The development of a standardized assessment can, in general, be broken into multiple stages. In the first, items to be used in the assessment are generated according to the skills and abilities that are to be assessed and the needs of the developers. These items are then, ideally, tested in the field on members of the population for which the assessment is intended. Item Response Theory (IRT) analysis is used to reveal items in the item pool which are unusable due to measurement error, redundancy in the level of item difficulty, or bias. More potential items may be generated and tested until there is a set of valid items with which the developers can move forward. The present study focused on the steps of item tryout and analysis for the establishment of demonstrable item-level validity. Fifty-one potential test items were analyzed for a version of the Shirts and Shoes Test (Plante & Vance, 2012) for 6-year-olds. A total of 23 items were discarded due to error in one or more of the measures mentioned above, and one item was discarded due to its low difficulty. The remaining 27 items were deemed suitable for the 6-year-old population.

This study aimed to test the effectiveness of classroom translations of some laboratory procedures for teaching simple auditory discriminations to learners with developmental disabilities. Three participants with autism and mental retardation were trained to make topographically distinct responses in the presence of two different stimuli, either a pure tone and silence, or two tones. A portable electronic piano keyboard was used to produce tones. Delayed prompt and differential reinforcement procedures were used to teach the responses. None of the participants performed the discriminations accurately without prompting despite numerous revisions to the procedures.

V minul©m stolet­ byl vynaloen znaÄn vzkum na pochopen­, jak jsou vizuln­ informace kdovny neurln­mi populacemi a jejich obvody. Celkov obraz, kter vyplynul z tohoto sil­, naznaÄuje, e vizuln­ informace jsou nejprve zpracovny sloitmi obvody v s­tnici a nslednÄ peneseny do vy­ch mozkovch struktur. Ukazuje se, e s­tnice i mozek si vyvinuly pozoruhodnÄ sofistikovan© vpoÄty pro extrakci tÄchto informac­. FunkÄn­ studie tÄchto neuronln­ch transformac­ byly provdÄny pomoc­ elektrofyziologickch nebo zobrazovac­ch technik. Tyto techniky omezovaly analzu prostorovch specializac­ s­tnice, a to buÄ poÄtem dostupnch elektrod (v elektrofyziologii) nebo velikost­ zorn©ho pole (FOV) (v zobrazovac­ch experimentech). Pro ukzku â zznamy aktivit gangliovch bunÄk s­tnice (RGC) byly omezeny na relativnÄ malou oblast (~ 200 x 200 um2) za pouit­ nejmodernÄj­ch zobrazovac­ch technik. Ve sv© diplomov© prci jsem prozkoumal novÄ vyvinutou metodu vyu­vaj­c­ FOV, kter je 40krt vÄt­ ve srovnn­ s FOV konvenÄn­ch optickch metod, co mi umoilo pekonat toto technick© omezen­. Prce vyu­v tuto novou zobrazovac­ metodu k prozkoumn­ populaÄn­ch charakteristik smÄrovÄ selektivn­ch gangliovch bunÄk (DSGC) v s­tnic­ch my­. Replikac­ ji znmch populaÄn­ch vzorc jsme verifikovali, e nae nov zobrazovc­ metoda funguje. Prce dle zkoum Äinky pomocnch ltek pro zven­ m­ry infekce RGCs. Tyto pomocn© ltky tak mohou potencilnÄ usnadnit nezaujat© zaznamenvn­ aktivit RGCs. Prce nav­c pedstavuje nov stimul pro inspekci receptivn­ch pol­ (RF) RGCs. Tento nov stimul pekonv konvenÄn­ stimuly pou­van© v souÄasnch studi­ch jak v rozlien­ vyprodukovan©ho RF, tak v nezbytn©m Äase prezentace stimulu a otev­r tak dvee pro nsleduj­c­ studie, kter© mohou poprv© popsat distribuÄn­ vzorce receptivn­ch poli nap­Ä s­tnic­ a zlepit tak klasifikaci bunÄÄnch t­d.

