Partial scalar invariance and observed differences across gender in a reasoning test battery

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Differences in performance in noise between conventional hearing aids and radiant multimicrophone beamforming technology

This paper discusses the results of a study to determine the differences between hearing aids and radiant beamforming technology.

Ownership rights in performance-based contracting: A case study of English law

Clients and contractors need to be aware of the project’s legal environment because the viability of a procurement strategy can be vitiated by legal rules. This is particularly true regarding Performance-Based Contracting (PBC) whose viability may be threatened by rules of property law: while the PBC concept does not require that the contractor transfers the ownership in the building materials used to the client, the rules of property law often lead to an automatic transfer of ownership. But does the legal environment really render PBC unfeasible? In particular, is PBC unfeasible because contractors lose their materials as assets? These questions need to be answered with respect to the applicable property law. As a case study, English property law has been chosen. Under English law, the rule which governs the automatic transfer of ownership is called quicquid plantatur solo, solo credit (whatever is fixed to the soil belongs to the soil). An analysis of this rule reveals that not all materials which are affixed to land become part of the land. This fate only occurs in relation to materials which have been affixed with the intention of permanently improving the land. Five fictitious PBC cases have been considered in terms of the legal status of the materials involved, and several subsequent legal questions have been addressed. The results suggest that English law does actually threaten the feasibility of PBC in some cases. However, it is also shown that the law provides means to circumvent the unwanted results which flow from the rules of property law. In particular, contractors who are interested in keeping their materials as assets can insist on agreeing a property right in the client’s land, i.e. a contractor’s lien. Therefore, the outcome is that English property law does not render the implementation of the PBC concept unfeasible. At a broader level, the results contribute to the theoretical framework of PBC as an increasingly used procurement strategy.

Visuospatial cognition in Williams syndrome: reviewing and accounting for the strengths and weaknesses in performance

Individuals with Williams syndrome typically show relatively poor visuospatial abilities in comparison to stronger verbal skills. However, individuals' level of performance is not consistent across all visuospatial tasks. The studies assessing visuospatial functioning in Williams syndrome are critically reviewed, to provide a clear pattern of the relative difficulty of these tasks. This prompts a possible explanation of the variability in performance seen, which focuses on the processing demands of some of these tasks. Individuals with Williams syndrome show an atypical processing style on tests of construction, which does not affect tests of perception.

Prosodic Morphology : Gender in Arabic Perfect Active and Passive 3rd Person Singular Verbs

Prosodic /template Morphology, that "draws heavily on the theoretical apparatus and formalisms of the generative phonology model known as autosegmental phonology" (Katamba, F. 1993: 154), is the best analysis that can handle Arabic morphology. Verbs in Arabic are represented on three independent tiers: root tier, the skeletal tier and the vocalic melody tier (Katamba, F. 1993). Vowel morphemes, which are represented by diacritics, are inserted within the consonant morphemes, which are represented by primary symbols, to form words. The morpheme tier hypothesis paves the way to understand the nonconcatenative Arabic morphology. This paper analyzes gender in perfect active and passive 3rd person singular verbs on the basis of PM. The focus of the analysis shall be drawn heavily on the most common Arabic verbs; triconsonantal verbs, with brief introduction of the less common verbs; quadriconsonantal perfect active and passive masculine and feminine 3rd person singular verbs. I shall, too, cast the light on some vowel changes that some verbs undergo when voice changes.

Construction of gender in computer magazine advertisements : confronting the literature

Previous studies (Sofia, 1998; 2002; Turner & Hovenden, 1997; Weinstein, 1998) discussed the power relations surrounding the advertisements for computers in computing magazines, in particular deconstructing the imagery and text which manifested the dominant digital discourse of power (Millar, 1998). In these studies, the authors found that women were positioned as incapable and impotent users of computers.  The authors examined a number of New Zealand and Australian home computing magazines published in 2003 and 2004, looking for evidence of the gendered nature of technology or examples of any form which would constitute discrimination against women or other identity categories. The purpose of this research was to determine whether previous arguments were still relevant and current, or whether advertisements had changed to accommodate populist understandings of gender and cultural equity, or reflect improved power relations between the sexes. In this paper we have explored the findings of a study, which, although small in scale, raises larger questions concerning the 'new' ways in which issues of gender influence advertising focused on computers. Whilst there has been a significant reduction in overtly sexist texts, hegemonic understandings of masculinity and femininity nevertheless continue to structure mainstream advertisements with women routinely positioned in passive, non-expert or very limited kinds of roles. The extent to which this imagery reflects broader social patterns regarding the re-emergence of traditional portrayals of women and men in the media more generally will be the subject of future studies.