Search results for "Mental development"
showing 10 items of 30 documents
Vectofocimetry: Dioptric power measurement in manual focimeters using power vectors
2021
Abstract Dioptric power measurement is classically achieved using manual focimeters. In this contribution, we present vectofocimetry as a novel methodology to be easily implemented in manual focimeters for improving their capabilities regarding dioptric power measurement. The new procedure is conceptually based on power vector formalism of dioptric power which represents the dioptric power as three values in the form of [M, J0, J45], it uses an iterative process of blur reduction, and it only requires a few modifications in the device that are easy-to-adapt and cost-effective. As a result, dioptric power measurements are easily and quickly obtained with comparable results to the reported on…
From Heuristics to Humble Theories in Physics Education: The Case of Modelling Personal Appropriation of Thermodynamics in Naturalistic Settings
2014
This paper concerns the analysis of data collected during the implementation of a teaching proposal on thermodynamics in a class of 20 students (17 year-olds) of a scientifically-oriented secondary school in Italy. After a brief presentation of the teaching proposal design and of the notion of learning environment as properly complex territory, the results of two levels of analysis are discussed. The first level regards a phenomenological (bottom-up) analysis of a selection of individual interviews to students. The analysis allowed us: i) to reconstruct how different students approached the study of thermodynamics; ii) to show in what sense we can infer, in the words of Confrey, that the te…
Reducing the Human Effort in Text Line Segmentation for Historical Documents
2021
Labeling the layout in historical documents for preparing training data for machine learning techniques is an arduous task that requires great human effort. A draft of the layout can be obtained by using a document layout analysis (DLA) system that later can be corrected by the user with less effort than doing it from scratch. We research in this paper an iterative process in which the user only supervises and corrects the given draft for the pages automatically selected by the DLA system with the aim of reducing the required human effort. The results obtained show that similar DLA quality can be achieved by reducing the number of pages that the user has to annote and that the accumulated h…
A sizing approach for stand-alone hybrid photovoltaic-wind-battery systems: A Sicilian case study
2018
Abstract Solar and wind energy are the two most available renewable energy resources in the world. In this paper, a high-resolution analysis that allows sizing a hybrid photovoltaic-wind turbine-battery banks has been carried out. The analysis aims to minimize the annualized cost of the systems satisfying two reliability constraints. The solution has been obtained numerically by means of an iterative technique. The decision variables are the photovoltaic area, wind turbine radius, and battery capacity. A high-resolution model, based on fuzzy logic inference system, has been developed to evaluate the number of active occupants and the domestic electricity consumption. In order to allow a mor…
Description of the Interim Peculiarities of Mental Developmental and Learning Disturbances
2015
More and more pupils with special needs, including those with learning disturbances and simple mental developmental disturbances, are attending general comprehensive educational institution. It is often difficult in practice to define clearly and differentiate these two kinds of disturbances, especially in borderline cases or in the interim stage because then the features and manifestations of learning disturbances and simple mental developmental disturbances partly overlap and change. The novelty of the article is the analysis of the interim peculiarities and manifestations of these two disturbances which will allow teachers to understand better the main learning difficulties of such pupil…
Two multilayered plate models with transverse shear warping functions issued from three dimensional elasticity equations
2014
Abstract A multilayered plate theory which uses transverse shear warping functions is presented. Two methods to obtain the transverse shear warping functions from three-dimensional elasticity equations are proposed. The warping functions are issued from the variations of transverse shear stresses computed at specific points of a simply supported plate. The first method considers an exact 3D solution of the problem. The second method uses the solution provided by the model itself: the transverse shear stresses are computed integrating equilibrium equations. Hence, an iterative process is applied, the model is updated with the new warping functions, and so on. Once the sets of warping functio…
A Novel Artificial Neural Network (ANN) Using The Mayfly Algorithm for Classification
2021
Training of Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) have been improved over the years using meta heuristic algorithms that introduce randomness into the training method but they might be prone to falling into a local minima in a high-dimensional space and have low convergence rate with the iterative process. To cater for the inefficiencies of training such an ANN, a novel neural network is presented in this paper using the bio-inspired algorithm of the movement and mating of the mayflies. The proposed Mayfly algorithm is explored as a means to update weights and biases of the neural network. As compared to previous meta heuristic algorithms, the proposed approach finds the global minima cost at f…
A systematic review of neurodevelopmental effects of prenatal and postnatal organophosphate pesticide exposure
2014
Agricultural and residential use of organophosphate (OP) pesticides has increased in recent decades after banning some persistent pesticides. Although there is evidence of the effects of OPs on neurodevelopment and behaviour in adults, limited information is available about their effects in children, who might be more vulnerable to neurotoxic compounds. This paper was aimed at analysing the scientific evidence published to date on potential neurodevelopmental and behavioural effects of prenatal and postnatal exposure to OPs. A systematic review was undertaken to identify original articles published up to December 2012 evaluating prenatal or postnatal exposure to OPs in children and effects …
Correlations and predictors of menarche age
1987
In a cross-sectional study of 452 girls between 10 and 16 years of age 36 indices of physical and 50 of mental development were tested for their correlation with age at menarche and chronological age, as well as for their predictive power for estimating menarche by multiple regression analysis. Indices of physical maturity and body weight when adjusted for chronological age showed the highest partial correlation coefficients with age at menarche. Among mental characters which show lower intercorrelations with menarche occurred the highest correlation coefficients for a handmotor factor "Spurennachzeichnen" and a factor "Gruppenabhangigkeit" (which indicates a type of social motivation). In …
PEDAGOGICAL PROCESS FACILITATING PHYSICAL ACTIVITY OF PRE-SCHOOLERS
2019
The research covers analysis of theoretical literature on significance of physical activities in the development of child’s integrity, as it is a well-known fact that child is researcher and his/her activity is manifested through movement. Child gets his first impressions about surrounding world through movement – the more diverse motions are, the more information is acquired, and the more intense is intellectual development thereof. However, quite often pedagogical process does not consider the specific factors facilitating capacity of child’s physical, functional, motion and mental development. To conduct the research, an aim was set to study physical activity of children in pre-school an…