cometadata/datacite-rtg-text-other-reclassification-records huggingface dataset:
Border Effects on Spatial Price Transmission between Fresh Tomato Markets in Ghana and Burkina-Faso: Any Case for Promoting Trans-Border Trade in West Africa?
Creators: name: Amikuzuno, Joseph
name: Amikuzuno, Joseph
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2011
Subjects: subject: Agribusiness
subject: Price Transmission
subject: Border
subject: Tomato
subject: Ghana
subject: Burkina-Faso

description: Cross-border trade in food commodities within sub-regional economic blocks in Sub-Sahara Africa (SSA) is believed to be faster, cheaper, more convenient and welfare-enhancing than overseas trade between SSA countries and the USA, EU and the BRIC countries. The difficulty of commodity arbitrage across international borders SSA is however a fundamental constraint to price transmission, market integration and the realisation of the welfare-enhancing role of cross-border trade in Africa. This study examines the impact of border and distance on price transmission between tomato markets in Ghana and Burkina-Faso. The analysis applies a regime-switching vector error correction model to estimate semi-weekly, wholesale prices of tomato in four tomato markets in Ghana and a production centre in Burkina-Faso. Estimated parameters of price transmission contain evidence of border and distance effects. This is expected since high transfer costs, including cross-border tariffs are incurred by traders in moving tomato across the border. Moreover, the perishable nature of tomato, and the poor quality of roads and transportation facilities may imply additional costs of risks to arbitrageurs. The findings have both theoretical relevance and practical implications for facilitating cross-border trade in West Africa, especially for trade between landlocked countries like Burkina-Faso and coastal ones like Ghana.
Technical Efficiency in the Chilean Agribusiness Sector
Creators: name: Aedo, Edinson Rivera
name: Lakner, Sebastian
name: Brümmer, Bernhard
name: Aedo, Edinson Rivera
name: Lakner, Sebastian
name: Brümmer, Bernhard
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2011
Subjects: subject: Agribusiness
subject: Technical Efficiency
subject: Food Processing Industry
subject: Chile

description: The reform-process towards a higher world-market orientation has a long tradition in Chile, with all its strengths and weaknesses. The food processing industry is highly competitive on the worldmarket. The following paper investigates the technical efficiency of the Chilean food processing industry between 2001 and 2007. We used a data-set from the 5,941 of firms in food processing industry. The observations are taken of the ‘Annual National Industrial Survey’. The method of stochastic frontier analysis is applied; the heteroscedasticity-model is used in order to analyze the determinants of technical efficiency. We included variables capturing different effects before and after the introduction of a liberalization policy in 2004. Raw materials and labor have to largest impact on the output. We could show that technical efficiency is different in the periods before and after 2004. The region with the highest level of efficiency is the metropolitan region around Santiago de Chile.
Imposing regularity conditions on a system of cost and factor share equations
Creators: name: Griffiths, William E.
name: O'Donnell, Christopher J.
name: Cruz, Agustina Tan
name: Griffiths, William E.
name: O'Donnell, Christopher J.
name: Cruz, Agustina Tan
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2000
Subjects: Resource /Energy Economics and Policy

description: Systems of equations comprising cost functions and first‐order derivative equations are often used to estimate characteristics of production technologies. Unfortunately, many estimated systems violate the regularity conditions implied by economic theory. Sampling theory methods can be used to impose these conditions globally, but these methods destroy the flexibility properties of most functional forms. We demonstrate how Bayesian methods can be used to maintain flexibility by imposing regularity conditions locally. The Bayesian approach is used to estimate a system of cost and share equations for the merino wool‐growing sector. The effect of local imposition of monotonicity and concavity on the signs and magnitudes of elasticities is examined.
Quantum Cooperative Robotics and Autonomy
Creators: name: Khoshnoud, Farbod
name: Quadrelli, Marco B.
name: Esat, Ibrahim I.
name: Robinson, Dario
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2020
Subjects: subject: Robotics (cs.RO)
subject: Systems and Control (eess.SY)
subject: Quantum Physics (quant-ph)
subject: FOS: Computer and information sciences
subject: FOS: Electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: The intersection of Quantum Technologies and Robotics Autonomy is explored in the present paper. The two areas are brought together in establishing an interdisciplinary interface that contributes to advancing the field of system autonomy, and pushes the engineering boundaries beyond the existing techniques. The present research adopts the experimental aspects of quantum entanglement and quantum cryptography, and integrates these established quantum capabilities into distributed robotic platforms, to explore the possibility of achieving increased autonomy for the control of multi-agent robotic systems engaged in cooperative tasks. Experimental quantum capabilities are realized by producing single photons (using spontaneous parametric down-conversion process), polarization of photons, detecting vertical and horizontal polarizations, and single photon detecting/counting. Specifically, such quantum aspects are implemented on network of classical agents, i.e., classical aerial and ground robots/unmanned systems. With respect to classical systems for robotic applications, leveraging quantum technology is expected to lead to guaranteed security, very fast control and communication, and unparalleled quantum capabilities such as entanglement and quantum superposition that will enable novel applications.
description: 18 pages, 21 figures
Dutch Diseas and the crime epidemic: an investigation of the mineral boom in Papua New Guinea
Creators: name: Chand, Satish
name: Levantis, Theodore
name: Chand, Satish
name: Levantis, Theodore
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2000
Subjects: Resource /Energy Economics and Policy

