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Background: There is a growing body of literature that indicates positive outcomes of group treatment approaches to intervention for communication difficulties in chronic traumatic brain injury (TBI). The published research to date examines face‐to‐face group intervention. Aim: This study draws on one of these approaches, 'Improving Natural Social Interaction: Group reHabilitation after Traumatic brain injury' (INSIGHT), and examines the adaptation of this program to a virtual setting. The principles underlying the program, which involved providing an authentic contextualised and natural environment for group interactions and enhancing opportunities for identity expression, were maintained. Methods & Procedures: Six participants with mild to severe TBI and cognitive communication difficulties participated in an 8‐week pilot program of the virtual INSIGHT program. Goal Attainment Scaling (GAS) scores completed over the course of the intervention served as the primary outcome measure. Secondary outcomes measures included The Repeatable Battery for the Assessment of Neuropsychological Status Update, The Awareness of Social Inference Test‐Revised, the La Trobe Communication Questionnaire and the Satisfaction with Life Scale. Outcomes & Results: A mixed multilevel analysis revealed significant improvement in GAS scores. A Wilcoxon signed rank test revealed no significant changes in secondary measures. Conclusions & Implications: There is a growing potential for this group treatment approach, in an online medium, and progress towards individualised goals was clear. The data have implications for examining the assessment measures typically used to document functional outcomes in clinical intervention. Future directions indicate a need to pursue more ecologically valid assessment methods. What this paper adds: What is already known on the subject: Recent literature has focused on the benefits of group intervention for cognitive communication diffuclties after traumatic brain injury (TBI). However, research to date examines only face‐to‐face group rehabilitation. As there has been a demand for a shift in the way we communicate worldwide, we must make adaptations to current intervention procedures to continue to serve individuals with diverse communication needs. What this paper adds to existing knowledge: This study contributes new information about the feasibility of a virtual communication skills group for individuals with TBI. This virtual INSIGHT (Improving Natural Social Interaction: Group ehabilitation after Traumatic brain injury) group intervention facilitates progress towards collaboratively set communication goals and the online setting has the potential to increase the accessibility of these services. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work?: Progress towards cognitive and social communication goals can be facilitated by an online group intervention. However, this progress was not correlated with scores on standard assessments of cognitive communication, social communication and quality of life. This has implications for the evaluation of the assessments typically used and their ecological validity and applicability to the communication context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents an overview of how the Swarthmore College Peace Collection: A Memorial to Jane Addams was developed. Significant material acquired from her nephew James Weber Linn's collection of papers, from Hull-House, and from the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom is mentioned. The Swarthmore College Peace Collection's website has correspondence from famous people such as Edward Bok, Carrie Chapman Catt, Herbert Hoover, Theodore Roosevelt, Beatrice Potter Webb, and Woodrow Wilson.

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Features abstracts of the research reports given at the Science Fairs, and the Display and Discussion poster session of the 17th Annual Meeting of The Society for Psychophysiological Research held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on October 19-22, 1977. Members of the Program Committee; Dual track workshops; Day-time program; Topics covered by the discussions and paper presentations.

The article announces the winner for the 2004 Best Paper Award of the 2005 National Oral Health Conference held at the Omni William Penn Hotel in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from May 2-4, 2005. The winner of the award is the paper published in the Spring 2004 issue of the journal entitled "The Effects of the Women, Infants, and Children's Supplemental Food Program on Dentally Related Medicaid Expenditures," by Jessica lee, R. Gary Rozier, Edward Norton, Jonathan Kotch, and William Vann.

The article presents a speech by Jessica Lee, one of the authors of the 2004 Best Paper entitled "The Effects of the Women, Infants, and Children's Supplemental Food Program on Dentally Related Medicaid Expenditure," delivered at the 2005 National Oral Health Conference held at the Omni William Penn Hotel in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania from May 2-4, 2005. She expresses her heartfelt appreciation to the American Association of Public Health Dentistry for choosing their research.

The article presents information on the annual meeting of the society of scientific study of religion at Vista International Hotel Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This year's theme of religious marginality encourages participants to go beyond core beliefs and practices of members of mainline churches to the expressions of interest or disinterest in religion that are less common religious experience, mixed intermarriage, unclear interpreting "don't know" responses to questions on belief, nonestablishment (religion among street people), or rejections of religion atheism and apostasy. List of topics related to this year's theme would include, denominational switching and conversion, sources of membership change in the mainline churches, apostates and returnees, new nones (apostates) vs. stable nones with no prior ties, inter-religious marriage and religion of children, divorce, religious socialization of children, religiosity and the life cycle, Inter-racial marriage and religion and the Black Church.

