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This study investigated the construct validity and measurement invariance of the Teacher Emotion Questionnaire to introduce a valid and reliable instrument for assessing English-as-a-foreign-language (EFL) teachers’ emotions inside the classroom. Second language (L2) teacher emotions have been largely neglected, despite the fact that Educational Psychology has long recognized and researched the role of teacher emotions in different aspects of teaching and learning. To bridge this gap, the current study had 208 Iranian EFL teachers in private language institutes fill out the Teacher Emotion Questionnaire (TEQ), which assessed six emotions teachers experience in their classroom, i.e., Joy, Pride, Love, Anger, Fatigue/Exhaustion, and Hopelessness. The preliminary analysis of the data showed that six items from the TEQ had a factor loading below the minimum recommended level of 0.3, meaning that they contributed to the total variance in the participants’ score less than expected. The collected data were then submitted to confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) for the purpose of construct validation and establishment of the factorial structure of the TEQ. The CFA results indicated that the hypothesized six-factor analysis had more favorable goodness-of-fit indices than both a one-factor structure and a two-factor structure (e.g., positive versus negative emotions). Multilevel CFA revealed that the tested six-factor structure of the TEQ was invariant across male and female EFL teachers. The implications for the use of TES in EFL teaching contexts are discussed, and some suggestions are proposed for further validation of the TEQ in language teaching contexts.
 

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Before teachers can transform the reality and promote a liberating education within mainstream educational contexts, they must first gain a thorough understanding of how learners perceive the world. In an attempt to gauge EFL learners’ perceptions, the present study set out to conceptualize the construct of Critical Digital Pedagogy (CDP) by developing and validating a questionnaire for use in online EFL settings. The researchers distributed a preliminary questionnaire with 65 items to 380 adult Iranian EFL learners and used Exploratory Factor Analysis as well as Confirmatory Factor Analysis (EFA, CFA) to analyze the results. After removing 9 items, the final questionnaire consisted of 56 items on a five-point Likert scale. The analysis revealed that CDP consists of 10 factors, namely “consciousness raising,” “community and collaboration,” “empowerment and agency,” “inclusivity,” “dialogism,” “co-creation of materials,” “praxis,” “problem-posing education,” “teachers as transformative intellectuals,” and “critical thinking and reflection.” Additionally, the convergent validity as well as the reliability of the questionnaire to measure the intended construct was statistically confirmed. These findings have important implications for EFL teachers, curriculum developers, course designers, and language researchers as they increase awareness of CDP and its underlying components.

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Since the change of land use accrued in the Iran, especially in northern Iran, this research aims tocompare the spatial variability of soil properties in three adjacent land uses including cultivated by wheat lands, grazing lands and forest Lands covered by juniperus sp,  fagus orientalis, quercus castanifolia, and acer velotinum species in kiasar region, Mazandaran Province, northern Iran. Some of soil features, i.e. pH, CaCO3, total nitrogen (TN), soil organic carbon (SOC), electric conductivity (EC), percentage of silt, clay and sand contents and saturation moisture content(SM) were measured at a grid with 20 m sampling distance on the top soil (0 – 30 cm depth). Accordingly, total of 147samples were taken from 49 soil sites. The normality of data was examined by the tests of normality. Then, data were analyzed by using of geostatistics approach. The results showed that spatial distribution of many soil properties could be well described by spherical model in the forest and exponential model in the cultivated and grazing lands. Spatial dependences were the highest for SOC, EC and the lowest for silt, (SOC and silt) in the forest method and grazing lands, respectively. Deforestation and conversion to cultivated and grazing lands decreased spatial dependence of soil properties.

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Aim: The aim of this study was to design a tool and to assess its validity and reliability based on native culture characterization to evaluate the health belief model (HBF) constructs about prenatal care.
Methods: 215 pregnant women covered by the health centers of Iranshahr in the age group of 18-35 years and the least ability of reading and writing participated in this cross-sectional study. After reviewing the literature, the tool was designed, and its validity and reliability were approved based on psychometric data of the target group and the view of a panel of experts through calculating the content validity ratio, content validity index, exploratory factor analysis, and internal consistency.
Findings: The validity of 42 items was assessed through calculating the index score of the item effect above 1.5, content validity ratio more than 0.80, and content validity index higher than 0.79. By using exploratory factor analysis with a special value greater than 1, six factors and 35 items remained that were classified into six categories based on the literature review and content items, which were able to predict 77.095 % of the total variance of the tool. The reliability of the research tool was calculated using Cronbach’s alpha equal to 0.816.
Conclusion: The results of this study provide proper evidence about the strength of structural factors and the reliability of the assessment tool for the structures of HBM about prenatal care. It can be considered by the researchers in developing a tool for research, education and action.