description: Papua New Guinea has pinned its hopes for economic development on its mineral wealth but, so far, this has been a false promise. Given Papua New Guinea’s vulnerability, this raises questions of a Dutch Disease effect. Dutch Disease is dismissed in principle, but an appreciating real exchange rate is considered to have important offsetting economic consequences via its implications for crime. Using a CGE model incorporating crime as an economic activity, the contribution to welfare of a resources boom is investigated. The results confirm that a resources boom will deliver a net welfare benefit, but far smaller than the revenues generated would suggest, and at a cost to equity.
title: Der Atlas zur deutschen Alltagssprache für DaF: Ein praxisbezogener Vorschlag zur Einführung der regionalen Sprachvariation im Unterricht
Creators: name: Bertollo, Sabrina
Publisher: name: Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek Darmstadt
Year: 2022

description: Obwohl wissenschaftlicher Konsens darüber besteht, dass die Verwendung von Korpora und Datenbanken im DaF-Unterricht Lernvorteile bietet, lassen sich unter DaF-Lehrenden viele skeptische Einstellungen dazu beobachten. Im vorliegenden Beitrag soll konkret gezeigt werden, wie der Atlas zur deutschen Alltagssprache (AdA) im DaF-Unterricht wirksam eingeführt werden kann, um die Bewusstheit über Sprachvariation auch in den Anfängerstufen zu fördern. Nachdem erörtert wird, warum Sprachvariation einen Platz im DaF-Unterricht finden sollte und inwiefern AdA dafür geeignet ist, wird ein umfangreicher Unterrichtsentwurf präsentiert. Der direkte Umgang mit dem Atlas durch die Lernenden, Arbeitsmethoden, technologische Aspekte, Lernziele sowie die unterschiedlichen Arbeitsphasen werden dabei betrachtet, sodass die Lerneinheit im DaF-Unterricht unmittelbar eingesetzt werden kann.
The Government/Democrats' package of changes in indirect taxes
Creators: name: Dixon, Peter B.
name: Rimmer, Maureen T.
name: Dixon, Peter B.
name: Rimmer, Maureen T.
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2000
Subjects: Agricultural and Food Policy

description: Australia is faced with a comprehensive package of changes to its indirect tax system, including the introduction of a GST. The Government’s only quantitative analysis in formulating the package employed PRISMOD, an archaic input‐output price model. PRISMOD sheds dim light on a very limited range of policy‐relevant variables. This article explains how PRISMOD works; this is of continuing relevance because PRISMOD results are a benchmark in negotiations concerning the price effects of the tax package. Then an assessment of the package is made using MONASH, a comprehensive dynamic general equilibrium model. Overall, the conclusions are negative: the package is welfare‐reducing and unnecessary.
Film-centric science communication: Striking a balance between accuracy and visual storytelling
Creators: name: Rahman, Matiur
name: Sayed, Tausif Ahmed
name: Mazumdar, Moumita
Publisher: name: figshare
Year: 2025
Subjects: classificationCode: 460105
subject: Applications in social sciences and education
classificationCode: 470102
subject: Communication technology and digital media studies
classificationCode: 451312
subject: Pacific Peoples media, film, animation and photography

description: What began as Public Understanding of Science (PUS) has over the years, transformed into Public Awareness of Science (PAS) and then to Public Engagement of Science (PES). However, what also remained at the center of the thought was the fact of ‘bringing a new urgency to the question of the communication of science’ to the public. With more widespread scientific literacy, the workers would be able to do their jobs better, managers and government would make better decisions and industry would become more competitive. In their personal lives, people would make better choices about their lifestyles, particularly if they understand risk better. Though the number of science films produced over the years has seen a rise, it has not been matched by the scholarly studies on them. Since celluloid films and television programs run larger risk of content dilution in order to appeal to a larger audience, it often results in a distortion of scientific facts while producing a media product. It is, therefore, important to apply caution during production and post-production of science films to ensure authenticity of content being treated in them. Research studies on this particular aspect of science film production is also seeking attention from scholars. Another important area where not enough research has been undertaken concerns the impact of science films as a media for science communication. This paper studies the literature that analyses the impact of science films and examines how effective films have proved for the public appreciation and understanding of science.
Tax reform and the natural resource industries
Creators: name: Freebairn, John W.
name: Freebairn, John W.
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2000
Subjects: Resource /Energy Economics and Policy

