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Copyright of Argentinian Journal of Respiratory & Physical Therapy (AJRPT) is the property of Asociacion Civil Cientifica de Difusion y Promocion de la Kinesiologia 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.)

The items of the Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale (Andreassen et al., 2012) were adapted to study the construct in Instagram users. This construct is defined as the tendency to be overly concerned about Instagram, spending so much time and effort on this platform to the point of harming other activities in the individual's life, interpersonal relationships and psychological well-being. Different Item Response Theory (IRT) models was applied for polytomous items in order to determine which one best explains the responses of those evaluated. The six items were translated into Spanish and evaluated by an expert jury. A total of 754 Instagram users from the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area took part in the study (65.8% women). An Exploratory Factor Analysis was performed to verify the unidimensional assumption and the assumption of local independence was corroborated. The results referring to the models fit data allows us to provide evidence that the Grades Response Model (GRM) presents the most adequate parametric structure to shape the subject's responses. All items were adjusted to GRM. Parameters a ranged from 2.02 to 3.45 (Mean = 2.69; SD = 0.49). Parameters b were located within the expected range (-3 to 3) with a minimum θ of -0.51 and a maximum of 2.74. The Ordinal Alpha and Omega were elevated. The Information Function shows a maximum value of 14.26 around a θ of 1.2. This function shows a negative asymmetry, indicating that the scale is more accurate for measuring high levels of the trait. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zaranda de Ideas: Revista de Jóvenes Investigadores en Arqueología is the property of Asociacion de Arqueologos Profesionales de la Republica Argentina (AAPRA) 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.)

In recent years, most Latin American nations have undergone major crises and political transformations while their macroeconomic conditions have remained stable. In contrast, Argentina is characterized by coexisting high levels of macroeconomic instability and political and partisan stability. The purpose of the present article is to identify the causes of such political and institutional stability, which is sustained despite the macroeconomic disorder, the strong polarization and the deterioration of the social conditions. In addition, the article concludes pointing out which the main challenges that the country is faced with in order for the already achieved stability to be sustained in the near future are. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista SAAP is the property of Sociedad Argentina de Analisis Politico 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.)

