Party ambiguity and individual preferences

Although the literature on party ambiguity does not lead to a consensus, recent findings suggest that party ambiguity is a good strategy for electoral success. However, the literature on decision processes shows that individuals generally dislike ambiguity. The aim of the present project is to test the effect of party ambiguity on party preferences at the individual level, to see if findings in decision processes still apply. Using election data from eight Western European democracies, I define a measure of party ambiguity at the individual level and find that ambiguity has a negative effect on party preferences. In addition, I find that individuals with a high interest in politics are less likely to like ambiguous parties

Liminal space or in limbo? Post Graduate Researchers and their personal pie charts of identity

How do postgraduate researchers (PGRs) see themselves at the start of their PhD journey? There is a duality of identity or even a triality when it comes to PGRs, since they exist in a space that is simultaneously researcher, student, and often ‘teacher’ in the broad sense of supporting other students in their learning. This report draws on data from a source originally not intended to be one: personal pie charts of identity. The activity was originally conceived as a warmer or discussion prompt for ensuing focus groups (four separate groups all completing a Teaching, Learning and Assessment strand of the mandatory elements of their PhDs). However, the pie charts themselves provided surprising insights. The pie charts presented here show considerable variance in the ways they see themselves within the academic community and raise issues about the implications for them as they exist and traverse the spaces within and between these multiple identities

Examining trade-offs between social, psychological, and energy potential of urban form

Urban planners are often challenged with the task of developing design solutions which must meet multiple, and often contradictory, criteria. In this paper, we investigated the trade-offs between social, psychological, and energy potential of the fundamental elements of urban form: the street network and the building massing. Since formal methods to evaluate urban form from the psychological and social point of view are not readily available, we developed a methodological framework to quantify these criteria as the first contribution in this paper. To evaluate the psychological potential, we conducted a three-tiered empirical study starting from real world environments and then abstracting them to virtual environments. In each context, the implicit (physiological) response and explicit (subjective) response of pedestrians were measured. To quantify the social potential, we developed a street network centrality-based measure of social accessibility. For the energy potential, we created an energy model to analyze the impact of pure geometric form on the energy demand of the building stock. The second contribution of this work is a method to identify distinct clusters of urban form and, for each, explore the trade-offs between the select design criteria. We applied this method to two case studies identifying nine types of urban form and their respective potential trade-offs, which are directly applicable for the assessment of strategic decisions regarding urban form during the early planning stages

Learning from Each Other: Peer-Reviewed Literature Searching

Background: Amidst shrinking staffing levels and expanding business, a health system library department developed a peer-learning program in order to build literature search capacity and self-efficacy amongst librarians and library support staff.Description: Library staff are partnered and rotate monthly; pairs include those in same and different job roles and experience levels. Staff are encouraged to choose real patron clinical questions that would serve as optimal learning opportunities, reinforcing best practices in search strategy and/or database functionality or ones that are particularly challenging. Partners independently perform the other’s search then meet virtually to compare results, strategies, and debrief on lessons learned.After a search for validated tools measuring library staff search self-efficacy turned up no appropriate tools, a brief survey was created based on feedback from senior librarians. REDCap was used to conduct a pre-survey of brief impressions on search self-efficacy and comfort with reaching out to colleagues for support when faced with a difficult search. A post-survey will be done at 6 and 12 months, as well as solicitation of candid feedback.Conclusion: We expect to measure an increase in search self-efficacy and comfort in asking colleagues for assistance at both 6 and 12 months. We hope to use staff’s candid feedback to inform and develop our peer-review program for continued use.Initial response to the program has been positive. While some staff indicated feelings of nervousness or lack of confidence going into the first debrief, most have expressed that they found the exercise useful and noted that it gave them a welcome opportunity to connect with geographically disparate colleagues they might not have otherwise

Air pollution modelling for birth cohorts: a time-space regression model

To investigate air pollution effects during pregnancy or in the first weeks of life, models are needed that capture both the spatial and temporal variability of air pollution exposures.; We developed a time-space exposure model for ambient NO2 concentrations in Bern, Switzerland. We used NO2 data from passive monitoring conducted between 1998 and 2009: 101 rural sites (24,499 biweekly measurements) and 45 urban sites (4350 monthly measurements). We evaluated spatial predictors (land use; roads; traffic; population; annual NO2 from a dispersion model) and temporal predictors (meteorological conditions; NO2 from continuous monitoring station). Separate rural and urban models were developed by multivariable regression techniques. We performed ten-fold internal cross-validation, and an external validation using 57 NO2 passive measurements obtained at study participant's homes.; Traffic related explanatory variables and fixed site NO2 measurements were the most relevant predictors in both models. The coefficient of determination (R(2)) for the log transformed models were 0.63 (rural) and 0.54 (urban); cross-validation R(2)s were unchanged indicating robust coefficient estimates. External validation showed R(2)s of 0.54 (rural) and 0.67 (urban).; This approach is suitable for air pollution exposure prediction in epidemiologic research with time-vulnerable health effects such as those occurring during pregnancy or in the first weeks of life