according to coates’s (2004, as cited in zhang, 2010) definition of "conversational dominance" (p.111), it refers to the phenomenon of a speaker dominating others in interaction. specifically, it means how a speaker makes use of certain strategies to get the floor and maintain the floor. thus, the amount of talk is the main measurement for the dominance of the conversation. whether a speaker do...

wireless sensor networks (wsns) are one of the most interesting consequences of innovations in different areas of technology including wireless and mobile communications, networking, and sensor design. these networks are considered as a class of wireless networks which are constructed by a set of sensors. a large number of applications have been proposed for wsns. besides having numerous applic...

this thesis is a study on insurance fraud in iran automobile insurance industry and explores the usage of expert linkage between un-supervised clustering and analytical hierarchy process(ahp), and renders the findings from applying these algorithms for automobile insurance claim fraud detection. the expert linkage determination objective function plan provides us with a way to determine whi...

the present study reports an analysis of response articles in four different disciplines in the social sciences, i.e., linguistics, english for specific purposes (esp), accounting, and psychology. the study has three phases: micro analysis, macro analysis, and e-mail interview. the results of the micro analysis indicate that a three-level linguistic pattern is used by the writers in order to cr...

this study purported to compare and contrast the use of self-mention and evidentials as two mtadiscourse features in opinion columns of persian and english newspapers. the theoretical basis of this study is the idea that metadiscourse features vary across cultural boundaries. for this purpose, 150 persian and 150 english opinion columns were collected based on three factors of topic, audience a...

tennessee williams (1911-1983), the modern american dramatist, had his own unique school of dramaturgy. the dramas which he depicted are populated by characters who are lonely, desperate, in anxiety, alienated and in one word lost. they face challenges which they may overcome or not, through the choices they make. all these moods and conditions are clearly seen and explained in the theory of ex...

seismic retrofit strategies have been developed in the past few decades following the introduction of new seismic provisions and the availability of advanced materials and methods. it can be observed that new approaches to deal with more lateral forces are more innovative and more energy absorbent. in line with this, there is a growing trend toward the use of steel shear walls as a system with ...

feminine voice and narratology in wuthering heights wuthering heights as a general "bronte" work has extraordinary dimensions to it which can make it focal to different ways of interpretation. among other differences the issue of narrative voice is essential in understanding the ultimate purpose of wuthering heights. emily bronte uses different narrators from various focal points speaking of m...

the present paper deals with criminal issues. for example, legal injunction on the necessity of returning a deposit has a legal nature and legal injunction on the punishment of those who breach the trust has a criminal nature. existing social issues are the basis of classification of some instances into the issue, some of which are based on variation and others on quality. therefore, the motiva...

there are two major theories of measurement in psychometrics: classical test theory (ctt) and item-response theory (irt). despite its widespread and long use, ctt has a number of shortcomings, which make it problematic to be used for practical and theoretical purposes. irt tries to solve these shortcomings, and provide better and more dependable answers. one of the applications of irt is the as...