Development and validation of a short Italian UPPS-P impulsive behavior scale

in Addictive Behaviors Reports (2015), 2

Impulsivity is a multidimensional construct that plays a prominent role in the development, maintenance, and relapse of addictive disorders. The UPPS-P model of impulsivity, which distinguishes between ... [more ▼]

Impulsivity is a multidimensional construct that plays a prominent role in the development, maintenance, and relapse of addictive disorders. The UPPS-P model of impulsivity, which distinguishes between five impulsivity components (positive urgency, negative urgency, lack of perseverance, lack of premeditation, sensation seeking), has been increasingly investigated during the last decade in relation to addictive and risky behaviors. Unfortunately, it currently lacks a validated scale that allows Italian researchers and clinicians to measure impulsivity based on the UPPS-P model. The current study fills this gap by testing the psychometric properties of a short 20-item Italian scale used to assess the five dimensions of the UPPS-P model in 188 volunteer participants from the community. Confirmatory factor analysis supported a model of five distinct, but interrelated, impulsivity components. The results indicated good internal consistency (Cronbach's α ranges from .73 to .84). Construct validity was evidenced by specific relations with measures of addictive behaviors and depressive symptoms. On the whole, this study demonstrated that the Italian short UPPS-P has good psychometric properties. © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. [less ▲]

Development and validation of a test intrument to assess basic motor qualifications in primary school

Poster (2015, July)

Development and Validation of the Revised Multicultural Ideology Scale in Germany and Luxembourg

in Psychological Reports (2021)

A revised version of the Multicultural Ideology Scale (rMCI; Berry 2020; Berry et al., 1977) is currently being developed to measure endorsement of multiculturalism in different cultural contexts. The ... [more ▼]

A revised version of the Multicultural Ideology Scale (rMCI; Berry 2020; Berry et al., 1977) is currently being developed to measure endorsement of multiculturalism in different cultural contexts. The current study, which is part of this cross-cultural research project, presents the first assessment of the rMCI scale in the German language. The measure aims to cover several attitudinal dimensions of multiculturalism, relevant to the integration of different ethnocultural groups: Cultural Maintenance, Equity/Inclusion, Social interaction, Essentialistic Boundaries, Extent of Differences, and Consequences of Diversity. Two independent datasets were acquired from Germany (N = 382) and Luxembourg (N = 148) to estimate the factor structure of the rMCI using different confirmatory factor analysis techniques. The findings suggest that a 4-factor solution, including Cultural Maintenance, Equity/Inclusion, Social interaction, and Consequences of Diversity, was the best fit for the data. Most of these subscales demonstrated adequate psychometric properties (internal consistency, convergent, and discriminant validity). The 4-factor model of the rMCI was partially invariant across the two ethnic groups and full measurement invariance was established across gender. [less ▲]

Development of a BIM-based web tool as Material and Component bank for a sustainable construction industry

in Sustainability (2020)

The construction industry consumes an enormous amount of global resources and produces more waste than any other sector. The need to move toward sustainable development in construction requires ... [more ▼]

The construction industry consumes an enormous amount of global resources and produces more waste than any other sector. The need to move toward sustainable development in construction requires significant changes in construction and demolition (C&D) waste management. The estimation of waste, recycling materials and reusable components could be vital in waste management, achieving huge efficiency in the construction industry. Moreover, a typical building comprises of an extensive amount of materials and components with various characteristics. This study proposes a Building Information Modelling (BIM) based system to allow the circular economy by storing information of the materials and components of buildings and by effectively managing the recycling of materials and reuse of components. A tool which serves as Material and Component (M&C) bank is developed with PHP and MYSQL by making use of a web browser able to extract the materials and component information of a building through the BIM model. This information is vital for several uses such as quantification of C&D waste and assessing for the design for deconstruction. It can also be used to obtain the information of reusable condition of the components and instructions for the reconstruction. [less ▲]

