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Accumulating evidence suggests that word production requires attention even though it is a highly practiced skill. For instance, language production has been shown to impair performance on an unrelated task such as driving a car when speaking and driving co-occur (Kubose et al., 2006). Several other studies have shown similar effects and argued that word production draws from a central attentional system (Cook & Meyer, 2008; Ferreira & Pashler, 2002; Roelofs, 2008). However, it remains unclear which attention system these studies refer to. Attention is a broad term that comprises different functionally and anatomically separate subsystems. Posner and colleagues have proposed there are three such attention systems: executive control, orienting, and alerting (Petersen & Posner, 2012; Posner & Petersen, 1990; Posner & Rothbart, 2007). One or all of these systems could contribute to language production, possibly in different ways.
Executive control is needed to keep one's goals in mind to successfully complete an action. This first attention system has been studied in relation to language, mostly in comprehension (Ye & Zhou, 2009) but also recently in production (Shao, Roelofs, & Meyer, 2012). Shao et al. decomposed executive control into three subcomponents – updating, inhibiting, and shifting – as suggested by Miyake and colleagues (Miyake et al., 2000). Updating (maintaining and manipulating items in working memory), and inhibiting (suppressing an inappropriate response) were found to correlate with participants' speed of word production. However, the third component, shifting (switching between goals) did not show such a correlation. This suggests that some but not all types of executive attention play a role during word production.
Second, orienting is the system that moves attention towards new and relevant information. Finally, the alerting system is needed to heighten levels of attention. This can be a short-lived attention boost for instance after a warning signal, or a prolonged attention increase for instance during a task. Such prolonged maintenance of attention is now referred to as sustained attention and was previously known as vigilance. Sustained attention has been suggested to play a role during word production, based on results of studies using the individual differences approach (Jongman, Meyer, & Roelofs, 2015; Jongman, Roelofs, & Meyer, 2015). In three experiments we showed that poor sustained attention ability coincided with worse performance on a picture naming task such that naming latency distributions were more positively skewed (i.e. had more 'abnormally' slow trials). These studies show there is a consistent relationship between sustained attention and language production.
One problem with these previous studies is that the strongest correlations were found for picture naming in a relatively difficult setting, i.e. in dual-task situations where participants named pictures and concurrently performed a second task, either linguistic or non-linguistic. Significantly smaller correlations were found for simple picture naming. One aim of the present study is to see whether the relationship between sustained attention and simple picture naming is reliably present. More importantly, the problem with these previous studies is that they provide only correlational evidence. These individual differences studies point to a role of sustained attention during language production, but as of yet there is no definitive evidence that sustained attention is required to produce words. To show a causal link I manipulated the need for sustained attention in a picture naming task by using a variable that is known to tax sustained attention in traditional sustained attention tasks. This manipulation could provide more direct evidence that sustained attention is required for fluent language production.
Sustained attention was first studied by Mackworth during the second world war. During the war, radar and sonar operators needed to detect rare irregular events for many hours. Mackworth showed that as time progressed, the likelihood of missing such a rare target would increase (Mackworth, 1948). Since then it has been shown that sustained attention can be affected by three factors: task parameters, participant characteristics, and environmental conditions (Ballard, 2001; Langner & Eickhoff, 2013; Oken, Salinsky, & Elsas, 2006; Robertson & O'Connell, 2010; Sarter, Givens, & Bruno, 2001). Task parameters that tax sustained attention include infrequent target signals, degraded stimuli, spatial uncertainty and high speed of stimulus presentation (McFarland & Halcomb, 1970; Mouloua & Parasuraman, 1995; Parasuraman, 1979; Parasuraman, Nestor, & Greenwood, 1989). The second factor that can influence sustained attention performance relates to individuals' characteristics. Older participants have more difficulty with maintaining attention than younger adults (McFarland & Halcomb, 1970; Mouloua & Parasuraman, 1995; Parasuraman, 1979; Parasuraman, Nestor, & Greenwood, 1989). Some clinical populations appear to have deficits in sustained attention, such as persons with schizophrenia and individuals with ADHD (Epstein, Johnson, Varia, & Conners, 2001; Liu et al., 2002). Finally, environmental factors such as noise can affect sustained attention performance (Broadbent & Gregory, 1965).
In the present study one of the variables known to tax sustained attention was manipulated, namely the speed of stimulus presentation. The speed of stimulus presentation can be manipulated either by changing the inter-stimulus-interval (ISI) or by changing the duration of the stimulus itself. Jerison and Pickett (1964) first reported a threefold decrease in the hit rate when the event rate in a visual vigilance task was increased from 5 events per minute to 30 events per minute. In other words, there are more failures to detect a target when the stimuli are presented in rapid succession. Other studies have also observed lower hit rates for faster event rates (1964). Some studies have, in addition, found a greater vigilance decrement (worse performance as time on task increases) for higher event rates compared to slow event rates (1964). The fact that fast event rates cause worse performance on sustained attention tasks has been argued to be due to faster depletion of a limited pool of attentional resources (Warm, Parasuraman, & Matthews, 2008).
These mentioned studies have all mainly looked at accuracy, not reaction time (RT). Ballard (2001) did measure RTs and found that participants responded faster in a fast event rate as compared to slow event rates. The decrease both in hit rate and in RTs for fast compared to slow event rates could indicate a speed-accuracy trade-off instead of reflecting sustained attention depletion differences between fast and slow tasks. However, findings that false alarms, failures to withhold response to a non-target, are higher for slow event rates than for fast rates argue against this idea of a speed-accuracy trade-off (Koelega et al., 1992; Lanzetta et al., 1987). Moreover, a large vigilance decrement in the fast event rate in both hit rate (a decrease over time) and RTs (an increase over time) would also argue against such a trade-off.
There have been several studies reporting contrasting results, such that fast event rates actually cause better performance than slow rates. This is true for sustained attention studies with children (Chee, Logan, Schachar, Lindsay, & Wachsmuth, 1989; Rose, Murphy, Schickedantz, & Tucci, 2001) but has also been found in a study using adults, albeit in an experiment not designed to test sustained attention. De Jong, Berendsen, and Cools (1999) had participants perform a spatial version of the Stroop task (i.e. the word LOW/HIGH presented above/below the center, with participants responding to location only), either in a fast or in a slow event rate design. Participants were faster to respond for the fast event rate with no loss in accuracy levels, as compared to the slow event rate. Interestingly, there was a large reduction in the Stroop effect (slower responses to incongruent trials, such as LOW presented above the center, than to congruent trials) in the fast event rate. The authors argued that with a fast event rate attention was sharply focused on the task, resulting in fast responses and fewer opportunities for the word meaning to interfere.
One goal of the present study was to provide a better picture of whether differences in the degree of depletion of sustained attention account for effects of event rate, whether it is a mere speed-accuracy trade-off or whether event rate differences reflect variation in the focusing of attention. Participants performed a digit discrimination task (DDT) measuring sustained attention with a fast and slow event rate. The DDT is a visual continuous performance task in which digits are presented on the screen one by one and participants are instructed to respond to an infrequent target only, i.e. the digit zero among foils one to nine (Matthews & Davies, 2001; Parasuraman et al., 1989; Sepede et al., 2012). In the present experiment, the ISI between digits was manipulated to create two contrasting event rates: fast versus slow. Stimulus duration was held constant for both conditions. The analyses not only focused on hit rate and false alarms but also on RTs. People should be faster to respond in the fast event rate, as shown in previous studies. If there is no loss in accuracy then the findings are in accordance with the sharp focusing of attention in the fast rate as in De Jong and colleagues (Matthews & Davies, 2001; Parasuraman et al., 1989; Sepede et al., 2012). If however, hit rates are lower for the fast event rate condition as compared to the slow event rate this would not hold. If fast event rates indeed tax sustained attention to a larger degree, a larger decrement should be found in both hit rates and RTs such that participants have fewer hits and respond more slowly over time as compared to the slow event rate. Lack of such an increased decrement would point to a mere speed-accuracy trade-off.
