title: The prevalence and impairment effects of drugged driving in New Zealand

authors: Starkey, Nicola J.

subjects: attitudes, drugged driving, incidence, medication, prevalence, toxicology

abstract: The purpose of the research was to establish a quantitative picture of the type and the extent of drugged driving in New Zealand and investigate the level of driving impairment produced by the most commonly used drugs, both legal and illegal. A stratified telephone survey (n=2,000) and internet survey (n=434) were conducted to explore the extent of drugged driving. Other than alcohol, the drugs most commonly taken prior to driving were strong opioid-based painkillers, antidepressant medication, anti-nausea medication, cannabis and anti-anxiety medication. A large proportion of drivers also reported taking combinations of different drugs prior to driving. Of the most commonly taken drugs, cannabis, opioid-based painkillers and benzodiazepines (typically used to treat anxiety or insomnia) have been associated with increased crash and driving-related impairment. The combination of drugs and alcohol leads to significantly higher crash risk and driving-related impairments. Between 25% and 50% of drivers who reported taking drugs admitted ‘drugged driving’ more than once a week over the last 12 months; for prescription drugs this most frequently occurred in the morning, while for illegal drugs this was typically in the evening.

text: The prevalence and impairment effects of drugged driving in New Zealand The purpose of the research was to establish a quantitative picture of the type and the extent of drugged driving in New Zealand and investigate the level of driving impairment produced by the most commonly used drugs, both legal and illegal. A stratified telephone survey (n=2,000) and internet survey (n=434) were conducted to explore the extent of drugged driving. Other than alcohol, the drugs most commonly taken prior to driving were strong opioid-based painkillers, antidepressant medication, anti-nausea medication, cannabis and anti-anxiety medication. A large proportion of drivers also reported taking combinations of different drugs prior to driving. Of the most commonly taken drugs, cannabis, opioid-based painkillers and benzodiazepines (typically used to treat anxiety or insomnia) have been associated with increased crash and driving-related impairment. The combination of drugs and alcohol leads to significantly higher crash risk and driving-related impairments. Between 25% and 50% of drivers who reported taking drugs admitted ‘drugged driving’ more than once a week over the last 12 months; for prescription drugs this most frequently occurred in the morning, while for illegal drugs this was typically in the evening.

year: 2017

title: Storm-driven changes in rip channel patterns on an embayed beach

authors: Gallop, Shari L.

subjects: rip currents

abstract: This paper introduces a semi-automatic computer algorithm designed to detect rip current channels in video imagery. As a case study, this method is applied to 3.3 years of video data from an embayed beach to demonstrate the link between antecedent surf zone morphology, wave energy and up/down transitions in beach state. An objective measure of rip channel change was developed to define six significant rip reconfiguration events and relate these events to wave energy. Over the period of study no complete resets of the nearshore morphology occurred. The analysis indicates that direct correlation of rip patterns with the instantaneous wave conditions is not a useful way to demonstrate how rips and waves interact. The average wave energy over a period of ten days, combined with storm duration were good indicators of rip channel change, demonstrating that in general, beach morphology responds with a time lag to changes in forcing. Rip channels with a short cross-shore length and narrow alongshore spacing responded faster to changes in wave conditions than rips with a long cross-shore length and wider alongshore spacing. To force changes in the rip morphology, longer rip channels required wave events of higher energy and/or a longer duration. Offshore islands protect the beach under certain wave approach angles, sometimes resulting in a dual-width surf zone, which was narrow at the sheltered end and wide at the exposed end of the beach. The wider surf zone end was characterised by three dominant and persistent rip channels, whereas the narrow surf zone section contained a number of smaller rips which evolved rapidly under wave forcing. Our observations demonstrate the importance of rip channel size in controlling the response time of nearshore morphology.

text: Storm-driven changes in rip channel patterns on an embayed beach This paper introduces a semi-automatic computer algorithm designed to detect rip current channels in video imagery. As a case study, this method is applied to 3.3 years of video data from an embayed beach to demonstrate the link between antecedent surf zone morphology, wave energy and up/down transitions in beach state. An objective measure of rip channel change was developed to define six significant rip reconfiguration events and relate these events to wave energy. Over the period of study no complete resets of the nearshore morphology occurred. The analysis indicates that direct correlation of rip patterns with the instantaneous wave conditions is not a useful way to demonstrate how rips and waves interact. The average wave energy over a period of ten days, combined with storm duration were good indicators of rip channel change, demonstrating that in general, beach morphology responds with a time lag to changes in forcing. Rip channels with a short cross-shore length and narrow alongshore spacing responded faster to changes in wave conditions than rips with a long cross-shore length and wider alongshore spacing. To force changes in the rip morphology, longer rip channels required wave events of higher energy and/or a longer duration. Offshore islands protect the beach under certain wave approach angles, sometimes resulting in a dual-width surf zone, which was narrow at the sheltered end and wide at the exposed end of the beach. The wider surf zone end was characterised by three dominant and persistent rip channels, whereas the narrow surf zone section contained a number of smaller rips which evolved rapidly under wave forcing. Our observations demonstrate the importance of rip channel size in controlling the response time of nearshore morphology.

year: 2010

title: The social meaning potential of loanwords: Empirical explorations of lexical borrowing as expression of (social) identity

authors: Zenner, Eline

abstract: The use of loanwords is not merely a lexical act (filling a lexical gap in a given language, or using a shorter word in place of a longer expression) but also a socially meaningful one – a contextual expression of self, social identity and language regard. Recent lexical borrowing research has drawn attention to this social meaning potential of loanwords. What motivates language users to select a borrowed form over a receptor language equivalent, what is the (perceived) social meaning of this choice and how can we empirically address these questions? This special issue seeks to bring into debate the interface between speakers (the social dimension) and language (the linguistic dimension) with regard to lexical borrowing, and to probe how language regard and speaker identity influence and explain the use of loanwords. In a bid to better understand this complex interface, the special issue includes papers that explore a range of empirical methodologies drawn from different subfields of (socio)linguistics and closely related scientific domains (linguistic anthropology, conversation analysis, corpus linguistics, social psychology and psycholinguistics) and documents a variety of contact situations: English loans into French and Finnish, Māori loanwords into New Zealand English, German loans into Dutch. Together, the different perspectives presented in this issue help advance our understanding of the relationship between lexical change on the one hand, and language regard and (social) identity on the other hand.

text: The social meaning potential of loanwords: Empirical explorations of lexical borrowing as expression of (social) identity The use of loanwords is not merely a lexical act (filling a lexical gap in a given language, or using a shorter word in place of a longer expression) but also a socially meaningful one – a contextual expression of self, social identity and language regard. Recent lexical borrowing research has drawn attention to this social meaning potential of loanwords. What motivates language users to select a borrowed form over a receptor language equivalent, what is the (perceived) social meaning of this choice and how can we empirically address these questions? This special issue seeks to bring into debate the interface between speakers (the social dimension) and language (the linguistic dimension) with regard to lexical borrowing, and to probe how language regard and speaker identity influence and explain the use of loanwords. In a bid to better understand this complex interface, the special issue includes papers that explore a range of empirical methodologies drawn from different subfields of (socio)linguistics and closely related scientific domains (linguistic anthropology, conversation analysis, corpus linguistics, social psychology and psycholinguistics) and documents a variety of contact situations: English loans into French and Finnish, Māori loanwords into New Zealand English, German loans into Dutch. Together, the different perspectives presented in this issue help advance our understanding of the relationship between lexical change on the one hand, and language regard and (social) identity on the other hand.

year: 2019