Development of a constitutive hyperelastic material law for numerical simulations of adhesive steel–glass connections using structural silicone

in International Journal of Adhesion and Adhesives (2014), 48

Silicone elastomers are amongst others employed in glass façades as structural connection materials. They are known to be durable adhesives, able to transfer forces under variable loading and atmospheric ... [more ▼]

Silicone elastomers are amongst others employed in glass façades as structural connection materials. They are known to be durable adhesives, able to transfer forces under variable loading and atmospheric conditions during their design life. For the dimensioning of adhesive joints, numerical simulations are often used, especially for joints which exhibit large deformations and/or for complex geometries. However, silicones have strong non-linear material behaviour already at small strain deformations, are slightly compressible and show a time-depending behaviour. The current existing material laws do not allow for considering these effects properly in simulation, particularly for combined loading. Therefore a hyperelastic material law for silicones has been developed and validated, based on a strain energy function. For this purpose, test series have been carried out to determine all relevant material parameters needed to describe the strain energy potential, namely tension, compression, shear and multi-axial oedometric test series on non-aged and artificially aged specimens. Furthermore, the softening due to low cyclic loading (Mullins’ effect) has been considered and quantified by comparison to quasi-static loading for all test series. The developed hyperelastic model has been implemented into the finite element software Abaqus® for validation and the results of numerical simulations have been compared to experimental results and existing laws. The comparison showed that the proposed model better matched the real behaviour of silicone elastomers and led to an increase in exactness of the numerical simulations of adhesive joints. [less ▲]

Development of a Control Strategy for a PVT-based CO2 Heat Pump

in Proceedings of 7th International Energy and Sustainability Conference (IESC) (2018)

In recent years, the possibility of combining photovoltaics (PV) and solar thermal collectors into one solar hybrid module (PVT-module) has been increasingly investigated. PVT-modules produce thermal and ... [more ▼]

In recent years, the possibility of combining photovoltaics (PV) and solar thermal collectors into one solar hybrid module (PVT-module) has been increasingly investigated. PVT-modules produce thermal and electrical energy at the same time. Since the efficiency of a photovoltaic module decreases with increasing temperature, the temperature of the heat transfer media is often limited to about 30 °C and the PVT-module is combined with a heat pump, which increases the temperature on the “warm side”. A common approach is to integrate the PVT-module directly as an evaporator in a heat pump system (PVT-direct). This paper presents the development of a control strategy for a PVT-based CO2 heat pump that takes into account solar radiation, ambient temperature, wind speed, evaporator temperature and compressor power. The developed control strategy provides different operating modes depending on the solar radiation supply as well as the ambient temperature. [less ▲]

Development of a Data-Driven Approach based on Kalman filtering for CFD Reactor Analysis

in PHYSOR 2018 (2018)

In the last several years, computer-based simulation has become an important analysis and design tool in many engineering fields. The common practice involves the use of low-fidelity models, which in most ... [more ▼]

In the last several years, computer-based simulation has become an important analysis and design tool in many engineering fields. The common practice involves the use of low-fidelity models, which in most cases are able to provide fairly accurate results while maintaining a low computational cost. However, for complex systems such as nuclear reactors, more detailed models are required for the in-depth analysis of the problem at hand, due for example to the complex geometries of the physical domain. Nevertheless, such models are affected by potentially critical uncertainties and inaccuracies. In this context, the use of data assimilation methods such as the Kalman filter to integrate local experimental data witihin the numerical model looks very promising as a high-fidelity analysis tool. In this work, the focus is the application of such methods to the problem of fluid-dynamics analysis of the reactor. Indeed, in terms of nuclear reactor investigation, a detailed characterization of the coolant behaviour within the reactor core is of manda- tory importance in order to understand, among others, the operating conditions of the system, and the potential occurrence of accident scenarios. In this context, the use of data assimilation methods allows the extraction of information of the thermo-dynamics state of the system in a benchmarked transitory in order to increase the fidelity of the com- putational model. Conversely to the current application of control-oriented black-box in the nuclear energy community, in this work the integration of the data-driven paradigm into the numerical formulation of the CFD problem is proposed. In particular, the al- gorithm outlined embeds the Kalman filter into a segregated predictor-corrector formu- lation, commonly adopted for CFD analysis. Due to the construction of the developed method, one of the main challenges achieved is the preservation of mass-conservation for the thermo-dynamics state during each time instant. As a preliminary verification, the proposed methodology is validated on a benchmark of the lid-driven cavity. The obtained results highlight the efficiency of the proposed method with respect to the state-of-art low fidelity approach. [less ▲]

