Auditory Pattern Representations Under Conditions of Uncertainty—An ERP Study

The auditory system is able to recognize auditory objects and is thought to form predictive models of them even though the acoustic information arriving at our ears is often imperfect, intermixed, or distorted. We investigated implicit regularity extraction for acoustically intact versus disrupted six-tone sound patterns via event-related potentials (ERPs). In an exact-repetition condition, identical patterns were repeated; in two distorted-repetition conditions, one randomly chosen segment in each sound pattern was replaced either by white noise or by a wrong pitch. In a roving-standard paradigm, sound patterns were repeated 1–12 times (standards) in a row before a new pattern (deviant) occurred. The participants were not informed about the roving rule and had to detect rarely occurring loudness changes. Behavioral detectability of pattern changes was assessed in a subsequent behavioral task. Pattern changes (standard vs. deviant) elicited mismatch negativity (MMN) and P3a, and were behaviorally detected above the chance level in all conditions, suggesting that the auditory system extracts regularities despite distortions in the acoustic input. However, MMN and P3a amplitude were decreased by distortions. At the level of MMN, both types of distortions caused similar impairments, suggesting that auditory regularity extraction is largely determined by the stimulus statistics of matching information. At the level of P3a, wrong-pitch distortions caused larger decreases than white-noise distortions. Wrong-pitch distortions likely prevented the engagement of restoration mechanisms and the segregation of disrupted from true pattern segments, causing stronger informational interference with the relevant pattern information.

Rheumatologist perspective of the Brazilian consensus for detection of auto antibodies in HEp-2 CELLS

Objective To evaluate the perception of rheumatologists regarding the recommendations of the Brazilian Consensus for detection of Autoantibodies (BCA) on HEp-2 Cells by Indirect Immunofluorescence assay (IFA) and how BCA recommendations help in clinical practice. Methodology A structured questionnaire regarding the BCA recommendations for detection and interpretations of autoantibodies in HEp-2 cells was applied to randomly selected rheumatologists. The results were tabulated using the Microsoft® Excel program, expressed as a simple percentage and the dichotomous data were analyzed using the Chi-square test and the Epi Info® program. Results Four hundred fuorteen rheumatologists participated in the study: 70% of them considered their knowledge of the HEp-2 IFA test satisfactory or excellent, and 43% said they knew the BCA recommendations in general, without distinguishing the edition of the BCA to which they refer. The Revista Brasileira de Rheumatologia/Advances in Rheumatology was the means of dissemination most consulted by specialists (50%). According to the rheumatologists’ opinion, the most relevant pattern was the homogeneous nuclear (78%) and 65% stated they were satisfied with the BCA recommendations at a level of satisfaction greater than or equal to 80%. There was no significant difference in the perception of rheumatologists from the several Brazilian geographic regions. Conclusion Brazilian rheumatologists are aware of the BCA guidelines and most are satisfied with the content published, considering that the BCA recommendations assist positively in the clinical practice. Most rheumatologists recognize the patterns associated with rheumatic autoimmune diseases and have used BCA recommendations to interpret the results of the HEp-2 IFA test.

Extending Expectancy Theory to Food Intake: Effect of a Simulated Fast-Food Restaurant on Highly and Minimally Processed Food Expectancies

Unhealthy diets are widespread and linked to a number of detrimental clinical outcomes. The current preregistered experiment extended expectancy theory into the study of food intake; specifically, we tested whether a fast-food restaurant affects food expectancies, or the emotions one expects to feel while eating highly processed foods (e.g., pizza) and minimally processed foods (e.g., carrots). Participants ( N = 200, mean age = 18.79 years) entered a simulated fast-food restaurant or a neutral space, completed questionnaires, and engaged in a bogus taste test. The simulated fast-food restaurant increased positive highly processed food expectancies ( d = 0.29). Palatable eating coping motives scores did not moderate the effect; however, this clinically relevant pattern of eating behavior was associated with greater positive highly processed food expectancies. In addition, there was an indirect effect of the fast-food restaurant on ad libitum food intake through positive highly processed food expectancies. Reducing positive highly processed food expectancies may improve diet, which may broadly affect health.

