Devising a procedure to form the diagnostic parameters for locomotives using a principal components analysis

Modern diagnostic systems are characterized by that the flow of diagnostic information requires significant computational resources to process. In order to improve the reliability of the object to be diagnosed and reduce operating costs, it is necessary to improve procedures for analyzing diagnostic results. This paper suggests a procedure to form the diagnostic features of locomotive nodes based on the use of a principal components analysis. The proposed approach is distinguished by a decrease in the dimensionality of the input set of diagnostic features in order to select the sets of interconnected diagnostic parameters. Based on the selection of the sets of interconnected diagnostic features, constructing new latent diagnostic parameters has been proposed. A latent diagnostic parameter contains information that combines data from several initial diagnostic features. The result of the method is a set of latent diagnostic parameters that do not correlate with each other and reflect the behavior of the object to be diagnosed from different technical points. The application of a sufficient number of latent diagnostic parameters involved the scree test method. This paper reports the results from using the proposed approach for treating the results from diagnosing the hydraulic transmissions in locomotives. The result from applying the procedure has made it possible to propose using three latent diagnostic parameters to assess the technical condition of a locomotive’s hydraulic transmission during bench tests. The suggested parameters contain 90 % of the original information and reflect losses in the transmission, as well as the load at the input and output of the transmission.

Testdiagnostik von AVWS im Grundschulalter – eine faktorenanalytische Untersuchung

Zusammenfassung Hintergrund Unsere eklektische Testbatterie zur Diagnose von auditiven Verarbeitungs- und Wahrnehmungsstörungen (AVWS) wurde in mehreren Vorstudien eingesetzt. Nun sollte ihre Inhaltsstruktur faktorenanalytisch untersucht werden. Material und Methode Testergebnisse von 143 Kindern mit AVWS (96 Jungen) im mittleren Alter von 8,3 (SD 1,1) Jahren gingen in mehrere exploratorische Faktorenanalysen ein (EFA; Hauptkomponentenmethode). Unter Berücksichtigung der Ergebnisse diskriminanzanalytischer Vorstudien und der zugrunde liegenden Interkorrelationen wurde eine EFA mit 12 (von insgesamt 16) diagnostischen Tests gewählt. Ergebnisse Das Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin-Maß der Stichprobeneignung war mit 0,739 mittelmäßig bis tendenziell gut. Die Bestimmung der Faktorenzahl erfolgte anhand des Kaiser-Kriteriums (Eigenwert > 1) und sprach für 4 Faktoren, die 63,7 % Gesamtvarianz erklärten – bestätigt durch den Scree-Test. Laut Komponentenmatrix waren die Ladungen auf den unrotierten Faktoren vorwiegend auf dem ersten Faktor hoch, weswegen sich diese EFA nicht interpretieren ließ. Nach Promax-Rotation resultierte eine interpretierbare Faktorenlösung mit folgenden 4 Faktoren: phonematische Verarbeitung, verbal-auditives Kurzzeitgedächtnis, basaler Hörverarbeitungsfaktor, Hörverarbeitungsfaktor von redundanzreduzierter Sprache. Fazit Mit diesen Ergebnissen liegt ein vorläufiges Modell zentral-auditiver Prozesse unserer AVWS-Testbatterie sowie ein erster Beitrag zur Konstruktvalidität vor.

