Restoring Trust in Finance: From Principal–Agent to Principled Agent

© 2019 Economic Society of Australia Banking solves the principal–agent problem with incentive contracts which assume a Homo Economicus representative agent. However, professions can solve the principal–agent problem by assuming a ‘Reasonable Person’ representative agent, from tort law, who reliably tells the truth about hidden action. We describe a non-virtuous circle in finance, which is a negative feedback loop between motivation crowding out arising from incentive contracts, and the subsequent need to offer incentive contacts because agents change from the Reasonable Person to Homo Economicus. We prescribe less reliance on incentive contracts in the practice of finance, and on Homo Economicus in the theory of finance

Integrated regional vulnerability assessment of government services to climate change

© Emerald Group Publishing Limited. Purpose – This paper aims to describe the conduct and outcomes of an integrated assessment (IA) of the vulnerability to climate change of government service provision at regional scale in New South Wales, Australia. The assessment was co-designed with regional public sector managers to address their needs for an improved understanding of regional vulnerabilities to climate change and variability. Design/methodology/approach – The study used IA of climate change impacts through a complex adaptive systems approach incorporating social learning and stakeholder-led research processes. Workshops were conducted with stakeholders from NSW government agencies, state-owned corporations and local governments representing the tourism, water, primary industries, human settlements, emergency management, human health, infrastructure and natural landscapes sectors. Participants used regional socioeconomic profiling and climate projections to consider the impacts on and the need to adapt community service provision to future climate. Findings – Many sectors are currently experiencing difficulty coping with changes in regional demographics and structural adjustment in the economy. Climate change will result in further impacts on already vulnerable systems in the forms of resource conflicts between expanded human settlements, the infrastructure that supports them and the environment (particularly for water); increased energy costs; and declining agricultural production and food security. Originality/value – This paper describes the application of meta-analysis in climate change policy research and frames climate change as a problem of environmental pollution and an issue of development and social equity

Identifying Needs and Implementing Organizational Change to Improve Retention of Early-Career Agents

Retention of agents is important for the growth and stability of Cooperative Extension. A study of early-career agents in Virginia Cooperative Extension identified specific areas in which organizational change could be made to improve agent fit in the organization and long-term retention. As a result, numerous changes have been made, particularly associated with existing agents but also in work with prospective agents. Although this article relates specifically to Virginia, the challenges and solutions identified may be relevant to other programs and to national professional development organizations

A worldsheet for Kerr

We show that the Newman-Janis shift property of the exact Kerr solution can be interpreted in terms of a worldsheet effective action. This holds both in gravity, and for the single-copy $\sqrt{\text{Kerr}}$ solution in electrodynamics. At the level of equations of motion, we show that the Newman-Janis shift holds also for the leading interactions of the Kerr black hole. These leading interactions are conveniently described using chiral classical equations of motion with the help of the spinor-helicity method familiar from scattering amplitudes

Validating Ionospheric Models Against Technologically Relevant Metrics

New, open access tools have been developed to validate ionospheric models in terms of technologically relevant metrics. These are ionospheric errors on GPS 3D position, HF ham radio communications, and peak F-region density. To demonstrate these tools, we have used output from Sami is Another Model of the Ionosphere (SAMI3) driven by high-latitude electric potentials derived from Active Magnetosphere and Planetary Electrodynamics Response Experiment, covering the first available month of operation using Iridium-NEXT data (March 2019). Output of this model is now available for visualization and download via https://sami3.jhuapl.edu. The GPS test indicates SAMI3 reduces ionospheric errors on 3D position solutions from 1.9 m with no model to 1.6 m on average (maximum error: 14.2 m without correction, 13.9 m with correction). SAMI3 predicts 55.5% of reported amateur radio links between 2–30 MHz and 500–2,000 km. Autoscaled and then machine learning “cleaned” Digisonde NmF2 data indicate a 1.0 × 1011 el. m3 median positive bias in SAMI3 (equivalent to a 27% overestimation). The positive NmF2 bias is largest during the daytime, which may explain the relatively good performance in predicting HF links then. The underlying data sources and software used here are publicly available, so that interested groups may apply these tests to other models and time intervals.</p

The PiGeOn project: Protocol of a longitudinal study examining psychosocial and ethical issues and outcomes in germline genomic sequencing for cancer