Advance directives are intended to extend patient autonomy by enabling patients to prospectively direct the care of their future incapacitated selves. There has been much discussion about issues such as whether the future incompetent self is identical to the agent who issues the advance directive or whether advance directives can legitimately secure patient autonomy. However, there is another important question to ask: to what extent and in what conditions is it ethically appropriate for one to limit the liberty or agency of one's future incompetent self by issuing an advance directive? In this paper, I use a virtue‐ethical approach to explore this question, focusing on the case of an advance directive for the future self with moderate dementia. First, I examine virtuous attitudes with regard to autonomy and argue that one can manifest vices or ethically undesirable character traits in trying to intervene in the future self's life. In particular, I argue that this case can manifest vices such as disdainfulness, intellectual arrogance, and self‐dictatorship, which is the vice of trying to control one's life to an excessive degree, and that a self‐dictator fails to give due moral consideration to the future self's liberty or agency. I then introduce the Daoist idea of wu‐wei, which recommends embracement of what happens in one's life, as one of the possible remedies for the overemphasis on the value of autonomy and control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Managing landscapes to increase agricultural productivity and environmental stewardship can be informed by spatially‐distributed models that operate at spatial and temporal scales that are intervention‐relevant. This paper presents Cycles‐L, a landscape‐scale agroecosystem and hydrologic modeling system, using as a test case a watershed in Pennsylvania. Cycles‐L emerges from melding the landscape and hydrology structure of Flux‐PIHM, a 3‐D land surface hydrologic model, with the agroecosystem processes in the Cycles model. Consequently, Cycles‐L can simulate processes affected by topography, soil heterogeneity, and management practices, owing to its physically‐based hydrology that can simulate horizontal and vertical transport of solutes with water. The model was tested at a 730‐ha experimental watershed within the Mahantango Creek watershed. Cycles‐L simulated well stream water and mineral nitrogen discharge (Nash‐Sutcliffe coefficient 0.55 and 0.60, respectively) and grain yield (root mean square error 1.2 Mg ha−1). Cycles‐L outputs are as good or better than those obtained with the uncoupled Flux‐PIHM (water discharge) and Cycles (grain yield) models. Modeled spatial patterns of nitrogen fluxes like denitrification illustrate the combined control of crop management and topography. For example, denitrification is almost twice as high when simulated with Cycles‐L than when simulated with Cycles 1‐D. Due to its spatial and temporal resolution, Cycles‐L fills a gap in the availability of models that operate at a scale relevant to evaluate interventions in the landscape. Cycles‐L can become a central component in tools for climate change scenario analysis, precision agriculture, precision conservation, and artificial intelligence‐based decision support systems. Key Points: Cycles‐L is a coupled agroecosystem hydrologic modeling system that couples an agroecosystem model with a 3‐D land surface hydrologic modelCycles‐L simulated well stream discharge, grain crops yield, and nitrogen exports in the stream at a 730‐ha agricultural experimental watershedCycles‐L can simulate landscape level processes affected by climate, topography, soil heterogeneity, and management practices [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we examine the relationship between vaccination against COVID‐19 and both the death rate from COVID‐19 and the rate of COVID‐19 spread. Our goal is determine if vaccination is associated with reduced death and/or spread of disease at the local level. This analysis was conducted at the county level in the state of Pennsylvania, United States of America, with data that were collected during the first half of 2022 from the state of Pennsylvania's Covid Dashboard (COVID‐19 Data for Pennsylvania (pa.gov). This study finds the vaccines to be highly effective in preventing death from Corona virus, even at a time when there was a mismatch between the vaccines and the prevalent variants. Specifically, a 1% increase in vaccination rate was found to correspond to a 0.751% decrease in death rate (95% confidence interval [0.236%, 1.266%]). Given that, during this time period, the vaccines being used were not geared specifically toward the common variants at that time, we found no statistically significant relationship between disease spread and vaccination rate at the county level. These results support previous findings from across the world that Covid vaccination is highly efficacious in preventing death from the disease. Even during a time when vaccine design was not optimally matched with the prevailing strains, vaccination was found to reduce death rate. Hence, improving global vaccine availability is vitally important, to achieve necessary outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Editorial. Introduces articles featured in the September 2000 issue of the periodical 'Bipolar Disorders,' which highlight papers presented during the Third International Conference on Bipolar Disorder held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in June 1999. Significant limitations of available treatments for bipolar affective disorder; Pathophysiology of bipolar disorder.

The article presents information on several conferences related to computer technology Scheduled to be held from November 1992 to September 1993. The second Software Engineering Institute conference on software risk is going to be held on March 2-4, 1993 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The conference brings together software managers, practitioners and educators to discuss software technical risk. Vendor exhibits will also be offered. The conference is sponsored by Carnegie Mellon University, Software Engineering Institute and the U.S. Department of Defense.

