Personal and communal resilience in communities exposed to missile attacks: Does intensity of exposure matter?

Based on the salutogenic model, this study aimed to examine the role of personal and communal resiliency in reducing individuals’ psychological distress when facing intensive missile attacks. We examined the relationships between these resources and psychological distress in communities which were exposed to different intensities of attacks. Data was gathered via anonymous self-report questionnaires from 843 adults during the period from one week to one month after intensive attacks in southern Israel. Questionnaires included demographic data as well as sense of coherence (SOC), community resiliency and psychological distress. Differences in levels of resiliency and distress were found among the groups with different ‘exposure levels’. Moreover, only personal resilience SOC explained psychological distress in the entire population, while community resiliency had no effect. Results are discussed on the basis of the salutogenic model with implications for developments of interventions with populations who are exposed to differing intensities of missile attacks.     

Implicit Association Test (IAT) Studies Investigating Pitch-Shape Audiovisual Cross-modal Associations Across Language Groups

Previous studies have shown that Chinese speakers and non-Chinese speakers exhibit different patterns of cross-modal congruence for the lexical tones of Mandarin Chinese, depending on which features of the pitch they attend to. But is this pattern of language-specific listening a conscious cultural strategy or an automatic processing effect? If automatic, does it also apply when the same pitch contours no longer sound like speech? Implicit Association Tests (IATs) provide an indirect measure of cross-modal association. In a series of IAT studies, conducted with participants with three kinds of language backgrounds (Chinese-dominant bilinguals, Chinese balanced bilinguals, and English speakers with no Chinese experience) we find language-specific congruence effects for Mandarin lexical tones but not for matched sine-wave stimuli. That is, for linguistic stimuli, non-Chinese speakers show advantages for pitch-height congruence (high-pointy, low-curvy); no congruence effects were found for Chinese speakers. For non-linguistic stimuli, all participant groups showed advantages for pitch-height congruence. The present findings suggest that non-lexical tone congruence (high-pointy, low-curvy) is a basic congruence pattern, and the acquisition of a language with lexical tone can alter this perception.     

编码方式与指拼特征在聋生手语词加工中的作用研究

本研究探讨了聋生在加工手语词过程中不同编码方式和指拼特征的影响。实验1采用指拼类手语词和手势类手语词考察了指拼有无对手语词编码方式的影响。实验2则采用不同特征的指拼类手语词,深入考察指拼位置、指拼形式对手语词编码方式的影响。结果表明,聋生较语音编码更擅长使用指拼编码加工手语词;指拼与手势的加工存在显著差异,指拼在聋生手语词加工中起到了促进作用;指拼位置与指拼形式共同作用于手语词的加工过程。     

Help-Seeking Attitudes of Chinese Americans and Chinese Immigrants in the United States: The Mediating Role of Self-Stigma

In this study, the authors examined the relationship between age, gender, self-stigma, and help-seeking attitudes of Chinese Americans and Chinese immigrants, hypothesizing that self-stigma would mediate the relationship between demographic variables (age and gender) and help-seeking attitude. Utilizing a path analysis, the authors found that self-stigma mediated the relationship between demographic variables and help-seeking attitude. Self-stigma was a moderately strong predictor for help-seeking attitude (β = –.41, p < .001). Implications are discussed. Es este estudio, los autores examinaron la relación entre edad, sexo, autoestigma y actitudes de búsqueda de ayuda en personas estadounidenses de origen chino e inmigrantes chinos, con la hipótesis de que el autoestigma mediaría la relación entre las variables demográficas (edad y sexo) y la actitud de búsqueda de ayuda. Mediante un análisis de ruta, los autores hallaron que el autoestigma medió la relación entre las variables demográficas y la actitud de búsqueda de ayuda. El autoestigma fue un indicador moderadamente fuerte de la actitud de búsqueda de ayuda (β = –.41, p < .001). Se discuten las implicaciones.     

