Distributional models of semantics have proven themselves invaluable both in cognitive modelling of semantic phenomena and also in practical applications. For example, they have been used to model judgments of semantic similarity (McDonald, 2000) and association (Denhire and Lemaire, 2004; Griffiths et al., 2007) and have been shown to achieve human level performance on synonymy tests (Landuaer and Dumais, 1997; Griffiths et al., 2007) such as those included in the Test of English as Foreign Language (TOEFL). This ability has been put to practical use in automatic thesaurus extraction (Grefenstette, 1994). However, while there has been a considerable amount of research directed at the most effective ways of constructing representations for individual words, the representation of larger constructions, e.g., phrases and sentences, has received relatively little attention. In this thesis we examine this issue of how to compose meanings within distributional models of semantics to form representations of multi-word structures. Natural language data typically consists of such complex structures, rather than just individual isolated words. Thus, a model of composition, in which individual word meanings are combined into phrases and phrases combine to form sentences, is of central importance in modelling this data. Commonly, however, distributional representations are combined in terms of addition (Landuaer and Dumais, 1997; Foltz et al., 1998), without any empirical evaluation of alternative choices. Constructing effective distributional representations of phrases and sentences requires that we have both a theoretical foundation to direct the development of models of composition and also a means of empirically evaluating those models. The approach we take is to first consider the general properties of semantic composition and from that basis define a comprehensive framework in which to consider the composition of distributional representations. The framework subsumes existing proposals, such as addition and tensor products, but also allows us to define novel composition functions. We then show that the effectiveness of these models can be evaluated on three empirical tasks. The first of these tasks involves modelling similarity judgements for short phrases gathered in human experiments. Distributional representations of individual words are commonly evaluated on tasks based on their ability to model semantic similarity relations, e.g., synonymy or priming. Thus, it seems appropriate to evaluate phrase representations in a similar manner. We then apply compositional models to language modelling, demonstrating that the issue of composition has practical consequences, and also providing an evaluation based on large amounts of natural data. In our third task, we use these language models in an analysis of reading times from an eye-movement study. This allows us to investigate the relationship between the composition of distributional representations and the processes involved in comprehending phrases and sentences. We find that these tasks do indeed allow us to evaluate and differentiate the proposed composition functions and that the results show a reasonable consistency across tasks. In particular, a simple multiplicative model is best for a semantic space based on word co-occurrence, whereas an additive model is better for the topic based model we consider. More generally, employing compositional models to construct representations of multi-word structures typically yields improvements in performance over non-compositonal models, which only represent individual words.

Since so many aids are available to help the teacher in the actual process of writing, this study will concentrate on the various ways in which other benefits, such as heightened awareness, educated imagination, increased self-esteem, and improved critical judgment, can be integrated into a composition class for accelerated students.

Background: Childhood overweight and obesity remains high, contributing to cardiometabolic risk factors at younger ages. It is unclear which measures of adiposity serve as the best proxies for identifying children at metabolic risk. This study assessed whether DXA-derived direct measures of adiposity are more strongly related to cardiometabolic risk factors in children than indirect measures. Methods: Anthropometric and DXA measures of adiposity and a comprehensive assessment of cardiometabolic risk factors were obtained in 288, 9-12 year old girls, most being of Hispanic ethnicity. Multiple regression models for each metabolic parameter were run against each adiposity measure while controlling for maturation and ethnicity. In addition, regression models including both indirect and direct measures were developed to assess whether using direct measures of adiposity could provide a better prediction of the cardiometabolic risk factors beyond that of using indirect measures alone. Results: Measures of adiposity were significantly correlated with cardiometabolic risk factors (p < 0.05) except fasting glucose. After adjusting for maturation and ethnicity, indirect measures of adiposity accounted for 29-34% in HOMA-IR, 10-13% in TG, 14-17% in HDL-C, and 5-8% in LDL-C while direct measures accounted for 29-34% in HOMA-IR, 10-12% in TG, 13-16% in HDL-C, and 5-6% in LDL-C. The addition of direct measures of adiposity to indirect measures added significantly to the variance explained for HOMA-IR (p = 0.04). Conclusion: Anthropometric measures may perform as well as the more precise direct DXA-derived measures of adiposity for assessing most CVD risk factors in preadolescent girls. The use of DXA-derived adiposity measures together with indirect measures may be advantageous for predicting insulin resistance risk.