In this paper, I reflect on my experiences conducting legal geographic research within a Central Pennsylvania courtroom. This research builds on my former professional experience as a legal advocate where I worked for five years providing advocacy services to over 800 survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. I discuss how I incorporated two common advocacy practices – accompaniment and institutional advocacy – into my research praxis as a means to fulfil my commitment to conduct activist research as a feminist legal geographer. I argue that the advocacy skills I learned outside of academia helped me navigate the tensions of studying power with legal actors in the privileged space of the courtroom. This paper contributes to recent interest in the methodological practices that legal geographers utilise within courtroom spaces, while also encouraging legal geographers to consider what knowledge and skills – beyond academic methodologies and methods – might serve to support activist research within spaces of power. In this paper, I reflect on my experiences conducting legal geographic research within a Central Pennsylvania courtroom. I argue that the advocacy skills I learned outside of academia helped me navigate the tensions of studying power with legal actors in the privileged space of the courtroom. This paper contributes to recent interest in the methodological practices that legal geographers utilise within courtroom spaces, while also encouraging legal geographers to consider what knowledge and skills – beyond academic methodologies and methods – might serve to support activist research within spaces of power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ecological data are being collected at a large scale from a multitude of different sources, each with their own sampling protocols and assumptions. As a result, the integration of disparate datasets is a rapidly growing area in quantitative ecology, and is subsequently becoming a major asset in understanding the shifts and trends in species' distributions.However, the tools and software available to construct statistical models to integrate these disparate datasets into a unified framework is lacking. This has made these methods inaccessible to general practitioners and has stagnated the growth of data integration in more applied settings.We therefore present PointedSDMs: an easy to use R package used to construct integrated species distribution models. It provides functions to easily format the data, fit the models in a computationally efficient way and presents the output in a format that is convenient for additional work.This paper illustrates the different uses and functions available in the package, which are designed to simplify the modelling of integrated models. A case study using the package is also presented: combining three datasets coming from different sampling protocols, all containing records of Setophaga caerulescens across Pennsylvania state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores how the Holy Family University in Philadephia strengthened its learning assessment process through cooperation between faculty and doctoral students. Involved in the project were three doctoral students and the faculty of the criminal justice program. Setting rubrics, or scoring guides, were used for five types of papers including the capstone research paper and capstone oral presentation. Details of the revised rubrics are also given.

Copyright of Policy Studies Journal is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper examines the performance of Philadelphia's eight-bank minority loan program, The Job Loan and Urban Venture Corporation of Philadelphia (JLC), and assesses its ability to select good credit risks from its total minority loan applicant pool. JLC is a non-profit corporation that was created in April, 1968 by eight Philadelphia commercial banks for the purpose of issuing and guaranteeing loans to minority entrepreneurs. Through January, 1970 (the time through which the data used in this study were gathered), JLC processed 848 loan applicants, of whom 290 were approved for approximately three million dollars in loans. The key issue explored by this paper--how does a bank differentiate between potentially good and potentially bad credit risks--goes beyond the questions raised by the examination of a single program's performance. To properly evaluate the JLC program's ability to select good credit risks, a generalized method for selecting potentially superior loan customers had to be developed. This methodology, as developed here and applied to JLC, has potential applications in other minority-oriented loan programs as well as other non-minority credit operations. The findings about JLC, also, bear upon a turbulent and extremely important contemporary debate--the viability of black capitalism and the possible role of utilizing private sector capital to finance it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates economic and psychological hardship during the COVID‐19 pandemic among a diverse sample (61% Latinx; 16% White; 9% Black; 14% mixed/other race) of socioeconomically disadvantaged parents (90% mothers; mean age = 35 years) and their elementary school‐aged children (ages 4–11; 49% female) in rural Pennsylvania (N = 272). Families participating in a local food assistance program reported on food insecurity (FI) and parent and child mood and behavior daily from January to May 2020. Longitudinal models revealed that FI, negative parent and child mood, and child misbehavior significantly increased when schools closed; only FI and parent depression later decreased. FI decreased most among those who received the local food assistance program; Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program receipt uniquely predicted decreases in child FI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper introduces the concept of stacked scale frames and explains how they can legitimate a particular set of interests as general interests. Specifically, it examines how shale gas development proceeded in Pennsylvania, and finds that stacked scale frames were a tool for establishing the legitimacy of fracking. Fracking is a technique for extracting oil and natural gas from shale rock formations using highly pressurised water, sand and chemicals. It has produced dramatic amounts of gas and wealth over the past seven to eight years, but poses risks to the environment and public health that are largely understudied and misunderstood. Previous studies of fracking have explained the rise of fracking in Pennsylvania using analyses of advertisements and corporate promotional materials. This study builds on their work and adds an understanding of the fracking boom seen through the concept of hegemony. The data used in this paper draw from a set of interviews with 'intellectuals' in Gramsci's sense of the word: societal elites who mould and shape public opinion. In the case of fracking, these elites included representatives of oil and gas capital, the state, academia, NGOs and civil society living near fracking sites. Overall, the benefits of fracking were recognised by all groups and the costs were less commonly represented. This paper contributes the concept of stacked scale frames to literature on social production of scale in human geography. Stacked scale frames made capitalist economic development appear to benefit a wider section of society spread across multiple scales simultaneously. In contrast, opponents of fracking framed the costs of fracking at individual scales and in a piecemeal fashion. It concludes that anti-fracking forces, and political ecologists in general, should embrace a critique that draws together social and environmental harms across multiple scales simultaneously. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a measure of water quality, water turbidity might be a source of water pollution in drinking water resources. Henceforth, having a reliable tool for predicting turbidity values based on common water quantity/quality measured parameters is of great importance. In the present paper, the performance of the online sequential extreme learning machine (OS‐ELM) in predicting daily values of turbidity in Brandywine Creek, Pennsylvania, is evaluated. For this purpose, in addition to the developed OS‐ELM, several data‐driven models, that is, multilayer perceptron neural network (MLPANN), the classification and regression tree (CART), the group method of data handling (GMDH) and the response surface method (RSM) have been applied. The general findings of the study confirm the superiority of the OS‐ELM model over the other applied models so that the OS‐ELM improved the averaged RMSE of the predicted values 9.1, 11.7, 20.5 and 29.3% over the MLPANN, GMDH, RSM and CART models, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Household size decline accounts for a substantial portion of population loss in shrinking cities, yet little research has focused on it. Much of the literature presents a simple growth/decline binary that is largely determined via population figures. In this paper, we highlight the importance and assess the impact of household size changes on population decline, and determine what types of household size declines are more acute in shrinking cities than other locales. We find that elderly households and households with school‐aged children are under‐represented in shrinking cities, while households with pre‐school‐aged children are over‐represented. More tellingly, we find the biggest source of household‐related loss in shrinking cities to be the growth of single‐person households now living in houses that were once home to entire families. These findings puncture the binary on which much of the shrinking cities discourse is based. The population dynamics of most cities are subtler than either practitioners or critical scholars assert. We argue that plans and development strategies for shrinking cities should reflect a range of demographic changes, including outmigration and internal household restructuring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

