Showing papers by "University of Macau published in 1995"
TL;DR: This paper investigated the differences in Eastern and Western culture regarding strategies of upward influence and the degree to which foreign culture behavioral tactics are adopted by expatriates in expatriate communities. But they focused on the behavior of expat populations.
Abstract: This research investigates the differences in Eastern and Western culture regarding strategies of upward influence, and the degree to which foreign culture behavioral tactics are adopted by expatriates
63 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors attempted to document the difficulties that teachers in Macau encountered in their work, the extent to which the job-related difficulties would induce burnout, and whether or not social support could buffer the adverse effects of stress on burnout.
Abstract: The present study attempts to document the difficulties that teachers in Macau encountered in their work, the extent to which the job-related difficulties would induce burnout, and whether or not social support could buffer the adverse effects of stress on burnout. In-service teachers enrolled in a teacher training program filled out questionnaires addressing the variables of interest. The results indicated that difficulties with fellow teachers, supervisors, students, and parents of students were associated with burnout. Conjectures were made regarding the noneffectiveness of social support.
37 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a comprehensive methodologies are described for the design of infinite impulse response switched-capacitor (SC) decimating filters employing either externally cascaded or internally cascaded structures.
Abstract: Comprehensive methodologies are described for the design of infinite impulse response switched-capacitor (SC) decimating filters employing either externally cascaded or internally cascaded structures. The former are more appropriate to achieve high decimating factors but suffer from the effects of unwanted aliasing frequency components associated with the intermediate sampling frequencies. The latter overcome this problem but become more complex to design to attain high decimating factors. Such decimating filters allow not only to relax the requirements of continuous-time pre-filters in the context of traditional SC filter systems but also to realize arbitrary baseband and anti-aliasing amplitude responses employing operational amplifiers with more relaxed speed requirements than their traditional SC filters counterparts. Examples are given to illustrate the proposed methodologies. >
24 citations
TL;DR: This paper examined the extent to which China's civil service system has embraced principles and features of Western civil service systems and illustrated the political nature of the attempt to establish a civil service, which severely limits a rational policy design in China.
Abstract: In examining how Chinese policy makers and law drafters defined problems and formulated solutions, this article seeks to address two questions First, the authors consider the extent to which China's civil service system has embraced principles and features of Western civil service systems Second, the authors illustrate the political nature of the attempt to establish a civil service system, which severely limits a rational policy design in China As a result of the political regression since June 1989, the present civil service system has experienced little change
17 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the circulant preconditioned conjugate gradient method was applied to solving the Wiener-Hopf equation and it was shown that it converges superlinearly.
Abstract: In this paper, we study the solutions of finite-section Wiener-Hopf equations by the preconditioned conjugate gradient method. Our main aim is to give an easy and general scheme of constructing good circulant integral operators as preconditioners for such equations. The circulant integral operators are constructed from sequences of conjugate symmetric functions {Cτ}τ. Letk(t) denote the kernel function of the Wiener-Hopf equation and\(\hat k(t)\) be its Fourier transform. We prove that for sufficiently large τ if {Cτ}τ is uniformly bounded on the real lineR and the convolution product of the Fourier transform ofCτ with\(\hat k(t)\) uniformly onR, then the circulant preconditioned Wiener-Hopf operator will have a clustered spectrum. It follows that the conjugate gradient method, when applied to solving the preconditioned operator equation, converges superlinearly. Several circulant integral operators possessing the clustering and fast convergence properties are constructed explicitly. Numerical examples are also given to demonstrate the performance of different circulant integral operators as preconditioners for Wiener-Hopf operators.
9 citations
TL;DR: In this article, an exact solution on the stress distribution of fillet welds is obtained, which can be used not only for estimating the accuracy of the present design method, but also for establishing a new design method.
Abstract: An exact solution on the stress distribution of fillet welds is obtained in this paper. This solution can be used not only for estimating the accuracy of the present design method of fillet welds but also for establishing a new design method.
6 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors investigated the outgrowth of private entrepreneurship in China, a major force that will contribute to shape the country's future economic model through studying the special case of Tian He High-and-New Technology Industrial Development Zone in Guangzhou.