The main goal of this study however, was to show that word production requires sustained attention. Participants not only performed a sustained attention task, but also a picture naming task. The same manipulation known to tax sustained attention in traditional sustained attention tasks was used in the picture naming task: pictures were presented either in a fast or slow event rate. In both event rates, pictures of simple objects were presented for one second and participants were asked to name them. In the fast event rate pictures were separated by a blank screen for only 500 ms, whereas the ISI was 2000 ms in the slow event rate condition. If sustained attention is required for word production one would expect patterns in error rates and RTs for the two event rates comparable to the pure sustained attention task. So if the fast event rate in the picture naming task depletes attention to a larger degree, one should find more errors and a larger decrement over time in both errors and RTs as compared to the slow naming task. Conversely, if the fast event rate helps to maintain focus on the task at hand, RTs should be lower in the fast rate and accuracy levels should be the same or higher when compared to the slow event rate.
Moreover, if sustained attention is required for picture naming, word production performance should correlate with performance on the pure sustained attention task. Thus individuals who are better at the sustained attention task should also be better at the picture naming task. In our previous studies accuracy in the sustained attention tasks and language production tasks was very high, and sustained attention ability was always defined by RTs. Manipulating event rate should result in more errors and allow sustained attention ability to be defined not only by RTs but also by hit accuracy.
Mean RTs on the picture naming task were divided into two dissociable components to test whether event rate affected all of the responses or only a subset. RT distributions are often not normally distributed but positively skewed. Instead of transforming the distribution, one can use ex-Gaussian analysis to decompose the distribution to get a better understanding of individuals' behavior. The normal part of the distribution is indexed by the μ parameter, whereas the tail end (the abnormally slow responses) is indexed by τ. In previous experiments we found sustained attention ability to correlate with the τ parameter of picture description latencies, but not with μ (Jongman, Meyer, & Roelofs, 2015; Jongman, Roelofs, & Meyer, 2015). In other words, individuals with poorer sustained attention ability did not have an overall right shift in naming latency distributions, but did have a larger right tail (i.e. more instances of a very slow response). We took τ to reflect the instances where individuals experience a lapse of attention, which has been previously proposed by Unsworth et al. (2010). It could very well be the case that the effect of event rate is manifested mostly in the τ parameter and as such correlations could be stronger for τ as compared to μ.
In summary, the first aim of the present study was to perform the first causal test of sustained attention in word production by manipulating the need for sustained attention within a language production task by varying event rate, and compare it to the effect of the same manipulation in a traditional sustained attention task. Does the event rate manipulation cause similar effects in both tasks? The second aim of this study was to find out if differences between a fast and slow event rate are due to differences in attention depletion, adjustments in focusing of attention, or reflect a speed-accuracy trade-off? The third aim of this study was to extend previous individual differences studies on sustained attention and language production. Does sustained attention ability, as measured not only by RTs but also by accuracy, correlate with simple picture naming?
Forty-eight young adults participated in the experiment; all were students of the Radboud University Nijmegen or the Hogeschool van Arnhem en Nijmegen. All subjects were native speakers of Dutch and had normal or corrected-to-normal vision. The average age was 23.0 years (range: 19–32), forty-one participants were female, forty-three were right-handed. Ethical approval was granted by the Ethics Board of the Faculty of Social Sciences of the Radboud University. Participants provided written informed consent before starting the experiment, participants received monetary compensation.
Participants were tested individually in a dimly illuminated, soundproof booth. The tasks were presented on a 17 inch (Iiyama LM704UT) screen, using Presentation Software (Version 16.2, www.neurobs.com). Participants first performed the picture naming task, with two fast event rate blocks alternating with two slow event rate blocks. Participants then performed the digit discrimination task, again with four blocks in total, alternating between fast and slow event rates.
Participants were presented with thirty common objects, with each object shown thirty times. The object names were monosyllabic and highly frequent (mean lemma frequency: 600 tokens per million; CELEX database (Baayen, Piepenbrock, & Gulikers, 1995)). The pictures were selected for high name agreement with a mean of 89% (Severens et al., 2005). See supplementary file S1 for all object names.
The pictures were depicted on the center of the computer screen, 300 by 300 pixels, corresponding to visual angles of 7.0° horizontally and 6.4° vertically when viewed from the participant's position, approximately 60 cm away from the screen. The thirty pictures were presented in a set, in a pseudorandomized order such that two objects of the same semantic category never followed one another, nor did two names starting with the same phoneme.
Prior to the start of the experiment, participants were shown the pictures together with the corresponding names. In the first familiarization block, each picture was presented in the middle of the screen with its name written below. The participant pressed Enter to proceed to the next picture. In the second familiarization block, a picture was presented and participants were asked to name the picture. Once the voicekey was triggered the correct name was shown on the screen, and participants were asked to check if their response matched the written text. Once all thirty pictures had been named, the participant proceeded with the actual experiment.
In the fast event rate, a trial was initiated by a blank screen shown for 500 ms, then the picture was presented for 1000 ms. In the slow event rate, the blank screen initializing the trial was presented for 2000 ms. The duration of picture presentation was identical to the fast event rate, thus 1000 ms. These durations were chosen based on the taxonomy suggested by Parasuraman and Davies (1977), and Lanzetta and colleagues (1987). The first study suggested a cut-off of 24 event rates per minute as the transition from a slow event rate to a fast event rate, whereas the latter study suggested a higher cut-off such as 48 events per minute for a simple task (i.e. when the current trial does not depend on information from the previous trial). Here, 40 events were presented per minute in the fast event rate, chosen to be near the Lanzetta cut-off whilst still allowing for enough time to name each picture before the start of the next picture onset.
In the fast event rate a total of 600 pictures were presented, divided over two blocks. The slow event rate consisted of 300 pictures in total, also over two blocks. Fast and slow event rate had equal durations, namely 15 minutes. All participants were presented with both event rates, thus with four blocks. Fast and slow event rate blocks alternated, with block order counterbalanced across the participants.
Vocal responses were recorded by a microphone (Sennheiser ME64). Response onsets were automatically marked in Praat (Boersma & Weenink, 2012) using a personalized script for each participant. Hesitations and naming errors were removed from the analyses. Furthermore, a reliability check was performed by manually annotating 200 trials randomly selected from 4 randomly chosen participants and comparing them with the RTs as measured by Praat. The automatic onset marker measured RTs in a highly comparable manner to manual annotation, the intraclass-coefficient (ICC) was .86 and so was the correlation between the two measurements. Therefore, the naming latencies as measured by Praat seem reliable and are used for the following analysis.
The naming latencies were analyzed using R (R Core Team, 2012), specifically with the lme4 (Bates, Maechler, & Bolker, 2013) and languageR (Baayen, 2011) packages. The initial linear mixed effects model included event rate (fast vs. slow) and block (first block vs. second block) as fixed effects as well as their interaction. Fixed effects were mean-centered. No outlier exclusion procedure was performed, but RTs were log transformed because of positive skewing. Variables were dropped that did not reliably contribute to model fit, models were compared using a likelihood ratio test. The models included both participant and item as random effects: for both factors and their interaction the intercepts and random slopes were included (Barr et al., 2013).
The DDT used here was adapted from the task used in Jongman, Meyer and Roelofs (2015). Single digits (font Arial, size 40) were presented in white on a black background. The target digit was the digit 0, and all other digits (1 through 9) were non-targets. The digit 0 was presented on 1/4 of all trials. Stimuli were presented in a pseudorandom sequence such that identical digits never directly followed one another and the target digit was preceded by each non-target an equal number of times. The experiment consisted of 72 practice trials and 1728 experimental trials.
Digits were presented for 100 ms each, with an inter-stimulus-interval (ISI) of 500 ms in the fast event rate and an ISI of 2000 ms in the slow event rate. The fast event rate, with 100 events per minute, was far above the suggested cut-off of 48 events per minute as suggested by Lanzetta and colleagues (1987). Participants were instructed to respond to the digit 0 with a button press using their dominant hand. The fast event rate consisted of 1344 trials, divided over two blocks. The slow event rate included 384 trials in total. Both event rate conditions lasted for 13.5 minutes. Participants were thus presented with four blocks where event rate blocks alternated, with block order counterbalanced across the participants.