description: Tax reforms passed by Federal Parliament in June 1999 include rationalising indirect taxes, a tax mix change, and a smaller fiscal surplus. The impact or first‐round effects on the natural resource industries indicate large gains. Important second‐round reactions, particularly a real currency appreciation, erode most of, and in some cases more than all of, the first‐round gains. A complete assessment requires the use of general equilibrium models.
Linear derivative Cartan formulation of General Relativity
Creators: name: Kummer, W.
name: Schuetz, H.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2004
Subjects: subject: General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology (gr-qc)
subject: High Energy Physics - Theory (hep-th)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Beside diffeomorphism invariance also manifest SO(3,1) local Lorentz invariance is implemented in a formulation of Einstein Gravity (with or without cosmological term) in terms of initially completely independent vielbein and spin connection variables and auxiliary two-form fields. In the systematic study of all possible embeddings of Einstein gravity into that formulation with auxiliary fields, the introduction of a ``bi-complex'' algebra possesses crucial technical advantages. Certain components of the new two-form fields directly provide canonical momenta for spatial components of all Cartan variables, whereas the remaining ones act as Lagrange multipliers for a large number of constraints, some of which have been proposed already in different, less radical approaches. The time-like components of the Cartan variables play that role for the Lorentz constraints and others associated to the vierbein fields. Although also some ternary ones appear, we show that relations exist between these constraints, and how the Lagrange multipliers are to be determined to take care of second class ones. We believe that our formulation of standard Einstein gravity as a gauge theory with consistent local Poincare algebra is superior to earlier similar attempts.
description: more corrected typos, added references
Covariance algebra of a partial dynamical system
Creators: name: Kwasniewski, B. K.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2004
Subjects: subject: Operator Algebras (math.OA)
subject: Dynamical Systems (math.DS)
subject: FOS: Mathematics
subject: 47L65; 46L45; 37B99

description: Partial dynamical systems (X,alpha) arise naturally when dealing with commutative C*-dynamical system (A,delta). We associate with every pair (X,alpha), or (A,delta), a covariance C*-algebra C*(X,alpha)=C*(A,delta) which agrees with a partial crossed product - in case alpha is injective, and a crossed product by a monomorphism - in case alpha is onto. The relevance between (X,alpha) and C*(X,alpha) is deeply investigated. In particular, the notions of topological freedom and invariance of a set are generalized, and as a consequence a version of Isomorphism Theorem and a description of ideals of C*(X,alpha) are obtained.
description: Introduction is extented and a few more examples are added
Personalized Recommendation of PoIs to People with Autism
Creators: name: Mauro, Noemi
name: Ardissono, Liliana
name: Cena, Federica
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2020
Subjects: subject: Information Retrieval (cs.IR)
subject: Machine Learning (cs.LG)
subject: FOS: Computer and information sciences

description: The suggestion of Points of Interest to people with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) challenges recommender systems research because these users' perception of places is influenced by idiosyncratic sensory aversions which can mine their experience by causing stress and anxiety. Therefore, managing individual preferences is not enough to provide these people with suitable recommendations. In order to address this issue, we propose a Top-N recommendation model that combines the user's idiosyncratic aversions with her/his preferences in a personalized way to suggest the most compatible and likable Points of Interest for her/him. We are interested in finding a user-specific balance of compatibility and interest within a recommendation model that integrates heterogeneous evaluation criteria to appropriately take these aspects into account. We tested our model on both ASD and "neurotypical" people. The evaluation results show that, on both groups, our model outperforms in accuracy and ranking capability the recommender systems based on item compatibility, on user preferences, or which integrate these two aspects by means of a uniform evaluation model.
Lyapunov Stability of a Nonlinear Bio-inspired System for the Control of Humanoid Balance
Creators: name: Lippi, Vittorio
name: Molinari, Fabio
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2020
Subjects: subject: Systems and Control (eess.SY)
subject: FOS: Electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering

description: Human posture control models are used to analyse neurological experiments and control of humanoid robots. This work focuses on a well-known nonlinear posture control model, the DEC (Disturbance estimate and Compensation). In order to compensate disturbances, unlike other models, DEC feedbacks signals coming from sensor fusion rather than raw sensory signals. In previous works, the DEC model is shown to predict human behavior and to provide a control system for humanoids. In this work, the stability of the system in the sense of Lyapunov is formally analysed. The theoretical findings are combined with simulation results, in which an external perturbation of the support surface reproduces a typical scenario in posture control experiments.
Examining electoral accountability through the dynamics of government support : party popularity, the economy and political context
Creators: name: Pickup, Mark
Publisher: name: University of British Columbia
Year: 2009

