Behavioral Economics and Developmental Science: A New Framework to Support Early Childhood Interventions

Public policies have actively responded to an emergent social and neuroscientific evidence base documenting the benefits of targeting services to children during the earliest period of their development. But problems of low utilization, inconsistent participation, and low retention continue to present themselves as challenges. Although most interventions recognize and address structural and psycho-social barriers to parent’s engagement, few take seriously the decision making roles of parents. Using insights from the behavioral sciences, we revisit assumptions about the presumed behavior of parents in a developmental context. We then describe ways in which this framework informs features of interventions that can be designed to augment the intended impacts of early development, education and care initiatives by improving parent engagement

A document-like software visualization method for effective cognition of c-based software systems

It is clear that maintenance is a crucial and very costly process in a software life cycle. Nowadays there are a lot of software systems particularly legacy systems that are always maintained from time to time as new requirements arise. One important source to understand a software system before it is being maintained is through the documentation, particularly system documentation. Unfortunately, not all software systems developed or maintained are accompanied with their reliable and updated documents. In this case, source codes will be the only reliable source for programmers. A number of studies have been carried out in order to assist cognition based on source codes. One way is through tool automation via reverse engineering technique in which source codes will be parsed and the information extracted will be visualized using certain visualization methods. Most software visualization methods use graph as the main element to represent extracted software artifacts. Nevertheless, current methods tend to produce more complicated graphs and do not grant an explicit, document-like re-documentation environment. Hence, this thesis proposes a document-like software visualization method called DocLike Modularized Graph (DMG). The method is realized in a prototype tool named DocLike Viewer that targets on C-based software systems. The main contribution of the DMG method is to provide an explicit structural re-document mechanism in the software visualization tool. Besides, the DMG method provides more level of information abstractions via less complex graph that include inter-module dependencies, inter-program dependencies, procedural abstraction and also parameter passing. The DMG method was empirically evaluated based on the Goal/Question/Metric (GQM) paradigm and the findings depict that the method can improve productivity and quality in the aspect of cognition or program comprehension. A usability study was also conducted and DocLike Viewer had the most positive responses from the software practitioners

Fundamental structures of dynamic social networks

Social systems are in a constant state of flux with dynamics spanning from minute-by-minute changes to patterns present on the timescale of years. Accurate models of social dynamics are important for understanding spreading of influence or diseases, formation of friendships, and the productivity of teams. While there has been much progress on understanding complex networks over the past decade, little is known about the regularities governing the micro-dynamics of social networks. Here we explore the dynamic social network of a densely-connected population of approximately 1000 individuals and their interactions in the network of real-world person-to-person proximity measured via Bluetooth, as well as their telecommunication networks, online social media contacts, geo-location, and demographic data. These high-resolution data allow us to observe social groups directly, rendering community detection unnecessary. Starting from 5-minute time slices we uncover dynamic social structures expressed on multiple timescales. On the hourly timescale, we find that gatherings are fluid, with members coming and going, but organized via a stable core of individuals. Each core represents a social context. Cores exhibit a pattern of recurring meetings across weeks and months, each with varying degrees of regularity. Taken together, these findings provide a powerful simplification of the social network, where cores represent fundamental structures expressed with strong temporal and spatial regularity. Using this framework, we explore the complex interplay between social and geospatial behavior, documenting how the formation of cores are preceded by coordination behavior in the communication networks, and demonstrating that social behavior can be predicted with high precision.Comment: Main Manuscript: 16 pages, 4 figures. Supplementary Information: 39 pages, 34 figure

Exploring Research through Design in Animal-Computer Interaction

This paper explores Research through Design (RtD) as a potential methodology for developing new interactive experiences for animals. We present an example study from an on-going project and examine whether RtD offers an appropriate framework for developing knowledge in the context of Animal-Computer Interaction, as well as considering how best to document such work. We discuss the design journey we undertook to develop interactive systems for captive elephants and the extent to which RtD has enabled us to explore concept development and documentation of research. As a result of our explorations, we propose that particular aspects of RtD can help ACI researchers gain fresh perspectives on the design of technology-enabled devices for non-human animals. We argue that these methods of working can support the investigation of particular and complex situations where no idiomatic interactions yet exist, where collaborative practice is desirable and where the designed objects themselves offer a conceptual window for future research and development

