Visual Causality: Investigating Graph Layouts for Understanding Causal Processes

Causal diagrams provide a graphical formalism indicating how statistical models can be used to study causal processes. Despite the extensive research on the efficacy of aesthetic graphic layouts, the causal inference domain has not benefited from the results of this research. In this paper, we investigate the performance of graph visualisations for supporting users’ understanding of causal graphs. Two studies were conducted to compare graph visualisations for understanding causation and identifying confounding variables in a causal graph. The first study results suggest that while adjacency matrix layouts are better for understanding direct causation, node-link diagrams are better for understanding mediated causation along causal paths. The second study revealed that node-link layouts, and in particular layouts created by a radial algorithm, are more effective for identifying confounder and collider variables

Tools for visualization and analysis of molecular networks, pathways, and -omics data.

Biological pathways have become the standard way to represent the coordinated reactions and actions of a series of molecules in a cell. A series of interconnected pathways is referred to as a biological network, which denotes a more holistic view on the entanglement of cellular reactions. Biological pathways and networks are not only an appropriate approach to visualize molecular reactions. They have also become one leading method in -omics data analysis and visualization. Here, we review a set of pathway and network visualization and analysis methods and take a look at potential future developments in the field

Arts-Based Methods for Decolonising Participatory Research

In an effort to challenge the ways in which colonial power relations and Eurocentric knowledges are reproduced in participatory research, this book explores whether and how it is possible to use arts-based methods for creating more horizontal and democratic research practices. In discussing both the transformative potential and limitations of arts-based methods, the book asks: What can arts-based methods contribute to decolonising participatory research and its processes and practices? The book takes part in ongoing debates related to the need to decolonise research, and investigates practical contributions of arts-based methods in the practice-led research domain. Further, it discusses the role of artistic research in depth, locating it in a decolonising context. The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, design, fine arts, service design, social sciences and development studies

Big Data Security (Volume 3)

After a short description of the key concepts of big data the book explores on the secrecy and security threats posed especially by cloud based data storage. It delivers conceptual frameworks and models along with case studies of recent technology

An investigation into achieving visual narration using photochromic dyes on a textile substrate

Photochromic dyes have the unique property of being colourless until exposed to ultraviolet (UV) light. Their application within design has thus far been basic, predominantly developing the medium as it is exposed to natural UV light. Therefore, by exploring the dyes’ colours and movement when printed on a textile substrate and developed by artificial UV light, this thesis investigates their ability to create a form of visual narrative. Using the dyes’ colours to evoke a change in emotion set the parameters for answering this aim. Testing the interactions of the dyes’ colours in sunlight, on a range of substrates and in varied combinations, provided initial knowledge of how they perform in this medium. Whilst the stylistic techniques of French Impressionist films provided configurations with which to explore the movement of the dyes, research on colour showed the diversity of ways in which it is able to be used to express emotion. Two custom built UV LED arrays, manually operated then software driven, enabled the dyes’ development times and intervals to be controlled. Design questions were then answered by combining these factors with the dyes’ fading speeds. Storyboarding photographs became an important part of the analysis and reflection process whilst filming also assisted in observing their transient nature. This work revealed that a new methodology, that was based on placement and sequencing, would be necessary when designing with dyes that move. Design exploration illustrated how using two dyes, from opposite ends of both the fading and emotional spectrum, mixed by printing, could create a colour change, as they faded, when they were developed in a linear sequence. Subsequently, by combining abstract representational imagery with variations on the stylistic film techniques, to alternately develop two dyes, it was illustrated how, by varying their development intervals, these dyes have the potential to create a visual narrative that evokes a change of emotion in the viewer

Planning purposeful imaginative activities in creative contexts for children’s literacy

Although children in primary schools in England are required to write imaginatively in order to gain optimum marks in statutory tests, an emphasis is often placed on revising decontextualised genre features, grammar and spelling. I wondered whether there was a place for creativity and imagination within the apparent constraints of a curriculum for English that had become defined by objectives and teaching procedures imposed by national strategies to raise literacy standards. Using a definition of creativity as purposeful imaginative activity, I set out to explore how teachers could interpret the objectives imaginatively and plan meaningful contexts for literacy, even in a climate of changing curriculum emphases. My thesis reports on three cycles of reflective, collaborative action research focused on literacy planning, in order to theorise meanings in relation to my values, understanding and practice. As a result of the research, approaches to planning sequences of purposeful imaginative activities that embed literacy concepts in meaningful creative contexts are exemplified. Evidence from an analysis of literacy plans for children in classrooms across the primary phase shows that teachers use their professional imaginations to plan their provision for children to read and write imaginatively – their statutory national curriculum entitlement (DfEE, 2000). We found that children’s literacy improves when they dwell in possible worlds as, for example, curators, custodians or concerned villagers, using the powerful resource of their own, and collective, imaginations. In addition, an analysis of drawings revealed evidence of the effort and effect of children’s somatic and affective imaginations. The work is underpinned by theories of: aesthetic appreciation and representation; child-centred, holistic pedagogy; inclusive creative processes; and the imagination as a resource for creating meaning. My ideas have been challenged and developed by academics such as Pat D'Arcy on literacy, Robert Sternberg on creativity, and Ken Robinson on imagination, in particular. As a result of the research, two conceptual tools for planning were developed and tested. They are underpinned by theory and professional experience and have been used effectively in schools during and beyond the research project. Components of the creative process were identified as motivating ideas, associating ideas, generating ideas, innovating ideas and communicating ideas, and became the MAGIC planning tool. Components of the imagination's repertoire were identified as auditory, kinaesthetic, tactile, emotional and visual, and became the AKTEV imagination repertoire. These represent the living education theories that have transformed my practice, and are offered as a contribution to the field of primary English education

