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The purpose of this study is to examine the effectiveness of two intervention strategies – identifying the global letter of Navon letters and verbally describing a face – in improving face recognition abilities of adolescents with autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

A total of 15 adolescents with ASD and 15 typically developing (TD) adolescents participated in this study, which consisted of three experimental conditions: verbalization, Navon and control. Participants were presented with a target face for a short period of time, then completed a task specific to the condition in a counterbalanced order, followed by a face recognition task.

The results of this study showed no significant interaction effects between groups and conditions, either in accuracy or reaction time. However, TD adolescents performed better than ASD adolescents in terms of accuracy. In addition, the verbalization condition resulted in better performance with slower response times compared to the control condition.

These findings suggest that verbalization may be a useful strategy to enhance face recognition abilities in ASD and TD individuals.

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether the banking crisis in the USA and Western Europe that began in August 2007 precipitated a change in the relationship between the currencies of the Baltic States and the Euro, such that it could be described as shift contagion. The paper also considers whether the “hardness” of the currency peg affects the market reaction to that crisis.

Shift contagion is said to be revealed if there a change in the co‐movements of exchange rates after August 2007 compared with before. Change is revealed by coherence and phase shifts. Both are drawn from cross‐spectral analysis.

Rather than weaken, the bonds between the currency board‐managed Kroon and the Litas, in a similar way to the Lat, exhibited greater bonding after the banking crisis began compared with before. The phase angles suggest some shift in money flows between the Baltic currencies and the Euro. With the Lat, the delays appear to be the same but at longer periodicies. The other two appear be subject to a reversal of money flows at various periodicies.

Spectral analysis reveals that bonding between currencies of ERMII countries and the Euro increased, but the structure of money flows changed as a result of the Western banking crisis in related geographical and financial markets, before a local crisis became evident. To what extent this is an improvement over correlation methods could be the basis of further research. The phase switch is a structural change that other techniques could not have revealed.

The paper shows that spectral analysis could be more widely used in financial economics to reveal the impact of events on term structures.

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the ways in which attention to programmatic vision and coherence – rather than foci on individual courses – might advance the work of justice-oriented, critical English education in important ways. The authors propose that consciously attending to the work of English education on the programmatic level can better enable English educators to cultivate democracy-sustaining dispositions in preservice teachers. Using Grossman et al.’s (2008) definition of “programmatic coherence”, the authors illustrate how one interdepartmental partnership is working to create a shared programmatic vision for English education.

Drawing on Cornel West’s call for the development of a three-piece democratic armor – Socratic questioning, prophetic witness and tragicomic hope – the authors describe their programmatic vision for cultivating democracy-sustaining dispositions in preservice teachers. They show how this shared vision constitutes the foundation for the organization, purpose and sequence of the four-semester cohort program. Finally, the authors describe how this vision helps facilitate meaningful and purposeful symbiosis between field experiences and university coursework.

In an effort to promote replicability regarding programmatic coherence, the authors share structural aspects of their program as well as pose generative questions for colleagues who are interested in approaching the work of critical, democratic English education from the programmatic level.

Addressing the challenges of teacher preparation – especially in this polarized and pitched historical moment – requires shifting the focus from individual courses to a more expansive view that might enable English educators to consider how courses within a program might collectively advance a particular vision of critical and democratic English education.

Since 2008, bitcoin has continued to attract investors due to its growing capitalization and opportunity for speculation. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the impact of bitcoin (BTC) on gold, the volatility index (VIX) and the dollar index (USDX).

The series used are weekly and cover the period from January 2016 to November 2022. To generate the results, the unrestricted vector autoregression (VAR), structural vector autoregression (SVAR) and wavelet coherence were performed.

The findings are mixed as not all tests show the exact effects of BTC in the three asset classes. However, common to all the tests is the significant influence that BTC maintains on gold and vice versa. The positive shock in BTC significantly increases the gold prices, confirmed in three different tests. The effects on the VIX and USDX are still being determined, where in some tests, it appears to be influential while in others not.

BTC’s diversification potential with equity stocks and USDX makes it a valuable security for portfolio managers. Furthermore, regulatory authorities should consider that BTC is not an isolated phenomenon and can significantly influence other asset classes such as gold.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the cross-spectra of stock, real estate and bond of ten selected Asian economies in the pre- and post-global financial crisis periods to detect whether there is greater cyclical co-movement post-financial crisis, and whether any observed increased co-movement measures the outcomes of contagion or integration.

Co-spectral approach is the proper econometric tool to deliver economic insight for this research.

Results indicate that Asian stock markets, and to a lesser degree, bond and real estate markets are more correlated post-financial crisis. Similarly, Asian financial markets have experienced increased co-movements with the US financial markets post-financial crisis. Moreover, these observed increased co-movements measure the outcomes of contagion in some cases of within-asset and cross-asset classes, as well as for some cross-US-Asian asset factor relationships along the high-frequency components of between two and four weeks. The stock markets are the most contagious, followed by the real estate markets and bond markets.

The results provide short-term investors with additional co-movement information at higher frequencies in order to identify short-term fluctuations of different asset classes. The empirical study also underscores the role of Asian real estate in investment portfolios in a mixed real estate, stock and bond context from a frequency domain perspective.