Abstract: Through studying the special case of Tian He High-and-New Technology Industrial Development Zone in Guangzhou, this work investigates the outgrowth of private entrepreneurship in China, a major force that will contribute to shape the country's future economic model. Following a case study design, using a questionnaire and in-depth interviews, this study characterises the private entrepreneurs who are operating in the Zone, their motivations to go into private business, and the facilitating or constraining factors in the environment that contributed to their decision.
4 citations
13 Sep 1995
TL;DR: The author proves that there exists, in 2D images, a basic topological invariant called total curvature, and an important binary feature of this invariant is discovered: it equals to 2π for external contours and −2π for hole contours, independent of the orientation of contour tracing.
Abstract: Component is one of the most basic topological concepts for digital images. However, there is still few simple method, to date, permitting to distinguish holes from external borders. Such theoretic difficulty on components leads to quite complex and unnatural algorithms on component analysis. In this paper, the author proves that there exists, in 2D images, a basic topological invariant called total curvature. The total curvature on a border is the sum of local curvature representing the external angle of polygon vertices. We have discovered an important binary feature of this invariant: it equals to 2π for external contours and −2π for hole contours, independent of the orientation of contour tracing. The binary characteristics of total curvature reveals that external contours are global convex despite of local concavities and hole contours are global concave despite of local convexities. Therefore hole and external contours can be unified as total convex and total concave borders. Classifying all the borders of images by total curvature provides directly the number of both components and holes and it can be calculated easily in digital images.
3 citations
23 Oct 1995
TL;DR: It is demonstrated that VPIUD has a clear physical meaning: a contour dilates around convex vertices and reduces around concave vertices, therefore VPIud is equivalent to total curvature, another invariant.
Abstract: A new invariant of contour VPIUD-virtual perimeter increment under dilation-has been proposed. Based on the contour propagation model, VPIUD is defined as the sum of secondary waves of a contour which represents the virtual perimeter under dilation minus the perimeter of the contour. It has been proved that VPIUD is invariant and binary for any component. In this paper, the invariant property of contour VPIUD has been discussed with arbitrary neighbourhood. We demonstrate that VPIUD has a clear physical meaning: a contour dilates around convex vertices and reduces around concave vertices. In 6 and 8-neighborhood, the contribution of contour pixels to VPIUD is directly linked with local curvature, therefore VPIUD is equivalent to total curvature, another invariant. VPIUD can be used to distinguish between hole and outer contours, without affecting images. The proposed algorithm has been implemented at ease and results of contour classification are presented.
2 citations
TL;DR: With a fast algorithm, it is shown that C is a good preconditioner for solving block Toeplitz systems with tensor structure and only O ( mn m log n ) operations are required for the solution of the preconditionsed systems.
2 citations
06 Sep 1995
TL;DR: A pseudo one pass parallel thinning algorithm using 3×3 masks is proposed, verifying for each edge point its interior normal neighbor (INN), the nearest neighbor to the wave vector.
Abstract: A pseudo one pass parallel thinning algorithm using 3×3 masks is proposed. Since electromagnetic waves propagate along the direction of wave vector, we suggest verifying for each edge point its interior normal neighbor (INN), the nearest neighbor to the wave vector. In each iteration, the algorithm first marks all edge points to differentiate edge and interior pixels and then it erases all removal edge points in one scan. Due to INN, the few masks used have a size of 3×3 and less than half of mask pixels need verification. The algorithm is fast and easy to implement. Properties are proved and results presented.
TL;DR: In this paper, a humanistic constructivist approach to meaningful measurement has been proposed, which is in accordance with a constructivist information processing perspective, where students' responses to the assessment tasks are now evaluated according to an item response measurement model, together with a hypothesized model detailing the progressive forms of knowing/competence under examination.
Abstract: In the past decade, there has been interest in the assessment of cognitive and affective processes and products for the purposes of meaningful learning. Meaningful measurement (MM) has been proposed which is in accordance with a humanistic constructivist information‐processing perspective. Students’ responses to the assessment tasks are now evaluated according to an item response measurement model, together with a hypothesized model detailing the progressive forms of knowing/competence under examination. There is a possibility of incorporating student errors and alternative frameworks into these evaluation procedures. Meaningful measurement leads us to examine the composite concepts of “ability” and “difficulty”. Under the rubric of meaningful measurement, validity assessment (i.e. internal and external components of construct validity) is essentially the same as an inquiry into the meanings afforded by the measurements. Concepts of reliability, expressed as a group statistics which is applied in...