Made available in DSpace on 2016-03-15T19:40:15Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Ariane Cristina Ramello de Carvalho.pdf: 542187 bytes, checksum: b329ccdc42149aed0374b8fe13c088c7 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-02-04 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Given the scarcity of well-validated instruments in Brazil capable of measuring local coherence ability in children-found the need to undertake a study to quantitatively reveal the performance of linguistic processing, in respect of local coherence in a population of normal children of the network mainstream education. The ability local coherence is essential for good reading comprehension and is characterized by the production of inferences between a sentence and the other from the reading of a text. In this study we used the Local Coherence Inference Test translated into Portuguese, which was applied in 50 normal children of elementary school, aged 9-13 years, with the objective of determining if there is an age effect on the performance of this group on the Local Coherence Inference Test translated into Portuguese. Results showed that children 9 years of age showed some reduction in their performance in the test, however, the discrepancy in the number of correct responses between the groups was not significant, which may indicate that children 9 years old can properly access the ability of local Coherence, but the more practice reading, knowledge about the theme and most relevant topic lexical repertoire child will be able to establish an more appropriate inference from a sentence and another. / Avaliação de coerência local e inferência por meio do Local Coherence Inference Test traduzido para a língua portuguesa Em face da escassez de instrumentos devidamente validados no Brasil capazes de medir habilidade de coerência local em crianças, constatou-se a necessidade de realizar um estudo que revele quantitativamente o desempenho do processamento linguístico, no tocante a coerência local numa população de crianças normais da rede de ensino regular. A habilidade coerência local é imprescindível para uma boa compreensão textual e é caracterizada pela produção de inferências entre uma sentença e outra à partir da leitura de um texto. Neste estudo utilizou-se o Local Coherence Inference Test traduzido para a língua portuguesa, o qual foi aplicado em 50 crianças normais, do Ensino Fundamental, na faixa etária de 9 a 13 anos, com o objetivo de verificar se há efeito de idade no desempenho deste grupo no Local Coherence Inference Test traduzido para a língua portuguesa. Os resultados mostraram que as crianças de 9 anos de idade apresentaram sensível redução no desempenho do teste, porém, a discrepância do número de acertos entre os grupos etários não foi significativa, o que pode indicar que crianças com 9 anos de idade já conseguem acessar adequadamente a habilidade de coerência local, porém, quanto mais treino de leitura, conhecimento sobre o tema lido e maior o repertório lexical mais competente a criança será em estabelecer uma inferência entre uma sentença e outra.

Neste trabalho foram estudadas algumas formas de relação entre séries temporais multivariadas. Discutiu-se, inicialmente, a função de coerência, uma função análoga a função de correlação(que é dada no domínio do tempo) calculada no domínio da freqüência. Foram estudadas também as funções de coerência parcial e coerência parcial direcionada. A função de coerência parcial mede a relação entre duas componentes de uma série multivariada, isolados os efeitos de outra série. Em linhas gerais, a Coerência Parcial Direcionada pode ser interpredata como a decomposição da coerência parcial a partir de modelos autoregressivos multivariados. Esse conceito pode ser interpretado como uma representação do conceito de causalidade de Granger no domínio da freqüência. Finalmente, foram aplicadas as funções acima em dois conjuntos de dados: um modelo VAR(1) trivariado simulado e dados de medições de eletroencefalograma. / In this work we studied relationships between multivariate time series. We discussed the coherence function, a function similar to the correlation function(calculated in time domain) in frequency domain. Next, we discussed partial coherence and partial directed coherence. The partial coherence measures the relationship between two components of a multivariate time series, after removing the influence of another time series. Generally, the partial directed coherence can be interpreted as the decompositioin of the partial coherence from multivariate autoregressive models. We can interpret this function as a representation of the Granger causality concept in frequency domain. Finally, we applied these concepts in two situations: a simulated VAR(1) model and an electroencefalogram database.

International Telemetering Conference Proceedings / October 18-21, 2004 / Town & Country Resort, San Diego, California / The analysis of multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) communication systems often assumes a static, or quasi-static, environment. Platform motion and changes in the environment makes this an unreasonable assumption for many telemetry applications. This paper uses computer simulations to characterize the time variation of MIMO channel parameters when there is relative motion between the transmitter and receiver. These simulation results yield explicit time intervals over which a MIMO channel can be considered static for a given relative velocity and propagation environment. These results can be used to predict the practical limitations of proposed MIMO system algorithms.

