bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Visualizing Coevolution with CIAO Plots
Authors: Cliff Dave , Miller Geoffrey F.
Published: May 2006

In a previous article, we introduced a number of visualization techniques that we had developed for monitoring the dynamics of artificial competitive coevolutionary systems. One of these techniques involves evaluating the performance of an individual from the current population in a series of trials against opponents from all previous generations, and visualizing the results as a 2D grid of shaded cells or pixels: qualitative patterns in the shading can indicate different classes of coevolutionary dynamics. As this technique involves pitting a current individual against ancestral opponents, we referred to the visualizations as CIAO plots. Since then, a number of other authors studying the dynamics of competitive coevolutionary systems have used CIAO plots or close derivatives to help illuminate the dynamics of their systems, and it has become something of a de facto standard visualization technique. In this very brief article we summarize the rationale for CIAO plots, explain the method of constructing a CIAO plot, and review important recent results that identify significant limitations of this technique.
Understanding Linguistic Evolution by Visualizing the Emergence of Topographic Mappings
Authors: Brighton Henry , Kirby Simon
Published: May 2006

We show how cultural selection for learnability during the process of linguistic evolution can be visualized using a simple iterated learning model. Computational models of linguistic evolution typically focus on the nature of, and conditions for, stable states. We take a novel approach and focus on understanding the process of linguistic evolution itself. What kind of evolutionary system is this process? Using visualization techniques, we explore the nature of replicators in linguistic evolution, and argue that replicators correspond to local regions of regularity in the mapping between meaning and signals. Based on this argument, we draw parallels between phenomena observed in the model and linguistic phenomena observed across languages. We then go on to identify issues of replication and selection as key points of divergence in the parallels between the processes of linguistic evolution and biological evolution.
Black Smoke in China and Its Climate Effects
Authors: Streets David G.
Published: May 2006

The emission of fine carbonaceous particles in China is a serious threat to human health, ecological systems, and regional and global climate regimes. China is thought to release about 20 percent of the global black carbon through the combustion of coal and biofuels without adequate particle controls. The household and industrial sectors are mainly responsible, but the country's growing transportation sector is a concern for the future. The economic cost of damage from black carbon likely exceeds the cost of controlling emissions by several fold, but as yet such costs have not been quantified.
Improving Text Segmentation Using Latent Semantic Analysis: A Reanalysis of Choi, Wiemer-Hastings, and Moore (2001)
Authors: Bestgen Yves
Published: May 2006

Choi, Wiemer-Hastings, and Moore (2001) proposed to use Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) to extract semantic knowledge from corpora in order to improve the accuracy of a text segmentation algorithm. By comparing the accuracy of the very same algorithm, depending on whether or not it takes into account complementary semantic knowledge, they were able to show the benefit derived from such knowledge. In their experiments, semantic knowledge was, however, acquired from a corpus containing the texts to be segmented in the test phase. If this hyper-specificity of the LSA corpus explains the largest part of the benefit, one may wonder if it is possible to use LSA to acquire generic semantic knowledge that can be used to segment new texts. The two experiments reported here show that the presence of the test materials in the LSA corpus has an important effect, but also that the generic semantic knowledge derived from large corpora clearly improves the segmentation accuracy.
Disclaimer
Authors: Gómez-Peña Guillermo
Published: May 2006

Dear Curator, Producer, Arts Presenter: Think twice before inviting this performance artist to your institution. His new work might be overtly political and too sexually explicit for these times. Remember: this is post-9/11 America, the Bush era, and these are extremely delicate times. Sincerely, The Artist, USA, 2005. Is self-censorship inevitable in the age of Bush?
Entry Costs and the Supply of Public School Teachers
Authors: Reback Randall
Published: May 2006

This article examines the impact of entry costs on the likelihood that recent college graduates will become public school teachers. I combine Barron's ratings of college selectivity, data on the types of teacher certification programs offered by colleges, and NELS data that track members of the high school class of 1988 into college and into the workforce. Restricting the sample to individuals who were not considering teaching careers when they were high school seniors, I estimate the marginal effect of the availability of undergraduate teacher certification programs on the likelihood that these individuals will become teachers. The results suggest that graduates from highly selective colleges are very sensitive to entry costs related to the number of years of schooling required for certification, while graduates from less selective colleges are not marginally influenced by these costs.
Exact Solutions for Evolutionary Strategies on Harmonic Landscapes
Authors: Dunkel Jörn , Schimansky-Geier Lutz , Ebeling Werner
Published: May 2006