The process of constructing a scale to measure the Depression facet according to the Five Factors Model is presented. A review of the theoretical and operational definitions of relevant authors of this model was carried out. Then 15 initial items were elaborated, 3 of which were eliminated by expert judges. The retained items were administered to 1222 adults of the general population residing in the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area, Argentina (50.8% women, mean age = 33.2 years and SD = 11.8 years). A random selection of 35% of cases was made to reduce the instrument with an Exploratory Factor Analysis. The remaining 65% was used to corroborate the internal structure with a Confirmatory Factor Analysis and to fit the Graded Response Model of the Item Response Theory. The results show that the 10 items of the final version form a one-dimensional structure with adequate internal consistency. Evidence of concurrent validity is provided with EPQ-RA and SCL-90-R. The Test Information Function reveals that the scale measures with constant high reliability over a wide range of the trait. It is concluded that the scale allows a satisfactory assessment of individual differences in the tendency to experience depressive affects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that political science in Argentina is expanding. Between 2005 and 2014 its development as a discipline and social relevance have grown. We base our argument on an examination of enrollment and graduation data, a selection and analysis of books, a bibliometric analysis of journals and a survey of the presence of political scientists in politics. In spite of unavoidable internal debates, political science in Argentina is undergoing its best moment ever. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An accurate knowledge of the direct solar irradiance at normal incidence (DNI) is required to size solar energy systems, specially those using solar concentration technologies. In the absence of measurements, DNI can be estimated over an arbitrary site with a dedicated satellite model or by using satellite-derived global horizontal irradiance (GHI) and a phenomenological diffuse-direct separation model. This second procedure is error-prone, specially under partial cloudiness conditions and low solar elevation angles. A novel and simple semi-empirical satellite-based model to estimate DNI in moderate albedo regions using a physical clear sky model and a cloudiness index obtained from visible satellite imagery is proposed and assessed. An ergodic assumption in which the images are spatially averaged to better represent the hourly time basis is used. Over the target region (Southeastern South America, SESA), the new DNI satellite model outperforms the alternative strategy at the hourly level, with an average uncertainty of 20% (versus 25%) when compared with three measurement station's data sets located in center Argentina, southern Brazil and Uruguay. • A simple model to estimate hourly solar direct normal irradiation (DNI) is presented. • Its based on a precise clear sky model and a cloud index obtained from satellite imagery. • Spatial averaging of images over each site improves representation of hourly DNI. • Outperforms strategy of estimating DNI from direct-diffuse separation models and GHI. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to present the findings obtained from the application of an Item Response Theory model (IRT) to the reactive of a Will-to-Work Measuring Test (WW). WW is defined as the individuals' tendency to generate efficient volatile processes that allow them to commit themselves to starting a task and to persisting in its execution by over coming obstacles until they achieve its materialization with precision and without procrastination. WW is a personality trait that describes the predisposition of an individual to assume duties in a responsible, self-motivated and prompt manner even when such duties may be unappealing. The scale measuring the WW comprises 9 items in polychromous response format (four-point rating scale), with the response options grad ed. Accordingly, one of the IRT most widely used models was applied for the monetization of ordered polychromous responses: Samejima's Graded Response Model (GRM). The GRM is a generalization of the Two Parameter Logistic Model of Birnbaum. In GRM, a person's probability of responding in category j to a specific item i, Pij(θ), is obtained by subtracting the probability of responding in or below category j-1 from the probability of responding in or below category j. Through the Item Response Category Curves, the GRM allows for the representation of an individual's likelihood to choose each of the item categories based on the level of the latent trait measured. The data from this psychometric test was obtained from a sample of 1,141 university students. The one-dimensional assumption required by the GRM was corroborated through an exploratory analysis of the data factor structure. The local independence assumption was considered to be satisfied after proving the scale one-dimensionality. All analyses based on the IRT were performed by operating the MULTILOG software program. The GRM parameters estimation was carried out through marginal maximum likelihood procedures. A discrimination parameter (a) and three location parameters (b1, b2 and b3) corresponding to thresholds separating the 4 response categories were estimated for each item. The model's goodness-of-fit was studied on an item basis by examining the residue of observed and expected proportions for each of the ordered response categories. The residue obtained was the same as or lower than .01, which led to the conclusion that the model adjustment to the data was satisfactory for all reactive. Despite this, one of the items showed in - appropriate behavior. The value of its location parameters turned out to be very different from the expected one and showed high estimation errors when compared against the values obtained for the rest of the items. Most of the location parameters showed mid-low WW values and discrimination parameters showed mid-high values (0.73-1.73). The instrument's reliability was acceptable if we consider the .75 marginal reliability coefficient obtained from IRT. However, local accuracy measures showed that the test is less reliable when measuring the WW highest levels. In other words, the measure error increases as we attempt to discriminate strongly willful individuals. This means that the WW scale is useful to measure mid-low levels of WW, but less accurate when it comes to individuals whose trait level is higher. It is therefore concluded that it is necessary to raise the number of WW scale items to optimize the instrument quality. It is particularly important to identify construct indicators allowing for a more accurate detection of the highest trait levels. The shortage of the application of IRT models to personality tests as well as the difficulty that the achievement of their exigent assumptions were discussed. The findings showed the problems posed by the WW scale and allowed us to obtain useful information to guide the building of new items. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Estudios Sociológicos is the property of El Colegio de Mexico AC 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.)

Copyright of Revista Argentina de Clínica Psicológica is the property of Fundacion AIGLE 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.)

The article examines democracy and government in Argentina in the context of the democratic transition in 1983 and following the economic crisis in 2001, focusing on the governments of Néstor Kirchner and Cristina Fernández de Kirchner from 2003 to 2009. Economic policies and state intervention in the economy by both Kirchner administrations is discussed in their attempts to regulate markets and redistribute wealth.

