How and why does religion matter for the integration of Muslim minorities?:Differentiating religiosity from religious orientations among Turkish Muslims in Germany

The high level of religiosity of immigrants in general and Muslims in particular is often conceived of as a barrier to integration in European public and scholarly debates. However, existing survey research on the relation between religion and integration was limited to measures of religiosity and has yielded contradictory findings. For a broad range of outcomes spanning the domains of structural, social and cultural integration, there are studies showing positive, negative or no associations with immigrants’ religiosity. Arguing that religious cognitions are independent of religiosity, we examine whether the way immigrants reason about religion explains additional variation in immigrant integration. Drawing on original survey data of Turkish-origin Muslims in Germany (N = 500), we examine how religious literalism, symbolism and theological exclusivism relate to a broad range of integration outcomes (educational attainment, labour market participation, intergroup contact, civic and political participation, volunteering, sense of belonging to Germany and social distance), over and above levels of religiosity. Factor analyses reveal that a symbolic approach to religion (i.e. emphasizing the need to take the historical context into account when interpreting religious texts) is conceptually distinct from literalism and exclusivism and can explain variation beyond religiosity, particularly in the domain of civic integration.</p

It ain't easy: using normatively motivated news diversification to facilitate policy support, tolerance, and political participation

Proponents of ‘democratic news recommender design’ argue that algorithmic news diversification may facilitate democratic participation. However, while various news diversification metrics have been proposed in recent years, few of them have been put to the test with real users. To assess the promises and pitfalls of algorithmic news diversification, we conduct a 2 (low vs. high levels of activating language) by 3 (low vs medium vs high levels of alternative voices) between subjects experiment with N = 715 respondents to test how normatively driven news diversification affects readers' (a) policy support, (b) outcome tolerance, (c) outgroup tolerance, and (d) political participation. Results show that in a one-off experiment, exposure diversity has at best very small effects on the dependent variables when demographic and attitudinal characteristics are controlled for. We also find that extreme forms of news diversification may impede user satisfaction

‘Climate-solutions polarization’: A value-based approach to understanding polarization dynamics around biomass in Dutch media discourse

Polarization dynamics around climate change are shifting from debates about the reality and severity of climate change to debates about climate solutions. We propose taking a value-based approach to understanding “climate-solutions polarization”. As a case study, we identified the discursive value expressions underlying the polarized biomass media discourse in the Netherlands, from 2019–2021. A discourse analysis showed how the value expressions (a) climate security, (b) environmental benevolence, and (c) local security produce an opposition discourse, whereas the value expressions (d) climate achievement, (e) technological security, and (f) economic security underpin advocacy discourse. We discuss how the strong presence of security values provides both communication opportunities and risks for transitioning to climate-resilient societies. Further, our research shows how both sides of the debate have scientific actors on their side using distinctive rhetorical strategies, providing insight into debates about the role of values in science. The value-based approach to understanding climate-solutions polarization is promising for both the science and practice of environmental communication

Long-term sequelae of COVID-19 with a focus on severe fatigue and (neuro) psychological functioning

While most infected individuals recover from COVID-19 symptoms within a reasonable time, a proportion of patients continues to have symptoms lasting several months after the initial infection. This thesis describes long-term sequelae of COVID-19, more specifically trajectories of infected individuals' mental health, severe fatigue, health-related quality of life and neuropsychological functioning. The findings illustrate that certain persistent complaints following COVID-19, especially severe fatigue and difficulty concentrating, are common and associated with interconnected biological, clinical, psychological, and social factors. Persistent symptoms following COVID-19 have a considerable influence on health-related quality of life

Attentional tunneling in pilots during a visual tracking task with a head mounted display

ObjectiveWe examined whether active head aiming with a Helmet Mounted Display (HMD) can draw the pilot’s attention away from a primary flight task. Furthermore, we examined whether visual clutter increases this effect.BackgroundHead up display symbology can result in attentional tunneling, and clutter makes it difficult to identify objects.MethodEighteen military pilots had to simultaneously perform an attitude control task while flying in clouds and a head aiming task in a fixed-base flight simulator. The former consisted of manual compensation for roll disturbances of the aircraft, while the latter consisted of keeping a moving visual target inside a small or large head-referenced circle. A “no head aiming” condition served as a baseline. Furthermore, all conditions were performed with or without visual clutter.ResultsHead aiming led to deterioration of the attitude control task performance and an increase of the amount of roll-reversal errors (RREs). This was even the case when head aiming required minimal effort. Head aiming accuracy was significantly lower when the roll disturbances in the attitude control task were large compared to when they were small. Visual clutter had no effect on both tasks.ConclusionWe suggest that active head aiming of HMD symbology can cause attentional tunneling, as expressed by an increased number of RREs and less accuracy on a simultaneously performed attitude control task.ApplicationThis study improves our understanding in the perceptual and cognitive effects of (military) HMDs, and has implications for operational use and possibly (re)design of HMDs