Both RTs and errors were analyzed, with errors divided into misses (failures to respond to targets) and false alarms (responses to non-targets). A logit mixed model was conducted for the hit rates, correct responses to targets (Jaeger, 2008). The model included event rate (fast vs. slow) and block (first vs. second) as fixed effects and their interaction. Fixed effects were mean-centered. The random factor participant was included in the model, with intercepts and slopes for the main effects and its interaction.
The linear mixed effects model for the correct RTs was computed identically to the model for picture naming (see above). In the fast event rate some responses were made after 600 ms, so after the next digit was already presented. These were coded as correct RTs. A target was never followed by another target, but always by a non-target. The participant therefore never had to respond twice in a row, so even though the participant may still have been in the process of responding when a new digit was presented there was no chance of missing a new target.
For correct trials in the picture naming task, the ex-Gaussian parameters μ, σ, and τ were estimated. These first two parameters index the mean (μ) and standard deviation (σ) of the normal part of the distribution and τ reflects both the mean and standard deviation of the exponential portion (i.e. the right tail of the distributions in Figure 1). Contrary to the linear mixed effects analyses, latencies were not log-transformed for the ex-Gaussian analyses. The parameters were estimated separately for the fast and slow event rate conditions for each participant, using the continuous maximum-likelihood method by Van Zandt (2000) as implemented in the program QMPE (Heathcote, Brown, & Cousineau, 2004). Only the μ and τ parameters were included in the following analyses to keep the number of comparisons low. These parameters were then correlated with two indices of participants' performance on the DDT, namely mean RTs and hit rates. Correlations were performed for each event rate separately, for example hit rates for the fast event rate condition on the DDT were correlated with the µ parameter for the slow event rate condition on the picture naming task. Moreover, vigilance decrement was calculated as RTs on the second block minus the first block for both tasks, and then correlated between the two tasks for each event rate. Spearman's rho is reported as several variables (hit rates and the τ parameters) were not normally distributed.
Since a total of 18 correlations were tested, the Benjamini-Hochberg correction was used to control for multiple comparisons. Instead of the familywise error rate, the false discovery rate is controlled resulting in greater power than Bonferroni-type procedures (Bender & Lange, 2001; Benjamini & Hochberg, 1995; Benjamini & Yekutieli, 2001; Williams, Jones, & Tukey, 1999). The p-values are sorted and ranked in such a way that the smallest value is given rank 1, the second rank 2 and the largest rank N. Then, each p-value is multiplied by N and divided by its assigned rank. In the present study, this resulted in the first thirteen correlations to be significant after the Benjamini-Hochberg correction, down to an uncorrected p-value of .03.
In 1.2% of all trials participants made a naming error (fast event rate: 1.6%; slow: 0.5%), and on 1.0% of the trials they hesitated (fast: 1.2%; slow: 0.4%). Too few errors were made for any further analysis.
The best-fitting linear mixed effects model for correct naming latencies included main effects of event rate (ß = 0.03, SE = 0.01, t = 3.97) and block (ß = 0.05, SE = 0.01, t = 7.78). Removing either event rate or block significantly decreased model fit (χ2 (1) = 13.88, p < .001 and χ2 (1) = 39.69, p < .001, respectively). Including the interaction did not improve model fit (χ2 (1) = 0.02, p = .88). The model revealed that naming latencies differed for the two event rates such that participants were faster to name the pictures in the fast event rate compared to the slow event rate (fast: 692 ms, SD = 210; slow: 710 ms, SD = 201). The main effect of block revealed that participants were slower in the second block of the experiment as compared to the first block (first: 676 ms, SD = 183; second: 720, SD = 227), independent of the manipulation of event rate (see Figure 2). A similar analysis, with trial count kept constant in both event rate conditions instead of task duration, revealed the same pattern (see supplementary file S2 for details).
False alarms, responding to non-targets, occurred on 0.5% of the non-target trials (fast event rate: 0.5%; slow event rate: 0.7%), precluding any further analysis. Misses, failures to respond to a target, occurred on 4.8% of the target trials. The logit mixed model on hits, the correct responses to targets, revealed a significant effect of event rate (ß = 1.85, SE = 0.41, z = 4.47, p < .001) and block (ß = –0.61, SE = 0.22, z = –2.81, p < .01). The interaction between event rate and block was not significant (ß = –0.77, SE = 0.69, z = –1.12, p = .26). Hit rates were significantly lower for the fast event rate as compared to the slow event rate (94.4% vs 97.9%). Moreover, a vigilance decrement was evident as hit rates decreased over time (first block: 95.9%; second block: 94.4%), see Figure 3.
The linear mixed effects model for correct RTs revealed a significant main effect of event rate (ß = 0.09, SE = 0.01, t = 7.26) and of block (ß = 0.04, SE = 0.01, t = 7.39). Dropping either of these two main effects resulted in worse model fit (event rate: χ2 (1) = 36.12, p < .001; block: χ2 (1) = 37.09, p < .001). Including the interaction between event rate and block did not improve model fit (χ2 (1) = 0.03, p = .86). Participants were faster to respond in the fast event rate condition as compared to the slow event rate (fast: 420 ms, SD = 82; slow: 465 ms, SD = 134). Performance deteriorated over time, as participants had an average response time of 421 ms (SD = 92) in the first half whereas in the second half they responded around 439 ms (SD = 103). The lack of an interaction between event rate and block indicates the vigilance decrement was of similar magnitude in both event rates (see Figure 4). See supplementary file S2 for similar analyses for both hit rate and RT, where the number of trials in each condition was kept constant instead of total duration of each condition, again no interactions between event rate and block were found. It must be noted that the main effect of event rate disappeared for hit rate, as hit rates were high for both event rates. It seems time is a critical factor in reducing accuracy levels in the fast event rate.
Both mean RT and hit rate on the sustained attention task correlated with the τ parameter of picture naming, for both event rates, see Table 1 and Figure 5. Overall, participants who showed worse sustained attention ability, as indexed by both RTs and hit rates, had more abnormally slow picture naming responses than individuals with better sustained attention. Furthermore, the mean RT on the DDT also correlated with the µ parameter of the picture naming latencies: those participants with slower reaction times on the sustained attention task were also consistently slower to name pictures. Note that the significance of each of the correlations does not change after removing the three participants with hit rates below .95.
|Picture Naming
|Event Rate
Vigilance decrement on the DDT (mean RT second block – mean RT first block) for the fast event rate did not correlate with the vigilance decrement for the fast event rate of the picture naming task (r = .12, p = .41), neither did the vigilance decrement for the slow event rates on the two tasks (r = .12, p = .40).
The current study had three aims. Firstly, to find a causal link between sustained attention and word production by using a manipulation known to tax sustained attention from the attentional literature. Event rate was manipulated in both a sustained attention task and picture naming task to see if this would result in corresponding effects. A second aim was to find out whether differences between a fast and slow event rate are due to differences in attention depletion, adjustments in focusing of attention, or whether it reflects a speed-accuracy trade-off. Thirdly, to show sustained attention ability correlates with language production, even in a simple naming paradigm.
The first aim was to find out if taxing sustained attention in a picture naming task would result in impaired performance. An event rate manipulation was used in both a picture naming task and in traditional sustained attention task. The prediction was that the manipulation known to tax sustained attention would result in similar effects for both tasks. Specifically, most previous studies have reported worse performance for fast event rates than slow event rates thought to be due to attention depletion, which should be reflected in lower hit rates, more false alarms, and a larger vigilance decrement. Here the event rate manipulation resulted in highly comparable outcomes in the sustained attention task and picture naming task, but not in the predicted direction. In both tasks participants were faster to respond when they were presented in rapid succession as compared to a slower presentation rate. Moreover, in both tasks, there was a vigilance decrement in RTs for both event rates, but there was no difference in the magnitude of the decrement between the two event rates. The only difference between the two tasks was in accuracy levels, such that hit rates were lower for the fast event rate of the DDT than for the slow rate, whereas there were hardly any errors made when naming pictures for either rate.
