25,489 research outputs found
Public Security vs. Private Self-Protection: Optimal Taxation and the Social Dynamics of Fear
In this paper, we develop a simple model of social dynamics governing the evolution of strategic self-protection choices of boundedly rational potential victims facing the threat of prospective offenders in a large population with random matching. We prove that individual (and socially transmitted) fear of exposure to criminal threats may actually condition choices even in the face of objective evidence of declining crime rates, and thereby cause the eventual selection of Pareto inefficient equilibria with self-protection. We also show that a suitable strategy of provision of public security financed through discriminatory taxation of self-protective expenses may actually overcome this problem, and drive the social dynamics toward the efficient no protection equilibrium. In our model, we do not obtain, as in Cressman et al. (1998), a crowding-out result such that the net impact of public spending on the actual social dynamics is neutral and the economy keeps on cycling between phases of high and low criminal activity with varying levels of self-protection; quite to the contrary, it can be extremely effective in implementing the social optimum, in that it acts primarily on the intangible dimension, that is, on the social dynamics of fear. We claim that this kind of result calls for more interdisciplinary research on the socio-psycho-economic determinants of fear of crime, and for consequent advances in modelling approaches and techniques.Self-Protection, Fear of Crime, Cultural Selection Dynamics, Replicator Dynamics
Modeling Individual Cyclic Variation in Human Behavior
Cycles are fundamental to human health and behavior. However, modeling cycles
in time series data is challenging because in most cases the cycles are not
labeled or directly observed and need to be inferred from multidimensional
measurements taken over time. Here, we present CyHMMs, a cyclic hidden Markov
model method for detecting and modeling cycles in a collection of
multidimensional heterogeneous time series data. In contrast to previous cycle
modeling methods, CyHMMs deal with a number of challenges encountered in
modeling real-world cycles: they can model multivariate data with discrete and
continuous dimensions; they explicitly model and are robust to missing data;
and they can share information across individuals to model variation both
within and between individual time series. Experiments on synthetic and
real-world health-tracking data demonstrate that CyHMMs infer cycle lengths
more accurately than existing methods, with 58% lower error on simulated data
and 63% lower error on real-world data compared to the best-performing
baseline. CyHMMs can also perform functions which baselines cannot: they can
model the progression of individual features/symptoms over the course of the
cycle, identify the most variable features, and cluster individual time series
into groups with distinct characteristics. Applying CyHMMs to two real-world
health-tracking datasets -- of menstrual cycle symptoms and physical activity
tracking data -- yields important insights including which symptoms to expect
at each point during the cycle. We also find that people fall into several
groups with distinct cycle patterns, and that these groups differ along
dimensions not provided to the model. For example, by modeling missing data in
the menstrual cycles dataset, we are able to discover a medically relevant
group of birth control users even though information on birth control is not
given to the model.Comment: Accepted at WWW 201
As the Cursor Blinks: Electronic Scholarship and Undergraduates in the Library
published or submitted for publicatio
Organizational time: a dialectical view
We present twelve propositions constituting a contribution to a contingency view of time in organizations and synthesize apparently opposite perspectives of time. To articulate them, we relate the planning, action and improvisation strategic orientations to the dependent, independent and interdependent perspectives of the environment. Then, we relate these strategic orientations related to approaches to the problems of scheduling, synchronization and time allocation. Action strategies rely on event time to handle scheduling, use entrainment to synchronize with their environment and view time as linear. Planning strategies use even time to handle scheduling, impose their internal pacing upon the environment and view time as cyclic. Improvisation strategies use even-event time to handle scheduling, synchronize via internal-external pacing and hold a spiral view of time. Our argument strengthens the case for a more deliberate approach to time in organizations and favors a dialectical view of organizational phenomena.action, contingency, dialectics, improvisation, planning, synthesis, time
Graph Signal Processing: Overview, Challenges and Applications
Research in Graph Signal Processing (GSP) aims to develop tools for
processing data defined on irregular graph domains. In this paper we first
provide an overview of core ideas in GSP and their connection to conventional
digital signal processing. We then summarize recent developments in developing
basic GSP tools, including methods for sampling, filtering or graph learning.