In this paper two different evolutionary strategies are tested by means of harmonic landscapes. Both strategies are based on ensembles of searchers, spreading over the search space according to laws inspired by nature. The main difference between the two prototypes is given by the underlying selection mechanism, governing the increase or decrease of the local population of searchers in certain regions of the search space. More precisely, we compare a thermodynamic strategy, which is based on a physically motivated local selection criterion, with a biologically motivated strategy, which features a global selection scheme (i.e., global coupling of the searchers). Confining ourselves to a special class of initial conditions, we show that, in the simple case of harmonic test potentials, both strategies possess particular analytical solutions of the same type. By means of these special solutions, the velocities of the two strategies can be compared exactly. In the last part of the paper, we extend the scope of our discussion to a mixed strategy, combining local and global selection.
Crossover Invariant Subsets of the Search Space for Evolutionary Algorithms
Authors: Mitavskiy Boris
Published: May 2006

This paper addresses the relationship between schemata and crossover operators. In Appendix A a general mathematical framework is developed which reveals an interesting correspondence between the families of reproduction transformations and the corresponding collections of invariant subsets of the search space. On the basis of this mathematical apparatus it is proved that the family of masked crossovers is, for all practical purposes, the largest family of transformations whose corresponding collection of invariant subsets is the family of Antonisse's schemata. In the process, a number of other interesting facts are shown. It is proved that the full dynastic span of a given subset of the search space under either one of the traditional families of crossover transformations (one-point crossovers or masked crossovers) is obtained after [log2n] iterations where n is the dimension of the search space. The generalized notion of invariance introduced in the current paper unifies Radcliffe's notions of firespectfl and figene transmissionfl. Besides providing basic tools for the theoretical analysis carried out in the current paper, the general facts established in Appendix A provide a way to extend Radcliffe's notion of figenetic representation functionfl to compare various evolutionary computation techniques via their representation.
Addressing the Global Governance Deficit
Authors: Haas Peter M.
Published: May 2006

There is mounting concern about a global governance deficit for managing international environmental problems and sustainable development. This article reviews the proposals and justifications for reform, and suggests an alternative model of global governance based on diffuse networks of diverse actors performing multiple and overlapping functions. Some reform proposals are offered to improve the prospects of network-based global governance.
One Basin at a Time: The Global Environment Facility and Governance of Transboundary Waters
Authors: Gerlak Andrea K.
Published: May 2006

Increased international attention to water resource management and integration has resulted in the creation of new institutional arrangements and environmental funding mechanisms. The Global Environmental Facility's (GEF) International Waters Program is at the heart of such novel collaborative approaches to managing transboundary resources. This paper assesses GEF-led efforts in twenty-three projects across ten geographic regions. It finds that the GEF has been successful in building scientific knowledge and creating linkages across social, economic and environmental issues. However, challenges of enhancing the contractual environment and building national capacity remain. While GEF efforts thus far do indicate that institutions can affect the growth of knowledge and cooperation around transboundary waters, long-lasting achievements of the GEF's International Waters Program have yet to be realized.
The Opposite of Learning: Ossification in the Climate Change Regime
Authors: Depledge Joanna
Published: May 2006

Promoting learning among participants is a key function commonly attributed to international regimes. Such learning, however, cannot always be guaranteed, and regimes may sometimes descend into ossification. In contrast to a learning regime, an ossifying regime is one that is unable to process new information, facilitate the free-flow of new ideas, or foster understanding and trust among negotiators. Evidence from the recent history of the climate change regime suggests it is suffering from ossification. Dragging forces contributing to this include the institutionalization of the “north/south divide,” complexity of the process, fragile conditions for effective communication, onerous decision—making rules, activities of obstructionists, absence of the US, and weak implementation. Pockets of learning on climate change are, however, still active, especially outside the regime itself. To reinvigorate the negotiations, meaningful progress is needed on domestic and regional implementation, including ensuring the success of the Protocol's market mechanisms.
Planting Trees to Mitigate Climate Change: Contested Discourses of Ecological Modernization, Green Governmentality and Civic Environmentalism
Authors: Bäckstrand Karin , Lövbrand Eva
Published: May 2006

Forest plantations or so-called carbon sinks have played a critical role in the climate change negotiations and constitute a central element in the scheme to limit atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations set out by the Kyoto Protocol. This paper examines dominant discursive framings of forest plantation projects in the climate regime. A central proposition is that these projects represent a microcosm of competing and overlapping discourses that are mirrored in debates of global environmental governance. While the win-win discourse of ecological modernization has legitimized the inclusion of sink projects in the Kyoto Protocol, a green governmentality discourse has provided the scientific rationale necessary to turn tropical tree-plantation projects operational on the emerging carbon market. A critical civic environmentalism discourse has contested forest sink projects depicting them as unjust and environmentally unsound strategies to mitigate climate change. The article examines the articulation and institutionalization of these discourses in the climate negotiation process as well as the wider implications for environmental governance.
Symbolic Politics or Rational Choice? Testing Theories of Extreme Ethnic Violence
Authors: Kaufman Stuart J.
Published: May 2006