The fact that hit rates were lower for the fast event rate than the slow event rate in the DDT seems to provide evidence for the attention depletion hypothesis. However, RTs were also faster for the fast event rate, which could point to a speed-accuracy trade-off instead. To prove that fast event rates are more taxing one needs to show a larger decrement in hit rates and/or RTs in the fast condition as compared to the slow event rate. There was a vigilance decrement for hit rates in both conditions, but no interaction. Similarly, a decrement in the RTs was present, but again no interaction with event rate, suggesting the decrement was similar for both event rates. Some previous studies found a larger number of false alarms for the slow event rate, which would argue against a speed-accuracy trade-off, but the current sustained attention task did not show this effect. The current result seems to speak in favor of a speed-accuracy trade-off interpretation. Whether speed or accuracy is prioritized depends on both the perceptual input but also on environmental constraints and internal goals (Heitz, 2014). In the fast event rate, there is less time for evidence to accumulate to decide whether the stimulus is a target or a non-target. As a result, participants are faster to respond but also make more errors.
It should be noted that for the DDT, the number of events per minute in the fast event rate was well above the cut-off of 48 events per minute as suggested by Lanzetta et al. (1987), namely 100 events per minute. Therefore, one cannot argue that the fast event rate condition was actually too slow. All in all, a simple trade-off explanation for the DDT cannot be refuted. These findings warrant caution for interpreting fast event rates as more taxing on sustained attention than slow rates, as done by the attention depletion account. Experiments need to report both hit rates and RTs and show that a decrement for one measure does not go hand in hand with an improvement for the other. Only reporting errors, as has been done predominantly in past research on sustained attention (Ballard, 2001; Coull et al., 1996; Jerison & Pickett, 1964; Lanzetta et al., 1987; Parasuraman, 1979; Parasuraman & Giambra, 1991), will not contest the speed-accuracy trade-off.
An attention depletion account also does not seem to hold for the event rate manipulation in the picture naming tasks. Accuracy levels for both event rates was near ceiling at 99% but responding was faster in the fast event rate condition. In contrast, the naming results support the proposal that the differences between fast and slow event rates are due to an adjustment in focusing of attention, in line with De Jong et al. (1999). They found faster RTs without a decline in accuracy for the fast event rate in a spatial Stroop task as compared to a slow rate. They argued that the fast event rate helped to keep focus on the task at hand, whereas the slow event rate gave rise to more fluctuations in attentional state, allowing word reading to interfere with responding to the location of the word. It could thus be the case that certain tasks benefit from a fast presentation rate, perhaps tasks where a response has to be given on each trial (as in the picture naming task) instead of only on a subset of trials as in the traditional sustained attention tasks (i.e., the DDT). Another possibility is that tasks that use more complicated and/or linguistic stimuli benefit from a fast event rate whereas simple non-linguistic tasks do not. So far, only De Jong et al. and the present study have used linguistic stimuli with complicated tasks (word reading and picture naming respectively). All previous studies testing sustained attention use tasks like the DDT, where stimuli are easier to decode (number or letter) and responses are easier to compute (button press). A benefit from focused attention due to a fast event rate might only be revealed for difficult tasks.
The lack of errors in both event rates could also indicate that the event rate manipulation in the picture naming task was less effective than in the sustained attention task. Accuracy was not analyzed statistically as error rate was only just above 1% but there is a hint that more errors and hesitations were made in the fast than slow event rate. This would follow the pattern of the DDT and again point to a speed-accuracy trade-off. It is also possible that the event rate manipulation did not work at all and therefore cannot be used as evidence against the attention depletion account. The lack of naming errors in both event rates could indicate that both event rates were relatively easy and that the fast event rate was actually not fast enough to strongly tax attention. The ISI was very short for a picture naming task, namely 500 ms. However, the picture stayed on the screen for one second. Picture duration was chosen at one second to give people enough time to identify the object, plan the name, and complete the speech output before the next trial started. The total trial length of 1.5 seconds may have been too long to tax sustained attention to a larger degree than the 3 second trial length in the slow event rate. With 40 events per minute, the fast event rate fell just below the cut-off of 48 events per minute for simple tasks as suggested by Lanzetta and colleagues (1987). It could be that the naming task is indeed such a simple task. Participants are familiarized with all the items, and repeat all items thirty times. The highly repetitive nature could have made the task too simple and participants had few problems naming pictures, even in the fast event rate.
Previous research has used similar ISIs to differentiate between fast and slow conditions as used in the present study (Smallwood et al., 2004). Not finding a larger vigilance decrement in the fast event rates could be due to other task parameters, such as task duration. Each experiment lasted approximately 30 minutes, with blocks around 7 minutes. It could be that the blocks did not last long enough to thoroughly tax sustained attention. Another possibility is that the alternation of fast and slow blocks caused participants to recharge, and as such the second block was not more difficult than the first block. It could be the case that within blocks, the performance decrement was larger for the fast event rates. Post-hoc analyses, adding a factor to the model dividing blocks into two, did not provide evidence for this idea. For the DDT, the interaction between event rate and this new factor did not reach significance for either hit rates (ß = 0.03, SE = 0.24, z = 0.14, p = 0.89) or RTs (ß = –0.00, SE = 0.01, t = –0.20). There was no interaction effect for picture naming either (ß = 0.00, SE = 0.00, t = 0.38).
The third aim was to link this study to previous research on sustained attention and its role in language production by correlating individuals' sustained attention ability with picture naming performance. In the previous studies, the correlation was strongest for production latencies when naming occurred in a relatively difficult situation, i.e. a dual-task experiment (Jongman, Meyer, & Roelofs, 2015; Jongman, Roelofs, & Meyer, 2015). The correlation with simple picture naming was significant, but weaker (Jongman, Roelofs, & Meyer, 2015). Here, by increasing the need to sustain attention within a simple picture naming paradigm instead of using a more demanding naming paradigm, sustained attention ability correlated with single word production. Both event rates were faster than the event rate used in the only study testing the role of sustained attention in simple picture naming, and participants named many more pictures in the current experiment (900 versus 240). This very likely made the current task more difficult than the simple picture naming task in the study by Jongman, Roelofs and Meyer. As in earlier research, the sustained attention task was found to correlate with the right tail end of naming latency distributions. However, the sustained attention task also correlated with the normal portion, suggesting the picture naming task was so demanding that individual differences became evident for the whole RT distribution and not just a subset of responses. Thus, individuals with worse sustained attention were consistently slower when naming pictures (µ) and showed a larger amount of very slow responses (τ) as compared to individuals with better sustained attention.
It is a possibility that the relationship between the mean RT on the DDT and the µ parameter for picture naming is not due to high task demands. The correlation could instead be due to a general reduction in speed of processing in certain individuals, instead of being due to a specific decrease in their sustained attention ability. This should be tested by adding a third task that measures general speed of processing. However, a similar argument cannot be made for the correlation between the mean RT on the DDT and the τ parameter of picture naming. General speed of processing should affect only the mean response time, not the size of the right tail of an RT distribution. Instead the correlation fits with the idea that τ reflects lapses of attention as previously proposed by Unsworth et al. (2010). Moreover, the fact that two dissociable measures of sustained attention, RT and hit rate, both show a correlation with the tau parameter of picture naming also supports the idea that picture naming is indeed tapping into sustained attention. Hit rate, the proportion of correctly detected targets, was lower than we found previously when using a DDT with an intermediate event rate. This allowed for testing the correlation between hit rates and picture naming latencies, and a significant relationship was found for the τ parameter. It shows that hit rates can quantify sustained attention ability if there are strong individual differences, and that not only RTs on the DDT correlate with picture naming latencies but also accuracy levels. This provides stronger evidence that picture naming calls upon sustained attention.
In conclusion, the main aim was to show that simple picture naming requires sustained attention by manipulating a task parameter that is often used in sustained attention tasks. The task parameter, event rate, did not lead to the predicted result of fast event rate being more taxing than the slow event rate. However, performance was similar across the sustained attention task and picture naming, suggesting similar mechanisms are at play in both tasks. A manipulation that undoubtedly taxes sustained attention should be used in a picture naming task to show a definitive causal link between sustained attention and production. The correlational results do suggest that this link is present as sustained attention ability, measured not only by RTs but also hit rates, correlated with the abnormally slow responses when naming pictures, even in a simple picture naming paradigm. In sentence or discourse production the effect of poor sustained attention could be much more pronounced, causing slow speech, many hesitations and possibly even errors. Future research is necessary to test the role of sustained attention in more natural language production.
