bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Risk factors for acute respiratory tract illness in military conscripts
Authors: JUVONEN Raija , BLOIGU Aini , PEITSO Ari , SILVENNOINEN‐KASSINEN Sylvi , SAIKKU Pekka , LEINONEN Maija , HARJU Terttu 
Published: May 2008

Background and objective:  Acute respiratory tract infections are the leading cause of missed service days among military conscripts. The aim of this study was to identify factors that possibly predicted and contributed to frequent respiratory tract infections among military conscripts.Methods:  Data on episodes of respiratory illness were collected during the 180‐day period of military service in Kajaani, Finland, between July 2004 and July 2005.Results:  There were 518 military conscripts recruited, 124 of whom had a diagnosis of asthma. Conscripts with frequent (three or more) infections were more often atopic or suffered from allergic rhinitis or asthma. Overweight (BMI ≥ 25 kg/m2) and previous respiratory tract infections were the two independent risk factors for frequent respiratory infections. Overall, 4.8% of those who had no risk factors, 10. 3% of those with one risk factor and 35.7% of those with two risk factors suffered from frequent respiratory infections (P for trend < 0.001).Conclusions:  Overweight (BMI ≥ 25 kg/m2) and previous respiratory tract infections are risk factors for frequent respiratory tract infections in young men during military service.
Enforced mouth breathing decreases lung function in mild asthmatics
Authors: HALLANI Mervat , WHEATLEY John R. , AMIS Terence C. 
Published: May 2008

Background and objective:  Nasal breathing provides a protective influence against exercise‐induced asthma. We hypothesized that enforced oral breathing in resting mild asthmatic subjects may lead to a reduction in lung function.Methods:  Asymptomatic resting mild asthmatic volunteers (n = 8) were instructed to breathe either nasally only (N; tape over lips) or orally only (O; nose clip) for 1 h each, on separate days. Lung function (% predicted FEV1) was measured using standard spirometry at baseline and every 10 min for 1 h. ‘Difficulty in breathing’ was rated using a Borg scale at the conclusion of the N and O periods.Results:  Baseline FEV1 on the N (101.2 ± 3.8% predicted) and O (102.7 ± 3.9% predicted) days was not significantly different (P > 0.3). At 60 min, FEV1 on the O day (96.5 ± 4.1% predicted) was significantly less than on the N day (101.0 ± 3.5% predicted; P < 0.009). On the N day, FEV1 did not change with time (P > 0.3), whereas on the O day, FEV1 fell progressively (slope = −0.06 ± 0.01% FEV1/min, P < 0.0001; linear mixed effects modelling). Three subjects experienced coughing/wheezing at the end of the O day but none experienced symptoms at the end of the N day. Subjects perceived more ‘difficulty breathing in’ at the end of the O day (1.5 ± 0.4 arbitrary units) than on the N day (0.4 ± 0.3 arbitrary unit; P < 0.05).Conclusions:  Enforced oral breathing causes a decrease in lung function in mild asthmatic subjects at rest, initiating asthma symptoms in some. Oral breathing may play a role in the pathogenesis of acute asthma exacerbations.
mRNA expression of RRM1, ERCC1 and ERCC2 is not associated with chemosensitivity to cisplatin, carboplatin and gemcitabine in human lung cancer cell lines
Authors: SHIMIZU Junichi , HORIO Yoshitsugu , OSADA Hirotaka , HIDA Toyoaki , HASEGAWA Yoshinori , SHIMOKATA Kaoru , TAKAHASHI Takashi , SEKIDO Yoshitaka , YATABE Yasushi 
Published: May 2008

