This study adopted Q methodology to construct a holistic configuration of Chinese university students’ understandings of plagiarism. Twenty-five Chinese undergraduate students sorted 48 statements on plagiarism. Following the Q sorting, eight participants took part in a follow-up interview to justify their sorting. The study identified three distinct profiles of viewpoints on plagiarism: (a) highly condemnatory and punitive with a focus on practical causes, (b) moderately condemnatory with an emphasis on learning, (c) highly condemnatory with a focus on honor and self-accountability. (...) These viewpoints are discussed with reference to the moral, developmental, and regulatory discourses on plagiarism in the literature. (shrink)

Profound sensorineural hearing loss is an auditory disability associated with auditory and cognitive dysfunction. Due to distinct pathogenesis, some associated structural and functional changes within the brain have been investigated in previous studies, but whole-brain structural alterations are incompletely understood. We extended the exploration of neuroanatomic differences in whole-brain structure in children with profound SNHL who are primarily users of Chinese sign language. We employed surface-based morphometry and subcortical analyses. T1-weighted magnetic resonance images of 26 children with profound SNHL and (...) 27 age- and sex-matched children with normal hearing were analyzed. Compared with the normal control group, children with profound SNHL showed diverse structural changes in surface-based and subcortical analyses, including decreased cortical thickness in the left postcentral gyrus, superior parietal lobule, paracentral lobule, precuneus, the right transverse temporal gyri, and the middle temporal gyrus; a noticeable increase in the Local Gyrification Index in the left precuneus and superior parietal lobule; and diverse changes in gray-matter volume in different brain regions. Surface-based vertex analyses revealed regional contractions in the right thalamus, putamen, pallidum, and the brainstem of children with profound SNHL when compared with those in the NC group. Volumetric analyses showed decreased volumes of the right thalamus and pallidum in children with profound SNHL. Our data suggest that children with profound SNHL are associated with diffuse cerebral dysfunction to cortical and subcortical nuclei, and revealed neuroplastic reorganization in the precuneus, superior parietal lobule, and temporal gyrus. Our study provides robust evidence for changes in connectivity and structure in the brain associated with hearing loss. (shrink)

Resumo: Para revelar como esculturas de gelo e neve redefinem a beleza natural no contexto da arte moderna e explorar suas implicações para o design de arquitetura paisagística, este artigo usa uma combinação de revisão de literatura e análise de caso, a fim de explorar o valor estético, forma artística e fundamento filosófico de esculturas de gelo e neve em jardins, e examina casos específicos de formas de arte de escultura de gelo e neve na arquitetura paisagística. Pesquisas mostraram que (...) a compreensão da filosofia da arte moderna da beleza natural ultrapassou o escopo da estética tradicional e está mais preocupada com a interação entre a natureza e os seres humanos. A escultura de gelo e neve é uma forma única de arquitetura paisagística, que não só incorpora as características estéticas dos materiais naturais, mas também expressa reflexões profundas sobre o ambiente natural, através da inovação tecnológica, criação artística e outros meios. Este texto fornece uma nova perspectiva para a criação da arquitetura paisagística e enriquece ainda mais a conotação estética dos jardins modernos. (shrink)

This study extensively explores the multifaceted realm of Mongolian yurts, deeply ingrained in Mongolia's cultural heritage and emblematic of nomadic life. Through detailed case studies, it investigates the fusion of traditional craftsmanship with modern architectural principles and the application of prefabricated elements for yurt renewal. These yurts, situated in diverse sociocultural contexts, provide a comprehensive cross-section of their architectural heritage, spanning from ancestral to contemporary instances. The methodology involves a harmonious synthesis of indigenous wisdom, sustainable material selection, and precision prefabrication (...) techniques. Initiating with a meticulous analysis of each yurt's structural condition, historical significance, and cultural relevance, skilled artisans and contemporary architects collaboratively integrate prefabricated elements tailored to the unique attributes of each yurt while preserving heritage-specific designs. Qualitative and quantitative data collected through fieldwork, custodian interviews, and structural assessments form the basis for an exhaustive analysis. The analysis covers architectural heritage preservation, the effectiveness of prefabricated elements in enhancing structural integrity while retaining cultural authenticity, as well as the evaluation of environmental sustainability and energy efficiency, shedding light on ecological impact. This research makes a significant contribution to the field of heritage conservation, extending its implications beyond Mongolian yurts. It underscores the dynamic interplay between tradition and innovation, advocating a reconsideration of the perceived past-versus-future dichotomy. The potential of prefabricated elements unveiled in yurt renewal offers a globally relevant path that respects historical significance while embracing modernity. (shrink)

