TOWARDS A DEVELOPMENT MODEL OF LOCAL CULTURAL TOURISM THROUGH THE INVOLVEMENT OF LOCAL ACTORS (PROVINCE OF CONSTANTINE, ALGERIA)

Since the nineties, cultural tourism is considered as a form of tourism that is carried out by groups of people or institutions, whose main motive is the fulfillment of an interest and knowledge more on the culture, the history and the heritage of the chosen destination. The city of Constantine, located in northeastern Algeria, is one of the oldest cities in the Mediterranean basin. It was elected "Capital of Arab Culture 2015" due to its history, cultural and architectural heritage. The aim of this study is to examine the influences of cultural tourism on local development, to highlight the perception of local actors' roles in the development of tourism and to determine their involvement in the preservation of Constantine's cultural heritage to achieve a development model of cultural tourism in Constantine. This study is based on a literature review and field surveys, the type of questionnaire includes different types of questions: open questions, Likert scale questions and multiple choice qualitative questions. A manual processing of the data was performed using the mean and standard deviation calculation. The results of this study reveal a misunderstanding of cultural tourism among local residents hence the need to develop a model of categorization of the objectives of the study (SPIP) which proposes four key principles for the development of local cultural tourism in the city of Constantine. However, unless the proposed model elements are incorporated, cultural tourism in this city would never emerge.

Erasure-Resilient Sublinear-Time Graph Algorithms

We investigate sublinear-time algorithms that take partially erased graphs represented by adjacency lists as input. Our algorithms make degree and neighbor queries to the input graph and work with a specified fraction of adversarial erasures in adjacency entries. We focus on two computational tasks: testing if a graph is connected or ε-far from connected and estimating the average degree. For testing connectedness, we discover a threshold phenomenon: when the fraction of erasures is less than ε, this property can be tested efficiently (in time independent of the size of the graph); when the fraction of erasures is at least ε, then a number of queries linear in the size of the graph representation is required. Our erasure-resilient algorithm (for the special case with no erasures) is an improvement over the previously known algorithm for connectedness in the standard property testing model and has optimal dependence on the proximity parameter ε. For estimating the average degree, our results provide an “interpolation” between the query complexity for this computational task in the model with no erasures in two different settings: with only degree queries, investigated by Feige (SIAM J. Comput. ‘06), and with degree queries and neighbor queries, investigated by Goldreich and Ron (Random Struct. Algorithms ‘08) and Eden et al. (ICALP ‘17). We conclude with a discussion of our model and open questions raised by our work.

Ansiedad ante el fracaso en educación física ¿puede la gamificación promover cambios en las alumnas de primaria? (Anxiety about failure in physical education. Can gamification promote changes in elementary school girls?)

Esta investigación valoró los efectos de un programa didáctico gamificado sobre la ansiedad ante el fracaso en Educación Física. Además, pudimos reconocer las posibles causas al analizar las impresiones del alumnado sobre la experiencia. Participaron 143 estudiantes de 5º y 6º de primaria. Se siguió un diseño pre-experimental, pre-test, post-test de un solo grupo, cuantitativo-cualitativo. Se administró la subescala Ansiedad y Agobio ante el Fracaso del Test de Motivación del Logro para el Aprendizaje en Educación Física (versión validada por Ruiz-Pérez et al. (2015) del Achievement Motivation in Physical Education Test, AMPET, de Nishida (1988)) y un cuestionario ad hoc con cuatro preguntas abiertas. Los datos cuantitativos mostraron que, tras la intervención didáctica, la ansiedad disminuyó de manera significativa. Los resultados cualitativos desvelaron aspectos positivos que pudieron promover dicha disminución, como: la superación de pruebas, el trabajo cooperativo, el disfrute de los elementos de la gamificación, la superación personal, el aprendizaje y la mejora de aspectos curriculares. Sin embargo, también se reconocieron otros aspectos negativos, como el trabajo de la resistencia y los grupos estables, lo cual deja entrever algunos aspectos de mejora en este planteamiento gamificado. Abstract: This research assessed the effects of a gamified project on anxiety about failure in Physical Education, perceiving the possible causes through the impressions of the students. 143 students from 5th and 6th grade participated. A pre-experimental, pre-test, post-test single-group, quantitative-qualitative design was followed. The Anxiety and Stress subscale was administered before the Failure of the Motivation Test of Achievement for Learning in Physical Education and open questions were used after the experience (version validated by Ruiz-Pérez et al. (2015) of the Achievement Motivation in Physical Education Test, AMPET, by Nishida (1988)) and an ad hoc questionnaire with four open questions. The quantitative data showed that anxiety decreased significantly after the intervention. The qualitative results revealed positive aspects that could promote said decrease: passing tests, cooperative work, enjoyment of the elements of gamification, personal improvement, learning and improvement of curricular aspects. However, other negative aspects were also recognized, such as resistance work and stable groups, which suggests some aspects of improvement in this gamified approach.

Restless Legs Syndrome: Known Knowns and Known Unknowns

Although restless legs syndrome (RLS) is a common neurological disorder, it remains poorly understood from both clinical and pathophysiological perspectives. RLS is classified among sleep-related movement disorders, namely, conditions characterized by simple, often stereotyped movements occurring during sleep. However, several clinical, neurophysiological and neuroimaging observations question this view. The aim of the present review is to summarize and query some of the current concepts (known knowns) and to identify open questions (known unknowns) on RLS pathophysiology. Based on several lines of evidence, we propose that RLS should be viewed as a disorder of sensorimotor interaction with a typical circadian pattern of occurrence, possibly arising from neurochemical dysfunction and abnormal excitability in different brain structures.