Prevalence and correlates of metabolic syndrome in Hong Kong Chinese adults—a random community sample study

The study investigates the prevalence and correlates of metabolic syndrome (MS) among Hong Kong Chinese adults. Random cluster sampling design and International Diabetes Federation (IDF) MS criteria were adopted. Totally 737 adults participated in questionnaire survey and received waist circumference (WC) measurement. Among them 335 showed central obesity (WC > 80 and 85 cm for women and men respectively). Subsequently 229 accepted blood test. Totally 71 participants met MS criteria, suggesting an overall prevalence of 14.1%. Both central obesity and MS increase sharply with age. Chi-square/ANOVA analyses revealed significant positive associations between central obesity with: being male, marital status being married/cohabit, lower education level, occupation as managers or housewives, and alcohol consumption. For MS, the significant positive correlates were: lower education level, occupation as service workers or housewives, lower income level, and alcohol consumption. After controlling for age, binary logistic regression analyses suggested the significant risk factors for central obesity were being male (OR = 1.4), married/cohabit (OR = 1.8), longer working hours (OR = 1.5), eating less vegetables (OR = 1.5), and alcohol consumption (OR = 1.8). For MS, only alcohol consumption appeared to be a significant risk factor (OR = 2.3). Multivariate binary logistic regressions also supported that age group and alcohol consumption were significant predictors of MS. To conclude, adopting randomized cluster sampling and IDF criteria, the study revealed a prevalence rate of MS at 14.1%. Alcohol consumption appears to be the strongest risk factor of MS, which however needs further investigation.     

Bidirectional feature selection with global and local structure preservation for small size samples

Collecting samples is a challenging task for face recognition, especially for some real-world applications such as law enhancement and ID card identification, where there is usually single sample per person (SSPS) used to train a face recognition system. To extract discriminative features from the small size samples, in this paper we propose virtual samples via bidirectional feature selection with global and local structure preservation (VS-BFS-GL) to augment the number of training samples. In VS-BFS-GL, bidirectional feature selection is developed, which introduces L_2,1 norm to explore the face variations from both horizontal and vertical directions. Further, to include more variations in the virtual images, the global structure information and sample-specified local structure information of the SSPP training set are considered. By integrating bidirectional feature selection, global and local structure, the limited training samples are fully utilized and more knowledge are mined. To further improve the effectiveness of VS-BFS-GL, an auxiliary database containing different face variations can be used to explore the local structure information. We extensively evaluated the proposed approach on AR and FERET database. The promising recognition results demonstrate that VS-BFS-GL is robust to expression, pose and partial occlusion variations in the faces.     

Cultural Identities of Children of Chinese Migrants in Spain: A Critical Evaluation of the Category 1.5 Generation

The term 1.5 generation has broadly been used to refer to individuals who migrate in childhood or adolescence. It has served as a distinction from the first generation, who voluntarily migrated in adulthood, and from the second generation, born in the host society. The experiences and cultural identities of 1.5-generation children have generally been described as located in between two worlds. However, the present qualitative study conducted among 1.5-generation Chinese living in Spain does not support these views. It shows that some children feel unequivocally Chinese, while the experiences of others reflect much more nuance and complexity that resists categorization. A dialogical perspective is proposed as a multilayered and intersectional approach from which to explore these identities.     

EMPIRICAL MINDFULNESS: TRADITIONAL CHINESE MEDICINE AND MENTAL HEALTH IN THE SCIENCE AND RELIGION DIALOGUE

As science and religion researchers begin to engage questions of mental health, mindfulness may prove to be a fruitful area of investigation. However, quantifying the physical effects of mindfulness on the brain is difficult because mindfulness deals with the problem of mental and physical interaction or, the mind/body problem. One system of understanding which may aid science and religion scholars in the pursuit of mindfulness is traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). Within TCM, heart Qi manages the body's present connection to time and space. If the “being in the moment” is disrupted, then the heart Qi is blocked and mental illness or various neurological disorders occur. Succinctly, within TCM, mindfulness is understood as a nonphysical phenomenon (Qi) which directly affects physical systems, resulting in empirical data. This is tracked and treated through the TCM understanding of Qi. The TCM view of Qi in mental health may therefore provide a helpful new paradigm to investigations concerning mindfulness and the human brain.     

适合汉语全拼输入的提示性软键盘的研发与验证

本研究设计了两种基于汉语全拼输入的提示性软键盘:加粗加黑和颜色提示,并通过实证性研究验证了这两种提示性软键盘对汉字输入绩效的影响。结果表明,两种提示性软键盘均优于非提示性软键盘,在打字速度、使用方便程度、喜爱程度和总体评价上均更好,加粗加黑提示性软键盘还显著提升了输入正确率。该结果为基于汉字输入的提示性软键盘的研发和使用提供了科学依据和数据支持,也将为相关键盘的投入市场做出贡献。