Rational choice theories claim that extreme ethnic violence (war and genocide) can be explained either as the result of information failures and commitment problems or as the utility-maximizing strategy of predatory elites. Symbolic politics theory asserts that such violence is driven by hostile ethnic myths and an emotionally driven symbolic politics based on those myths that popularizes predatory policies. Tests of these models in the cases of Sudan's civil war and Rwanda's genocide show that the rationalist models are incorrect: neither case can be understood as resulting from information failures, commitment problems, or rational power-conserving elite strategies. Rather, in both cases ethnic mythologies and fears made predatory policies so popular that leaders had little choice but to embrace them by playing up associated ethnic symbols, even though these policies led to the leaders' downfalls. Ethnic security dilemmas in such cases are driven not by uncertainty but by predatory leaders engaged in symbolic politics.
The End of MAD? The Nuclear Dimension of U.S. Primacy
Authors: Lieber Keir A. , Press Daryl G.
Published: May 2006

For nearly half a century, the world's most powerful nuclear-armed states have been locked in a condition of mutual assured destruction. Since the end of the Cold War, however, the nuclear balance has shifted dramatically. The U.S. nuclear arsenal has steadily improved; the Russian force has sharply eroded; and Chinese nuclear modernization has progressed at a glacial pace. As a result, the United States now stands on the verge of attaining nuclear primacy, meaning that it could conceivably disarm the long-range nuclear arsenals of Russia and China with a nuclear first strike. A simple nuclear exchange model demonstrates that the United States has a potent first-strike capability. The trajectory of nuclear developments suggests that the nuclear balance will continue to shift in favor of the United States in coming years. The rise of U.S. nuclear primacy has significant implications for relations among the world's great powers, for U.S. foreign policy, and for international relations scholarship.
Moscow's Proxy? Cuba and Africa 1975–1988
Authors: Gleijeses Piero
Published: May 2006

Drawing on thousands of pages of documents from the closed Cuban archives, from U.S. archives, and from the former East German archives, as well as published materials, this article explores the role that Cuba played in Africa after its dramatic dispatch of 36,000 soldiers to Angola in late 1975 and the first few months of 1976. The article focuses on the two most important aspects of Cuba's policy in Africa after 1976: its intervention in Ethiopia in 1977–1978 and its continuing presence in Angola, a presence that continued until 1991. The article analyzes Cuba's motivations, the extent to which Fidel Castro's policy was a function of Soviet demands, and the effect of Cuba's policy in Africa on relations with the United States. The concluding section offers an assessment of the costs and benefits of Cuba's policy in Africa.
Recent Advances in Design for Environment at Motorola
Authors: Hoffman William F.
Published: May 2006

Motorola is a large electronics company that uses design for environment (DfE) t o address our customers' environmental needs. In working to integrate environmental considerations into product design, Motorola has encountered new challenges in product design, and as a result has had to develop new frameworks and employ new analytical tools. This article describes those challenges and Motorola's efforts to date. The examination of how products are designed in Motorola led to the realization that there are distinct phases in design: concept development, detail design, and prototype manufacture. In the earlier phases where the greatest flexibility for product reconfiguration exists, there is the least amount of detailed information available for use in making environmental assessments. In an effort to match the data availability to the environmental assessment needs, Motorola developed a tiered approach to DE using a matrix‐based abridged life‐cycle assessment (LCA) in the concept development stage, a scoring system based in part on multiattribute value theory in the detail design stage, and potentially full‐scale life‐cycle assessment in the prototype manufacturing stage.
Chlorine in the Netherlands, Part I, An Overview
Authors: Kleijn René , Tukker Arnold , van der Voet Ester
Published: May 2006

Over the last decade debate among environmental pressure groups, industry, and the authorities overthe threat posed by chlorine has become extremely polarized. In response, the Dutch minister of the environment commissioned a strategic study on chlorine. The first phase of the study described in this article, was designed as a substance flow analysis, encompassing some 99% of the flows of chlorinated hydrocarbons (CHC) in the Netherlands. The study provided an overview of flows of CHC through the Dutch anthroposphere and to inventory the leaks to the environment. Emissions, wastestreams, exports, imports, and flows through the anthroposphere were inventoried, drawing on all possible sources including the Dutch emission registration database, life‐cycle assessment (LCA) databases, and industrial data. Emissions were evaluated using the characterization step from LCA methodology. Emissions with toxicological effects were also evaluated on the basis of actual risk assessments of the National Institute of Public Health and Environmental Protection (RIVM).This resulted in the establishment of six groups of priority segments in the Dutch chlorine chain, for which additional measures will be prepared. The study showed that the environmental groups' pronouncements about the structural dangers associated with the chlorine chain are not supported by current knowledge. The study however; also indicates that important areas of uncertainty require attention, especially relating to the possible emissions of persistent bioaccumulating toxic micropollutants.
Informing the Green Consumer: The Debate Over the Use and Abuse of Environmental Labels
Authors: Salzman James
Published: May 2006