All the stimuli, presentation materials, participant data, and analysis files can be found on this paper's project page on figshare: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.4685038.v1.Object names picture naming tasks
Target names of pictures, with English translation. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.84.s1Additional analyses
Performance in the slow event rate conditions compared to performance on the equal amount of trials in the fast event rate conditions. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.84.s2
I thank Gurupriya Ramanathan and Hanna de Groot for help with setting up the experiment, testing the participants, and annotating part of the data, and Antje Meyer, Ardi Roelofs, and Brónagh McCoy for valuable comments on an earlier draft of this paper.
The author has no competing interests to declare.
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The author(s) of this paper chose the Open Review option, and the peer review comments are available at: http://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.84.pr


text:
Programming is for Nerds
I was recently at a library where I picked up an interesting looking little book, before flicking through it.
Intriguingly named Programming Pearls (by Jon Bentley), it was something I had been looking out for for a while, but was pleasantly surprised to find this inside. Yes that's my thumb (copyright Stephen Moon, 2015).
However, what made me smile (beyond the message: Programming is for Nerds! Have a beer!) is that it reminded me of the famous Post Secret site where people share their secrets. I guess that itself isn't that common but what some do is to also hide them in books (usually of the same name) for others to read. Was this message in the same vein? A desperate plea to save a nerd? Who did this? Why? How? I had to know more.
The Library & University
Let's start with where I was - the library at Birkbeck University, in London. You can't have one without the other, so I am going to group these two together. According to the website, the university is:
…a world-class research and teaching institution, a vibrant centre of academic excellence and London's only specialist provider of evening higher education.
So this person probably lives in or near London, most likely has a job and wants to improve themselves. Also, entering the library is via an electronic gate - you can't just walk right into these high-quality establishments you know :-). So, they must have had special permission/authorisation. Hold on. Maybe it's just the partner of someone like that that sneakily slipped the note in when the other person took the book home? My logical brain just can't help considering all options. I don't know, though. I need to dig deeper, but for now, I'm going to go with the hypothesis that the person that wrote this is a student.
Students at Birkbeck
Helpfully, I can make some educated guesses about those students because the university publishes some of their statistics. Pulling out the most common demographics, in 2012/13, most students were:
- Undergraduate or lower (~ 2/3),
- Part-time (88%),
- From the UK,
- Female (a small majority),
- Over 30,
- White and,
- Students of Social Science, History or Philosophy.
I think I am drawing closer to the culprit.
The Section
So where exactly was this book? The computing section is on the first floor and to visit any other section on that floor, you have to pass by the IT books. I can't imagine a computing student writing that, so what other subjects can you access from there? Actually all of them! There are stairs leading off from there that can reach the other floors. This isn't going to help.
The Book
The book is quite a good choice. Of course it has the word programming in the title, as does the note, but it's actually a particularly well known book for people that like to really think about programming. In actual fact, the book comes from a series of articles that were published in the Communications of the ACM - a well-known and read journal. As for plaudits, it has many, but one I recognised was Steve McConnell (author of Code Complete - another well respected book) who described it as:
…one of the most influential books I read early in my career.
And it's audience (if you didn't guess!) is best summed up by the author in the preface:
This book is written for programmers.
So there you have it. A message for programming nerds written in a book for programmers. Good choice.
The Note
I think there is quite a bit we can glean from this note. Let's take it piece by piece.
The Paper
The paper it is written on is a post-it note. These are very common in businesses which fits right in with the idea that this person has a job…but…they are also useful for studying when you want to remember your place in a text. Keep digging.
The Orientation
I have rotated the image below and as you can see, this person did not write the note with the paper in the correct orientation - it is slightly angled.
That makes me think that the person did not own the post-it. Perhaps it was someone else's and they reached across the table? Possibly they are just sloppy? I know a computer scientist would have taken the time to align the bottom edge of the note with the table and centrally aligned the text, for correctness ;-). Again, it is unlikely to be someone like that.
The Implement
I'd need to send the note off for analysis but I would say that this was written in black biro. Without the resources to take this further, I can't narrow it down much further than that, which is a shame. Even if I did, though, unless it was an unusual pen, it wouldn't help me find them.
The Style
The writing is quite scratchy which matches that of many people that make heavy use of computers. Writing with a pen is a skill and it can degrade through lack of use. What about writing in capital letters? That's not exactly grammatically correct, I guess, but I am not sure it means anything. You could also think about the position of the words: 1 (PROGRAMMING), 2 (IS FOR), 1 (NERDS!), 3 (HAVE A BEER!). Not particularly well thought out in terms of layout, but again, without more specialist advice, my attempts to interpret this are going to be amateurish. I'm hesitant to embarrass myself.
The Position
The note was located on page 15, of chapter 2. So, quite early on in the book. Was that so it would be discovered soon? Was it a computer science student that felt like giving up early into reading? Does the fact that it is covering up the sub-heading: "Getting It Together: Sorting", mean anything? So many things to consider.
Where's Wally?
I am not sure I am really all that closer to finding my author, but here's what I have come up with for my mystery person (taking a few gentle leaps of faith): I think it is a female, arts student, studying for an undergraduate degree, that should have spent more time practising her handwriting when younger. She thinks computer scientists should/may only drink beer (incorrect!) to relax, but doesn't plan or consider her actions (given the sloppy writing or nature of the note).
I'd guess she's spontaneous and has a good sense of humour but lacks a proper understanding of the type of person that studies this subject. Lastly, I'd posit that she likes to dip into people's minds and make them think - could philosophy be her thing? All in all, she sounds like someone that would be fun to hang out with but her room in the student halls is probably a mess.
Now that I have reached the end of my investigation into nowhere, it's left me wondering more about myself. I've reached two conclusions that you may have realised much earlier:
- I must have quite a bit of spare time and,
- I might over-analyse things…sometimes.
One last thing: Did you write that note? Send me an email - we need to have a beer.
Hi! Did you find this useful or interesting? I have an email list coming soon, but in the meantime, if you ready anything you fancy chatting about, I would love to hear from you. You can contact me here or at stephen 'at' logicalmoon.com

subset: commoncrawl


text:
Services on Demand
Related links
- Similars in SciELO
Salud Pública de México
Print version ISSN 0036-3634
UNIKEL-SANTONCINI, Claudia; OCAMPO-ORTEGA, René and ZAMBRANO-RUIZ, Joaquín. Exactitude of self-reported weight and height in 15 to 19 year old female adolescents of the State of Mexico. Salud pública Méx [online]. 2009, vol.51, n.3, pp.194-201. ISSN 0036-3634.
OBJECTIVE:To know the accuracy of weight and height in 15 to 19 years old women in relation to age, marginalization and migratory intensity level of localities and father's academic level. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study was carried out with a probabilistic sample of public high school students at the State of Mexico (N=2 357), to whom self-reported weight and height were asked and were directly measured afterwards. Data were collected from January to April 2007. RESULTS:The results obtained showed that these adolescents overestimate their height not significantly, and significantly underestimate their weight, with similar trends analyzing age, marginalization levels, migratory intensity and father's education status. CONCLUSIONS:Results show the validity of self-reported height but not of self-reported weight among this sample.
Keywords : adolescents; body weight; body height; anthropometric measures; Mexico.


text:
Pokemon Alpha Sapphire / Omega Ruby animated segment is Kawaii!
Prepare for something that will melt your heart. Nintendo has released a new commercial for Pokemon Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby in Japan that is probably one of the most precious, Pokemon-related things you'll see all week, if not all year. To prepare people for the practically worldwide,November 21, 2014 launch date, an original animated segment has been released starring the trainers from the games.
