Suchergebnisse

Frontmatter -- Contents -- 1. Complementary Studies on Trust and Cooperation in Social Settings: An Introduction -- 2. Institutional Design and Human Motivation: The Role of Homo Economicus Assumptions -- 3. Rational Choice Theory, the Model of Frame Selection and Other Dual-Process Theories. A Critical Comparison -- 4. Too Simple Models in Sociology: The Case of Exchange -- 5. Rational Exploitation of the Core by the Periphery? On the Collective (In)efficiency of Endogenous Enforcement of Universal Conditional Cooperation in a Core-Periphery Network -- 6. Reputation Effects, Embeddedness, and Granovetter's Error -- 7. Robustness of Reputation Cascades -- 8. Organized Distrust: If it is there and that Effective, Why Three Recent Scandals? -- 9. Polarization and Radicalization in the Bounded Confidence Model: A Computer-Aided Speculation -- 10. Local Brokerage Positions and Access to Unique Information -- 11. Who Gets How Much in Which Relation? A Flexible Theory of Profit Splits in Networks and its Application to Complex Structures -- 12. Social Identity and Social Value Orientations -- 13. Does Money Change Everything? Priming Experiments in Situations of Strategic Interaction -- 14. Social Norms and Commitments in Cooperatives – Experimental Evidence -- 15. Rational Choice or Framing? Two Approaches to Explain the Patterns in the Fehr-Gächter-Experiments on Cooperation and Punishment in the Contribution to Public Goods -- 16. Maverick: Experimentally Testing a Conjecture of the Antitrust Authorities -- 17. Cooperation, Reputation Effects, and Network Dynamics: Experimental Evidence -- 18. Comparing Consequences of Carrots and Sticks on Cooperation in Repeated Public Good Games -- 19. A Sociological View on Hierarchical Failure: The Effect of Organizational Rules on Exchange Performance in Buyer- Supplier Transactions -- 20. Organizational Innovativeness Through Inter-Organizational Ties -- 21. A Transaction Cost Approach to Informal Care -- 22. Trust is Good – Or is Control Better? Trust and Informal Control in Dutch Neighborhoods – Their Association and Consequences -- 23. Religious Diversity and Social Cohesion in German Classrooms: A Micro-Macro Study Based on Empirical Simulations -- Notes on the Editors and Contributors

In an era of data-driven decision-making, a comprehensive understanding of quantitative research is indispensable. Current guides often provide fragmented insights, failing to offer a holistic view, while more comprehensive sources remain lengthy and less accessible, hindered by physical and proprietary barriers. This gap underscores the urgent need for a clear, accessible guide that demystifies quantitative research, a necessity not just for academic rigor but for practical application. Against this backdrop, this guide offers an overview of quantitative research, elucidating its core motivations, defining characteristics, and methodological considerations. The necessity, importance, relevance, and urgency of quantitative research are articulated, establishing a strong foundation for the subsequent discussion, which delineates the scope, objectivity, goals, data, and methods that distinguish quantitative research, alongside a balanced inspection of its strengths and shortcomings, particularly in terms of data collection and analysis. The guide also addresses various design considerations, ranging from the choice between primary and secondary research, cross-sectional and longitudinal studies, to experimental and non-experimental designs. The crucial role of pretesting and piloting instruments is underscored, with a discussion of its goals, focal areas, and participant selection. Data considerations are also examined, covering sampling approaches, sample size determination, and data and resource maximization strategies, as well as comprehensive data preparation techniques including handling missing data, managing outliers, standardizing variables, and verifying assumptions. The guide further delves into analysis considerations, spotlighting the assessment of psychometric properties, diverse analytical approaches, and essential robustness checks. The guide concludes by demystifying the hypothesis testing process, detailing the formulation of null and alternative hypotheses, the interpretation of statistical significance, and the issue of Type I, Type II, Type III, and Type IV errors. Therefore, this guide serves as a valuable compass for researchers seeking to navigate the multifaceted aspects of quantitative research, ensuring rigorous, reliable, and valid scientific inquiry.