Third‐party environmental labeling programs continue to develop around the world. They are being increasingly challenged at the policy level, however; by a well‐organized industry opposition claiming that the labels do not identify environmentally superior goods and are subject to abuse as protectionist trade barriers. Ecolabels' effectiveness in the marketplace still has not been empirically proven, although industry interest remains high and in certain cases labels appear to have influenced product design. There is little empirical evidence labels have acted as trade barriers, and negotiations within the World Trade Organization are stalemated. The International Organization for Standardization is developing standards for ecolabeling programs that may influence their status under intemational trade law. The Forest Stewardship Council, a nongovernmental umbrella group certifying sustainably harvested timber; remains the leader in this sector of resource labels. Intense industry interest in environmental labels likely arises out of fear that labels will be used as protectionist nontarifftrade barriers and, more important that label criteria will be adopted as the basis for government public procurement programs.
The Importance of LCAs—Warts and All
Authors: Ehrenfeld John R.
Published: May 2006

Life‐cycle assessment (LCA) is a new method for exploring the environmental implications of human action. Like all methods, it is analytically limited and consequently it must be used with caution. Recent papers have criticized LCA and caution against its use in all but a few narrow applications. Even while accepting many of these arguments, this article argues that LCAs, like other analytic frameworks used in the policy and planning domains, have important uses in shaping the processes by which both products and policies are designed. The arguments made against the use of LCAs omit comparisons to realistic appraisals of alternative and competing methods of environmental assessment.
Searching for Leverage to Conserve Forests: The Industrial Ecology of Wood Products in the United States
Authors: Wernick Iddo K. , Waggoner Paul E. , Ausubel Jesse H.
Published: May 2006

The forest and the creatures it shelters exemplify nature, and logging exemplifies the impacts of humans. In the 1990s Americans annually removed 70% more timber from the forest than in 1900. Since I900 population rose more than three times and gross domestic product (GDP) per person almost five. Despite more people, affluence, and logging, U.S. forest area remained constant. Since mid‐century, standing timber volume me nearly 30%. Consumers, millers, and foresters, responding to changes in style, ethics, and technology, have contributed to these outcomes. We examine the role of each actor in the industrial ecology of forests for their leverage for sparing forests. Consumers lessened their use of wood products per GDP (Intensity of Use) during the century by 2.5% annually to offset expanding population and GDP per person, a trend that will level or lower timber consumption if population and affluence grow as expected. Millers became highly efficient at utilizing wood and recycled fiber for their material or energy, a success that limits their fcrture leverage. Foresters have leverage to grow trees faster and thus use less forest land to grow and harvest timber. Steady or declining demand for trees coupled to productive forests could spare more US. forest land for sequestering carbon, ecosystem services, and habit for nature.
Life‐Cycle Assessment in the Service Industries
Authors: Graedel Thomas E.
Published: May 2006

Despite the dominant role service industries play in modern society, those industries have by and large not been involved in the strong efforts underway to create environmentally responsible operations. Part of the reason is that the role of these industries as driving factors in resource flows has not been recognized. Perhaps more important, no common framework for assessing the environmental responsibility of service industries has been established. This article provides such a framework and applies it to a generic service industry: automotive repair. Among the results are that evaluation must take different forms for different types of services, and that the approaches of service industries to the use of buildings and equipment will require innovative solutions quite unlike those advocated for the “greening” of manufacturing operations.
The Factor X Debate: Setting Targets for Eco‐Efficiency
Authors: Reijnders Lucas
Published: May 2006

The quantification and achievement of eco‐efficiency or dematerialization in the form of a factor X, with X varying between 4 and 50 is being espoused by a variety of analysts and advocates. Politically, these efforts are mainly confined to some European countries. They reflect a remarkable technological optimism. This article reviews some of the major issues pertinent to the factor X debate. The case is presented for quantifying dematerialization or eco‐efficiency goals using a factor X. It is also found that the factor X lacks precision as yet, and that there is only limited interest in the possibilrty that achievable values for X may vary widely among economic activities given technological constraints. There is no agreement whether technological improvement alone will be sufficient to achieve a factor X in practice for economies as a whole. It seems likely, however; that government‐driven technology forcing will be necessary to achieve a factor X in practical terms, especially when X is relatively large.
Is Environmental Improvement in Automotive Component Design Highly Constrained?
Authors: Keoleian Gregory A.
Published: May 2006