Background and objective:  Expression of genes involved in DNA repair and/or DNA synthesis, including ribonucleotide reductase M1 (RRM1) and excision repair cross‐complementation 1 (ERCC1) has been reported to be associated with chemosensitivity to platinum agents and gemcitabine. The aim of this study was to test whether similar associations would be seen between mRNA expression for the RRM1, ERCC1 and ERCC2 genes and in vitro chemosensitivity in lung cancer.Methods:  Using a panel of 20 lung cancer cell lines, including 15 NSCLC and 5 small cell lung cancers (SCLC), the mRNA expression levels for the RRM1, ERCC1 and ERCC2 genes were examined by quantitative real‐time reverse transcription PCR. The in vitro cytotoxicity of cisplatin, carboplatin and gemcitabine was assessed using a tetrazolium‐based colorimetric assay (3‐[4,5‐dimethylthiazol‐2‐yl]‐2,5‐diphenyltetrazoliumbromide (MTT) assay).Results:  Significantly, higher RRM1 mRNA expression was found in SCLC compared with NSCLC. However, there were no correlations between mRNA expression of the ERCC1, ERCC2 and RRM1 genes and chemosensitivity to cisplatin, carboplatin or gemcitabine.Conclusions:  These in vitro results suggest that further studies are needed to evaluate the expression of the RRM1, ERCC1 and ERCC2 genes as predictive biomarkers for sensitivity to platinum agents and gemcitabine.
Dominance of putative marine benthic Archaea in Qinghai Lake, north‐western China
Authors: Jiang Hongchen , Dong Hailiang , Yu Bingsong , Ye Qi , Shen Ji , Rowe Harry , Zhang Chuanlun 
Published: May 2008

SummaryRecent studies have revealed important and versatile roles that Archaea play in a wide variety of environmental processes on Earth. In this study, we investigated the abundance and diversity of archaeal communities in lake water and a 5 m sediment core collected from Qinghai Lake on the Tibetan Plateau, north‐western China. An integrated approach was employed including geochemistry, quantitative polymerase chain reaction (Q‐PCR) and 16S rRNA gene analysis. Here, we show that Archaea dominated the prokaryotic community in the lake sediments. Members of putative marine benthic groups [Marine Benthic Group (MBG)‐B, ‐C and ‐D] and Miscellaneous Crenarchaeotic Group (MCG) were dominant, many of which were previously reported to be predominantly present in deep‐sea environments. These results demonstrate that these groups are not limited to marine sediments. Despite their ubiquitous presence in aquatic environments, metabolic functions of these important groups largely remain unknown. Whereas many of these groups (such as MBG‐B and ‐D) have typically been found in methane‐hydrate deposits in marine environments, our carbon isotopic and molecular results from Qinghai Lake sediments indicate a lacustrine origin.
Climate Change and UK Politics: From Brynle Williams to Sir Nicholas Stern
Authors: McLEAN IAIN 
Published: May 2008

In 2000 the UK Labour government abandoned annual real fuel duty increases ‐ a policy it had inherited from the preceding Conservative administration ‐ in the face of direct action by farmers and hauliers. A short‐term Conservative lead in the polls opened up. In 2006, the same Chancellor, Gordon Brown, announced an increase in air passenger duty from February 2007 in the light of the newly published Stern Review. The opposition parties denounced this as too feeble.As Stern points out, all citizens in the world are in a global N‐person prisoners' dilemma. Everybody knows that a world without global warming is better than a world with it; but each actor is unconditionally better off from continuing to pollute than from restraining her polluting.Everybody expects somebody else to drive less. Now, however, all parties have committed themselves to tax and/or emission trading policies to mitigate global warming. The paper examines this transition.
The Effects of Trade Liberalization between Heterogeneous Countries on Endogenous Mergers
Authors: Calmette Marie‐Françoise 
Published: May 2008

AbstractThis paper examines the effects of trade liberalization on merger behavior. We endogenize merger choice among owners in an oligopolistic industry in asymmetric countries to analyze the consequences of trade cost reductions on competitiveness and welfare. In this context, the non‐cooperative game supports asymmetric market structures. We also find that trade liberalization is not necessarily pro‐competitive in countries with the competitive advantage, even if trade costs are completely abolished. Moreover, the tariff‐jumping explanation of international mergers does not necessarily apply. The welfare analysis shows that merger behavior can significantly alter any gains from liberalization. Countries should consider enforcing competition in regional agreements. Specifically, to avoid a reduction in domestic welfare following trade‐liberalizing reductions in trade costs, a high‐cost country's optimal policy may be to ban international mergers.
Maximum‐revenue versus Optimum‐welfare Export Taxes: a Delegation Game*
Authors: Clarke Roger , Collie David R. 
Published: May 2008