© 2018 The Author(s). Background: Advances in genomics offer promise for earlier detection or prevention of cancer, by personalisation of medical care tailored to an individual's genomic risk status. However genome sequencing can generate an unprecedented volume of results for the patient to process with potential implications for their families and reproductive choices. This paper describes a protocol for a study (PiGeOn) that aims to explore how patients and their blood relatives experience germline genomic sequencing, to help guide the appropriate future implementation of genome sequencing into routine clinical practice. Methods: We have designed a mixed-methods, prospective, cohort sub-study of a germline genomic sequencing study that targets adults with cancer suggestive of a genetic aetiology. One thousand probands and 2000 of their blood relatives will undergo germline genomic sequencing as part of the parent study in Sydney, Australia between 2016 and 2020. Test results are expected within12-15 months of recruitment. For the PiGeOn sub-study, participants will be invited to complete surveys at baseline, three months and twelve months after baseline using self-administered questionnaires, to assess the experience of long waits for results (despite being informed that results may not be returned) and expectations of receiving them. Subsets of both probands and blood relatives will be purposively sampled and invited to participate in three semi-structured qualitative interviews (at baseline and each follow-up) to triangulate the data. Ethical themes identified in the data will be used to inform critical revisions of normative ethical concepts or frameworks. Discussion: This will be one of the first studies internationally to follow the psychosocial impact on probands and their blood relatives who undergo germline genome sequencing, over time. Study results will inform ongoing ethical debates on issues such as informed consent for genomic sequencing, and informing participants and their relatives of specific results. The study will also provide important outcome data concerning the psychological impact of prolonged waiting for germline genomic sequencing. These data are needed to ensure that when germline genomic sequencing is introduced into standard clinical settings, ethical concepts are embedded, and patients and their relatives are adequately prepared and supported during and after the testing process

The PiGeOn project: Protocol for a longitudinal study examining psychosocial, behavioural and ethical issues and outcomes in cancer tumour genomic profiling

© 2018 The Author(s). Background: Genomic sequencing in cancer (both tumour and germline), and development of therapies targeted to tumour genetic status, hold great promise for improvement of patient outcomes. However, the imminent introduction of genomics into clinical practice calls for better understanding of how patients value, experience, and cope with this novel technology and its often complex results. Here we describe a protocol for a novel mixed-methods, prospective study (PiGeOn) that aims to examine patients' psychosocial, cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to tumour genomic profiling and to integrate a parallel critical ethical analysis of returning results. Methods: This is a cohort sub-study of a parent tumour genomic profiling programme enrolling patients with advanced cancer. One thousand patients will be recruited for the parent study in Sydney, Australia from 2016 to 2019. They will be asked to complete surveys at baseline, three, and fivemonths. Primary outcomes are: knowledge, preferences, attitudes and values. A purposively sampled subset of patients will be asked to participate in three semi-structured interviews (at each time point) to provide deeper data interpretation. Relevant ethical themes will be critically analysed to iteratively develop or refine normative ethical concepts or frameworks currently used in the return of genetic information. Discussion: This will be the first Australian study to collect longitudinal data on cancer patients' experience of tumour genomic profiling. Findings will be used to inform ongoing ethical debates on issues such as how to effectively obtain informed consent for genomic profiling return results, distinguish between research and clinical practice and manage patient expectations. The combination of quantitative and qualitative methods will provide comprehensive and critical data on how patients cope with 'actionable' and 'non-actionable' results. This information is needed to ensure that when tumour genomic profiling becomes part of routine clinical care, ethical considerations are embedded, and patients are adequately prepared and supported during and after receiving results

Stress of Caring for Children: The Role of Perceived Racism

Regardless of race, most mothers experience stress related to concerns about their children. African-American mothers may experience the additional stress of their child(ren) experiencing racism. This paper describes the stress that African-American women have about their children experiencing racism

Self-compensation in semiconductors: The Zn vacancy in Ga-doped ZnO

Self-compensation, the tendency of a crystal to lower its energy by forming point defects to counter the effects of a dopant, is here quantitatively proven. Based on a new theoretical formalism and several different experimental techniques, we demonstrate that the addition of 1.4 × 10 exp 21-cm exp −3 Ga donors in ZnO causes the lattice to form 1.7 × 10 exp 20-cm exp −3 Zn-vacancy acceptors. The calculated VZn formation energy of 0.2 eV is consistent with predictions from density functional theory. Our formalism is of general validity and can be used to investigate self-compensation in any degenerate semiconductor material.Peer reviewe