bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Living with large carnivores: predation on livestock by the snow leopard (Uncia uncia)
Authors: Bagchi S. , Mishra C. 
Published: February 2006

AbstractLivestock predation by large carnivores and their retaliatory persecution by pastoralists are worldwide conservation concerns. Poor understanding of the ecological and social underpinnings of this human–wildlife conflict hampers effective conflict management programs. The endangered snow leopard Uncia uncia is involved in conflict with people across its mountainous range in South and Central Asia, where pastoralism is the predominant land use, and is widely persecuted in retaliation. We examined human‐snow leopard conflict at two sites in the Spiti region of the Indian Trans‐Himalaya, where livestock outnumber wild ungulates, and the conflict is acute. We quantified the snow leopard's dependence on livestock by assessing its diet in two sites that differed in the relative abundance of livestock and wild ungulates. We also surveyed the indigenous Buddhist community's attitudes towards the snow leopard in these two sites. Our results show a relatively high dependence of snow leopards on livestock. A higher proportion of the snow leopard's diet (58%) was livestock in the area with higher livestock (29.7 animals km−2) and lower wild ungulate abundance (2.1–3.1 bharal Pseudois nayaur km−2), compared with 40% of diet in the area with relatively lower livestock (13.9 km−2) and higher wild ungulate abundance (4.5–7.8 ibex Capra ibex km−2). We found that the community experiencing greater levels of livestock losses was comparatively more tolerant towards the snow leopard. This discrepancy is explained by the presence of a conservation‐incentive program at the site, and by differences in economic roles of livestock between these two communities. The former is more dependent on cash crops as a source of income while the latter is more dependent on livestock, and thereby less tolerant of the snow leopard. These data have implications for conflict management strategies. They indicate that the relative densities of livestock and wild prey may be reasonable predictors of the extent of predation by the snow leopard. However, this by itself is not an adequate measure of the intensity of conflict even in apparently similar cultural settings.
Abundance, microhabitat selection and conservation of eyed lizards (Lacerta lepida): a radiotelemetric study
Authors: Díaz J. A. , Monasterio C. , Salvador A. 
Published: February 2006

AbstractThe utility of radiotelemetry as a tool for estimating the size and microhabitat requirements of a population of Lacerta lepida, the largest European lacertid, was investigated in central Spain. Population density estimates based on repeated marking and recapture (3.2 lizards ha−1) were much higher than those based on line transects (0.22 lizards ha−1). The probability of sighting lizards before they could retreat into a refuge was largely increased by our ability to radiolocate them. Rocks were selected as refuges 96% of the times, and the locations of radiotracked lizards were much closer to rocks than randomly expected. Rocks used as retreat sites were larger and had more crevices than those available at random, which suggests that refuge selection was primarily determined by the need to find shelter from predators. Rockrose patches, which were positively selected, might be used as refuge‐connecting corridors that combine shelter with opportunities to forage and thermoregulate. Our results emphasize the need for using radiotelemetry to establish baseline information on abundance and to clarify the actuality, extent and pattern of the population declines experienced by species that may function as key links in their ecosystems, but the wariness of which poses a serious problem for monitoring their conservation status.
Inferred behaviour and ecology of the primitive sabre‐toothed catParamachairodus ogygia(Felidae, Machairodontinae) from the Late Miocene of Spain
Authors: Salesa M. J. , Antón M. , Turner A. , Morales J. 
Published: February 2006

AbstractThe Late Miocene (Late Vallesian, MN 10, about 9 Mya) carnivore trap of Batallones‐1 (Madrid, Spain) has yielded a large sample of two species of sabre‐toothed cats: the puma‐sizedParamachairodus ogygiaand the tiger‐sizedMachairodus aphanistus. This has allowed, for the first time, complete studies of the biomechanics and comparative anatomy of these animals. Focusing our study on the small species,Par. ogygia, the most richly represented and best known carnivore from Batallones‐1, we attempt to infer some aspects of the behaviour and ecology of this early sabre‐toothed cat, such as breeding behaviour, the degree of social interaction between individuals, sexual dimorphism, preferred habitat and prey size. Our results suggest thatPar. ogygiawas a solitary felid with a low sexual dimorphism index, which in turn indicates low competition between males for access to females, and some degree of tolerance between adults, so that young adults were allowed to share the territory of their mothers for some time after maturity. The machairodont adaptations ofPar. ogygiaindicate that this species was able to subdue and kill prey in less time than pantherines do, thus minimizing the risk of injury and the energetic costs of this action. In a wider context, the carnivore guild of Batallones‐1 and the overall mammal community indicate that the landscape around the trap was a wooded habitat. Batallones‐1 is thus establishing itself as one of the most important European Late Miocene fossil localities, not only for the study of the anatomy and biomechanics of the early sabre‐toothed cats but also for our understanding of the intra‐ and inter‐specific ecological relationships of the first members of this specialized sub‐family of felids.
Functional diversity in extreme environments: effects of locomotor style and substrate texture on the waterfall‐climbing performance of Hawaiian gobiid fishes
Authors: Blob R. W. , Rai R. , Julius M. L. , Schoenfuss H. L. 
Published: February 2006

