University of Haifa

About: University of Haifa is a education organization based out in Haifa, Israel. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Poison control. The organization has 7558 authors who have published 27141 publications receiving 711629 citations. The organization is also known as: Haifa University & Universiṭat Ḥefah.

Decentering and Related Constructs: A Critical Review and Metacognitive Processes Model.

Abstract: The capacity to shift experiential perspective-from within one's subjective experience onto that experience-is fundamental to being human. Scholars have long theorized that this metacognitive capacity-which we refer to as decentering-may play an important role in mental health. To help illuminate this mental phenomenon and its links to mental health, we critically examine decentering-related constructs and their respective literatures (e.g., self-distanced perspective, cognitive distancing, cognitive defusion). First, we introduce a novel metacognitive processes model of decentering. Specifically, we propose that, to varying degrees, decentering-related constructs reflect a common mental phenomenon subserved by three interrelated metacognitive processes: meta-awareness, disidentification from internal experience, and reduced reactivity to thought content. Second, we examine extant research linking decentering-related constructs and their underlying metacognitive processes to mental health. We conclude by proposing future directions for research that transcends decentering-related constructs in an effort to advance the field's understanding of this facet of human experience and its role in (mal)adaptation.

Contracting or Public Delivery? The Importance of Service, Market and Management Characteristics

Abstract: Analysis of local government contracting decisions typically focuses on transactions costs related to service characteristics, especially asset specificity and difficulty of contract management. This analysis expands the focus to include market characteristics (competition), citizen characteristics (public interest in the service delivery process), and place characteristics (metro status and public management) and finds these are the more important factors. A 2007 survey of US city managers’ rankings of 67 services by transactions costs, competition, and citizen interest is combined with a 2007 national survey of city managers’ sourcing decisions (direct public, intergovernment cooperation, for-profit and nonprofit contracting). Multinomial logit models of service delivery sourcing choice find that metro status and competition are key explanatory variables. Intergovernmental cooperation represents an important public market alternative when contract management is difficult and competition is low. For profit contracting is less common when citizen interest is high and competition is low. Governments with professional managers appear more effective in addressing these broader transactions costs of citizen interests, political and labor opposition, and market management.

Predicting secret keys via branch prediction

Abstract: This paper announces a new software side-channel attack — enabled by the branch prediction capability common to all modern high-performance CPUs. The penalty paid (extra clock cycles) for a mispredicted branch can be used for cryptanalysis of cryptographic primitives that employ a data-dependent program flow. Analogous to the recently described cache-based side-channel attacks our attacks also allow an unprivileged process to attack other processes running in parallel on the same processor, despite sophisticated partitioning methods such as memory protection, sandboxing or even virtualization. In this paper, we will discuss several such attacks for the example of RSA, and experimentally show their applicability to real systems, such as OpenSSL and Linux. Moreover, we will also demonstrate the strength of the branch prediction side-channel attack by rendering the obvious countermeasure in this context (Montgomery Multiplication with dummy-reduction) as useless. Although the deeper consequences of the latter result make the task of writing an efficient and secure modular exponentiation (or scalar multiplication on an elliptic curve) a challenging task, we will eventually suggest some countermeasures to mitigate branch prediction side-channel attacks.

Coping with breast cancer: patient, spouse, and dyad models.

Abstract: Objective The objectives of this study were 1) to assess similarities and differences between patients with breast cancer and their spouses in terms of coping strategies and adjustment (psychosocial and psychological) to cancer and 2) to investigate the pattern of relationships between the patients' and spouses' coping strategies and between each of these strategies and the patient's adjustment to the illness using three types of models: patient, spousal, and dyadic coping. Methods Seventy-three patients with breast cancer and their spouses completed questionnaires that measured distress (Brief Symptom Inventory), psychosocial adjustment, and coping strategies. Results The patients' distress was greater than their spouses', but a similar level of psychosocial adjustment was reported. The patients used more strategies involving problem-focused coping than their spouses. The use of emotion-focused coping, which included ventilation and avoidance strategies, was highly related to distress and poor adjustment on the part of the patient. The spouses' emotion-focused coping and distress were related to that of the patients. Dyad emotion-focused coping measures were highly associated with the patients' distress and adjustment. Conclusions Spousal and dyad coping are important factors in a patient's adjustment to breast cancer.