Saturday, August 31, 2019

Honors Biology Midterm Exam Answer Packet

Name:Block: Honors Biology – Mid Term Review |Characteristics of Life | | |What is the difference between stimulus and response? Stimulus: causes you to react/respond, ex: something that irritates your eyes | |Give an example of each |Response: reaction to/response to a stimulus, ex: eyes closing/blinking/squinting/tearing as a result of the | | |irritant | |Multicellular organisms have order to their parts.In|Smallest part to largest level of organization: | |increasing order of complexity the parts are |Cell, tissues, organ, organ systems | |organized in: | | |Autotrophs (producers) must be exposed to what |Sunglight!! – no sunlight means no photosynthesis | |abiotic factor in order to survive? | |Different species which live closely together and |mutualism | |help each other out exhibit a symbiotic lifestyle | | |known as__________ | | |An example of two species that exhibit the lifestyle |Clown fish and anemone | |described in the previous question are: |Bees and fl owers | |What type of reproduction involves only one parent? |Asexual reproduction | |Give three examples of the type of reproduction |Binary fission | |described in the previous question. budding | | |take one part of a plant and letting it grow into a whole new plant | |The ability to maintain constant optimum internal |homeostasis | |conditions necessary for life is the ability to | | |maintain _____ | | |Ecology/Environment | | |What combinations of birth and death rates result in |Increased BIRTH rate and decreased DEATH rate | |greatest growth rate of populations? | | |By what process/organisms is carbon removed from the |Plants/trees/autotrophs remove carbon dioxide from the air/atmosphere by photosynthesis | |atmosphere/air? | |What does a graph that shows changes in the size of |[pic] | |predator/prey populations look like? Why? | | |What is the difference between predation and |Predation: one species hunts/eats another | |competition? |Competition: two different species wa nt/need the same (third/different) species/resource | |The greenhouse effe ct is amplified due to the buildup|Carbon dioxide and methane | |of what gases? | |After a disaster, what process returns the |Ecological succession | |environment to its original condition? | | |What type of community shows great species diversity? |A climax community | |Organisms that are the first to show up in barren |Pioneer species | |environments are called ______________ species. | | |Organisms that make their own food are called (bio |Autotrophs (primary producers) | |vocabulary!! | | |Plant eaters are called ___________ |Herbivores (heterotrophs), primary consumers | |Organisms that eat plant eaters are called |Carnivores (secondary or tertiary consumers) | |________________ | | |A decrease in a predator population will cause an |Prey (source of food for the predator) | |increase in the ____________ population. | | |Foods containing proteins are broken down during |Every level ABOVE the level in whi ch the food source is found | |digestion. The atoms from those proteins will be | | |found at what levels in the food chain? | |Examples of biotic factors in an ecosystem: |Types of plants and animals | |Examples of abiotic factors in an ecosystem: |Rainfall, amount of sunlight, temperature | |In a food chain/web, the amount of energy available |Decreases (only 10% of the energy at one level is available to the next level UP the food chain/web) | |to each level (increases or decreases) as you move UP| | |the food chain/trophic levels? | | |New species can be harmful when introduced to a new |Competition – fights with another creature for limited resource | |environment for two reasons: | | | |it has no predator so grows out of control | |What is the scientific definition of â€Å"population†? Members of the same SPECIES living in an area | |Give an example of a â€Å"population† |All of the red robins in Piscataway OR all of the gray squirrels in New Jersey | |W hat happens to the amount of a poison/toxin within a|The amount of toxin/poison INCREASES as you go up a food chain/food web | |food web/food chain? | | |What is the name of the phenomenon described in the |Biological magnification | |previous question? | | |Why are invasive species often destructive to an |They have no natural predators and their numbers can grow out of control, crowding out the creatures that | |ecosystem? live there as well | |Nitrogen gas is removed from the atmosphere to make |Bacteria (nitrogen fixing bacteria) remove nitrogen from the atmosphere so that it can be used other | |it available to other living organisms by what type |organisms | |of organism? | | |What process notoriously adds lots of carbon dioxide |Use of / burning of fossil fuels (gasoline, coal) | |to the atmosphere? | | |What conditions must exist for two species to be in |They must be in direct competition for some resource, food, place to live, etc | |competition with each other? | |Scienti fic Method/Data Analysis | | |Be able to read a data table!! Be able to interpret a graph | |When designing an experiment – one test group has NO |Control | |variables changed – this is called the __________ | | |group. All other groups are called the ____________ |experimental | |groups. | |In an experiment – the factor that is changed is | | |called the _______________ variable and the factor |Independent | |that is measured /the result is the ________________ | | |variable. |Dependent | |In a data table, usually the values of the |Independent | |__________________ are in the left most column and | | |the values of the _________________ variable are in |Dependent | |the columns to the right. | |Scientific theories are developed and confirmed by |Many scientists working together | |(one scientist or many scientists working together) | | |Chemistry of Life | | |Elements in all living organisms |Carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, sulfur | |Which type of organic polymer is found in the nucleus|Nucleic acids / DNA / double helix | |of cells and is shaped like a double helix? | | |Which type of organic compound helps to speed |Proteins/enzymes – if they are denatured, the rate of the reaction will slow down/decrease | |chemical reactions? | | |What is the special name for those organic molecules |enzymes | |that speed up chemical reactions? | |Organic polymers are â€Å"built† by reactions in which |Dehydration synthesis | |water is removed called _______________________ | | |reactions. | | |Which type of organic compound store LARGE amounts of|Lipids (fats) | |energy for later use by the organism? | | |The â€Å"core† of all organic compounds is what element? Carbon | |Examples of INORGANIC cmpnds: |Water (H2O), salt (NaCl) | |What pH(s) are considered acidic? |Acidic is less than 7 | |Basic/alkaline? |Basic/Alkaline is greater than 7 (up to 14) | |Neutral? |Neutral is EXACTLY 7 | |Compounds whose name ends i n â€Å"ose† are typically what|Carbohydrates (such as glucose) | |type of organic compound? | | |Which type of rganic compound is most affected by |Proteins (enzymes) | |temperature? | | |What elements found in carbs? |C, H, O | |What is the chemical formula of the building block of|C6H12O6 | |all carbs? | | |What is the general NAME of the building block of |monosaccharide | |carbohydrates? | |Triglycerides are a type of fat/lipid that is built |Glycerol and three fatty acids | |when ____________ are joined together? | | |The lower the pH the (weaker or stronger) the (acid |The lower the pH the stronger the acid | |or base). | | |Pick which words in parenthesis best completes the | | |statements. | | |Why must living organisms have enzymes? Reactions would be too slow to meet the needs of life | |Glucose is an example of what type of organic |Carbohydrate, monosaccharide | |compound (2 correct answers) | | |What is the building block of proteins? |Amino acids | |What makes one protein different from another |The number of amino acids, the types of amino acids, and the order of the amino acids | |protein? | | |Why characteristic of water makes it a unique |It is a polar molecule | |compound? | |True or False: Living organisms contain only organic |FALSE! | |compounds. | | |Why did you pick the answer you chose for the |Water makes up most of cells/living organisms and water is inorganic | |previous question? | | |In a chemical equation, often the name of a substance|An enzyme | |is written OVER the arrow in the equation. Read also Lab 2 BiologyThat | | |substance is often a(n) ___________ | | |Referring to the previous question, why isn’t that |Because it isn’t used up or changed as a result of the reaction | |substance written to the right or the left of the | | |arrow in the equation? | | |What molecule – often abbreviated with 3 letters – is|ATP | |considered the energy molecule for cells? | |The specific substances that bind to enzymes are |substrates | |called _____________ | | |Looking at a chemical equation/reaction, an enzyme |The reactants (substances to the LEFT of the arrow in the equation) | |that catalyzes the reaction â€Å"works† on | | |( the products / the reactants) | | |Protein structure is often called globular because |Folded and twisted into a three dimensional molecule | |the chain of amino acids is not straight but instead | | |is ___________________ | | |Waxes are what type of organic compound? lipids | |What substance tests for the presence of starch and |Substance used to test for starch: IODINE | |what is the positive test result? | | | |Positive test result: BLUE/BLACK color | |What substance is used to test for simple sugars |Substance used to test for starch: BENEDICT’s SOLUTION | |(glucose)? | | |What is the positive test result? Positive test result: ORANGE RED | |The enzyme that breaks down lipids |Lipase | |A hydrocarbon chain with a carboxyl group at one end |Fatty acid | |is a ________________ | | |The molecule described in the previous question may |lipid | |be found in what type of organic compound? | |Two molecules with the same chemical formula but |isomers | |different structural formulas are called______ | | |Cell Structure | | |What two structures found in plant cells not found |Plant cells have a cell wall and chloroplasts, animal cells do not | |in animal cells? | | |What are the three parts of the cell theory? Cells are the basic unit of structure AND function | | | | | |All life is made of cells | | | | | |All cells come from other cells | |Why is the job of the cell membrane? |Allows only some materials in/out – others are blocked | |Where can ribosomes be found within a cell? |Free floating in cytoplasm OR attached to the endoplasmic reticulum | |What is the function of ribosomes? |Protein synthesis (makes/builds proteins) | |Prokaryotic cells lack what structure(s)? Nuclear membrane (membrane bound nucleus), organelles surrounded by membranes (NOTE: these structures missing| | |from prokaryotic cells ARE found in eukaryotic cells) | |Where is the DNA in a prokaryotic cell found? |Floating in the cytoplasm | |What organelle stores energy from the sun in the |chloroplast | |bonds of organic compounds? | | |Which organelle releases the energy in the bonds of |mitochondria | |organic compounds by storing in a more â€Å"usable† form? | |The purpose of the water vacuole in plant cells is: |To provide a rigid structure, gives plants support | |Double membr ane organelles in which the inner |chloroplasts | |membrane is highly folded include: | | | |mitochondria | |What cell structures work together to make and |Ribosomes, ER, and golgi apparatus | |transport proteins out of the cell? | | |In what cellular structure in eukaryotic cells might |nucleus | |you find DNA? | |The animal cell structure that contains digestive |lysosome | |enzymes is called the ________________ | | |Microscopes | | |How can you â€Å"brighten† the field of view when using a|Open/adjust the diaphragm | |compound light microscope? | | |How do you calculate the â€Å"total magnification† when |Magnification of the eyepiece (ocular) times (multiplied by) the magnification of the objective lens | |using a compound light microscope? | |When you change from low to mid power on a compound |The image gets bigger. If low power is 40X and mid power is 100X, then under mid power the image will be 2. 5 | |light microscope, what happens to the image? (be |times bigger than it was under low power | |specific) | | |When you change from mid to high power on a |If mid power is 100X and high power is 400 X, the image is 4 times bigger under high power than under mid | |microscope, what happens to the image? be specific) |power | |Cell Transport | | |What process restores turgor pressure/turgidity in |OSMOSIS of WATER back INTO the cells of the wilted plants | |wilted plants? | | |With respect to concentration gradients, what is the |Passive Transport: substances move DOWN the concentration gradient | |difference between passive and active transport? | | |Active Transport: substances move UP/AGAINST the gradient | |Cytolysis/cell bursting may be the result of placing |Hypotonic (pure distilled water) | |cells animal cells into what â€Å"type† of solution? | | |Why does this happen? |Osmosis – water moves from where there is more water (outside of the cell) to where there is less water | | |(inside of the cell) | |Plasmolysis/cell shriveling happens when cells are |Hypertonic solutions (more dissolved solute/higher concentration of solute, less water/solvent) | |placed into what â€Å"type† of solution? | | |Why does this happen? Water moves by osmosis from where there is more (inside of the cell) to where there is less (outside of the | | |cell) | |What is the MAIN difference between active and |Active transport uses/needs energy (ATP) | |passive transport? |Passive transport doesn’t use/need energy from the cell | |Paramecia have a unique structure called the |Contractile vacuole | |___________ which maintains homeostasis relative to | | |osmotic pressure. | |Putting human cells into a hypotonic solution would |Cells to burst | |cause the cells to _____________. | | |If a solute cannot pass through a membrane to reach |Solvent (water) | |equilibrium, the ____________ will move in whatever | | |direction is necessary to create an equal | | |concentration of solutes on both sides of the | | |me mbrane. | |Photosynthesis | | |What are two other names for the light independent |Calvin Cycle, Carbon Fixation | |reactions of photosynthesis? | | |Specifically where do those reactions occur within |Stroma of the chloroplast | |plant cells? | | |What product of photosynthesis is easily observable |Oxygen gas | |with the naked eye? | |Referring to the previous question, what part of |The light dependent reactions | |photosynthesis makes that product? | | |As a result of photosynthesis, energy from the sun is|Chemical bonds of glucose | |transferred to/stored in ____________ | | |Colors that we see represent wavelengths of light |reflected | |that are (absorbed / reflected) by the object. | |The two products of the light reactions that are |ATP and NADPH | |needed in the dark reactions are: | | |In the light reactions, prior to chemiosmosis, |Stroma into the thylakoid | |hydrogen ions are pumped from the _____ to the _____ | | |Some plants use alternate pathways during |The light i ndependent reactions, Calvin cycle, carbon fixation | |photosynthesis. What part of photosynthesis involves | | |these alternate pathways? | | |As electrons pass down the ETC in Photosystem II, the|Photosystem I | |final electron acceptor is a molecule in ___ | |General Biology Ii Study Guide (Online Class)

