We introduce MMMU: a new benchmark designed to evaluate multimodal models on massive multi-discipline tasks demanding college-level subject knowledge and deliberate reasoning. MMMU includes 11.5K meticulously collected multimodal questions from college exams, quizzes, and text-books, covering six core disciplines: Art & Design, Busi-ness, Science, Health & Medicine, Humanities & Social Science, and Tech & Engineering. These questions span 30 subjects and 183 subfields, comprising 30 highly het-erogeneous image types, such as charts, diagrams, maps, tables, music sheets, and chemical structures. Unlike existing benchmarks, MMMU focuses on advanced perception and reasoning with domain-specific knowledge, challenging models to perform tasks akin to those faced by experts. The evaluation of 28 open-source LMMs as well as the propri-etary GPT-4V(ision) and Gemini highlights the substantial challenges posed by MMMU. Even the advanced GPT-4V and Gemini Ultra only achieve accuracies of 56% and 59% respectively, indicating significant room for improvement. We believe MMMU will stimulate the community to build next-generation multimodal foundation models towards expert artificial general intelligence.
This research reviews the literature on case study as a strategic qualitative research methodology. Although case studies have been criticised by some authors as lacking scientific rigour and do not address generalizability, this research, however, reiterated its appropriateness when dealing with a process or a complex real-life activities in great-depth. Case study has been commonly used in social science fields like sociology, industrial relations and anthropology eventhough generally was considered an underutilized strategy. Hence, this research explained the general concept of a case study, strengths and weaknesses of using this method knowing that theoretically case is exciting and data rich. Based on a study of four organizations and the researcher’s own experience, this article described matters on how case study was undertaken, gaining excess to those organizations and the systematic process of data collection and triangulation (multiple techniques). It was noted that combining multiple techniques for elicitng data in case study research actually strengthens and confirmed results.
The Covid-19 pandemic has presented an opportunity for rethinking assumptions about education in general and higher education in particular. In the light of the general crisis the pandemic caused, especially when it comes to the so-called emergency remote teaching (ERT), educators from all grades and contexts experienced the necessity of rethinking their roles, the ways of supporting the students’ learning tasks and the image of students as self-organising learners, active citizens and autonomous social agents. In our first Postdigital Science and Education paper, we sought to distil and share some expert advice for campus-based university teachers to adapt to online teaching and learning. In this sequel paper, we ask ourselves: Now that campus-based university teachers have experienced the unplanned and forced version of Online Learning and Teaching (OLT), how can this experience help bridge the gap between online and in-person teaching in the following years? The four experts, also co-authors of this paper, interviewed aligning towards an emphasis on pedagogisation rather than digitalisation of higher education, with strategic decision-making being in the heart of post-pandemic practices. Our literature review of papers published in the last year and analysis of the expert answers reveal that the ‘forced’ experience of teaching with digital technologies as part of ERT can gradually give place to a harmonious integration of physical and digital tools and methods for the sake of more active, flexible and meaningful learning.
Abstract Marine protected areas (MPAs) generate powerful interactions between social, economic and environmental interests, manifest at a circumscribed and often local scale. Consequently the designation and management of an individual MPA typically plays out in microcosm the general challenge of sustainable development in the marine environment. Some universally relevant questions relating to four commonly held defining attributes of MPAs are articulated. However, while many of the questions are universal, in practice the answers vary greatly. Consequently there are few MPAs which would not provide an informative case study elucidating the dynamics at the intersection between science, policy and management in the marine realm. The papers in this collection exemplify a range of key issues across this spectrum of disciplines. In practice most contentious issues relate to the balance within MPAs between environmental and socio-economic considerations, not least relating to fishing. In this respect greater attention in MPA management plans, to the economic benefits of MPAs for local communities is encouraged. However we also recognise that glib assertions that a secure sustainable balance between conservation and exploitation can be established in practice, typically with few resources in a largely unseen and often data-poor environment, may sometimes be politically expedient but scientifically questionable. Yet it is ultimately the work of all those involved directly with MPAs to collectively achieve the task of transforming the rhetoric of marine conservation policy into a successful reality on the ground and we commend the authors of this collection for their efforts to achieve that goal.
A. Sarker, Rachel E. Ginn, Azadeh Nikfarjam
et al.
OBJECTIVE Automatic monitoring of Adverse Drug Reactions (ADRs), defined as adverse patient outcomes caused by medications, is a challenging research problem that is currently receiving significant attention from the medical informatics community. In recent years, user-posted data on social media, primarily due to its sheer volume, has become a useful resource for ADR monitoring. Research using social media data has progressed using various data sources and techniques, making it difficult to compare distinct systems and their performances. In this paper, we perform a methodical review to characterize the different approaches to ADR detection/extraction from social media, and their applicability to pharmacovigilance. In addition, we present a potential systematic pathway to ADR monitoring from social media. METHODS We identified studies describing approaches for ADR detection from social media from the Medline, Embase, Scopus and Web of Science databases, and the Google Scholar search engine. Studies that met our inclusion criteria were those that attempted to extract ADR information posted by users on any publicly available social media platform. We categorized the studies according to different characteristics such as primary ADR detection approach, size of corpus, data source(s), availability, and evaluation criteria. RESULTS Twenty-two studies met our inclusion criteria, with fifteen (68%) published within the last two years. However, publicly available annotated data is still scarce, and we found only six studies that made the annotations used publicly available, making system performance comparisons difficult. In terms of algorithms, supervised classification techniques to detect posts containing ADR mentions, and lexicon-based approaches for extraction of ADR mentions from texts have been the most popular. CONCLUSION Our review suggests that interest in the utilization of the vast amounts of available social media data for ADR monitoring is increasing. In terms of sources, both health-related and general social media data have been used for ADR detection-while health-related sources tend to contain higher proportions of relevant data, the volume of data from general social media websites is significantly higher. There is still very limited amount of annotated data publicly available , and, as indicated by the promising results obtained by recent supervised learning approaches, there is a strong need to make such data available to the research community.