description: Evidence of electoral accountability in Canada, in terms of the performance of the economy, has been contradictory and weak. This dissertation demonstrates that this confusion is largely a product of methodological flaws in the modelling of economic popularity. These flaws are corrected through the development of a unique structural approach. The basis of this structural approach is the use of the state-space form of time series modelling. In this approach, the observed values of popularity are regarded as being made up of distinct unobserved components and measurement error. The unobserved components driven by the changing political context in which economic popularity operates are each modelled separately, revealing the dynamics of this political context and accounting for the nonstationarity produced by these dynamics. The dynamics of measured popularity produced by measurement errors that correlate and cycle with time are explicitly modelled. This accounts for the nonstationarity produced by the dynamics of measurement error variances. The unobserved components also include a stationary process. This stationary component is extracted from the nonstationary dynamics by the state-space model. By modelling the impact of economic conditions directly through this component, it is appropriate to use modelling techniques that assume stationarity. Accordingly, the Box-Jenkins approach is adapted and applied to determine the correct lag and error structure for the state-space economic popularity models. When this approach is applied to Canadian federal party popularity data between 1957 and 2000, important political contextual dynamics are revealed. These dynamics include trending and inter-election cycling in popularity, election effects, leadership effects, national crises effects, and period-specific dynamics. Economic effects are also clearly demonstrated. Since 1984, the popularity of the party in government has been strongly affected by economic conditions - in particular, inflation and economic growth. Therefore, it is fair to conclude that governments, in a very real way, have at times been held accountable for the outcomes of their economic policies and that electoral accountability often operates as we expect it to. Suggestions are made for further analysis to examine the outstanding question: why is it that electoral accountability does not always operate as expected?
New Numerical Methods to Evaluate Homogeneous Solutions of the Teukolsky Equation
Creators: name: Fujita, Ryuichi
name: Tagoshi, Hideyuki
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2004
Subjects: subject: General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology (gr-qc)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We discuss a numerical method to compute the homogeneous solutions of the Teukolsky equation which is the basic equation of the black hole perturbation method. We use the formalism developed by Mano, Suzuki and Takasugi, in which the homogeneous solutions of the radial Teukolsky equation are expressed in terms of two kinds of series of special functions, and the formulas for the asymptotic amplitudes are derived explicitly.Although the application of this method was previously limited to the analytical evaluation of the homogeneous solutions, we find that it is also useful for numerical computation. We also find that so-called "renormalized angular momentum parameter", $ν$, can be found only in the limited region of $ω$ for each $l,m$ if we assume $ν$ is real (here, $ω$ is the angular frequency, and $l$ and $m$ are degree and order of the spin-weighted spheroidal harmonics respectively). We also compute the flux of the gravitational waves induced by a compact star in a circular orbit on the equatorial plane around a rotating black hole. We find that the relative error of the energy flux is about $10^{-14}$ which is much smaller than the one obtained by usual numerical integration methods.
description: 36 pages,7 figures
Influence of the Third Dimension of Quasi-Two-Dimensional Cuprate Superconductors on Angle-Resolved Photoemission Spectra
Creators: name: Bansil, A.
name: Lindroos, M.
name: Sahrakorpi, S.
name: Markiewicz, R. S.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2004
Subjects: subject: Superconductivity (cond-mat.supr-con)
subject: Strongly Correlated Electrons (cond-mat.str-el)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) presents significant simplications in analyzing strictly two-dimensional (2D) materials, but even the most anisotropic physical systems display some residual three-dimensionality. Here we demonstrate how this third dimension manifests itself in ARPES spectra of quasi-2D materials by considering the example of the cuprate Bi$_2$Sr$_2$CaCu$_2$O$_{8}$ (Bi2212). The intercell, interlayer hopping, which is responsible for $k_z$-dispersion of the bands, is found to induce an irreducible broadening to the ARPES lineshapes with a characteristic dependence on the in-plane momentum $k_\parallel$. Our study suggests that ARPES lineshapes can provide a direct spectroscopic window for establishing the existence of coherent c-axis conductivity in a material via the detection of this new broadening mechanism, and bears on the understanding of 2D to 3D crossover and pseudogap and stripe physics in novel materials through ARPES experiments.
description: 5 pages, 4 figures
title: Mädchenförderung im Sportunterricht
Creators: name: Oppeneiger, Sarah
Year: 2023