AbstractDecades of research has revealed that humans can concurrently represent small quantities of three‐dimensional objects as those objects move through space or into occlusion. For infants (but not older children or adults), this ability apparently comes with a significant limitation: when the number of occluded objects exceeds three, infants experience what has been characterized as a "catastrophic" set size limit, failing to represent even the approximate quantity of the hidden array. Infants' apparent catastrophic representational failures suggest a significant information processing limitation in the first years of life, and the evidence has been used as support for prominent theories of the development of object and numerical cognition. However, the evidence for catastrophic failure consists of individual small‐n experiments that use null hypothesis significance testing to obtain null results (i.e., p > 0.05). Whether catastrophic representational failures are robust or reliable across studies, methods, and labs is not known. Here we report a systematic review and Bayesian meta‐analysis to examine the strength of the evidence in favor of catastrophic representational failures in infancy. Our analysis of 22 experiments across 12 reports, with a combined total of n = 367 infants aged 10–20 months, revealed strong support for the evidence for catastrophic set size limits. A complementary analysis found moderate support for infants' success when representing fewer than four objects. We discuss the implications of our findings for theories of object and numerical cognitive development.Research Highlights
Previous work has suggested that infants are unable to concurrently represent four or more objects—a "catastrophic" set size limit.
We reviewed this work and conducted a Bayesian meta‐analysis to examine the robustness of this limit across individual small‐n experiments.
We found strong support for the evidence for catastrophic set size limits, and moderate support for infants' success when representing fewer than four objects.

AbstractIt is commonly claimed there is a crisis of expertise in liberal democracies and that experts who provide evidence‐based policy ideas have become widely distrusted. This paper reconsiders the nature of this perceived crisis in policy advisory systems. The literature has identified four reasons for this trend—politicisation, diversification, diminished policy capacity, and populism. Building on these claims, this paper suggests that the contestability of policy advice has been the key underlying shift in policy advisory processes. Contestability can be positively useful for testing the robustness of policy proposals. However, if the policy debate has no evidentiary standards, the contest becomes a clash of opinions and slogans. Hence, several approaches have been proposed to strengthen the role of professional expertise and improve the quality and legitimacy of evidence‐informed policymaking. One approach is the rebuilding of bureaucratic capacity to provide evidence‐informed policy advice. However, a technocratic–elitist style that invokes scientific authority would be difficult to sustain politically in relation to complex issues affecting citizen well‐being. A second approach is to improve stakeholder engagement and to enhance respect for the expertise embodied in 'lived experience'. Thus, rebuilding trust and legitimacy may require broadening the range of relevant expertise through multi‐stakeholder approaches.Points for practitioners
Types of expert policy advice have evolved and diversified, with many sources and channels both inside and outside government
Contestability of policy advice has become more widespread
Public service policy capacity has arguably been weakened through outsourcing, use of consultants, interest group lobbying, and the growing influence of ministerial advisors
Evidence‐informed advisory systems have been challenged by fast decision‐making, wicked problems, media misinformation, and populist slogans
Rebuilding capacity and trust in high‐quality policy systems requires new thinking, including more inclusive processes and a wider view of relevant expertise.

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to use empirical data to examine the hierarchical impact of the Internet of things capability on supply chain integration (SCI), supply chain capability (SCC) and firm performance (FP) in the UK retail industry.Design/methodology/approachA deductive approach was employed to carry out this research. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was performed using the partial least square method (SmartPLS 3.3.3) to test theoretical predictions which underlie the relationships among Internet of things capability (IoTC), SCI, SCC and FP. Data are collected using an online survey completed by senior executives of 66 large, medium and small firms within the UK retail industry.FindingsThe empirical results of this research reveal that IoTC has a significant positive effect on the UK retail industry FP through the mediating role of SCI and SCC.Practical implicationsThe research results from this study provide useful management insights for firms within the retail industry into the development of effective strategies for integrating their supply chain alongside the adoption of IoTC into SCI, consequently leading to improvements in FP.Originality/valueAlthough previous studies have explored the impact of IoT on FP through the sequential mediating role of SCI and SCC, few have explored the impact of the IoT capability (IoTC) on FP through sequential mediators, i.e. SCI and SCC. This study examines the relationship between IoTC, SCI, SCC and FP in the UK retail industry supply chain to address this knowledge gap. Moreover, this study examines the effects of IoTC on FP by applying partial least square (PLS)-SEM techniques. Testing the sequential mediating role of SCI and SCI is undertaken, and the relationships among IoT-enabled SCI and SCC is analysed to improve FP. The robustness check's result through PLSpredict analysis also confirms the power of the model proposed in this study.