Background: Previous studies on anthroposophic lifestyle and allergy show that the children have less risk of developing allergies. All studies so far have been retrospective and have included children in school age. In view of the facts that this lifestyle seems to protect children from allergies and that different symptoms of atopy have increased dramatically during the last decades it is of general interest to study this group of children more in detail. The earlier findings have now been followed up in a prospective research program ALADDIN (Assessment of Life style and Allergic Disease During Infancy), applying different approaches. One of these is to focus on stress (as measured by cortisol) as a factor that may underlie the decreased risk of allergy in children from anthroposophic families.   Aim: This thesis is based on data from the ALADDIN study focusing on influence of family lifestyle on allergy sensitization early in children’s life in relation to psychosocial factors and salivary cortisol as an indicator of stress. Methods: A total of 552 families were recruited during pregnancy or during the first month of the child´s life in two recruitment waves, 330 families between September 2004 and November 2007 and another 222 families between March 2008 and January 2011. They were recruited at anthroposophic maternal and child health care centers (MCHC) and from conventional MCHCs.  Data on demographics and exposures were obtained by questionnaires and interviews. Parental capacity to adapt to stressors was evaluated by means of the questionnaire “Sense of Coherence” (SOC; Antonovsky). Salivary samples were collected at home from the infants and both parents for analyzes of cortisol. Blood samples were obtained from the parents and from the children for analyzes of IgE. Results: Many family related characteristics differed markedly between the groups before and during pregnancy, during delivery and the first 12 months of age. Children from anthroposophic families had lower levels of salivary cortisol compared to peers from families with a more conventional lifestyle on all sampling occasions at 6 months of age and on some of the occasions at 12 and 24 months of age. There were no differences concerning cortisol between parents with different lifestyle and no significant differences concerning SOC-scores between the three lifestyle groups. An anthroposophic lifestyle was associated with a lower risk of allergic sensitization up to five years of age. This risk was partially explained by lower cortisol levels during infancy. Children in families with a partly anthroposophic lifestyle also had substantially lower risk of sensitization. Conclusion: An anthroposophic lifestyle protects from development of allergy during childhood, at least up to five years of age. This protective capacity is partly mediated by low cortisol levels during infancy but is also dependent on unknown characteristics of this lifestyle.  These results call for further studies on health related effects of an anthroposophic lifestyle.

<p>This thesis addresses the subject of diffractive axicons inpartially coherent or oblique illumination. Design andcharacterization of the axicons are performed using asymptoticwave optics, employing the stationary-phase method to obtainapproximations of the diffraction integrals.</p><p>A design method for axicons in partially coherentillumination is derived. The method can be applied to anyincident illumination on radially symmetric Schell-model form.It provides analytical solutions for some specific cases, butfor most incident intensity and coherence distributions it canbe solved numerically to yield the desired on-axis intensity.In addition, a method for estimating the width of the focalline is provided. For coherent light, the design method isidentical to the old one based on energy conservation in raybundles. Since the new method is derived entirely from waveoptics, it both clarifies the old method and extends it topartially coherent light.</p><p>Oblique illumination of axicons, frequently encountered inapplications, causes degradation of the focal line. This changeis characterized, and from the asymptotic theory it is foundthat the focal line is described by an asteroid curve. Thewidth of the focal segment in oblique illumination isaccurately predicted, as confirmed by simulations andexperiments. It is also found that at a fixed angle, anelliptical axicon may be used to compensate for the adverseeffects of oblique illumination.</p><p><b>Keywords:</b>axicons, diffractive optics, coherence,asymptotic methods</p>

<p>The licentiate thesis explored the relationship between working conditions and wage income, and the relationship between working conditions and sense of coherence in relation to ill health, focusing on cardiovascular disease, musculoskeletal pain, and psychological distress among the working population in Sweden. The studies were based on cross-sectional and longitudinal survey data (ULF and LNU), and on the Swedish census (FoB90) linked to the national cause of death registry. The samples included employed men and women residing in Sweden, aged 18-64.</p><p>The main results show that working conditions contributed to income differences in CVD prevalence as well as CVD mortality irrespective of study design or way of assessing working conditions. Further, sense of coherence moderated, yet not consistently, the impact of working conditions on musculoskeletal pain and psychological distress. The moderating role seemed to vary by work exposure, gender and health outcome. Hence, the results do not support the hypothesis that sense of coherence is a global health-protective factor.</p><p>The findings stress that future research into working conditions and employees’ health would benefit from including income in the analyses since wages are closely related to working conditions and to people’s position on the labour market. In addition, focusing on individual resources such as sense of coherence increases our undertanding of how individual differences in coping with adverse working conditions may affect health. Since the results also revealed considerable gender differences, suggesting that the factors that determine future work-related health are different for men and women, it is important to study men and women separately.</p>

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Conceptual development and conceptual change processes are described by a longitudinal study on preschool children’s conception of the earth. Conceptual change is often described as a causal process in which changes in an embraced system of beliefs result in a new system of beliefs. A normative line of research has been dominating the research field of conceptual change. There has been a search for specific conceptions that are missing in the learners’ reasoning or that prevent conceptual change from occur. Here, the learner’s capacity of reasoning is focused. The children’s reasoning is described in its own right (Driver &amp; Easley, 1978). It is argued that conceptual change is to be understood as an intentional activity with regard to the learner, that is, what the learner is doing when trying to understand something. Children were interviewed annually from four to six years of age. There were 37 children participating, of which 29 were followed during all three years. The children were interviewed about their conceptions of the earth. The results directs the focus of conceptual change from specific conceptions to structural changes. The children processed a lot of conflicting information. However, there does not appear to be any specific conflict that causes the process of conceptual change to occur. Rather, conceptual change is about the reorganization of the sum total of beliefs and to find adequate contexts to which they relate. Conceptual change involves a simultaneous processing of information and complex conception as well as revisions and changes at a model level, and all of this processing is related to contexts for description and explanation. The result also indicates some core stability in reasoning over the course of the investigation. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defence the folowing papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 1: Manuscript; Paper 2: Manuscript.</p>

Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited / The estimation of time delay and Doppler difference of a signal arriving at two physically separated sensors is investigated in this thesis. Usually, modified cross power spectrum coupled with Doppler compensation is used to detect a common, passive signal received at two separated sensors. Another successful approach uses the cross coherence to achieve this goal. This thesis modifies these two techniques to model the Doppler difference via an autoregressive (AR) technique. Analytical results are derived and experimentally verified via a computer simulation. Performance at high and low signal to noise ratios (SNRs) is examined. / http://archive.org/details/armodelingofcohe00leej / Captain, Korea Air Force