AbstractJuveniles of three species of Hawaiian gobiid fishes climb waterfalls during migration to adult habitats using two kinematically distinct patterns: Awaous guamensis and Lentipes concolor use rapid, intermittent bouts of axial undulation (‘powerbursts’), whereas Sicyopterus stimpsoni inches up waterfalls by alternately attaching oral and pelvic suckers to the substrate. Despite the differing kinematics and speed of these behaviors, the extreme demands of locomotion up waterfalls might require similar levels of performance from all climbing goby species. However, the roughness of climbing surfaces might affect performance differently between climbing styles, with rough surfaces decreasing inching performance by impairing the grip of sucking discs on the substrate, but improving powerburst performance by allowing the pectoral fins better purchase as they push against the substrate to start climbing bouts. To test whether species of Hawaiian climbing gobies differ in climbing performance, we filmed multiple individuals of each species as they ascended distances of several body lengths over substrates with three different degrees of roughness. Substantial differences in climbing performance among species were independent of climbing style. For example, the powerburst climber L. concolor always had a faster net climbing speed (speed over 20 cm, including rests between climbing bouts) than the inching climber S. stimpsoni; however, the powerburst climber A. guamensis was similar in net speed to S. stimpsoni, or, on smooth substrates, climbed more slowly. Yet, some differences in performance did emerge between the climbing styles. Substrate roughness did not affect climbing speed in S. stimpsoni, but, as predicted, both powerburst climbers climbed faster on rougher surfaces. In addition, the intermittent motion and rest periods for both powerburst climbers seem of appropriate durations to facilitate an increase in the distance that these species travel before fatigue, but the inching climber S. stimpsoni spent more time in motion than either powerburst climber, and the relative durations of its motion and rest periods seem less likely to convey any performance advantages. These results indicate considerable functional diversity among Hawaiian climbing gobies beyond the two varieties of climbing styles, and show that a wide range of performance capabilities can persist among members of a fauna even under extreme environmental conditions.
The breeding biology of introduced hedgehogs (Erinaceus europaeus) on a Scottish Island: lessons for population control and bird conservation
Authors: Jackson D. B. 
Published: February 2006

AbstractThe breeding biology of a recently (1974) introduced hedgehog Erinaceus europaeus population was studied on a large Scottish island. These hedgehogs have caused serious declines in internationally important ground‐nesting shorebirds, and population control is now being attempted. Sexual behaviour commenced in late April, a few days after the main emergence from hibernation. It peaked in mid‐May and again in late June/early July, and ceased by mid‐August. Females were promiscuous and were estimated to have sexual encounters (although not necessarily matings) with at least five males during the main mating period. Two‐thirds of females attempted to breed for the first time in their second calendar year (i.e. as sub‐adults), and the rest in their third calendar year (i.e. as adults). At least 96% (n=27) of adult females attempted to breed in the early part of the season (litters born in June). The vast majority (81%, n=26) bred again in the later part of the season (litters born after mid‐July). Breeding success (≥1 young emerged) was relatively high. For adults, 63% (n=24) of early‐season and 86% (n=18) of late‐season attempts were successful. For sub‐adult females the figure was 62% (n=9). The annual mean productivity per female was estimated at 4.04 young for adults and 0.85 young for sub‐adults. The implications of these results for the effectiveness, timing and welfare aspects of hedgehog control programmes are discussed.
When to Combine Hypotheses and Adjust for Multiple Tests
Authors: Veazie Peter J. 
Published: February 2006

Objective.To provide guidelines for identifying composite hypotheses and addressing the probability of false rejection for multiple hypotheses.Data Sources and Study Setting.Examples from the literature in health services research are used to motivate the discussion of composite hypothesis tests and multiple hypotheses.Methods.This article is a didactic presentation.Principal Findings.It is not rare to find mistaken inferences in health services research because of inattention to appropriate hypothesis generation and multiple hypotheses testing. Guidelines are presented to help researchers identify composite hypotheses and set significance levels to account for multiple tests.Conclusions.It is important for the quality of scholarship that inferences are valid: properly identifying composite hypotheses and accounting for multiple tests provides some assurance in this regard.
The Effect of Changes in Hospital Reimbursement on Nurse Staffing Decisions at Safety Net and Nonsafety Net Hospitals
Authors: Lindrooth Richard C. , Bazzoli Gloria J. , Needleman Jack , Hasnain‐Wynia Romana 
Published: February 2006

