10 and 15 years.Methods: A total of 329 caregivers completed a sociodemographic questionnaire and the FSOC Scale. Analyses were performed to evaluate the factor structure of the FSOC Scale with 26 items as well as composite reliability, internal consistency, convergent-related validity, and discriminant-related validity of the scale scores.Results: The findings supported a three-factor solution for a 13-item version that maintains the original FSOC Scale structure. The three FSOC dimensions presented a good fit to the data. Cronbach’s alpha, composite reliability, and convergent-related validity were considered very good for the FSOC Scale (α = 0.956; CR = 0.974; AVE = 0.689). No evidence of discriminant-related validity was found for the dimensions of FSOC.Conclusion: The findings support the use of the Portuguese FSOC Scale for research and clinical purposes with Portuguese caregivers. Future research is necessary to further develop a European Portuguese version of the FSOC Scale.Implications: This study provides a psychometric evaluation of FSOC Scale characteristics in a Portuguese sample. The results are helpful for clinicians and family therapists who work with families since it could help them to assess the resources of families and their ability to cope with adversity and enhance their strengths.

As formas de tratamento na abordagem multissistémica: um novo modelo teórico de análise

Address Forms in a Multisystemic Approach: A New Theoretical Model of Analysis. The aim of this paper is to propose a new theoretical model for the analysis of address forms. In the first part of the paper, I do a critical evaluation of existing theoretical models, showing, on the one hand, that the divergent approaches reflect the complexity of address research, and, on the other hand, that there is a need for a unified model to englobe morphosyntactic, semantic, pragmatic, discursive, and diachronic approaches. In the second part of the paper, I present the multisystemic theory developed by the Brazilian linguist Ataliba de Castilho and demonstrate that it can be successfully used for the analysis of address forms. In the last part of the paper, I show that lexicalization, semanticization, discursivization, and grammaticalization (linguistic processes identified by Ataliba de Castilho in his theory) can explain linguistic phenomena of the address systems in Portuguese and Romanian. Keywords: address forms, European Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese, Romanian, multisystemic theory, multisystemic theory of Ataliba de Castilho

Unidades fraseológicas em Recordações de infância: (des)continuidades nas traduções portuguesas

Idioms in Childhood Memories: (Dis)continuities in Portuguese Translations. My study aims to present a comparative translation analysis of the phraseological units in Romanian and European Portuguese and is based on the two Portuguese translations of Amintiri din copilărie (Recordações de infância) by Ion Creangă. Relying on the concept of equivalence – a key element in translation studies and comparative phraseology, debated and contested to the same extent – I propose an analysis of phraseological units both from an interlinguistic and an intralinguistic perspective, as well as a classification of translation solutions according to the types of equivalence proposed by Corpas Pastor (2001). At the same time, the identification of a certain type of equivalence leads us to an analysis of the translation strategies used. In this way, I note a strong connection between translation strategies and the types of equivalence between the two languages. The similarities and the differences between the translation solutions analyzed in the two Portuguese texts highlight the characteristics of the original text, as well as the translators’ choices. Keywords: phraseological units, idioms, equivalence, translation strategies, source text / target text

Psychometric properties and factor structure of the UCLA Loneliness Scale v3: the European Portuguese version

Loneliness refers to the perception of mismatch between the perceived and desired quantity and quality of meaningful relationships. Currently, the golden standard measure to assess loneliness is the University of Los Angeles Loneliness scale version 3 (UCLA v3). The aim of this study was to analyze the psychometric properties and the factor structure of UCLA v3 for the European Portuguese population. A sample of 282 participants was surveyed in Portugal. Analyses showed internal consistency was optimal for the Portuguese population: Cronbach’s α = .91 and McDonald’s ω = .91. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) supported a single global factor for loneliness and optimal fitness. Multi-group CFA indicates invariance across sex. Floor and ceiling effects were largely absent. Loneliness correlated with well-established mental health indicators such as psychological stress, depressive and anxiety symptomatology or psychological inflexibility. The findings support UCLA v3 as a reliable and valid measure of loneliness in the Portuguese population.

A Comparative Analysis of Machine Learning Named Entity Recognition Tools for the Brazilian and European Portuguese Language Variants

Informações textuais, apesar de digitais, não são computacionalmente estruturadas, necessitando do uso de técnicas para estruturá-las e extrair informações. Este trabalho tem o objetivo de avaliar ferramentas de REN utilizando machine learning para as variantes brasileira e europeia da língua portuguesa. As ferramentas Apache OpenNLP, Stanford CoreNLP e spaCy foram selecionadas; o corpus HAREM foi usado para treinar e avaliar os modelos; uma ferramenta foi desenvolvida para pré-processar o corpus HAREM. Dois tipos de comparações foram realizadas: uma geral e outra entre variantes do português. Foi possível identificar que as variantes podem afetar no treinamento e avaliação de modelos de REN (Reconhecimento de entidades nomeadas).

Literalization in the self-revision process of novice and experienced biomedical translators

This paper explores decision-making in translation focusing on the self-revision process of novice and experienced translators of biomedical content in the English to European Portuguese language pair. Adopting process- and product-oriented methods, an experiment was designed to study thirty translations of a 244-word instructional text about a medical device intended for health professionals. The data elicited from fifteen novice translators and fifteen experienced translators included keylogging and screen-recording data. These data were triangulated and analyzed to describe the translation solutions in the interim and final versions in response to problematic translation units and to test if, during the self-revision process, novice and experienced translators tend to proceed from more literal versions to less literal ones, or vice versa, in biomedical translation. Contrary to expectations, the analysis points towards a literalization phenomenon in the translators’ processes. The data also indicates that the tendency to proceed from less literal versions to more literal ones is more pronounced in novice translators than in experienced translators. The findings reported here shed new light on the self-revision processes of novice and experienced translators and their relationship with prevailing translation norms, and enable us to better understand the practices in place in professional biomedical translation.