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The usefulness of mean aggregates in the analysis of intervention effectiveness is a matter of considerable debate in the psychological, educational, and social sciences. In addition to studying "average treatment effects," the evaluation of "distributional treatment effects," (i.e., effects that go beyond means), has been suggested to obtain a broader picture of how an intervention affects the study outcome. We continue this discussion by considering distributional causal effects. We present formal definitions of causal effects that go beyond means and utilize a distributional regression framework known as generalized additive models for location, scale, and shape (GAMLSS). GAMLSS allows one to characterize an intervention effect in its totality through simultaneously modeling means, variances, skewnesses, kurtoses, as well as ceiling and floor effects of outcome distributions. Based on data from a large-scale randomized controlled trial, we use GAMLSS to evaluate the impact of a teacher classroom management program on student academic performance. Results suggest the teacher classroom management training increased mean academic competence as well as the chance to obtain the maximum score on the academic competence scale. These effects would have been completely overlooked in a traditional evaluation of mean aggregates. The evaluation of intervention effectiveness is dominated by an "averagarian" view; that is, for an intervention to be deemed successful, the effect must manifest in changes in averages of outcome distributions. In randomized controlled trials and in the absence of postrandomization disturbances, however, not only outcome means, but any parameter of the outcome distribution (variances, skewnesses, kurtoses, and even the chance for ceiling and floor effects) will, at study baseline, be the same across study groups. As a consequence, any distributional difference in the posttreatment measures can be attributed to the intervention and is, therefore, informative to describe an intervention effect in its totality. The present study introduces the concept of distributional treatment effects (DTEs) and proposes, in addition to standard mean modeling, using distributional regression techniques to evaluate intervention effects. The benefits of this distributional perspective are illustrated using data from a large-scale randomized controlled trial that evaluates the impact of a teacher classroom management program on student academic performance. Distributional regression uncovered treatment effects that manifested in outcome means and at the upper end of the response scale (i.e., in increased ceiling effects), whereas a traditional evaluation of outcome means would have missed both treatment effects. Thus, distributional modeling enriches the standard statistical toolbox in the task of characterizing intervention effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Early adolescence represents a critical developmental period for the identification, prevention, and early intervention of mental health concerns. The Early Identification System--Student Report (EIS-SR) was developed as a user-friendly, accessible, and cost-efficient method for identifying youth at risk for mental health concerns. The present study examined the psychometric properties of the EIS-SR in a sample of middle school students in the Midwest. Two confirmatory factor analyses (N1 = 2,404, N2 = 2,404) supported the hypothesized seven correlated factor model showing adequate model fit and subscale reliability (range = 0.68-0.90). Subsequent analyses found that many of the EIS-SR subscales predicted office discipline referrals, suspensions, and standardized academic achievement performance. Additionally, the subscales correlated in expected ways with subscales of the Behavior Assessment Scales for Children (3rd edition). These findings suggest that the EIS-SR is promising for identifying youth in early adolescence who are at risk for mental health concerns in addition to being a free and efficient universal screening tool.

Teachers readily welcome instructional materials that situate mathematics in the real world because they provide the relevance of mathematics to students who genuinely seek the answer to the question, "When are we ever going to use math in real life?" Although using the real world as a motivational hook is often effective for engagement, a number of scholars point to a more conceptual purpose as well: the potential of the real world to support students in making sense of abstract mathematical ideas by connecting to their existing knowledge of the world around them (e.g., Freudenthal 1991; Lesh and Lehrer 2003). It is this point that the authors wish to explore in this article, that real-world contexts can play an expanded, conceptual role in mathematics learning. The authors contend that certain contexts can serve not only as hooks but also as anchors that ground students' reasoning in contextual experiences and continue to support the transition to abstract reasoning. The authors use the work of several middle school teachers who use realistic contexts as both hooks and anchors to illuminate three characteristics of real-world contexts: (1) to support the transition from concrete to abstract reasoning; (2) to engage students in conceptual mathematical discourse; and (3) to capitalize on real-world and experientially real-world situations.