Research Objective. The financial savings from the Balanced Budget Act (BBA) are attractive to policy makers, but such savings come at a cost. We measure changes in nurse staffing at hospitals related to potential declines in reimbursement through the BBA.Study Design. Following Hadley, Zuckerman, and Feder (1989), we define a fiscal pressure index (FPI) to measure the differential effect of the BBA. We estimate the effect of the FPI on the number of full‐time equivalent registered nurses (RN) and licensed practical nurses (LPN) per adjusted patient day using American Hospital Association (AHA) data of a panel of hospitals from 1996 to 2001. The AHA data are combined with the Area Resource Files and health maintenance organizations penetration data. We control for hospital heterogeneity using fixed effects.Population Studied. All urban short‐term general hospitals that responded to the staffing and uncompensated care questions in the AHA survey between 1996 and 2001. We define safety net hospitals as those with a high ratio of uncompensated costs to total hospital expenses (see, e.g., Zuckerman et al. 2001).Principal Findings. We find that the nonsafety net hospitals that were most susceptible to the provisions of the BBA experienced a decline in RN staffing ratios about twice the rate of the nonsafety net hospitals that were least susceptible to the BBA. We are unable to detect an effect of the BBA on staffing at safety net hospitals.Conclusions. RN and LPN staffing levels per adjusted patient day declined, on average, between 1996 and 2001. Within the context of the general decline, we find that RN staffing per adjusted patient day declined even more at nonsafety net hospitals that were most susceptible to lower reimbursement related to the BBA. Thus, there was a small but statistically significant incremental effect of potential BBA losses on RN staffing at hospitals that were expected to be affected most. This incremental decline represented about a 6 percent increase in nurse workload that in isolation might not affect quality. Nevertheless, the BBA contributed to the contemporaneous trends toward higher nurse workloads that could have deleterious effects on quality. In contrast, safety net hospitals did not respond to the provisions of the BBA by reducing staffing ratios. This conclusion is tempered by the fact that we have few safety net hospitals in the sample.
Rules for Medical Markets: The Impact of Medicare Contractors on Coverage Policies
Authors: Foote Susan Bartlett , Wholey Douglas , Halpern Rachel 
Published: February 2006

Objective. Examine Medicare's local contractors' claim payment rules, focusing on how technology affects the balancing of competing demands to respond to local medical markets (rule heterogeneity) with concerns about national consistency in payment rules (rule homogeneity).Data Sources. Local medical review policies (LMRPs) posted in policy sets by contractor organizations on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) website and a survey of Contractor Medical Directors.Study Design. We classified LMRPs based on type (NT=new technology; TE=technology extensions, and UM=utilization management), and examined the effect of technology type on LMRP focus, evidence use, policy revisions, implementation speed, and reference material citation characteristics of LMRPs using multivariate analysis.Principal Findings. NT policies were more homogenous, as were policies among contractors related through multistate affiliation or through informal networks. UM policies were more heterogeneous. NT policies were more likely than UM policies to cite research journals as evidence while UM policies were more likely to cite medical reference materials.Conclusions. Coverage policies associated with new technologies diffuse rapidly and are homogenous compared to utilization management coverage policies. This suggests that new technology policies are responsive to the development of new technologies at the national level. In contrast, utilization management policies are responsive to local heterogeneity in health care practice. Congress has mandated reforms to the contracting process to achieve consistency and reduce duplication. Our data elucidate the nature and sources of variation and will help policymakers strike a balance between homogeneity and local adaptation.
Educating Art in a Globalizing World. The University of Ideas: A Sociological Case‐study
Authors: Gielen Pascal 
Published: February 2006

AbstractIn 1999, the Italian Arte Povera artist Michelangelo Pistoletto and other artists laid the foundations of The University of Ideas (UNIDEE), an exceptional international artist‐in‐residence programme with a strong ideological foundation. As a sociologist of culture I had the opportunity to do research in the huge organization for a month by doing participant observation, in‐depth interviews and discourse analysis. In this article the educational programme of UNIDEE is interpreted in sociological terms. First of all it will be contextualized in the artistic work of Michelangelo Pistoletto through his concept of the mirror and his a‐modern idea of ‘The Minus Artist’. In the second part Pistoletto's artistic, political and economic movement Cittadellarte, in which UNIDEE is based, will be described. Finally UNIDEE will be analysed as a model for art education on the border of modernity attempting to redefine the position of art and of the artist in a globalizing world.
School Art Education: Mourning the Past and Opening a Future
Authors: Atkinson Dennis 
Published: February 2006