Next, we review progress in several application areas using GSP, including
processing and analysis of sensor network data, biological data, and
applications to image processing and machine learning. We finish by providing a
brief historical perspective to highlight how concepts recently developed in
GSP build on top of prior research in other areas.Comment: To appear, Proceedings of the IEE
The Realm of Things Culinary. Anthropological Recipes
The text is a presentation of an anthropological project of research on
culinaries constructed in such a way to be accessible also to practitioners of other
disciplines of the humanities. The proposed range of topics was embedded in four
general discourses: the temporal discourse, the spatial discourse, the discourse
of identity and the discourse of cultural trends. These discourses may fulfill the
role of cultural categories (as interpreted by Gurevich),and thus be descriptive and
interpretative tools. Investigation of the cultural phenomenon of things culinary
does not pertain only to those them; it also reveals various âfacesâ of culture in
the era of fluid modernity
The rationale for increasing the theoretical understanding on the basic concepts of economic theory
The issues dealing with the process of making rational decisions in the production and consumption, an accurate assessment of results and costs in the economy have been the focus of attention for many generations of economists. Assessment of results and costs in the economy are always associated with consideration of the prices for different types of resources. However, some underlying aspects of prices still require further comprehensive consideration. By now, the economic essence of such basic concepts of economic theory as money, price, and utility have not been studied thoroughly, on an appropriate theoretical level. Therefore, one cannot provide a monistic theoretical justification for many economic phenomena such economic processes as forecasting prices for economic resources, optimization of the market economy operation according to the theories of economic welfare, social (collective) choice, general equilibrium, etc. This study aims to increase the theoretical understanding of the basic concepts of economic theory, which would enable to eliminate inconsistencies and contradictions in their interpretation at the fundamental and applied levels of research.
The methods of scientific abstraction, system and comparative analysis of mathematical models aiming to establish their possible inconsistency and incompatibility, a logical method, as well as economic and mathematical modeling were used as a methodological basis of the research. Upon conducting a comparative analysis of economic and mathematical models that describe the foundations of the economy, we identified their logical inconsistency and discrepancies with the underlying nature of prices, money and utility.
Having analyzed utility functions and the âfunction of social or aggregated utilityâ, we proved the need for changing the traditional form of these functions, the need to introduce new phenomena, both individual utility functions and social utility functions that consider the system (emergent) characteristics of the economy. The authors propose considering the system (emergent) characteristics of the economy as: the matrix structure of the economy and the limited cyclic-temporal potential of its lifespan. We believe that the focus on the system (emergent) content characteristic of the nature of prices will allow a more accurate prediction and regulation of their future dynamics, and this will also enable to overcome one of the main contradictions of economic theory between the theoretical basis of consumer choices that are made according to utility values and the practical basis of these choices which are always made according to cost parameters.peer-reviewe
Evolutionary consequences of behavioral diversity
Iterated games provide a framework to describe social interactions among
groups of individuals. Recent work stimulated by the discovery of
"zero-determinant" strategies has rapidly expanded our ability to analyze such
interactions. This body of work has primarily focused on games in which players
face a simple binary choice, to "cooperate" or "defect". Real individuals,
however, often exhibit behavioral diversity, varying their input to a social
interaction both qualitatively and quantitatively. Here we explore how access
to a greater diversity of behavioral choices impacts the evolution of social
dynamics in finite populations. We show that, in public goods games, some
two-choice strategies can nonetheless resist invasion by all possible
multi-choice invaders, even while engaging in relatively little punishment. We
also show that access to greater behavioral choice results in more "rugged "
fitness landscapes, with populations able to stabilize cooperation at multiple
levels of investment, such that choice facilitates cooperation when returns on
investments are low, but hinders cooperation when returns on investments are
high. Finally, we analyze iterated rock-paper-scissors games, whose
non-transitive payoff structure means unilateral control is difficult and
zero-determinant strategies do not exist in general. Despite this, we find that
a large portion of multi-choice strategies can invade and resist invasion by
strategies that lack behavioral diversity -- so that even well-mixed
populations will tend to evolve behavioral diversity.Comment: 26 pages, 4 figure
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Market Structure and Energy Efficiency: The Case of New Commercial Buildings
This is a report on why commercial office buildings arenât more energy efficient. Several decades of energy efficiency programs have resulted in some gains, but overall increases in the energy efficiency of buildings have fallen far short of the 30 to 50 percent improvement that many efficiency advocates believe is possible. The purpose of this study is to consider the âwhyâ question by empirically examining the dynamics of new commercial building markets. To do so, the authors used multiple research techniques, including qualitative field observation and interview methods that allow for a more in-depth understanding of complicated market processes. Their research focused primarily on new office buildings and centered in four regional markets: Sacramento, San Francisco, Seattle, and Portland. The authors identify key dynamics of commercial office building markets, describe how change and innovation occurs in commercial development, discuss the implications for energy efficiency, and suggest next steps
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