Seeing America: Women Photographers between the Wars

Seeing America explores the camera work of five women who directed their visions toward influencing social policy and cultural theory. Taken together, they visually articulated the essential ideas occupying the American consciousness in the years between the world wars. Melissa McEuen examines the work of Doris Ulmann, who made portraits of celebrated artists in urban areas and lesser-known craftspeople in rural places; Dorothea Lange, who magnified human dignity in the midst of poverty and unemployment; Marion Post Wolcott, a steadfast believer in collective strength as the antidote to social ills and the best defense against future challenges; Margaret Bourke-White, who applied avant-garde advertising techniques in her exploration of the human condition; and Berenice Abbott, a devoted observer of the continuous motion and chaotic energy that characterized the modern cityscape. Combining feminist biography with analysis of visual texts, McEuen considers the various prisms though which each woman saw and revealed America. Their documentary photographs were the result of personal visions that had been formed by experiences and emotions as well as by careful calculations and technological processes. These photographers captured the astounding variety of occupations, values, and leisure activities that shaped the nation, and their photographs illuminate the intricate workings of American culture in the 1920s and 1930s. Winner of the 1999 Emily Toth Award for the best feminist study of popular culture given by the Women’s Caucus of the Popular Culture Association Melissa McEuen is an assistant professor of history at Transylvania University. Each short biographical study of these artists and their professional habits charts the evolution of socially conscious photography. —Arkansas Review A treasury of information and analysis. . . . A rich resource for anyone interested in the history of photography, women\u27s history, and American history in general. —Bloomsbury Review The quality in this study rests in McEuen’s ability to synthesize individual creativity with a description of the period, and how these women’s photography played a role in so many aspects of it. —Choice A valiant, well-researched effort to bridge the history of visual culture with American social and political history. —Journal of American History Gives credit to the women who had the unique ability to capture the unfailing human spirit in their images. —Kentucky Monthly Profiles five female photographers, their work, their motivations and their reflection of America. —Lexington Herald-Leader The best books always leave their audience wanting more. That is certainly true of this gem of a work. —Library Journal (starred review) Succeeds in conveying to the reader the remarkable intellectual curiosity and wherewithal of these women, as evidenced by the vibrancy and variety of the their work. —Magill Book Reviews McEuen has contributed an impressively-researched, well-written, and engaging volume, rich in contextual details and appealing to specialists and general readers alike. —NWSA Journal Illuminates both the work and the personalities of the artists—as well as the difficulties of being a woman photographer at the time. —Ohioana Quarterly Opens a window on American culture between the world wars. —Publishers Weekly McEuen looks beyond the image, in this case photographs, to understand who fashioned the image and why. —Register of the Kentucky Historical Societyhttps://uknowledge.uky.edu/upk_womens_studies/1007/thumbnail.jp

Cultures of Citizenship in the Twenty-First Century: Literary and Cultural Perspectives on a Legal Concept

In the early twenty-first century, the concept of citizenship is more contested than ever. As refugees set out to cross the Mediterranean, European nation-states refer to "cultural integrity" and "immigrant inassimilability," revealing citizenship to be much more than a legal concept. The contributors to this volume take an interdisciplinary approach to considering how cultures of citizenship are being envisioned and interrogated in literary and cultural (con)texts. Through this framework, they attend to the tension between the citizen and its spectral others - a tension determined by how a country defines difference at a given moment

Artist as rhetor: strategies for the visual communication of artistic & scientific concepts

The notion that art, like science, contributes to scholarly discourse remains a contentious issue in academic debate. However an increased interest in the visual image within intellectual inquiry and a shift in the scholarly position concerning the image as a valid form of inquiry has provided an avenue in which to argue that art is a legitimate form of knowledge. This argument is premised on the notion that images are significant to both artistic and scientific discourse in that both disciplines have long utilised the image as a means to construct meaning and communicate concepts. Consequently the key insights derived from this study’s research findings are understood through a framework of visual rhetoric. This study, through a constructivist grounded theory approach, presents a substantive theory of the visual image in academic discourse and in doing so advances the understanding that art is an authoritative way of knowing. In this way this study identifies the image, which is the product of an image-making process, as knowledge artefact whereby knowledge exists through a plurality of practices involving both verbal and visual forms of representation. For this study the image-maker is considered significant to the production, representation and dissemination of knowledge. This is because as rhetor the image-maker, whether artisan or artist, utilises the image to bring forth new findings and thus new knowledge