AbstractThis article begins with a brief summary of the findings of a recent research project that surveyed the content of the art curriculum in a selection of English secondary schools. The research findings suggest a particular construction of pedagogised subjects and objects rooted in ideas of technical ability and skill underpinned by a transmission model of teaching and learning. Drawing upon psychoanalytic and social theory reasons for passionate attachments to such curriculum identities are proposed, when in the wider world of art practice such identities were abandoned long ago. Working with the notion of the subordination of teaching to learning and the difficulties of initiating curriculum practices within increasingly complex social contexts, the article argues for learning through art to be viewed as a productive practice of meaning‐making within the life‐worlds of students. The term, ‘encounters of learning’ is employed to sketch a pedagogical quest in which an ethics of learning remains faithful to the truth of the learning event for the student.
How does Education Support the Formation and Establishment of Individual Identities?
Authors: Latchem Johannah 
Published: February 2006

AbstractThis article examines how education could support the formation and establishment of identities. It focuses on museum education and in particular artist interrogations of museum narratives. These interventions into museum pedagogy are critical reworkings of the presentation of cultural histories in dominant narratives. The aim of this research is to examine the consequences of these interventions for pedagogy in the museum site, when linear narratives are subject to reconstruction by individual agencies. The complexities of museum pedagogy are revealed and analysed in order to identify models of teaching and learning that are inclusive. The work of Fred Wilson, artist and curator of an installation project at the Maryland Historical Society in Baltimore, USA, is applied to explore notions of cultural capital and cultural empowerment through education in the museum. Throughout the article is concerned with investigating how the individual subject is formed and informed through the narrative. Analogies are drawn with the view that the curriculum may not be a neutral and objective selection of knowledge and that in the same way it is worth investigating this claim to enquire whether institutional presentations of history are equally subjective. If museum education projects are set by curators and education officers to meet certain curriculum requirements then there must be questions raised about the structure of narratives and the process by which they are disseminated. This article is an exploration of these actions with far‐reaching applications, to ascertain whether they can successfully promote social justice in education and empower the individual or whether they serve to polarize essentialism and multiculturalism.
Creativity:What Is It? Can You Assess It? Can It Be Taught?
Authors: Lindström Lars 
Published: February 2006

AbstractThis article takes the subject of visual arts in Sweden as the point of departure in a discussion of how, with the help of portfolios, assessments may extend to include both the unpredictable and the ambiguous. The notion that assessments of learning outcomes must be either limited to superficial knowledge or completely arbitrary is shown to be a misconception. The author has made a study of the progression of young people's creativity in the visual arts from preschool to upper secondary school. The assessment was based on both product criteria and process criteria (investigative work, inventiveness, ability to use models, capacity for self‐assessment). The materials assessed were portfolios of work containing sketches, drafts and finished works, log books, sources of inspiration and videotaped interviews with the students.Is there any progression in students' visual design, in their ability to work independently and assess their work? What is the degree of correlation in the assessments of different judges of student portfolios? These are some of the questions that this article attempts to answer, which concludes with a discussion of how schools can build a culture of learning that fosters the creative powers of young people.
Experience Field for the Development of the Senses: Hugo Kükelhaus' Phenomenology of Consciousness
Authors: Luescher Andreas 
Published: February 2006

AbstractThis article (re)introduces the pedagogy of the German artist Hugo Kükelhaus (1900–84) whose interest in the psycho‐physiological substratum of learning led to theoretically and experimentally accomplished investigations of the conscious experience. Kükelhaus' most well‐known infant toy productions of the 1930s, the Allbedeut, and the ‘Experience Field for the Senses’ of the 1960s serve here as illustrations of the significance of his ideas to contemporary theories of intelligence; educational technology; and the design of learning environments. I examine some of the issues surrounding the conceptualization, realization and critical reception of these inventions. The article concludes that Kükelhaus' approach to the apparent contradiction of the sensuous idea offers practical and philosophical directions for the development of integrative, heuristic and archetypal tools and learning environments.
Drawing in Preschools: A Didactic Experience
Authors: Frisch Nina Scott 
Published: February 2006

AbstractTo be understood, visually, often depends on how skilled one is in catching form and translating it into a two‐dimensional surface. This is a challenge we are confronted with early in life. Children's learning strategies in drawing are not always understood or encouraged. This article presents a socio‐cultural analysis from Norway of a pedagogical practice that attempts to shed light on the question, How does the preschool teacher support 3–5 year old children when they are drawing something they see, and how do children in this age group respond to this support?
The Design Studio as Teaching/Learning Medium — A Process‐Based Approach
Authors: Öztürk Maya N. , Türkkan Elif E. 
Published: February 2006

AbstractThis article discusses a design studio teaching experience exploring the design process itself as a methodological tool. We consider the structure of important phases of the process that contain different levels of design thinking: conception, function and practical knowledge as well as the transitions from inception to construction. We show how this approach to the design process allows the possibility of addressing elusive issues that underlie the practice of design.