This article investigates the influence of environmental, cost, and performance requirements on the design and management of automotive components through a case study involving instrument panels. To address the question of whether the environmental improvement of an instrument panel (IP) is highly constrained, a lifecycle inventory analysis is used to characterize the major environmental burdens associated with a generic IP defined from an average of three midsized vehicle models. A life‐cycle cost analysis is also conducted to understand the market forces operating in the domains of the original equipment manufacturer; consumer; and end‐of‐life (EOL) vehicle managen. This study indicates that the existing set of environmental requirements, in conjunction with current cost drivers and the large set of manufacturing and use phase functional performance requirements, highly constrain opportunities for environmental improvement Specific improvement strategies‐lightweighting, elimination of the painting operation, and reduction in material complexity‐are examined in the context of existing system requirements. The near‐term forecast for improvements is not optimistic. Innovation will continue in a slow and piecemeal fashion until requirements affecting the total vehicle system are significantly changed
Mensch and Mesh
Authors: Ruth Matthias
Published: May 2006

This article discusses several relationships between technologies, industries, and socioeconomic institutions that are central to the emerging field of industrial ecology but as of yet have found little recognition. Special attention is given to the history of changes in the complexity of technologies and socioeconomic institutions, methods for dealing with this complexity conceptually and in the context of decision making, and interrelationships between technology and policy choice at various levels of system organization. On the basis of that discussion, new roles for systems thinking and modeling, systems engineering, and technology and industrial policy are identified to promote the development of industrial ecosystems that minimize their environmental impacts.
Reuse of Electric Motors in Consumer Products
Authors: Klausner Markus , Grimm Wolfgang M. , Hendrickson Chris
Published: May 2006

Product takeback calls for sound strategies of product recovery management One such strategy‐is the reuse of the components of a product. There are consumer products such as power tools whose most expensive component, the electric motor; offers potential for reuse. Empirical evidence reveals that the lifetime of a motor often exceeds the life‐time of the product using it. This article focuses on the reuse of electric motors. For this purpose, a novel circuit was developed that measures, computes, and records parameters strongly correlated with the degradation of a motor during the use stage of the product. This circuit, called electronic data log (EDL), provides valuable insights into the usage patterns of products. The data recorded during the use stage are retrieved after product takeback as a basis for reuse decisions. In this article, the trade‐off between higher initial manufacturing cost caused by the EDL and cost savings from the reuse of used motors is analyzed. The problem of misclassifications of used motors is also addressed. It is shown that the return rate of used products is the critical parameter determining the economic efficiency of a motorreuse strategy based on EDLs. The analysis shows that the implementation of EDLs in products as an enabler for motor reuse may be associated with large cost savings
Society's Metabolism
Authors: Fischer‐Kowalski Marina , Hüttler Walter
Published: May 2006

“Societal metabolism” provides the appropriate conceptual basis for the rapidly growing development and analylical and policy interest in materials flow analysis (MFA). Following the review of the earlier intellectual background of societal metabolism in the first installment of this two‐part article, this paper focuses on the current state of the art by examining more recent research referring t o societal metabolism in terms of material and substance flows. An operational classification of the literature according to frame of reference (socioeconomic system, ecosystem), system level (global, national, regional, functional, temporal), and types of flows under consideration (materials, energy, substances) highlights some of its characteristic features. There follows an integrated discussion of some of the major conceptual and methodological properties of MFA, with a particular focus on the field of bulk materials flows on a national level, comparing the major empirical results. Finally, the theoretical stringency research productivity, and political relevance of the MFA‐related studies are assessed.
Lucent Industrial Ecology Faculty Fellowship Program
Authors: Laudwe Robert A. , Taylor‐Smith Ralph E.
Published: May 2006

In this report, we review the Lucent Foundation‐funded Industrial Ecology Fellowship Program for the 1992‐I997 period and summarize the program genesis and history. During that period, 33 fellowships were awarded. This article gives a complete listing of funded faculty fellows and their research topics, which range from physical science and engineering to economics, public policy, and law. We assess the program impacts and present an objective evaluation of the widespread influence and consequences of Lucent Foundation support of the emerging paradigm of industrial ecology. In addition, we discuss future directions for the field and emphasize the significance of total quality management concepts in the reduction of industrial ecology principles to practice.
Learning before Doing
Authors: Rejeski David
Published: May 2006

Over the past decade, advances in computing, combined with new techniques for virtual prototyping and simulation, have altered our approach to the areas of training, design, and product and process development. Taken collectively these capabilities represent one of the most significant changes in the production paradigm since the beginning of mass production and one with important implications for the environment. These advances need to be viewed as more than just a new set of tools in the industrial ecology tool box They provide the basis for a fundamental shift in how we learn and solve environmental problems‐an opportunity to move from learning too late to learning before doing. Industrial ecology can embrace and articulate this new framework for learning and apply it broadly to the challenge of facilitating social and technological change and innovation in an increasingly complex world.
Books
Authors: Welch Eric W.
Published: May 2006

