Sensing Subjective Well-being from Social Media

Subjective Well-being(SWB), which refers to how people experience the quality of their lives, is of great use to public policy-makers as well as economic, sociological research, etc. Traditionally, the measurement of SWB relies on time-consuming and costly self-report questionnaires. Nowadays, people are motivated to share their experiences and feelings on social media, so we propose to sense SWB from the vast user generated data on social media. By utilizing 1785 users' social media data with SWB labels, we train machine learning models that are able to "sense" individual SWB from users' social media. Our model, which attains the state-by-art prediction accuracy, can then be used to identify SWB of large population of social media users in time with very low cost.Comment: 12 pages, 1 figures, 2 tables, 10th International Conference, AMT 2014, Warsaw, Poland, August 11-14, 2014. Proceeding

Untersuchungen zur Ermittlung der Bruchzähigkeit and MDF-Platten

Zusammenfassung: Die Bruchzähigkeit ist eine Materialkenngrässe, die das Verhalten eines Werkstoffes gegenüber der Ausbreitung eines Risses kennzeichnet. In dieser Arbeit wurde der Einfluß von Rohdichte und Holzfeuchte auf die Bruchzähigkeit von MDF untersucht. Die Prüfung erfolgte nach ASTM E 399 an CT-Proben (Kompaktzugproben) durch Zugbelastung parallel zur Plattenebene. Zur Beurteilung des Bruchverhaltens und des Bruchbildes wurde zusätzlich die Schallemissionsanalyse und die Rasterelektronenmikroskopie eingesetzt. Die Untersuchungen zeigten, daß die Bruchzähigkeit mit zunehmender Rohdichte ansteigt. Eine Erhöhung der Holzfeuchte bewirkt eine deutliche Reduzierung der Bruchzähigkeit. Die Messungen der Schallemission während der Rißaufweitung brachten keine eindeutigen Ergebnisse im Hinblick auf das Bruchverhalten von MDF. Die rasterelektronenmikroskopischen Untersuchungen machten deutlich, daß die Fasern überwiegend aus dem Faserverbund herausgezogen werden. Reine Holzbrüche, wie sie bei Spanplatte z.T. erfolgen, waren hier nicht nachweisba

A numerical study of the quasinormal mode excitation of Kerr black holes

We present numerical results from three-dimensional evolutions of scalar perturbations of Kerr black holes. Our simulations make use of a high-order accurate multi-block code which naturally allows for fixed adaptivity and smooth inner (excision) and outer boundaries. We focus on the quasinormal ringing phase, presenting a systematic method for extraction of the quasinormal mode frequencies and amplitudes and comparing our results against perturbation theory. The amplitude of each mode depends exponentially on the starting time of the quasinormal regime, which is not defined unambiguously. We show that this time-shift problem can be circumvented by looking at appropriately chosen relative mode amplitudes. From our simulations we extract the quasinormal frequencies and the relative and absolute amplitudes of corotating and counterrotating modes (including overtones in the corotating case). We study the dependence of these amplitudes on the shape of the initial perturbation, the angular dependence of the mode and the black hole spin, comparing against results from perturbation theory in the so-called asymptotic approximation. We also compare the quasinormal frequencies from our numerical simulations with predictions from perturbation theory, finding excellent agreement. Finally we study under what conditions the relative amplitude between given pairs of modes gets maximally excited and present a quantitative analysis of rotational mode-mode coupling. The main conclusions and techniques of our analysis are quite general and, as such, should be of interest in the study of ringdown gravitational waves produced by astrophysical gravitational wave sources

Happiness and the Human Development Index : the paradox of Australia

According to the well-being measure known as the U.N. Human Development Index, Australia now ranks 3rd in the world and higher than all other English-speaking nations. This paper questions that assessment. It reviews work on the economics of happiness, considers implications for policymakers, and explores where Australia lies in international subjective well-being rankings. Using new data on approximately 50,000 randomly sampled individuals from 35 nations, the paper shows that Australians have some of the lowest levels of job satisfaction in the world. Moreover, among the sub-sample of English-speaking nations, where a common language should help subjective measures to be reliable, Australia performs poorly on a range of happiness indicators. The paper discusses this paradox. Our purpose is not to reject HDI methods, but rather to argue that much remains to be understood in this area

Are people who participate in cultural activities more satisfied with life?