description: Koedukation ist seit der Entstehung ein viel diskutiertes Thema, auch in Bezug auf den österreichischen Sportunterricht. Aus der Umsetzung entstandenen Nachteile für das physische Selbstkonzept der Mädchen wurden in zahlreichen Studien untersucht und dokumentiert. Obwohl Koedukation im Sportunterricht in Österreich nicht die Regel ist, findet die Unterrichtsform gelegentlich an Mittelschulen aufgrund eines Mangels an qualifizierten Lehrkräften oder geeigneten Sportstätten Anwendung. Dies ist auch der Fall an der Schule, die Gegenstand dieser Forschung ist und somit den Anlass für die vorliegende Studie bildet. Mittels dieser empirischen Arbeit wird ermittelt, inwiefern sich das physische Fähigkeitskonzept der Mädchen im Sportunterricht nach einer fünfwöchigen monoedukativen Intervention im Sportunterricht verändert. Der monoedukative Sportunterricht wurde mittels Unterrichtsmodellen aus der Schriftenreihe Mädchen im Turnsaal mit speziellem Fokus auf die Förderung des Selbstkonzepts der Mädchen geplant und umgesetzt. In einer Mixed-Methods-Studie wurden die Einstellungen gegenüber Sport, dem Sportunterricht und das Selbstkonzept der Schülerinnen vor und nach der Intervention mittels Fragebögen und Gruppendiskussionen erfasst. Die Auswertung der quantitativ und qualitativ erhobenen Ergebnisse zeigte keine besonderen Veränderungen im sportlichen Selbstkonzept der Mädchen nach der fünfwöchigen Intervention. Die Studie erbrachte jedoch wichtige Erkenntnisse bezüglich der Mädchenförderung im Sportunterricht, welche als Handlungsimplikationen in dieser Arbeit näher erörtert werden.
description: Coeducation in physical education (PE) in Austria has been a widely discussed topic ever since its introduction. A disadvantage to the girls’ physical self-concept is often the result of coeducation in PE and has been researched and documented in numerous studies. Teaching PE in a coeducational setting is not the norm in Austria, however it does take place in some schools due to a lack of qualified sports teachers or suitable sports facilities. This is also the case at the school, which is subject of this research, thus providing the motivation for the present study. This study aims to determine the extent to which the physical self-concept of girls in physical education changes after a five-week intervention monoeducation. The intervention was carried out by planning the lessons with the series called Mädchen im Turnsaal with a specific focus on promoting the girls’ self-concept. The general attitude towards sports and the PE lessons as well as the self-concept of the girls was determined before and after the intervention via questionnaires and group discussions. The analysis of the quantitative and qualitative results did not reveal significant changes in the girls' sports-related self-concept after the five-week intervention. Nevertheless, the study yielded valuable insights for the empowerment of girls in PE, which are discussed in this paper.
Measuring the MSSM Lagrangean
Creators: name: Plehn, Tilman
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2004
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: At the LHC, it will be possible to investigate scenarios for physics beyond the Standard Model in detail. We present precise total and differential cross section predictions, based on Prospino2.0 and SMadGraph. We also show to what degree the structure of the weak--scale supersymmetric Lagrangean can be studied, based on LHC data alone or based on combined LHC and linear collider. Using Sfitter we correctly take into account experimental and theoretical errors. We make the case that a proper treatment of the error propagation is crucial for any analysis of this kind.
description: proc. Physics at LHC, 2004, Vienna
Multi-Staged Cross-Lingual Acoustic Model Adaption for Robust Speech Recognition in Real-World Applications -- A Case Study on German Oral History Interviews
Creators: name: Gref, Michael
name: Walter, Oliver
name: Schmidt, Christoph
name: Behnke, Sven
name: Köhler, Joachim
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2020
Subjects: subject: Audio and Speech Processing (eess.AS)
subject: Computation and Language (cs.CL)
subject: FOS: Electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering
subject: FOS: Computer and information sciences

description: While recent automatic speech recognition systems achieve remarkable performance when large amounts of adequate, high quality annotated speech data is used for training, the same systems often only achieve an unsatisfactory result for tasks in domains that greatly deviate from the conditions represented by the training data. For many real-world applications, there is a lack of sufficient data that can be directly used for training robust speech recognition systems. To address this issue, we propose and investigate an approach that performs a robust acoustic model adaption to a target domain in a cross-lingual, multi-staged manner. Our approach enables the exploitation of large-scale training data from other domains in both the same and other languages. We evaluate our approach using the challenging task of German oral history interviews, where we achieve a relative reduction of the word error rate by more than 30% compared to a model trained from scratch only on the target domain, and 6-7% relative compared to a model trained robustly on 1000 hours of same-language out-of-domain training data.
description: Published version of the paper can be accessed via https://www.aclweb.org/anthology/2020.lrec-1.780
Dynamics of the Pionium with the Density Matrix Formalism
Creators: name: Afanasyev, L
name: Santamarina, C
name: Tarasov, A
name: Voskresenskaya, O
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2004
Subjects: subject: Atomic Physics (physics.atom-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: The evolution of pionium, the $π^+ π^-$ hydrogen-like atom, while passing through matter is solved within the density matrix formalism in the first Born approximation. We compare the influence on the pionium break-up probability between the standard probabilistic calculations and the more precise picture of the density matrix formalism accounting for interference effects. We focus our general result in the particular conditions of the DIRAC experiment at CERN.
description: 14 pages, 2 figures, submitted to J. Phys. B: At. Mol. Phys
Development and prediction of adolescent smoking and drinking
Creators: name: Maggi, Stefania
Publisher: name: University of British Columbia
Year: 2009