Toxic Sludge Is Good for You: Lies, Damn Lies, and the Public Relations Industry, by John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton

Greenwash: The Reality behind Corporate Environ‐mentalism, by Jed Greer and Kenny Bruno.
Books
Authors: Jackson Tim
Published: May 2006

Integrated Product Policy, a report for the European Commission DGXI by Ernst and Young

Product Policy in Europe: New Environmental Per‐spectives, by Frans Oosterhuis, Frieder Rubik, and Gerd Scholl
Book
Authors: Rogich Donald G.
Published: May 2006

Relationships Are Important: Accounting for Resources, 1: Economy‐Wide Applications of Mass Balance Principles to Materials and Waste, by Robert U. Ayres and Leslie W. Ayres

Relationships Are Important: Accounting for Resources, 2: The Life Cycles of Materials, by Robert U.Ayres and Leslie W. Ayres
Book
Authors: Orr David
Published: May 2006

Ecodemia: Campus Environmental Stewardship at the Turn of the 21st Century: Lessons in Smart Management from Administrators, Staff, and Students, by Julian Keniry

Green Investment, Green Return: How Practical Conservation Projects Save Millions on America's Campuses by David J. Eagan and Julian Keniry

Greening of the Ivory Tower by Sarah Hammond Creighton

Implementing Sustainable Development at University Level: A Manual of Good Practice edited by Walter Leal Filho Frances MacDermott, and Jenny Padgham
book
Authors: Hart Stuart L.
Published: May 2006

Business Management and the Natural Environment: Cases and Text by Forest Reinhardt and Richard Vietor

Environmental Management: Readings and Cases by Michael Russo
Books
Authors: Reinhardt Forest
Published: May 2006

Book reviewed in this article:

Cool Companies: How the Best Businesses Boost Profits and Productivity by Cutting Greenhouse Gas Emissions, by Joseph J. Romm.

Profit Centers in Industrial Ecology: The Business Executive's Approach to the Environment, by Ronald S. Smith Jr.
Opera and Absolutism in Restoration Italy, 1815–1860
Authors: Davis John A.
Published: May 2006

Opera played an important part in the lives of urban Italians during the decades that followed the fall of Napoleon's European empire and the restoration of the Italian legitimist rulers by the Congress of Vienna. To argue, however, that opera mattered because of its association with nationalism is to get the formula the wrong way around. Nationalists, as well as political authorities, wanted to harness opera to their cause because of its inherent social significance. The theater offered urban, educated Italians the opportunity to be entertained and to congregate lawfully in a public place. The fact that the theaters continued to draw regular audiences, regardless of censorship, would seem a sure indication that politics—at least not in the narrow, nationalist sense—was not the primary reason why opera mattered.
To Please the Public: Composers and Audiences in Nineteenth-Century Italy
Authors: Sorba Carlotta
Published: May 2006

From the composers' perspective, which eludes the traditional sociological perspective on publics, nineteenth-century Italian composers had a strong personal involvement with their audiences. Bellini, Donizetti, and Verdi were particularly sensitive to the expectations and tastes of the public. Much of Italian opera's power during the Romantic era derived from this relationship and its civic reverberations.
Task-Set Switching Deficits in Early-Stage Huntington's Disease: Implications for Basal Ganglia Function
Authors: Aron Adam R. , Watkins Laura , Sahakian Barbara J. , Monsell Stephen , Barker Roger A. , Robbins Trevor W.
Published: May 2006

Executive functions are likely mediated by interconnected circuits including frontal lobe and basal ganglia structures. We assessed the executive function of task switching in patients with early-stage Huntington's disease (HD), a neurodegenerative disease affecting the basal ganglia. In two experiments, the HD patients had greater difficulty when switching than when repeating a task than matched controls, and this was true even when scaling for the overall slowing of the patients. In the first experiment, HD patients had a switching deficit even in a “pure” condition where they had to switch, predictably, and with substantial preparation time, between stimuli having only one possible response, indicating a switching deficit different from that for patients with Parkinson's disease or frontal lobe trauma, and possibly relating to inadequate activation of stimulus-response links or “response set.” In the more elaborate second experiment, we could not account for the switching deficit of the patients in terms of inadequate preparation in advance of a switch, deficient suppression of taskset processing from the preswitch trial, or impaired suppression of interference due to the presence of a competing task set. Instead, we found that part of the switching deficit was due to elevated reaction time and errors on switch trials for a repeated response (same button press as on preswitch trial) relative to an alternated response (different button press from preswitch trial). We argue that this elevated “repetition effect” for the HD patients is due to excessive inhibition of the justperformed response in advance of a switch. Alterations in the “response-setting” process alone (Experiment 1) and both the response-setting and “response inhibition” process (Experiment 2) probably arise from striatal pathology in HD, thus accounting for the task-switching deficits and showing how basal ganglia implemented response processes may underpin executive function.
Working Memory and Lexical Ambiguity Resolution as Revealed by ERPs: A Difficult Case for Activation Theories
Authors: Gunter Thomas C. , Wagner Susanne , Friederici Angela D.
Published: May 2006