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Aflatoxin M­1 is a result fungal secondary metabolite in ruminants .this toxin remains in milk as one the most important contaminants. In this work we modified the methods described by other researchers and presented it as a validated method for monitoring aflatoxin M1 in Iranian white cheese for the first time. At first, toxin was extracted from a polar solution (dichloromethane) and then the extract was dried and dissolved in hexan, methanol and water solution .in the third step water phase separated and purified using immunoaffinity liquid chromatography .for method validation we calculated accuracy, precision and sensitivity factors. Measurement of accuracy of method was performed by fortification of conventional blank samples. For precision measurement method was evaluated in six working days under repeatability condition and calculated the mean, variance and relative standard deviation (RSD). Limit of detection in our method was 55 ppt and limit of quantification was 183 ppt.

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Aims: Modeling precipitation-runoff processes and forecasting river flow are an essential step in floods management and controlling, designing water structures in watersheds and droughts management.
Materials & Methods: In the present research, WetSpa distributed hydrological model was applied to simulate river flow in Ziarat watershed of Golestan Province. This basin has an area of 95 km2 and it has an average height of 1760 m above sea level. As a distributed, continuous, and physical model, WetSpa is characterized with daily or hourly time series which accounts for processes of precipitation, runoff, and evapotranspiration contexts. The model parameters include distributive and global parameters. To run model, daily data on flow, precipitation, temperature, and evaporation for years 2008–2016 were considered for calibration and validation.
Findings: The results of simulation showed a relatively good compatibility between calculated and measured hydrograph at the basin outlet. According to Nash-Sutcliffe model for calibration periodic model, efficiency coefficient estimated daily hydrographs and maximum flow rate by 57.32% and 84.11% accuracy, respectively. However, given Nash–Sutcliffe coefficient which was equaled to −385.39 and −209.06 for low and high flow, respectively, validation results are not acceptable which it can be attributed to water withdrawal and diversion dam for water harvesting before gauging stations in outle.
Conclusion: Given the calibration results, WetSpa model has great efficiency under high flow circumstances compared to low flow mainly due to model weakness in low flow estimation but as a whole model simulated total flow with acceptable accuracy.

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Assessment of the English proficiency of applicants of entry into postgraduate studies, undeniably, is of utmost importance. Nationally speaking, the current status of the English test administered by the National Organization of Educational Testing (NOET) in Iran has been a topic of heated contention in recent years. This study purports to investigate the validity of the Iranian English proficiency test for Ph.D. admission purposes adopting the assessment use argument as the main framework for its validation research. To this end, the required data were collected from the relevant stakeholders of the test, namely applicants of the test, experts in educational assessment and language testing, and test readiness instructors. Structured interviews and focus groups were conducted and the acquired data were analyzed using the qualitative content analysis approach. Most prominent themes that emerged from the data in addition to a number of relevant representative quotes constituted the major findings of this study. The results revealed that the test is in need of major revisions in some parts, and further modifications are deemed as necessary. In the final section, summary of the results along with suggestions for optimization of the test are put forth. Keywords: Iranian Ph.D. admission English proficiency test, test validation, assessment use argument

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Antifungal drugs have an important role for treatment of fungal skin diseases of livestock and prophylaxis. These compounds belong to the different chemical groups but Imidazole group is one of the most important groups. In this study 60 pasteurized milk samples were analyzed by liquid-liquid microextraction and high performance liquid chromatography. And the efficiency of solid phase extraction and high performance chromatography-UV spectroscopy was evaluated in the extraction and determination of Ketoconazole and Clotrimazole analytes in milk.  In this research, after full validation, detection and quantitation limits were 0.01 μg.ml^-1 and 0.1 μg.mL^-1 for Ketoconazole and Clotrimazole. The linear range of calibration was relatively wide (0.01-100 μg.ml^-1). The relative standard deviation was 0.1-7.5% for Ketoconazole and 0.1-8.5% for Clotrimazole. Monitoring of 60 pasteurized milk in different seasons for Clotrimazole and Ketoconazole residue with 0.01 ppm detection limit, demonstrated there is no detectable amounts of these antifungal residues in pasteurized milk.