The influence of various aspects of life on wellbeing has been extensively researched. However, despite little empirical evidence, participation in leisure activities has been assumed to increase subjective wellbeing. Leisure is important because it is more under personal control than other sources of life satisfaction. This study asked whether people who participate in cultural leisure activities have higher life satisfaction than people who do not, if different types of leisure have the same influence on life satisfaction and if satisfaction is dependent on the frequency of participation or the number of activities undertaken. It used data from UKHLS Survey to establish associations between type, number and frequency of participation in leisure activities and life satisfaction. Results showed an independent and positive association of participation in sport, heritage and active-creative leisure activities and life satisfaction but not for participation in popular entertainment, theatre hobbies and museum/galleries. The association of reading hobbies and sedentary-creative activities and life satisfaction was negative. High life satisfaction was associated with engaging in a number of different activities rather than the frequency of participation in each of them. The results have implications for policy makers and leisure services providers, in particular those associated with heritage recreation. Subjective wellbeing measures, such as life satisfaction, and not economic measures alone should be considered in the evaluation of services. The promotion of leisure activities which are active and promote social interaction should be considered in programmes aimed at improving the quality of life

New dynamics in cerebellar Purkinje cells: torus canards

We describe a transition from bursting to rapid spiking in a reduced mathematical model of a cerebellar Purkinje cell. We perform a slow-fast analysis of the system and find that -- after a saddle node bifurcation of limit cycles -- the full model dynamics follow temporarily a repelling branch of limit cycles. We propose that the system exhibits a dynamical phenomenon new to realistic, biophysical applications: torus canards.Comment: 4 pages; 4 figures (low resolution); updated following peer-review: language and definitions updated, Figures 1 and 4 updated, typos corrected, references added and remove

The promotion of local wellbeing: A primer for policymakers

There is growing interest among policymakers in the promotion of wellbeing as an objective of public policy. In particular, local authorities have been given powers to undertake action to promote wellbeing in their area. Recent advances in the academic literature on wellbeing are giving rise to an increasingly detailed picture of the factors that determine people’s subjective wellbeing (how they think and feel about their lives). However, the concept of subjective wellbeing is poorly understood within local government and much of the evidence base is extremely recent. I therefore review the literature on the definition, measurement, and determinants of wellbeing, and discuss some of its implications for local public policy

The MUSE-Wide Survey: A first catalogue of 831 emission line galaxies

We present a first instalment of the MUSE-Wide survey, covering an area of 22.2 arcmin$^2$ (corresponding to $\sim$20% of the final survey) in the CANDELS/Deep area of the Chandra Deep Field South. We use the MUSE integral field spectrograph at the ESO VLT to conduct a full-area spectroscopic mapping at a depth of 1h exposure time per 1 arcmin$^2$ pointing. We searched for compact emission line objects using our newly developed LSDCat software based on a 3-D matched filtering approach, followed by interactive classification and redshift measurement of the sources. Our catalogue contains 831 distinct emission line galaxies with redshifts ranging from 0.04 to 6. Roughly one third (237) of the emission line sources are Lyman $\alpha$ emitting galaxies with $3 < z < 6$, only four of which had previously measured spectroscopic redshifts. At lower redshifts 351 galaxies are detected primarily by their [OII] emission line ($0.3 \lesssim z \lesssim 1.5$), 189 by their [OIII] line ($0.21 \lesssim z \lesssim 0.85$), and 46 by their H$\alpha$ line ($0.04 \lesssim z \lesssim 0.42$). Comparing our spectroscopic redshifts to photometric redshift estimates from the literature, we find excellent agreement for $z<1.5$ with a median $\Delta z$ of only $\sim 4 \times 10^{-4}$ and an outlier rate of 6%, however a significant systematic offset of $\Delta z = 0.26$ and an outlier rate of 23% for Ly$\alpha$ emitters at $z>3$. Together with the catalogue we also release 1D PSF-weighted extracted spectra and small 3D datacubes centred on each of the 831 sources.Comment: 24 pages, 14 figures, accepted for publication in A&A, data products are available for download from http://muse-vlt.eu/science/muse-wide-survey/ and later via the CD

Inner wellbeing: concept and validation of a new approach to subjective perceptions of wellbeing-India

© The Author(s) 2013. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited.This paper describes the conceptual development of a multi-domain, psychosocial model of 'Inner Wellbeing' (IWB) and assesses the construct validity of the scale designed to measure it. IWB expresses what people think and feel they are able to be and do. Drawing together scholarship in wellbeing and international development it is grounded in field research in marginalised, rural communities in the global South. Results from research in India at two points in time (2011 and 2013) are reported. At Time 1 (n = 287), we were unable to confirm an eight-factor, correlated model as distinct yet interrelated domains. However, at Time 2 (n = 335), we were able to confirm a revised, seven-factor correlated model with economic confidence, agency and participation, social connections, close relationships, physical and mental health, competence and self-worth, and values and meaning (five items per domain) as distinct yet interrelated domains. In particular, at Time 2, a seven-factor, correlated model provided a significantly better fit to the data than did a one-factor model.This work is supported by the Economic and Social Research Council/Department for International Development Joint Scheme for Research on International Development (Poverty Alleviation) grant number RES-167-25-0507 ES/H033769/1. Special thanks are due to Chaupal and Gangaram Paikra, Pritam Das, Usha Kujur, Kanti Minjh, Susanna Siddiqui, and Dinesh Tirkey

A Pinned Polymer Model of Posture Control

A phenomenological model of human posture control is posited. The dynamics are modelled as an elastically pinned polymer under the influence of noise. The model accurately reproduces the two-point correlation functions of experimental posture data and makes predictions for the response function of the postural control system. The physiological and clinical significance of the model is discussed.Comment: uuencoded post script file, 17 pages with 3 figure