Though I'm referring to this as a Pokemon Alpha Sapphire and Omega Ruby commercial, it's more of an incredibly brief OVA. Players get to see the male and female trainer waking up with their Mudkip, Torchic, and Treeko. There's some frolicking, but then we get glimpses of the two trainers as they go around the Pokemon world, fighting and seeing all of the new Mega Evolutions. Don't let the fact that it's in Japanese scare you, as there's very little talking and it's mainly about seeing animated versions of various pokemon.
The section at the 25 second mark where the Mudkip and Torchic are playing in the pool is the best part. Really, that's all you need to see.
This really is quite a successful promotion tool for Nintendo, don't you think?
Source [Tiny Cartridge]
November 21, 2014


text:
|Amilda, personagem de "Angel Gabriel - Pacto de Sangue", romance de Ana C. Nunes
Esta ilustração foi desenhada a lápis e pintada, aqui e ali, com lápis de aguarela.
The girl in the picture is Amilda L'Agrande (Muërnica is her sorceress' name),who is Angel Thompson's adoptive sister. They are both characters from my upcoming novel Angel Gabriel - Blood Bound (already available in portuguese).
This illustration was drawn with pencils and then coloured, here and there, with watercolour pencils.


text:
You are able to log in as anyone. Be careful!
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n49 2000-2015 | N49 is proudly made in toronto
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About Pioneer Petroleums
Ontario's largest independent gasoline retailer. Go to full description...
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Pioneer Petroleums
850 Appleby Line, Burlington, L7L 2Y7 (4 km away)
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Pioneer Petroleums
553 Dundas St E, Waterdown, L0R 2H1 (6 km away)
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Pioneer Petroleums
5360 South Service Rd, Burlington, L7L 5L1 (6 km away)
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Pioneer Petroleums
1800 Burlington St E, Hamilton, L8H 3L4 (10 km away)
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Founded in Hamilton, Ontario in 1956, Pioneer Petroleums is a dynamic, Canadian-owned network of convenience gasoline retail locations offering one-stop shopping to motorists across Ontario. Pioneer delivers the products and services today's busy con- sumers want most — quality fuel and auto- motive products, car washes, ATM bank machines, snack foods, soft drinks, news- papers and magazines, tobacco products, fresh hot coffee and much, much more. That translates into one of the hottest business opportunities available today.


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The DELIGHT is an aesthetic highlight on a first class journey with passion. Truly a luxury vibrator with stimulating curves and intuitive control. Perfect in every way, the elegant love toy unites external and vaginal stimulation.
- The Rolls Royce vibrators
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- Rechargeable
- 8 vibration intensities
- 3 vibration programs
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- 100 % medical grade silicone
- Size: 15 cm, Ø 3 cm
What happens when noble elegance meets fabulous functionality? Every woman should try by herself. The DELIGHT vibrator is not only an eye-catcher. Awarded among others the reddot design award, the DELIGHT will not only please the eye but also enchant with its abilities. Double stimulation doesn't get more penetrating than this – the DELIGHT literally bends to pamper women in every possible way.
This wonder boy from the Deluxe VIBES series is considered the Rolls Royce vibrators with good reason. It creates a totally new sensation of passion and perfect climaxes. The playful S-shape in combination with its special abilities makes it the perfect candidate for that certain extra kick. Full of fantasy, it combines external and vaginal stimulation, without neglecting the G-spot of course. The DELIGHT opens many paths to satisfying moments full of passion.
The DELIGHT is truly a luxury vibrator which gives flight to royal heights of passion. The aesthetically curved shape and the intuitive operation with the ROYAL CURL makes it stand out. In symphony with the vibrations, the tipped end stimulates the G-spot and an additional little curvature tickles out passion from the most hidden erogenous zones. What remains is a sigh...


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Conservatory & Orangeries
For many, introducing some much-needed extra living space in the form of a new conservatory or orangery means adding a wealth of value to their property, not just economically, but practically too. We supply an array of attractive home extension designs well-suited to seamlessly merging in with most styles of home. A guaranteed way of enhancing a home with plenty more space and natural light, feel free to enquire about adding a conservatory or orangery today.
Window Inspiration
Whether it's an energy efficient classic sliding sash window for your period property or a tilt & turn design capable of improving your modern life, all windows featured in our range result in a finished product that is both beautiful and practical. Although a small change at first glance, new replacement windows have the potential to make all the difference, and thankfully; we provide customers with the ability to find a design ideally suited to their home's character.
Door Inspiration
Readily capable of boosting house style and improving a property's overall kerb appeal almost instantly, both front and rear entrance doors in the Adorn Range enhance a home's security, aesthetics, and performance. A suite of attractive RAL and heritage colours makes creating a specific look never a chore, resulting in doors that create memorable transitions both into and out of the home. In need of a new door? Team Frames Trade & Retail can help.
Bifolding/Sliding Doors
Bring yourself closer to your home's outside with a new patio door style featured in the Adorn Range. Whether you'd prefer the neat side-stacking panels a bifold door can bring to make the most of space or would like things simple with the smooth-sliding action of sliding patio doors, larger openings and increased light entry is always guaranteed.
Lantern/Glazed Roofs
Much more stylish, enhancing, and acoustically insulating when compared to the previous polycarbonate conservatory roofs of yesteryear, there's no longer any need to suffer from the insufficient comfort or the sound of harsh rainfall with lantern and glazed replacement roof from our range. Both capable of letting the light shine in from above as well as around, both styles make the most of energy efficient glazing to result in increased comfort every time.


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Olivia Wilde's latest film, the indie dramatic comedy "Drinking Buddies," takes on one of her favorite activities: drinking. Which is convenient, since writer-director Joe Swanberg strove for realism by having Wilde and her co-stars imbibe real beer during the shoot. The film follows two brewery employees and longtime friends, Kate and Luke (Wilde and "New Girl" star Jake Johnson) who think there might be something more to their friendship. We caught up with the actress in Los Angeles.
What kind of drunk did you want Kate to be?
It was interesting trying to figure out what kind of drunk Kate would be, because she drinks so much all the time — and we were really drinking real beer the whole time we were shooting, so I was familiar with what that would be like, to drink that much every day. But I wanted to play her drunk still very capable, cool, collected, a little woozy and she becomes a little emotional. But it was interesting because I was like, I don't think she's a sloppy drunk. She couldn't have that job and be a sloppy drunk. She just gets a little slurry and a little slow and a little sultry. I thought it was fun.
Outside of the acting part, your job involves a fair amount of drinking, with film festivals and premiere parties and events.
Yeah. I have what my dad calls a hollow leg. I can hold my liquor, it takes a lot. I'm an extremely expensive drunk, which is good. I mean, I appreciate having that amount of self-control. I don't like drunk people — people who are out of control and can't control their liquor scare me.
You've been promoting this film for a bit.
Yeah, but you know? It doesn't really feel like work to promote this movie because it's one that I care so deeply for, and it's one that is interesting to talk about, because I almost feel that I watch it as an audience member. Because of the nature of the process, we never had a script, we improvised an entire film and shot enough — probably 40 hours of film at least, it might be 70 — and Joe Swanberg kind of wrote the film in the editing process by choosing certain takes and storylines. So I watched it for the first time like a completely innocent audience member and was just blown away by his skill. So talking about it is kind of fun because I sort of feel like I'm in a place of awe, because this was my first time working with this type of process.
Was there anything that really surprised you in the finished product?
Yeah, there were certain things they cut out that at first I thought, will the audience understand without that? And then I realized the great thing about Joe is that he does not underestimate his audience in their intelligence. He knows they'll understand that if you suddenly see Jake and Anna's characters at our lake house that we invited them. We don't need to show the scene where it's like, "Hey, want to come to the lake?" The audience gets it. It's fun to see someone with a very keen eye like Joe make those choices. And I think they're the right ones.
What about the question of whether men and women can be friends?
My opinion is that we're not asking that question. We're saying, "Can Luke and Kate be friends?" Because men and women can definitely be friends — definitely, definitely. But not if the specific individuals really like each other and really find something in each other that they're not finding in their current relationships. And I think it is common to feel that this person who you can joke around with and who seems to accept you in all ways would be the ideal person for you in a romantic way, but what the movie shows is that love is not in the happy moments. Love is not tested when things are groovy and fun. Love is tested when s— hits the fan.