Direction dependence analysis (DDA) is a recently developed method that addresses the need for more sophisticated tools to evaluate causal mechanisms of developmental processes and interventions. The present study applied DDA to evaluate the hypothesized mediators of a classroom behavior management training program on student academic competence. The study involved a group randomized controlled trial with 105 teachers and 1,818 students (K-3rd grade) in a large urban school district in the United States. Analyses revealed only student prosocial skill development causally mediated the intervention's effects on student academic competence. The findings support the importance of explicit instruction and coaching of student social skills as part of classroom behavior management programs and confirm the causal link between prosocial skills and academic success. The findings are discussed with regard to implications for future applications of DDA in developmental research.

The purpose of this study was to examine the treatment effects of the Incredible Years Teacher Classroom Management (IY TCM), a universal classroom management intervention, on the outcomes of children with aggressive behavior in elementary school. Classroom management has been demonstrated as a factor in either escalating children's aggressive behavior or decreasing those problematic behaviors. Participants included 1,817 students (Grade K to 3) and 105 teachers from nine elementary schools in a large urban Midwestern school district. Teachers were randomly assigned to receive IY TCM or to a wait-list comparison group. The hypotheses were that baseline levels of aggression would moderate the relationship between intervention status and outcomes. Findings indicated the hypothesized moderation effect on several outcome variables; specifically, children with baseline aggression problems who were in IY TCM classrooms had significantly improved math achievement, emotional regulation, prosocial behaviors, and observed aggression in comparison to similar peers in the control classrooms. Implications for practice and future research based on the findings are discussed.

Seismic ground-motion data provide valuable constraints on explosion characteristics, such as yield and height-of-burst/depth-of-burial (HOB/DOB). This study investigated a range of seismic amplitude features and their efficacy in minimizing errors associated with yield estimation. Using a set of explosion recordings from experiments conducted in alluvium and sedimentary rock geologies, we investigated the effectiveness of three different seismic feature types over a range of different frequencies. Using both velocity and displacement data, we investigated the zero-to-peak (ZTP) amplitude of the first arriving P wave, the peak-to-peak (PTP) amplitude of the first arriving P wave, and the Prms amplitude over various time windows starting with the P wave. These three basic features were measured on both vertical component only data and the vertical–radial vector sum. In total, there were 56 different combinations investigated. Our seismic models combine the effects of scaled range and scaled HOB/DOB on the observed seismic features. The results show that the vertical–radial vector sum of the ZTP amplitudes measured on displacement seismograms most consistently produce models with the smallest difference between predicted amplitude values and observed amplitude values when accounting for both alluvium and sedimentary rock lithology. The improvement in fit to the data when incorporating the difference in source lithology is significant. If an alluvium lithology is assumed for a sedimentary rock lithology, the difference in yield could be up to ∼3.0 times the appropriate yield in the far field.

To develop a catalog of regulatory sites in two major model organisms, Drosophila melanogaster and Caenorhabditis elegans, the modERN (model organism Encyclopedia of Regulatory Networks) consortium has systematically assayed the binding sites of transcription factors (TFs). Combined with data produced by our predecessor, modENCODE (Model Organism ENCyclopedia Of DNA Elements), we now have data for 262 TFs identifying 1.23 M sites in the fly genome and 217 TFs identifying 0.67 M sites in the worm genome. Because sites from different TFs are often overlapping and tightly clustered, they fall into 91,011 and 59,150 regions in the fly and worm, respectively, and these binding sites span as little as 8.7 and 5.8 Mb in the two organisms. Clusters with large numbers of sites (so-called high occupancy target, or HOT regions) predominantly associate with broadly expressed genes, whereas clusters containing sites from just a few factors are associated with genes expressed in tissue-specific patterns. All of the strains expressing GFP-tagged TFs are available at the stock centers, and the chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing data are available through the ENCODE Data Coordinating Center and also through a simple interface (http://epic.gs.washington.edu/modERN/) that facilitates rapid accessibility of processed data sets. These data will facilitate a vast number of scientific inquiries into the function of individual TFs in key developmental, metabolic, and defense and homeostatic regulatory pathways, as well as provide a broader perspective on how individual TFs work together in local networks and globally across the life spans of these two key model organisms.