Twenty years of "Lipid World": a fertile partnership with David Deamer

"The Lipid World" was published in 2001, stemming from a highly effective collaboration with David Deamer during a sabbatical year 20 years ago at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel. The present review paper highlights the benefits of this scientific interaction and assesses the impact of the lipid world paper on the present understanding of the possible roles of amphiphiles and their assemblies in the origin of life. The lipid world is defined as a putative stage in the progression towards life's origin, during which diverse amphiphiles or other spontaneously aggregating small molecules could have concurrently played multiple key roles, including compartment formation, the appearance of mutually catalytic networks, molecular information processing, and the rise of collective self-reproduction and compositional inheritance. This review brings back into a broader perspective some key points originally made in the lipid world paper, stressing the distinction between the widely accepted role of lipids in forming compartments and their expanded capacities as delineated above. In the light of recent advancements, we discussed the topical relevance of the lipid worldview as an alternative to broadly accepted scenarios, and the need for further experimental and computer-based validation of the feasibility and implications of the individual attributes of this point of view. Finally, we point to possible avenues for exploring transition paths from small molecule-based noncovalent structures to more complex biopolymer-containing proto-cellular systems.711473 - Minerva Foundation; 80NSSC17K0295, 80NSSC17K0296, 1724150 - National Science FoundationPublished versio

Nursing Students\u27 Self-Efficacy and Attitude: Examining the Influence ofthe Omaha System In Nurse Managed Centers

Self-efficacy, or confidence, as an outcome behavior has been identified as influencing nursing job satisfaction and retention. Clinical learning environments and teaching strategies that build and support perceived self-efficacy are critical aspects of preparing new nurses for their entry and continuing role as professional nurses in today\u27s information-intensive data-management healthcare environment. The purpose of this pre-test post-test study is to measure, using the C-scale (Grundy, 1992), nursing students\u27 self-efficacy to perform patient assessment in Nurse Managed Centers (NMC) after one semester of using the Omaha System documentation framework. Nursing students\u27 attitudes of preparation for using Standardized Nursing Languages (SNL) in the future was also examined. Bandura\u27s (1977, 19986) theoretical model of self-efficacy provided the conceptual framework. Students\u27 overall self-efficacy scores increased significantly over the 12 week study. Use of the Omaha System \u27prepared a little\u27 to \u27very prepared\u27 90% of student nurses for future use of SNL. Continued use of the Omaha System documentation framework in Nurse Managed Center clinicals as a tool for understanding SNL is recommended.

Inflation and Unemployment in the Long Run

We study the long-run relation between money, measured by inflation or interest rates, and unemployment. We first discuss data, documenting a strong positive relation between the variables at low frequencies. We then develop a framework where both money and unemployment are modeled using explicit micro-foundations, integrating and extending recent work in macro and monetary economics, and providing a unified theory to analyze labor and goods markets. We calibrate the model, to ask how monetary factors account quantitatively for low-frequency labor market behavior. The answer depends on two key parameters: the elasticity of money demand, which translates monetary policy to real balances and profits; and the value of leisure, which affects the transmission from profits to entry and employment. For conservative parameterizations, money accounts for some but not that much of trend unemployment — by one measure, about 1/5 of the increase during the stagflation episode of the 70s can be explained by monetary policy alone. For less conservative but still reasonable parameters, money accounts for almost all low-frequency movement in unemployment over the last half century.inflation, unemployment, search

Developing A Theory of Change

This is a best practice to obtain clarity about what needs to happen to achieve and sustain the changes, or outcomes, that want to be seen (mapping the outcome pathways to success) and to identify who (people or institutions) can influence these outcomes positively or negatively (mapping the activity ecosystem). It sets the framework for identifying impact, intermediary outcome and process indicators