Exit, voice, loyalty: a supplier’s perspective

Hirschman (1970) suggests that every member of a group can influence the group by either expressing their voice or exiting the group. Subsequent research has looked at exit-voice-loyalty from the supplier-retailer perspective (Blois, 2008). This paper takes an overview of the wholesaler-retailer relationship in the UK convenience sector; it considers how their approach to exit-voice-loyalty may be affecting the wholesalers’ turnover. The results of the research suggest that the wholesalers do not use cost of exit or enabling retailer voice exclusively; instead they now tend to combine both within their retailer relationship strategies.

A question of a voice: with what voice will I cry my sad fado?

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Using dysphonic voice to characterize speaker's biometry

Phonation distortion leaves relevant marks in a speaker's biometric profile. Dysphonic voice production may be used for biometrical speaker characterization. In the present paper phonation features derived from the glottal source (GS) parameterization, after vocal tract inversion, is proposed for dysphonic voice characterization in Speaker Verification tasks. The glottal source derived parameters are matched in a forensic evaluation framework defining a distance-based metric specification. The phonation segments used in the study are derived from fillers, long vowels, and other phonation segments produced in spontaneous telephone conversations. Phonated segments from a telephonic database of 100 male Spanish native speakers are combined in a 10-fold cross-validation task to produce the set of quality measurements outlined in the paper. Shimmer, mucosal wave correlate, vocal fold cover biomechanical parameter unbalance and a subset of the GS cepstral profile produce accuracy rates as high as 99.57 for a wide threshold interval (62.08-75.04%). An Equal Error Rate of 0.64 % can be granted. The proposed metric framework is shown to behave more fairly than classical likelihood ratios in supporting the hypothesis of the defense vs that of the prosecution, thus ofering a more reliable evaluation scoring. Possible applications are Speaker Verification and Dysphonic Voice Grading.

Modeling spectral changes in singing voice for pitch modification

We present an advanced method to achieve natural modifications when applying a pitch shifting process to singing voice by modifying the spectral envelope of the audio ex- cerpt. To this end, an all-pole spectral envelope model has been selected to describe the global variations of the spectral envelope with the changes of the pitch. We performed a pitch shifting process of some sustained vowels with the envelope processing and without it, and compared both by means of a survey open to volunteers in our website.

Giving Voice to Voiceless: Engaging Urban Youth for Possibilities

This symposium will discuss the expansion of The Education Effect – Booker T. Washington, as a university community school partnership designed to engage urban youth for college and career readiness. The partnership is focused on developing collective impact and capacity for academic achievement, social success and college completion. The partnership aligns university expertise, resources and evidenced based strategies to address educational needs through the improvement of teaching and learning; increase graduation rate and parental involvement.

UW School of Music presents a Voice Division Recital November 28, 2016

Concert Program

Cage & Partch with Luke Fitzpatrick Adapted Viola, Intoning Voice and Violin December 2, 2016

Concert Program

Impact de trois interventions: méthode mère kangourou, massage en incubateur et massage en position kangourou sur la croissance et le développement des enfants prématurés nés à moins de 33 semaines d’âge gestationnel

