Two Screen Viewing and Social Relationships. Exploring the invisible backchannel of TV viewing

Use of social networks to create a real-time backchannel of\ud communication among viewers of television programs has been documented, and has been termed “two-screen viewing,” with one screen devoted to the program being watched, and a second screen (usually a laptop, tablet, or cell/mobile\ud phone) devoted to maintaining the backchannel. Prior research has examined twoscreen viewing through content analysis of social media posts. However, little has been done to explore the way in which two screen viewing qualitatively changes the viewing experience, or to understand how this behavior contributes to the construction or maintenance of social relationships. Couch (1992) noted that social interaction require a shared focus, a social objective, and congruent functional identities. The first screen program provides the shared focus. Using online interviews, this small pilot project seeks to discover whether social objectives and congruent functional identities are established through two-screen viewing. That is, the study explores how one might go about determining whether this communication actually contributes to social relationships or serves some other, asocial purpose. The present study is a small pilot project only. Preliminary\ud data suggest that there are two types of two-screen viewing defined by different degrees of visible and invisible online practice

Bays in Peril: A Forecast for Freshwater Flows to Texas Estuaries

Takes a look at increasing water demands in Texas, and what would happen to the inflows to the seven major estuaries if existing water permits were fully used and wastewater reuse increased. Provides recommendations for action

Raising the Tone?:The Impact of 'Positive' and 'Negative' Campaigning on Voting in the 2007 Scottish Parliament Election

Most survey-based research on campaign effects in British elections has focussed on exposure to the campaign. Far less attention has been given to how the campaign is perceived, although American research on the effects of negativecampaigning suggests that this is a potentially important area. The article investigates the extent to which vote choices in the 2007ScottishParliamentelection were affected by perceptions of the parties’ campaigns as ‘positive’ or ‘negative’. Partisanship and increased exposure to a party’s campaign increased individuals’ chances of rating a campaign positively. Other things being equal, however, campaigns which come to be seen in a negative light backfire on the party responsible, reducing the propensity of people to vote for it

A Consistent Model of the Accretion Shock Region in Classical T Tauri Stars

We develop a consistent model of the accretion shock region in Classical T Tauri Stars (CTTSs). The initial conditions of the post-shock flow are determined by the irradiated shock precursor and the ionization state is calculated without assuming ionization equilibrium. Comparison with observations of the C IV resonance lines (λλ 1550 Å) for CTTSs indicate that the post-shock emission predicted by the model is too large, for a reasonable range of parameters. If the model is to reproduce the observations, C IV emission from CTTSs has to be dominated by pre-shock emission, for stars with moderate to large accretion rates. For stars with low accretion rates, the observations suggest a comparable contribution between the pre- and post-shock regions. These conclusions are consistent with previous results indicating that the post-shock will be buried under the stellar photosphere for moderate to large accretion rates

The Effects of Social Competition of the Economic Behavior of Rats

Recent studies have shown that the law of supply and demand describes behavior on simple Variable Interval (VI) schedules. When the quantity of reinforcement supplied is large, animals will pay less for the reinforcer than when quantity supplied is small. These studies, however, feature organisms responding alone in operant chambers, without the social competition which economists argue drive the law of supply and demand. The present series of experiments examine the effects of social context on the economic behavior of rats on VI schedules. Rats responded on a pseudo-randomly assigned sequence of VI schedules differing in reinforcement rate. During half of the sessions, a second rat was placed in the chamber behind a Plexiglas barrier. As predicted by economic theory, there was an inverse relationship between the quantity of reinforcement supplied and the obtained behavioral cost of reinforcement. In addition, the presence of a competitor rat altered the relationship between supply and cost

Sources of occupational stress in NSW and ACT dentists

© 2015 Australian Dental Association. Abstract Background This study aimed to identify and understand the chronic sources of work stress in the NSW and ACT dentistry context. Further, the study examines whether Australian dentists are exposed to similar sources of work stress as dentists internationally. Methods A purposive sample of registered members of the NSW Branch of the Australian Dental Association (ADA) were interviewed. Participants were selected because they represented the key characteristics of the broader ADA population. Interviews were recorded and fully transcribed. Themes were identified, developed, refined and clarified using established and rigorous methods of interview investigation and analysis. Results A total of 18 dentists participated in the study. Inductive content analysis was used to develop six main categories of chronic sources of stress. These groupings were time and scheduling pressures, professional concerns, patient/public perceptions of dentists, staffing problems, pressures associated with treating patients and business process stressors. Conclusions Like their international counterparts, Australian dentists are subject to a variety of job-specific stressors. However, the most notable difference between Australian and international dentists relates to the business side of dentistry. It would appear that the Australian statutory, regulatory and industrial relations environment place unique and profound pressures on Australian dentists

