FARM-LEVEL DETERMINANTS OF CONVERSION TO SUSTAINABLE FARMING PRACTICES IN THE NEW MEMBERS STATES

A field survey carried out in 2005 in the Czech Republic and Lithuania to investigate the determinants of converting to organic farming reveals that farmer's own belief and the intrinsic characteristics of the farm increase the likelihood of conversion. If the process of certification as an organic farm implies important changes of the structure of the farm, it lowers the propensity of farmers to consider the conversion to organic. When considering the case of family farms, results of a logit model reveal that apart from farmers' own belief in the environmental or food quality benefits of organic farming, availability of information/own knowledge about the characteristics of technology to be adopted, availability of extra labour, and membership to farmers' associations increase the likelihood to convert.sustainability, organic, adoption, NMS, CAP., Environmental Economics and Policy, Farm Management,

SUSTAINABILITY DIMENSIONS AND INCOME PROSPECTS FOR THE FARMING SYSTEMS IN THE NEW MEMBER STATES

An investigation carried out at the farming system level on the sustainability dimensions and agricultural income prospects in the Czech Republic and Lithuania under the implementation of the 2003 common agricultural policy reform reveals (a) the economic dimension as the leading one in terms of the overall sustainability rank position farming systems achieved, and (b) that under certain policy scenario assumptions, adoption of energy crops (Czech Republic) or conversion to organic farming (Lithuania) trigger potentially the highest farm gross income at the 2013 time horizon.sustainability, dimensions, systems, CAP, NMS, income, Environmental Economics and Policy, Farm Management,

The role of aversiveness in the relationship between intolerance of uncertainty and inflexible avoidance

The study of avoidance behaviour is considered relevant to improve our understanding of anxiety disorders, which are commonly characterized by the presence of undue avoidance behaviours. Flores et al. (2018) found evidence that Prospective Intolerance of Uncertainty (P-IU) is associated with inflexible avoidance behaviour. Specifically, healthy participants learned in a free-operant discriminative task to avoid an aversive sound, and were tested in extinction to measure the sensitivity of avoidance responses to the devaluation of the sound aversiveness. The results showed that an increase in P-IU was positively associated with insensitivity to outcome devaluation. This association was still significant even when trait anxiety was controlled for. These results suggested that PIU may be a vulnerability factor for inflexible avoidance. However, in a recent replication, we found that the relationship between P-IU and inflexible avoidance was moderated by the participants ratings of outcome aversiveness. Specifically, the significant association between PIU and insensitivity to outcome devaluation was found to be conditional upon high aversiveness ratings.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech. Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, proyecto I+D+i PSI2014-56061. Marie Curie International Outgoing Fellowship within the 7th European Community Framework Programme. Plan Propio de Investigación de la Universidad de Málaga, Programa de Fortalecimiento de las Capacidades en I+D+I en las Universidades 2014-20150, Fondos FEDER

Estimates of the likelihood of threats are related to intolerance of uncertainty and learning

In the present experiment, we assessed the relationship between intolerance of uncertainty and expectancy ratings of threats both in the presence of conditioned stimuli (CS) that signalled the delivery of an aversive unconditioned stimulus (US), and after making an avoidance response. Participants learned the relationship between several pictures serving as CSs and an aversive sound serving as the US, and learned to avoid the US through a procedure including alternating pavlovian and negative reinforcement training phases. Expectancy ratings were measured on every training trial. Our results only showed a significant association between intolerance of uncertainty and expectancy ratings made after avoidance responses. This association was found only when the avoidance response was made in the presence of CSs signalling that the aversive sound was avoidable. The increase in intolerance of uncertainty was related to lower expectancy ratings in good learners, and to higher expectancy ratings in bad learners. These results are tentatively explained by invoking a view of intolerance of uncertainty as an exaggerated reaction to uncertainty aimed at learning to avoid threats.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech. Ministerio de Ciencia y Competitividad. Proyecto Nacional I+D+i. PSI2014-56061

Studying habit acquisition with an avoidance learning task

Afiliaciones: Universidad de Málaga and Instituto de Investigación Biomédica de Málaga (IBIMA), Spain Universidad de Málaga, Spain University of Leuven, BelgiumThe study of habit acquisition and expression is considered relevant to improve our understanding of mental disorders characterised by the presence of compulsive or incontrollable behaviours. Most studies on habit learning, both in animals and in humans, are based on positive reinforcement paradigms. However, the compulsions and habits involved in some mental disorders may be better understood as avoidance behaviours, which involve some peculiarities such as anxiety states that have been shown to promote habitual responses. Consequently, we studied habit acquisition by using a free-operant discriminated avoidance procedure. Participants learned to avoid an aversive noise presented either to the right or to the left ear by pressing two different keys. After a devaluation phase where participants could reduce the volume of the noise presented to one of the ears, participants went through a test phase identical to the avoidance learning phase except for the fact that the noise was never administered. Habit acquisition was inferred by comparing the rate of responses to the stimulus signalling the devalued reinforcer and to the stimulus signalling the non-devalued reinforcer. Habitual responses would entail the absence of differences between the referred conditions. Finally, we discuss the theoretical and clinical implications of the results obtained.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