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The present study examined the content and construct validity, and internal consistency of the Academic Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (AERQ) in the Iranian English as a Foreign Language (EFL) context. The original scale was translated and back-translated between English and Persian. The content validity ratio (CVR), and content validity index (CVI) were then measured by a panel of 14 expert judges. The internal consistency coefficients of the scale were estimated by piloting it with 60 Iranian EFL learners. The results of the Cronbach’s alpha showed a satisfactory level of reliability. The AERQ was then administered to 346 English language learners (M_age = 19.34, SD_age = 4.951). To explore the factorial structure of the 37 items of the questionnaire, an Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) was conducted. In addition, Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was run to examine the convergent and discriminant validity of the AERQ’s measurement model. The results obtained from the modified measurement model showed an adequate fit of the data. In the modified version, two items (i.e., one item from suppression, and one from redirection of attention) were omitted due to low standardized loadings (< .50). The model fit indices also provided a reasonable model fit for the structural model. The internal consistency coefficients for the constructs were higher than the minimum value (α = .70). Implications and limitations of the study are discussed.

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The present study intends to extend the current ancillary understanding horizons of the developmental theory of individual-differences relationship-based (DIR) framework and emotioncy framework, to investigate aspects of emotioncy tensions that include identity-related attitudes, behaviors, and beliefs by providing "what-to-do" information when enacting identity tensions. Through validating the Student Identity Emotioncy Tension Scale (SIETS), the researchers suggested that social identities are also associated with specific emotional tensions by providing "what-to-feel" information during identity enactment. To do so, a total number of 300 students filled out the scale. In the validation process, statistical procedures were exerted to validate the scale. First, Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) was used to ascertain the underlying factors. Then, Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Communalities were checked for the relevance of component variance. Cronbach’s coefficient was used to check the reliability of the 18 items. The results indicated that the scale can be best explained by a three-factor solution with an acceptable reliability. In the qualitative phase of cognitive interviews, students were interviewed to further examine the quality of the items. In the end, the findings were elucidated and implications for future research and practice were presented.

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Unsaturated soils are often encountered in civil engineering practice, such as compaction works in construction of roads, dams and other types of embankment. In unsaturated soil stress-strain behavior is complex and is influenced by many factors including externally applied stresses, soil type, structure, density, and suction. Therefore, constitutive models for soils should ideally represent the soil behavior over entire ranges of possible pore pressure and stress values. In the literature, there are different approaches differing upon the choice of the set of suitable variables describing the material behavior. This choice is a key point in unsaturated soils modeling. Possible pairs of suitable stress variables for use in unsaturated soil mechanics presented by Fredlund and Morgenstern (1977) with Three combinations Consist of and , and , and . The stress-state variables employed in early models are the net stress and the suction. It is the simplest and most practical choice in terms of stress path representation, but, it poses difficulties when trying to incorporate hydraulic hysteresis effects. This combination could fail to provide a straightforward transition between saturated and unsaturated states, i.e. for a null suction. On the other hand Terzaghi’s effective stress cannot be exactly recovered. Also these stress variables were also difficult to implement in existing finite element codes for saturated soils because most saturated soil relations are described in term of effective stress. The effective stress principle is probably the single most fundamental contribution in the field of soil mechanics. In the other hand, it is true to say that the principle of effective stress lies at the foundation of most modem soil mechanics theory and practice. Therefore, the choice of appropriate stress variables for unsaturated soils has often been an intensively debated issue, often in connection with the possibility of defining an effective stress measure. So far, many efforts have been made to the development of effective stress for unsaturated soils in the literature. This paper presents a comparison between the values of effective stress parameter of unsaturated granular soils obtained from relations proposed by Schrefler, Aitchison, Kohgo, Khalili-Khabbaz and Dangla-Coussy with special regard into the critical state concept. The principle is to re-plot experimental data obtained of both consolidated drained and constant water content tests in conventional stress–strain coordinates, stress variables being usually net stress and suction, into new effective stress coordinates. The critical state lines (CSL) at different suction values tend to converge remarkably towards a unique saturated line in the deviatoric stress versus mean effective stress coordinates. Therefor since critical state lines presented as independent of suction, comparison of soil properties in many cases becomes easier. The comparison results show that effective stress values determined from the relations proposed by Khalili-Khabbaz well best agrees with the values from the both type test results

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Credit institutions to provide variety of facilities to their customers, need to comprehensive studies by qualitative and quantitative aspects of their applicants. By this way, accomplish a complete evaluation of repay ability measure and calculate the refund facilities probability and finance services by them , these reviews generally validation name. The purpose of this study was ranking customer groups and specifies the best part of them until brokerage firm do its credit allocation process mechanically. Here, after the preprocessing of the data, they are processes in the RFM model. Then SOM neural network as one of the clustering algorithms will change customers to 10 cluster. Using the proposed model, the clusters will rank. The top clusters, identification and facilities grant operations to the members of these clusters will do. Finally, three clusters 5, 1 and 7 defines as top clusters that they are the target customers. Coefficient facilities granted to the top three clusters respectively are 0.271, 0.173 and 0.556.

