Validation of the Chinese Version of the Children’s ChronoType Questionnaire (CCTQ) in school-aged children

ABSTRACT

The Children’s ChronoType Questionnaire (CCTQ) is a valid and reliable measure for assessing prepubertal children aged 4–11 years. The CCTQ is a parent-reported, 27-item questionnaire consisting of sleep-wake parameters for scheduled and free days (16 items), a morningness/eveningness scale (M/E, 10 items), and a five-point, single-item, chronotype score. The CCTQ has been translated into different languages, but a Chinese version is not available. In the present study, we aimed to produce a Chinese version of the CCTQ and test its validity and reliability on school-aged children. A total of 555 children aged 7–11 years were recruited from five primary schools. The parents were told to complete the CCTQ and record their child’s sleep pattern in a 7-day sleep diary. Sixty-six children and their parents were invited to participate in determining the test-retest reliability of the CCTQ over a 2-week interval, and their sleep patterns were assessed using a sleep diary. The internal consistency of the Chinese CCTQ M/E score as measured by Cronbach’s alpha was acceptable (0.74). Regarding the test-retest reliability of the instrument, moderate to strong Spearman’s correlation coefficients were found for most of the CCTQ – sleep-wake items (ρ = 0.52–0.86) and for the CCTQ-M/E total score (ρ = 0.78). For the concurrent validity, Spearman’s correlations between the sleep-wake parameters of the CCTQ and the sleep diary were moderate to high on both the scheduled days (ρ = 0.54 to 0.87) and free days (ρ = 0.36 to 0.60). For the correlations measured with actigraphs, significant correlations were found in the CCTQ sleep-wake parameters, including bedtime, get-up time, sleep latency, sleep period, time in bed, and mid-sleep point on both the scheduled (ρ = 0.31 to 0.76) and free days (ρ = 0.27 to 0.52), but not in sleep latency and sleep period on free days. The results of the present study suggest that the Chinese version of the CCTQ is a reliable and valid tool for assessing chronotypes in Chinese school-aged children in Hong Kong.     

Articulated Knowledges: Environmental Forms after Universality's Demise

Critiques of universalism require rethinking when confronted with environmental political arenas, in which the very concepts of "universality" and "particularity" are in a constant process of self-conscious deployment. In this article, I attend to the analytic and political implications of such deployments in a recent incinerator controversy in Hong Kong. I suggest that an aesthetic of local appropriateness and its formal requirement of simultaneous universal and particular truth value normalize the politics of environmental expertise such that the only legible form for counterknowledge is one of articulated knowledges. To understand how the knowledges emergent in an NGO–village collaboration were scaled, linked, and mobilized, I analyze a translation of expert knowledge and the event's metapragmatic effects. A subsequent account of unarticulated knowledges emphasizes the political-economic conditions that limit whose knowledges can count as particular in articulations of counterexpertise.     

Flexible and Semitransparent Organic Solar Cells

Flexible and semitransparent organic solar cells (OSCs) have been regarded as the most promising photovoltaic devices for the application of OSCs in wearable energy resources and building‐integrated photovoltaics. Therefore, the flexible and semitransparent OSCs have developed rapidly in recent years through the synergistic efforts in developing novel flexible bottom or top transparent electrodes, designing and synthesizing high performance photoactive layer and low temperature processed electrode buffer layer materials, and device architecture engineering. To date, the highest power conversion efficiencies have reached over 10% of the flexible OSCs and 7.7% with average visible transmittance of 37% for the semitransparent OSCs. Here, a comprehensive overview of recent research progresses and perspectives on the related materials and devices of the flexible and semitransparent OSCs is provided.     