Microcapsules are a key class of microscale materials with applications in areas ranging from personal care to biomedicine, and with increasing potential to act as extracellular matrix (ECM) models of hollow organs or tissues. Such capsules are conventionally generated from non-ECM materials including synthetic polymers. Here, we fabricated robust microcapsules with controllable shell thickness from physically- and enzymatically-crosslinked gelatin and achieved a core-shell architecture by exploiting a liquid-liquid phase separated aqueous dispersed phase system in a one-step microfluidic process. Microfluidic mechanical testing revealed that the mechanical robustness of thicker-shell capsules could be controlled through modulation of the shell thickness. Furthermore, the microcapsules demonstrated environmentally-responsive deformation, including buckling by osmosis and external mechanical forces. A sequential release of cargo species was obtained through the degradation of the capsules. Stability measurements showed the capsules were stable at 37 {\deg}C for more than two weeks. Finally, all-aqueous liquid-liquid phase separated and multiphase liquid-liquid phase separated systems were generated with the gel-sol transition of microgel precursors. These smart capsules are promising models of hollow biostructures, microscale drug carriers, and building blocks or compartments for active soft materials and robots. ; Cambridge Trust (Y.X.; B.L.), the Jardine Foundation (Y.X.), Trinity College Cambridge (Y.X.), Peterhouse College Cambridge (T.C.T.M.), the Swiss National Science Foundation (T.C.T.M.), the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (K.L.S.), the Schmidt Science Fellowship program in partnership with the Rhodes Trust (K.L.S.), St John's College Cambridge (K.L.S.), China Scholarship Council (H.Z.; B.L.), EPSRC Cambridge NanoDTC (EP/037221/1; A.P.M.G.), the Newman Foundation (T.P.J.K.), the Wellcome Trust (T.P.J.K.), and the European Research Council under the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) through the ERC grant PhysProt (agreement n◦ 337969; T.P.J.K.).

International audience ; The GM15 community is a bacterial consortium used to generate a novel standardized mouse model with a simplified controlled intestinal microbiota recapitulating the specific opportunistic pathogen-free (SOPF) mouse phenotype and the potential to ensure an increased reproducibility and robustness of preclinical studies by limiting the confounding effect of microbiota composition fluctuation. T he intestinal microbiota is a complex and dynamic ecosystem largely composed of bacteria whose activity greatly impacts the health and diseases of the host (1). Associating mice with stable defined bacterial consortia reduces the complexity of the microbiota and overcomes limitations related to the variability between individuals and animal facilities (2, 3). Therefore, gnotobiotics contribute to standardization and experimental reproducibility and are a powerful tool for testing causality in host-microbiome studies (4-6). Thus, we have developed a simplified mouse microbiota that is representative of the fecal microbiota found in C57BL/6J mice on the functional level and derived a standardized gnotobiotic mouse model called GM15, which has been bred successfully for over eight generations in the gnotobiology unit of BIOASTER. All animal procedures were approved by the French Ministry of Higher Education, Research and Innovation (MESR) and the ANSES/ENVA/UPEC ethics committee (Autorisation de Projet Utilisant des Animaux à des Fins Scientifiques [APAFIS] no. 4529-2016022616404045v3, 785-2015042819315178v2, and 18918-2019020118003843v3) and were conducted in accordance with national French and European legislation on the protection of animals used for scientific purposes. We report here the draft genome sequences of 9 bacterial strains isolated from the intestinal microbiota of C57BL/6J specific-opportunistic-pathogen-free (SOPF) mice (Charles River Laboratories, France), 2 bacterial strains isolated from C57BL/6J axenic mice recolonized with feces of the altered Schaedler flora (ASF) mouse model ...