Entrepreneurship is a tool for driving economic and social progress. Especially in Hong Kong, the government has recently taken steps to encourage young people to engage in entrepreneurship. However, Hong Kong youths’ entrepreneurial intentions are still low. The objective of this study is to empirically explore the impacts of personality traits on start-up preparation among Hong Kong youths through the constructs of the theory of planned behavior. Through a multi-channel survey, we finally collected 230 valid respondents aged 18 to 40. (...) In addition, this study used SmartPLS software to conduct confirmatory factor analysis for the measurement model as well as path analysis for the structural model. This study’s results suggested that creativity, risk-taking propensity, need for achievement, and internal locus of control influence TPB models’ components and indirectly influence start-up preparation through TPB models’ components. Also, attitude and perceived behavioral control influence intention, and intention influences preparation. Furthermore, prior entrepreneurial experience and entrepreneurship education positively influence preparation. In conclusion, this study revealed the mediating effects of TPB components between four personality traits and start-up preparation. Finally, this study had theoretical implications by providing the influence of six personality traits on youths’ entrepreneurial intention and preparation through the TPB model and the human capital theory. This study also had practical implications by providing suggestions for the government and higher education institutions. (shrink)

Corporate social responsibility has generally been recognized as corporate pro-social behavior aimed at remediating social issues external to organizations, while political CSR has acknowledged the political nature of such activity beyond social aims. Despite the growth of this literature, there is still little attention given to gender as the starting point for a conversation on CSR, ethics, and the Global South. Deploying critical insights from feminist work in postcolonial traditions, I outline how MNCs replicate gendered neocolonialist discourses and perpetuate exploitative (...) material dependences between Global North/south through CSR activities. Specifically, I address issues of neocolonial relations, subaltern agency, and ethics in the context of gendered global division of labor through the exemplar of Rana Plaza and its aftermath. In all, I offer new directions for CSR scholarship by attending to the intersections of gender, ethics, and responsibility as they relate to corporate actions in the Global South. (shrink)

This study conducted a cross-sectional investigation of facial appearance dissatisfaction between patients before undergoing orthognathic surgery and a non-surgical sample to evaluate the potential influencing factors of facial appearance dissatisfaction. A sample of 354 participants completed a set of questionnaires concerning facial appearance dissatisfaction, interpersonal pressure, media pressure, and fear of negative appearance evaluation (112 patients, 242 controls). The patients reported higher facial appearance dissatisfaction, more media pressure, more interpersonal pressure, and a greater fear of negative appearance evaluation among others (...) than the control group. Moreover, regression analyses identified interpersonal pressure and fear of negative appearance evaluation as the main influencing factors on facial appearance dissatisfaction whether in the orthognathic patients or in the control groups. The associations between the perceptions of interpersonal pressure, fear of negative appearance evaluation, and facial appearance dissatisfaction support the possible utility of strengthening social experiences and psychological intervention in preventing and treating these appearance-concerns, especially for the orthognathic patients. (shrink)

This study extended the research on the relationship between youth elite athletes’ satisfaction and coaches’ paternalistic leadership by identifying athletes’ resilience as a moderator. A total of 221 youth elite football players aged 13–19 years old who are students of a Chinese professional football boarding school participated in a questionnaire survey. The study found no correlation between the three dimensions of coaches’ paternalistic leadership and the youth athletes’ satisfaction. The results also showed that the interaction of resilience and moral leadership (...) affects the youth elite athletes’ satisfaction, whereas resilience does not play a moderating role in the relationship between authoritative leadership or benevolent leadership and satisfaction. As the results of the study are different from those of other scholars, they may reveal the uniqueness of youth elite football players in boarding schools. This study further analyzed the possible reasons for this result and prospected the theoretical and practical implications of these findings. Based on the conclusion, the study recommended that youth elite football schools should pay attention to the results of scientific research in leadership styles and apply them to practice in the future. (shrink)

This paper provides an experimental test of stochastic choice models of decisions. Models that admit Fechnerian structure are tested through the repeated pairwise choice problems. Results refute the Fechner hypothesis that characterizing the probability of selecting a given prospect increases in how strongly it is preferred to alternative choices. However, the experimental data lend support to characterizing an individual’s binary choice probability as some scalable functions of the von Neumann–Morgenstern utilities in the risky context.

