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The issue of Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic (WEIRD) samples dominating research has been ongoing for decades, and now the emerging trend is to turn to theoretical perspectives from the Majority World. Adopting Western-centric methods based on reductionism can overlook important details and differences between similar cultures, particularly in East Asian cultures, where the Confucian values of relational harmony take many forms. We discuss a novel theoretical perspective on moral constitutions in Confucian heritage cultures. Our central tenet is that divergent moral concepts and ideals are present in Confucian cultures because each culture emphasizes a specific pillar and the self is situated differently in the social relationships that define the scope of interpersonal moral obligations. We consider three Confucian countries: China, Japan, and South Korea as examples. Despite geographical proximity and conventional categorization in cultural psychology, each Confucian country manifests distinct patterns of the self, moral ideals, and behavior in socio-moral contexts. To understand how and why moral worldviews vary within a region, we need to examine how the self in socio-cultural contexts differs and guides interpersonal norms and behaviors across sociocultural contexts. We conclude this paper by offering methodological recommendations for including indigenous moral concepts outside the WEIRD context.

Background: Awe, a complex emotion, arises in response to perceptually and conceptually vast stimuli that transcend one’s current frames of reference, which is associated with subjective psychological phenomena, such as a sense of self and consciousness. This study aimed to develop a Japanese version of the Awe Experience Scale (AWE-S), a widely used questionnaire that robustly measured the state of awe, and simultaneously investigated how the multiple facets of awe related to the narrative representations of awe experiences. Methods: The Japanese AWE-S was created via back-translation and its factor structure and validity was investigated through an online survey in Japan. Results: The results revealed that the Japanese AWE-S consisted of the same six factors as the original (i.e., time, self-loss, connectedness, vastness, physiological, and accommodation) and had sufficient internal consistency, test-retest reliability, construct validity, and also Japan-specific characteristics. The structured topic modeling generated seven potential topics of the descriptions of awe experiences, which were differently associated with each factor of the Japanese AWE-S. Conclusions: Our findings contribute to a deeper understanding of awe and reveal the constructs of awe in Japan through cross-cultural comparisons. Furthermore, this study provides conceptual and methodological implications regarding studies on awe.

Background Chronic kidney disease (CKD) might influence fractional flow reserve (FFR) value, potentially attenuating its prognostic utility. However, few large‐scale data are available regarding clinical outcomes after FFR‐guided deferral of revascularization in patients with CKD. Methods and Results From the J‐CONFIRM registry (Long‐Term Outcomes of Japanese Patients With Deferral of Coronary Intervention Based on Fractional Flow Reserve in Multicenter Registry), 1218 patients were divided into 3 groups according to renal function: (1) non‐CKD (estimated glomerular filtration rate ≥60 mL/min per 1.73 m2), n=385; (2) CKD (estimated glomerular filtration rate 15–59 mL/min per 1.73 m2, n=763); and (3) end‐stage renal disease (ESRD) (eGFR

Background Cardiac death or myocardial infarction still occurs in patients undergoing contemporary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). We aimed to identify adverse clinical and vessel characteristics related to hard outcomes after PCI and to investigate their individual and combined prognostic implications. Methods and Results From an individual patient data meta‐analysis of 17 cohorts of patients who underwent post‐PCI fractional flow reserve measurement after drug‐eluting stent implantation, 2081 patients with available clinical and vessel characteristics were analyzed. The primary outcome was cardiac death or target‐vessel myocardial infarction at 2 years. The mean age of patients was 64.2±10.2 years, and the mean angiographic percent diameter stenosis was 63.9%±14.3%. Among 11 clinical and 8 vessel features, 4 adverse clinical characteristics (age ≥65 years, diabetes, chronic kidney disease, and left ventricular ejection fraction