BRISKIN L. Nursing Inquiry 2012; 19: 285-296 Resistance, mobilization and militancy: nurses on strike Drawing on nurses' strikes in many countries, this paper explores nurse militancy with reference to professionalism and the commitment to service; patriarchal practices and gendered subordination; and proletarianization and the confrontation with healthcare restructuring. These deeply entangled trajectories have had a significant impact on the work, consciousness and militancy of nurses and have shaped occupation-specific forms of resistance. They have produced a pattern of overlapping solidarities - occupational solidarity, gendered alliances and coalitions around healthcare restructuring - which have supported, indeed promoted, militancy among nurses, despite the multiple forces arrayed against them. The professional commitments of nurses to the provision of care have confronted healthcare restructuring, nursing shortages, intensification of work, precarious employment and gendered hierarchies with a militant discourse around the public interest, and a reconstitution and reclamation of 'caring', what I call the politicisation of caring. In fact, nurses' dedication to caring work in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries may encourage rather than dissuade them from going on strike. This paper uses a trans-disciplinary methodology, qualitative material in the form of strike narratives constructed from newspaper archives, and references to the popular and scholarly literature on nursing militancy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Acoustic recordings of soundscapes are an important category of audio data that can be useful for answering a variety of questions, and an entire discipline within ecology, dubbed "soundscape ecology," has risen to study them. Bird sound is often the focus of studies of soundscapes due to the ubiquitousness of birds in most terrestrial environments and their high vocal activity. Autonomous acoustic recorders have increased the quantity and availability of recordings of natural soundscapes while mitigating the impact of human observers on community behavior. However, such recordings are of little use without analysis of the sounds they contain. Manual analysis currently stands as the best means of processing this form of data for use in certain applications within soundscape ecology, but it is a laborious task, sometimes requiring many hours of human review to process comparatively few hours of recording. For this reason, few annotated data sets of soundscape recordings are publicly available. Further still, there are no publicly available strongly labeled soundscape recordings of bird sounds that contain information on timing, frequency, and species. Therefore, we present the first data set of strongly labeled bird sound soundscape recordings under free use license. These data were collected in the Northeastern United States at Powdermill Nature Reserve, Rector, Pennsylvania, USA. Recordings encompass 385 minutes of dawn chorus recordings collected by autonomous acoustic recorders between the months of April through July 2018. Recordings were collected in continuous bouts on four days during the study period and contain 48 species and 16,052 annotations. Applications of this data set may be numerous and include the training, validation, and testing of certain advanced machine‐learning models that detect or classify bird sounds. There are no copyright or propriety restrictions; please cite this paper when using materials within. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several papers are presented regarding symbolic calculations in the August 2004 National Meeting of the American Chemical Society in Philadelphia. The paper presentation reflects a wide variety of approaches to symbolic computation methods. It is said that symbolic computation has established new approaches within the established theoritical methods such as the ability to generate algebraic solutions to a series of related problems. The advent of symbolic computation has increased rapidly.

