POVERTY AND THE MANAGEMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES:A MODEL OF SHIFTING CULTIVATION

It is frequently asserted in the environment/development literature that severe poverty causes the neglect of worthwhile investments, resulting in deforestation and other resource degradation. While microeconomic theory does suggest a relationship between poverty and the evaluation of investments, the environmental impact is not so simple. This paper develops a dynamic theory of “shifting cultivation,” with special attention to an environmental impact variable: the length of time a given field is cultivated before a shift to the next. The model indicates that poverty reduction will lead in some ways to accelerated extraction of a natural resource, but also to a longer extraction period. The results therefore provide support for claims of an indirect environmental benefit from the primary goal of alleviating rural poverty. The impact of discount rates, prices, and other parameters are also explored.

The Relationship Between Social Cognition and Social Behavior of Young Adults with Autism Spectrum Disorder Using the UCLA PEERS® for Young Adults Social Skill Program

Research indicates that social communication impairments are a defining and persistent feature of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2022). Social communication consists of what an individual knows about social skills (i.e., social cognition) and how they observably respond in social situations (i.e., social behavior). It is difficult to gain a comprehensive assessment of social communication because social cognition assessments are prone to inaccuracies due to poor metacognitive skills in individuals with ASD (DeBrabander et al., 2021; Cederlund et al., 2010; Vickerstaff et al., 2006). Inaccurate reporting of social cognition leads to potential discrepancies in observable social behavior (Vickerstaff et al., 2006; White et al., 2015). Thus, the relationship between social cognition and observable social behavior is not well understood (White et al., 2015). This within-subjects research design study aims to investigate the relationship between social cognition and social behavior in young adults with ASD and to test the effectiveness of the PEERS® for Young Adults social skill program in improving social cognition and social behavior. Four participants with ASD – Level 1 (ages 18-25 years) completed the Test of Young Adult Social Skill Knowledge (TYASSK; Laugeson, 2017) and the Contextual Assessment of Social Skills (CASS; Ratto et al., 2011) before and after the completion of PEERS® for Young Adults. Results revealed that young adults demonstrated improvement in social skill knowledge but no significant improvement in social behavior after the completion of PEERS® for Young Adults. The improvement in social cognition from pre-intervention to post-intervention was approaching significance. Results also indicated that young adults\u27 introspection of rapport and involvement in social scenarios was inaccurate. Results support the effectiveness of PEERS® for Young Adults in improving participants\u27 social cognition but not in improving their observable social behavior. Thus, the skills learned in PEERS® for Young Adults did not generalize and improve participants’ overall social communication. Limitations of this study include a small sample size, lack of maintenance measurements, and a discrepancy between specificity of research measures. Suggestions for future research include assessing the effectiveness of social communication interventions by utilizing general social cognition and behavior assessments that are not specific to the intervention. Clinical implications include ways to improve the generalizability of social communication interventions

'Studentsification': recognising the diversity of student populations and student accommodation pathways

This thesis advances understandings of the diversity of student populations, student accommodation pathways, and connections to processes of studentification. The massification of HE, coupled with widening participation and internationalisation agendas, has led to changes in the social composition of the student population. Alongside this transformation, student accommodation preferences are changing, and student accommodation is being supplied which contrasts with traditional notions of shared student housing. From this starting point, this thesis progresses existing knowledges of student geographies in several ways. [Continues.

In-Vivo Investigation of the Medial Longitudinal Arch of the Foot and Orthotic Interactions using Bi-Planar Fluoroscopy

Orthotic devices are a conservative treatment for common disorders of the foot and ankle such as pes planus and pes cavus. It is thought that orthotics change the kinematics of the foot by applying forces and constraint on the plantar surface, which can act to change body biomechanics and correct for malalignment in the legs and trunk. This thesis compares the angle of the medial longitudinal arch (MLA) between three foot types: pes planus (low arch), pes cavus (high arch) and normal arch, during barefoot and shoed walking, and walking with orthotics. In-vivo bi-planar fluoroscopy was used with markerless radiostereometric analysis (RSA) to measure an angle that defines the MLA with the greatest accuracy to date. MLA angles were significantly smaller (

Task Dependent Effects of Head Orientation on Perceived Gaze Direction

The perception of gaze direction involves the integration of a number of sensory cues exterior to the eye-region. The orientation of the head is one such cue, which has an overall repulsive effect on the perceived direction of gaze. However, in a recent experiment, we found the measured effect of head orientation on perceived gaze direction differed within subjects, depending on whether a single- or two-interval task design was employed. This suggests a potential difference in the way the orientation of the head is integrated into the perception of gaze direction across tasks. Four experiments were conducted to investigate this difference. The first two experiments showed that the difference was not the result of some interaction between stimuli in the two-interval task, but rather, a difference between the types of judgment being made across tasks, where observers were making a directional (left/right) judgment in the single-interval task, and a non-directional (direct/indirect gaze) judgment in the two-interval task. A third experiment showed that this difference does not arise from observers utilizing a non-directional cue to direct gaze (the circularity of the pupil/iris) in making their non-directional judgments. The fourth experiment showed no substantial differences in the duration of evidence accumulation and processing between judgments, suggesting that observers are not integrating different sensory information across tasks. Together these experiments show that the sensory information from head orientation is flexibly weighted in the perception of gaze direction, and that the purpose of the observer, in sampling gaze information, can influence the consequent perception of gaze direction

Postgraduate events as a building block for interdisciplinary research

Postgraduate students are at the forefront of geographical research, forging their career in a rapidly changing landscape. The ideology of geography as a single discipline is being erased, enabling complex geographical questions spanning both natural and social sciences to be properly addressed. A postgraduate event organised in a thematic manner, rather than by discipline, reveals that postgraduate students still associate with ‘human’ or ‘physical’ geography, rather than with interdisciplinary work. However, students who overcome time constraints and have exposure to, or engage with, interdisciplinary research gain valuable transferable skills, enhancing research outputs and employability. Therefore, postgraduate perceptions of interdisciplinary research are important for geography to advance

Hard, soft and off-the-shelf foot orthoses and their effect on the angle of the medial longitudinal arch: A biplane fluoroscopy study

Background: Foot orthoses have proven to be effective for conservative management of various pathologies. Pathologies of the lower limb can be caused by abnormal biomechanics such as abnormal foot structure and alignment, leading to inadequate support. Objectives: To compare biomechanical effects of different foot orthoses on the medial longitudinal arch (MLA) during dynamic gait using skeletal kinematics. Study Design: Prospective, cross-sectional study design. Methods: The MLA angle was measured for 12 participants among three groups: pes planus, pes cavus and normal arch. Five conditions were compared: three orthotic devices (hard custom foot orthosis (CFO), soft CFO, and off-the-shelf Barefoot Science©), barefoot and shod. An innovative method, markerless fluoroscopic radiostereometric analysis (RSA), was used to measure the MLA angle. Results: Mean MLA angles for both CFO conditions were significantly different from the barefoot and shod conditions (p0.05). Additionally, the differences between hard and soft CFOs were not statistically significant. All foot types showed an MLA angle decrease with both the hard and soft CFOs. Conclusions: These results suggest that CFOs can reduce motion of the MLA for a range of foot types during dynamic gait