Joint go and no-go effects (joint Simon effects; JSEs) are considered to have a stimulus–response compatibility effect on joint reaction time tasks (joint Simon task) caused by the presence of other people. Additionally, JSEs are known to be associated with various social factors and are therefore a potential clinical marker for communicative function; however, the relationship with the personality that is associated with communication skills remains unclear. In this study, we focused on the association between JSE and personality traits. Thirty Japanese participants (fifteen women) were recruited. First, personality trait scores were obtained using the Japanese version of the ten-item personality inventory before the experiment. Second, we measured reaction times in the joint Simon task and single go and no-go tasks with the go signal presented on the congruent and incongruent sides. At last, we analyzed the association between reaction times and personality traits by using Spearman’s correlation analysis. As a result, we observed two pairs with significant correlations: JSE and neuroticism and short reaction times in the joint condition and agreeableness. In conclusion, we identified potential psychological markers associated with the joint Simon task. These findings may lead to an additional hypothesis regarding the neurobiological mechanisms of JSEs.

Background: In the resting conditions, narrowing the window of coronary pressure measurements from the whole cardiac cycle to diastole improves diagnostic performance of coronary pressure–derived physiological index. However, whether this also applies to the hyperemic conditions has not yet been thoroughly evaluated. Objectives: The purpose of this study was to assess whether diastolic fractional flow reserve (diastolic FFR) has better diagnostic performance in identifying ischemia-causing coronary lesions than conventional FFR in a prospective, multicenter, and independent core laboratory–based environment. Methods: In this prospective multicenter registry at 29 Japanese centers, we compared the diagnostic performance of FFR, diastolic FFR, resting distal to aortic coronary pressure (Pd/Pa), and diastolic pressure ratio (dPR) using myocardial perfusion scintigraphy (MPS) as the reference standard in 378 patients with single-vessel coronary disease. Results: Inducible myocardial ischemia was found on MPS in the relevant myocardial territory of the target vessel in 85 patients (22%). In the receiver-operating curve analyses, diastolic FFR had comparable area under the curve (AUC) compared with FFR (AUCdiastolic FFR: 0.66; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.58-0.73, vs AUCFFR: 0.66; 95% CI: 0.58-0.74, P = 0.624). FFR and diastolic FFR showed significantly larger AUCs than resting Pd/Pa (0.62; 95% CI: 0.54-0.70; P = 0.033 and P = 0.046) but did not show significantly larger AUCs than dPR (0.62; 95% CI: 0.55-0.70; P = 0.102 and P = 0.113). Conclusions: Diastolic FFR showed a similar diagnostic performance to FFR as compared with MPS. This result reaffirms the use of FFR as the most accurate invasive physiological lesion assessment. (Diagnostic accuracy of diastolic fractional flow reserve (d-FFR) for functional evaluation of coronary stenosis; UMIN000015906)

Moral psychology is a domain that deals with moral identity, appraisals and emotions. Previous work has primarily focused on moral development and the associated role of culture. Knowing that language is an inherent element of a culture, we used the social media platform Twitter to compare moral behaviors of Japanese tweets with English tweets. The five basic moral foundations, i.e., Care, Fairness, Ingroup, Authority, and Purity, along with the associated emotional valence were compared between English and Japanese tweets. The tweets from Japanese users depicted relatively higher Fairness, Ingroup, and Purity, whereas English tweets expressed more positive emotions for all moral dimensions. Considering moral similarities in connecting users on social media, we quantified homophily concerning different moral dimensions using our proposed method. The moral dimensions Care, Authority, and Purity for English and Ingroup, Authority and Purity for Japanese depicted homophily on Twitter. Overall, our study uncovers the underlying cultural differences with respect to moral behavior in English- and Japanese-speaking users.

