SUN: Top-down saliency using natural statistics

When people try to find particular objects in natural scenes they make extensive use of knowledge about how and where objects tend to appear in a scene. Although many forms of such "top-down" knowledge have been incorporated into saliency map models of visual search, surprisingly, the role of object appearance has been infrequently investigated. Here we present an appearance-based saliency model derived in a Bayesian framework. We compare our approach with both bottom-up saliency algorithms as well as the state-of-the-art Contextual Guidance model of Torralba et al. (2006) at predicting human fixations. Although both top-down approaches use very different types of information, they achieve similar performance; each substantially better than the purely bottom-up models. Our experiments reveal that a simple model of object appearance can predict human fixations quite well, even making the same mistakes as people.     

Syntactic features and synonymy relations: a unified treatment of some proofs of the compactness and interpolation theorems

This paper introduces the notion of syntactic feature to provide a unified treatment of earlier model theoretic proofs of both the compactness and interpolation theorems for a variety of two valued logics including sentential logic, first order logic, and a family of modal sentential logic includingM,B,S ₄ andS ₅. The compactness papers focused on providing a proof of the consequence formulation which exhibited the appropriate finite subset. A unified presentation of these proofs is given by isolating their essential feature and presenting it as an abstract principle about syntactic features. The interpolation papers focused on exhibiting the interpolant. A unified presentation of these proofs is given by isolating their essential feature and presenting it as a second abstract principle about syntactic features. This second principle reduces the problem of exhibiting the interpolant to that of establishing the existence of a family of syntactic features satisfying certain conditions. The existence of such features is established for a variety of logics (including those mentioned above) by purely combinatorial arguments.Presented byMelvin Fitting     

Transitive inference in pigeons: Control for differential value transfer

Transitive inference (TI) effects have been demonstrated in several nonhuman species using a nonverbal version of the task in which A is better than B is represented in a simple simultaneous discrimination, A+B?. Following five-term training (e.g., A+B?, B+C?, C+D?, D+E?), the choice of B over D on test trials is taken as evidence of TI. Recently, differential value transfer from the S+ to the S? in a simultaneous discrimination has been proposed as a noncognitive basis for these effects. Two experiments were conducted to control for differential value transfer. The results suggest that differential value transfer is not the only basis for nonhuman TI performance. An alternative account based on spatial mapping is discussed.     

Working with potentially dangerous persons: What clergy need to know

This article addresses the increasing involvement of clergy in dangerous situations, particularly family violence. It provides a quick reference guide to assist clergy in assessing for the risk of potential violence with suggested interventions. In a society that is marked by unprecedented levels of violence and a shortage of mental health services, clergy are increasingly being confronted by dangerous situations that require expert crisis intervention skills. This article provides specific, concrete guidelines for clergy confronted by violence in ministry.The Earth is full of violence.Genesis 6:13This article is dedicated to the memory of The Reverend Harold M. Eads of Topeka, Kansas who was stabbed to death in his apartment on December 17, 1978 in East Harlem, New York where he served the poor and disinherited as a United Methodist minister.     

Adjunctive psychotherapy for bipolar disorder: effects of changing treatment modality

In a randomized, controlled trial, the authors studied an adjunctive, individual psychotherapy, interpersonal and social rhythm therapy (IPSRT) for bipolar disorder. After stabilizing participants with episode appropriate pharmacotherapy and either IPSRT or intensive clinical management (CM), participants were reassigned to IPSRT or CM in conjunction with pharmacotherapy for 2 years of preventative treatment. Early results (n = 82) suggest that altering participants' treatment assignment at entry to the preventative phase is related to risk of recurrence. Participants remaining in the same treatment for both acute and preventative phases had lower rates of recurrence (< 20% vs. > 40%) and levels of symptomatology over the subsequent 52 weeks than those reassigned to the alternate modality. This finding, consistent with the authors' philosophy that bipolar patients benefit from stable routines, suggests that disruptions in the psychosocial treatment plan contribute to worse outcomes.     

Effects of Prolonged Exposure to Gratuitous Media Violence on Provoked and Unprovoked Hostile Behavior1

On 4 consecutive days, respondents were exposed to gratuitously violent or nonviolent intact feature films. They rated the entertainment value of these films. One day after exposure to the last film of the series, respondents participated in ostensibly unrelated research on emotion recognition. As they performed a test, they were neutrally or abusively treated by a research assistant. Thereafter, they were put in a position to harm this assistant. Both provocation and exposure to violent films were found to foster markedly increased hostile behavior. These effects were noninteractive. Moreover, these effects were uniform for respondent gender. Compared to men, women exhibited less hostility overall, however. The findings thus show that prolonged exposure to gratuitously violent films is capable (a) of escalating hostile behavior in provoked men and women, and (b) perhaps more importantly, of instigating such behavior in unprovoked men and women.     

Relationships between scores on Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence--Revised and Stanford-Binet IV

The Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence--Revised and the Stanford Binet-Intelligence Scale: Fourth Edition were given to 51 preschool, kindergarten, first, and second grade students. Twelve of 15 Pearson correlations between Wechsler IQs and composite and area scores of the Stanford-Binet IV were statistically significant. It is apparent that the two tests measure similar, but not identical, concepts.     

A procedure for maintaining student progress in a personalized university course

Ten students in a personalized university course were given target dates for completing each of 26 lessons. The lessons could be completed before those dates, but not after. The first two failures to complete a lesson by the target date led to "warnings"; the next failure required the student to withdraw from the course. When each student's rate of lesson completion was compared with and without target dates, it was found that students completed an average of 1.0 lesson a day with the target-date contingency and 0.3 without it. Individual data indicated that most students did few or no lessons without the contingency. It was concluded that a target-date contingency is an effective method for maintaining student progress in personalized university courses.     

A precision tooth-pulp stimulation technique for the assessment of pain threshold

Accurate and consistent pain threshold measurements for the tooth pulp can be achieved with careful preparation of a moisture-proof appliance and the use of a high-quality constant-current stimulator. Using an extant dental filling as the cathode, the usual problems associated with the control of the stimulation area and locus and, consequently, current density can be overcome. Repeated measurements showing less than ±5% variation over many months can be routinely achieved on the same individual. The technique has shown a high degree of sensitivity to common analgesic agents and is potentially useful for the investigation of variations in pain threshold over extended periods of time.     

A national survey of hospital directors' views about the importance of various chaplain roles: differences among disciplines and types of hospitals

A national random sample of hospital directors was asked to rate the importance of seven categories of chaplain roles and functions: 246 nursing directors, 267 social services directors, 307 medical directors, and 611 pastoral care directors. All four groups rated end-of-life care, prayer, and emotional support as being between very important and extremely important. Other roles, including consultation, advocacy, community outreach, and religious services and rituals were rated significantly less important. Significant differences were found across disciplines and hospital settings (general, psychiatric, etc.). Medical directors rated most chaplain roles lower than other directors did, and directors in psychiatric hospitals rated all roles, except religious services/rituals, lower than their counterparts in other types of hospitals. The importance that directors accorded to all the chaplain roles examined was also influenced by their own spirituality and religiosity, as well as the religious affiliation of their institution.