InDialectic of Enlightenment Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno argue that reason, which claims to lead to truth, is always instrumental reason—a form of domination based on violence. Enlightenment, which aspired to emancipate society from the violence of myth, ends by reenacting this violence and turning back into myth.2 Jürgen Habermas attacks this argument for falling prey to an unbridled scepticism that fails to appreciate the achievements of modernity.3 For him, Horkheimer's and Adorno's radical critique of reason is analogous to Nietzsche's (...) critique of science and morals in On the Genealogy of Morality to the extent that a claim to truth…. (shrink)

The article is intended to show that bertolt brecht absorbed foreign materials, In this case chinese philosophy, And transformed them into new intellectual experiences and visions which were strictly his own. The author examines the thought of five chinese philosophers, Confucius, Lao-Tzu, Mencius and chuang-Tzu and mo-Tzu, With whom brecht became familiar. Since chinese philosophers are essentially social philosophers, Brecht read them in order to find guidance in his search for a political and social theory which was to become the (...) basis of his literary work. The study of chinese philosophy led brecht to modify his marxism in a way which amounts to a reinvention of it. (shrink)

Writings on Hindu cosmology and science.

Interpretative study of Lokāyata philosophy.

Medical argumentation in non-Western societies has attracted little attention. In line with the pragma-dialectical approach to the study of argumentation, this article identifies a prototypical argumentative pattern in Chinese medical consultations. In addition to institutional preconditions, whose relevance to the argumentative pattern has been well cited, a factor that may be equally important has remained unnoticed: the preference for certain drugs, treatments or therapeutic measurements on the basis of folk interpretations of medical phenomena in individual ethnic groups. These preferences may (...) be seen as cultural preferences in the medical domain. In this paper, a prototypical argumentative pattern of Chinese medical consultations is provided. Two levels of the pattern are distinguished and discussed: a basic argumentative pattern as presented in the pragmatic-dialectical approach and its extensions due to cultural preferences as well as institutional constraints. Illustrated by an exemplary analysis on the basis of empirical data collected from Chinese consulting rooms, the impact of cultural preferences on physicians’ strategic maneuvering in argumentation is identified and recognized. It is argued that the existence and impact of cultural preferences require attention in medical argumentation. (shrink)

This paper addresses the unresolved question of whether demonstrative this/that and their accompanying gestures serve the same function. By utilizing Langacker’s notion of Current Discourse Space (CDS) and integrating gesture studies and frame semantics, this research models the entire process of demonstrative use and points to the distinct roles that demonstratives and gestures play in each usage event. The findings reveal that their functions are indeed different: the gesture (gazing) initially singles out an entity as a target, followed by the (...) demonstratives encoding it phonetically. Subsequently, the demonstratives evoke the initiation of a targeting act by the hearer, and the gesture (pointing) specifically identifies the entity during the decoding process. Based on the notion of distinguishing role and value, this study proposes that the semantic content (‘target’) encoded by demonstratives is the role (‘element’) within the viewing (attention)-target event frame, rather than its value (‘entity’). This principle applies to both exophoric and anaphoric contexts, providing a unified conceptual foundation for the function of demonstratives. In the light of these findings, the article also offers novel perspectives on the function of demonstratives as grounding elements, contributing to a deeper understanding of their role in communication. (shrink)

This paper studies the fixed-time trajectory tracking control problem of robot manipulators in the presence of uncertain dynamics and external disturbances. First, a novel nonsingular fixed-time sliding mode surface is presented, which can ensure that the convergence time of the suggested surface is bounded regardless of the initial states. Subsequently, a novel fast nonsingular fixed-time sliding mode control is developed so that the closed-loop system is fixed-time convergent to the equilibrium. By applying the proposed NFNFSMC method and the adaptive technique, (...) a novel adaptive nonsingular fixed-time control scheme is proposed, which can guarantee fast fixed-time convergence of the tracking errors to small regions around the origin. With the proposed control method, the lumped disturbance is compensated by the adaptive technique, whose prior information about the upper bound is not needed. The fixed-time stability of the trajectory tracking control under the proposed controller is proved by the Lyapunov stability theory. Finally, corresponding simulations are given to illustrate the validity and superiority of the proposed control approach. (shrink)

Considering three monetary policy rules, together with two endogenous macroprudential policies that are credit constraints for households and counter-cyclical capital for bankers, this paper establishes a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model. Based on the welfare analysis of different combinations of macroprudential rules and monetary policy rules, this paper identifies the optimal policy combinations and analyzes the coordination effects between macroprudential policies and monetary policies. The results show that no matter what kind of monetary policy rules is implemented, the introduction of (...) macroprudential rules has improved the level of total social welfare. In the optimal “two pillars” framework of monetary policies and macroprudential rules, the main objective of monetary policy is to stabilize price inflation, and the macroprudential policy to be implemented is the CRR macroprudential policy. This combination can effectively promote the stability of the real estate market, financial market, and macroeconomy, while maximizing the improvement of total social welfare. (shrink)