Friday, August 30, 2019

Economy of the United States Essay

The time is considerably improved for the distinctive American citizen of 2007 than for a citizen of the 1800s. An array of economic policies known as import substitution is frequently quoted as the central reason of Latin America’s crises in the 1980s. The stratagem had outsized harmful upshots on economic growth in the 1980s reacting to the 1970s and 1980s progress. However, in the mid 1990s, import substitution policies had slight hit in renovating Latin American countries into sellers of feigned products. In fact, the condition was even worse in 1980s, as anxieties about non-payment raised; mean yearly price rises climbed radically from 1980 to 1985. And the economic deformations linked with hikes in inflation are stern. From last 1990s, numerous efforts have been carried out to alleviate the dilemma related to Latin America’s huge outside debt. A few restructurings in the 1990s had no brunt or were untied almost immediately as they were brought in. Just the once recent economic development and dependable growth in input & output, and output per person commences, it is liable to persist on a usual source and progress public’s being. It is constant with the world’s practice in the 80s and 90s era. For now, in the United States, the introduction of Information technology generated an innovative market that created the hardware and generated the software required to suit the ignition claim for these appliances that had grown to be reasonable to about everybody. That market substituted the previous; a belief of capitalist theory called creative destruction which envisaged that outcome, truly emerged to be operational, even as the economy appeared to be strong. Obstinately, United States government tax policy also offers inducements for U. S. multinational firms to set up abroad. In current tax laws, firms are allocated without letting up to suspend disbursing business revenue taxes on incomes made offshore. The suspension is fine in anticipation of these firms send back the incomes to the home, upon which occasion they are taxed at the typical business income tax charge. However the U. S. business income-tax charge is one of the biggest in the planet, there is an extremely well-built inducement for firms to reinvest those profits outside of the United States. As a result, United States Government; the Congress agreed to provide tax relief per annum, in order that firms could send back incomes back to the home at a lesser tax charge. Firms made it in having this 2004 tax break by saying that it would facilitate them to employ those incomes to invest in the home and make employments for US citizens. Certainly, it’s almost unfeasible to establish they performed the deed or not. The initial phases of globalization and outsourcing charge millions of U. S. manufacturing employments but different specialists declared us that this was nil to agonize about since they were blue-collar Rust Belt employments. United States of America was converting itself into an overhaul economy, and facilitated all along by the Information technology. Internet tune-ups, cutting-edge research and growth made the transparent, high-paying employments that kept U. S. ahead in the current era. However, supporters of globalization disagree that outsourcing millions of mechanically transportable service jobs will decrease rates and increase productivity in the U. S. Except the assets of globalization don’t seem so gentle from the perspective of an American computer analyst or auditor. They have performed what they were expected for but their effort was obstinately spoilt when the home employers hired overseas staff working so cheap. When lucrative manufacturing and service jobs shift abroad, relocated American employees are frequently obliged to accept low pay jobs and upward mobility. Paradoxically, at the instance millions of jobs are being outsourced and millions of unlawful migrants are overflowing into the U. S. , to get away form their domestic scarcity and joblessness; hence purely spoiling U. S. internal economy. Ironically, the good news is that, while United States governed Congress helped out to generate this chaos with poor economic and foreign policies, she can assist to overcome it. Still, U. S. is the best-positioned to make sustainable advantage of the growing world economy in the global marketplace. Modern economic trends, together with a huge trade shortage, on its last legs of norm revenues, comparatively weak job growth, have been to state the slightest rather intimidating. However there is one thing encouraging, the strong growth of productivity in the U. S. Commencing in the mid-1990s, productivity has recovered after 20 years of comparatively meager presentation. Regrettably, economists have hardly any solutions for progressive economic growth, as conservative neo-traditional growth forms pay no heed to technological modernization. On the contrary, a â€Å"neo-Schumpetarian† examination proposes that the revitalization and immobility of productivity are tied to the materialization and succeeding collapse of new techno-economic manufacture procedures. While an old economy attains its perimeters from the perspective of innovation and the dispersal of the technology structure, it grows to be ever more intricate to spin out productivity growth. Just after an innovative technology system suits reasonably priced as much as necessary and invasive adequate is it capable to rejuvenate the engine of productivity patterns. This examination recommends that though the modern information technology based technology system is probable to prolong to impel strong productivity growth for at any rate the coming 20 years, an innovation-exhaustion hold up may be very soon above the prospect. In fact, IT is really improving productivity, however merely in peculiar segments. Since the 1990s, productivity grew 1. 1% per year in segments spending greatly in computers and about 0. 35% in segments spending less. During 1990 and 2003, productivity growth in IT-exhaustive production averaged 3. 03% per annum, in contrast to just 0. 2% per annum in less-IT-exhaustive industry. In effect, the increase in mechanical automation was the really enormous growth of the economy of the era. Since many economists declare that globalization and technology have merged to generate up-to-the-minute tenets for the U. S. economy. However this economist considers old economics still offers the unsurpassed elucidation for current happenings. However, the new-economy model is not only a design that is obviously cleared by a particular economist and an extensive choice of thoughts descends below the new-economy streamer. Relatively than reviewing the concepts of a range of new-economy researchers, the subsequent argument assembles the thoughts into three extensive reports of the new economy; a long-run-growth, a sources-of-growth version, and a business-cycle version, which reveal the combined concept of several economists. Even as these reports disagree in particular calculations and inferences; butt all contribute to a widespread center that constructs them ingredient of the new-economy structure. In the past few years, the U. S. conomy has gained from a pointed deterioration in oil and commodity costs, a well-built American dollar, a tendency on the way to handled concern and reserved health-care prices, an impartial budget, and a fall in military expenses. Each one of these transient causes may have assisted the economy and guided to the unforeseen blend of falling inflation and unemployment rates. While distinguishing between temporary factors and structural changes, it is a hard chore that entails cautious empirical analysis and, additionally significant is a lengthier instant sequence of information. Simply by scrutinizing unemployment and inflation under a broad variety of economic circumstances for several years will it be achievable to wrap up if a structural change has in fact risen? Fast track and fiscal policy for the International Monetary Fund are merely fractions of a better scheme the United States Government must create to facilitate its citizens retain their leadership in what is, incontrovertibly, an accurately global economy. Moreover, the Federal Reserve should reduce interest rates, at this time sprinting at approximately four times the rate of inflation, with no less than one-half of 1%. Moreover, Conformist economics observes economic growth as a consequence of input accumulation and technological growth in a world of nearly invariable come backs to level. At the same time, there is a little argument about how to determine inputs and how to describe technological growth, there is an agreement that a great deal of economic growth engages trade-offs, such as increasing capital means investment, forgone consumption and savings, though increasing labor input needs education expenses and relinquished freedom. Whichever unsolved growth is branded the input of total factor productivity (TFP), also called the famous Solow residual, which reveals technical progress, improved efficiency, spillovers, scale economies, demand side policy, pull inflation and so on. Countless economic studies of foreign direct investment center on the features of the companies in creating its resolution to spend overseas. While the rest employ features of host nations as independent variables, that U. S. oreign direct investment runs to Europe contain such independent variables as growth of market size and size in host countries, levels of protectionism in host countries, and capital control programs of the U. S. Government. The causes for the disparity in corresponding the employment and productivity growth amid the two regions may be vibrant, except mostly dialogue they go down into three types. At the outset, the expansion of the pay, the rental ratio is a typical macroeconomic elucidation for modifications in labour and capital intensity influencing the employment growth productivity. During the 2000-s, pay control and active labour market policies elevated labour force membership statistics in Europe however, simultaneously decreased the growth of labour charge comparative to the capital cost. The quicker employment growth but lower growths of labour productivity are probable consequences of these policies of the U. S. Government. Seeing the initiation of the global economy and amplified tax competition, businesses and other shareholders employ geographically fungible capital to reduce their tax charges by shifting their assets to lower tax regions. Hence the capacity for capital flight compels limitations on the point of taxation that in order compels fiscal discipline on the U. S. Government. However the normative economic research have demonstrated that the optimal tax rate on capital is zero, while the optimal tax rate on labor is positive, proposing that the expressive decline of taxes on capital, during tax competition, would offer wide-reaching advantages in the global market. In addition, in a more competent market, investment will be owed more effectively, escorting to worldwide welfare profits in the all-embracing race. The interconnected concepts comprise nonlinear growth once a critical mass is attained, worthy rounds of positive feedback in manufacturing and communal firms for example Silicon Valley, and declining costs and amplified excellence by means of technology and scale economies. These concepts are not new-fangled to conservative US economics; however the new economy offers them far better magnitude and looks them as the dynamic energy of growth economy-wide (Fretz, 4-15). The recent facts propose that it is yet excessively untimely to let know if a new economy has actually materialized. The new economy is resolutely constructed on the supposition of structural changes in the economy; however there is just not sufficient information yet to differentiate elemental transformations from unconventional accounts, for example transitory shocks can escort to the identical upshots. By building up these concepts at this instant, economists and policymakers would be capable to come to a decision if there truly is a new economy in the United States