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The new gTLDs have a Sunrise phase that is exclusively for those trademark holders who register their marks with the Trademark Clearinghouse and place orders for domain names that correspond to their trademark. Shortly after the Sunrise phase is over, registrations are open to the general public. However, you don't have to wait until then to place orders for new gTLDs; you can place pre-orders for many of the gTLDs now.
When you submit a pre-order for one of the new gTLDs, it is held as PENDING. Once General Availability begins for that gTLD, OpenSRS will automatically process all pre-orders.
Submitting pre-orders via the Control Panel
To submit a pre-order through the Control Panel, create the order as you would for any regular domain, but instead of submitting it for registration, click Save as Draft.
Submitting pre-orders via the API
To submit a pre-order through the API, use the sw_register command, and be sure to include the "handle" parameter and set it to "save" so that the order will be saved as pending.
For information on the sw_register and process_pending commands, see the Domains API Commands Reference guide on the OpenSRS website.
Submitting pre-orders via the RWI
- In the General Availability (Pre-order - New gTLDs) field, enter the name of the domain that you want to order.
- Click Pre-Order Now.
- Complete the order form, and then click Submit.
Which TLDs can I pre-order?
For a list of the TLDs that are now in Sunrise and can be pre-ordered, click here. This page also lists the dates when the Sunrise periods end and when General Availability begins for each TLD.
How much do they cost?
For information about pricing, click here.
How are the orders processed? What if there is more than one order for the same name?
Pre-orders are processed automatically once General Availability begins.
Orders are processed at the registry on a first come, first served basis. If there is more than one order submitted for the same name, the order that is placed first will be allowed to register the name.


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Over 20 Years Experience
Over 20 Years Experience
Cumming Home Heating & Cooling is your one-stop provider of home environment enjoyment. We sell only the most reliable brands of heating and cooling systems, and service even those we don't sell. When it comes to service, Cumming Home's team can assess your situation and immediately know exactly what needs to be done.
"In my opinion, you have to repair a significant number of different types of equipment to reach the point where you can do the repair right the first time. We have — and we do." , Says owner Chris Cumming.
We treat all installation and service appointments as an opportunity to educate you on the proper maintenance of your home. We will always tell you, in layman's terms, what we're doing and why. In our years of experience, we've learned that a happy customer is one who understands the problem and the solution.
Cumming Home is a warranty service provider for a number of pool companies. So, how can we help you?


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Flatwater Touring Inflatable SUP Boards
Flatwater inflatable stand up paddle boards are optimised for flatwater, open ocean paddling, and 'downwinders'. They are typically longer than allround boards, and often have a nose area that is pointed to help the board slice through the water smoothly, increase glide and help the board go straight. The sides are usually rounded for more glide and speed. Most flatwater & touring inflatable SUP boards are wide enough to be stable for beginners.


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Here's how she's teaching her piano students today. Happy Halloween!
Here's how she's teaching her piano students today. Happy Halloween!
How to meet the chili of your dreams.
We're currently cooking up a batch of the mexican taco chili. Smells yummy.
"Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions"
G.K. Chesterton
Former Democratic staffer, burned by Obamacare: "I was wrong. Very wrong.":
"'I spent two years defending Obamacare. I had constituents scream at me, spit at me and call me names that I can't put in print. The congressman was not re-elected in 2010 mainly because of the anti-Obamacare anger. When the congressman was not re-elected, I also (along with the rest of our staff) lost my job. I was upset that because of the health care issue, I didn't have a job anymore but still defended Obamacare because it would make health care available to everyone at, what I assumed, would be an affordable price. I have now learned that I was wrong. Very wrong.' "
Too bad the rest of us got pulled along for the ride so these people could learn some wisdom.
"The Obamacare rollout is leading to the cancellation of hundreds of thousands of health insurance plans nationwide, contradicting President Barack Obama's repeated pledge that people who like their coverage can keep it." The act never would have passed without that promise, which was known to the Administration to be false even as it was made.
via Insty
Do not trust what has proven untrustworthy.
I finally got to take this Tormach CNC machine course today at TechShop (courtesy of a free course I won for winning a woodworking contest there a few weeks ago). What an amazing machine! feed it instructions, set it up correctly, and watch it machine a hunk of metal into a part. Stupendous.
via Instapundit: "Don't donate to the tea party or to evangelical Christian groups — that was the message soldiers at a pre-deployment briefing at Fort Hood said they received from a counter-intelligence agent who headed up the meeting.
If you do, you could face punishment — that was the other half of the message, as reported by Fox News. The briefing was Oct. 17, and about a half-hour of it was devoted to discussion about how perceived radical groups — like tea party organizations and the Christian-based American Family Association — were 'tearing the country apart,' one unnamed soldier said, to Fox News.
Among the remarks the agent allegedly made: Military members who donate to these groups would be subject to discipline under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the soldier reported.
Liberty Institute has stepped in to investigate. Michael Berry, one of the nonprofit's attorneys, said he has been advising the soldier about his options — but that in the meanwhile, he said the American public should be on guard."
Iran gives Christians 80 lashes for communion wine as UN blasts human rights record:
"Four Iranian Christians were reportedly sentenced to 80 lashes for drinking wine for communion, a shocking punishment meted out even as a new United Nations report blasted the Islamic republic for its systematic persecution of non-Muslims.
The four men were sentenced Oct. 6 after being arrested in a house church last December and charged with consuming alcohol in violation of the theocracy's strict laws, according to Christian Solidarity Worldwide. They were among several Christians punished for their faith in a nation where converting from Islam to Christianity can bring the death penalty. According to a new October UN report by Ahmed Shaheed, UN special rapporteur on human rights in Iran, such persecution is common, despite new President Hasan Rouhani's pledge to be a moderate."
The Dog Ate My Homework | The Fiscal Times
Ho hum, no accountability here.
Related: Megan Mcardle: "I admire the way that fearless liberals have come out to criticize the rollout of the exchanges — much more quickly and completely than supporters of the Iraq War managed, I'm afraid. (Though of course, in fairness, the malfunctioning exchanges are right here where everyone can see them, not thousands of miles away.) But as with Iraq, I fear that the bitterness of the debate in the run-up is making the administration and many of its supporters discount too deeply the valid criticism coming from the opposition."
What Would an Ideal College Look Like? A Lot Like This:
"A second component of Champlain's undergraduate education comes through its required 'Life Experience and Action Dimension' program, which has two parts: (1) some real-world education, emphasizing financial literacy and sophistication (developing a budget, making sense of credit cards, understanding how employee benefits work and why they're important, etc.) and job skills (marketing oneself, negotiating business contracts, and developing skills in interviewing, networking, etc.); and (2) a community-service element that puts students to work helping Burlington's needy and simultaneously broadening cultural awareness and a sense of engaged citizenship."
What a strange job I have. Today I woke up at 4am and gamed out my day (insomnia has been a real bear lately). Spend the first two hours developing a spreadsheet for some props. I'll spend the next 5 or 6 hours writing music, then I'll go to TechShop and spend the following 8 hours or so building a set of platforms for a school in Dallas. Then back here to transcribe orchestral music, do a bit of recording, and start to tackle corrections and fixes for clients. In between I'll try and carve out an hour to glue together the remaining 2 jewelry displays for Erin's pending business as well as start in on designing and engineering props for the show. I'm the guy you used to see on those variety shows that keeps ninety seven plates spinning at once. Except I'm occasionally asked to juggle. I'd be dead meat if I couldn't manage my time and discipline myself well but fortunately this job has taught me that. Who needs Ritalin when you've got deadlines?
I'll probably hit the sack around midnight or 1AM and lie there for an hour or so planning out tomorrow (or, more likely, take a Tylenol PM and knock myself out for 9 hours). I call it "roller coastering" where I get 3 or 4 hours of sleep for a few days, become nearly non-functional, then binge sleep under the gentle ministrations of a Tylenol PM. Lather, rinse, repeat until the work is done or my brain finally calms down. Ick.