Cognitive agency in sociocultural evolution

Models of sociocultural evolution generally study the population dynamics of cultural traits given known biases in social learning. Cognitive agency, understood as the dynamics underlying a specific agent’s adoption of a given trait, is essentially irrelevant in this framework. This article argues that although implementing and instrumenting agency in computational models is fundamentally challenging, it is ultimately possible and would help us overcome major limitations in our understanding of sociocultural dynamics.Indeed, the behaviour of humans is not causally generated by a set of predefined behavioural laws, but by the situated activity of their cognitive architecture. Idealised models of biased transmission certainly help us understand specific features of population dynamics. However, they distract us from the deep intrication of the cognitive and ecological processes underlying sociocultural evolution, and erase their embodied, subjective nature.In line with the earlier “Thinking Through Other Minds” account of sociocultural evolution, this article highlights how the Active Inference framework can help us implement and instrument computational models that address these limitations. Such models would not only help ground our understanding of sociocultural evolution in the underlying cognitive dynamics, but also help solve (or frame) open questions in the study of ritual, relation between cultural transmission and innovation, as well as scales of cultural evolution.

Physiological Perspectives on Molecular Mechanisms and Regulation of Vesicular Glutamate Transport: Lessons From Calyx of Held Synapses

Accumulation of glutamate, the primary excitatory neurotransmitter in the mammalian central nervous system, into presynaptic synaptic vesicles (SVs) depends upon three vesicular glutamate transporters (VGLUTs). Since VGLUTs are driven by a proton electrochemical gradient across the SV membrane generated by vacuolar-type H+-ATPases (V-ATPases), the rate of glutamate transport into SVs, as well as the amount of glutamate in SVs at equilibrium, are influenced by activities of both VGLUTs and V-ATPase. Despite emerging evidence that suggests various factors influencing glutamate transport by VGLUTs in vitro, little has been reported in physiological or pathological contexts to date. Historically, this was partially due to a lack of appropriate methods to monitor glutamate loading into SVs in living synapses. Furthermore, whether or not glutamate refilling of SVs can be rate-limiting for synaptic transmission is not well understood, primarily due to a lack of knowledge concerning the time required for vesicle reuse and refilling during repetitive stimulation. In this review, we first introduce a unique electrophysiological method to monitor glutamate refilling by VGLUTs in a giant model synapse from the calyx of Held in rodent brainstem slices, and we discuss the advantages and limitations of the method. We then introduce the current understanding of factors that potentially alter the amount and rate of glutamate refilling of SVs in this synapse, and discuss open questions from physiological viewpoints.

Permissivess, guiltiness, anxiety:

Introduction: Studies on procrastination are increasing, studies are aimed at university students, as it is the population that most procrastinates their daily activities, especially academic ones. Most studies fail to explain existing conflicts on the subject, suggesting that there are futures with a qualitative focus, where the researcher is closer to the phenomenon, with no research on the topic with OT students. Objective: To explore and research explanations reported by occupational therapy students at a private university in southeastern Brazil about the behavior of procrastinating schoolwork, considering themselves self-reported as "procrastinators" Methods: Clinical-qualitative design; data collected through in-depth semi-structured findings with open questions; a thematic analysis generated categories discussed in the light of the psychodynamic framework Results: Seven OT students were interviewed and, according to the results of the analysis: procrastination linked to anxiety as productivity, but without the executive drive, imprisoning the individual in a vicious cycle of procrastination; defense mechanisms linked to self-preservation so as not to assume responsibility for tasks and other adversities of adult and university life; ineffective methods are tried by students to try to avoid procrastination, but without resolving the emotional and psychodynamic conflicts related to the activity. Conclusions: Students' procrastination ambivalently affects their daily lives, both positively and negatively, although everyone reported the phenomenon as negative. These studies can contribute to thinking about the clinic in the context of health and education. Therefore, we suggest studies that explore meanings brought by students and even other categories for comparative purposes.

Using materials for quasiparticle engineering

The fundamental excitations in superconductors – Bogoliubov quasiparticles – can be either a resource or a liability in superconducting devices: they are what enables photon detection in microwave kinetic inductance detectors, but they are a source of errors in qubits and electron pumps. To improve operation of the latter devices, ways to mitigate quasiparticle effects have been devised; in particular, combining different materials quasiparticles can be trapped where they do no harm and their generation can be impeded. We review recent developments in these mitigation efforts and discuss open questions.

Water Interaction with Fe2NiP Schreibersite (110) Surface: a Quantum Mechanical Atomistic Perspective

Phosphorus is an element of primary importance for all living creatures, being present in many biological activities in the form of phosphate (PO43-). However, there are still open questions about the origin of this specific element and on the transformation which allowed it to be incorporated in biological systems. The most probable source of prebiotic phosphorus is the intense meteoritic bombardment during the Archean era, few million years after the solar system formation, which brought tons of iron-phosphide materials (schreibersite) on the early Earth crust. It was recently demonstrated that by simple wetting/corrosion processes from this material various oxygenated phosphorus compounds are produced. In the present work, the wetting process of schreibersite (Fe2NiP) was studied by computer simulations using density functional theory, with the PBE functional supplemented with dispersive interactions through a posteriori empirical correction. To start disentangling the complexity of the system, only the most stable (110) surface of Fe2NiP was used simulating different water coverages, from which structures, water binding energies and vibrational spectra have been predicted. The computed (ana-)harmonic infrared spectra have been compared with the experimental ones, thus confirming the validity of the adopted methodology and models.