This series of three event-related potential experiments explored the issue of whether the underlying mechanism of working memory (WM) supporting language processing is inhibitory or activational in nature. These different cognitive mechanisms have been proposed to explain the more efficient processing of subjects with a high WM span compared to those with a low WM span. Participants with high and low WM span were presented with sentences containing a homonym followed three words later by a nominal disambiguation cue and a final disambiguation using a verb. At the position of the disambiguation cue, inhibitory or activational WM mechanisms predict contrasting results. When activation is the underlying mechanism for efficient processing, the prediction is that high memory span persons activate both meanings of the homonym equally in WM, whereas low memory span persons only have one meaning present. When inhibition is the underlying mechanism, the predictions are the reverse. The ERP data, in particular, the variations of the meaning related N400 component, showed clear evidence for inhibition as the underlying cognitive mechanism in high-span readers. For low-span participants the cueing towards the dominant or the subordinate meaning elicited an equivalently large N400 component suggesting that both meanings are active in WM. In highspan subjects, the dominant disambiguation cue elicited a smaller N400 than the subordinate one, indicating that for these subjects particularly the dominant meaning is active. The experiments showed that inhibitory processes are probably underlying WM used during language comprehension in high-span subjects. Moreover, they demonstrate that these subjects can use their inhibition in a more flexible manner than low-span subjects. The effects that these processing differences have on the efficiency of language parsing are discussed.
Enhanced Extrastriate Activation during Observation of Distorted Finger Postures
Authors: Avikainen Sari , Liuhanen Sasu , Schürmann Martin , Hari Riitta
Published: May 2006

Hand and finger postures of other people are important body language cues that strongly contribute to the observer's decision about the person's intentions, thoughts, and attentional state. We compared neuromagnetic cortical activation elicited by color images of natural and distorted finger postures. The distorted postures contained computer-deformed joint angles and thereby easily caught the observer's attention. From about 260 msec onwards, extrastriate occipital areas of both hemispheres were activated more strongly by distorted than natural finger postures. We interpret this result as an early topdown effect of emotional valence on the processing of unusual hand shapes in the extrastriate visual cortex.
Language Lateralization in a Bimanual Language
Authors: Corina David P. , Jose-Robertson Lucila San , Guillemin Andre , High Julia , Braun Allen R.
Published: May 2006

Unlike spoken languages, sign languages of the deaf make use of two primary articulators, the right and left hands, to produce signs. This situation has no obvious parallel in spoken languages, in which speech articulation is carried out by symmetrical unitary midline vocal structures. This arrangement affords a unique opportunity to examine the robustness of linguistic systems that underlie language production in the face of contrasting articulatory demands and to chart the differential effects of handedness for highly skilled movements. Positron emission tomography (PET) technique was used to examine brain activation in 16 deaf users of American Sign Language (ASL) while subjects generated verb signs independently with their right dominant and left nondominant hands (compared to the repetition of noun signs). Nearly identical patterns of left inferior frontal and right cerebellum activity were observed. This pattern of activation during signing is consistent with patterns that have been reported for spoken languages including evidence for specializations of inferior frontal regions related to lexical–semantic processing, search and retrieval, and phonological encoding. These results indicate that lexical–semantic processing in production relies upon left-hemisphere regions regardless of the modality in which a language is realized, and that this left-hemisphere activation is stable, even in the face of conflicting articulatory demands. In addition, these data provide evidence for the role of the right posterolateral cerebellum in linguistic–cognitive processing and evidence of a left ventral fusiform contribution to sign language processing
Attentional Modulation of Unconscious “Automatic” Processes: Evidence from Event-related Potentials in a Masked Priming Paradigm
Authors: Kiefer Markus , Brendel Doreen
Published: May 2006