Advancements in the invasive treatment of atrial fibrillation

In de afgelopen decennia is de behandeling van boezemfibrilleren steeds meet verschoven van een ingrijpende laatste redmiddeloperatie, naar een vroege behandeloptie in dagbehandeling. Dit heeft geleid tot een enorme toename in het aantal uitgevoerde pulmonale venen isolatie (PVI) procedures. Om aan deze groeiende vraag te voldoen, zijn snellere procedures met goede effectiviteit en veiligheid nodig. Traditionele punt-voor-punt radiofrequente ablatie (RFA) vereist een ervaren operateur en vaak langdurige procedures om een succesvolle AF-ablaties uit te voeren. Dit heeft geleid tot de ontwikkeling van verschillende innovatie instrumenten en "single shot"-devices. In het eerste deel van dit proefschrift zijn de prestaties van de PVAC Gold-katheter uitgebreid geëvalueerd in de dagelijkse praktijk en head-to-head vergeleken met alternatieven. De multi-elektrode (decapolaire) gefaseerde radiofrequente pulmonale vene ablatiekatheter (PVAC) is ontworpen om circumferentiële ablatie van de longaders uit te voeren via een over-de-draad techniek. Later werd de tweede generatie, met negen gouden elektroden (PVAC Gold), geïntroduceerd om de prestaties verder te verbeteren. In het tweede deel wordt het gebruik van ultra-lage temperatuur cryoablatie (ULTC) onderzocht. Samengeperste en gekoelde stikstof nabij het vloeistof-damp-kritieke punt biedt unieke eigenschappen, waardoor het mogelijk is om door zeer kleine kanalen te stromen vanwege de lage viscositeit (zoals een gas), terwijl het de hogere thermische geleidbaarheid en warmtecapaciteit (zoals een vloeistof) behoudt. Het eerste gebruik bij mensen met behulp van het ULTC-systeem werd onderzocht in de Cryocure 1 en 2 studies en beschreven in dit proefschrift.<br/

The rise of technology courts, or: How technology companies re-invent adjudication for a digital world

The article “The Rise of Technology Courts” explores the evolving role of courts in the digital world, where technological advancements and artificial intelligence (AI) are transforming traditional adjudication processes. It argues that traditional courts are undergoing a significant transition due to digitization and the increasing influence of technology companies. The paper frames this transformation through the concept of the “sphere of the digital,” which explains how digital technology and AI redefine societal expectations of what courts should be and how they function.The article highlights that technology is not only changing the materiality of courts—moving from physical buildings to digital portals—but also affecting their symbolic function as public institutions. It discusses the emergence of AI-powered judicial services, online dispute resolution (ODR), and technology-driven alternative adjudication bodies like the Meta Oversight Board. These developments challenge the traditional notions of judicial authority, jurisdiction, and legal expertise.The paper concludes that while these technology-driven solutions offer increased efficiency and accessibility, they also raise fundamental questions about the legitimacy, transparency, and independence of adjudicatory bodies. As technology companies continue to shape digital justice, the article also argues that there are lessons to learn for the role and structure of traditional courts to ensure that human rights and public values are upheld

Genetic adaptation to amoxicillin in <i>Escherichia coli</i>:The limited role of <i>dinB</i> and <i>katE</i>

Bacteria can quickly adapt to sub-lethal concentrations of antibiotics. Several stress and DNA repair genes contribute to this adaptation process. However, the pathways leading to adaptation by acquisition of de novo mutations remain poorly understood. This study explored the roles of DNA polymerase IV (dinB) and catalase HP2 (katE) in E. coli's adaptation to amoxicillin. These genes are thought to play essential roles in beta-lactam resistance-dinB in increasing mutation rates and katE in managing oxidative stress. By comparing the adaptation rates, transcriptomic profiles, and genetic changes of wild-type and knockout strains, we aimed to clarify the contributions of these genes to beta-lactam resistance. While all strains exhibited similar adaptation rates and mutations in the frdD gene and ampC operon, several unique mutations were acquired in the ΔkatE and ΔdinB strains. Overall, this study distinguishes the contributions of general stress-related genes on the one hand, and dinB, and katE on the other hand, in development of beta-lactam resistance

Multilinguality and multiculturalism:Towards effective and inclusive neural language models

Language models require vast amounts of data during training. This limits their use to languages for which such data requirements can be met. To extend access to language technology to more linguistic communities, researchers have developed multilingual language models (MLMs) that are trained on data from multiple languages. The idea is that languages can support each other as they share common patterns, making the models useful across more languages.However, this approach brings new challenges from both a technical and social perspective. When a model is trained on multiple languages, these languages start competing for limited model capacity, which can lead to negative interference and reduce effectiveness. In addition, to deploy MLMs in culturally-diverse communities, their output needs to be sensitive to the sociocultural norms and biases of those communities. This necessitates MLMs to become inherently multicultural as well.In this thesis, we investigate how to build more effective MLMs that mitigate negative cross-language interference and study the effect that multilingual training has on the social biases and cultural values that they encode

Contesting the Musical Ear:Hermann von Helmholtz, Gottfried Weber and Carl Stumpf Analyzing Mozart

Music analysis emerged in the late nineteenth century as an occupationin its own right, independent from the education of composers. This chapter usesthree case studies to describe how and with what aims three authors, in analyzingmusic by Mozart, produced samples to which to compare his music. It therebytraces how a pairing of the notions of analysis and composition increasingly createdroom for a concept of synthesis that eventually replaced the notion of the “fine ear”for music with procedures devised by the analyst that take into account a genuinemalleability of hearing and listening. The cases are Hermann von Helmholtz’scharts for indicating the harmoniousness of its component chords in Mozart’s Aveverum corpus, K. 618; Gottfried Weber’s fabricated alternatives to the famous dis-sonances opening the string quartet C major, K. 465; and, finally, Carl Stumpf’scomments on his listening of the Serenade B-flat major, K. 361, after having exten-sively used the first technical analysis and synthesis of the sound of musicalinstruments