Traveler Responses to Real-Time Transit Passenger Information Systems

In recent years, a considerable amount of money has been spent on Real-time Transit Passenger Information Systems (RTPISs), which provide timely and accurate transit information to current and potential riders to enable them to make better pre-trip and en-route decisions. Understanding traveler responses to real-time transit information is critical for designing such services and evaluating their effectiveness. To answer this question, an effort is made in this dissertation to systematically conceptualize a variety of behavioral and psychological responses travelers may undertake to real-time transit information and empirically examine the causal effects of real-time information on traveler behavior and psychology. This research takes ShuttleTrac, a newly implemented real-time bus arrival information system for UMD's Shuttle-UM service, as a case for empirical study. In Part 1 analysis, using panel datasets derived from three-waved online campus transportation surveys, fixed-effects OLS models and random-effects ordered probit models are estimated to sort out causal relations between ShuttleTrac information use and general/cumulative behavioral and psychological outcomes. In addition, a two-stage instrumental variable model was estimated to examine the potential change in habitual mode choices due to real-time transit information use. The results show that with a few months of adjustment, travelers may increase their trip-making frequency as a result of real-time transit information use, and positive psychological outcomes are more prominent in both short and longer terms. In Part 2 analyses, using the cross-sectional dataset derived from the onboard survey, OLS models and ordered logit models were estimated to examine the trip-specific psychological effects of real-time transit information. The results show that these trip-specific psychological effects of real-time transit information do exist in expected directions and they vary among user groups and in different scenarios. A finding consistent across two parts of analyses is that accuracy of information plays a greater role in determining traveler behavior and psychology than the mere presence. This research contributes to the general discussion on traveler behavior under advanced information by 1) developing an integrative conceptual framework; and 2) providing useful insights into the issue with much empirical evidences obtained with revealed-preference data and sophisticated modeling techniques

Analysis of Chinese travel blogs of New Zealand

The Chinese outbound tourism market is a fast growing source market for many destinations. However, more research is needed to better understand the Chinese outbound tourism market and its diversity and complexity. Again, it can be argued that consistent monitoring of what is a fast evolving market is required, even where prior research has been undertaken. The aim of this research is to provide the tourism industry with a better understanding of the Chinese tourist market and the attitudes of Chinese visitors with specific reference to New Zealand. Consequently perceived destination image, travel motivations, and patterns of online communications of and about New Zealand were identified by analysing travel blogs written by Chinese tourists. Given that there were 181 million bloggers existing in China by the end of 2009 (CNNIC, 2009), blogs written by Chinese visitors have a significant market value for tourism organisations and marketers. This study used content analysis to identify the perceived destination image held by Chinese tourists to New Zealand. In this study, the analytical process was divided into two parts, namely photographic and textual analysis. In each of the two parts, qualitative content analysis was first undertaken, and then followed by secondary quantitative analysis to support the findings discerned through the qualitative process. By analysing 6968 photographs and 408 blog entries posted by Chinese visitors, an image of New Zealand as a tourism destination was identified. The findings revealed that the main components of New Zealand, as perceived by Chinese visitors, were that it possessed a protected ecological environment, offered a variety of activities, and had a highly developed society with a “Pakeha” culture. The research also indicated that Chinese cultural norms played an important role in the process of decision making, perception formation and interpretation. These norms included the desire of harmony, Li, Junzi Aspiration, and a respect of authorities. The results of the study also included details about travel patterns in dining, accommodation, and tourism activities. These results indicated that content analysis of visual and textual materials provides rich information about perceived destination image, travel preference, and online information search behaviours. Online photographs and narratives posted by visitors are not only valuable information source for potential visitors who read the blogs, but can also be an effective way to understand the Chinese market. Based on the results, it can be concluded that blogs are important, and point a way by which destination marketing organisations can seek to influence potential visitors. For example, blog celebrities are an effective way by which to attract thousands of readers to know more about the country. The use of the Chinese language and creating special arrangements for Chinese festivals are shown to be effective means by which hosts can display a friendly attitude to their Chinese guests. With more and more countries being granted Approved Destination Status (ADS) by the Chinese government, Chinese citizens have more choices as to where to travel overseas, thereby intensifying competition for their custom. It is vital for tourism destinations to promote their unique features through all possible channels according to different target markets. Additionally, because service quality is a crucial issue for group tourists, consistent monitoring the travel blogs is an effective way of facilitating the improvement of the service quality of tourism product suppliers