Moral appraisals are found to be associated with a person’s individual differences (e.g., political ideology), and the effects of individual differences on language use have been studied within the framework of the Moral Foundations Theory (MFT). However, the relationship between one’s moral concern and the use of language involving morality on social media is not self-evident. The present exploratory study investigated that relationship using the MFT. Participants’ tweets and self-reported responses to the questionnaire were collected to measure the degree of their appraisals according to the five foundations of the MFT. The Japanese version of the Moral Foundations Dictionary (J-MFD) was used to quantify the number of words in tweets relevant to the MFT’s five moral foundations. The results showed that endorsement of the Fairness and Authority foundations predicted the word frequency in the J-MFD across all five foundations. The findings suggest that the trade-off relationship between the Fairness and Authority foundations plays a key role in online language communication. The implications and future directions to scrutinize that foundation are discussed.

The moral foundations theory (MFT) proposes that there are five moral foundations that work as the standard to make moral judgments. Among them, the purity foundation is a complex concept. It is considered to be a distinctive foundation compared with the other ones partly because it involves religious beliefs. The assumption underlying the purity foundation is Christian beliefs, so the MFT was developed and made prevalent mostly in the Western cultures. However, because of that assumption, cultural differences in perceiving the purity foundation should be observed with a non-Western sample, such as Japan. It would be important to discuss and clarify the Japanese unique aspect of their orientation toward the pure and impure. We constituted a scale to measure people's tendency toward purity orientation–pollution avoidance (POPA), based on the purity/sanctity subscale of the MFT. For validation, we administered several scales along with POPA. In Study 1, we developed the scale and measured the relationship between the degree of one's POPA, disgust, and animism. We identified four factors as POPA subscales. In Study 2, we investigated the test–retest reliability of POPA and conducted questionnaire surveys to measure attitudes toward paranormal phenomena and the degree of concern for each of the moral foundations. The results showed the validity of the scale, based on the moderate correlations with other scales. The POPA can be a promising tool to better understand the phenomena involving the purity foundation in a Japanese context.

The Moral Foundations Dictionary (MFD) is a useful tool for applying the conceptual framework developed in Moral Foundations Theory and quantifying the moral meanings implicated in the linguistic information people convey. However, the applicability of the MFD is limited because it is available only in English. Translated versions of the MFD are therefore needed to study morality across various cultures, including non-Western cultures. The contribution of this paper is two-fold. We developed the first Japanese version of the MFD (referred to as the J-MFD) using a semi-automated method-this serves as a reference when translating the MFD into other languages. We next tested the validity of the J-MFD by analyzing open-ended written texts about the situations that Japanese participants thought followed and violated the five moral foundations. We found that the J-MFD correctly categorized the Japanese participants' descriptions into the corresponding moral foundations, and that the Moral Foundations Questionnaire (MFQ) scores correlated with the frequency of situations, of total words, and of J-MFD words in the participants' descriptions for the Harm and Fairness foundations. The J-MFD can be used to study morality unique to the Japanese and also multicultural comparisons in moral behavior.

The numerical analysis on the flight stability of the underwater projectiles are performed using computational fluid dynamics code which consists of gas/liquid phases analysis, 2D calculation method. The nose shape effect on the underwater flight stability is conducted. The ogival nose, the flat nose and the spike nose are used for the nose shapes. The static stability is determined by the direction of pressure on the projectile. The pressure on the flat nose makes projectile stable, although pressure on the ogival nose and the horizontal area of flat nose makes projectile unstable. The spike nose is statically unstable, however it is possible to increase the flight stability by changing the spike radius and the spike length. When the part of projectile gets out of the bubble and contacts with water, the water pressure acts as restoring force, which lead to improve the flight stability. This phenomenon is called ‘Tail slapping effect’. Tail slapping effect works most effectively when only backward of the center of gravity of the projectile contacts with water. The Effects is canceled as the angle of attack increases and the front of the projectile contacts with water. As a result, the improvement of stability due to the tail slapping effect is limited.