This article analyses the inner workings of the Argentinian Frente Grande party at the height of its political and electoral development. It is based on the assumption that parties are not singular actors, but diverse organizations with complex internal operations. From that perspective, in order to identify the causes of both its rapid growth and current crisis, the article examines the distribution of power, styles of leadership and formal and informal rules of the Frente Grande. Starting from conceptual frameworks recently suggested in the literature, this article explains the Frente's institutionalization attempts and the resilience of its leadership. The article also considers the impact of the party's original organizational characteristics on its subsequent development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The processes involved in deductive reasoning have been studied by Cognitive Psychology since the seventies. Many hypotheses have been put forward to explain the difficulties in solving simple reasoning problems when considering their logical connectives, content and context of the tasks in which they are presented. These hypotheses have led to the development of different theories of reasoning like those based on the formal inference rules approach (Braine, 1978; Braine & O'Brien, 1991; Braine & Rumain, 1983; Rips, 1994), the Pragmatic Schemas Theory (Cheng & Holyoak, 1985) and the theory of semantic mental models (Johnson-Laird, 1983, Johnson-Laird & Byrne, 1991). The componential models of the Item Response Theory have allowed Psychometry to explain said these processes (Embretson, 1994). Thus, for instance, the Linear Logistic Latent Trait Model (LLTM) (Fischer, 1973, 1997), an extension of the Rasch model, expresses item difficulty as the sum of the effects due to the sources of difficulty predicted by the mentioned cognitive theories, which enables us to decide whether these effects are significant and estimate them. In other words, the Rasch item parameters βi are linearly decomposed in the form βi = p∑l=1 wilal+c (1) where p is the number of components considered, al -the basic parameters of the model, expresses the difficulty of each component l, wil is the weight of al with respect to the difficulty of the item i and c is an arbitrary normalization constant. Formula (1) implies that the application of the LLTM model makes sense only when the Rasch model fits the data. On the other hand, if the proposed components were sufficiently exhaustive to explain the differences between the items, formula (1) would allow us, once the basic parameters αl have been estimated, to recover estimates β̂i similar to those obtained directly by the application of the Rasch model, which would imply a high correlation between the parameters estimated under both models. The identification of the difficulty components and the estimate of their effects may be useful to generate items with preset difficulty parameters. This paper describes the process to find a subset of deductive reasoning items to which the LLTM model fits well. A set of 24 deductive reasoning items were designed and created considering the sources of difficulty predicted by cognitive theories and educational practice. The objective is to verify the suitability of such sources and to guide the construction of new items. Each item may consist of one, two or three premises and one conclusion. The individual must decide whether the conclusion is true or false. Nine items are made of concrete content, neutral to avoid any bias due beliefs or opinions, and the remaining ones have abstract or symbolic content. They were administered to a sample of 251 students of Psychology (Universidad de Buenos Aires - Argentina), composed of 24% males and 76% females, whose average age is 22.68 (DS = 6.35). Good fit for the Rasch model (p = .89) and for the LLTM model (p = .11) were obtained for 12 of them. The Wald z-values were not significant for the 12 items mentioned before. The linear correlation between the parameters estimated under both models was r = .99. Five components that turned out to be significant were considered. These components are listed in a decreasing level of difficulty: (a) affirmation of the consequent and negation of antecedent fallacies, (b) negation when affecting disjunction / conjunction, (c) abstract or symbolic content, (d) quantifiers and (e) conditionals. The two assumptions that refer to both, the item and subject parameter invariance, were checked. The results of this exploratory step encourage us to go on constructing new items taking into account the sources of difficulty that were found. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the study of differential item functioning (DIF), measuring its size is of great relevance. An easily interpreted measure is the Mantel-Haenszel Log Odds Ratio (MH-LOR): its sign shows the group which the item favors and its value is zero when the item does not show DIF. This research also considers a measure of DIF named LOR-IRT because it is linked to the log odds ratio and is formulated on the basis of the item parameters within the item response theory (IRT) framework. In order to study the similarity between the LOR-IRT measure according to the number of parameters of the adjusted model and MH-LOR, the DIF was analyzed through real data as well as non-DIF simulated data. The real data consists of a 20-item verbal reasoning test taken by 349 senior high school students and 865 sophomore students from the School of Psychology in the Uni versity of Buenos Aires. The simulated data includes answers to a 20-item test based on the three-parameter logistic model for two samples of 1,000 participants from a normal standard population. The parameters of the 20 items under study stem from the combination of four discrimination levels (0.4, 0.8, 1.2 and 1.6) and five difficulty levels (-2, -1, 0, 1 and 2). In order to replicate the conditions of the DIF analysis on the basis of real data, the value of the guessing parameter was set at 0.25 for all the items. Therefore, the chosen design was a 4 X 5 type with 100 repetitions. After analyzing the DIF of the verbal reasoning items on the basis of real data, we concluded that the LOR-IRT obtained upon the adjustment of the one-parameter logistic model (the Rasch model) led to results similar to those of MH-LOR. This statement holds true in the light of the following three facts: there is a 94.44% coincidence in the decisions about the presence of DIF, and both the lower sum of the squared differences and the higher correlation are obtained when compared with the results of the adjustment of the two or three-parameter model. The similarity between the corresponding standard errors is outstanding, the sum of the squared differences is almost zero, and the correlation is remarkably higher than that of the two or three-parameter logistic model. Considering that the verbal reasoning test presents four alternatives of which only one is correct, the items can be modeled according to the three-parameter logistic model, with a non-null guessing parameter. However, the LOR-IRT results are similar to those of MH-LOR in terms of magnitude and standard error when the one-parameter logistic model is adjusted. These results remained the same in the simulation study. In fact, the adjustment of the one-parameter logistic model led to LOR-IRT values which are, on average, similar to those of MH-LOR, and that both the lower sum of the squared differences and the higher correlation are obtained. As for the real data, the similarity between the corresponding standard errors is also outstanding. The sum of the squared differences is almost zero and the regression line is similar to the identity line when the Rasch model is adjusted. The purpose of future research will be to not only study similarities between LOR-IRT and MH-LOR on other designs in terms of test length, group sample size and impact presence, but also to assess their performance in the correct identification of items that show DIF. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]