Search results for " statistical"
showing 10 items of 1649 documents
Qualitative analysis of the Best Possible Self intervention: Underlying mechanisms that influence its efficacy.
2019
BackgroundThe Best Possible Self is a Positive Psychology Intervention which asks participants to write down about themselves in their best possible future. Previous studies have shown its efficacy to enhance wellbeing, but the mechanisms that underlie its efficacy are still unknown.ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to analyze the content of the essays of the BPS intervention and to examine how this content was related to the efficacy of the intervention to increase positive affect.MethodParticipants (N = 78) were randomized to either the Best Possible Self condition, or one of two variants of the intervention: one's best self in the present, and one's best self in the past. Qualitative an…
Levels of trace elements in human hair samples of adolescents living near petrochemical plants
2020
The aim of the study is a comparative analysis to investigate human hair metal profiles of adolescents residing near petrochemical plants (Sicily, Italy). We selected the small town of Augusta, Gela, and Pace del Mela, and a control area made up of the towns characterized by low anthropogenic activity. Twenty trace elements were measured in samples of scalp hair from adolescents (11–14 years old) of both genders. Hair samples were cleaned using a rigorous cleaning method, mineralized, and processed for analyses by inductively coupled plasma–mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). In industrial sites, zinc was always the most abundant element, ranging from186 to 217 μg g−1. Following zinc, the elements …
A method for automatic forensic facial reconstruction based on dense statistics of soft tissue thickness.
2019
In this paper, we present a method for automated estimation of a human face given a skull remain. The proposed method is based on three statistical models. A volumetric (tetrahedral) skull model encoding the variations of different skulls, a surface head model encoding the head variations, and a dense statistic of facial soft tissue thickness (FSTT). All data are automatically derived from computed tomography (CT) head scans and optical face scans. In order to obtain a proper dense FSTT statistic, we register a skull model to each skull extracted from a CT scan and determine the FSTT value for each vertex of the skull model towards the associated extracted skin surface. The FSTT values at p…
FACTORIAL INVARIANCE OF PERSONALITY RATINGS
1969
Kuusinen, J. Factorial invariance of personality ratings. Scand. J. Psychol., 1969, 10, 33–44—Three studies employing the same set of 33 personality rating scales are described. (I) Five factor structures of the scales, derived from ratings of five groups of stimuli, were compared. (2) One subject rated different personality concepts three times at one week's intervals. (3) 12 individual factor structures were compared to the factor structure computed from peer ratings of a group of 39 subjects. Results: (a) the factor structure of the scales was largely independent of stimuli, (b) the structure for an individual was stable, (c) the group structure represented the individual's structure, (d…
Salt content impacts food preferences and intake among children
2012
This work was supported by a PhD grant from the Nutrition, Chemical Food Safety and Consumer Behavior Division of INRA (French National Institute for Agronomical Research, France) and the Regional Council of Burgundy (France) received by SB; and by a research grant (Gustolf) from Regional Council of Burgundy (France) received by SN. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.; Decreasing dietary sodium intake, which can be achieved by reducing salt content in food, is recommended. Salt contributes to the taste of foods and makes them more enjoyable. Whether a food is liked or disliked is an important determina…
Novel loci for childhood body mass index and shared heritability with adult cardiometabolic traits
2020
The genetic background of childhood body mass index (BMI), and the extent to which the well-known associations of childhood BMI with adult diseases are explained by shared genetic factors, are largely unknown. We performed a genome-wide association study meta-analysis of BMI in 61,111 children aged between 2 and 10 years. Twenty-five independent loci reached genome-wide significance in the combined discovery and replication analyses. Two of these, located nearNEDD4LandSLC45A3, have not previously been reported in relation to either childhood or adult BMI. Positive genetic correlations of childhood BMI with birth weight and adult BMI, waist-to-hip ratio, diastolic blood pressure and type 2 d…
Bayesian model to detect phenotype-specific genes for copy number data
2012
Abstract Background An important question in genetic studies is to determine those genetic variants, in particular CNVs, that are specific to different groups of individuals. This could help in elucidating differences in disease predisposition and response to pharmaceutical treatments. We propose a Bayesian model designed to analyze thousands of copy number variants (CNVs) where only few of them are expected to be associated with a specific phenotype. Results The model is illustrated by analyzing three major human groups belonging to HapMap data. We also show how the model can be used to determine specific CNVs related to response to treatment in patients diagnosed with ovarian cancer. The …
Assessment of Susceptibility Risk Factors for ADHD in Imaging Genetic Studies
2019
Objective: ADHD consists of a count of symptoms that often presents heterogeneity due to overdispersion and excess of zeros. Statistical inference is usually based on a dichotomous outcome that is underpowered. The main goal of this study was to determine a suited probability distribution to analyze ADHD symptoms in Imaging Genetic studies. Method: We used two independent population samples of children to evaluate the consistency of the standard probability distributions based on count data for describing ADHD symptoms. Results: We showed that the zero-inflated negative binomial (ZINB) distribution provided the best power for modeling ADHD symptoms. ZINB reveals a genetic variant, rs273342…
Limited indirect fitness benefits of male group membership in a lekking species
2014
In group living species, individuals may gain the indirect fitness benefits characterizing kin selection when groups contain close relatives. However, tests of kin selection have primarily focused on cooperatively breeding and eusocial species, whereas its importance in other forms of group living remains to be fully understood. Lekking is a form of grouping where males display on small aggregated territories, which females then visit to mate. As females prefer larger aggregations, territorial males might gain indirect fitness benefits if their presence increases the fitness of close relatives. Previous studies have tested specific predictions of kin selection models using measures such as …
Frequency, intensity and localization of pain as risk factors for frailty in older adults
2018
Background: the association between pain characteristics and frailty risk is uncertain. Objective: to investigate the separate impact of the frequency, intensity and location of pain on frailty risk and its possible mechanisms. Methods: prospective cohort of 1505 individuals ≥63 years followed between 2012 and 2015 in Spain. In 2012, pain was classified into: lowest pain (Score 0), middle pain (Score 1-4) and highest pain (Score 5-6). Incident frailty was assessed in 2015 as having ≥3 Fried criteria or a Frailty Index (FI) ≥0.30. Results: in multivariate analyses, the risk of frailty (measured with the Fried criteria or the FI) increased progressively with the frequency of pain, its intensi…