description: This study examines the development and etiology of cigarette smoking and alcohol drinking among Canadian children and adolescents. The National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (NLSCY) was employed first to identify the developmental trajectories of smoking and drinking and then to identify patterns of early prediction of occasional smoking, daily smoking, and infrequent drinking. Utilizing data from participants between 10 and 17 years of age, growth mixture modelling was used to identify sub-groups of children and adolescents following similar developmental trajectories in the acquisition of smoking (N=2,886) and drinking (N=2,i8i). Results of this portion of the study indicate that there is no one 'universal' way in which adolescent smoking and drinking develops over time; rather, acquisition of smoking and drinking is better characterized by a number of distinct developmental pathways. Employing a different NLSCY sample of 1,414 (for smoking) and 1,422 (for drinking) 14- and 15- year-old participants, multinomial and logistic regression analyses were used for the data reduction and modelling of the early predictors of smoking and drinking. Results of these analyses indicate that while the early pattern of prediction of occasional smoking was found to be associated with family interpersonal factors such as parenting and family functioning, the early pattern of prediction of daily smoking was found to be associated with individual level factors such as hyperactivity/inattention and poor health. This led to the development of the 'smoking as coping' model where two causal pathways are hypothesized: the self-medication pathway explaining daily smoking and the social-compensation pathway explaining occasional smoking. In contrast, we found that infrequent drinking could not be predicted by any individual or interpersonal risk factors, suggesting that it may simply be a normative behaviour among young adolescents. Interestingly, we found that children who did not drink at all were more likely to" have had asthma and to be physically aggressive. These results contradict the dominant view where substance use, even in moderation, is believed to be associated with negative predictors.
Homotopy operations and rational homotopy type
Creators: name: Blanc, David
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2004
Subjects: subject: Algebraic Topology (math.AT)
subject: FOS: Mathematics
subject: 55P62; 55Q35, 55P15,18G50

description: We describe a collection of higher homotopy operations which determine the rational homotopy type of a simply-connected space X. These are described in terms of simplicial resolutions of successive approximations (L^k,α} to the Quillen DGL model for X. The operations lie in suitable cohomology groups H^*{L^{(k,α)}; π_* X\otimes Q} of these DGLs. To facilitate the recovery of an integral version of the operations from the rational description, we also define a differential graded non-associative algebra model for rational spaces.
description: 28 pages
EVALUATION OF WILLINGNESS TO ACCEPT AND ADOPT CLEAN DEVELOPMENT MECHANISM PROJECTS AMONG SMALLSCALE FARMERS IN NJORO DISTRICT, KENYA
Creators: name: Ayuya, Oscar Ingasia
name: Ayuya, Oscar Ingasia
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2010
Subjects: Environmental Economics and Policy
Farm Management

description: Carbon markets are developing world wide with the major aim of environmental protection and poverty alleviation in developing countries. Some carbon sequestration projects have been started in Kenya though it is still not yet a vibrant investment in spite of the available suitable biophysical land. Njoro district has no such project regardless of being affected by deforestation. One inevitable result has been the unpredictable rainfall pattern constituting overall climate change, increased surface run off, the low water levels in river Njoro, loss of biodiversity and the increased poverty in the region. It is still not clear if such projects are to be initiated, the smallscale farmers would be willing to accept and adopt them. There was need therefore, to assess the willingness of small scale farmers to accept and adopt carbon trade tree project in order to understand farmer’s decision making process. The study used multi-stage sampling procedure to select 150 small-scale farmers in Njoro district. Both primary and secondary data sources collected using observations and interviews with the help of a semi-structured questionnaire. Data analysis was done using descriptive statistics, ordinal logit model and the double hurdle model using STATA computer programs. The results indicated that 29% of the farmers practiced tree planting/agro-forestry as the voluntary CDM practice in the study area. On the level of awareness the result indicates that 58% of the farmers were not aware of the project, 23% were aware and correct and 19% of the farmers were aware but wrong signifying low levels of awareness of the CDM project among farmers. Gender, household size, farm debt, attitude towards risk, farm size, land tenure, availability of voluntary CDM and perception of the technology were found to influence the willingness to accept the project. Further, age, extension contacts, attitude towards risk, land tenure and perception towards the technology influenced on the extent the farmer is willing to adopt. The study therefore, recommends policy interventions in increasing awareness, improved training through extension services on agro-environmental programmes, formation of agro-environmental self help groups by farmers and creation of strategies that would improve socio-economic conditions of smallholder farmers in Kenya. Through this, adoption of carbon tree trade would be successful consequently increasing carbon sinks and increased smallholder farm income hence poverty reduction and sustainable development.
IMPACT OF POLICY AND SOCIOECONOMIC FACTORS ON SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION OF LIVESTOCK PRODUCTION SYSTEMS IN RIVER NJORO WATERSHED, KENYA
Creators: name: Kyalo Willy, Daniel
name: Kyalo Willy, Daniel
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2009
Subjects: Agricultural and Food Policy
Livestock Production/Industries

