An empirical study of the effectiveness of multimedia disclosure of informed consent: A technology mediated learning perspective

Informed consent is a term used to describe communications between physicians and their patients; it gives rise to important ethical and legal implications. We explored how multimedia-mediated disclosure of informed consent prior to surgery influenced the learning process and learning outcomes of patients.A total of 107 samples were obtained from patients with degenerative knee arthritis. Our research indicated that multimedia-mediated disclosure outperformed other more traditional method in that it enhanced learning, interest, remembering, comprehension, and satisfaction. Also learning motivation and interest were positively and strongly correlated with perceived comprehension and satisfaction. Furthermore, learning interest was more influential in improving the process than was learning motivation.     

The performance of message-passing using restricted virtual memory remapping

DASH is a distributed operating system kernel. Message-passing (MP) is used for local communication, and the MP system uses virtual memory ( VM) remapping instead of software memory copying for moving large amounts of data between virtual address spaces. Remapping eliminates a potential communication bottleneck and may increase the feasibility of moving services such as file services to the user level. Previous systems that have used VM remapping for message transfer, however, have suffered from high per-operation delay, limiting the use of the technique. The DASH design reduces this delay by restricting the generality of remapping: a fixed part of every space is reserved for remapping, and a page's virtual address does not change when it is moved between spaces. We measured the performance of the DASH kernel for Sun 3/50 workstations, on which memory can be copied at 3·9 MB/s. Using remapping, DASH can move large messages between user spaces at a rate of 39 MB/s if they are not referenced and 24·8 MB/s if each page is referenced. Furthermore, the per-operation delay is low, so VM remapping is beneficial even for messages containing only one page. To further understand the performance of the DASH MP system, we broke an MP operation into short code segments and timed them with microsecond precision. The results show the relative costs of data movement and the other components of MP operations, and allow us to evaluate several specific design decisions.     

Investigation of conductive and transparent Al-doped ZnO/Ag/Al-doped ZnO multilayer coatings by electron beam evaporation

Multilayer coatings consisting of thin silver layer sandwiched between layers of Al-doped ZnO (AZO) were prepared by electron beam evaporation. The optical and electrical performances of AZO/Ag/AZO multilayers were investigated. Optimization of the multilayer coatings resulted with low sheet resistance of 7.7 Ω/sq and transmittance of 85%. The influence of thickness of each layer on the optic and electrical performance was analyzed. The sheet resistance of the multilayer was reduced to 5.34 Ω/sq. and the average transmittance was improved to 90% by the thermal treatment. The coatings had satisfactory properties of low resistance, high transmittance and thermal stability.     

Deposition of Ag-based Al-doped ZnO multilayer coatings for the transparent conductive electrodes by electron beam evaporation

Silver-based Al-doped ZnO (AZO) multilayer coatings were prepared on glass by e-beam evaporation techniques. Optimization of the deposition conditions of both AZO and Ag layers were performed for better electrical and optical properties. The properties of the multilayers were affected by the deposition process of both AZO and Ag layers. The best multilayer coatings exhibit low sheet resistance of 5.34 Ω/sq and transmittance of more than 85%. The coatings have satisfactory properties of low resistance and high transmittance for application as transparent conductive electrodes.     

Application of electrolyzed oxidizing water on the reduction of bacterial contamination for seafood

For reducing bacterial contamination, electrolyzed oxidizing water (EO water) has been used to reduce microbial population on seafood and platform of fish retailer. The specimens of tilapia were inoculated with Escherichia coli and Vibrio parahaemolyticus, and then soaked into EO water for up to 10 min. EO water achieved additional 0.7 log CFU/cm² reduction than tap water on E. coli after 1 min treatment and additional treatment time did not achieved additional reduction. EO water treatment also reduced V. parahaemolyticus, by 1.5 log CFU/cm² after 5 min treatment and achieved 2.6 log CFU/cm² reduction after 10 min. The pathogenic bacteria were not detected in EO water after soaking treatment. In addition, EO water could effectively disinfect the platform of fish retailer in traditional markets and fish markets.     