Thursday, August 29, 2019

Big Mountain High School Case Study Analysis Education Essay

Big Mountain High School serves over 1450 pupils in grades 10-12. Large Mountain is the lone high school in the county, and besides the largest high school in the province. Its geographical location is known for its wilderness and beauty. Because of its location it is mostly a rural territory where many of the attending pupils commute more than 30 stat mis every twenty-four hours to have day-to-day direction. The population of the school ranges from diverse socio-economic backgrounds. As evidenced in the instance, 40 % of the pupils will travel on to go toing 4-year colleges, while 20 % of the pupils attend 2-year colleges. For pupils that are non college edge, as an excess educational option, the territory provides them with a vocational plan ( Smith A ; Louis, Winter 1999 ) . The Superintendent of the territory is Mr. Bob Carpenter a indigen of the territory. He has been the overseer for four old ages and he is described as being magnetic, a individual who makes determinations and gets things done. He is extremely respected amongst the instructors and staff because he meets straight with the instructors and listens to what they have to state. Mr. Carpenter is besides described as utilizing a bottom-up leading manner doctrine. The chief Mr. Vogel has held the place for 15 old ages. He is known as being a dedicated manager, candid and carnival to his staff. Mr. Vogel besides adopted a bottom-up leading manner doctrine. Some nevertheless, see him to be â€Å" crusty and impersonal † and even unapproachable. He makes hiring determinations, nominates the section chairs, normally communicates with instructors in short staff meetings, and maintains that disposal has full authorization over the processs and policies in the school. The sections at Big Mountain high school were given entire authorization and liberty as how they distribute the instruction assignments, how course of study and direction is designed and they besides make the determinations on budget allotments. Meetings between the principal and section caputs are non regular events, they normally meet one time every three hebdomads and the meetings are normally really short. Finally, there are the instructors. The territory ranks the highest paid among other territories in the province, supplying the territory with a big pool of extremely qualified appliers. Teachers at Big Mountain command how they teach, have small or no treatments over learning methods, the type of direction, and have small or no input in the determination doing procedure that takes topographic point in the school. Faculty is divided and with really small interdisciplinary engagement. There are several leading issues present in the instance. The major issues revolve around the ability of the leading to expeditiously take the school during a much needed alteration. In the instance of the mandated course of study alteration as required by the province, the treatments of the new course of study raised personal and pedagogical differences amongst the module. If the end of the leading is to further growing and alter the way in which the school is traveling, it would be wise for the leading to take a human resource frame attack as discussed in Bolman A ; Deal, where under the human resource frame, leaders provide and foster equal engagement in the determination devising ( Bolman A ; Deal, 2008 ) . At Big Mountain, the caputs of section have a significant sum of influence and authorization, and are perceived by the module as decision makers and determination shapers. These differences in power have led to a deficiency of interdisciplinary engagement between section caputs and module members where Hargreaves A ; Fink refer to as, traditional power blocks ( Hargreaves A ; Fink, April 2004 ) . This deficiency of interdisciplinary engagement and the misinterpretation of a collaborative leading, as become a top-down hierarchy leading, instead than a sensed bottom-up leading as expressed by the chief Mr. Vogel. It is obvious that the principal in this school will non be developing meaningful relationships with the staff. His neglect for the sentiments of the instructors during his short module meetings, along with his important leading manner resemble what Fullan ( 2001 ) describes as coercive and bossy leading. As the freshly appointed caput for the Language Arts Department, Mr. Chester non merely appointed to the commission merely those who agree with him, he besides restricted the engagement from the instructors that will be implementing the course of study. By making so, he derailed Bolman A ; Deal ‘s model attack, and the construct of the structural frame where the attempts of groups and persons are coordinated, and besides the human resource frame, where affecting others gives them a sense of belonging and ownership ( Bolman A ; Deal, 2008 ) . Even though ab initio the principal shared the determination devising with the commission, he rapidly reversed that determination and decided to do the determinations himself. However, subsequently he decided to name Chester to take the new alterations commission to implement the new course of study. One once more his rushed determination was made without the engagement and the input from the instructors, go forthing it small room to win and showing the deficiency of communicating and alliance edifice, necessary when turn toing alteration ( Kanter, Summer 1999 ) . As the overseer, Bob Carpenter was non of much aid to the principal in set uping and developing a successful civilization of committed members within the organisation. Although important and magnetic, his strong interaction accomplishments, the ability to construct relationships while run intoing with instructors and listening to their concerns when the principal was non supportive, have earned him the regard of the instructors, minimising the authorization of the principal. As the overseer, Bob failed as a function theoretical account, and a wise man to the principal. He came across as holding his ain political docket, showing the deficiency of his leading qualities. Qualities required when constructing a successful organisation. Recommendations for Improvement Inspiring leaders have the ability to turn schools about. On the other manus mediocre leaders can alter the civilization of a school and hinder the patterned advance of successful enterprises that may be ongoing within an organisation driven by its members. â€Å" A civilization of alteration consists of great celerity and nonlinearity, on one manus and every bit great potency for originative discoveries on the other. The paradox is that transmutation would non be possible without attach toing muss † ( Fullan, 2001, p. 31 ) . It is obvious that muss is in the hereafter of Big Mountain. Changes are inevitable, and a complete restructuring of the school is recommended. From the overseer, to principal, to section leaders, and to instructors, all fail to develop a collaborative and cohesive work environment. In the instance, the prostration was initiated from the top-down where is lacked sustainable leading. Hargreaves ( 2009 ) describes five obstructions that impede effectual leading and should be addressed in the restructuring procedure of Big Mountain. The obstructions impede the successful execution of the restructuring when sequence is ill planned, sequence passages are severely managed, sequence is frequently on the incorrect frequence, sequence planning fails to see the emotional facets, and in conclusion sequence is non treated as a systemic job. Sequence in leading is an of import facet when reconstituting an organisation and it is frequently overlooked, weakening the long term alterations for a successful turn-around. Large Mountain could profit of an increased stableness in leading. It was evident that neither the overseer nor the principal were wholly dedicated to the school and its vision. The overseer and the principal could hold been more proactive in edifice and set uping a common vision for the school. Constructing a systemic leading is another of import facet that should be taken into consideration. The overseer should work on developing unfastened lines of communicating with other successful schools in the territory, and develop partnerships with the other schools where information is shared, and thoughts are exchanged leting schools to assist each other and ultimately addition accomplishment. Another recommendation involves the development of a distributed leading and the creative activity of managers for the new leading. Bolman A ; Deal ( 2008 ) depict the human resource frame, where the overseer and the principal would put more accent on constructing personal relationships, and the sc hool would profit from the constitution of an unfastened and true bottom-up leading manner doctrine. Because more and more disposal is comprised of first-time leaders, giving support to new leaders will relieve the emotional emphasis associated with the place. Supplying good back uping managers will assist the new leaders with the troubles that come with the new administrative function. A concluding option is to maintain the position quo of the school. However, without alterations in leading, the instability that exists amongst the staff will stay and will go on to decline. Leadership stableness can be improved by leading sequence, and this may be accomplished by administering successful leaders across schools in the territory and developing a support web that will help overseers, principals and instructors throughout the territory. â€Å" Successful sequence is about turning and linking leading throughout a system, non merely happening the right tantrum for single leaders. † And â€Å" Permanent betterment seldom exists without leading stableness or successful sequence. Effective sequence is a strategic challenge but non an unsurmountable 1 † ( Hargreaves A ; Fink, April 2004 ) . Mentions Bolman, L. G. , A ; Deal, T. E. ( 2008 ) .Reframing organisations. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Fullan, M. ( 2001 ) .Leading in a civilization of alteration. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Hargreaves, A. ( 2009 ) . Leadership Succession and Sustainable Improvement.School Administrator, 66 ( 11 ) , 10-15. Retrieved from ERIC database. Hargreaves, A. , A ; Fink, D. ( April 2004 ) . The Seven Principles of Sustainable Leadership.Educational Leadership, 61 ( 7 ) , 8-13. Kanter, M. ( Summer 1999 ) . The Enduring Skill of Change Leaders.Leader to Leader Journal( 13 ) , 15-22. Smith, B. , A ; Louis, L. ( Winter 1999 ) . Case 2: Changes at Big Mountain High School [ Abstract ] .Journal of Cases in Educational LeadershiP, 2 ( 1 ) , 1-2. Big Mountain High School Case Study Analysis Education Essay Big Mountain High School serves over 1450 pupils in grades 10-12. Large Mountain is the lone high school in the county, and besides the largest high school in the province. Its geographical location is known for its wilderness and beauty. Because of its location it is mostly a rural territory where many of the attending pupils commute more than 30 stat mis every twenty-four hours to have day-to-day direction. The population of the school ranges from diverse socio-economic backgrounds. As evidenced in the instance, 40 % of the pupils will travel on to go toing 4-year colleges, while 20 % of the pupils attend 2-year colleges. For pupils that are non college edge, as an excess educational option, the territory provides them with a vocational plan ( Smith A ; Louis, Winter 1999 ) . The Superintendent of the territory is Mr. Bob Carpenter a indigen of the territory. He has been the overseer for four old ages and he is described as being magnetic, a individual who makes determinations and gets things done. He is extremely respected amongst the instructors and staff because he meets straight with the instructors and listens to what they have to state. Mr. Carpenter is besides described as utilizing a bottom-up leading manner doctrine. The chief Mr. Vogel has held the place for 15 old ages. He is known as being a dedicated manager, candid and carnival to his staff. Mr. Vogel besides adopted a bottom-up leading manner doctrine. Some nevertheless, see him to be â€Å" crusty and impersonal † and even unapproachable. He makes hiring determinations, nominates the section chairs, normally communicates with instructors in short staff meetings, and maintains that disposal has full authorization over the processs and policies in the school. The sections at Big Mountain high school were given entire authorization and liberty as how they distribute the instruction assignments, how course of study and direction is designed and they besides make the determinations on budget allotments. Meetings between the principal and section caputs are non regular events, they normally meet one time every three hebdomads and the meetings are normally really short. Finally, there are the instructors. The territory ranks the highest paid among other territories in the province, supplying the territory with a big pool of extremely qualified appliers. Teachers at Big Mountain command how they teach, have small or no treatments over learning methods, the type of direction, and have small or no input in the determination doing procedure that takes topographic point in the school. Faculty is divided and with really small interdisciplinary engagement. There are several leading issues present in the instance. The major issues revolve around the ability of the leading to expeditiously take the school during a much needed alteration. In the instance of the mandated course of study alteration as required by the province, the treatments of the new course of study raised personal and pedagogical differences amongst the module. If the end of the leading is to further growing and alter the way in which the school is traveling, it would be wise for the leading to take a human resource frame attack as discussed in Bolman A ; Deal, where under the human resource frame, leaders provide and foster equal engagement in the determination devising ( Bolman A ; Deal, 2008 ) . At Big Mountain, the caputs of section have a significant sum of influence and authorization, and are perceived by the module as decision makers and determination shapers. These differences in power have led to a deficiency of interdisciplinary engagement between section caputs and module members where Hargreaves A ; Fink refer to as, traditional power blocks ( Hargreaves A ; Fink, April 2004 ) . This deficiency of interdisciplinary engagement and the misinterpretation of a collaborative leading, as become a top-down hierarchy leading, instead than a sensed bottom-up leading as expressed by the chief Mr. Vogel. It is obvious that the principal in this school will non be developing meaningful relationships with the staff. His neglect for the sentiments of the instructors during his short module meetings, along with his important leading manner resemble what Fullan ( 2001 ) describes as coercive and bossy leading. As the freshly appointed caput for the Language Arts Department, Mr. Chester non merely appointed to the commission merely those who agree with him, he besides restricted the engagement from the instructors that will be implementing the course of study. By making so, he derailed Bolman A ; Deal ‘s model attack, and the construct of the structural frame where the attempts of groups and persons are coordinated, and besides the human resource frame, where affecting others gives them a sense of belonging and ownership ( Bolman A ; Deal, 2008 ) . Even though ab initio the principal shared the determination devising with the commission, he rapidly reversed that determination and decided to do the determinations himself. However, subsequently he decided to name Chester to take the new alterations commission to implement the new course of study. One once more his rushed determination was made without the engagement and the input from the instructors, go forthing it small room to win and showing the deficiency of communicating and alliance edifice, necessary when turn toing alteration ( Kanter, Summer 1999 ) . As the overseer, Bob Carpenter was non of much aid to the principal in set uping and developing a successful civilization of committed members within the organisation. Although important and magnetic, his strong interaction accomplishments, the ability to construct relationships while run intoing with instructors and listening to their concerns when the principal was non supportive, have earned him the regard of the instructors, minimising the authorization of the principal. As the overseer, Bob failed as a function theoretical account, and a wise man to the principal. He came across as holding his ain political docket, showing the deficiency of his leading qualities. Qualities required when constructing a successful organisation. Recommendations for Improvement Inspiring leaders have the ability to turn schools about. On the other manus mediocre leaders can alter the civilization of a school and hinder the patterned advance of successful enterprises that may be ongoing within an organisation driven by its members. â€Å" A civilization of alteration consists of great celerity and nonlinearity, on one manus and every bit great potency for originative discoveries on the other. The paradox is that transmutation would non be possible without attach toing muss † ( Fullan, 2001, p. 31 ) . It is obvious that muss is in the hereafter of Big Mountain. Changes are inevitable, and a complete restructuring of the school is recommended. From the overseer, to principal, to section leaders, and to instructors, all fail to develop a collaborative and cohesive work environment. In the instance, the prostration was initiated from the top-down where is lacked sustainable leading. Hargreaves ( 2009 ) describes five obstructions that impede effectual leading and should be addressed in the restructuring procedure of Big Mountain. The obstructions impede the successful execution of the restructuring when sequence is ill planned, sequence passages are severely managed, sequence is frequently on the incorrect frequence, sequence planning fails to see the emotional facets, and in conclusion sequence is non treated as a systemic job. Sequence in leading is an of import facet when reconstituting an organisation and it is frequently overlooked, weakening the long term alterations for a successful turn-around. Large Mountain could profit of an increased stableness in leading. It was evident that neither the overseer nor the principal were wholly dedicated to the school and its vision. The overseer and the principal could hold been more proactive in edifice and set uping a common vision for the school. Constructing a systemic leading is another of import facet that should be taken into consideration. The overseer should work on developing unfastened lines of communicating with other successful schools in the territory, and develop partnerships with the other schools where information is shared, and thoughts are exchanged leting schools to assist each other and ultimately addition accomplishment. Another recommendation involves the development of a distributed leading and the creative activity of managers for the new leading. Bolman A ; Deal ( 2008 ) depict the human resource frame, where the overseer and the principal would put more accent on constructing personal relationships, and the sc hool would profit from the constitution of an unfastened and true bottom-up leading manner doctrine. Because more and more disposal is comprised of first-time leaders, giving support to new leaders will relieve the emotional emphasis associated with the place. Supplying good back uping managers will assist the new leaders with the troubles that come with the new administrative function. A concluding option is to maintain the position quo of the school. However, without alterations in leading, the instability that exists amongst the staff will stay and will go on to decline. Leadership stableness can be improved by leading sequence, and this may be accomplished by administering successful leaders across schools in the territory and developing a support web that will help overseers, principals and instructors throughout the territory. â€Å" Successful sequence is about turning and linking leading throughout a system, non merely happening the right tantrum for single leaders. † And â€Å" Permanent betterment seldom exists without leading stableness or successful sequence. Effective sequence is a strategic challenge but non an unsurmountable 1 † ( Hargreaves A ; Fink, April 2004 ) . Mentions Bolman, L. G. , A ; Deal, T. E. ( 2008 ) .Reframing organisations. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Fullan, M. ( 2001 ) .Leading in a civilization of alteration. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Hargreaves, A. ( 2009 ) . Leadership Succession and Sustainable Improvement.School Administrator, 66 ( 11 ) , 10-15. Retrieved from ERIC database. Hargreaves, A. , A ; Fink, D. ( April 2004 ) . The Seven Principles of Sustainable Leadership.Educational Leadership, 61 ( 7 ) , 8-13. Kanter, M. ( Summer 1999 ) . The Enduring Skill of Change Leaders.Leader to Leader Journal( 13 ) , 15-22. Smith, B. , A ; Louis, L. ( Winter 1999 ) . Case 2: Changes at Big Mountain High School [ Abstract ] .Journal of Cases in Educational LeadershiP, 2 ( 1 ) , 1-2.

Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Political Participation and Nonprofit organization Essay

Political Participation and Nonprofit organization - Essay Example They include religious, educational and social institutions. They register under the 501(c) (3) section of the federal law. The other major branch of non-profit organisations includes political parties and unions. They are actively involved in political matters but to a certain scoop. They cannot fund a political campaign or a particular candidate. They register under 501(c) (4).The last group; the Political Action Committees (PACs) are the most partisan of them. The Federal Election Commission regulates their operations. They are permitted to support candidates. However, despite the restrictions, non-profit organisations play a huge role in influencing political activities that it is becoming difficult to draw a boundary where they should not cross in political arenas (International Association for Public Participation, 2015). Non-profit organisations advocate for issues. They start out as non-partisans, uninvolved in political movements. However, eventually they take a position in addressing political issues. They mainly concentrate on creating awareness to the public on civic matters such as urging them to register as voters (Fair Vote, 2015 ). Since the public trusts them, many follow their stand. They have become an agent of change in society, whether negatively or positively. Their presence in political matters is impossible to ignore. MoveOn.org is a non-profit organisation registered in two parts. One is a 501(c) (3) group while the other is under the PAC. The organisation shook the decision of the House of Representatives when it opposed its impeachment against Clinton. The court had to pronounce him innocent because of their voice. They used the internet to influence people’s preferences and eventually, they won. It shows just how powerful non-profit organisations can be, especially with t he right tools. Communication has gone so fast and wide that the internet itself can help

Tuesday, August 27, 2019

Sasha Jensen's Interior Landscape Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Sasha Jensen's Interior Landscape - Essay Example How she sees the world and life, how individuals should treat them, is expressed in the scene she describes when remembering that job in the dress shop, dealing with the bald, old Englishwoman and her daughter. This is how she would like to be, not how she was, or is. Already, we see the complexity of this character. She has suffered betrayal, dreadful poverty, the death of a child and many hurts and views herself as a victim. Yet she retains a fine sense of irony, the ability to see through others, and a recognition of her own condition and despair. She is contradictory in the extreme, This last comment gives an insight into Sasha's alienation, 'they' always seeing her in ways she does not perceive herself, 'they' always wanting to take from her. On the other hand, in contradiction, she agrees to, then seeks the company of the young Russian, visits the painter and goes to great lengths to improve her appearance, with make up, hair dye and a new hat. That these 'improvements' make Sasha feel good, signifies a universal truth, without offending feminist principles; that most females would relate to these feelings. She becomes empowered, this person who is at times incapable of expressing her intelligent and perceptive thoughts aloud, past or present. Using the strength of that empowerment, she sees Rene, the gigolo, as an opportunity to pay back for the hurts endured throughout her life. In fact, they recognize in each other, two outsiders, wounded in many ways. Sasha's perceptions are so damaged that she is unable to trust that he will cause no further hurt. So ali enated is she from the concept of human kindness, just for its own sake, that she continues to let her experiences prevent her from accepting his offer of just loving kindness for one night. While the prospect of meeting him again excites, Sasha encapsulates her feelings thus: 'I won't do a thing - not a thing. I will not grimace and posture before these

Monday, August 26, 2019

Book review1 Literature review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Book review1 - Literature review Example The book was published in the year 2007 by Crossway Books publishing ministry of Good News Publishers whose headquarters are in Illinois. Among the several books that J. Piper has published includes God’s Passion for His Glory, The Pleasures of God, Future Grace, A hunger for God and Desiring God among others. Based on the many items on theology, the author has produced a book that provides a basis for today Christian living. The various concepts displayed in the book relate to academic, biblical and psychological understanding of the writer on key items as presented in the bible. John Piper addresses main topics basing his ideas on the works of N.T Wright and citing his works throughout his book which centres on justification and judgment. The scope of the book is wide as the writer outlines his ideas concerning previous works of others, maintaining his thought on various issues and using ideas to base his argument. Among the issues discussed in the book are such as the relationship between law and covenant, dynamics of justification, justification and gospel, and places of Christian works in justification. The author also analyses the concept of justification on the death of Christ being able to cleanse sin. In this, he notes that avoiding sin is essential for the forgiveness of sin but noting with precedence that his death was to ensure human justification. He cites Colossian 2:14, Revelation 1:5, Galatians 2:21 among other books to show that the death of Christ is sufficient to cover human sins. He is opposed to the view of the writers of the New Testament who saw the death of the Messiah as the ultimate end to His life (Piper, 2007, p.43). Piper’s view is that the Lord continually seems to manifest himself in us implying He lives as implored in the story of the resurrection. According to him, the obedience of Christ to die for us