Cette recherche vise à étudier l’impact d’interventions réalisées par les parents dans l’unité néonatale de soins intensifs. Plus spécifiquement, le premier objectif est de documenter les effets différentiels de la Méthode Mère Kangourou « MMK » accompagnée ou non du Massage en incubateur «MI » ou du Massage en Position Kangourou « MPK » et des Soins Traditionnels «ST » accompagnés ou non du massage dans l’incubateur sur la croissance physique mesurée par le poids, la taille et le périmètre crânien pendant une période de 5 et 15 jours dans l’unité néonatale et l’impact à 40 semaines d’âge gestationnel. Le second objectif est de comparer, chez des enfants qui bénéficient de la « MMK » la valeur ajoutée du « MPK » ou du «MI » sur le neuro-développement à 6 et 12 mois d’âge corrigé de l’enfant. Un échantillon total de 198 enfants et leur famille a été recruté de la façon suivante dans trois hôpitaux de Bogota. Dans chaque hôpital, 66 sujets ont été répartis aléatoirement à deux conditions. Ces hôpitaux ont été choisis afin de tester les effets de diverses conditions expérimentales et de diminuer les bais de sélection. Dans chaque hôpital, deux techniques ont été assignées aléatoirement. Il s’agit, dans le premier, de la « MMK & MPK » vs « MMK & MI ». Dans le second, « MMK sans massage » vs « MMK & MI ». Dans le troisième, « MI » a été comparé aux « ST » ce qui implique une absence de contact physique continu des bébés avec leurs parents. Les résultats rapportés dans le premier article sont à l’effet que, dans le premier hôpital, il y a un effet compensatoire de l’intervention « MMK & MPK » sur la perte physiologique du poids de l’enfant prématuré dans les 15 premiers jours de vie avec un impact sur le poids à 40 semaines d’âge gestationnel, sur la durée du portage kangourou et sur la durée d’hospitalisation totale. Aucun effet sur le périmètre crânien ou la taille n’est apparu. Dans le deuxième hôpital, aucune différence significative n’est rapportée pour le poids sauf quand l’intervention est commencée après le 10ième jours de vie alors que l’enfant « MPK» semble grossir mieux que le «MMK avec MI». Finalement, dans le troisième hôpital il n’y a aucun effet du massage sur les variables anthropométriques, le groupe avec MI grossissant moins vite avec un léger impact sur le poids à 40 semaines. Cela pourrait être dû à la perte de chaleur due à l’ouverture de l’incubateur quand l’enfant est très immature. Dans le second article, les 66 enfants de l’hôpital sont répartis aléatoirement dans le groupe « MMK & MPK» vs le groupe « MMK & MI», ont complété, à 6 et 12 mois d’âge corrigé, un test de neuro-développement, le Griffiths. Les résultats à 6 mois ne montrent aucune différence entre les 2 interventions, mais a 12 mois le IQ semble dépendant du nombre de jours d’hospitalisation de l’enfant, cette durée d’hospitalisation correspond au temps que met l’enfant à se stabiliser physiquement et correspond également au temps que mettent la mère et l’enfant à s’adapter à la méthode kangourou. Une fois, l’adaptation kangourou réussie, la dyade mère enfant sort avec l’enfant toujours en position kangourou. Le temps d’hospitalisation correspond au temps que met l’enfant à être éligible à l’apprentissage de la MMK par la mère. À 12 mois les deux groupes montrent des résultats équivalents, mais des différences positives sont apparues pour le groupe « MMK & MPK» dans les sous échelle Coordination Oculo Manuelle et Audition et Langage du test Griffiths. Dans l’ensemble, les résultats suggèrent que la pratique des deux interventions non traditionnelles peut contribuer à une meilleure croissance physique dans nos cohortes. Le gain de poids du bébé, notamment, est affecté par l’intervention MPK (Hôpital 1) ou sans l’ajout du Massage (Hôpital 2). Par ailleurs, le massage en incubateur n’a pas de différence significative en comparaison aux soins traditionnels, ces interventions ont toutefois un impact mineur (tendances) sur le neuro développement à 6 et 12 mois d’âge corrigé dans cette étude.

Shaping the future of learning using the student voice: we’re listening but are we hearing clearly?

Student voice data is a key factor as Manchester Metropolitan University strives to continually improve institutional technology enhanced learning (TEL) infrastructure. A bi-annual Institutional Student Survey enables students to communicate their experience of learning, teaching and assessment on programmes and specific units studied. Each cycle of the survey contains approximately 40–50,000 free text comments from students pertaining to what they appreciate and what they would like to see improved. A detailed thematic analysis of this data has identified 18 themes, arranged into six categories relating to the ‘Best’ aspects of courses, and 25 themes, arranged in seven categories in relation to aspects of courses considered to be ‘in need of improvement’. This student data was then used as a basis for semi-structured interviews with staff. Anecdotally, evidence suggested that student expectations and staff expectations around TEL and the virtual learning environment (VLE) differed. On-going evaluation of this work has highlighted a disconnect. In significant instances, academic colleagues seemingly misinterpret the student voice analysis and consequently struggle to respond effectively. In response to the analysis, the learning technologist's role has been to re-interpret the analysis and redevelop TEL staff development and training activities. The changes implemented have focused on: contextualising resources in VLE; making lectures more interactive; enriching the curriculum with audio–visual resources; and setting expectations around communications.