Automatic processes are usually thought to occur independently of any cognitive resources. This traditional view has been recently challenged by showing that temporal attention to a target stimulus is a prerequisite for “automatic” response priming. The event-related potential (ERP) study reported here extends this research by pursuing a somewhat different approach. In two experiments, it was investigated whether masked semantic priming effects can be modulated by temporal attention to the prime using a cueing procedure. We hypothesized that masked priming is amplified when attention is directed to the stimulus stream in the time window of masked prime presentation, even in the absence of any prime awareness. ERPs were recorded while subjects performed a primed lexical decision task. Target words were preceded by semantically related or unrelated masked prime words, which were not consciously identified. A cue stimulus prompted subjects to direct their attention to the stimulus stream either shortly before the masked prime (short cue interval) or a long time interval before. Priming affected the amplitude of the N400 ERP component, an electrophysiological index of semantic processing. Unrelated prime–target pairs elicited a larger N400 than related pairs (N400 priming effect). Most importantly, this masked N400 priming effect was strongest when the cue interval and the stimulus onset asynchronies were short. The present results show that temporal attention to the prime is a prerequisite for obtaining masked N400 priming effects. They also demonstrate that unconscious automatic processes are susceptible to attentional modulation.
Reward-period Activity in Primate Dorsolateral Prefrontal and Orbitofrontal Neurons Is Affected by Reward Schedules
Authors: Ichihara-Takeda Satoe , Funahashi Shintaro
Published: May 2006

Reward-period activity observed in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) is thought to represent the detection of reward delivery. To investigate whether this activity plays the same role in these areas, we examined this activity under different reward schedules and whether the reward schedule has similar effects on this activity in each of these areas. A monkey performed an oculomotor delayed-response (ODR) task under two reward schedules. In the ODR-1 schedule, the monkey received a large amount of reward only after four successful trials, whereas in the ODR-2 schedule, it received a small amount of reward after every successful trial. Although reward-period activity was observed in both areas, more neurons exhibited this activity in the OFC. Reward-period activity was modulated by the proximity to reward delivery in both areas and this feature was observed more frequently in the OFC. The onset time of this activity also gradually advanced depending on the proximity to reward delivery. Moreover, many OFC neurons with this activity responded to free reward delivery. These results indicate that reward-period activity in the OFC represents the detection of reward delivery and that the gradual change in the magnitude and the onset time of this activity represents the expectation of reward delivery. Similar features of reward-period activity were observed in DLPFC neurons, although a significant number of DLPFC neurons did not respond to free reward delivery and no advance was observed in the onset time of this activity. These results suggest that reward-period activity in the DLPFC participates in whether or not correct performance was achieved. Thus, although similar reward-period activity was observed in both areas, the activity in the OFC represents the detection of reward delivery and is affected by the monkey's motivational state, whereas that in the DLPFC seems to participate in monitoring whether or not the necessary performance is achieved.
The Neural Basis of Perceptual Hypothesis Generation and Testing
Authors: Weidner R. , Shah N. J. , Fink G. R.
Published: May 2006

Four-dot masking is a new form of visual masking that does not involve local contour interactions or spatial superimposition of the target stimulus and the mask (as, e.g., in pattern or metacontrast masking). Rather, the effective masking mechanism is based on object substitution. Object substitution masking occurs when low-level visual information representations are altered before target identification through iterative interaction with high-level visual processing stages has been completed. Interestingly, object substitution interacts with attention processes: Strong masking effects are observed when attentional orientation toward the target location is delayed. In contrast, no masking occurs when attention can be rapidly shifted to and engaged onto the target location. We investigated the neural basis of object substitution masking by studying the interaction of spatial attention and masking processes using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Behavioral data indicated a two-way interaction between the factors Spatial Attention (valid vs. invalid cueing) and Masking (four-dot vs. pattern masking). As expected, spatial attention improved performance more strongly during object substitution masking. Functional correlates of this interaction were found in the primary visual cortex, higher visual areas, and left intraparietal sulcus. A region-of-interest analysis in these areas revealed that the largest blood oxygenation level-dependent signal changes occurred during effective four-dot masking. In contrast, the weakest signal changes in these areas were observed when target visibility was highest. The data suggest that these areas represent an object substitution network dedicated to the generation and testing of a perceptual hypotheses as described by the object substitution theory of masking of Di-Lollo et al. [Competition for consciousness among visual events: The psychophysics of reentrant visual processes. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 129, 481–507, 2000].
Effects of Selective Attention on Perceptual Filling-in
Authors: De Weerd P. , Smith E. , Greenberg P.
Published: May 2006

After few seconds, a figure steadily presented in peripheral vision becomes perceptually filled-in by its background, as if it “disappeared”. We report that directing attention to the color, shape, or location of a figure increased the probability of perceiving filling-in compared to unattended figures, without modifying the time required for filling-in. This effect could be augmented by boosting attention. Furthermore, the frequency distribution of filling-in response times for attended figures could be predicted by multiplying the frequencies of response times for unattended figures with a constant. We propose that, after failure of figure–ground segregation, the neural interpolation processes that produce perceptual filling-in are enhanced in attended figure regions. As filling-in processes are involved in surface perception, the present study demonstrates that even very early visual processes are subject to modulation by cognitive factors.