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Water content plays an important role in the process of plant photosynthesis and biomass accumulation. Many methods have been developed to retrieve canopy leaf water content from remote sensing data. However, the validity of these methods has not been verified, which limits their applications. This study estimates the Leaf Water Content (LWC) of winter wheat with three most widely used indexes: Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI), Simple Ratio (SR), and Shortwave Infrared Perpendicular Water Stress Index (SPSI), as well as MODIS short wave and near infrared data, and then compares remote sensing estimates of vegetation water content with field-measured values measured in concurrent dates. The results indicate that the three indexes are significantly correlated with the LWC of winter wheat at the 0.01 significance level. They all have good accuracy with higher than 90%. The indexes derived from MODIS bands 6 and 2 were better than those from bands 7 and 2 for measuring wheat leaf water content, and the correlations of the former two (NDWI and SR) were stronger than that of SPSI.

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The ogee spillways are constructed to regulate the flow in reservoir of dams. When the excess waters overflow the ogee spillway, the velocity at toe of spillway is pretty high and the flow has a huge amount of energy. The bucket spillway is used in order to reduce the amount of such energy. Next, the trajectory flow combines with air and the flow loses its energy significantly. If the materials at downstream of spillway are erodible, the probability of the scour exist; as a result, the stability of spillway endangers. Therefore, the prediction of scour hole depth in this area is quite significant. In this study, the depth of scour at downstream of the bucket spillway simulated using the Extreme Learning Machine (ELM) model. One of the most popular methods based on the artificial intelligence is the feed-forward neural network (FFNN). The training speed of this algorithm is very low. It's due to the use of the gradient based algorithms such as the back propagation (BP) which has low speed and the adjustment of the parameters related to the network is iterative. The extreme learning machine (ELM) is a Single Layer Feed-Forward Neural Network (SLFFNN) which selects the number of nodes randomly and determines the output weights analytically. This algorithm is much faster than conventional neural networks and has a good generalization performance. The use of this method has had a good performance in different fields and its comparison with FFNN-BP has showed that this method in addition to reduce high computational costs has a higher accuracy. In current study, to evaluate the performance of ELM models, the Monte Carlo simulation (MCs) is applied. Monte Carlo simulation is a broad class of computational algorithms that rely on repeated random sampling to obtain numerical results. Their essential idea is using randomness to solve problems that might be deterministic in principle. They are often used in physical and mathematical problems and are most useful when it is difficult or impossible to use other approaches. Monte Carlo simulation is mainly used in different problems such as optimization and numerical integration from a probability distribution. Also in this study, the k-fold Cross Validation (k-fold) is used for evaluating the models ability. In k-fold cross validation method, the original sample is randomly partitioned into k equal sized subsamples. In the k subsamples, a single subsample is retained as the validation data for testing the specific model, and the remaining k-1 subsamples are used as training data. The cross-validation process is then repeated k times (the folds), with each of the k subsamples used exactly once as the validation data. The k results from the folds can then be averaged to produce a single estimation. The advantage of this method over repeated random sub-sampling is that all observations are used for both training and validation, and each observation is used for validation exactly once. The k value was considered 5 in this study. In this study, to validate the results of numerical models, the Azmathullah et al. (2005) experimental measurements were used. They measured the scour depth at the downstream of bucket spillway. Next, the effective parameters on scour depth were identified and six ELM models defined. In other words, one model simulated the scour depth with combination of five input parameters including the discharge dimensionless parameter, the ratio of the total head to the tailwater depth(H/dw), the ratio of the bucket radius to the tailwater depth(R/dw), the ratio of the mean sediment size to the tailwater depth(d50/dw) and lip angle of bucket, and five models predicted the output variable using four input parameters. In addition, the sensitivity analysis was carried out in order to identify the effective factor. This sensitivity analysis showed that the discharge dimensionless parameter was the most effective factor. Also, the superior model was introduced by analyzing the results of all models. This model had reasonable accuracy and was the function of all input parameters. For example, the determination coefficient and scatter index were obtained 0.993 and 0.071, respectively. Also, The RMSE and MAPE for this model were obtained 0.240 and 8.891, respectively. Additionally, the maximum, minimum and average discrepancy ratios for the superior model were respectively calculated 1.567, 0.360 and 0.991.