Receptive language skills form the foundation for later expressive use and therefore play an important role in language development. The role of receptive language skills in the field of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) has received limited attention as, historically, the function of AAC has been to enhance the expressive language skills of persons who rely on AAC. While this is an important role and the primary outcome of AAC intervention, the role of AAC intervention on receptive language skills is equally important. The ability of persons who rely on AAC to understand spoken language ranges from age equivalent comprehension to minimal comprehension. AAC interventions that improve comprehension include a variety of strategies, but a synthesis of the effects of these strategies has not occurred. The aim of this scoping review was, therefore, to map and synthesise the research evidence on the effects of AAC interventions on receptive language skills of children with developmental disabilities. A four-pronged search strategy was used to identify studies that met the inclusion criteria. Twenty-three studies were included in the scoping review. The studies were described in terms of number of publications, participant characteristics, research design, AAC interventions, intervention outcomes, intervention effects, and quality appraisal. Furthermore, the studies were described in terms of three groups of effects: (i) the effect of aided AAC interventions, (ii) the effect of unaided AAC interventions, and (iii) a comparison of two types of AAC interventions. The trends and gaps in the literature are highlighted in terms of the use of AAC interventions and the receptive language skills addressed. Directions for future research are posited. Valuable preliminary evidence regarding the effects of AAC interventions on receptive language skills of children with developmental disabilities was obtained in the scoping review. / Mini Dissertation (M(AAC))--University of Pretoria, 2017. / National Research Foundation (NRF) / Centre for Augmentative and Alternative Communication (CAAC) / M(AAC) / Unrestricted

The key to understanding vision is to acquire insight into the sensory coding of indi- vidual neurons. To this end, major advances were done over the past 50 years in fitting models to neural data to identify the mapping from sensory space to neural responses. Especially the advance of DNNs in neuroscience allowed for model fits with excellent predictive power. However, such advanced neural models are complex, and their poor in- terpretability has so far hindered deeper understanding of the principles of visual coding. To address this issue, a recent study proposed a method which identifies the stimulus that activates the neuron the most. However, the sensory coding of highly non-linear neurons, which are abundant already at the earliest stages of visual processing, is too complex for a single stimulus to sufficiently characterize it. A more robust way to char- acterize this coding is through identifying the input sub-space within which the neuron is activated identically - i.e. finding invariances of the neuron's sensory representation. In this thesis, a novel approach for finding such invariant stimuli is proposed. The proposed technique is based on a generator neural network, which maps Gaussian noise from latent space to a stimulus set which equally activates a given neuron. The method demonstrated the...

An important question in teaching language is, what accounts for the emergence of either receptive or expressive labels when teaching only one of them? The teaching procedures in the present study were intended to reproduce the natural development of bidirectional naming in which caregivers comment on the items a child is interacting with and children echo those vocalizations they hear. Thus, the only vocalizations presented by the researcher during teaching occurred after the learner pointed to a specific stimulus, and were specific to the stimulus being targeted. These vocalizations are referred to in this study as stimulus-specific consequences. The purpose of this research was to investigate if the stimulus-specific consequences could become discriminative stimuli for receptive labels, and lead to the emergence of expressive labels. Three studies were conducted, each with four adults. Results demonstrated that using a stimulus-specific consequence during teaching led to receptive labels for all participants, but led to the emergence of expressive labels for only four participants. In other words, bidirectional naming did not occur for the majority of participants. Factors that may improve interrelations between receptive and expressive labels were analyzed, but further evaluations are needed to account for the inconsistent demonstrations of naming.