Most medical equipment cannot function properly due to a lack of maintenance activities, including at Arifin Achmad Regional General Hospital. Scheduled maintenance activities are not carried out according to the established schedule, and unscheduled maintenance activities often experience delays, resulting in hospitals experiencing a shortage of medical equipment. This study aims to analyze the management of medical equipment maintenance at Arifin Achmad Regional General Hospital and the factors inhibiting maintenance management. The theory used is the maintenance management theory by Ignatius Deradjad Pranowo, which has 6 indicators: maintenance planning, maintenance scheduling, managing the execution of maintenance actions, evaluating maintenance performance, ensuring sustainable repairs, and possible equipment redesign. This study uses qualitative research with a descriptive nature. The results of the research found that the maintenance management of medical equipment at Arifin Achmad Hospital has not been fully implemented well, seen from the indicators of managing the implementation of maintenance actions and in allowing maintenance actions not to be carried out optimally. Inhibiting factors in Medical Equipment Maintenance Management at Arifin Achmad Hospital are slow administrative processes, lack of awareness of the importance of maintenance, large workload on technicians, dependence on third parties, and lack of evaluation of maintenance.
Radek Trnka, Melisa Schneiderova, Iveta Vojtechova
et al.
SuperAging deserves special attention from researchers in the field of the psychology of aging, because it denotes the preservation of multiple cognitive abilities in very old age. Currently, very little is known about lifestyle factors that could be related to SuperAging. The main goal of the present narrative review was to bring together available evidence involving social factors related to SuperAging and to target avenues for future research. The review summarizes the findings of studies published between 2005 and 2022. Low social participation in midlife age and high social participation in older age were found to be related to SuperAging. In contrast, social network size and diversity did not differ between SuperAgers and cognitively normal older adults. The synthesis of the results indicates that having positive, close, high-quality relationships and a high frequency of social contact may be considered to be hypothetical predictors of superior cognitive performance in later life.
History of scholarship and learning. The humanities, Social Sciences
Soo Ran Won, Yong Pyo Kim, Misheel Sainjargal
et al.
In this study, 34 volatile organic compounds (VOCs) were analyzed using an online VOCs instrument at 30-min intervals from November 16 to November 23, 2023, in Ulaanbaatar (UB), the capital of Mongolia for the first time. The average concentration of the 34 VOCs was 13.0 ± 11.1 ppb, with the top 10 compounds, such as benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and xylenes (BTEX), constituting 80 % of the total. The concentrations of n-hexane, n-heptane, and undecane tended to increase significantly during high-concentration episode period (HEP). Compared to other studies, BTEX concentration levels in UB were higher than those in Seoul and Beijing, but lower than in Southeast Asian cities. Positive matrix factorization (PMF) identified four VOCs sources: vehicle exhaust (33.8 %), industrial/coal combustion (25.3 %), secondary formation precursors (21.3 %), and solvent usage (19.6 %). Vehicle exhaust and industrial/coal combustion sources increased during rush hours and were strongly correlated with nitrogen oxides. During HEP, stagnant air mass led to increased contributions from vehicle exhaust and industrial/coal combustion sources, indicating a significant local impact. Solvent usage appeared to be influenced by building materials and exterior painting which increased with high relative humidity. Secondary formation precursors increased in concentration during daytime and were highly correlated with ozone. Among the measured compounds, benzene was assessed for lifetime health risk, showing that adults with the prolonged exposure exhibited higher risk than infants and children. However, during HEP, children were also at increased risk, despite their shorter exposure duration. Based on the concentration levels of VOCs and the associated health risks, the results highlight that the need for a policy on ambient VOCs management in UB, with a particular focus on local source management.
Judith Owokuhaisa, Eleanor Turyakira, Frank Ssedyabane
et al.
Abstract Background Cervical cancer continues to threaten women’s health, especially in low-resource settings. Regular follow-up after screening and treatment is an effective strategy for monitoring treatment outcomes. Consequently, understanding the factors contributing to patient non-attendance of scheduled follow-up visits is vital to providing high-quality care, reducing morbidity and mortality, and unnecessary healthcare costs in low-resource settings. Methods A descriptive qualitative study was done among healthcare providers and patients who attended the cervical cancer screening clinic at Mbarara Regional Referral Hospital in southwestern Uganda. In-depth interviews were conducted using a semi-structured interview guide. Interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and thematically analysed in line with the social-ecological model to identify barriers and facilitators. Results We conducted 23 in-depth interviews with 5 healthcare providers and 18 patients. Health system barriers included long waiting time at the facility, long turnaround time for laboratory results, congestion and lack of privacy affecting counselling, and healthcare provider training gaps. The most important interpersonal barrier among married women was lacking support from male partners. Individual-level barriers were lack of money for transport, fear of painful procedures, emotional distress, and illiteracy. Inadequate and inaccurate information was a cross-cutting barrier across the individual, interpersonal, and community levels of the socio-ecological model. The facilitators were social support, positive self-perception, and patient counselling. Conclusions Our study revealed barriers to retention in care after cervical cancer screening, including lack of partner support, financial and educational constraints, and inadequate information. It also found facilitators that included social support, positive self-perception, and effective counselling.
Gynecology and obstetrics, Public aspects of medicine