Advance directives are intended to extend patient autonomy by enabling patients to prospectively direct the care of their future incapacitated selves. There has been much discussion about issues such as whether the future incompetent self is identical to the agent who issues the advance directive or whether advance directives can legitimately secure patient autonomy. However, there is another important question to ask: to what extent and in what conditions is it ethically appropriate for one to limit the liberty or agency of one's future incompetent self by issuing an advance directive? In this paper, I use a virtue‐ethical approach to explore this question, focusing on the case of an advance directive for the future self with moderate dementia. First, I examine virtuous attitudes with regard to autonomy and argue that one can manifest vices or ethically undesirable character traits in trying to intervene in the future self's life. In particular, I argue that this case can manifest vices such as disdainfulness, intellectual arrogance, and self‐dictatorship, which is the vice of trying to control one's life to an excessive degree, and that a self‐dictator fails to give due moral consideration to the future self's liberty or agency. I then introduce the Daoist idea of wu‐wei, which recommends embracement of what happens in one's life, as one of the possible remedies for the overemphasis on the value of autonomy and control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The strain hardening test (SHT) is based on uniaxial tensile testing to estimate the time to failure. It has been shown that the strain hardening modulus can be easily determined using SHT with testing times only a few hours. Due to the same molecular processes during SHT and conventional methods such as full notch creep test (FNCT) and Pennsylvania edge notch test (PENT), the strain hardening modulus covers the slow crack growth (SCG) resistance in pipe‐grade high‐density polyethylene (PE‐HD) to a high degree. The contribution summarizes the results of SHT, carried out on PE‐HD. It discusses the effects of geometry of the test specimens, and the correlation with the PENT and FNCT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research using collaborative mobile augmented reality games in science education revealed that such games can be used to promote learner engagement and have found that engagement in such mobile games is related to flow. This study investigated whether player's flow experience differed by achievement track, gender, or gender composition of working groups. In an urban school district, 202 students from two eighth‐grade science classes participated in a collaborative mobile science game. Data included a self‐report survey collected after the game that measured player's flow experience. Using a regression model, the relationship of flow experience with achievement track and gender was explored while controlling for group composition and teacher effects. The study found that gender was related to flow experience; specifically, girls reported higher flow experience scores (d = 0.30). Flow experience did not have a statistically significant relationship with achievement track showing that the activity engaged all observed students similarly. Lay Description: What is already known about this topic: Achievement level tracking is a known problem for discouraging student success.Girls lack interest in science; they are more anxious and enjoy it less than boys.Girls and low achievers are more engaged if science is taught in a meaningful way.Game‐based learning can be engaging and facilitates social construction of knowledge.What this paper adds: The collaborative mobile game model engages low‐achievement students in a similar fashion to other students.The collaborative mobile game model engages girls more than boys.Implications for practice and/or policy: Playing collaborative mobile games may help low‐achieving students achieve more success in science.Playing collaborative mobile games may help girls become more interested in science.Overall, this study demonstrates a way to engage under‐represented populations with science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electron and ion currents to a cylindrical Langmuir (electrostatic) probe were calculated using the particle‐in‐cell/Monte Carlo (PIC/MC) self‐consistent simulation for a neutral gas in the pressure range 2–3,000 Pa. The simulation enables us to calculate the probe currents even at high neutral gas pressures when the collisions of collected charged particles with neutral gas particles near the probe are important. The main aim of this paper is the calculation of probe currents at such high gas pressures and the comparison of the results with experimentally measured probe currents. Simulations were performed for two cases: (a) probes with varying radii in a non‐thermal plasma with high electron temperature at low neutral gas pressure of 2 Pa (in order to verify the correctness of our simulations), and (b) probe with the radius of 10 μm in the afterglow plasma with low electron temperature and a higher neutral gas pressure (up to 3,000 Pa). The electron probe currents obtained in case (a) show good agreement with those predicted by the orbital motion limited current (OMLC) theory for probes with radii up to 100 μm for the given plasma conditions. At larger probe radii and/or at higher probe voltages, the OMLC theory incorrectly predicts too high an electron probe current for the plasma parameters studied. Additionally, a formula describing the spatial dependence of the electron density in the presheath in the collisionless case is derived. The simulation at higher neutral gas pressures, i.e. case (b), shows a decrease of the electron probe current with increasing gas pressure and the creation of a large presheath around the probe. The simulated electron probe currents are compared with those of measurements by other authors, and the differences are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Black youth account for the largest number of new HIV infections among heterosexual youth. Mental illness and difficulties in emotion regulation contribute to increased reports of HIV/sexually transmitted infection (STI) risk‐related sexual behaviors in this group. Yet limited interventions exist to address this affective component of the sexual decision‐making process. The purpose of this paper was to describe the trial design, research challenges, and baseline characteristics from a study designed to fill this gap. Project GOLD was a pilot randomized controlled trial of a psychoeducational HIV/STI prevention intervention designed to address the role of mental illness and emotion regulation in HIV/STI risk among heterosexually‐active Black youth aged 14 to 17 (N = 108). Challenges encountered in the research process warrant further attention in future research (e.g., disagreement among the regulatory bodies on parental permission requirements). The most common mental health diagnoses were Recurrent Major Depressive Disorder (15.7%) and current substance abuse (7.4%). Participants reported higher levels of emotional suppression, and adaptive methods of emotion management, than culturally inappropriate expressions of anger or sadness. They also reported a mean age of 13.6 at first vaginal sex, used condoms 66% of the time for vaginal sex, and had an average of three sexual partners in the past 6 months. More than one‐quarter (26.9%) had sex with more than one person in the same day. These findings indicate intervention is crucial for this population. The forthcoming trial evaluation will indicate the promise of such interventions in reducing HIV/STI infections in this key population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the relationship between formal and informal participation of individuals in three Pennsylvania rural communities. Data concerning the range and intensity of informal activities were used to test the hypothesis that a positive relationship exists between formal and informal participation of individuals in rural society. In general, this hypothesis was substantiated by the evidence on eighteen selected types of informal activities. However, more research is needed, not only on the roles played within various informal groups but also on participation in other areas of informal activities than those reported in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the history of the scientific association in Pottsville, Pennsylvania during the period 1854 to 1862. On October 10, 1854 a small group of men with a common interest in science formed the Pottsville Scientific Association. The association stimulated its members' own studies. The association published several worthwhile contributions to science. The members accumulated a large collection of minerals and a library of some 700 bound volumes as well as a large collection of scientific papers. .