Dual high-frequency difference excitation for contrast detection

Stimulating high-frequency nonlinear oscillations of ultrasound contrast agents is helpful to distinguish microbubbles from background tissues. Nevertheless, inefficiency of such oscillations from most commercially available contrast agents and intense attenuation of the resultant high-frequency harmonics limit microbubble detection with high-frequency ultrasound. To avoid this high-frequency nature, we devised and explored a dual-frequency difference excitation technique to induce efficiently low-frequency, rather than high-frequency, nonlinear scattering from microbubbles by using high-frequency ultrasound. The proposed excitation pulse is comprised of 2 high-frequency sinusoids with frequency difference subject to the microbubble resonance frequency. Its envelope, with frequency being the difference between the 2 frequencies, is used to stimulate nonlinear oscillation of microbubbles for the consonant low-frequency harmonic generation, whereas high-imaging resolution is retained because of narrow high-frequency transmit beams. Hydrophone measurements and phantom experiments of speckle-generating flow phantoms were performed to demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed technique. The results show that, especially when the envelope frequency is near the microbubbleiquests resonance frequency, the envelope of the proposed excitation pulse can induce significant nonlinear scattering from microbubbles, the induced nonlinear responses tend to increase with the pulse pressures, and up to 26 dB and 36 dB contrast-to-tissue ratios with second- and fourth-order nonlinear responses, respectively, can be obtained. Potential applications of this method include microbubble fragmentation and cavitation with high-frequency ultrasound.     

Examination of community identification and interpersonal trust on continuous use intention: Evidence from experienced online community members

Members’ continued intention to use a community service is rooted in social identity. Past research has examined social identity but ignored the development of interpersonal trust through community identification. Drawing on social identity theory, one can conclude that community identification is the foundation of a member’s continuous use intention through interpersonal trust. Data come from responses to a two-stage survey of experienced members of an online game-based community. The findings support the belief that the identity of the community will strengthen long-term relationships within it. The projection of community identification on continuous use intention is tied to interpersonal trust.     

A vision-based regression model to evaluate Parkinsonian gait from monocular image sequences

Parkinson’s Disease (PD) is a common neurodegenerative disorder with progressive loss of dopaminergic and other sub-cortical neurons. Among various approaches, gait analysis is commonly used to help identify the biometric features of PD. There have been some studies to date on both the classification of PD and estimation of gait parameters. However, it is also important to construct a regression system that can evaluate the degree of abnormality in PD patients. In this paper, we intended to develop a PD gait regression model that is capable of predicting the severity of motor dysfunction from given gait image sequences. We used a model-free strategy and thus avoided the critical demands of segmentation and parameter estimation. Furthermore, we used linear discriminant analysis (LDA) to increase the feature efficiency by maximizing and minimizing the between- and within-group variations. Regression was also achieved by assessing the spatial and temporal information through classification and finally by using these two new indices for linear regression. According to the experiments, the outcomes significantly correlated with the sum of sub-scores from the Unified Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS): motor examination section with r = 0.92 and 0.85 for training and testing, respectively, with p < 0.0001. Compared with conventional methods, our system provided a better evaluation of PD abnormality.     

Research issues of Internet-integrated cognitive style

Cognitive style was once a popular research topic in the field of decision support systems (DSS), but because of the lack of usable results, it has not received much attention from the research community in recent years. This paper argues that it can be both promising and worthwhile to revive research efforts into cognitive style in the modern decision-making environment. Several reasons are offered to support this argument: First, the decision-making environment is now more integrated with technology, particularly the Internet, making it more uniform and easier to define. Second, the potential benefit of such studies is greater because more people are using Internet-based technology to make decisions. Third, data on the cognitive behavior of decision makers are captured and available for analysis because of the close integration between technology and the decision-making process. Research questions are raised and potential variables are proposed and discussed.     

The influence of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation on individuals' knowledge sharing behavior

A major challenge in knowledge management involves motivating people to share knowledge with others. The objective of this study is to deepen our understanding of how to influence an individual's tendency to engage in knowledge sharing behavior in a team setting. Specifically, we investigate the effects of intrinsic motivation (altruism) and extrinsic motivation (economic reward, reputation feedback and reciprocity) on knowledge sharing (number of ideas generated, idea usefulness, idea creativity and meeting satisfaction) in a group meeting. Results of our experiment show that a knowledge management system with built-in reputation feedback is crucial to support successful knowledge sharing.