RESUMÉ WAYS OF THE SOLVING OF THE BANKRUPTCY IN THE "FIRST-REPULIC ERA" This work offers close look on the ways, in which bankruptcy was solved in Czechoslovakia between both World Wars. This period was very interesting from social and economic point of view. During this time was rise substituted by recession. Except from this, with the formation of the independent state a great normative effort was on the rise too. Problems of solution of bankruptcy in so called "first-republic era" are introduced by brief description of historical development, which is mentioned to remember some elementary legal institutes, on which the bankruptcy law is based up to these days. During the work on this text of lead experts of the period in this branch were critically compared in order to realize the positives and negatives of the then regulation in the view of the praxis due to their opinions and possible conflicts as well as the way, in which the juristic theory and normative might reacted on the practical problems and public meaning. Studying of the Explanatory memorandum for the bill of the Act No. 64/1931 Coll., on bankruptcy, composition and resistance, helped a lot in this effort. The analysis of this Act is the axis of the work. Both the mentioned Act and the former Austrian regulation were compared as well as the...

The purpose of the study was to examine the relationship and comparisons of athletic amenorrhea and bone mineral density in adolescent, cross-country runners. Subjects: Twenty-eight female adolescent cross-country runners (Mean Age + SD = 15.0 + 1.3 years); consisting of seventeen eumenorrheics & eleven amenorrheics. Design: The design consisted of a sixmonth longitudinal design in which the subjects were measured before and after cross-country season for height, weight, and lean tissue (LT), body fat (BF), bone mineral content (BMC), and bone mineral density (BMD) using whole-body scan densitiometry with a Lunar Dual-energy X-ray Absorptiometer (DXA). Run performance, weekly training volumes, menstrual dysfunction, menarchal age, nutritional information, and stress fractures were reported by the subjects. Statistical analyses consisted of Pearson product-moment and partial correlations to examine the associations of the variables, paired t-tests to measure seasonal body composition changes, multivariate analysis (MANOVA & MANCOVA) to investigate the subgroup differences of variables, and simple linear regression to determine the best body composition predictor variable for BMD. Results: The eumenorrheic subgroup's BMD was significantly greater than the amenorrheic subgroup's BMD (F(1, 54) = 16.22, p<.05, partial h² =.231). The eumenorrheic subgroup's bodyweight (F(1, 54) = 7.65, p<.05, partial h² =.124), BF (F(1, 54) = 8.56, p<.05, partial h² =.137), and BMC (F(1, 54) = 8.52, p<.05, partial h² =.136) were significantly greater than the amenorrheic subgroup. There was also a significant seasonal increase in BMD (t(27) = -4.01, p <.05) for the overall group. Bodyweight was the body composition component that best predicted BMD (F(1, 26) = 46.434, p<.05, R² =.641). There were no significant subgroup differences with respect to run performance, stress fractures, and nutritional supplementation. Conclusions: Athletic amenorrhea was highly associated with lower levels of BMD in adolescent, cross-country runners. Athletic amenorrhea was also highly associated with lower levels of bodyweight, BF, and BMC in adolescent cross-country runners. Finally, cross-country running was highly associated with increased BMD in adolescent athletes. Implications: The long-term implication of the study is that subjects with lower levels of BMD may be at a greater risk of osteoporosis. Recommendations: Educate and instruct runners to utilize proper training methods so the healthful benefits of crosscountry running, as well as improved performance, are obtained.