AbstractIn the Eaton and Grossman (1986) Bertrand duopoly model of strategic export taxes, both countries may be better off if they both delegate to policymakers who maximize tax revenue rather than welfare. However, both countries delegating to policymakers who maximize tax revenue is not a Nash equilibrium unless the degree of product substitutability is sufficiently high. For a wide range of values for the degree of product substitutability, the game is a prisoner's dilemma where both countries are better off delegating to policymakers who maximize tax revenue but both will delegate to policymakers who maximize welfare in the Nash equilibrium.
Reciprocal Dumping with Product Differentiation*
Authors: Friberg Richard , Ganslandt Mattias 
Published: May 2008

AbstractThis paper examines if international trade can reduce total welfare in an international oligopoly with differentiated goods. We show that intra‐industry trade, i.e. “reciprocal dumping,” can result in lower total surplus than autarky in a Cournot model for any degree of product differentiation. Moreover, trade can reduce welfare compared to autarky in a Bertrand model when the local markets are sufficiently competitive and products are sufficiently close substitutes. Otherwise it unambiguously increases welfare.
Debt and Currency Crises—Complements or Substitutes?*
Authors: Herz Bernhard , Tong Hui 
Published: May 2008

AbstractDebt and currency crises are closely interlinked through the government's intertemporal budget constraint. The default tax and the inflation/devaluation tax can be considered as alternative means of financing. Our empirical analysis finds that high‐debt countries choose default rather than inflation/devaluation for financing, while a high money stock reduces the probability of debt crises. Further, we find strong evidence that debt and currency crises share common fundamental causes. Finally, there is a Granger causality running from debt crises to currency crises, but only weakly in the other direction.
Beyond neuropathy in hereditary sensory and autonomic neuropathy type V: cognitive evaluation
Authors: De Andrade D. C. , Baudic S. , Attal N. , Rodrigues C. L. , Caramelli P. , Lino A. M. M. , Marchiori P. E. , Okada M. , Scaff M. , Bouhassira D. , Teixeira M. J. 
Published: May 2008

Background and purpose:  Hereditary sensory and autonomic neuropathy (HSAN) type V is a very rare disorder. It is characterized by the absence of thermal and mechanical pain perception caused by decreased number of small diameter neurons in peripheral nerves. Recent genetic studies have pointed out the aetiological role of nerve growth factor beta, which is also involved in the development of the autonomic nervous system and cholinergic pathways in the brain. HSAN type V is usually reported not to cause mental retardation or cognitive decline. However, a structured assessment of the cognitive profile of these patients has never been made.Methods and results:  We performed a throughout evaluation of four HSAN type V patients and compared their performance with 37 normal individuals. Our patients showed no cognitive deficits, not even mild ones.Discussion and Conclusions:  Although newer mutations on this and related disorders are continuously described, their clinical characterization has been restricted to the peripheral aspects of these conditions. A broader characterization of this rare disorder may contribute to better understand the mechanisms of the nociceptive and cognitive aspects of pain.
It's a long way to Auchterarder! ‘Negotiated management’ and mismanagement in the policing of G8 protests1
Authors: Gorringe Hugo , Rosie Michael 
Published: May 2008

AbstractRecent analyses of protest policing in Western democracies argue that there has been a marked shift away from oppressive or coercive approaches to an emphasis on consensus based negotiation. King and Waddington (2005) amongst others, however, suggest that the policing of international summits may be an exception to this rule. This paper examines protest policing in relation to the 2005 G8 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland. We argue that ‘negotiated management’ cannot be imported wholesale as a policing strategy. Rather it is mediated by local history, forms of police knowledge and modes of engagement. Drawing on interviews and participant observation we show that ‘negotiated management’ works best when both sides are committed to negotiation and that police stereotyping or protestor intransigence can lead to the escalation of any given event. In closing we note the new challenges posed by forms of ‘global’ protest and consider the implications for future policing of protest.
Attitudes towards globalization and cosmopolitanism: cultural diversity, personal consumption and the national economy
Authors: Woodward Ian , Skrbis Zlatko , Bean Clive 
Published: May 2008