This paper proposes an approach to estimating the uncertainty related to EPA Storm Water Management Model model parameters, percentage routed ( PR) and saturated hydraulic conductivity ( Ksat), which are used to calculate stormwater runoff volumes. The methodology proposed in this paper addresses uncertainty through the development of probability distributions for urban hydrologic parameters through extensive calibration to observed flow data in the Philadelphia collection system. The established probability distributions are then applied to the Philadelphia Southeast district model through a Monte Carlo approach to estimate the uncertainty in prediction of combined sewer overflow volumes as related to hydrologic model parameter estimation. Understanding urban hydrology is critical to defining urban water resource problems. A variety of land use types within Philadelphia coupled with a history of cut and fill have resulted in a patchwork of urban fill and native soils. The complexity of urban hydrology can make model parameter estimation and defining model uncertainty a difficult task. The development of probability distributions for hydrologic parameters applied through Monte Carlo simulations provided a significant improvement in estimating model uncertainty over traditional model sensitivity analysis. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the information that papers of the seventh international conferences on endodontics was scheduled to be held at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from September 12-15, 1983. Regrettably the meeting had to be cancelled for reasons beyond the control of organizers. The theme of the conference was "Endodontic Treatment around the World." The "International Endodontic Journal" considered that papers of the conference should not be lost and therefore sought to produce an issue of the journal devoted to the theme of the cancelled conference. The July 1, 1984 issue of the journal is a collection of papers, which give a valuable insight into endodontic treatment in different countries across continents.