La substance chez Aristote: forme, matière et privation

In Aristotle, substance, being specified in Z17 as cause and principle, is to be understood according to the analogical theory of principles and causes, namely form, matter and privation. These three causes involve potentiality and actuality, since form, privation, and the compound substance are in actuality, while matter is in potentiality. ≪What a substance is≫ depends on the connection between these three principles. In order to grasp the meaning of this connection, one has to put the analogical theory of principles back in its context, where previous theories on contraries (Plato’s theory included) are amended.The amendment of previous theories of principles relies on positing a third term, matter, between both opposites, i.e. form and privation. The implied distinction between matter and privation allows an understanding of generation which makes it compatible with substance. While generation removes privation, substance as form gives shape to matter, final matter and shape being identical to one another. Predication of matter by form supplies a relevant pattern for considering the relationship between matter, form and privation. At the same time, predication of matter by form provides both a renovated theory of opposites and a new theory of form as a cause, i.e. a theory of form as actuality.

Morpho-Phonological Processes in Korean

It has been an ongoing issue within generative linguistics how to properly analyze morpho-phonological processes. Morpho-phonological processes typically have exceptions, but nonetheless they are often productive. Such productive, but exceptionful, processes are difficult to analyze, since grammatical rules or constraints are normally invoked in the analysis of a productive pattern, whereas exceptions undermine the validity of the rules and constraints. In addition, productivity of a morpho-phonological process may be gradient, possibly reflecting the relative frequency of the relevant pattern in the lexicon. Simple lexical listing of exceptions as suppletive forms would not be sufficient to capture such gradient productivity of a process with exceptions. It is then necessary to posit grammatical rules or constraints even for exceptionful processes as long as they are at least in part productive. Moreover, the productivity can be correctly estimated only when the domain of rule application is correctly identified. Consequently, a morpho-phonological process cannot be properly analyzed unless we possess both the correct description of its application conditions and the appropriate stochastic grammatical mechanisms to capture its productivity. The same issues arise in the analysis of morpho-phonological processes in Korean, in particular, n-insertion, sai-siot, and vowel harmony. Those morpho-phonological processes have many exceptions and variations, which make them look quite irregular and unpredictable. However, they have at least a certain degree of productivity. Moreover, the variable application of each process is still systematic in that various factors, phonological, morphosyntactic, sociolinguistic, and processing, contribute to the overall probability of rule application. Crucially, grammatical rules and constraints, which have been proposed within generative linguistics to analyze categorical and exceptionless phenomena, may form an essential part of the analysis of the morpho-phonological processes in Korean. For an optimal analysis of each of the morpho-phonological processes in Korean, the correct conditions and domains for its application need to be identified first, and its exact productivity can then be measured. Finally, the appropriate stochastic grammatical mechanisms need to be found or developed in order to capture the measured productivity.

The Junction Usage Model (JUM): A method for comprehensive annotation-free analysis of alternative pre-mRNA splicing patterns

Alternative pre-mRNA splicing (AS) greatly diversifies metazoan transcriptomes and proteomes and is crucial for gene regulation. Current computational analysis methods of AS from Illumina RNA-seq data rely on pre-annotated libraries of known spliced transcripts, which hinders AS analysis with poorly annotated genomes and can further mask unknown AS patterns. To address this critical bioinformatics problem, we developed a method called the Junction Usage Model (JUM) that uses a bottom-up approach to identify, analyze and quantitate global AS profiles without any prior transcriptome annotations. JUM accurately reports global AS changes in terms of the five conventional AS patterns and an additional “Composite” category composed of inseparable combinations of conventional patterns. JUM stringently classifies the difficult and disease-relevant pattern of intron retention, reducing the false positive rate of IR detection commonly seen in other annotation-based methods to near negligible rates. When analyzing AS in RNA-samples derived from Drosophila heads, human tumors and human cell lines bearing cancer-associated splicing factor mutations, JUM consistently identified ~ twice the number of novel AS events missed by other methods. Computational simulations showed JUM exhibits a 1.2-4.8 times higher true positive rate at a fixed cut-off of 5% false discovery rate. In summary, JUM provides a new framework and improved method that removes the necessity for transcriptome annotations and enables the detection, analysis and quantification of AS patterns in complex metazoan transcriptomes with superior accuracy.

Three Conceptions of Group-Based Reasons

Group-based reasons are reasons to play one’s part in some pattern of action that the members of some group could perform, because of the good features of the pattern. This paper discusses three broad conceptions of such reasons. According to the agency-first conception, there are no group-based reasons in cases where the relevant group is not or would not be itself an agent. According to the behaviour-first conception, what matters is that the other members of the group would play their parts in the relevant pattern, not whether they would have the cooperative intentional states constitutive of group agency in doing so. This paper argues against these conceptions and in favour of the powers-first conception, according to which what matters is that the members of the group have practically relevant powers.