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Making decisions to undergo Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) genetic testing can be challenging. It is important to understand how the perceptions of affected individuals might influence testing decision-making. Although evidence has shown that psychological factors are important in predicting testing decisions, affect-type variables have been largely ignored among well-established health theories. Using questionnaires, we examined genetic testing decision-making among 444 parents of children with ASD in Taiwan. The largest predictor of intention was anxiety (ß = 0.46, p<0.0001) followed by fear/guilt (ß = -0.041, p<0.000). Attitudes did not predict intention. Affect-type variables should be considered in genetic testing decision making theory, research, and practice.

We examine the performance of financial holding companies ( FHCs) in Taiwan after the financial reform that removes the separation of banking, securities, insurance, and other financial services. Using data envelopment analysis, we find that FHCs fail to improve technical efficiencies in the post-reform era. They also do not outperform independent commercial banks after the financial reform. Lower technical efficiency caused by excess operating expenses appears to be the primary source of inefficiency. While scale efficiency may improve as FHCs grow larger, the benefits are marginal and insufficient to offset the potential costs of organizational diseconomies. Our findings suggest that increasing the size and scope of financial activities alone do not necessarily improve the performance of financial firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The muddy area along the Zhejiang coast contains a record of historical environmental conditions and can facilitate a better understanding of the linkages among terrestrial sediment fluxes, littoral sediment dynamics, and climate change. However, the origin and transport of the sediments in this muddy area has been open to debate. We present a detailed environmental magnetic study with high-density sampling to provide magnetic evidence for the input and transport of the materials in this region. Our results show that magnetic minerals in the sediments are generally dominated by magnetite and titanomagnetite with minor amounts of maghemite and hematite. The magnetic minerals are mainly pseudo-single domain (PSD) particles, and decrease in concentration seawards. Based on the coastal current flow and magnetic characteristics, we argue that the sediments in this area are mainly derived from the Changjiang River, the mountainous rivers in the surrounding islands, and erosion by coastal currents. Notably, the increase in sediment input from small mountainous rivers and coastal erosion in the Zhejiang coastal area is primarily associated with decreased sediment discharge from the Changjiang River. However, there is no evidence of the accumulation of Taiwan-derived sediment in this area. • Magnetite, titanomagnetite, maghemite and hematite are local main magnetic minerals. • The magnetic zoning is interpreted to result from the interaction of sediment transport pattern and dynamic environments. • No evidence is present of Taiwan-derived sediment accumulating in the study area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The present study evaluated the applicability of the sentence-focused framework to Mandarin-speaking children with cochlear implants (CIs) by examining the relative contribution of receptive/expressive noun and verb lexicon sizes to later grammatical complexity., Method: Participants were 51 Mandarin-speaking children who received cochlear implantation before 30 months of age. At 12 months after CI activation, parents were asked to endorse words that their child could understand only or understand and say using the infant version of the Early Vocabulary Inventory. At 24 months after CI activation, parents were asked to endorse the grammatical structures that their children were able to say using the Grammatical Complexity subtest in the Mandarin Communicative Development Inventory-Taiwan. Children's receptive/expressive noun and verb lexicon sizes and grammatical complexity scores were computed from these parent checklists., Results: Correlational analyses showed that children's receptive/expressive noun and verb lexicon sizes at 12 months after CI activation were all highly correlated with their grammatical complexity scores at 24 months after CI activation (ρs = .52-.63, p s < .001). Regression analyses further revealed that verb lexicon sizes at 12 months after CI activation outweighed noun lexicon sizes in accounting for grammatical complexity at 24 months after CI activation., Conclusions: Our findings supported the prediction of the sentence-focused framework. Emphasizing the role of verbs in early intervention has the potential to enhance grammatical outcomes in Mandarin-speaking children with CIs., Supplemental Material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.26129044.