While researchers have examined fiscal stabilization for state and local governments, less attention has been dedicated to special purpose governments, such as school districts. This paper fills the gap by examining the general unassigned fund balance of Pennsylvania school districts before and after the Great Recession using a Two-Step Generalized Method of Moments estimator. Although Pennsylvania imposes limitations on the unassigned fund balance, half of school districts are non-compliant, choosing instead to accumulate savings above the limits to improve their budget flexibility. Since the Great Recession, however, state revenue constraints have challenged savings accumulation. Additionally, while districts use savings for covering expenditures, less unassigned fund balance was drained during downturn years due to cutback management. Collectively, these findings signal a 'new normal' for Pennsylvania districts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim To critically appraise evidence for the prediction of caries using four caries risk assessment ( CRA) systems/guidelines ( Cariogram, Caries Management by Risk Assessment ( CAMBRA), American Dental Association ( ADA), and American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry (AAPD)). This review focused on prospective cohort studies or randomized controlled trials. Methods A systematic search strategy was developed to locate papers published in Medline Ovid and Cochrane databases. The search identified 539 scientific reports, and after title and abstract review, 137 were selected for full review and 14 met the following inclusion criteria: (i) used as validating criterion caries incidence/increment, (ii) involved human subjects and natural carious lesions, and (iii) published in peer-reviewed journals. In addition, papers were excluded if they met one or more of the following criteria: (i) incomplete description of sample selection, outcomes, or small sample size and (ii) not meeting the criteria for best evidence under the prognosis category of the Oxford Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine. Results There are wide variations among the systems in terms of definitions of caries risk categories, type and number of risk factors/markers, and disease indicators. The Cariogram combined sensitivity and specificity for predicting caries in permanent dentition ranges from 110 to 139 and is the only system for which prospective studies have been conducted to assess its validity. The Cariogram had limited prediction utility in preschool children, and a moderate to good performance for sorting out elderly individuals into caries risk groups. One retrospective analysis on CAMBRA's CRA reported higher incidence of cavitated lesions among those assessed as extreme-risk patients when compared with those at low risk. Conclusion The evidence on the validity for existing systems for CRA is limited. It is unknown if the identification of high-risk individuals can lead to more effective long-term patient management that prevents caries initiation and arrests or reverses the progression of lesions. There is an urgent need to develop valid and reliable methods for caries risk assessment that are based on best evidence for prediction and disease management rather than opinions of experts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Academic service partnerships (ASPs) are structured linkages between academe and service which have demonstrated higher levels of innovation. In the absence of descriptions in the literature on financial frameworks to support ASPs, the purpose of this paper is to present the supporting financial frameworks of a Swiss and a U.S. ASP. Methods: This paper used a case study approach. Results: Two frameworks are presented. The U.S. model presented consists of a variety of ASPs, all linked to the School of Nursing of the University of Pennsylvania. The structural integration and governance system is elucidated. Each ASP has its own source of revenue or grant support with the goal to be fiscally in the black. Joint appointments are used as an instrument to realize these ASPs. The Swiss ASP entails a detailed description of the financial framework of one ASP between the Institute of Nursing Science at the University of Basel and the Inselspital Bern University Hospital. Balance in the partnership, in terms of both benefit and cost between both partners, was a main principle that guided the development of the financial framework and the translation of the ASP in budgetary terms. The model builds on a number of assumptions and provides the partnership management within a simple framework for monitoring and evaluation of the progress of the partnership. Conclusions: In operationalizing an ASP, careful budgetary planning should be an integral part of the preparation and evaluation of the collaboration. The proposed Swiss and U.S. financial frameworks allow doing so. Clinical Relevance: Outcomes of care can be improved with strong nursing service and academic partnerships. Sustaining such partnerships requires attention to financial and contractual arrangements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural sociologists figure prominently in the move towards public sociology. The paper takes up Michael Burawoy's call for public sociology and discusses what rural sociologists have to offer to publics and how we stand to gain as a discipline in working with publics. The paper argues that rural sociologists' ability to adopt a cosmopolitan view while negotiating the complexities of global/local processes provides a useful theoretical stance for doing public sociology. Methodologically, both feminist methods and various approaches to networks can guide us as we do public sociology. Then, the paper provides two examples of recent efforts to do public sociology with a women's community group in Sri Lanka in response to the tsunami and with the Pennsylvania Women's Agricultural Network to illustrate the possibilities and limitations of working with networks. In conclusion, the paper addresses opportunities for doing public sociology, the challenges we face as we go public, and future work that is needed to develop theoretically and methodologically strong public rural sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper demonstrates how satellite image data [e.g., from Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM)], in conjunction with an urban growth model and simple runoff calculations, can be used to estimate future surface runoff and, by implication, water quality within a watershed. To illustrate the method, predictions of land use change and surface runoff are shown for Spring Creek Watershed, a medium sized urbanizing watershed in Central Pennsylvania. Land cover classifications for this watershed were created from images for summertime1986 and 1996 and subsequently used as input to the Clarke urban growth model, called SLEUTH, to predict land use changes to the year 2025. Simulations with this model show a progressive growth in the percentage of urban pixels and in impervious surface area in the watershed but also an increase in woodland, primarily in previously clear-cut areas. Given that woodland area will continue to increase in area, surface runoff into Spring Creek is predicted to remain only slightly above present level. However, should the woodland amount fail to increase, surface runoff is then predicted to increase more significantly during the next 25 years. Finally, the concept of urban sprawl is addressed within the context of predicted increases in urbanization by relating the implied increase in impervious surface area to population density within the watershed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The integrity of critical ethnography requires engagement in reflexive practice at all phases of the research process. In this discussion paper, I explore the insights and challenges of reflexive practice in an ethnographic study of the recovery experiences of black trauma patients in a Philadelphia hospital. Observation and interviews were conducted with twelve patients who were admitted to trauma-designated units of the hospital over the course of a year. During fieldwork, I learned the ways that my background as a professional nurse structured my way of being in clinical space and facilitated a particular interpretation of clinical culture. In analysis, reflection on subjectivities through which I designed this ethnographic research allowed me to see beyond my preconceived and theoretically informed perspective to permit unexpected features of the field to emerge. Reflexive practice also guided my reconciliation of key practical and epistemological differences between clinical ethnographic research and the anthropologic tradition in which it is rooted. I conclude that with careful reflection to the subjectivities that influence the research process, interdisciplinary clinically relevant applied interpretations of critical ethnographic work can be used to generate detailed knowledge across contexts in clinical care, nursing practice, and patient experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Teen dating violence (TDV) is a common phenomenon of great public concern. TDV may lead to severe long-term consequences for victims and offenders, and even more so for females than for males.Aim: The aim of this paper is to investigate possible underlying factors for involvement in TDV either as a perpetrator or a victim. Social learning theory is commonly used to explain internalisation of parents' behaviour on children's behavioural expressions, but less so on parents' emotion regulation as a direct link to later TDV.Method: We used longitudinal data from the Pittsburgh Girls Study (N = 2450) to investigate if and how parents' positive and negative emotion regulation is related to TDV, controlling for early aggression and race.Results: Results show a moderately strong association between parents' negative emotion regulation and their daughters' involvement in serious dating violence. We also found that many more African American girls were involved in TDV compared to Caucasian girls, both as a perpetrator and victim.Conclusions and Practical Implications: We discuss directions for future research focusing on emotion regulation and dating violence. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper seeks to directly assess the relationship between immigration and the transformation of the urban service economy through a case study of immigrants in the hotel industry in New York City and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This comparative study of the hotel industry provides a particular good test case for both the restructuring and the replacement labor perspectives. Hotels in major U.S. cities have witnessed a major burst of capital investment in recent years. The industry's growth has been linked to the new sources of urban agglomeration and the pattern of growth has followed the trajectory of market segmentation predicted by the restructuring hypothesis. As hotels have also been a traditional employer of African-Americans focusing on this industry highlights the processes by which jobs are allocated to immigrants or native blacks. By comparing New York, still the quintessential immigrant city, with Philadelphia, a city with few immigrants, the paper assess whether the service sector/immigration interactions are indeed as important as the restructuring hypothesis asserts.