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The objective of this study was to estimate Daughter Yield Deviations (DYDs) of bulls and Yield Deviations (YDs) for cows using a random regression model and validation of genetic trend using estimated DYDs and Method II of Interbull for test-day records of Somatic Cell Score (SCS) in the first lactation of Iranian Holsteins. Data set included the 108995 test day records collected by the Animal Breeding Center of Iran from 2001 to 2010. Results of the present study indicated that variation in YDs of cows at different stages of lactation corresponds closely with their Estimated Breeding Values (EBVs). Because YDs and DYDs are considered as an additional measure of an animal’s genetic merit, their correlation with EBVs is very important. The correlation between DYDs and EBVs of bulls for SCS was 0.88. High correlation estimates between DYDs and EBVs indicated that, in addition to EBV, the DYD can be an appropriate measure for dairy cattle breeding programs. The correlation increased with increase in the number of bull daughters and the average number of test-days of daughters. Estimated DYDs for each production year were used to validate the genetic trend obtained from the model which was used for genetic evaluation. Results indicated that genetic trend for SCS in the first lactation of Iranian Holsteins was slightly overestimated.

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In the present study, the optimization process of phenolic compounds extraction and antioxidant activity (DPPH radical-scavenging assay, FRAP test, and oxidative stability index) of Pistacia khinjuk fruits was evaluated using ultrasound waves through response surface methodology (RSM). To optimize the extraction process from the central composite design with three independent variables including time (5, 27.5 and 50 minutes), temperature (25, 45 and 65 ° C) and ethanol ratio in water-ethanol solvent (0, 50 and 100% ) was used. Significant effects of independent variables on the extraction of phenol compound, DPPH radical scavenging power, FRAP test and OSI of P.khinjuk fruit extract, with the regression coefficients of 97.65, 98.09, 98.62 and 98.38 %, respectively, were noted. Among the independent parameters, ethanol concentration was the most effective parameter because two effects of quadratic and linear were observed in the proposed models of different tests. The interaction effect between different paprameters was not observed in the models of this study, too. It was also the strongest model for the phenolic compounds extraction test; because in this test, in addition to the linear effect of independent parameters that were common to all tests, a quadratic effect was also observed in the parameters of time and ethanol concentration. Also, the best antioxidant activity of P.khinjuk fruit was obtained by using the ultrasonic wave for 50 minutes at 65 ºC and with 57.7% v/v ethanol/water solution. Finally, it was found that the results of experimental tests were close to the values predicted by the response level method.

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Mathematical models have the potential to provide a cost-effective, objective, and flexible approach to assessing management decisions, particularly when these decisions are strategic alternatives. In some instances, mathematical model is the only means available for evaluating and testing alternatives.  However, in order for this potential to be realized, models must be valid for the application and must provide results that are credible and reliable. The process of ensuring validity, credibility, and reliability typically consists of three elements: verification, validation, and calibration. Model verification, validation and calibration are essential tasks for the development of the models that can be used to make predictions with quantified confidence. Quantifying the confidence and predictive accuracy of model provides the decision-maker with the information necessary for making high-consequence decisions. There appears to be little uniformity in the definition of each of these three process elements. There also appears to be a lack of consensus among model developers and model users, regarding the actions required to carry out each process element and the division of responsibilities between the two groups. This paper attempts to provide mathematical model developers and users with a framework for verification, validation and calibration of these models. Furthermore, each process element is clearly defined as is the role of model developers and model users. In view of the increasingly important role that models play in the evaluation of alternatives, and in view of the significant levels of effort required to conduct these evaluations, it is important that a systematic procedure for the verification, validation and calibration of mathematical models be clearly defined and understood by both model developers and model users.

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In Egypt, pamphlets are often used to disseminate agricultural information to farmers. The aim of this study was to construct and develop a scale of quality standards for agricultural extension pamphlets. The process to construct the scale involved the following steps: (1) The articulation of the construct; (2) Selection of response format; (3) Data collection; and (4) Psychometric analysis. The scale consists of 33 items measuring five domains: content; processing the information; the appearance of text; illustrations; and designing and formatting. Items analysis, reliability, and validity estimates were obtained by a group of experts (N= 78). The reliability of the domains was strong and ranged from (α= 0.81 to α= 0.91). The authors tested validation process by evidence of content validity, criterion-related validity, construct validity, and discriminant validity. Depending on the reliability and validity results, the scale was suggested as a reliable tool for assessing the quality of agricultural extension pamphlets. Implications for practice in planning and evaluation of printed materials for agricultural extension work are discussed.