description: Livestock production is an important contributor to rural development. In the past two decades, developing countries have experienced changes in market structures, climate and demographic characteristics. These changes have been accompanied by fast growth in demand for livestock products and the increasing dependence on livestock for sustainable livelihood systems. In response to these changes, there has been rapid land use and land cover changes, characterized by expansion of agricultural land, and land fragmentation. This has caused environmental degradation in several rural areas, including the River Njoro watershed. Policy makers and development agents are therefore, facing a dilemma on trade-offs between meeting the expanding demand for livestock products and sustainable utilization of the limited stock of natural resources. At the backdrop of this dilemma, this study sought to identify and characterize livestock production systems in Njoro River watershed using principal components and cluster analysis. A multinomial logistic regression model was then used to determine the factors that influence the spatial distribution of livestock production systems and Changes in Land Use Efficiency for Small extent (CLUE- S) model used to assess the effect of suggested policies on the spatial distribution of livestock production systems. Primary data used in the study was collected using a household survey. Data was managed and analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) v15, STATA V9, and (CLUE-S) Modeling softwares. Results indicate that farmers in the watershed fall under three major livestock production systems: Intensive, Semi intensive, and Extensive. Land size, access to extension services, age of household head, altitude of the farm, distance of farm household to the river, number of extension visits, value of physical assets, access to credit, household size, household income, and involvement in off-farm activity are the factors found to significantly influence changes in livestock production systems. It was also observed that if the current trends in land use changes continue, the production of livestock products will continue to decline in the future. This study concludes that if the growth in food production has to surpass the population growth rate, relevant policy issues to enhance sustainable livestock production have to be addressed. Policy implications drawn from this study have focused on incentives for intensification, institutional reforms, improving livestock productivity, and innovations that enhance the synergies between livestock production and the environment.
title: Vom Versuch, die Sucht zu kontrollieren
Creators: name: Röhrle, Ines
Year: 2022

description: Wer mit einer „Alkoholabhängigkeit“ diagnostiziert wird, hat per Definition die Kontrolle über seinen Konsum verloren - und daher nur eine Möglichkeit: lebenslange Abstinenz. Jedoch existiert seit einigen Jahren ein Konzept am Rande des suchtwissenschaftlichen Diskurses, welches eine Alternative zur Abstinenz darstellt: kontrolliertes Trinken. Indem es das Postulat eines irreversiblen Kontrollverlusts verneint und Betroffenen eine Rückkehr zu einem strengen, selbstüberwachtem Trinkverhalten nach Plan in Aussicht stellt, rüttelt es jedoch auch an den Grundpfeilern jahrzehntelanger abstinenzorientierter Suchtforschung. Ziel dieser Arbeit war es, zu erforschen, wie sich das Paradigma des kontrollierten Trinkens trotz heftiger Kontroversen aus dem Abstinenzparadigma entwickeln und herauslösen konnte. Dies gelang unter Verwendung der Methode der kritischen Diskurs- und Dispositivanalyse nach Jäger. In einem ersten Analysezyklus wurden anhand des Internetauftritts der Protagonist*innen zugrundeliegende Menschenbilder, Motive und Visionen herauspräpariert, um den ‚Geist‘ des kontrollierten Trinkens zu erfassen. In einem zweiten Analysezyklus wurde mithilfe einer diachronen Betrachtungsperspektive der suchtwissenschaftliche Diskurs zu kontrolliertem Trinken von 2000 bis 2020 nachvollzogen. Dazu wurden Textfragmente aus der deutschsprachigen Zeitschrift SUCHT feinanalysiert. Es konnte gezeigt werden, dass die Akzeptanz von kontrolliertem Trinken weniger von rational-wissenschaftlichen Argumenten, sondern vielmehr von vorherrschenden Menschenbildern, Vorurteilen zu Sucht und finanziellen Interessen abhängt. Jahrelang wird kontrolliertes Trinken als unwirksam abgelehnt. Jedoch wird dann die sogenannte „medikamentös gestützte Trinkmengenreduktion“ von der einflussreichen Pharmaindustrie als kapitalistisch verwertbar entdeckt und finanziell unterstützt. Nach und nach ändert sich auch die wissenschaftliche Mehrheitsmeinung und das Abstinenzparadigma weicht auf. Kontrollierter Konsum könnte das Abstinenzparadigma womöglich bald als vorherrschendes Dispositiv ablösen, da es zwei gegenläufige Elemente erfolgreich verschaltet: ein zunehmend pathologisierender Diskurs in Bezug auf Alkohol und das den Neoliberalismus bestimmende Menschenbild des autonomen, aber selbstverantwortlichen Subjektes.
Universality of the rho-meson coupling in effective field theory
Creators: name: Djukanovic, D.
name: Schindler, M. R.
name: Gegelia, J.
name: Japaridze, G.
name: Scherer, S.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2004
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: It is shown that both the universal coupling of the rho-meson and the Kawarabayashi-Suzuki-Riadzuddin-Fayyazuddin expression for the magnitude of its coupling constant follow from the requirement that chiral perturbation theory of pions, nucleons, and rho-mesons is a consistent effective field theory. The prerequisite of the derivation is that all ultraviolet divergences can be absorbed in the redefinition of fields and the available parameters of the most general effective Lagrangian.
description: 4 pages, 2 figures, REVTeX 4, accepted for publication in PRL
A Bayesian dose-response meta-analysis model: simulation study and application
Creators: name: Hamza, Tasnim
name: Cipriani, Andrea
name: Furukawa, Toshi A.
name: Egger, Matthias
name: Orsini, Nicola
name: Salanti, Georgia
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2020
Subjects: subject: Methodology (stat.ME)
subject: FOS: Computer and information sciences

