Electronically Manufactured Law

This Article seeks to strengthen the case for the academy and the legal profession to pay heed to the consequences of the shift to electronic research, primarily by employing cognitive psychology to guide predictions about the impacts of the shift and, thereby, address a perceived credibility gap. This credibility gap arises from the difficulty and imprecision in postulating how changes in the research process translate into changes in researcher behavior and research outcomes. Applying principles of cognitive psychology to compare the print and electronic research processes provides an analytical basis for connecting changes in the research process with changes in researcher behavior and research outcomes. Cognitive psychology generates two specific predictions about how electronic research will change the law. First, electronic research will lead to increased diversity in framing -- divergence in the selection of the legal theory or theories through which to conceptualize facts, arguments, and cases. Second, electronic research will lead to more tilting at windmills -- the advancement of marginal cases, theories, and arguments. The Article explores how an increase in diversity in framing and tilting at windmills could affect the legal profession and the law. For example, in an adversarial system, judicial options for case resolution are largely defined and constrained by the theories proffered by counsel. Diversity in framing could expand judicial authority by providing judges with a wider variety of options for dispute resolution. This underlines the way in which counsel serve as gatekeepers by exercising judgment about which cases and theories have sufficient merit to warrant pursuit. Increased tilting at windmills may require recalibration of the existing limits placed on lawyers in their role as gatekeepers. Recalibration may be necessary to prevent the dedication of client and judicial resources to lost causes spurred by lapses in judgment related to electronic research and to allow attorneys to advance, without fear of sanctions, thoughtful arguments designed to push doctrinal boundaries. Specifically, Part II reviews existing legal theory, scholarship, and data that suggest that the shift to electronic research will likely have broad-ranging impacts. Part III compares print and electronic research and discusses three particularly salient changes in research process: (1) electronic researchers are not guided by the key system to the same extent as print researchers when identifying relevant theories, principles, and cases; (2) electronic researchers do not encounter and interpret individual cases through the lens of key system information to the same extent as print researchers; and (3) electronic researchers are exposed to more and different case texts than print researchers. Part IV uses principles of cognitive psychology to examine these process differences and predict two major non-process consequences of the shift to electronic research: increased diversity in framing and tilting at windmills. Part V concludes by assessing the broader significance of these hypothesized consequences

A review of the characteristics of 108 author-level bibliometric indicators

An increasing demand for bibliometric assessment of individuals has led to a growth of new bibliometric indicators as well as new variants or combinations of established ones. The aim of this review is to contribute with objective facts about the usefulness of bibliometric indicators of the effects of publication activity at the individual level. This paper reviews 108 indicators that can potentially be used to measure performance on the individual author level, and examines the complexity of their calculations in relation to what they are supposed to reflect and ease of end-user application.Comment: to be published in Scientometrics, 201

How the EAT-Lancet commission report 'Food in the Anthropocene' influenced discourse and research on food systems: a systematic review covering the first two years post-publication

In 2019, the EAT–Lancet Commission's report on food in the Anthropocene presented a planetary heath diet to improve health while reducing the environmental effect of food systems globally. We assessed EAT–Lancet's immediate influence on academic research and debate by conducting a systematic review of articles citing the Commission and others published from January, 2019, to April, 2021. The Commission influenced methods, results, or discourse for 192 (7·5%) of 2560 citing articles, stimulating cross-disciplinary research and debate across life sciences (47%), health and medical sciences (42%), and social sciences (11%). Sentiment analysis of 76 critiquing articles indicated that opinions were, on average, more positive than negative. Positive sentiments centred on benefits for informing policy, public health, and raising public awareness. Negative sentiments included insufficient attention to socioeconomic dimensions, feasibility, and environmental effects other than emissions. Empirical articles predominantly evaluated the effects of changed diets or food production on the environment and wellbeing (29%), compared current diets with EAT–Lancet recommendations (12%), or informed future policy and research agendas (20%). Despite limitations in EAT–Lancet's method, scope, and implementation feasibility, the academic community supported these recommendations. A broad suite of research needs was identified focusing on the effects of food processing, socioeconomic and political drivers of diet and health, and optimising consumption or production for environment and health

Using citation tracking for systematic literature searching - study protocol for a scoping review of methodological studies and a Delphi study

Background: Up-to-date guidance on comprehensive study identification for systematic reviews is crucial. According to current recommendations, systematic searching should combine electronic database searching with supplementary search methods. One such supplementary search method is citation tracking. It aims at collecting directly and/or indirectly cited and citing references from "seed references". Tailored and evidence-guided recommendations concerning the use of citation tracking are strongly needed. Objective: We intend to develop recommendations for the use of citation tracking in systematic literature searching for health-related topics. Our study will be guided by the following research questions: What is the benefit of citation tracking for systematic literature searching for health-related topics? Which methods, citation indexes, and other tools are used for citation tracking? What terminology is used for citation tracking methods? Methods: Our study will have two parts: a scoping review and a Delphi study. The scoping review aims at identifying methodological studies on the benefit and use of citation tracking in systematic literature searching for health-related topics with no restrictions on study design, language, and publication date. We will perform database searching in MEDLINE (Ovid), CINAHL (EBSCOhost), Web of Science Core Collection, two information science databases, web searching, and contact experts in the field. Two reviewers will independently perform study selection. We will conduct direct backward and forward citation tracking on included articles. Data from included studies will be extracted using a prespecified extraction sheet and presented in both tabular and narrative form. The results of the scoping review will inform the subsequent Delphi study through which we aim to derive consensus recommendations for the future practice and research of citation tracking

