Cannabis use regimens in trauma-exposed individuals: associations with cannabis use quantity and frequency

People with trauma histories have an increased odds of cannabis use. Little is known about the frequency or consequences of different cannabis use regimens in cannabis users with trauma histories. Individuals with anxiety disorders tend to administer benzodiazepines in a pro re nata (PRN; i.e., as needed) as opposed to regularly scheduled (RS, e.g., twice daily [BID], three times daily [TID]) manner. Although physicians tend to prescribe benzodiazepines on a PRN regimen to minimize use, this regimen is paradoxically associated with greater use levels. Indeed, PRN administration regimens may increase use via negative reinforcement processes. We extended this older benzodiazepine literature to cannabis by examining regimen of cannabis use among 94 trauma-exposed cannabis users (mean age = 35.1 years; 52.1 % male; 23.4 % with cannabis prescription). Participants reported their initial and current cannabis use regimen (PRN vs. RS vs. both [‘PRN+’]) and their past month cannabis use frequency (use occasions in last month) and quantity (grams/use occasion). Consistent with patterns in benzodiazepine research, PRN (47.1 % of sample) and PRN+ (43.5 % of sample) were more common than RS regimens (9.4 % of sample). Also consistent with patterns seen with benzodiazepines, our sample moved toward PRN regimens from initial to current use: e.g., 100 % of initial RS users switched to a regimen that included PRN use. Consistent with predictions emerging from learning theory, PRN and PRN+ cannabis users reported significantly higher cannabis use frequencies compared to RS users (p's </p

Impact of green bonds on traditional equity markets

This study examines the broader U.S. green bond market, with focus on its association with the U.S traditional equity market from 2016–2021. For this purpose, we use the S&P Green Bond Index, the S&P U.S. Aggregate Bond Index, and the S&P 500 to build the connection between the markets based on both univariate generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH) and multivariate vector autoregression (VAR) models. Our empirical results show that the patterns of returns and the volatility behavior of green bonds included significant changes over the years of study. The findings highlight the importance of the emergence and evolution of the promising green bonds market, thus providing useful policy implications for portfolio and risk management as well as asset pricing. This study contributes to a deeper understanding of the impact of green bonds on equity markets.</p

Subvertising

Subvertising refers to practices of engaging with advertising critically, both symbolically and materially, and can aim for futures beyond growth-driven economies and consumer-driven cultures. For example, it engages with advertising symbolically through challenging the language of advertising, and materially through illustrating its connections with carbon heavy industries. Subvertising can be understood as both activist practice and a social movement. Subvertising is often used interchangeably or in connection with terms such as culture jamming, anti-advertising, adbusting, and ad takeovers, while in Spanish it is contrapublicidad, and in French antipublicitaire.</p

Animation

While there have been some illuminating studies on animation as objects of study, its relationship to the living and the deceased, and a focus on otherwise marginalised productions in the global south, how anthropological insights might inform the making of an animation have yet to be substantively considered. How can the two terrains – of animation as graphic medium and anthropology as ethnographic representation – effectively be brought together? A fitting topic to optimally explore this medium of motion is with respect to the processes and experiences of human migration - its relevance and poignancy becoming even more piercing when that migration is forced due to violence and is met by incremental violence of various kinds along the way. By focussing on a looped three minute zoom animation on the stories of Eritrean refugees, North Star Fading (2018), this chapter highlights how zoom animation enabled by digital programming pose very distinctive issues about imagery, sound, subjectivity and sensory experience that contrasts markedly with animation that is created and reproduced on the non-zoom planar surface (positivenegatives.org/story/north-star-fading). We do not so much as watch and listen, but we enter the animation. We too are drawn in.</p

Dependency and Capitalism

No description supplied</p

Configurational theory in business and management research: status quo and guidelines for the application of qualitative comparative analysis (QCA)

Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) has become a key method in Business and Management research, sparking significant discussions about its use. While many studies have explored QCA's application across various research contexts, there has been limited focus on the critical link between its theoretical foundations and methodological applications. Our review of QCA literature in Business and Management research (n = 675 articles) reveals that many studies focus more on methodological aspects than configurational theorizing. Despite repeated calls for stronger theoretical integration, only a limited number of studies have successfully employed QCA in a way that aligns theoretical principles with empirical investigation. Additionally, we found a predominant use of QCA in inductive research, though a surprising number of deductive studies misuse QCA for hypothesis testing—despite its incompatibility with set-theoretic approaches. We clarify that QCA should not be employed for hypothesis testing and emphasize its proper deductive use in evaluating theory through the alignment of theoretical propositions and empirical findings. Furthermore, we provide guidelines for conducting rigorous QCA and offer a research protocol to better align theoretical foundations with methodological applications. With this, the study contributes to the field by addressing gaps in how QCA is applied and enhancing its use in configurational theorizing.</p

When do incumbents adopt radical net-zero technologies? Analysing differences in strategy trajectories of European truck manufacturers towards alternative vehicle technologies

Net-zero vehicle technologies are essential to curb CO2 emissions from heavy-duty road transport. This study investigates the innovation strategies of European truck manufacturers following the EU's decision to limit CO2 emissions of heavy-duty vehicles in 2019. Our analysis is based on interviews with managers from all European truck manufacturers and publicly available documents covering the period from 2018 to 2021. We find four different types of strategy trajectories: proactive diversifier, focused leapfrogger, initial incrementalist, and diverse follower; these range from manufacturers with proactive strategies towards all alternative technologies to those favouring more incremental technologies and displaying laggard-like behaviour towards more radical technologies. Our analysis reveals that these types show a close match to key markets, resources and competencies, research investments, knowledge acquisitions, and expectations towards low-carbon technologies and infrastructures. Additionally, we uncover interdependencies with other segments and markets, the growing political weight of the vehicle industry through infrastructure provision, and the consolidating market impact resulting from necessary collaborations to achieve ambitious (political) decarbonisation targets with increasingly stringent policies. We conclude that both technology-neutral and technology-specific policies can restrict the adoption of potentially more efficient net-zero technologies and recommend leveraging firm-level determinants for more effective net-zero policy mixes.</p

Listening

Listening figures in political communication in relation to sound specifically (speech, music, noise, silence) but also as a metaphor more broadly for audiencing and civic action. The entry begins by addressing the paradox that listening is central to the practice of political communication but marginalised in many accounts that privilege the analysis of political expression. It traces some of the reasons for that marginalisation and indicates some of the key ways in which listening features in diverse theories and practices of political communication. In so doing, listening is considered in relation to a wide range of subjects relevant to political communication, including rhetoric, political theory, changing media technologies, public opinion, propaganda and public relations, media literacy, the attention economy, agency and affect, and how listening is invoked in ethical terms as a cypher for values of openness, recognition, empathy, and parity etc.</p

Bedrock disturbances

Periglacially-derived bedrock disturbances can be observed in many lowland areas of past permafrost in both weak and strong rock. Both large-scale landforms and small-scale structures are left as a legacy of these freeze–thaw dominated environments in this periglacial landsystem. The nature of these disturbances can present highly variable ground conditions that present geohazards and geotechnical challenges for any construction works undertaken within them</p

Context matters: diagnosing and targeting local barriers to success at school

We trialed a novel method aimed at reducing educational inequalities in any given school by tailoring an intervention to address the specific local social, cultural, and psychological barriers that contribute to those inequalities. In Study 1 (N = 2070), we validated measures in a student survey of barriers experienced by students ages 11–16 years in two schools in England. We used a pilot version of these measures to identify two barriers that appeared to be contributing in both schools to poorer attendance and behavioral records of Black versus Asian students and of lower socioeconomic status (SES) students versus higher SES students. These barriers consisted of perceptions that (a) the schools were biased against certain groups of students and that there were negative stereotypes about certain groups of students, and (b) teachers and students did not come from similar backgrounds. In Study 2, which was pre-registered, we administered a brief tailored intervention to target these barriers in students ages 11–14 years in the same two schools the following year (N = 1070). The intervention, which aimed to induce values affirmation and reveal hidden teacher-student similarities, improved the attendance of low-SES students by 0.20 SD (p = .009) and reduced the gap with their peers by 60%. Exploratory analyses indicated that the improvement in attendance was larger for students who reported perceiving greater levels of bias and poorer teacher-student relationships at baseline. The impact of the intervention on the behavioral records of Black students (p = .089) and low-SES students (p = .293) was not significant. These qualified but encouraging findings provide a basis for developing practical ways for individual schools to improve outcomes for their historically disadvantaged students.</p