El objetivo principal fue identificar los factores que influyeron en el estancamiento de las exportaciones de paquetes turísticos de las agencias de viaje de Lima Metropolitana durante el 2018. En este sentido, se requiere determinar si los factores de gestión empresarial, político – legales y el entorno competitivo influyeron en el estancamiento de las exportaciones de paquetes turísticos. Por este motivo, se realizó una investigación cualitativa – exploratoria con un diseño de teoría fundamentada a fin de obtener información sobre las percepciones de las agencias de viaje de Lima Metropolitana, entrevistándose a 13 agencias de viaje. A fin de triangular la información obtenida, se entrevistó también al gremio rector Canatur, expertos en el tema y al Mincetur. El presente trabajo concluyó que los factores de gestión empresarial (bajo aprovechamiento de las herramientas digitales en la oferta exportable), factores político – legales (ausencia de fiscalización a las agencias informales y desconocimiento del alcance de la Ley N° 30641) y el entorno competitivo (alta competitividad por parte de las OTAs y cambio en el rol de las aerolíneas) influyeron en el estancamiento de las exportaciones de paquetes turísticos de las agencias de viaje de Lima Metropolitana durante el 2018. Asimismo, existen indicios de nuevos hallazgos como la inseguridad del país, Perú “Macchupizado” y la alianza como estrategia de desarrollo. Por otro lado, es importante recalcar que no se encontró a la fecha registros de tesis nacionales que aborden la problemática del sector en Lima Metropolitana enfocada desde el punto de vista de los negocios internacionales. / The main objective was to identify the factors that influenced the stagnation of tourism package exports of travel agencies in Metropolitan Lima during 2018. In this context, it is necessary to determine whether the factors of business management, political - Legal and competitive environment influenced the stagnation of exports of tourist packages For this reason, a qualitative-exploratory research was conducted with a grounded theory design in order to obtain information on the perceptions of travel agencies in Metropolitan Lima, so 13 travel agencies were interviewed. In order to triangulate the information obtained, the Canatur group, experts on the subject and the Mincetur were also interviewed. The research work concluded that business management factors (low use of digital tools in the exportable offer), political-legal factors (lack of informal agencies control and lack of knowledge of the Law No. 30641 scope) and the competitive environment (OTAs high competitiveness and change in the role of the airlines) influenced the stagnation of the exports of tourist packages of the travel agencies of Metropolitan Lima during 2018. There is also evidence of new findings such as country insecurity, “Perú Macchupizado” and alliance as a development strategy. On the other hand, it is important to emphasize that there were not records of national thesis that address the problem of the sector in Lima Metropolitan from the point of view of international business. / Tesis

Limited data exists on intimate partner violence (IPV) among transgender women (TW), though global trends suggest IPV is associated with HIV risk in this population. We describe the prevalence of verbal, physical, and/or sexual violence as well as participant- and partner-level correlates of IPV among TW in Lima, Peru. Among 389 respondents, 15.2% reported IPV with one or more of their last three sexual partners: 9.2% verbal, 8.2% physical, and 2.3% sexual violence. Physical and verbal violence were more common with stable partners (aPR 3.46, 95% CI 1.17–10.25, aPR 2.46, 95% CI 1.14–5.28, respectively). Physical violence was associated with condomless receptive anal intercourse (cRAI) (aPR 2.22, 95% CI 1.19–4.13) and partner alcohol use (aPR 4.38, 95% CI 1.56–12.33) while verbal violence correlated with participant inebriation (aPR 4.86, 95% CI 1.63–14.46). Our results link IPV with stable partnerships, alcohol use, and cRAI, suggesting TW in Peru may benefit from multidimensional IPV prevention strategies to foster supportive relationships and reduce HIV transmission. / amfAR, The Foundation for AIDS Research / Revisión por pares

This study investigates the impact that reading aloud has on receptive vocabulary for youngerlearners. It takes the current environment of English language learning within Swedish schoolsinto account and explores several language acquisition theories that are deemed instrumental indeveloping a foundation for receptive vocabulary, as well as contrasting and comparing with howthe method of reading aloud has an impact on language learning. The study will also investigatehow this method differs among first- and second- or foreign-language learners. Through thesynthesis of multiple research articles that have been made on the subject, we discover that thepositive effects of a read aloud experience translate to a greater understanding of receptivevocabulary, and that there are ultimately only positives to draw from the experience. However,conflicting sources regarding second-language or foreign-language learners’ performances pointsto the importance of ensuring the material and exercises be carefully selected and structured inorder to foster an equal ground for everyone’s developmental trajectory.

Cat hair receptors were studied to determine whether they could be distinguished by the following receptive field characteristics: thickness of innervated guard hairs, distance between innervated follicles and receptive field size. Initially the receptors were classified as G1, GI, G2 or D on the basis of their velocity requirements for excitation, their degree of linear directionality, their vibrational sensitivity, and whether they were activated by movement of down hairs. It was found that the thickest guard hairs on the posterior aspect of a cat's hindleg were usually 4-5 times thicker than the thinnest guard hairs from the same area and that G1, GI and G2 neurons innervated the full range of guard hair thicknesses available. Although there was a tendency for thicker guard hairs to be more heavily innervated, none of the neurons studied innervated thick guard hairs exclusively. While movement of the down hair and most guard hairs within D-mechanoreceptive fields easily evoked activity, a few guard hairs were regularly found for which mechanical displacement did not elicit a discharge even though they were well within the receptive field. Receptive field sizes and nearest neighbor distances between innervated follicles were smaller for D than for G1, GI and G2 receptors and greater for G1 than GI and G2 receptors.