VALIDATION OF ELDERLY ABUSE ASSESSMENT TOOL

Background: Several screening tools for elderly abuse have been developed but they have rarely been validated properly for wider use. The multiplicity of the tools available revealed the need to develop through collaborative research, a simple and reliable tool that can be adapted and used in different geographical and cultural settings. As the cases of abuse increase, nurses are in a position to rescue this vulnerable population through equipping knowledge and be knowledgeable on using elderly assessment tool for abuse cases.Objective: To validate the developed Filipino-based elderly abuse assessment tool. Methods: The study utilized descriptive confirmatory method design and underwent validation and reliability process. Five experts conducted the scrutiny during validation and 220 elderly clients’ subjected the tool for reliability tests. Data are analyzed using SPSS version 23, while frequency and percentage were used for continuous variable.Results: The Elderly Abuse Assessment Tool is valid and reliable. The tool is clear in terms of the word composition, the texts are understood easily, comprehensive, and relevant based on expert reviews. It has I-CVI of 0.84 (44 items) and increases value in its second version to 0.87 (42 items). On one hand, the tool obtained a very high degree of reliability with Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.974 during the second version. Regardless of item numbers are retained, the value remains high. Constructs identified from the validated tool. Kaiser’s criterion or the Eigenvalue result of the second version of the developed tool revealed six factors that can be extracted. However, in the Scree test or plot, only two factors located above the inflection points. This means that two factors or constructs can be named. The researcher decided to choose the lesser number for easier naming of factors. The tool was classified into two constructs, namely physico-sexual and psycho-financial factors, respectively.Conclusion: The Elderly Abuse Assessment Tool (EAAT) is valid and has a very high degree of reliability. Physico-sexual and Psycho-financial are the two major constructs of the tool. Filipino nurses can now articulate their expression of unending caring through the utility of the validated Elderly Abuse Assessment Tool (EAAT).

Clustering and Principal Component Analysis of Nerica Mutant Rice Lines Growing Under Rainfed Condition

A field experiment was conducted at subtropical region in Bangladesh to assess the contribution of morphological traits to variability in some NERICA mutant rice lines. The experiment was conducted following RCBD with three replications. Thirty-one NERICA rice genotypes (twenty-eight mutant lines along with three parents) of advanced generations were used. Data were collected on twelve morphological traits. The results of the principal component analysis showed that the first four components account for 80% of total variation giving a clear idea of the structure underlying the variables analyzed. This result was also supported by scree test. Cluster analysis using Ward's method classified the thirty-one genotypes into five distinct groups. The maximum inter-cluster distance was observed between clusters indicating the possibility of high heterosis if individuals from these clusters are cross-bred. The results of PCA were closely in line with those of the cluster analysis. These results can now be used by breeders to develop drought tolerant high yielding rice varieties and new breeding protocols for rice improvement. Int. J. Appl. Sci. Biotechnol. Vol 7(3): 327-334

Reliability, validity and psychometric properties of the Greek translation of the posttraumatic stress disorder scale

The Greek version of the Davidson Trauma Scale (DTS) was developed to respond to the need of Greek-speaking individuals. The translated questionnaire was administered to 128 HIV outpatients (aged 37.1±9.1) and 166 control patients (aged 32.4±13.4). In addition to the DTS Greek scale, subjects were assessed with two other scales useful for assessing validity. For each factor analyses two components were extracted, based on Cattell’s scree test. The two components solution accounted for 55.34% of the total variation in case of frequency variables and 61.45% in case of severity variables. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient and Guttman split-half coefficient of the DTS scale were 0.93 and 0.88 respectively. The test-retest reliability of the Greek version of DTS scale proved to be satisfactory. Individual items had good intra-class correlation coefficients higher than 0.5, which means that all questions have high levels of external validity. The psychometric strength of interview for posttraumatic stress disorder-Greek version it’s reliable for its future use, particularly for screening subjects with possible diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder.

Reliability, validity and psychometric properties of the Greek translation of the posttraumatic stress disorder scale

The Greek version of the Davidson Trauma Scale (DTS) was developed to respond to the need of Greek-speaking individuals. The translated questionnaire was administered to 128 HIV outpatients (aged 37.1±9.1) and 166 control patients (aged 32.4±13.4). In addition to the DTS Greek scale, subjects were assessed with two other scales useful for assessing validity. For each factor analyses two components were extracted, based on Cattell's scree test. The two components solution accounted for 55.34% of the total variation in case of frequency variables and 61.45% in case of severity variables. The Cronbach's alpha coefficient and Guttman split-half coefficient of the DTS scale were 0.93 and 0.88 respectively. The test-retest reliability of the Greek version of DTS scale proved to be satisfactory. Individual items had good intra-class correlation coefficients higher than 0.5, which means that all questions have high levels of external validity. The psychometric strength of interview for post-traumatic stress disorder-Greek version it's reliable for its future use, particularly for screening subjects with possible diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder.