As part of its most recent Efficiency Research Programme, which sought to advance understanding of workforce retention in health and social care, the Health Foundation have provided funding to a team within the Centre for Social Care, Health and Related Research at Birmingham City University. This project proposes to utilise exploratory data analysis techniques to investigate the underpinning contributory factors to nurse retention and ultimately patient safety across 10 acute and 10 mental healthcare providers. Exploratory data analysis techniques do not conform to the accepted hypothesis setting and testing associated with the traditional experimental research design within medicine and consequently, can be subject to criticism. However, these techniques afford bountiful opportunity to generate insight from real-world data; insight that could not be gleamed from experimental designs, therefore they warrant further investigation before being written off as 'data dredging'.
Exploratory data analysis techniques applied to large datasets that are routinely collected as part of standard care have the potential to revolutionise healthcare. Machine learning and artificial intelligence are becoming common place in everyday life but have been relatively slow to be adopted as a mechanism for improving healthcare. An aspect of the medical community's reluctance to accept these techniques is a perceived lack of robustness in determining relationships, as hypotheses aren't typically generated in advance and therefore the process exposes itself to unscrupulous actions where analyses are undertaken until a relationship is found. An element of this programme of work is to develop a set of standards for the application of these techniques to healthcare-generated data including, but not limited to and housing data in open access formats to improve transparency and reporting on findings.
This session seeks to explore these issues with colleagues across disciplines, generating debate regarding novel approaches to complex issues.

2018 Summer. ; Includes bibliographical references. ; Miniature robots have many applications ranging from military surveillance to search and rescue assistance in disaster areas. Traditionally, fabrication of these robots has been labor intensive, time-consuming, and expensive. This thesis proposes to leverage recent advances in 3D printing technology to fabricate centimeter-scale walking robots utilizing compliant elements printed directly into the walking mechanisms in replacement of traditional revolute joints or rigid links. The ability to design around the capabilities of 3D printers and novel material choices gives miniature robots the ability to have multiple functions in the same mechanism, reduces the overall number of parts that must be assembled to make a functional robot, and decrease the time and cost of prototyping. This thesis details three areas of study for compliant mechanisms with applications to walking robots. First, we utilize multi-material 3D printing to fabricate a miniature walking robot (49 x 38 x 25mm) that directly replaces the traditional revolute joints in the designed walking mechanism with a custom, soft joint. Some links are also printed with soft materials to enhance the robustness and durability of the robot. Along with design and testing of the robot, we develop two numerical models to simulate the effects of the soft elements on the mechanism trajectory. Second, we leverage the numerical models to optimize the design of the walking mechanism to produce a trajectory similar to that of the same mechanism using all revolute joints. Third, we redesign the original robot to utilize a conductive polylactic acid (PLA) material to 3D print linkages that allow for changing joints locations by softening the desired part through applied electricity. This variable joint mechanism can create multiple trajectories without changing the mechanical structure, therefore creating a multi-functional compliant mechianism. Such capabilities are demonstrated throughwalking on the ground and grasping objects using the same leg mechanism.

A new fungus, Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans (Bsal), was identified in wild populations of salamanders in the Netherlands and Belgium, and in kept salamander populations in Germany and the United Kingdom. EFSA assessed the potential of Bsal to affect the health of wild and kept salamanders in the EU, the effectiveness and feasibility of a movement ban of traded salamanders, the validity, reliability and robustness of available diagnostic methods for Bsal detection, and possible alternative methods and feasible risk mitigation measures to ensure safe international and EU trade of salamanders and their products. Bsal was isolated and characterised in 2013 from a declining fire salamander (Salamandra salamandra) population in the Netherlands. Based on the available evidence, it is likely that Bsal is a sufficient cause for the death of S. salamandra both in the laboratory and in the wild. Despite small sample sizes, the available experimental evidence indicates that Bsal is associated with disease and death in individuals of 12 European and 3 Asian salamander species, and with high mortality rate outbreaks in kept salamanders. Bsal experimental infection was detected in individuals of at least one species pertaining to the families Salamandridae, Plethodontidae, Hynobiidae and Sirenidae. Movement bans constitute key risk mitigation measures to prevent pathogen spread into naïve areas and populations. The effectiveness of a movement ban is mainly dependent on the import volumes, possibility of Bsal to remain viable outside susceptible/tolerant species, and the capacity to limit illegal movements. Duplex real‐time PCR can be used to detect Bsal DNA, but has not been fully validated. Quarantining salamanders, enacting legislation that requires testing of animals to demonstrate freedom from Bsal, before movement can take place, restricting salamander movements, tracking all traded species, hygienic procedures/biosecurity measures before and during movements, and increasing public awareness are relevant measures for ...