Bench mark assessment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Bench mark assessment - Essay Example The heritage assessment tool identifies other factors such as family relations, place of origin and religion. In this regard, the tool exposes key issues that affect health in unknown capacities. Applying health assessment tool is an intelligent measure that enables health experts identify silent factors that affect health. Effective health policies can be devised from the results of the heritage assessment tools. From the tool, experts have a chance to access data that can trace historical health issues in the family. The point implies that health professionals can interpret various issues from the data that is given by the families. The different types of information in the tool, for example, commitment to religion, gives a clue to the health experts on which health threats a family might suffer or be suffering (World Health Organization). In this regard, effective control measures can be designed to protect them and how practitioners approach their health related problems. As the assessment results show, the most common health traditions include eating ethnic foods, engaging in religious activities and engaging in ethnic activities. Health is considered a combination of spiritual, mind and body well-being. Thus, understanding these issues and their effect on the health is the first step in ensuring a healthy community (Hollins 2009). All the issues positively identify a diverse health situation in a population. The families exposed a unique preference to ethnic foods. The families explained that at ethnic food from their background is art of their meals. In this regard, it is imperative to evaluate the nature of the consumed foods to ascertain the suitability for sustaining good health. The two families, with Asian and Caribbean origins, showed a tight relationship and preference to continue consuming ethnic foods. The cultural considerations in diet are critical in determining

Sunday, August 25, 2019

An overview of the incidence of diabetes in the United States Term Paper

An overview of the incidence of diabetes in the United States - Term Paper Example Difference in susceptibility by gender is, however, small with adult males having a unit percent higher prevalence rate as compared to adult females (â€Å"Diabetes statistics†, 2011). Incidences of the disease also vary with race. ‘Non-Hispanic’ blacks are the most vulnerable at almost 13 percent prevalence rate while ‘non-Hispanic’ whites have a prevalence rate of seven percent. Despite control measures, diabetes remains a killer disease, both directly and indirectly (â€Å"National diabetes statistics†, 2011). The disease’s prevalence rate also bears relationships with other complications. Published data, for example, indicate an almost seventy percent prevalence rate of heart diseases among diabetic patients. A survey of data between the years 2005 and 2008 also reported a 67 percent rate of high blood pressure among diabetic patients. Significant relationships in prevalence rates have also been identified between diabetes and other diseases such as â€Å"blindness,† â€Å"kidney disease,† â€Å"nervous system disease† and â€Å"amputation† (â€Å"Diabetes statistics†, 2011, p.

Saturday, August 24, 2019

Emotional intelligence Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Emotional intelligence - Essay Example Rationale for support of emotional intelligent First, before taking side with any of the sides, it is important to understand what EI entails. Stein, et al (7) argued that EI entails an individual being in a position to perceive, evaluate and control emotions. In this regard, EI could be termed as a potential tool in any work place that can be used to assess or predict management performance. This is arguably true because in any work place, it is obvious that employees would be confronted by different situations that would require application of EI in order to be able to solve them. For instance, in the course of performing their duties, employees may find themselves in conflict with their employers, fellow employees or customers. In such a situation, employees are supposed to apply EI principles in order to overcome such conflicts in a professional manner. EI helps people to accurately perceive emotions (Druskat, et al 3). For instance, an employee should be in a position to accurat ely understand signs of an angry employer through various means such as body language and other nonverbal signs. In addition, employees can use EI in using emotions to promote thinking and cognitive thinking. This helps them to garner appropriate measure to use in order to handle the situation at hand in a professional manner. ... This is important especially when dealing with employers, fellow employees or even the customers. Some employers may use EI to assess whether an employee can be able to perform in a stressful position within the organization. This can be applied especially when employers are seeking new persons to fill vacant positions or during promotion of the already existing employees (Stein, et al 7). If an employee has been in constant fights with colleagues and probably not been able to control his emotions, it is apparent that the employer would find it not suitable to offer such an employee a certain position that require soberness when dealing with customers and other employees (Cherniss 3). In another dimension, EI has been argued to play a critical role in motivating employees. When EI is known to be an evaluative tool within an organization, employees tend to carry themselves in a professional manner in order to please their bosses and improve on their performance. In this regard, it can be argued that EI can be used as a tool that can make employees excel in their work. However, opponents of EI may argue that EI can lock out potential employees from putting their skills in practice. Nevertheless, it should be noted that although many employees have intellectual intelligent (IQ), it is not enough to make them good employees. In order for an organization to maintain competitive advantage especially in a highly competitive market, it is necessary to have a work force well equipped with both IQ and EI. This argument is correct because, for example, an excellent student with unbeatable IQ would require having EI in order to mange stress and emotions when sitting for exams. This is what would

Friday, August 23, 2019

REFLECTION Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

REFLECTION - Research Paper Example I felt very relieved after the first meeting because my English is week. I did not have the confidence to communicate things the way he did. So I was happy when he offered to do the compilation himself. The second meeting also took place through a conference call. We all met and made our questions for the teams. Making the questions was not as easy as it seemed. I knew that whatever question I would come up with would reflect how deeply I understand things. The questions had to be sensible in order to project good image of the person asking them. So I conducted a thorough research and review of literature to acquaint the required concepts before deciding which questions I would propose. The third, fourth and fifth meetings were about organizing of the paper as well as the presentation. I am good at organizing things and did my part of the job always in time. I am also very good at making presentations because I know how to adjust the colors of the text with the colors of the backgrou nd so that the colors do not merge with the background and so that the text is clearly readable. I am also quite skilled in the use of powerpoint, so I included some very good effects that all group members were very happy to see. The virtual meetings were more challenging for all of us generally and for me in particular because my English is not very good. It takes me some time to organize my thoughts and opinions in the form of questions or suggestions and put them in front of others in English whereas my other group members were very fluent in English and so easily conveyed whatever they had in their mind. Since the meetings were virtual, I was even more worried because when you are talking and everybody is listening to you in a conference call, and you take time to convey your point, it fills nervousness in you. May be if the meetings were table conferences, I would not be that much worried because in table conferences, the others are looking more of you than