TERMINATION CRITERION FOR PCA WITH ANN FOR DETECTION OF NS1 FROM ADULTERATED SALIVA

Detection of Non-structural Protein 1 (NS1) in saliva has become appealing as it may lead to a non-invasive detection method for NS1-related diseases at the febrile phase, before complication developed. NS1 is found to have its unique molecular fingerprint from Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SERS) technique. Our work here intends to investigate the effect of termination criterion of Principal Component Analysis (PCA) on the classification performance by the different Artificial Neural Network (ANN) learning algorithms. This will help in optimizing the automated classification of NS1 adulterated saliva, and hence detection of NS1-related diseases. Raman spectra of saliva (n=64) and saliva mixed with NS1 (n=64) are acquired using SERS obtained from the UiTM-NMRR 12868-NS1-DENV database. Large input data dimension of the raw [128 x 1801] are reduced according to the respective PCA termination criteria: Scree test [128 x 5], Cumulative Percent of Total Variance (CPV) [128 x 70] and Eigenvalues One Criterion (EOC) [128 x 115]. The reduced data dimensions are used as inputs to ANN algorithms. Performance of these algorithms, in term of [accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, and precision] from Levenbergh Marquardt (LM), Scale Conjugate Gradient (SCG), Resilient Backpropagation (RPROP) and One Step Secant (OSS) are investigated. The best performance [100%, 100%, 100%, 100%] are achieved from the integration of Scree test criterion and SCG learning algorithm, the highest expected of adulterated data.

Kleronacionalizam kao zajedničko ishodište nacionalne vezanosti, nacionalne isključivosti i religioznosti

Studija se bavi razmatranjem odnosa između nacionalne vezanosti, nacionalne otvorenosti i religioznosti. Time se testira pretpostavka da tri navedene dimenzije imaju zajedničko jezgro i da kao takvo predstavljaju subsistem autoritarnosti. Studija je sprovedena u deset gradova Bosne i Hercegovine i obuhvatila je 1238 ispitanika (629 žena) starosne dobi od od 16 do 30 godina (M=20.72 i SD=2.77). U okviru veće baterije testova su primijenjene i skale NVNO (Čekrlija i Turjačanin, 2006) i Skala R (Čekrlija, 2004) uz zadovoljavajuće psihometrijske karakteristike. Na standardizovane i normalizovane podatke je primijenjena faktorska analiza sa metodom glavnih komponenti u ekstrakciji i scree test u određenju broja značajnih faktora. Izdvojena su tri značajna faktora rotirana u promax poziciju. Njihova priroda i međuodnosi podupiru postojanje kleronacionalizma kao autoritarne strukture ličnosti nadređene nacionalnoj vezanosti, nacionalnoj otvorenosti i religioznosti.

Escala de Comportamentos de Bullying (ECB): Elaboração e Evidências Psicométricas

Resumo Este estudo objetivou elaborar a Escala de Comportamentos de Bullying (ECB), checando evidências de validade e precisão. Participaram 455 estudantes do ensino fundamental de escolas públicas e particulares de Parnaíba (PI), com idade média de 11,3 anos, em maioria do sexo feminino (53,5%). Todos responderam à versão preliminar da medida, de 30 itens, e perguntas demográficas. Realizou-se a análise dos eixos principais (AEP) (rotação Varimax), o Scree Test, e a análise paralela indicou a existência de uma estrutura tetrafatorial. Logo, realizou-se uma nova AEP, fixando a extração de quatro fatores, estes explicaram conjuntamente 47,7% da variância total, cujos alfas de Cronbach variaram de 0,60 a 0,79. Esses achados revelam que a ECB reúne evidências favoráveis de validade e consistência interna, podendo ser adequadamente utilizada em estudos futuros para conhecer os antecedentes e consequências do bullying.