Microbiological quality of pork meat from local Hong Kong markets

Over a 3-week period, samples of fresh, chopped, pork meat were taken every morning and afternoon from 50 meat stalls. Microbiological examination revealed that the samples had (c.f.u./g): total microbes, 1×10³ to 2.14×10⁶; mean probable numbers of coliforms and Escherichia coli, 1.51×10³ to 1.15×10⁴; and yeasts and moulds, 0 to 1.28×10⁴. Salmonella, found in 32 samples from 21 stalls, were serotyped as B (three samples), C1 (four) or E (25). No Campylobacter were found. Because microbial growth and/or contamination of the meat occurred during the day, samples taken in the afternoon had greater total counts (P<0.05) and contained detectable numbers of Salmonella more frequently (42% versus 22%) than those taken in the morning.The author is with the Department of Biology and Chemistry, City Polytechnic of Hong Kong, 83 Tat Chee Ave, Kowloon, Hong Kong     

PRODUCTION OF MUCILAGE BY THE ADRIATIC EPIPELIC DIATOM CYLINDROTHECA CLOSTERIUM (BACILLARIOPHYCEAE) UNDER NUTRIENT LIMITATION

The carbon partitioning of the epipelic diatom Cylindrotheca closterium (Ehrenberg) Reiman and Lewin isolated from the Adriatic Sea was studied in the laboratory under varying scenarios of nutrient limitation. Total number of cells, photosynthesis measured at 695 μmol photons·m ^{− 2}·s ^{− 1} irradiance (P_{695- μ mol}), chlorophyll ( a + c ) content, respiration, extracellular polymeric substances (EPS), total particulate carbohydrate (TPC), and dissolved carbohydrate were evaluated under nitrogen and phosphorus deficiencies in culture. The highest total number of cells was found in the control, whereas the nitrogen-limited treatment showed the lowest value. During the transition phase of growth, photosynthesis in the nitrogen-limited treatment was 3-fold lower than in the phosphorus-limited treatment and 4-fold lower than in the control. Differences in respiration rates and chlorophyll ( a + c ) content were even more marked. Dissolved carbohydrate remained the same in all the treatments, whereas during the transition and stationary phase, EPS presented the highest values under phosphorus limitation and the lowest in the control treatment. The production of EPS was closely linked to the periods of carbon assimilation (transition phase) in the nutrient depleted treatments, especially in the phosphorus-limited treatment. These results point out the relevance of the nutrient imbalance (nitrogen or phosphorus) in the production of EPS by the benthic or resuspended diatoms and suggest that these diatoms play an important role in nutrient-unbalanced systems like sediments or marine snow.     

Reefs of tomorrow: eutrophication reduces coral biodiversity in an urbanized seascape

Although the impacts of nutrient pollution on coral reefs are well known, surprisingly, no statistical relationships have ever been established between water quality parameters, coral biodiversity and coral cover. Hong Kong provides a unique opportunity to assess this relationship. Here, coastal waters have been monitored monthly since 1986, at 76 stations, providing a highly spatially resolved water quality dataset including 68 903 data points. Moreover, a robust coral species richness (S) dataset is available from more than 100 surveyed locations, composed of 3453 individual colonies' observations, as well as a coral cover (CC) dataset including 85 sites. This wealth of data provides a unique opportunity to test the hypothesis that water quality, and in particular nutrients, drives coral biodiversity. The influence of water quality on S and CC was analyzed using GIS and multiple regression modeling. Eutrophication (as chlorophyll‐a concentration; CHLA) was negatively correlated with S and CC, whereas physicochemical parameters (DO and salinity) had no significant effect. The modeling further illustrated that particulate suspended matter, dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) and dissolved inorganic phosphorus (DIP) had a negative effect on S and on CC; however, the effect of nutrients was 1.5‐fold to twofold greater. The highest S and CC occurred where CHLA <2 μg L^?1, DIN < 2 μm and DIP < 0.1 μm . Where these values were exceeded, S and CC were significantly lower and no live corals were observed where CHLA > 15 μg L^?1, DIN > 9 μm and DIP > 0.33 μm . This study demonstrates the importance of nutrients over other water quality parameters in coral biodiversity loss and highlights the key role of eutrophication in shaping coastal coral reef ecosystems. This work also provides ecological thresholds that may be useful for water quality guidelines and nutrient mitigation policies.     