description: Dose-response models express the effect of different dose or exposure levels on a specific outcome. In meta-analysis, where aggregated-level data is available, dose-response evidence is synthesized using either one-stage or two-stage models in a frequentist setting. We propose a hierarchical dose-response model implemented in a Bayesian framework. We present the model with cubic dose-response shapes for a dichotomous outcome and take into account heterogeneity due to variability in the dose-response shape. We develop our Bayesian model assuming normal or binomial likelihood and accounting for exposures grouped in clusters. We implement these models in R using JAGS and we compare our approach to the one-stage dose-response meta-analysis model in a simulation study. We found that the Bayesian dose-response model with binomial likelihood has slightly lower bias than the Bayesian model with the normal likelihood and the frequentist one-stage model. However, all three models perform very well and give practically identical results. We also re-analyze the data from 60 randomized controlled trials (15,984 participants) examining the efficacy (response) of various doses of antidepressant drugs. All models suggest that the dose-response curve increases between zero dose and 40 mg of fluoxetine-equivalent dose, and thereafter is constant. We draw the same conclusion when we take into account the fact that five different antidepressants have been studied in the included trials. We show that implementation of the hierarchical model in Bayesian framework has similar performance to, but overcomes some of the limitations of the frequentist approaches and offers maximum flexibility to accommodate features of the data.
title: PolyCoDif : a method for semantic patches of multiple programming languages based on continuously captured changes
Creators: name: Sperl, Matthias
Publisher: name: TU Wien
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: Quellcode Differenz Extraktion
subject: Algorithmen für Änderungserkennung von Baumstrukturen
subject: kontinuierliche Änderungserkennung
subject: Software Evolution
subject: Source code change extraction
subject: tree-differencing algorithms
subject: continuous tracking
subject: polyglot
subject: software repositories
subject: software evolution analysis

description: Modern tools for developing software have added a plethora of capabilities to support software engineers in their daily work. These tools do not only provide simple features based on the words in a file, but parse and understand the code, and extract the underlying structure. Especially operations for refactoring have become more and more sophisticated. It is possible with a couple of clicks to change the signature of methods, move classes, extract variables, and structurally search and replace code snippets. These advances in writing new code and adapting existing code have been a major advantage for developers. While integrated development environments and editors like IntelliJ IDEA can perform more and more operations based on the structure of the source code, tools for reviewing code are still stuck with the textual representation of the code. The difference between two versions of the source code is calculated line by line, word by word, character by character without any regard for the semantic meaning and tree-like structure of source code. Diff algorithms which work on the abstract syntax trees can, for example, mark changes in the code which have no effect on the runtime behavior of the program. If, for example, a programmer changes the formatting of the code, this will result in many detected changes when using classic text-based algorithms. Semantic diff algorithms could hide these changes so that a reviewer can focus on semantically relevant changes. The goal of this thesis is to take existing algorithms for calculating the difference between two versions of source code in a tree structure and extend them to work with multiple programming languages. Current Version Control Systems are tracking the changes only on actions of software engineers to track change between certain points in the history. This results in a loss of information between these points in time. To remedy that, the semantic diff algorithms are combined with approaches to continuously track changes of source code without relying on the developer to record fixed points in time with explicit commits. A qualitative user study tests the usefulness of the resulting prototype, where developers try to answer questions about source code in four different scenarios. The usability of the tool is judged by the participants of the user study based on the System Usability Scale and reached an overall value of 73,75.
EFFECT OF CREDIT ON HOUSEHOLD WELFARE: THE CASE OF “VILLAGE BANK” MODEL IN BOMET DISTRICT, KENYA
Creators: name: Langat, Jackson Kipngetich
name: Langat, Jackson Kipngetich
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2009
Subjects: Agricultural Finance
Farm Management

description: In recent years, governmental and nongovernmental organizations in many low-income countries have introduced credit programs targeted to the poor. Many of these programs specifically target the poor on the premise that they are more likely to be credit constrained and have restricted access to the wage labour market. Though participation is by choice, little is known about the role of credit on welfare. The purpose of this study was then to assess the role of credit service on welfare of the microfinance clients. It was also to enable the microfinance institutions assess if they are achieving the intended objectives of their program. The study area was Bomet District and the sample was drawn from Mulot and Silibwet “village banks”. A sample of 125 “village bank” members was selected, out of which 91 had used the credit service and the other 34 had not. Primary data on the selected respondents were collected using a structured interview schedule and secondary data were obtained from the selected “village banks” operating in the study area and relevant government departments in the district. The study used analysis of variance and Heckman’s selection model which corrects for selectivity bias in the sample. This consists of a probit equation (borrowing participation equation) and target equation of household expenditure. The results from the study indicated that farm income, off farm income, distance to market and household assets influences the probability to participate in “village bank” credit. The household income of credit participants was also higher than that of the non-participants. There was a positive relationship between the amount borrowed and household expenditure. Age of the household head, farm income, distance to market and off farm income also plaid a significant role in influencing the wellbeing of a household.