A new fungus, Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans (Bsal), was identified in wild populations of salamanders in the Netherlands and Belgium, and in kept salamander populations in Germany and the United Kingdom. EFSA assessed the potential of Bsal to affect the health of wild and kept salamanders in the EU, the effectiveness and feasibility of a movement ban of traded salamanders, the validity, reliability and robustness of available diagnostic methods for Bsal detection, and possible alternative methods and feasible risk mitigation measures to ensure safe international and EU trade of salamanders and their products. Bsal was isolated and characterised in 2013 from a declining fire salamander (Salamandra salamandra) population in the Netherlands. Based on the available evidence, it is likely that Bsal is a sufficient cause for the death of S. salamandra both in the laboratory and in the wild. Despite small sample sizes, the available experimental evidence indicates that Bsal is associated with disease and death in individuals of 12 European and 3 Asian salamander species, and with high mortality rate outbreaks in kept salamanders. Bsal experimental infection was detected in individuals of at least one species pertaining to the families Salamandridae, Plethodontidae, Hynobiidae and Sirenidae. Movement bans constitute key risk mitigation measures to prevent pathogen spread into naïve areas and populations. The effectiveness of a movement ban is mainly dependent on the import volumes, possibility of Bsal to remain viable outside susceptible/tolerant species, and the capacity to limit illegal movements. Duplex real-time PCR can be used to detect Bsal DNA, but has not been fully validated. Quarantining salamanders, enacting legislation that requires testing of animals to demonstrate freedom from Bsal, before movement can take place, restricting salamander movements, tracking all traded species, hygienic procedures/biosecurity measures before and during movements, and increasing public awareness are relevant measures for ensuring safe intra-EU and international trade of salamanders.

Introduction: Polypharmacy and medication adherence in the older populationwith multiple chronic conditionsare significant public health issues across all the European Union (EU) countries. SIMPATHY (Stimulating Innovation Management of Polypharmacy and Adherence in The Elderly) is a consortium of 10 organizations representing 8 EU countriesaiming to provide to EU policy makers the evidence and tools, including Change Management methodologies, to support to formulate and introduce new policies.Methods: The selection the Change management approach, in SIMPATHY, aimed to provide the analytical tool to identify the impact of various factors affecting polypharmacy, not only currently but also in the short and long run. The approach selected is the PESTEL analysis, it has been deployed in three steps andis expected to provide projection of the estimated impact of the factors up to 10 years. First step aimed to create a PESTEL analysis framework and to prepare guide to help the partners to conduct the analysis; a pilot testing performed in three of the partner countries for assessing the specificity, objectivity and robustness of the multidimensional content, before the finalization of the relevant Handbook. The second step focused to conduct the analysis -through interviews and workshopsamong the stakeholders, decision makers and focus groups across all eight countries.The third step refers to the interpretation of the results in order the evident drivers and barriers to change polypharmacy landscape to be identified and to be taken into consideration for future strategy development.Process and preliminary results: The change management approach stimulated a dynamic process within SIMPATHY. The first and second step of the entire PESTEL process is about to be completed. The PESTEL frameworkhasbeen formulated incorporating economic, political, legaland cultural contextas well as alternative interventionsrelated to the health system structure and attributes in health and social care delivery process among EU ...