Literature suggests that improving teacher use of culturally responsive classroom management strategies may reduce the disproportionate number of racial and ethnic minority students who receive exclusionary discipline actions and are identified as needing special education, particularly for emotional and behavioral disorders. Coaching teachers is one way to support teachers' development of such culturally responsive classroom management strategies; however, there is limited research on the implementation and teacher-perceived acceptability of coaching, both broadly and for this specific skill set. In this article, we focus on the adaptation of the Classroom Check-Up (CCU) coaching model for addressing culturally responsive classroom management strategies; we discuss issues related to the implementation dosage, fidelity, feasibility, and acceptability of the CCU model. Specifically, data from 146 coached teachers are included and summarize how coaches spent their time, the fidelity to the coaching model, and acceptability and feasibility of the CCU model. Findings indicated that the CCU required about 3 hours of active teacher participation. Coaches spent a substantial amount of time collecting data in the classroom as well as building relationships and trust within the schools to facilitate uptake. The results suggested that coaches implemented the model as intended and that the time required of teachers is relatively modest. Teachers provided positive feedback about four domains of the coaching, indicating the acceptability and feasibility of this adapted version of the CCU.

Measures that can be used to identify malleable, dynamic indicators of teacher practices that lead to or are associated with student outcomes are needed to inform classroom interventions and consultation practices with teachers. The purpose of this study was to evaluate and validate the Brief Student-Teacher Classroom Interaction Observation in elementary classrooms (Grades K-3). A universal sample of 896 students was observed during classroom instruction. The measure was utilized to gather information on how teachers interacted with students with regard to their use of positive versus negative feedback during a 5-min window at the start of the school year. Findings indicate that students who received more negative feedback than positive feedback from their teacher were rated at the end of the year as having a significant increase in problems with emotion regulation, concentration problems, and observed disruptive behavior, whereas students who received more positive feedback demonstrated significant increases in prosocial behaviors. Implications for how this brief 5-min observation can be used to inform teacher practice and identify students at the start of the year in need of additional supports are discussed.

Background/aimsThe generic quality of life KINDL-R -questionnaire is validated for use in children/adolescents ≤16 years. The aim of this cross-sectional investigation was to modify the KINDL-R questionnaire for use in adults and to validate its psychometric properties.MethodsFive items of the KINDL-R questionnaire were adapted and the newly developed KINDL-A(dult) questionnaire administered to 255 patients with hereditary and acquired bleeding disorders (mean age 53 years). Its internal consistency and convergent and divergent construct validity were investigated and confirmatory factor analysis was used to evaluate the latent factor structure.ResultsThe KINDL-A questionnaire showed satisfactory reliability, varying construct validity, but inconclusive factor structure. The KINDL-AB(rief) was developed by removing half of the items and combining 2 sub-axes. This led to factor loadings between 0.62 and 0.91 and increased overall fit (Goodness of fit > 0.8 and Root Mean Square Error of Approximation, RMSEA, < 0.08). Results were validated in 966 healthy blood donors (mean age 38 years). In this group, the KINDL-AB questionnaire showed factor loadings between 0.43 and 0.77, Goodness of fit > 0.95 and RMSEA < 0.05.ConclusionsThe new KINDL-AB suggests sufficient to good psychometric properties in adult patients with hereditary and acquired bleeding disorders.

Mn doping of group-IV semiconductors (Si/Ge) is achieved by embedding nanostructured Mn-layers in group-IV matrix. The Mn-nanostructures are monoatomic Mn-wires or Mn-clusters and capped with an amorphous Si or Ge layer. The precise fabrication of δ-doped Mn-layers is combined with element-specific detection of the magnetic signature with x-ray magnetic circular dichroism. The largest moment (2.5 μB/Mn) is measured for Mn-wires with ionic bonding character and a-Ge overlayer cap; a-Si capping reduces the moment due to variations of bonding in agreement with theoretical predictions. The moments in δ-doped layers dominated by clusters is quenched with an antiferromagnetic component from Mn-Mn bonding.

Gas-puff imaging techniques are employed to determine the far SOL region radial electric field and the plasma potential in ICRF heated discharges in the Alcator C-Mod tokamak. The twodimensional velocity fields of the turbulent structures, which are advected by RF-induced E × B flows, are obtained via the time-delay estimation (TDE) techniques. Both the magnitude and radial extension of the radial electric field Er are observed to increase with the toroidal magnetic field strength Bj and the ICRF power. In particular, the RF-induced Er extends from the vicinity of the ICRF antenna to the separatrix when Bj = 7.9 T and PICRF ≳ 1 MW. In addition, low-Z impurity seeding near the antenna is found to substantially reduce the sheath potential associated with ICRF power. The TDE techniques have also been used to revisit and estimate ICRFinduced potentials in different antenna configurations: (1) conventional toroidally aligned (TA) antenna versus field-aligned (FA) antenna; (2) FA monopole versus FA dipole. It shows that FA and TA antennas produce similar magnitude of plasma potentials, and the FA monopole induced greater potential than the FA dipole phasing. The TDE estimations of RF-induced plasma potentials are consistent with previous results based on the poloidal phase velocity.