The involvement of cholesterol crystals (CCs) in plaque progression and destabilization of atherosclerotic plaques has been recently recognized. This study aimed to evaluate the association between the intraplaque localization of CCs and plaque vulnerability.We investigated 55 acute coronary syndrome (ACS) and 80 stable angina pectoris (stable AP) lesions using optical frequency domain imaging (OFDI) prior to percutaneous coronary intervention. The distance between CCs and the luminal surface of coronary plaques was defined as CC depth.Although the incidence of CCs had similar frequencies in the ACS and stable AP groups (95% vs. 89%, p = 0.25), CC depth was significantly less in patients with ACS than in those with stable AP (median [25th to 75th percentile]: 68 μm [58 to 92 μm] vs. 152 μm [115 to 218 μm]; p < 0.001). The incidences of plaque rupture, thrombus, lipid-rich plaques, and thin-cap fibroatheroma were significantly greater in patients with ACS than in those with stable AP (62% vs. 18%, p < 0.001; 67% vs. 16%, p < 0.001; 84% vs. 57%, p < 0.01; and 56% vs. 19%, p < 0.001, respectively).OFDI analysis revealed that CCs were found in the more superficial layers within the coronary atherosclerotic plaques in patients with ACS than in those with stable AP, suggesting that CC depth is associated with plaque vulnerability. CC depth, a novel OFDI-derived parameter, could be potentially used as an alternative means of evaluating plaque vulnerability in coronary arteries.

Although narcissism has long been researched in relation to anger, previous research examined narcissistic anger toward negative feedback that had already occurred. In this study, we investigated the effects of anticipation of evaluation (present vs. absent) and negative feedback (present vs. absent), using a creativity task paradigm, on state anger scores among 231 U.S. undergraduates (76% White, 60% women). We also measured undergraduates’ narcissistic tendencies and impressions of the creativity task. Multiple regression analyses revealed a significant interaction between narcissism and negative feedback on total anger scores, with narcissists responding with more anger than non-narcissists in the condition of negative feedback. We also found a significant two-way interaction between narcissism and anticipation of evaluation on total enjoyment scores. Anticipation of feedback inhibited narcissist-prone individuals from enjoying the task in the anticipation condition, but this pattern was not present in the no-anticipation condition. Implications and recommendations to better understand the nature of narcissism are discussed.

We investigate spinning detonations propagating in a square tube using numerical simulations based on three-dimensional compressible Euler equations and the two-step-reaction model proposed by Korobeinikov et al. The dynamics of the simulation results is used to understand how spinning detonations propagate. The track angles calculated from soot-track images of the square-tube walls are numerically reproduced for various initial pressures and channel length. The results show that the numerically obtained track angles are consistent with those of the previous reports. The spinning detonation maintains its propagation when the rotating transverse detonation completely consumes any unburned gas. Transverse detonation is important for the propagation of spinning detonations. We also discuss acoustic coupling between the transverse detonation and the acoustic wave that propagates along the wall. The rotating transverse detonation propagates with successive reflections off the walls, and acoustic waves are generated at the reflections. When the spinning detonation maintains its propagation, the rotating transverse detonation couples with the acoustic wave traveling between the walls. We analyze the maximum and minimum track angles that allow the coupling and propagation of a spinning detonation in a square tube to be maintained and find that the simulated track angles fall within the estimated maximum and minimum track angles. This result indicates that acoustic coupling is important for maintaining propagation of a spinning detonation in a square tube.

Direct addition of a food additive-grade Aspergillus niger phytase preparation to 30% brown rice flour-added bread ingredients reduced the bread myo-inositol hexaphosphate (IP6) content. The phytase preparation had protease and amylase activities. Addition of the crude phytase preparation induced bread crust collapse. Protease-free high- and low-amylase phytase fractions were prepared using preparative ampholyte-free isoelectric focusing (autofocusing). Addition of the protease-free low-amylase phytase fraction did not significantly affect loaf volume and did not collapse the crust. Addition of the protease-free high-amylase phytase fraction significantly increased loaf volume approximately 1.5× in the presence of amylase at 193–1029 U. However, addition of 1029 and 2058 U of amylase induced partial and whole bread crust collapse, respectively. Therefore, removal of protease and control of amylase activities in the phytase preparation are crucial in the preparation of brown rice flour-added bread with a low myo-inositol phosphate (IP6) and good swelling property.