Environmental problems, at local scale as well as global scale, are now considered as key issues and scientists are encouraged to be part of the process to address these issues. For the last decades, scholars have been focusing on the study of interactions between social dynamics and ecological processes and produced a set of concepts and scientific discourses aiming at framing the analysis of socio-ecological dynamics and eventually at orienting interventions. Scientific discourses are produced by scholars who belong to different groups (resilience, vulnerability, political ecology, commons, robustness …) which identity go beyond disciplines, methods, frameworks and concepts and include a collective history on the evolution of ideas and research organization. Different research units based in Montpellier (France) have been conducting research on socio-ecological systems (SES) to understand many types of relationships, including those between agriculture and biodiversity, policies and landscapes dynamics, watershed management, ecosystem management and health risk. A project named SETER (Socio-Ecological Theories and Empirical Research) was elaborated aiming at assessing the relevance and the complementarities of theoretical frameworks by applying and testing them on several empirical research case studies developed by the participating research units based in Montpellier. We have confronted different scholars, holding the flags of different schools of thought, to the same concrete issues. The purpose of this assessment was to clarify the respective potential of the different theoretical frameworks and to provide the basis for new conceptualizations of socio-ecological systems dynamics and management. Although some authors call for an integrated framework and some advocate for the diversity of explanations, both agree on the fact that there is a need for clarification for a better scientific debate and better interactions with the managers, stakeholders and interested people. The scientific debate remains obscure ...

European legislation requires the assessment of reproductive toxicity of cosmetic ingredients without using tests on the organisms defined by the European directive on animals used for scientific purposes. To screen by excluding chemicals, cosmetics industry needs to develop an alternative method to animal testing, which needs to be predictive and specific in identifying teratogen agents (during embryonic development substances causing definitive physical and / or functional defects). For this, zebrafish, medaka fish and Xenopus amphibian at embryonic stages were assessed on a list of 43 reference substances. Medaka has been selected to the reliability of its supply, the robustness of its embryonic stages during handling, as well as for performance of its test. In addition, this test can detect the most potent teratogen agents, nearly half of the 26 teratogens of our list. Its specificity rate is set at 100% for correctly identifying 17 negative substances for which the absence of teratogenic effects is proved in humans or mammalian model organism. However, the performance of this test may be improved by its automation and integration of new quantification parameters for the identification of functional defects. Finally, to predict the safety of a chemical in humans, the predictive teratogenicity test using medaka embryos must be integrated into a comprehensive strategy for assessing the teratogenicity. ; La règlementation européenne requiert l'évaluation de la reprotoxicité des ingrédients cosmétiques sans avoir recours aux tests sur les organismes définis par la directive européenne sur les animaux utilisés à des fins scientifiques. Pour cribler par exclusion des substances chimiques, l'industrie cosmétique a besoin de développer une méthode alternative à l'expérimentation animale prédictive et spécifique à l'identification d'agents tératogènes (substances entraînant au cours du développement embryonnaire et de manière définitive des malformations physiques et/ou fonctionnelles). Pour cela, le poisson zèbre, ...

This paper was accepted for publication in the journal Journal of Hydrology and the definitive published version is available at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhydrol.2010.06.043. ; This paper presents a novel framework for undertaking climate change impact studies, which can be used for testing the robustness of precautionary climate change allowances used in engineering design. It is illustrated with respect to fluvial flood risk in the UK. The methodology departs from conventional scenario-led impact studies because it is based on sensitivity analyses of catchment responses to a plausible range of climate changes (rather than the time-varying outcome of individual scenarios), making it scenario-neutral. The method involves separating the climate change projections (the hazard) from the catchment responsiveness (the vulnerability) expressed as changes in peak flows. By combining current understanding of likelihood of the climate change hazard with knowledge of the sensitivity of a given catchment, it is possible to evaluate the fraction of climate model projections that would not be accommodated by specified safety margins. This enables rapid appraisal of existing or new precautionary allowances for a set of climate change projections, but also for any new set of climate change projections for example arising from a new generation of climate models as soon as they are available, or when focusing on a different planning time horizon, without the need for undertaking a new climate change impact analysis with the new scenarios. The approach is demonstrated via an assessment of the UK Government's 20% allowance for climate change applied in two contrasting catchments. In these exemplars, the allowance defends against the majority of sampled climate projections for the 2080s from the IPCC-AR4 GCM and UKCP09 RCM runs but it is still possible to identify a sub-set of regional scenarios that would exceed the 20% threshold.