The Old order Amish of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, can be classified as one of the oldest alternative communities in the United States. In this paper, we wish to examine ways in which the productive role of Amish women helps maintain Old Order Amish society, and the way these roles vary with woman's position in the life cycle. The contribution of women to production varies greatly between societies (Sanday, 1976). Furthermore, this contribution is not always recognized. Recently writers have argued that housewives not only perform private services for their husbands, but that their work helps maintain industrial capitalism (Malos, 1978). We believe our findings are informative not only with references to Amish society but that they are helpful in providing clues about women's roles in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A major theme in social theory concerns the transformation of social relationships in small communities as a result of modernization. This paper examines changing social relations in some small towns in southeastern Pennsylvania. For several hundred years, the residents of these towns have continuously developed institutions to preserve their local identity and maintain personal relations at the same time that they are incorporated into larger, regional social systems. The same local institutions and relations, however, are replicated in each small town, suggesting that local and particular interests are expressed through regional institutions. Although focused on a few small towns in one region of the United States, this paper examines the local expression of processes which are global. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article investigates the relationship between aptitude and academic achievement measures in the study and teaching of college chemistry by researchers from Reading, Pennsylvania. The use of "An Inventory Piaget's Developmental Tasks" (IDPT) to determine cognitive performance was effective in correlating Scholastic Aptitude Tests (SAT) and performance in both lecture and laboratory classes of college chemistry. IDPT is a 72-item, untimed, multiple-choice paper-and-pencil inventory. Its validity and reliability makes it a significant tool in correlating SAT and placement data.

This paper analyzes liability and insurance for nuclear power plants in light of the March 1979 accident at Three Mile Island. Existing estimates of the risks of nuclear power are reviewed and the estimates are compared with the evidence of Three Mile Island. A conclusion of particular interest is that private insurers' implicit estimates of the risks are more accurate than those of the government. Thus, there is reason to reconsider the existing liability and insurance arrangements, which are founded on the assumption that private insurers will overestimate the nuclear risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents reply to the criticism of the research paper related to sediment intrusion and rheoplasis in Pennsylvanian fluvial strata of eastern Canada, prepared by the author, as of February 1989. Evaluation of the hypothesis of researchers H.W. van de Poll and I.M. Patel, regarding diapiric intrusion of siltstone into sandstone; Explanation regarding the visibility of two blocks of siltstones at Alma, Michigan; Reason for the absence of explanation of flutes and other structures in the research paper.

Discusses the research paper prepared by researcher A.G. Plint, regarding the concept of sediment intrusion and rheoplasis, in Pennsylvanian fluvial strata of eastern Canada, as of February 1989. Criticism of Plint's description of occurrences of slump blocks of Alma, Michigan, in the paper; Omission of the fluted mangled mass of twisted mudstone and sandstone in the paper; Demonstration regarding the formation of mudblocks and flute moulds in this area.

Understanding the influence of treated wastewater reuse for irrigation on nitrate groundwater contamination in karstic landscape is critical for developing long‐term management plans and assessing the sustainability of these practices. The Pennsylvania State University has been operating a secondary treated wastewater effluent irrigation site—the "Living Filter"—since the 1960s. The objective of this study is to develop a regional groundwater flow and nitrate transport model to assess the impact of treated wastewater and disposal of large volumes of wastewater for irrigation of agricultural and forested lands on nitrate groundwater contamination in a karst landscape in the Spring Creek Watershed in central Pennsylvania. The modular three‐dimensional finite‐difference ground‐water flow model (MODFLOW) was used to construct the groundwater flow model of the local aquifer and simulate three‐dimensional regional changes in the water table over time. The simulation of nitrate fate and transport in the aquifer was conducted by developing a groundwater mass transport model using MODFLOW and a modular three‐dimensional transport multi‐species model (MT3DMS). The calibrated groundwater model yielded a root mean square error of 5.41 ft for the area of irrigation and 24.67 ft for the entire modeled area. Results of the calibrated model show the extension of a nitrate plume over most of the study area with concentrations below 10 mg·L−1 under the current 2015 setting and the long‐term 2035 scenario of increased irrigation rates. The nitrate migration was dominated by the presence of two high conductivity groundwater troughs adjacent to the study area resulting in a near steady‐state total mass since the 1990s. Core Ideas: A groundwater flow and nitrate transport model was developed for a karst landscape.The impact of wastewater irrigation of lands on karst groundwater recharge was assessed.The impact of wastewater irrigation of lands on karst groundwater quality was assessed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports a study of the use of information sources by farm operation in the farm practice adoption process and develops a model to account for the differential use of sources as farmers progress toward adoption. Utilizing a less-structured interviewing technique, the findings from this study of 175 Pennsylvania dairy farmers lend support to previous investigations of the use of information sources in the various stages of the adoption process. The model constructed to account for the differential use of information sources as farmers progress toward adoption involves five considerations: (1) institutionalization of information sources, (2) the temporal sequence of sources, (3) the possibility of negative recommendations, (4) scheduling limitations, and (5) the need for local legitimation. A reasonably good fit was obtained between model and data. A prediction derived from the model, that farmers citing peer influences as sources in the early stages of the adoption process would make less progress toward adoption than farmers citing other sources, was also supported by the data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]