AbstractOne of the widely accepted consequences of globalization is the development of individual outlooks, behaviours and feelings that transcend local and national boundaries. This has encouraged a re‐assessment of important assumptions about the nature of community, personal attachment and belonging in the face of unprecedented opportunities for culture, identities and politics to shape, and be shaped by, global events and processes. Recently, the upsurge of interest in the concept of cosmopolitanism has provided a promising new framework for understanding the nexus between cosmopolitan dispositions and global interconnectedness across cultural, political and economic realms. Using data from a representative social survey of Australians this paper investigates the negotiation of belonging under the conditions of globalization. The data tap into attitudes and behaviours associated with a broad gamut of cosmopolitan traits in the domains of culture, consumption, human rights, citizenship, and international governance. They show how cosmopolitan outlooks are shaped by social structural factors, and how forms of identification with humanity and the globe are fractured by boundaries of self and others, threats and opportunities, and the value of things global and local.
Double‐edged swords? Collective identity and solidarity in the environment movement1
Authors: Saunders Clare 
Published: May 2008

AbstractPerhaps by virtue of its theoretical slipperiness, collective identity is often hailed as an important feature of social movements for the role it plays in unifying activists and organizations, and so helping them to develop shared concerns and engage in collective action. However, this paper argues that collective identity is the result of group rather than movement level processes, and although it can unite activists within a single movement organization, it is not always beneficial for the broader social movement. Although movements consist of networks of activists and organizations that have a broad shared concern, differing collective identities within the movement can actually be quite divisive. Based on case studies of three organizations in the environmental movement, this paper shows that activists who are most committed to an organization with an encompassing collective identity develop a strong sense of solidarity with other activists similarly committed to that organization. The resultant solidarity leads to the construction of a ‘we–them’ dichotomy between organizations within the same movement, increasing the chances of hostility between organizations and factions within the movement.
Climate change, travel and complex futures1
Authors: Urry John 
Published: May 2008

AbstractIn this paper I examine various sociologies of the future. I argue that one future, of global climate change, is now exceptionally significant. This future is based upon certain sociological presumptions and thus sociology is central to its emerging contours and to its analysis. I examine one aspect of such a future, the role of travel and especially automobility within this emerging dystopia. I use some formulations from complexity theory to examine what might constitute an alternative to global heating and the scenario of ‘tribal trading’. It is suggested that one feasible alternative is a ‘digital panopticon’ and I examine some small changes that might tip the system to such a post‐automobility system. But there is no free lunch here. It is argued that the world may be torn between two bleak scenarios as a consequence of the twentieth century's exceptional degree of resource use, between a Hobbesian war of all against all and an Orwellian digital panopticon. The twentieth century would seem to be reaping its bitter revenge.
Integrating institutional, relational and embodied structure: an emergentist perspective1
Authors: Elder‐Vass Dave 
Published: May 2008

AbstractThis paper begins to develop an emergentist and realist account of normative social institutions. The argument is developed as a response to Lopez and Scott's historical portrait of the debate on social structure as a dialogue between two different concepts of structure: institutional structure and relational structure, integrated more recently through the concept of embodied structure. The paper argues that all these approaches tend to neglect the idea of structure as a whole and suggests that we cannot understand social structures without recognizing the nature of the corresponding wholes, and how they relate to the human individuals that comprise them. Such a perspective makes clear that embodiment alone is inadequate as a means of integrating institutional and relational conceptions of structure. For a fuller resolution, we must set social structure in an emergentist framework, which can reconcile the complementary roles of institutional structure, relational structure, and indeed embodiment, as aspects of the production of social structures as wholes.
Ignorance as an under‐identified social problem1
Authors: Ungar Sheldon 
Published: May 2008