In this research, we study image composition in the context of computer rendering, investigate why composition is difficult with conventional rendering methods, and propose our solutions. Image composition is a process in which an artist improves a visual image to achieve certain aesthetic goals, and it is a central topic in studies of visual arts. Approaching the compositional quality of hand-made art work with computer rendering is a challenging task; but there is scarcely any in-depth research on this task from an interdisciplinary viewpoint between computer graphics and visual arts. Although recent developments of computer rendering have enabled the synthesis of high quality photographic images, most rendering methods only simulate a photographic process and do not permit straightforward compositional editing in the image space. In order to improve the visual quality of the digitally synthesized images, the knowledge of visual composition needs to be incorporated. This objective not only asks for novel algorithmic inventions, but also involves research in visual perception, painting, photography and other disciplines of visual arts. With examples from historical painting and contemporary photography, we inquire why and how a well-composed image elicits an aesthetic visual response from its viewer. Our analysis based on visual perception shows that the composition of an image serves as a guideline for the viewing process of that image; the composition of an image conveys an artist's intention of how the depicted scene should be viewed, and directs a viewer's eyes. A key observation is that for a composition to take effect, a viewer must be allowed to attentively look at the image for a period of time. From this analysis, we outline a few rules for composing light and shade in computer rendering, which serve as guidelines for designing rendering methods that create imagery beyond photorealistic depictions. Our original analysis elucidates the mechanism and function of image composition in the context of rendering, and offers clearly defined directions for algorithmic design. Theories about composition mostly remain in the literature of art critique and art history, while there are hardly any investigations on this topic in a technical context. Our novel analysis is an instructive contribution for enhancing the aesthetic quality of digitally synthesized images. We present two research projects that develop our analysis into rendering programs. We first show an interpolative material model, in which the surface shading is interpolated from input textures with a brightness value. The resultant rendering depicts surface brightness instead of light energy in the depicted scene. We also show a painting interface with this material model, with which an artist can directly compose surface brightness with a digital pen. In the second project, we ask an artist to provide a sketch of lighting design with coarse paint strokes on top of a rendering, while details of the light and shade in the depicted scene are automatically filled in by our program. This project is staged in the context of creating the visual effects of foliage shadows under sunshine. Our software tool also includes a novel method for generating coherent animations that resemble the movements of tree foliage in a gentle breeze. These programming projects validate the rendering methodology proposed by our theoretical analysis, and demonstrate the feasibility of incorporating compositional techniques in computer rendering. In addition to programming projects, this interdisciplinary research also consists of practices in visual arts. We present two art projects of digital photography and projection installation, which we built based on our theoretical analysis of composition and our software tools from the programming projects. Through these art projects, we evaluate our methodology by both making art ourselves and critiquing the resultant pieces with peer artists. From our point of view, it is important to be involved in art practices for rendering researchers, especially those who deal with aesthetic issues. The valuable first-hand experiences and the communications with artists in a visual arts context are rarely reported in the rendering literature. These experiences serve as effective guides for the future development of our research on computer rendering. The long term goal of our research is find a balance between artistic expression and realistic believability, based on the interdisciplinary knowledge of composition and perception, and implemented as either automated or user-assisted rendering tools. This goal may be termed as to achieve a staged realism, to synthesize images that are recognizable as depictions of realistic scenes, and at the same time enabling the freedom of composing the rendering results in an artistic manner. / Graduate / 0357 / 0984

Thesis (D.M.A.)--Boston University

MMus, Wits School of Arts, Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand, 2009 / This research report explores the compositional identity South African composers, mostly born after 1976, are constructing. I conduct a critical ethnographic micro study of the Wits Contemporary Performance Ensemble (WCPE), a group of young composers and performers dedicated to workshopping and performing new compositions. South African compositional identity is explored and problematised in Chapter 1, along with the identification of two schools or types of composition within South Africa. The history and formation of the WCPE is discussed in Chapter 2, while the third chapter draws on interview data to present and problematise the field in which young composers work, discussing a series of perceived ‘lacks’ that affect their ability to produce new music. The fourth chapter critiques and evaluates the progress the WCPE made, using Timothy Rice’s model of the Subject-Centered Musical Ethnography (2003), to interpret what the music of these young composers is saying about the time and place in which they live. The conclusion considers the impact the WCPE has had on young South African composers and the necessity of a group like this in the formation of a new South African compositional voice.

Thesis (M.S.)--Boston University

<p> This project report analyzes Eric Whitacre&rsquo;s choral piece <i> When David Heard</i>, a work about grieving the loss of a son, alongside psychologist Elizabeth K&uuml;bler-Ross&rsquo;s five stages of grief. The paper serves to better understand the lamentation of King David in Whitacre&rsquo;s piece by seeing where each of the five stages fit into the process of grief throughout the piece. </p><p> The analysis observes Whitacre&rsquo;s variety of musical devices such as tonal clusters, intermittent silences, and polyrhythms, as a means to describe the stages of grief that David is experiencing. By understanding these different stages of grief within the piece, one can conduct or sing the performance of this piece with better understanding of this grief.</p><p>