The National Spherical Torus Experiment (NSTX) has undergone a major upgrade, and the NSTX Upgrade (NSTX-U) Project was completed in the summer of 2015. NSTX-U first plasma was subsequently achieved, diagnostic and control systems have been commissioned, the H-mode accessed, magnetic error fields identified and mitigated, and the first physics research campaign carried out. During ten run weeks of operation, NSTX-U surpassed NSTX record pulse-durations and toroidal fields (TF), and high-performance ∼1 MA H-mode plasmas comparable to the best of NSTX have been sustained near and slightly above the n = 1 no-wall stability limit and with H-mode confinement multiplier H98y,2 above 1. Transport and turbulence studies in L-mode plasmas have identified the coexistence of at least two ion-gyro-scale turbulent micro-instabilities near the same radial location but propagating in opposite (i.e. ion and electron diamagnetic) directions. These modes have the characteristics of ion-temperature gradient and micro-tearing modes, respectively, and the role of these modes in contributing to thermal transport is under active investigation. The new second more tangential neutral beam injection was observed to significantly modify the stability of two types of Alfven eigenmodes. Improvements in offline disruption forecasting were made in the areas of identification of rotating MHD modes and other macroscopic instabilities using the disruption event characterization and forecasting code. Lastly, the materials analysis and particle probe was utilized on NSTX-U for the first time and enabled assessments of the correlation between boronized wall conditions and plasma performance. These and other highlights from the first run campaign of NSTX-U are described.

More than half of all sarcomas occur in adolescents and young adults (AYAs) aged 15 to 39 years. After the publication of the AYA series in the April 1, 2016 issue of Cancer, several leaders in the field of sarcoma across disciplines gathered to discuss the status of sarcoma clinical research in AYAs. They determined that a focused effort to include the underrepresented and understudied AYA population in current and future sarcoma clinical trials is overdue. Trial enrichment for AYA-aged sarcoma patients will produce more meaningful results that better represent the disease's biology, epidemiology, and treatment environment. To address the current deficit, this commentary outlines changes believed to be necessary to expediently achieve an increase in the enrollment of AYAs in sarcoma clinical trials. Cancer 2017;123:3434-40. © 2017 American Cancer Society.

Modifications of the drift-kinetic transport code XGC0 to include the transport, ionization, and recombination of individual charge states, as well as the associated radiation, are described. The code is first applied to a simulation of an NSTX H-mode discharge with carbon impurity to demonstrate the approach to coronal equilibrium. The effects of neoclassical phenomena on the radiated power profile are examined sequentially through the activation of individual physics modules in the code. Orbit squeezing and the neoclassical inward pinch result in increased radiation for temperatures above a few hundred eV and changes to the ratios of charge state emissions at a given electron temperature. Analogous simulations with a neon impurity yield qualitatively similar results.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a heterogeneous disease and a leading cause of mortality and morbidity worldwide. The aim of this study was to investigate the sex dependency of circulating metabolic profiles in COPD.Serum from healthy never-smokers (healthy), smokers with normal lung function (smokers), and smokers with COPD (COPD; Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease stages I-II/A-B) from the Karolinska COSMIC cohort (n=116) was analysed using our nontargeted liquid chromatography-high resolution mass spectrometry metabolomics platform.Pathway analyses revealed that several altered metabolites are involved in oxidative stress. Supervised multivariate modelling showed significant classification of smokers from COPD (p=2.8×10-7). Sex stratification indicated that the separation was driven by females (p=2.4×10-7) relative to males (p=4.0×10-4). Significantly altered metabolites were confirmed quantitatively using targeted metabolomics. Multivariate modelling of targeted metabolomics data confirmed enhanced metabolic dysregulation in females with COPD (p=3.0×10-3) relative to males (p=0.10). The autotaxin products lysoPA (16:0) and lysoPA (18:2) correlated with lung function (forced expiratory volume in 1 s) in males with COPD (r=0.86; p