Visual approaches to knowledge organization and contextual exploration

This thesis explores possible visual approaches for the representation of semantic structures, such as zz-structures. Some holistic visual representations of complex domains have been investigated through the proposal of new views - the so-called zz-views - that allow both to make visible the interconnections between elements and to support a contextual and multilevel exploration of knowledge. The potential of this approach has been examined in the context of two case studies that have led to the creation of two Web applications. The \ufb01rst domain of study regarded the visual representation, analysis and management of scienti\ufb01c bibliographies. In this context, we modeled a Web application, we called VisualBib, to support researchers in building, re\ufb01ning, analyzing and sharing bibliographies. We adopted a multi-faceted approach integrating features that are typical of three di\ufb00erent classes of tools: bibliography visual analysis systems, bibliographic citation indexes and personal research assistants. The evaluation studies carried out on a \ufb01rst prototype highlighted the positive impact of our visual model and encouraged us to improve it and develop further visual analysis features we incorporated in the version 3.0 of the application. The second case study concerned the modeling and development of a multimedia catalog of Web and mobile applications. The objective was to provide an overview of a significant number of tools that can help teachers in the implementation of active learning approaches supported by technology and in the design of Teaching and Learning Activities (TLAs). We analyzed and documented 281 applications, preparing for each of them a detailed multilingual card and a video-presentation, organizing all the material in an original purpose-based taxonomy, visually represented through a browsable holistic view. The catalog, we called AppInventory, provides contextual exploration mechanisms based on zz-structures, collects user contributions and evaluations about the apps and o\ufb00ers visual analysis tools for the comparison of the applications data and user evaluations. The results of two user studies carried out on groups of teachers and students shown a very positive impact of our proposal in term of graphical layout, semantic structure, navigation mechanisms and usability, also in comparison with two similar catalogs

Comparing sustainability transition labs across process, effects and impacts: Insights from Canada and Sweden

Purposeful transformative change on a level of societal systems, structures and practices is called for in response to contemporary sustainability challenges. Sustainability transition labs and arenas represent a particular set of governance innovations seeking to foster systemic change based on deliberate engagement of multiple actors around complex issues of concern. Most labs aim for long-term contributions in addressing persistent societal challenges and transitioning into sustainability, yet are seldomly evaluated on whether, how and to what extents such contributions become realised in practice. In this paper, we further an analytical framework for comparatively analysing sustainability transition labs and arenas with emphasis on their processes, effects and impacts. The framework is applied on two cases: Energy Futures Lab initiated in Alberta, Canada and the arenas for a Fossil Independent West Sweden - Climate 2030. In particular, the comparison showcases how contextual difference in terms of urgency and turbulence may influence lab activities and how ownership and governance conditions may influence the various directions outputs, effects and wider impacts took. The comparison further illuminates how backcasting and the multi-level perspective may serve as complementary frameworks and tools in lab processes, whose respective role may depend on aspiration and context. We end the paper by providing a series of key considerations in furthering the comparative analytical framework and its application in practice. They orient around the three guiding questions on the why\u27s, what\u27s, and how\u27s of doing comparative research on sustainability transition arenas and labs across their processes, effects and impacts

Citations versus expert opinions: Citation analysis of Featured Reviews of the American Mathematical Society

Peer review and citation metrics are two means of gauging the value of scientific research, but the lack of publicly available peer review data makes the comparison of these methods difficult. Mathematics can serve as a useful laboratory for considering these questions because as an exact science, there is a narrow range of reasons for citations. In mathematics, virtually all published articles are post-publication reviewed by mathematicians in Mathematical Reviews (MathSciNet) and so the data set was essentially the Web of Science mathematics publications from 1993 to 2004. For a decade, especially important articles were singled out in Mathematical Reviews for featured reviews. In this study, we analyze the bibliometrics of elite articles selected by peer review and by citation count. We conclude that the two notions of significance described by being a featured review article and being highly cited are distinct. This indicates that peer review and citation counts give largely independent determinations of highly distinguished articles. We also consider whether hiring patterns of subfields and mathematicians' interest in subfields reflect subfields of featured review or highly cited articles. We reexamine data from two earlier studies in light of our methods for implications on the peer review/citation count relationship to a diversity of disciplines.Comment: 21 pages, 3 figures, 4 table