Environmental behaviours within ecological and social limits: integrating well-being with behavioural research for sustainability

This is the final version. Available from Elsevier via the DOI in this record. There is a pressing need to reduce inequalities and bring everyone above a foundational level of well-being whilst simultaneously staying within planetary boundaries. Yet, there is a limited understanding of how moving into and maintaining such 'safe and just' spaces affect environmental behaviours. To fill this gap, we argue for integrating human well-being and behaviour research. In particular, to 1) implement social thresholds when investigating environmental behaviours; 2) investigate the impact of social inequalities on environmental behaviours directly and 3) incorporate well-being domains with controlled behavioural experiments. Such understandings will be crucial for anticipating the implications of realising safe and just spaces for people and the planet.Swedish Research Council for Sustainable Development (Formas)Beijer Foundatio

Surface-induced charge state conversion of nitrogen-vacancy defects in nanodiamonds

We present a study of the charge state conversion of single nitrogen-vacancy (NV) defects hosted in nanodiamonds (NDs). We first show that the proportion of negatively-charged NV$^{-}$ defects, with respect to its neutral counterpart NV$^{0}$, decreases with the size of the ND. We then propose a simple model based on a layer of electron traps located at the ND surface which is in good agreement with the recorded statistics. By using thermal oxidation to remove the shell of amorphous carbon around the NDs, we demonstrate a significant increase of the proportion of NV$^{-}$ defects in 10-nm NDs. These results are invaluable for further understanding, control and use of the unique properties of negatively-charged NV defects in diamondComment: 6 pages, 4 figure

The Gendered Nature of Ecosystem Services

This is the final version. Available from Elsevier via the DOI in this record. This article assesses the extent to which our conceptualisation, understanding and empirical analysis of ecosystem services are inherently gendered; in other words, how they might be biased and unbalanced in terms of their appreciation of gender differences. We do this by empirically investigating how women and men are able to benefit from ecosystem services across eight communities in coastal Kenya and Mozambique. Our results highlight different dimensions of wellbeing affected by ecosystem services, and how these are valued differently by men and women. However, it is not just the division of costs and benefits of ecosystem services that is gendered. Using a heuristic device of the ‘ecosystem-wellbeing chain’ we explain patterns within our primary data as an outcome of gendered knowledge systems, gendered behavioural expectations, gendered access to resources and gendered institutions. We conclude that this holistic, gendered understanding of ecosystem services is important not just for how ecosystem services are conceptualised, but also for the development and implementation of sustainable and equitable policy and interventions.Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation (ESPA)Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC

Save reefs to rescue all ecosystems

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Nature Research via the DOI in this recor

Non-invasive diagnosis of liver lesions by blood tests in NAFLD

Background and Aims: Non invasive tests are not well developedin NAFLD. This could be partly due to the pathological description of certain lesions that is hampered by semi-quantitative scorings. Our aim was to develop an accurate non-invasive measurement of main liver lesions in NAFLD by blood tests based on a thorough pathological and morphometric analysis. Methods: Steatosis, NASH and fibrosis were graded according to CRN-NASH (Kleiner, Hepatology 2005) and Metavir systems in 226 patients with NAFLD. A fully automated, in-house software measured the fractal dimension (reflecting architecture) and the area (reflecting amount) of steatosis or fibrosis on liver specimens. Independent predictors were selected by logistic or multiple regression repeated in 1000 random bootstrap samples. When models were determined, a second bootstrap resampling was performed to measure optimism bias (Steyerberg et al. 2001)

Light depolarization effects in tip enhanced Raman spectroscopy of silicon (001) and gallium arsenide (001)

We report on the effects of light depolarization induced by sharp metallic tips in Tip-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (TERS). Experiments on Si(001) and GaAs(001) crystals show that the excitation field depolarization induces a selective enhancement of specific Raman modes, depending on their Raman tensor symmetry. A complete polarization analysis of the light backscattered from the tip confirms the TERS findings. The spatial confinement of the depolarization field is studied and its dependence on the excitation wavelength and power are explored

Elasticity in ecosystem services: Exploring the variable relationship between ecosystems and human well-being