Smuggling in theories and practices of contemporary visual culture

The term smuggling has, for the most part, functioned in critical theory and visual culture only as an arch-metaphor. It conveniently carries discourse unproblematically and invisibly across impasses and between bodies of incompatible work. Alternatively, it is all too visible and taken for granted as romantic stereotype. In the thesis, contraband and smuggling are examined for their complexity beyond these omissions and over-determinations in their theorization and circulation in literary and visual cultures. Secrecies, emergences and partial visibilities of smuggling are considered for how they disrupt dominant modes of vision, such as the scopic geometry of border checkpoints and simplistic representative mappings of territory that assign fixed cultural identities and positionalities. The thesis proposes that contraband subjectivities produce new ways of being-in-the-world, critical perspectives and modes of mobility, as well as providing a toolbox for examining ways that art practice negotiates between its visibility and its constitutive secrecy. The simplistic, unimpeded scopic structuring of the border drama between smuggler and customs/Law, that often becomes ensnared in systematic psychoanalytic and socio-anthropologic readings, is contested, and instead proposed as a site of variability; of partial visibilities, knowledges and meanings. Smuggling, rarely considered in postcolonial theory, is put forward as a mediating installation and subjective occupation of a space that began to be opened up through the oscillating veil theorized, by amongst others, Frantz Fanon. The argument attempts to move beyond the screening of contraband towards another form of mobility that is most subtly expressed through the baroque notion of the fold theorized by Gilles Deleuze (after Leibniz) and that suggests forms of dissimulation that go beyond surface and towards productive secrecy. In a case study that examines a very overt, literal form of smuggling in Colombia it is suggested that secrecy must be built back into conceptions of contrabanding for it to be, at least in part, visually comprehensible. New ways of thinking contraband, for instance in alliance with law and as public secrecy, are examined for how they form relational counter-cartographies and singular fields of operation that might be taken up by art practices. The capacity for critical theorists to get close to affective contraband milieu through visual material becomes a measure of how they themselves perform as smugglers

Using hierarchical folders and tags for file management

Hierarchical folders have been widely used for managing digital files. A well constructed hierarchical structure can keep files organized. A parent folder can have several subfolders and one subfolder can only reside in one parent folder. Files are stored in folders or subfolders. Files can be found by traversing a given path, going through different levels of folders and subfolders. Folders can be moved, renamed, copied and deleted to serve the needs of the changing working environment. However, previous research has revealed several problems with hierarchical folder structures. One important problem is that users frequently have to turn to desktop search to re-find files. Tagging is the activity of applying users’ own descriptors to digital objects, such as web pages, photos, and documents. Compared with traditional indexing which enforces a controlled vocabulary, tagging systems give users freedom in describing digital resources. We believe that tagging may have the potential to improve information navigation and information organization. This research aimed at exploring the possibility of incorporating tagging into the hierarchical folder structure for file management, especially for the process of file organization and file re-finding.We studied users’ behavior and preference of using three file management structures, a hierarchical folder structure, a tagging structure, and a hybrid structure with both hierarchical folder and tagging functionalities. We found that using tag alone or using folder alone generated similar results in file organization time, in file re-finding time and in answer correctness. Combining folders and tags resulted in longer file organization time but no improvement in file re-finding efficiency. The tagging structure required the least number of mouse clicks in the re-finding process among the three structures. The primary contribution of the study is a comparison of three file management structures for better organizing and re-finding files in the desktop environment. Advantages and disadvantages of each structure were revealed from the study. Users’ preference among the three structures was compared. Both quantitative and qualitative research methods were used in the research. This work will provide design implications for future file management tools.Ph.D., Information Science and Technology -- Drexel University, 201

Taking the ‘poo’ out of ‘pool’: participatory systems modelling as a decision-support tool for even the messiest public environmental health problems