Anyway, work is good right now so I'm not complaining. This time of year is when I usually get all sorts of calls to do stuff. What is it about November 1st that makes it such a deadline magnet? If I did complain, it would be that there are only 18 work-able hours during the day.
Tea = liquid sleep.
And now for something completely different (gotta have balance, huh?).
Yes, it was a guilty pleasure but I'm not ashamed:
(h/t Sean)
Good friend Greg posted a response to my last entry and I wanted to elevate my regular response to a full-fledged post. Greg is a great guy I know who, unfortunately, moved away. Smart engineering type who's opinion I respect (even when I don't agree with him). Plus, he brews a mean cider and a positively devastating Hefeweissen. So I was triply sad to see him move.
Props to him, also, for being one of those friends that disagrees with me but is willing to have a good discussion and entertain alternate points of view. Sigh. Miss the guy.
Anyway, here's my response (see the previous entry for his comment):
There's a long, long post that I have brewing that would probably better serve as a reply, but a short part of it is this. I have to politely disagree (if what you're saying is what I think… I wasn't sure what the "this is mad" part referred to)
Raising the debt limit is fundamentally not like ignoring your credit card bill. Instead it is exactly like getting another credit card. Not paying the debt you already owe is decoupled from obtaining a higher credit limit. The two things are not related at all. If I owe $20,000 on a credit card bill and my interest payments alone are, say $1000/year, getting a higher debt limit does not allow or disallow me from spending the money to pay the bill I've already racked up.
When President Obama said that raising the debt limit would not incur more debt he was being overly clever with his wording. It's true that the direct result of a higher debt limit would not be more debt, but the expected result is that, yes, the government will run up the additional debt and then come back for more (sidenote: what good is a "debt limit" if it is going to be raised every time we come up against it? That's like saying "this is my household budget" and then ignoring it completely).
But back to the point. There is enough money coming into the treasury to pay off the bills we have already accrued to date (or at least pay off the interest on the loans while we figure out a way to address the principle). Failing to raise the debt limit would not force us into default unless we chose to ignore the bills we already had. Would this be painless? Absolutely not. In fact, I suspect that, if we really had gone past the deadline, we'd have seen the administration use economic strong arm tactics similar to closing the national parks to make it hard on the average American. But, just like in the analogy with a household budget, if you must pay your debt (a Constitutional requirement) then all other bills become secondary (defense, social programs, etc). The bills— or at least the interest on the bills— is at the head of the line when it comes to repayment. It would be the Mother of All Shutdowns but would have the salutary effect of instantly balancing the budget. Just like in a household that cuts up credit cards.
But, distressingly, what is missing in this whole discussion is the bigger point of it all. As a nation we've been saying "you can't kick the can down the road forever" for years and years. Decades. We all knew that someday our fiscally errant behavior would come back to bite us in the backside. But previous generations were comfortable pushing the day of reckoning off into the unknown future, secure in the knowledge that they would be dead and gone before the math caught up to them (Social Security ponzi scheme as a particularly egregious example). So instead of arguing over the particulars of the shutdown we are beginning to hear people stand up and loudly declare "it's not just about this program! It's not just Obamacare or Social Security or Welfare or Defense or anything else. It's that We. Cannot. Afford. Everything. Not even close".
The math doesn't allow us to have everything we want. And 100-200 trillion dollars in future unfunded kicked-the-can-down-the-road liabilities are beginning to insist that we won't be able to have anything we want unless we get this leviathan under control. The math has been positively screaming it for decades and only now is its voice becoming harder to ignore. I have never seen a serious proposal for paying off our debt that doesn't ask for some sacrifice from citizens. Unfortunately, what we've gotten the last decade and a half has been a gigantic expansion of the problem.
So, to come back around to your original point. When someone stands up and attempts, however inelegantly, to force the issue of fiscal sanity by flirting with a debt limit (which could constitutionally still be dealt with) he is derided and shouted down. One side "wins" and the other side "blinks". The media report joyfully. Ha ha! Problem averted! To the victor go the spoils! Except in this game ultimately it is math that will win. The road is getting very, very short and the can is becoming too big to kick.
You stated "If you want to help fix the problem, deal with it when congress makes a budget." Except that the Senate has not offered up a budget since April 29th… 2009. (source: http://www.budget.senate.gov/republican/public/index.cfm/budget-background?ID=b630d3bd-f985-4943-a87a-a746ecec6a51). Except once when the President offered a template budget and it was unanimously voted down. Even by his own party. This does not inspire confidence that they're taking the problem seriously.
I'm not trying to win points or lay partisan blame here. But what I am saying (along with a growing number of voices on both sides) is that we must do something soon. We cannot continue running up debt like this and not expect Very Bad Things to happen (see: every example in history— and we're orders of magnitude worse in debt than just about every one of those examples were!).
People are positively screaming for a responsible response to this. So far all we've gotten is… more spending, no serious budget, bigger entitlements (O-care), and a turbocharging of the welfare state.
When does it stop? If we don't chose a different path, and soon, a stop will be forced upon us. And it won't be pretty.
The Reality of America's Finances | FreedomWorks: "The analogy is imperfect, but imagine the green is your salary, the yellow is the amount you're spending over your salary, and the red is your Visa statement. Then imagine your spouse runs into the room and shouts, 'great news honey, our fiscal crisis is over. We just got approved for a new MasterCard!' Your first call would be to a marriage counselor or a shrink."
Click to see the chart he's referring to.
Now that the government shutdown is over, the MSM is beginning to increase its coverage of what, so far, looks like a systemic failure of the ACA in its early rollout. Negative coverage — of how hard it is to enroll, how badly the program as a whole is working, how unpopular it remains — will likely make all but the most motivated customers stay away. Those customers will be exactly the ones Obamacare does not need: customers with expensive pre-existing conditions whose need for insurance is so dire that they will fight through any and all obstacles to get enrolled.
All told, we wonder if Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and President Obama are as happy today about Obamacare as they were on the day the law was passed. Beyond that, everything that has happened since passage has confirmed our view that far from solving the problems facing American health care, this poorly drafted, poorly executed system makes the problem of health care reform both more urgent and more difficult.
So not only was the legislation contrary to the best traditions of Americanism (making someone buy a product just because they live and breathe is anything but liberty), it was also poorly written abysmally executed. To everyone who was in favor of this, congratulations…
And people still say they weren't warned.
Eastern Howard School Corporation:
Regardless of your position on the Affordable Care Act this is the reality. Public schools are non-profits. With this mandate you only have 2 choices. Reduce the hours of instructional aides, bus drivers, cooks, custodians etc below 30 hours or offer them insurance. If you offer all these employees insurance you cannot generate any additional revenue to pay for these additional employees. Result…lay off teachers; cut staff; cut programs for students. All over this country students will suffer educationally due to the implementation of this law as non-profits can only reduce the level of service to pay for these additional costs. No one is talking about this impact on kids. We do not have a way to generate revenue to pay for unfunded mandates from the federal government. Unfortunately.
I have noticed an incredible lack of commentary or acknowledgement on the side of the folks who rammed this abomination through. It's almost like now that they've gotten what they want their attention has wandered on to other things. Nothing to see here, move along, move along.
And among those who do acknowledge the problems, the universal response has been "oh, we'll just spend an indeterminate amount of time and (taxpayer) money to shore up the system. It'll work eventually. Someday. Cross-my-heart.
It's shameful and embarrassing (and entirely predictable).
Civil Disobedience: Citizens Pushing Back: "There is a finely calibrated bargain at the heart of a republic: Citizens have a duty to obey the lawful and legitimate mandates of the government, including those with which they disagree, and the government has a duty to see to it that its actions are lawful and legitimate. The people have an obligation to be prudent and circumspect about engaging in civil disobedience, and the government has a responsibility to be scrupulous with its powers. That contract has been violated by the White House."
By several recent White Houses, I would add. Only in asserting our power as the true owners of this country and demanding reforms and accountability that will stick (government leaders are not above the law, perp walks for any govt. official who breaks it– no matter how lofty a position–, demanding long term stability of our Republic) can we reasonably be expected to survive as a country. At the rate things are going don't hold your breath.
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