Thursday, August 22, 2019

Carl Gustav Jung Essay Example for Free

Carl Gustav Jung Essay In this essay I will aim to demonstrate an understanding of Jung’s Personality Types by describing and evaluating his theory and show how they might be useful in helping me to determine therapeutic goals. I will also look at some of the criticism levelled at Jung’s theory,I think this allows the therapist,ie myself to better understand the positive from the negative. I am also of the opinion that detailing Jung’s early years and background play am important role in the overall evaluation. I have particular interest in when Jung met Freud and how this meeting of minds shaped or maybe changed their individual conclusions. I will cover this later in my essay. Carl Gustav Jung was born July 26, 1875, in the small Swiss village of Kessewil. His father was Paul Jung, a country parson, and his mother was Emilie Preiswerk Jung. He was surrounded by a fairly well educated extended family, including quite a few clergymen and some eccentrics as well. By the age of just six years old Jung started to learn Latin which started an interest in language and literature, especially ancient literature. Jung read several ancient languages including ‘Sanskrit’ the original Holy Hindu language book. Jung was a distant youth whilst growing up who did not enjoy his schooling years and was not competitive. Jung’s later education was in Basel, Switzerland where he attended boarding school where he found himself the centre of jealous pestering. Carl Jung began to use sickness as an excuse, developing an embarrassing tendency to faint under pressure. Carl Jung’s first career choice was archaeology; Jung went on to study medicine at the University of Basel. Whilst working under the well-known neurologist Krafft-Ebing, he established himself on psychiatry as his career. After graduating, he took a place at the Burghoeltzli Mental Hospital in Zurich under Eugene Bleuler, an expert on schizophrenia. In 1903, Jung married Emma Rauschenbach. He also taught classes at the University of Zurich, had a private practice, and invented word association at this time. (internet  search) In 1907 Jung met Freud. Freud would be seduced by the esteem and personality of Jung and would soon see in him the spiritual son that could guarantee the survival of psychoanalysis. The unwillingness of Jung towards the Freudian Theory referred to the role of sexuality in the psychic development. In fact Jung on no occasion completely embraced the sexual theory of Freud. From 1912 onwards Jung found himself more and more distant from Freud’s writings. By abandoning the winding and indirect of Psycho-sexuality, Jung would launch himself in the fields of spirituality and science which was understood by only an initiated few. Jung’s inner world became something for him to study and develop his theories on and during this time Jung evolved the goal of his psychology of individuation, which is the achievement of the self and other guide marks, such as the archetypes, the collective unconscious. Jung’s theory stresses the importance of understanding our personal unconsciousness (events, feeling, behaviour patterns that we have buried in our subconscious from our own direct past) and the collective unconscious (patterns, trends, traits, behaviours that all humans have no matter what background or culture have running through our lives). Whereas Freud believed the unconscious was suppressed by the human mind. Jung in the other hand believed the unconscious mind was where the conscious mind had its origins and where our psyche begins or is created from. Balance was the key for Jung, which he believed the balancing of the two sides is what drives us humans ‘towards’ or ‘away’ from goals. The foundation of the mind that consisted of the EGO (who we think we are); the SHADOW (the part of us that we deny or do not acknowledge) was developed by Jung. He continued to believe our mind was constantly developing or moving towards our true self (individuation) and this journey was fuelled by natural laws, the principles of opposites, that every aspect of our mind has an opposite force. The principle of equivalence that equal amounts of energy are given to both sides, and the principle of entropy, that everything natural winds down as energy is evenly distributed, eventually with the opposing side blending together creating a harmony. Jung believed that our  mind’s voyage followed a repeating in the ‘rites of passage’ for birth, marriage and death, mirrored throughout all cultures and peoples. Jung believed that this drive to move towards a state if harmony or individuation, was fundamentally important to us all. Jung spent a good deal of time and energy on the importance of dreams and getting to understand what their meanings meant to each individual. Jung believed that by understanding the imageries within our dreams we would benefit a better knowledge of ourselves. He indicated that dreams should not be interpreted too accurately, but considered for finding personal meanings in the imaginary or symbolism. Jung also recognised and identified two opposites of personality; 1. INTROVERSION 2. EXTROVERSION Introversion – when psychic energy is turned inwards towards our inner world. These people tend to be thoughtful people with reserved natures, preferring their own company and evading large groups, they may be cautious and uncertain, disliking change or new things, they may seem defensive and they like privacy and personal space and spend a lot of time in contemplation. Extreme forms of introversion have similar qualities to autism and some forms of schizophrenia. Extroversion – is when the movement of energy is turned outwards towards the outside world. An extroverted person would show interest in the outside world, they will be objective and frank with helpful and easy-going personalities, they like action and people around them, extreme versions of extroverts would be hopeless alone and not able to bear silence or solitude, needing continuous excitement and external inspiration to prevent boredom or unhappiness. Jung also identified four different functions (attitudes) of the mind; THINKING – when a person connects to the world via reason and intelligence. These types will have thinking searching minds, always questioning. They  will be good at judging things able to see the origin and results, and will reach logical decisions. They may be open and appear cool and detached emotionally, and will be good at adjusting to new situations. FEELING – when a person makes worth decisions about the world based on how they feel about something, putting ideas, points, and issues in order based on how they assess them and not on emotional feelings. Feeling people have a sturdy sense of traditional values and human connection is significant to them as they tend to be warm and creative. SENSATION – when a person relies sensory impressions – perceptions. These people rely on sensory impressions, how certain things appear, feel and sound. They tend to be mentally and emotionally stable people, taking things at face value, they can be seen as dull and boring which often be easy going and fun, with a calm nature. INTUITION – when the world is understood or interpreted in a particular way mainly through the unconscious – when people speak of having a hunch, gut feeling or instinct about something, this type of person is conscious of changes. Possibilities can appear distracted or ungrounded; they will get bored of uninterested or boring details which are often not practical. They can be creative and inspirational. Jung believed that a person is essentially an introvert or an extrovert and this remains equally fixed, however, an individual will rely mainly on functioning using one of these four modalities but that opposing function also had an impression on their relationships and behaviour and these functions may adjust throughout life. He combined two attributes and the four functions to eight different psychological types. Jung understood that most people are a blend of two or more types, and that understanding how your own personality type and that of people around you related to the world would offer a deeper understanding of yourself. For example; bringing you closer to individuation. Jung trusts that we understand and recognised the strengths and weaknesses of our mind; that we would improve and achieve balance. The functions and attitudes are also not fixed with one side of the  pair leading, the other becomes unconscious. Jung believed that the unconscious part then finds a way of ex pressing its hidden self. A person’s conscious orientation will be towards one of the four functions; the leading or principle function – this will decide how you respond to experiences. 1.The dominant or principle function – this will determine how you react to experiences. 2. Auxiliary functions – mainly conscious. 3. The opposite auxiliary – suppressed and partially unconscious. 4. Remaining generally unconscious Jung believed when the conscious function was solid there was a trend for the opposing function to break through into the conscious occasionally in the form of hysteria, phobias and obsessions. He believed in order to achieve balance one must work with the repressed function in therapy which in this case has echoed Freud’s theory on repressed feelings and emotions surfacing unconsciously. These combinations of psychological types, Jung formulated into eight types, combining the two attitudes with the four functions; Extroverted and Introverted 1.Thinking Type, 2.Feeling Type, 3.Sensation Type, 4.Intuitive Type The above generalisation was Jung’s way of providing a structure in order to begin and to understand individual’s behaviours and feelings. Although these types are still current they form the basis of personality or psychometric testing (Myers-Briggs) which is still in use today. I believe the significance of this information is that it is an opening point from which to discover and explore our own or clients mind using a structure. Jung maintains that psychological types are mostly inborn and not acquired through life’s experiences. I concur with this belief, However, Jung  recognised that personality types were influenced as a child advances through life by factors such as parents and the amount of influence each parent has over a child, and social factors such as school, peer groups surroundings. Jung also believed problems (mental ill health) arose when external influences forced children into a pattern that goes against the natural energy flow of a person’s mind or psychological type. As with Freud, most of the theories of early pioneers are quite impossible to prove or test due to no scientific way of measuring them. Also the amount of patients used was in very small numbers and little practical work was done. Jung’s work has given foundations to many modern psychologies including theories to develop and explore further and deeper, including words that have been accepted by the modern language. For example; * Psyche * Extrovert * Introvert * Archetype These are parallels with other great psychologies – Freud, as I already mentioned and discussed, and the work of Hans Eysenck a more modern theorist. Eysenck was the first psychologist to make this trait or temperament business into something more mathematical: he gave long lists of adjectives to hundreds of thousands of people and used a special statistics called factor analysis to figure out what factors trait dimensions carry the most weight. He took results of this work and created a test called the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ) instead of making these traits either-or, like Jung did, he saw them as dimensions. His first trait dimension was, like Jung, ‘extraversion-introversion’. But rather than say you were one or the other (an I or an E), he provided you a score on extraversion-introversion. Eysenck based his theories on Galen, an ancient Greek theory which was created around two thousand BC. It is one of the oldest personality theories around. Eysenck added on the two basic dimensions of temperament (like Jung) and these were based on four types (unscientifically based on the types of fluids he believed were washing  around the individuals body) a sanguine type, cheerful, optimistic and easy to be with, choleric, quick, hot tempered and aggressive. A phlegmatic type temperament, slow people who had a tendency to be sad, depressed and have a negative view of the world. Much simpler and much less sophisticated than Jung’s theory; Eysenck expands this into three dimensions of personality; 1. Introversion extroversion 2. Neuroticism emotional 3. Stability and psychoticism With five further subdivisions; 1. extroversion 2. agreeableness 3. conscientiousness 4. neuroticism 5. openness The theme of four (opposing) forces repeats throughout cultures and across time, North, South, East and West, Earth, Fire, Wind and Air. In religion(used my own as my example!) we see recurrences of types, for example; The Father The Son The Holy Ghost or the Virgin Mother The Crone Archetypal images we can recognise and begin to understand. These theories have a degree of objectivity, whilst they may give different labels to the personality types there does seem to be agreement that you begin to understand individuals if you can assess basic similar categories or repeating personality traits. Like Jung’s theory, and the teachings in the Bible (parables) perhaps these theories have value as a way of forming a framework for us to ask question, and discovering more of ourselves. CONCLUSION Jung believed each personality type or psyche was influenced by another, it is logical to assume that in all human relationships, mainly within an analyst/patient relationship, the analyst may encourage the patient so a subjective conclusion or true individuation may not be achievable. I feel it is important to recognise as Jung did that these types are not fixed and that a person’s personality or psyche changes throughout life and that energy flows and fluctuates between the opposing sides of our psyche so we understand that a person does not fit neatly into one of the boxes. Jung created this structure or framework to help work towards understanding of our own psyches and how better to relate to the world and people around us. Understanding how a person or patient feels, reacts and relates is obviously the first step to the beginning to help them. Being able to plan a patient’s healing journey will be more effectively tailored to them if we have a good understanding of why they think or feel the way they do and help them to understand this too. Jung believed that in order to heal, people need to learn to listen to messages from the unconscious mind, to follow their own path and think independently, and that in order to become a competent analyst you must ‘first understand yourself’ in order to efficiently help a client and to determine therapeutic goals,This is an ongoing journey of self discovery which this course is bringing out in me. BIBLIOGRAPHY Chrysalis – Diploma in psychotherapeutic counselling – year two – Module Three Carl Jung Resources, 2014 http://www.carl-jung.net/ What Freud really said – David Stafford-Clark WWW.Philosophy.lander.edu (Internet research) Wikipedia (Internet) Carl Jung – Dr. C. George Boeree http://worldtracker.org/media/library/Psychology/Boere Hans Eysenck – Dr. C. George Boeree http://worldtracker.org/media/library/Psychology/Boere Introducing Jung a graphic guide – Maggie Hyde Michael McGuinness Personality Types: Jung’s Model of Typology – Darl Sharp

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

Can Video Games Make Kids More Violent Essay Example for Free

Can Video Games Make Kids More Violent Essay Can video games make kids more violent? A new study employing state-of-the-art brain-scanning technology says that the answer may be yes. Researchers at the Indiana University School of Medicine say that brain scans of kids who played a violent video game showed an increase in emotional arousal – and a corresponding decrease of activity in brain areas involved in self-control, inhibition and attention. Does this mean that your teenager will feel an uncontrollable urge to go on a shooting rampage after playing â€Å"Call of Duty?† Vince Mathews, the principal investigator on the study, hesitates to make that leap. But he says he does think that the study should encourage parents to look more closely at the types of games their kids are playing. â€Å"Based on our results, I think parents should be aware of the relationship between violent video-game playing and brain function.† Mathews and his colleagues chose two action games to include in their research one violent the other not. The first game was the high-octane but non-violent racing game â€Å"Need for Speed: Underground.† The other was the ultra-violent first-person shooter â€Å"Medal of Honor: Frontline.† The team divided a group of 44 adolescents into two groups, and randomly assigned the kids to play one of the two games. Immediately after the play sessions, the children were given MRIs of their brains. The scans showed a negative effect on the brains of the teens who played â€Å"Medal of Honor† for 30 minutes. That same effect was not present in the kids who played â€Å"Need for Speed.† The only difference? Violent content. What’s not clear is whether the activity picked up by the MRIs indicates a lingering — or worse, permanent — effect on the kids’ brains. And it’s also not known what effect longer play times might have. The scope of this study was 30 minutes of play, and one brain scan per kid, although further research is in the works. OK. But what about violent TV shows? Or violent films? Has anyone ever done a brain scan of kids that have just watched a violent movie? Someone has. John P. Murray, a psychology professor at Kansas State University, conducted a very similar experiment, employing the same technology used in Mathews’ study. His findings are similar. Kids in his study experienced increased emotional arousal when watching short clips from the boxing movie â€Å"Rocky IV.† So, why is everyone picking on video games? Probably because there’s a much smaller body of research on video games. They just haven’t been around as long as TV and movies, so the potential effects on children are a bigger unknown. That’s a scary thing for a parent. Larry Ley, the director and coordinator of research for the Center for Successful Parenting, which funded Mathews’ study, says the purpose of the research was to help parents make informed decisions. â€Å"There’s enough data that clearly indicates that [game violence] is a problem,† he says. â€Å"And it’s not just a problem for kids with behavior disorders.† But not everyone is convinced that this latest research adds much to the debate – particularly the game development community. One such naysayer is Doug Lowenstein, president of the Entertainment Software Association. â€Å"Weve seen other studies in this field that have made dramatic claims but turn out to be less persuasive when objectively analyzed.† The ESA has a whole section of its Web site dedicated to the topic of video game violence, which would suggest that they get asked about it — a lot. And they’ve got plenty of answers at the ready for the critics who want to lay school shootings or teen aggression at the feet of the game industry. Several studies cited by the ESA point to games’ potential benefits for developing decision-making skills or bettering reaction times. Ley, however, argues such studies aren’t credible because they were produced by â€Å"hired guns† funded by the multi-billion-dollar game industry. â€Å"We’re not trying to sell [parents] anything,† he says. â€Å"We don’t have a product. The video game industry does.† Increasingly parents are more accepting of video game violence, chalking it up to being a part of growing up. â€Å"I was dead-set against violent video games,† says Kelley Windfield, a Sammamish, Wa.-based mother of two. â€Å"But my husband told me I had to start loosening up.† Laura Best, a mother of three from Clovis, Calif., says she looks for age-appropriate games for her 14 year-old son, Kyle. And although he doesn’t play a lot of games, he does tend to gravitate towards shooters like â€Å"Medal of Honor.† But she isn’t concerned that Kyle will become aggressive as a result. â€Å"That’s like saying a soccer game or a football game will make a kid more aggressive,† she says. â€Å"It’s about self-control, and you’ve got to learn it.† Ley says he believes further research, for which the Center for Successful Parenting is trying to arrange, will prove a cause-and-effect relationship between game violence and off-screen aggression. But for now, he says, the study released last week gives his organization the ammunition it needs to prove that parents  need to be more aware of how kids are using their free time. â€Å"Let’s quit using various Xboxes as babysitters instead of doing healthful activities,† says Ley, citing the growing epidemic of childhood obesity in the United States. And who, really, can argue with that?