Background: Awe, a complex emotion, arises in response to perceptually and conceptually vast stimuli that transcend one’s current frames of reference, which is associated with subjective psychological phenomena, such as a sense of self and consciousness. This study aimed to develop a Japanese version of the Awe Experience Scale (AWE-S), a widely used questionnaire that robustly measured the state of awe, and simultaneously investigated how the multiple facets of awe related to the narrative representations of awe experiences. Methods: The Japanese AWE-S was created via back-translation and its factor structure and validity was investigated through an online survey in Japan. Results: The results revealed that the Japanese AWE-S consisted of the same six factors as the original (i.e., time, self-loss, connectedness, vastness, physiological, and accommodation) and had sufficient internal consistency, test-retest reliability, construct validity, and also Japan-specific characteristics. The structured topic modeling generated seven potential topics of the descriptions of awe experiences, which were differently associated with each factor of the Japanese AWE-S. Conclusions: Our findings contribute to a deeper understanding of awe and reveal the constructs of awe in Japan through cross-cultural comparisons. Furthermore, this study provides conceptual and methodological implications regarding studies on awe.

Background: Awe, a complex emotion, arises in response to perceptually and conceptually vast stimuli that transcend one’s current frames of reference, which is associated with subjective psychological phenomena, such as a sense of self and consciousness. This study aimed to develop a Japanese version of the Awe Experience Scale (AWE-S), a widely used questionnaire that robustly measured the state of awe, and simultaneously investigated how the multiple facets of awe related to the narrative representations of awe experiences. Methods: The Japanese AWE-S was created via back-translation and its factor structure and validity was investigated through an online survey in Japan. Results: The results revealed that the Japanese AWE-S consisted of the same six factors as the original (i.e., time, self-loss, connectedness, vastness, physiological, and accommodation) and had sufficient internal consistency, test-retest reliability, construct validity, and also Japan-specific characteristics. The structured topic modeling generated seven potential topics of the descriptions of awe experiences, which were differently associated with each factor of the Japanese AWE-S. Conclusions: Our findings contribute to a deeper understanding of awe and reveal the constructs of awe in Japan through cross-cultural comparisons. Furthermore, this study provides conceptual and methodological implications regarding studies on awe.

The issue of Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic (WEIRD) samples dominating research has been ongoing for decades, and now the emerging trend is to turn to theoretical perspectives from the Majority World. Adopting Western-centric methods based on reductionism can overlook important details and differences between similar cultures, particularly in East Asian cultures, where the Confucian values of relational harmony take many forms. We discuss a novel theoretical perspective on moral constitutions in Confucian heritage cultures. Our central tenet is that divergent moral concepts and ideals are present in Confucian cultures because each culture emphasizes a specific pillar and the self is situated differently in the social relationships that define the scope of interpersonal moral obligations. We consider three Confucian countries: China, Japan, and South Korea as examples. Despite geographical proximity and conventional categorization in cultural psychology, each Confucian country manifests distinct patterns of the self, moral ideals, and behavior in socio-moral contexts. To understand how and why moral worldviews vary within a region, we need to examine how the self in socio-cultural contexts differs and guides interpersonal norms and behaviors across sociocultural contexts. We conclude this paper by offering methodological recommendations for including indigenous moral concepts outside the WEIRD context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The amplification hypothesis of disgust, which proposes that incidental disgust causes harsher moral judgment, remains controversial due to mixed results in previous studies. However, some studies have investigated further effects based on the hypothesis. This may be problematic, because it is not guaranteed that an amplification effect will occur first. Therefore, the present study tested whether the amplification hypothesis is itself supported by replicating a previous study conducted and published in Japan. This study was conducted as an extension of the original study's methodology, with a few modifications due to the COVID-19 pandemic situation. Our results showed small, non-significant effects. This study offers a valuable contribution to introducing replication to international readership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]