‘Playing’ at the ethnic boundary: strategic boundary making/unmaking among ethnic Chinese groups in Australia

The sociological literature has constructed a systematic typology of ‘modes’ and ‘means’ of strategic ethnic boundary making/unmaking. Through exploring different strategies, scholars illustrate the processes and contexts of boundary expansion or contraction. Other scholars also distinguish ethnic elements and ‘moral' values attached to certain ethnicities but not to others. This paper acknowledges dynamic boundary making/unmaking and moral aspects of ethnicity, while exploring the different degrees to which national and pan-national identity nest within each other among ethnic Chinese groups, as well as how ethnic boundary becomes a field where people ‘play' in their everyday interactions. Based on participant observations and in-depth interviews from two pan-Chinese worksites in Australia, the paper argues that different interpretations of ethnic identity as well as how different identities (national and pan-national) are nested give people room to ‘play' at the ethnic boundary and result in different outcomes. This paper also shows that people can cross the ethnic boundary (between Taiwanese/Hong Kongese and PRC-Chinese) without expanding/contracting the existing categories or ‘repositioning/transvaluing' their ethnic statuses.     

Empowering Semi‐Transparent Solar Cells with Thermal‐Mirror Functionality

Device architectures for semi‐transparent perovskite solar cells are proposed that are not only highly efficient but also very effective in thermal‐mirror operation. With the optimal top transparent electrode design based on thin metal layer capped with a high‐index dielectric layer for selective transmittance in visible and high reflectance in near‐infrared (NIR) region, the proposed see‐through devices exhibit average power conversion efficiency as large as 13.3% and outstanding NIR rejection of 85.5%, demonstrating their great potential for ideal “energy‐generating and heat‐rejecting” solar windows that can make a smart use of solar energy.     

丹红注射液治疗膝关节置换术后患者的临床疗效及机制研究

目的:探讨丹红注射液治疗膝关节置换术后患者的临床疗效、安全性及其可能作用机制。方法:选取我院骨科收治的行膝关节置换术的患者86例,根据就诊顺序平均分为两组,对照组43例予以术后常规治疗,实验组43例予以丹红注射液治疗。治疗后,观察并比较两组患者的临床疗效,血清IL-6、IL-8及TNF-α水平的变化,并发症的发生情况以及膝关节功能的活动情况。结果:与对照组相比较,实验组的总有效率及HSS评分更高(P0.05),血清IL-6、IL-8、TNF-α的水平,感染和粘连的发生率较低(P0.05)。结论:丹红注射液能够提高膝关节置换术的临床疗效,减少并发症的发生,使患者的膝关节功能尽快恢复,这可能与其降低血清IL-6、IL-8及TNF-α水平有关。     

Assumption 2: opaque to intuition?

Aim The aim of this paper was to revise the historical biogeographical method for resolving complicated distribution patterns through a technique that has come to be called assumption 2. Assumption 2 was used to resolve multiple areas on a single terminal branch (masts) as well as paralogous and missing areas in two or more areagrams. Recent examples, however, have shown that assumption 2 may be using rather than resolving paralogy. The paper attempts to resolve this problem by formulating a separate procedure to avoid using paralogous (redundant) area data in area cladistic analyses. Method The revision results in a new derivative method, the transparent method, to replace assumptions 1 and 2. It separates the procedures for resolving paralogy and for solving distribution patterns that occur in more than one area (masts). Results Several hypothetical examples show how the transparent method reduces paralogy and masts. The results show that paralogy can be reduced if the paralogy subtree method is applied after uncovering all possible relationships as single components on the terminals of areagrams. Conclusion The transparent method is a significant step forward in cladistic biogeography as it utilizes area relationships rather than generating general areagrams based on paralogous data.