It is widely recognised that environmental health services and interventions operate in dynamically complex systems. Environmental health researchers and practitioners work to solve complex problems yet continue to favour methods that eschew the concept of complexity. Conventional quantitative risk assessment methods used in environmental health, while valuable, are often based on studies that examine the effects of individual environmental hazards in isolation. They do not examine a system that leads to adverse environmental health outcomes, such as disease outbreaks.In this research, I explored the applicability of participatory system dynamic modelling as a means of assisting environmental health decision-makers in the management of dynamically complex infectious diseases. Using cryptosporidiosis in South East Queensland as a case study, I applied system dynamic modelling techniques to explore the population-level drivers of Cryptosporidium transmission in the study area, with a particular focus on the role of public aquatic facilities (i.e. public swimming pools).This research was conducted in three stages. This first involved an extensive review of the literature on complexity and environmental health service delivery, decision-making for complex environmental health problems, and system dynamic modelling. This review highlighted current challenges environmental health decision-makers face when developing policies and interventions and identified ways in which system dynamic models can assist in overcoming some of these.\ua0The second stage involved a participatory system modelling exercise, informed by a series of stakeholder consultation workshops and interviews. This process identified a series of interconnected drivers and barriers to Cryptosporidium transmission in South East Queensland and emphasised the often-overlooked role of the primary health care sector, as well as overseas travel, in local transmission dynamics. It also uncovered multiple interconnected feedback loops within the system that cross sectoral boundaries, highlighting the need for multisectoral collaboration to address Cryptosporidium outbreaks. These feedback loops were captured in a causal loop diagram.Lastly, a quantitative system dynamic model was constructed to simulate the relationships identified in the participatory system modelling exercise, and empirically test a range of policy options to improve the management of cryptosporidiosis in the study area. The modelling process identified several policy-relevant insights, including (1) unclear guidelines for the management of disease risk associated with swimming pool water, (2) the non-cyclic nature of a seemingly cyclical pattern of cryptosporidiosis notifications, and, (3) the relative effectiveness of primary versus secondary outbreak prevention strategies in the overall management of cryptosporidiosis. \ua0\ua0\ua0\ua0\ua0 \ua0The implications and contributions of this study are two-fold. The insights mentioned above call into question many commonly held assumptions about community-level Cryptosporidium transmission dynamics. From a local perspective, the model provides a platform for stakeholders and decision-makers to tests these assumptions in a locally-relevant context. It also uncovered previously unexplored leverage points within the system, particularly those related to the primary healthcare sector that can be used to improve the management of cryptosporidiosis. More broadly, this research contributes to the body of evidence supporting the benefits of applying system dynamic modelling to understand and manage complex environmental health problems

Traveler's Next Activity Predication with Location-Based Social Network Data

Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2022The rise of technology and the internet provides powerful means for people from all around the world to communicate and connect with one another. Online social network platforms become go- to places for users to express and share their individuality, which includes choice of activities, locations, and associated timestamps. In turn, their opinions affect the point of view of others, who are in their online friendship circle. Users’ increasing usage of social networks help accumulate massive amount of data that can be further explored. Particularly, this type of data attracts and allows researchers, who are interested in studying and understanding how social factors and previous experience influence user behavior in terms of activity-related travel choice. In this paper, the goal is to utilize such rich data sources to build a model that predicts user next activity. Such model contributes a powerful tool for integrating the location prediction with transportation planning and operations processes. Besides, it is valuable in commercial applications to create better recommendation systems with higher accuracy and ultimately attract more customers to partnering businesses. By studying the dataset, which contains millions of historical check-ins from thousands of users, it is possible to derive information that is useful in predicting user next activity. The proposed approach applies machine learning techniques on the collected features to deliver highly accurate prediction results with fast training and prediction time

Texas Law Review

Journal containing articles, notes, book reviews, and other analyses of law and legal cases

University catalog, 2018-19

Welcome to the University of Missouri 2018-2019 catalog! We are pleased to provide an interactive and searchable catalog online. The catalog is a comprehensive reference for your academic studies. It includes a list of all degree programs offered at MU, including bachelors, masters, specialists, doctorates, minors, certificates, and emphasis areas. It details the university wide requirements, the curricular requirements for each program, and in some cases provides a sample plan of study. The catalog includes a complete listing and description of approved courses. It also provides information on academic policies, contact information for supporting offices, and a complete listing of faculty members. Information in the catalog is current as of May 2018.--Page 17