Background and objectivesFamily members and friends of patients with advanced chronic illness are increasingly called on to assist with ever more complex medical care and treatment decisions arising late in the course of illness. Our goal was to learn about the experiences of family members and friends of patients with advanced kidney disease.Design, setting, participants, & measurementsAs part of a study intended to identify opportunities to enhance advance care planning, we conducted semistructured interviews at the Veterans Affairs Puget Sound Health Care System with 17 family members and friends of patients with advanced kidney disease. Interviews were conducted between April of 2014 and May of 2016 and were audiotaped, transcribed, and analyzed inductively using grounded theory to identify emergent themes.ResultsThe following three themes emerged from interviews with patients' family members and friends: (1) their roles in care and planning were fluid over the course of the patient's illness, shaped by the patients' changing needs and their readiness to involve those close to them; (2) their involvement in patients' care was strongly shaped by health care system needs. Family and friends described filling gaps left by the health care system and how their involvement in care and decision-making was at times constrained and at other times expected by providers, depending on system needs; and (3) they described multiple sources of tension and conflict in their interactions with patients and the health care system, including instances of being pitted against the patient.ConclusionsInterviews with family members and friends of patients with advanced kidney disease provide a window on the complex dynamics shaping their engagement in patients' care, and highlight the potential value of offering opportunities for engagement throughout the course of illness.

Knowing where, when, and how much rice is planted and harvested is crucial information for understanding the effects of policy, trade, and global and technological change on food security. We developed RiceAtlas, a spatial database on the seasonal distribution of the world's rice production. It consists of data on rice planting and harvesting dates by growing season and estimates of monthly production for all rice-producing countries. Sources used for planting and harvesting dates include global and regional databases, national publications, online reports, and expert knowledge. Monthly production data were estimated based on annual or seasonal production statistics, and planting and harvesting dates. RiceAtlas has 2,725 spatial units. Compared with available global crop calendars, RiceAtlas is nearly ten times more spatially detailed and has nearly seven times more spatial units, with at least two seasons of calendar data, making RiceAtlas the most comprehensive and detailed spatial database on rice calendar and production.

Multicellular organisms are composed of tissues that have distinct functions requiring specialized proteomes. To define the proteome of a live animal with tissue and subcellular resolution, we adapted a localized proteomics technology for use in the multicellular model organism Caenorhabditis elegans. This approach couples tissue- and location-specific expression of the enzyme ascorbate peroxidase (APX), which enables proximity-based protein labeling in vivo, and quantitative proteomics to identify tissue- and subcellular-restricted proteomes. We identified and localized more than 3000 proteins from strains of C. elegans expressing APX in either the nucleus or cytoplasm of the intestine, epidermis, body wall muscle, or pharyngeal muscle. We also identified several hundred proteins that were specifically localized to one of the four tissues analyzed or specifically localized to the cytoplasm or the nucleus. This approach resulted in the identification both of proteins with previously characterized localizations and of those not known to localize to the nucleus or cytoplasm. Further, we confirmed the tissue- and subcellular-specific localization of a subset of identified proteins using green fluorescent protein tagging and fluorescence microscopy, validating our in vivo proximity-based proteomics technique. Together, these results demonstrate a new approach that enables the tissue- and subcellular-specific identification and quantification of proteins within a live animal.

This study compared 5 scoring methods in terms of their statistical assumptions. They were then used to score the Teacher Observation of Classroom Adaptation Checklist, a measure consisting of 3 subscales and 21 Likert-type items. The 5 methods used were (a) sum/average scores of items,(b) latent factor scores with continuous indicators, (c) latent factor scores with ordered categorical indicators using the mean- and variance-adjusted weighted least squares estimation method,(d) latent factor scores with ordered categorical indicators using the full information maximum likelihood estimation method, and (e) multidimensional graded response model using the Bock-Aitkin expectation-maximization estimation procedure. Measurement invariance between gender groups and between free/reduced-price lunch status groups was evaluated with the second, third, fourth, and fifth methods. Group mean differences based on the 5 methods were calculated and compared. [This article was published in "Journal of Experimental Education" (EJ1044746).]