The practical implication of this research is that benefits to investors from international diversification may not be as great during the present time compared to previous periods because financial/asset market movements have become more correlated. However, it does not imply the complete absence of diversification benefits. This is because although cyclical correlations increase in the short run, many of the values are still between low and moderate range, indicating that some diversification benefits may still be realized.

In advancing the body of knowledge in international financial markets, this research is probably the first study to consider a multi-asset class portfolio context that includes stock, real estate and bond across the ten Asian economies and the USA in a single study. The frequency domain analysis conducted in this paper adds to the understanding of real estate, stock and bond market co-movement, integration and contagion dynamics, as well as the Asian cross-asset factor and US-Asian asset factor relationships in global mixed-investing environment.

This paper aims to investigate the linear and nonlinear interactions between the blockchain technology index and the UAE stock market index within the context of the Abu Dhabi and Dubai banking sector.

In this study, linear analysis was performed using the generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity model (GARCH) (1,1) model, whereas nonlinear analysis was performed using the wavelet coherence model.

Based on the results of the GARCH (1) model, the authors find that the blockchain technology index has a positive significant impact on stock market returns in the Abu Dhabi and Dubai banking sector. In addition, the findings indicate that increasing blockchain integration in the banking industry decreases banks’ stock market volatility and facilitates price stabilization. Additionally, the coherence wavelet analysis reveals that there is a phase relationship between the blockchain technology index and banks’ stock market indices in the banking sector of the UAE. The association was stronger during the global pandemic crisis because they were moving together across different timescales.

With the help of the linear analysis, this study offers a focal point and valuable insights to policymakers, central banks and commercial banks management on how implementing blockchain technology in the banking industry help boost stock market returns, reduce volatility and facilitate price stability. As a result of the nonlinear analysis of the significant long-term degree of co-movement between blockchain technology and banks’ stock markets in UAE, policymakers or the management of banks in UAE should take the growth of the blockchain technology industry into consideration to ensure the continued development of the banking sector. For investors, the findings provide implications for portfolio managers operating in the UAE who are encouraged to take short-term co-movement into account (1–16-week horizons) through both frequency and time when designing their portfolio while keeping long-horizon periods in mind is not recommended.

It is a pioneering study that empirically examines the linear and nonlinear nexus between the blockchain technology index and banks’ stock market returns and price stability.

This chapter provides a range of data that we broadly characterize as listening to preservice teachers’ perceptions and representations of teacher education programs. Our first purpose is to illustrate the variety of ways in which it is possible to listen to those learning to teach and to illustrate the rich complexity of the replies we received. Our second purpose is to illustrate how these data have encouraged and sustained us in the development of our own teacher education practices, both in the university classroom and in practicum supervision in schools.

Human resource management (HRM), in contrast to “personnel management” and “personnel administration”, is often held to be proactive rather than reactive, strategic rather than tactical, and integrated with corporate strategy rather than marginal or peripheral. Argues that it is important to distinguish several dimensions of “integration” ‐internal, external and institutional – and that the strategic integration of human resource development (HRD) is achievable through the adoption of career‐focused, competence‐based models. However, existing competence frameworks are criticized for their generic character, their retrospective orientation, their abstract nature and their focus on the individual job rather than the career stream or wider organizational role. Prospective, organization‐specific, anchored, collaborative and career‐focused models seem more promising vehicles for achieving not only “internal integration” – the consistent, coherent application of a range of HR policy levers – but also “external integration”, the integration of HR strategies with corporate strategies. Explores such a framework in relation to two empirical studies of competence‐based approaches to managerial assessment and development, one a management development programme in the National & Provincial Building Society, the other a senior management development workshop in Oxford Regional Health Authority.

In the United States, policy discussions of teacher education in relationship to teacher quality have tended to focus more closely around debates about the nature of teacher preparation and the need for quality teachers to possess advanced degrees or certification. The field is in need of an array of indicators – a set of powerful, well-researched indicators that can be applied to large public universities as well as small regional private colleges, from university-based programs to “alternative” programs and to more “hybrid” programs. These indicators need to be relevant for teacher certification across a variety of age-ranges and developmental stages. In this chapter, we build on a growing conversation about practice in teacher education and efforts on the part of researchers to identify key features of powerful teacher education. We propose that quality teacher education is designed around a clear and shared vision of good teaching; it is coherent in that it links theory with practice and offers opportunities to learn that are aligned with the vision of good teaching; and it offers opportunities to enact teaching. While these features are supported for the most part by growing consensus in the literature (National Research Council, 2010; NCATE, 2010), there is also an emerging empirical base that provides support for the value of these features as well.

People with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) are known to have difficulties in their social communication and interaction. The internet is a twenty-first century phenomenon that provides such individuals with a world in which they can exist without the awkwardness of face-to-face contact. The purpose of this paper is to start to illustrate the high risks that can occur when the internet is used as the main forum for interaction in individuals who are socially impaired.

This paper provides a brief summary of literature in relation to ASD and risk of offending behaviour followed by a case study of a young man with a diagnosis of Asperger syndrome who was convicted of conspiracy to murder.

This paper concludes that possible deficits in central coherence, theory of mind and social skills, combined with extensive periods of time spent alone on the internet forums and a late diagnosis of ASD, may place individuals at risk of committing a serious offence.

This paper highlights the difficulties that people with Autism may have in separating fantasy from reality and the high level of risk that can occur as a result.