El reconocimiento de los derechos sociales fundamentales en la Union Europea

En este estudio se realiza un análisis histórico del reconocimiento de los derechos sociales fundamentales en la Unión Europea. Así, partiendo del silencio del Tratado de Roma sobre esta materia y del intento frustrado de desarrollo que constituyó la Carta Comunitaria de Derechos Fundamentales de los Trabajadores, se analizan las sucesivas reformas de los Tratados llevadas a cabo en Maastricht y Ámsterdam, la Carta Europea de Derecho Fundamentales de Niza y, finalmente, el proyecto de Constitución Europea.This study makes a historical analysis of the recognition of the fundamental social rights in the European Union. Thus, starting from the point of the Treaty of Rome making no mention of this matter and the thwarted attempt at development that constituted the Community Charter of Fundamental Social Rights of Workers, an analysis is made of the successive reforms of the Maastricht and Amsterdam Treaties, the European Charter of Fundamental Rights of Nice and, finally, the EU Constitution Project.In dieser Studie wird eine historische Untersuchung der Anerkennung der sozialen Grundrechte in der EU durchgeführt. Ausgehend von der Tatsache, dass der EU-Vertrag von Rom diese Sachfrage schweigend übergeht und angesichts des fehlgeschlagenen Ausarbeitsversuchs durch die Charta der sozialen Grundrechte der Arbeitnehmer, werden nachfolgende Reformen der Verträge von Maastricht und Amsterdam und schließlich auch das Projekt der Europäischen Verfassung untersucht

Assessing Perspective-Taking in Children through Different Formats of Deictic Framing Protocol

The modern behavioral account of human language and cognition known as Relational Frame Theory (RFT) has argued that deictic relations are key repertoires underlying the development of the ability to take the perspective of another individual. Several studies have employed a deictic framing-based test protocol as an assessment of perspective-taking. In recent years, the format of the protocol has been modified in different studies. However, no empirical investigations have compared the original protocol with the new formats. The present chapter reports two studies that investigated whether a deictic relational protocol based on modification from recent research demonstrated better performance versus traditional deictic relations measured, with typically developing children. Results of Study 1 showed that variability in the scenarios proposed by recent research could be the best option, although a series of modifications should be made for the target population. Results of Study 2 showed that a combination of both original and new protocols of deictic relations gave a better performance on the perspective-taking task in the sample used. This chapter supports the need to adapt perspective-taking protocol to the work with children

An experience on the correlation analysis between academic marks and emotions

This article is an extended and modified version of a paper presented at the Third International Workshop on Adaptive Learning via Interactive, Collaborative and Emotional approaches (ALICE 2013), held on July 3-5, 2013, in Taichung, Taiwan, in conjunction with the 7th International Conference on Complex, Intelligent and Software Intensive Systems (CISIS 2013)Observe appropriate evidence that pointing emotions plays an important role in the learning process. However, there is no precedent of a research analyzing the relationship between emotions and academic marks using text analysis. Thus, in this article, we show the experience we have performed in order to analyze the possible existing correlations between student marks, assigned by both their classmates and by their instructors, and the emotion traces that can be found in their writings. To that end, we gathered data corresponding to text contributions of a course on Computer Systems in our University and perform the correspondent analysis. The obtained results look to indicate that some kind of correlation exists between marks and emotions in both the highest and the lowest marks.This research was partially funded by the Spanish National Plan of R+D, project numbers TIN2010-17344, TIN2011-24139 and TIN2011-29542-C02-02, and by the Autonomous Community of Madrid, e-Madrid project, number S2009/TIC-1650

Zipper plot : visualizing transcriptional activity of genomic regions

Background: Reconstructing transcript models from RNA-sequencing (RNA-seq) data and establishing these as independent transcriptional units can be a challenging task. Current state-of-the-art tools for long non-coding RNA (lncRNA) annotation are mainly based on evolutionary constraints, which may result in false negatives due to the overall limited conservation of lncRNAs. Results: To tackle this problem we have developed the Zipper plot, a novel visualization and analysis method that enables users to simultaneously interrogate thousands of human putative transcription start sites (TSSs) in relation to various features that are indicative for transcriptional activity. These include publicly available CAGE-sequencing, ChIP-sequencing and DNase-sequencing datasets. Our method only requires three tab-separated fields (chromosome, genomic coordinate of the TSS and strand) as input and generates a report that includes a detailed summary table, a Zipper plot and several statistics derived from this plot. Conclusion: Using the Zipper plot, we found evidence of transcription for a set of well-characterized lncRNAs and observed that fewer mono-exonic lncRNAs have CAGE peaks overlapping with their TSSs compared to multi-exonic lncRNAs. Using publicly available RNA-seq data, we found more than one hundred cases where junction reads connected protein-coding gene exons with a downstream mono-exonic lncRNA, revealing the need for a careful evaluation of lncRNA 5′-boundaries. Our method is implemented using the statistical programming language R and is freely available as a webtool