Tuesday, August 20, 2019

Algorithms for pre-processing and processing stages of x-ray images

Algorithms for pre-processing and processing stages of x-ray images 1.1 Introduction This chapter presents algorithms for pre-processing and processing stages of both cervical and lumbar vertebrae x-ray images. Pre-processing stage here is the process of locating and enhancement the spine regionof interestin the x-ray image, where the processing stage includes the shape boundary representation and segmentation algorithms based feature vectors extraction and morphometric measurement. In this research the spine vertebrae are introduced and the objectives of segmentation algorithm are discussed. Then various general segmentation approaches including those based on the shape boundary extraction are discussed and applied to our spinal x-ray image collection. The current approach is introduced with a flow diagram and then the individual blocks of the segmentation process are taken up and discussed in detail. 1.2 Image Acquisition A digital archive of 17,000 cervical and lumbar spine x-ray images from the second National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES II) is maintained by the Lister Hill National Center of Biomedical Communications in the National Library of Medicine (NLM) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Among these 17,000 images, approximately 10,000 are cervical spine x-rays and 7,000 are lumbar x-rays. Text data (including gender, age, symptom, etc.) are associated with each image. This collection has long been suggested to be very valuable for research into the prevalence of osteoarthritis and musculoskeletal diseases. It is a goal of intramural researchers to develop a biomedical information resource useful to medical researchers and educators. Figure 3.1 shows two sample images from the database. Spine x-ray images generally have low contrast and poor image quality. They do not provide meaningful information in terms of texture or color. Pathologies found on these spine x-ray images that are of interest to the medical researchers are generally expressed along the vertebral boundary. (a) (b) 1.3 Proposed segmentation scheme The proposed process main stages scheme shown at Figure3.2, followed by a details review of the used methods applied to our spinal images and can be listed as follow: a. Pre-processing stage include image acquisition, region localization (RL) and region localization enhancement. b. Shape boundary representation and segmentation stage; include active shape model (ASM) segmentation based on two shape boundary representation 9-anatomical points and b-spline representation. c. Feature extraction stage; include feature extraction based shape feature vector and morphometric measurement-invariant features for indexing. d. Classification and similarity matching stage; include feature models classifier and similarity matching for diagnosis and retrieval 1.4 Pre-processingstage 1.4.1 Spineregion localization Region localization (RL) refers to the estimation of boundaries within the image that enclose objects of interest at a coarse level of precision. RL is important for assisting human experts in rapid image display and review (independent of its use in initializing a segmentation process). For example, with an algorithm that can rapidly, and with high probability identify the spine region with a marked line passing, this region of interest can be automatically zoomed on the display even though the location and orientation of the spine may vary appreciably in these images. This algorithm assumes that a line passing through the maximum amount of bone structure in the image will lie over a large part of the spine area, given a line passing through the image; Figure 3.3 shows the region localization (RL) selection of both cervical and lumbar images. (a) (b) 1.4.2 Enhancement approach Image enhancement is significant part of AVFAS recognition systems. Changes in lighting conditions produces dramatically decrease of recognition performance, if an image is low contrast and dark, we wish to improve its contrast and brightness. The widespread histogram equalization cannot correctly improve all parts of the image. When the original image is irregularly illuminated, some details on resulting image will remain too bright or too dark. Typically, digitized x-ray images are corrupted by additive noise and de-noising can improve the visibility of some structures in medical x-ray images, thus improving the performance of computer assisted segmentation algorithms. However, image enhancement algorithms generally amplify noise [17, 18]. Therefore, higher de-noising performance is important in obtaining images with high visual quality for that reason different enhancement techniques was implemented i. Adaptive histogram-based equalization ( Filter 1) Adaptive histogram-based equalization (AHE) can be applied to aid in the viewing of key cervical and lumbar vertebrae features, and its an excellent contrast enhancement method for medical image and other initially no visual images. In medical imaging its automatic operation and effective presentation of all contrast available in the image data make it a competitor of the standard contrast enhancement methods. The goal of using adaptive histogram equalization is to obtain a uniform histogram for the output image, so that an optimal overall contrast is perceived. However, the feature of interest in an image might need enhancement locally. Adaptive Histogram Equalization (AHE) computes the histogram of a local window centred at a given pixel to determine the mapping for that pixel, which provides a local contrast enhancement. However, the enhancement is so strong that two major problems can arise: noise amplification in flat regions of the image and ring artifacts at strong edges [12, 13]. Histogram equalization maps the input images intensity values so that the histogram of the resulting image will have an approximately uniform distribution [9-11].The histogram of a digital image with gray levels in the range [0, L-1] is a discrete function Where is the gray level, is the number of pixels in the image with that gray level, is the total number of pixels in the image, and k =0, 1, 2 L-1, basically gives an estimate of the probability of occurrence of gray level The local contrast of the object in the image is increased by applied histogram equalization, especially when the applied data of the image is represented by close contrast values. Through this adjustment the intensity can be better distributed on the histogram, this allows for areas of lower local contrast to gain a higher contrast without affecting the global contrast. (a) (b) ii. Adaptive contrast enhancement The idea is to enhance contrast locally analyzing local grey differences taking into account mean grey level. First we apply local adaptive contrast enhancement. Parameters are set to amplify local features and diminish mean brightness in order to obtain more contrast resulting image. After that we apply histogram equalization. Adaptive gamma value Gamma correction Gamma correction operation performs nonlinear brightness adjustment. Brightness for darker pixels is increased, but it is almost the same for bright pixels. As result more details are visible. 1.5 Shape boundary segmentation Shape boundary segmentation presented at this work is a hierarchical segmentation algorithm tailored to the segmentation of cervical and lumbar vertebrae in digitized x-ray images. The algorithm employs the both shape boundary representation schemes, 9-anatomical points representation (9-APR) and B-spline representation (B-SR) to obtain a suitable initialization for segmentation stage that utilize active shape models (ASMs) proposed by Cootes et al. The advantage of using ASMs in medical image segmentation applications is that rather than creating models that are purely data driven, ASMs gain a priori knowledge through a thorough observation of the shape variation across a training set. 1.5.1 Shape boundary representation Shape is an important characteristic for describing pertinent pathologies in various types of medical image and its a particular challenges regarding vertebra boundary segmentation in spine x-ray images. It was realized that the shape representation method would need to serve the dual purpose of providing a rich description of the vertebra shape while being acceptable to the end user community consisting of medical professionals. In order to model the spinal vertebra shape we presented by term of set points chosen to place point around the boundary , this must be done for each shape at training stage and the labelling point its important. Two schemes list has been used at this stage to determine a vertebra boundary shape in terms of list points i. 9-anatomical point representation (9-APR) We obtained segmentation data created by medical expertise at an early state of our segmentation work; the purpose of this task was to acquire reference data as a guideline for validating vertebrae segmentation algorithms. These data consisted of (x, y) coordinates for specific geometric locations on the vertebrae; a maximum of 9-anatomical points representation (9-APR) assigned and marked by board certificate radiologist that is indicative of the pathology found to be consistently and reliably detectable per vertebra were collected . Figure 3.7 shows below the points were placed manually on each vertebrae and which is the interest to medical researchers. Points 1, 3, 4, and 6 are indicative of the four corners of the vertebral body as seen in a projective sagittal view. Points 4 and 3 mark the upper and lower posterior corners of the vertebra, respectively; Points 6 and 1 mark the upper and lower anterior corners of the vertebra, respectively. Points 5 and 2 are the median along the upper and lower vertebra edge in the sagittal view; Point 8 is the median along the anterior vertical edge of the vertebra in the sagittal view. Note that Points 7 and 9 mark the upper and lower anterior osteophytes, so if osteophyte(s) are not present on the vertebra, then these points (7-9) coincide with points 6 and 1, respectively. ii. B-spline representation (B-SR) Representation of curves using piecewise polynomial interpolation to obtain curves is widely used in computer graphics .B-spline are piecewise polynomial curves whose shape is closely related to their control polygon a chain of vertices giving a polygonal representation of curves. B-splines of the third order are most common because this is the lowest order which includes the changes of curvatures. The Advantage of using B-spline techniques at this research is to enhance the 9-anatomical points, B-spline curves require more information (i.e., the degree of the curve and a knot vector) and a more complex theory than Bà ©zier curves. But, it has more advantages to offset this shortcoming. * B-spline curve can be a Bà ©zier curve. * B-spline curves satisfy all important properties that Bà ©zier curves have. * B-spline curves provide more control flexibility than Bà ©zier curves can do. * The degree of a B-spline curve is separated from the number of control points. More precisely [ReF]. We can use lower degree curves and still maintain a large number of control points and also we can change the position of a control point without globally changing the shape of the whole curve (local modification property). Since B-spline curves satisfy the strong convex hull property, they have a finer shape control. Moreover, there are other techniques for designing and editing the shape of a curve such as changing knots. B-spline is a generalization of the Bezier curve [Ref] , let a vector known as the knot vector be defined, Where, is a no decreasing sequence with and define control points, Define the degree as ,The knots are called internal knots. 1.5.2 Modelling Shape Variations In ASM, an object shape is represented by a set of landmark points and requires a good initialization of an objects pose in an image (i.e., location, size, and angle of rotation); therefore, we used the two schemes representation (9-APR B-SR) in our proposed segmentation technique to create this initialization. Several instances of the same object class are included in a training set and in order to model the variations we need to align the set of shapes. i. Training set In order to build a model that is flexible enough to cover the most typical variations of vertebrae, a sufficiently large training set has to be used. For the purpose of the investigation reported in this work, we locate the shape (by eye) and its important that the two schemes representations are accurately located and that there is an exact correspondence between labels in different instances of training shapes. In this research a set of 1100 vertebra for both cervical (400 vertebral) and lumbar (710 vertebra) has been used. ii. Aligning trainshapes The model that will be used to describe a shape and its typical appearances is based on the variations of the spatial position of each landmark point within the training set. Each point will thus have a certain distribution in the image space and therefore the shape model is being referred to as a Point Distribution Model (PDM). In order to obtain the PDM, we use the two shape representation, to align the shapes, and finally, to summarize the landmark variations in a compact form. In what follows, these steps are being described in some detail. We achieve the required alignment by scaling, rotating and translating the training shapes so that they correspond as closely as possible. 