Voice conversion with pre-trained representations for audio anonymization

The recording and processing of voice data raises increasing privacy concerns for users and service providers. One way to address these issues is to move processing on the edge device closer to the recording so that potentially identifiable information is not transmitted over the internet. However, this is often not possible due to hardware limitations. An interesting alternative is the development of voice anonymization techniques that remove individual speakers characteristics while preserving linguistic and acoustic information in the data. In this work, a state-of-the-art approach to sequence-to-sequence speech conversion, ini- tially based on x-vectors and bottleneck features for automatic speech recognition, is explored to disentangle the two acoustic information using different pre-trained speech and speakers representation. Furthermore, different strategies for selecting target speech representations are analyzed. Results on public datasets in terms of equal error rate and word error rate show that good privacy is achieved with limited impact on converted speech quality relative to the original method.

Anatomical Study Of Minor Alterations In Neonate Vocal Folds.

Minor structural alterations of the vocal fold cover are frequent causes of voice abnormalities. They may be difficult to diagnose, and are expressed in different manners. Cases of intracordal cysts, sulcus vocalis, mucosal bridge, and laryngeal micro-diaphragm form the group of minor structural alterations of the vocal fold cover investigated in the present study. The etiopathogenesis and epidemiology of these alterations are poorly known. To evaluate the existence and anatomical characterization of minor structural alterations in the vocal folds of newborns. 56 larynxes excised from neonates of both genders were studied. They were examined fresh, or defrosted after conservation via freezing, under a microscope at magnifications of 25× and 40×. The vocal folds were inspected and palpated by two examiners, with the aim of finding minor structural alterations similar to those described classically, and other undetermined minor structural alterations. Larynges presenting abnormalities were submitted to histological examination. Six cases of abnormalities were found in different larynges: one (1.79%) compatible with a sulcus vocalis and five (8.93%) compatible with a laryngeal micro-diaphragm. No cases of cysts or mucosal bridges were found. The observed abnormalities had characteristics similar to those described in other age groups. Abnormalities similar to sulcus vocalis or micro-diaphragm may be present at birth.

Application Of Tactile/kinesthetic Stimulation In Preterm Infants: A Systematic Review.

To verify the methods used by the clinical trials that assessed the effect of tactile/kinesthetic stimulation on weight gain in preterm infants and highlight the similarities and differences among such studies. This review collected studies from two databases, PEDro and PubMed, in July of 2014, in addition to bibliographies. Two researchers assessed the relevant titles independently, and then chose which studies to read in full and include in this review by consensus. Clinical trials that studied tactile stimulation or massage therapy whether or not associated with kinesthetic stimulation of preterm infants; that assessed weight gain after the intervention; that had a control group and were composed in English, Portuguese, or Spanish were included. A total of 520 titles were found and 108 were selected for manuscript reading. Repeated studies were excluded, resulting in 40 different studies. Of these, 31 met all the inclusion criteria. There were many differences in the application of tactile/kinesthetic stimulation techniques among studies, which hindered the accurate reproduction of the procedure. Also, many studies did not describe the adverse events that occurred during stimulation, the course of action taken when such events occurred, and their effect on the outcome. These studies made a relevant contribution towards indicating tactile/kinesthetic stimulation as a promising tool. Nevertheless, there was no standard for application among them. Future studies should raise the level of methodological rigor and describe the adverse events. This may permit other researchers to be more aware of expected outcomes, and a standard technique could be established.

As vozes da sociedade: letramento, consciência e poder

The dialectic tension between the phenomenon of illiteracy and the remedial efforts of the literate to provide a voice for those who don t have one, reflects at the same time the difficulties that the emerging discourses have to struggle with, and highlights the importance of this struggle as one that belongs to the opressed, not the well-meaning educators and political activists. It also informs the latter s efforts on behalf of the uneducated. Naturally these issues have attracted a good deal of attention of some specialists in South America. There is now a movement afoot there that aims at placing illiterate discourse inside the societal discourse proper without letting the latter manipulate the former for its own ends. I will address the typical exigencies and limitations inherent in such efforts, but at the same time point to new ways of understanding and handling the problem of literacy in a developing country.

Avaliação da aplicação do Metodo Mulligan e massoterapia classica nas disfunções da articulação temporomandibular em mulheres adultas por meio da escala visual-numerica de dor e pelo SF-36

Universidade Estadual de Campinas . Faculdade de Educação Física

Bem-vinda à escola : o ingresso da criança no primeiro ano do ensino fundamental sob o olhar docente e a perspectiva do brincar

Universidade Estadual de Campinas . Faculdade de Educação Física