Although ecosystem services are increasingly recognized as benefits people obtain from nature, we still have a poor understanding of how they actually enhance multidimensional human well-being, and how well-being is affected by ecosystem change. We develop a concept of “ecosystem service elasticity” (ES elasticity) that describes the sensitivity of human well-being to changes in ecosystems. ES Elasticity is a result of complex social and ecological dynamics and is context dependent, individually variable, and likely to demonstrate nonlinear dynamics such as thresholds and hysteresis. We present a conceptual framework that unpacks the chain of causality from ecosystem stocks through flows, goods, value, and shares to contribute to the well-being of different people. This framework builds on previous conceptualizations, but places multidimensional well-being of different people as the final element. This ultimately disaggregated approach emphasizes how different people access benefits and how benefits match their needs or aspirations. Applying this framework to case studies of individual coastal ecosystem services in East Africa illustrates a wide range of social and ecological factors that can affect ES elasticity. For example, food web and habitat dynamics affect the sensitivity of different fisheries ecosystem services to ecological change. Meanwhile high cultural significance, or lack of alternatives enhance ES elasticity, while social mechanisms that prevent access can reduce elasticity. Mapping out how chains are interlinked illustrates how different types of value and the well-being of different people are linked to each other and to common ecological stocks. We suggest that examining chains for individual ecosystem services can suggest potential interventions aimed at poverty alleviation and sustainable ecosystems while mapping out of interlinkages between chains can help to identify possible ecosystem service trade-offs and winners and losers. We discuss conceptual and practical challenges of applying such a framework and conclude on its utility as a heuristic for structuring interdisciplinary analysis of ecosystem services and human wellbeing.This paper results from the project Sustainable Poverty Alleviation from Coastal Ecosystem Services (SPACES) project number NE-K010484-1, funded by the Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation (ESPA) programme. The ESPA programme is funded by the Department for International Development (DFID), the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC).

Life satisfaction in coastal Kenya and Mozambique reflects culture, gendered relationships and security of basic needs: Implications for ecosystem services

This is the final version. Available from Elsevier via the DOI in this record. Data availability: Data are published in https://reshare.ukdataservice.ac.ukLife satisfaction is both a desirable ‘end’ for sustainable development, and a means to understand the priorities, and behaviour of people towards local ecosystems. Ecosystem-services research on life satisfaction has focused on cultural services in wealthy, Western contexts, although ecosystem services are essential for poor people's livelihoods in the Global South. We examined reported life satisfaction from a survey of over 2000 people in rural and urban settings of coastal Kenya and Mozambique. We coded respondents’ open-ended reasons for their reported satisfaction, and used multiple correspondence analysis to explore the characteristics of people who mentioned different reasons. We tested associations between satisfaction and the meeting of basic needs and income, with binary logistic regression, accounting for site and gender. Life satisfaction was lower in Kenya, for men, and in the most urbanised site. Respondents explained high, and low, satisfaction in terms of social relationships, basic needs, money and employment. They rarely mentioned the ecosystem services and related livelihoods that underpin those, suggesting an instrumental relation to nature. Meeting basic needs, including economic security better predicted satisfaction than household income. Life satisfaction reflected material differences in people's lives but also different evaluative criteria and national cultures. For example, family reasons more commonly explained women's satisfaction, while money was more important for urban-dwelling men. We propose that the holistic perspective offered by life-satisfaction research can inform environmental management alongside more focused ecosystem-service research. For example, our results suggest that a) interventions should recognise immediate needs and social relationships, b) the role of ecosystem services for subjective wellbeing varies by local culture and individual identities and c) secure and fair access to ecosystem services may support life satisfaction better than high incomes that are insecure or inequitably distributed.Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)Department for International Development (DFID)Natural Environment Research Council (NERC

Feature integration in natural language concepts

Two experiments measured the joint influence of three key sets of semantic features on the frequency with which artifacts (Experiment 1) or plants and creatures (Experiment 2) were categorized in familiar categories. For artifacts, current function outweighed both originally intended function and current appearance. For biological kinds, appearance and behavior, an inner biological function, and appearance and behavior of offspring all had similarly strong effects on categorization. The data were analyzed to determine whether an independent cue model or an interactive model best accounted for how the effects of the three feature sets combined. Feature integration was found to be additive for artifacts but interactive for biological kinds. In keeping with this, membership in contrasting artifact categories tended to be superadditive, indicating overlapping categories, whereas for biological kinds, it was subadditive, indicating conceptual gaps between categories. It is argued that the results underline a key domain difference between artifact and biological concepts