Development of a European Combined Geodetic Network (ECGN)

in Journal of Geodynamics (2005), 40(4-5), 450-460

To ensure the long-time stability of the terrestrial reference system with an accuracy of 10‑9 in the global and continental scale, the interactions between different time-dependent influences of the ... [more ▼]

To ensure the long-time stability of the terrestrial reference system with an accuracy of 10‑9 in the global and continental scale, the interactions between different time-dependent influences of the system Earth to the terrestrial reference system and the related observation has to be considered in the evaluation models. It is proposed to establish a kinematic European Combined Geodetic Network (ECGN) and to integrate the spatial and height reference system into the Earth gravity field parameter estimation. This plan is in agreement with the foreseen IAG project of an Integrated Global Geodetic Observation System (IGGOS). In selected European stations ECGN will establish the combination of time series of spatial/geometric GNSS observations, precise levelling and tide gauge records with gravity field related observations (gravity, Earth tides). Observations are complemented with meteorological parameters, surrounding information of the stations, e.g. eccentricities and ground water level. A first call for participation in the project was directed to the implementation of the ECGN stations. These stations include the standard observation techniques GNSS (GPS/GLONASS—permanent), gravity (super conducting gravimeter and/or absolute gravimeter—permanent or repeated), levelling connections to nodal points of the European levelling network (UELN) (repeated) and meteorological parameters (permanent). A basic constituent of the ECGN stations is a local network for controlling the eccentricities at the 1 mm accuracy level in all three spatial components. For the contributing observation techniques, guidelines have been agreed upon to ensure equal observation principles [less ▲]

Development of a large-scale screener for functional vision impairments in early childhood

Scientific Conference (2021, October 21)

Cerebral Visual Impairment (CVI) is a term used to designate a neurological disorder of the visual pathways impacting visual processes at any given level (Lueck et al., 2019). Due to the advances in ... [more ▼]

Cerebral Visual Impairment (CVI) is a term used to designate a neurological disorder of the visual pathways impacting visual processes at any given level (Lueck et al., 2019). Due to the advances in perinatal and medicinal care, CVI’s occurrence has increased significantly over the last years (Chokron & Dutton, 2016). The condition almost always entails aggregated functional vision impairments, i.e., limitations on the use of binocular vision during everyday tasks (Dutton, 2015). CVI can have effects on school achievements if undetected. Early detection is thus key to offer appropriate aids to avoid a negative impact on learning processes. The aim of this project is to develop a large-scale screener at the beginning of formal schooling, to identify functional vision impairments early on. For this reason, a set of items assessing different visual functions will be incorporated into the Luxembourgish school monitoring program. Based on a theoretical model of visual perceptual processing (Humphreys and Riddoch, 1987), we developed timed and non-timed items that can be administered in a large-scale classroom setting which target different stages of visual perceptual processing. Furthermore, we included visual functions connected with both dorsal and ventral streams, visual spatial processing, visual exploration and visual memory. We will present the design of the large-scale screener in relation to the theoretical model, as well as the rationale used to include or exclude various perceptual visual functions in the final test. Furthermore, we will explain the planned data collection and tool validation processes. [less ▲]

Development of a method for ex-post identification of falsifications in survey data

Scientific Conference (2011, November)