Validation of the Patient Activation Measure in a Multiple Sclerosis Clinic Sample and Implications for Care

Purpose. Patient engagement in multiple sclerosis (MS) care can be challenging at times given the unpredictable disease course, wide range of symptoms, variable therapeutic response to treatment and high rates of patient depression. Patient activation, a model for conceptualising patients’ involvement in their health care, has been found useful for discerning patient differences in chronic illness management. The purpose of this study was to validate the patient activation measure (PAM-13) in an MS clinic sample. Methods. This was a survey study of 199 MS clinic patients. Participants completed the PAM-13 along with measures of MS medication adherence, self-efficacy, depression and quality of life. Results. Results from Rasch and correlation analyses indicate that the PAM-13 is reliable and valid for the MS population. Activation was associated with MS self-efficacy, depression and quality of life but not with self-reported medication adherence. Also, participants with relapse-remitting MS, current employment, or high levels of education were more activated than other subgroups. Conclusions. The PAM-13 is a useful tool for understanding health behaviours in MS. The findings of this study support further clinical consideration and investigation into developing interventions to increase patient activation and improve health outcomes in MS

The V3, V4 and V6 bands of formaldehyde: A spectral catalog from 900 cm(-1) to 1580 cm(-1)

The results of a complete high resolution study of the three vibration-rotation bands v sub 3, v sub 4, and V sub 6 using both TDLs and FT-IR spectroscopy are presented. The reults are given in terms of a table of over 8000 predicted transition frequencies and strengths. A plot of the predicted and calculated spectra is shown. Over 3000 transitions were assigned and used in the simultaneous analysis of the three bands. The simultaneous fit permitted a rigorous study of Coriolis and other type iterations among bands yielding improved molecular constants. Line intensities of 28 transitions measured by a TDL and 20 transitions from FTS data were used, along with the eigenvectors from the frequency fitting, in a least squares analysis to evaluate the band strengths

Applicability of ERTS-1 to Montana geology

The author has identified the following significant results. Late autumn imagery provides the advantages of topographic shadow enhancement and low cloud cover. Mapping of rock units was done locally with good results for alluvium, basin fill, volcanics, inclined Paleozoic and Mesozoic beds, and host strata of bentonite beds. Folds, intrusive domes, and even dip directions were mapped where differential erosion was significant. However, mapping was not possible for belt strata, was difficult for granite, and was hindered by conifers compared to grass cover. Expansion of local mapping required geologic control and encountered significant areas unmappable from ERTS imagery. Annotation of lineaments provided much new geologic data. By extrapolating test site comparisons, it is inferred that 27 percent of some 1200 lineaments mapped from western Montana represent unknown faults. The remainder appear to be localized mainly by undiscovered faults and sets of minor faults or joints

Interactive 3D visualisation of optimisation for water distribution systems

Session S6-03, Special Session: Evolutionary Computing in Water Resources Planning and Management IIIThis project investigates the use of modern 3D visualisation techniques to enable the interactive analysis of water distribution systems with the aim of providing the engineer with a clear picture of the problem and thus aid the overall design process. Water distribution systems are complex entities that are difficult to model and optimise as they consist of many interacting components each with a set of considerations to address, hence it is important for the engineer to understand and assess the behaviour of the system to enable its effective design and optimisation. This paper presents a new three-dimensional representation of pipe based water systems and demonstrates a range of innovative methods to convey information to the user. The system presented not only allows the engineer to visualise the various parameters of a network but also allows the user to observe the behaviour and progress of an iterative optimisation method. This paper contains examples of the combination of the interactive visualisation system and an evolutionary algorithm enabling the user to track and visualise the actions of the algorithm down to an individual pipe diameter change. It is proposed that this interactive visualisation system will provide engineers an unprecedented view of the way in which optimisation algorithms interact with a network model and may pave the way for greater interaction between engineer, network and optimiser in the futur