1.7 Shape boundary Indexing The shape analysis described here is related to the statistical analysis of vertebrae shapes to shape similarity matching and recognition. Three schemes of shape analysis implemented at this stage. First scheme is the shape analysis based feature vectors extraction includes statistical shape feature (SSF) and Gabor wavelets features (GWF). Second scheme is the shape analysis based morphometric measurement based angles measurement index (AMI) and intra-bone ratio measurement (IBRM). Last is the analysis based similarity matching, the index output result from each analysis will be considered as input to the classifier systems those schemes outlined are described below. Feature vector is an n-dimensional vector of numerical features represents object shape. Statistical models captured from active shape model, Gabor wavelets filter bank require a numerical representation of vertebrae shape based on both boundary shape representation (9-anatomical point model ,B-spline curve), since such representations facilitate processing and statistical analysis. Figure below shows schematic pattern recognition system based feature vectors. 1.7.1 Statistical shapefeatures(SSF) Each vertebral in the training set, when aligned can be represented by a single points in 2n dimensional space (eq2).Thus a set of N example shapes gives base on each shape boundary representation cloud of N point in this 2n dimensional space. We assume that these points lie within some region of the space which call the Allowed Shape Domain and that the points give an indication of the shape and size of this region. Every 2n-D point within this domain gives a set of landmarks whose shape is broadly similar to that of those in the original training set. Thus by moving about the Allowable shape domain we can generate new shapes in systematic way .The approach given below attempts to model the shape of this cloud in high dimensional space and hence to capture the relationship between the positions of the individual landmark points. 1.7.2 Gabor wavelets features(GWF) The objectives of this stage is to explore the feasibility of using Gabor wavelet-constructed spatial filters to extract feature-based vector from shape boundary consisting of cervical and lumbar vertebrae, and to use these extracted feature vectors to train and test with different classifier. To evaluate the robustness of the method, so many analysis based filter and mask size was experimented to select the suitable Gabor mask that will be convolute with the two vertebra shape boundary extracted. In order to briefly describe Gabor wavelets and provide a rationale for this stage of work, the Short Time Fourier Transform (STFT) and Gabor Transform need to be explained first. The Fourier transform is a fundamental tool of classical signal analysis. i. Gabor wavelets filter bank The Gabor wavelet function used in this research for AOs feature extraction was same as Naghdy (1996) used and was defined. Where: the different choices of frequency j and orientation constructed a set of filters. ii. Filter frequency and mask size analysis As the frequency of the sinusoid changes, the window size will be changed. (Fig. 3.28, 3.29, 3.30 and 3.32) shows real and imaginary parts of eight two-dimensional wavelets filters. When j is changed from 1 to 4, the sinusoid frequency is reduced whereas the Gaussian window size increases. In comparison, for the Gabor transform, Gaussin window size will remain same. iii. Convolution vertebral region with the filter bank The elementary Gabor wavelet functions were used to construct spatial domain filters, Each filter was made of a pair of filters, which were the real and imaginary part of the complex sinusoid. These pair was convolved with the green channel signal of texture image separately. The reason of choosing the green channel to do convolution was that the green channel was found to have the best texture quality, which means the best contrast level between plants and soil, among red, blue and MExG channels. This scenario is absolutely sensor dependent and may not be the case for other sensors. For one frequency level, the filtering output was the modulation of the average of the convolution output from real and imaginary filter masks on all convolved pixels in the green channel image, which was computed. iv. Gabor wavelets filer bank block diagram 1.8 Shape boundary morphometric measurement 1.8.1 Morphometric measurement-invariant features For efficient image retrieval, it is important that the pathological features of interest be detected with high accuracy. In this stage of Automatic Vertebral Fracture Assessment System techniques, new morphometric measurement-invariant features were investigated for the detection of anterior osteophytes, including lumbar and cervical vertebrae. The goal in this stage of work is to investigate a measurement algorithm for high accuracy and avoid the complex calculation. Two approaches morphometric measurement-invariant features were developed based: 1) Angles invariant features (A-IF) 2) Intra-distance ratio invariant features (ID-IF) The results of this morphometric extraction geometries calculation will produce a signal of two index based on angle and distance measurement that can be used to distinguish between the anterior osteoporosis classes and their severity implemented as input for classifier algorithm. Figure below show the block diagram of the shape analyses based morphometric technique. Stage 1: AOs detection Two classification schemes for anterior osteophytes were established by a medical expert to evaluate the accuracy of the PSM algorithm. The first is Macnabs classification, established by Macnab and his coworkers in 1956 on radiological and pathological bases [6, 7].Two types of osteophytes are adapted from Macnabs classification: claw and traction, as shown in Figure 1. Their visual characteristics are: 1. Claw spur rises from the vertebral rim and curves toward the adjacent disk. It is often triangular in shape and curved at the tips. 2. Traction spur protrudes horizontally, is moderately thick, does not curve at the tips, and never extends across the intervertebral disk space. The second classification is a grading system which was defined by the medical expert consistent with reasonable criteria for assigning severity levels to anterior osteophytes (AO). Three grades of AO are slight, moderate, and severe, also shown in Table 1. Their visual characteristics are: 1. Slight grade includes normal, where the corner angles on the vertebral boundary are approximately right angles. It may have a slight protuberance, where the tip of the osteophyte is round and no narrowing is observed at the base of the protuberance. 2. Moderate grade is characterized by evident protuberance from the ideal horizontal or vertical edge of the vertebra. The bounding edges of the AO form an angle of at least 45 degrees and the osteophyte has a relatively wider base than severe grade. 3. Severe grade is characterized by presence of hook, the angle is less than 45 degrees and has a narrow base, or protrudes far (about 1/3 of the length of the horizontal border) from the normal (ideal 90 degree) vertebral corner. Angles invariant features (A-IF) We explore three main angles for measurement that make sense of difference between the AO classes from the 9-anatomical landmarks model. Shape below show the angle of interest selected that will be used next as input for our classifier system to make decision (a) Turning Angle (b) Intra-Distance Across the Shape Turn Angle (TA) To capture the characteristics of shape in local regions, we use two different features. The first is Turn Angle (TA). Turn Angle is also called Turning Angle or Bent Angle. It is defined as follows [3]: if the points on the polygon are ordered in the counterclockwise direction, and the polygon is traversed in this direction, the Turn Angle is the angle between the direction vector for the current polygon segment and the next one; the sense of the Turn Angle is calculated such that a clockwise turn gives a negative angle whereas a counterclockwise turn gives a positive angle. Figure 3 (a) shows an example. For an arbitrary shape, the Turn Angle feature could be calculated from the approximating polygon for that shape. Turn Angle for a polygon with n vertices is simply a vector in Rn . For example, if the vertebra is represented as a polygon with 72 vertices (our sparse representation), the Turn Angle is a 72-element vector. If the polygon has the concept of an initial vertex, similarity computation is straightforward, e.g., with a Euclidean metric. If there is no initial vertex, similarity between two shapes may be computed by a combinatorial comparison of distances between possibly-matching sets of vertices. This computation may be optimized by dynamic programming. Intra-distance ratio invariant features (ID-IF) Distance across the shape [4] is another local shape feature. DAS is defined, for each vertex P in a polygon, as the length of the angle bisector at P, measured as the line segment from P to the intersecting side of the polygon. For Example, the interior bisector of angle à ¢Ã‹â€ Ã‚  P2P3P4 in the figure 3 (b) intersects the contour at point I3. The length of P3I3 is the DAS at point P3. If the bisector intersects the shape multiple times, the distance to the closest intersection is used. Similarly as for turn angle, if we represent the vertebra shape as a polygon with 72 sample points, the DAS feature may be calculated on those 72 points. Where, V: is called as vertical angle calculated between the points 7-8-9 H: is called as horizontal angle calculated between the points 1-2-3 C: is called as corner angle calculated between the points 8-9-1 Angle formula calculation between these three points coordinates as follow 1.9 Operation Step 1: Calculate the Horizontal angle and this calculation based on the Step 2: Calculate the Horizontal angle and this calculation based on the Step 3: Calculate the Horizontal angle and this calculation based on the Step 4: build the rule base and evaluate the result by visual inspection Intra-Distance ratio Measurement (I-DRM) Inter-bone ration is another morphometric measurement issue, it was explored based on the shape distance here we focused Where, : Represents the distance posterior height calculated between the points 3-4 : Represents the distance medial height calculated between the points 5-2 : Represents the distance interior height calculated between the points 1-6 : Represents the distance calculated between the points 8-mp, where mp Midpoint between the points 3-4, the Midpoint (mp) coordinates calculation formula as the following: With; (, ) is the point 3 coordinate, (,) is the point 4 coordinate Given the two points (, ) and (,), the distance between these points is given by the formula: The normal vertebra was estimated to have the following ratio distance Distance () =Distance () =Distance () Base on this estimation by expert radiologist we develop another rule base decision system that can work properly to and true classify the normal and abnormal and bone The criteria of the X= Stage 2: AOsLocation Detection of the Ao position conduct us to determine the location either upper or lower AO a) b) The position of the AO is determined by sample way calculation based of angles too Stage 3: Disc space narrowing (DSN) Stage 4 Stage 5:Subluxation/Spondylolisthesis Segmentation and Pre-processing The vertebra shapes were segmented using an active contours method modified to constrain evolving contour points to follow orthogonal curves [18], to avoid convergence to a self-intersecting solution contour at vertebra corners [9]. The solution contours have 36 points. Nine of these 36 points were distinguished as geometrical or anatomical reference points, with relative locations that are approximately constant across the veterbra shapes. The nine points, shown in Figure 2 were either manually marked by experts, or extracted automatically or semi-automatically by specialized algorithms [9]. For the current work, we preprocess these segmented shapes by curve smoothing (to reduce noise), fitting (for smoothness), interpolation, and re-sampling (for larger number of evenly distributed points) to obtain the final shape contour description. The curve fitting and interpolation are done with the natural cubic spline algorithm. Then the shape contour is resampled by equal arc length sampling. Finally, the vertebra whole shape is represented by two boundary point sets with different resolutions. The dense sampling set contains 180 points, and the superior and the inferior anterior corners are represented by 60 points, respectively. The sparse sampling set contains 72 points, with the superior and the inferior anterior corners represented by 25 points, respectively.