AbstractThis paper examines the persistence and intensification of ignorance in the ostensible knowledge society. Given the ubiquity of ignorance, it focuses on research and observations dealing with functional knowledge deficits that challenge the ideal of the well‐informed citizen. These developments are traced back to the contradictory dynamics of the knowledge society, specifically information explosions in the knowledge economy and the resultant knowledge–ignorance paradox. The theoretical unfolding of this paradox in terms of entry and speech barriers suggests that pockets of observed public knowledge – rather than ignorance – are exceptional and require specific explanation. While ignorance among individuals, as well as experts and organizations, is a serious social problem with potentially deadly consequences, ignorance remains relatively unrecognized since it has major liabilities as a marketable issue. The conclusion points to the importance of future research on the cultural and institutional production of ignorance.
Education effects on authoritarian–libertarian values: a question of socialization1
Authors: Stubager Rune 
Published: May 2008

AbstractOver the past decades an authoritarian–libertarian value dimension has become increasingly important to electoral behaviour across western countries. Previous analyses have shown that education is the most important social antecedent of individuals’ positions on this value dimension; high education groups tend towards the libertarian pole and low education groups tend towards the authoritarian pole. It remains an open question, however, what aspects of education cause this relationship. The article examines a range of explanatory models: a psychodynamic, a cognitive, a socialization, and an allocation effects model. The results strongly favour the socialization model in which the relationship between education and authoritarian–libertarian values is explained as a result of differences in the value sets transferred to students in different educational milieus. The value differences between the educational groups should thus not be seen as reflecting economic differences between the groups but rather as the result of a more fundamental value conflict.
The contribution of media consumption to civic participation1
Authors: Livingstone Sonia , Markham Tim 
Published: May 2008

AbstractA national UK survey (N = 1017) examined the association between media consumption and three indicators of civic participation – likelihood of voting, interest in politics, and actions taken in response to a public issue of concern to the respondent. Multiple regression analysis was used to test the variance explained by media use variables after first controlling for demographic, social and political predictors of each indicator of participation. Media use significantly added to explaining variance in civic participation as follows. In accounting for voting, demographic and political/social factors mattered, but so too did some media habits (listening to the radio and engagement with the news). Interest in politics was accounted for by political/social factors and by media use, especially higher news engagement and lower media trust. However, taking action on an issue of concern was accounted for only by political/social factors, with the exception that slightly fewer actions were taken by those who watched more television. These findings provided little support for the media malaise thesis, and instead were interpreted as providing qualified support for the cognitive/motivational theory of news as a means of engaging the public.
Repetitive and stereotyped movements in children with autism spectrum disorders late in the second year of life
Authors: Morgan Lindee , Wetherby Amy M. , Barber Angie 
Published: May 2008

Objectives:  The purpose of this study was to examine group differences and relationships with later developmental level and autism symptoms using a new clinical tool developed to measure repetitive and stereotyped movements (RSM) in young children.Method:  Videotaped behavior samples using the Communication and Symbolic Behavior Scales Developmental Profile (CSBS; Wetherby & Prizant, 2002) were coded for children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD; n = 50), developmental delays without ASD (DD; n = 25), and typical development (TD; n = 50) between 18 and 24 months of age.Results:  Children with ASD demonstrated significantly higher rate and larger inventory of RSM with objects and body during a systematic behavior sample than both the DD and TD groups. Measures of RSM were related to concurrent measures of social communication and predicted developmental outcomes and autism symptoms in the fourth year for the ASD group. None of the correlations between RSM and autism symptoms remained significant when controlling for CSBS Symbolic level. RSM with objects predicted unique variance in the severity of autism symptoms in the fourth year beyond that predicted by social communication measures alone.Conclusions:  This study provides support for the diagnostic significance of RSM in children under 24 months of age and documents the utility of this RSM measurement tool as a companion to the CSBS.