2,171 research outputs found

    Are virtues national, supranational, or universal?

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    Many studies investigated cultural differences in values, most notably by Hofstede and Schwarz. Relatively few have focused on virtues, a related and important concept in contemporary social science. The present paper examines the similarities and differences between nations, or blocks of - culturally related - nations on the perceived importance of virtues. Adults (N = 2.809 students) from 14 countries were asked to freely mention which virtues they found important to practice in daily life, and next to rate a list of 15 virtues, which reflect the most frequently mentioned categories in The Netherlands, as found in a previous study. The 14 nations included the United States, Mexico, nine European and three Asian nations. For the free-listed virtues, we compared the top-ten lists of most frequently mentioned virtues across the nations. We used a correspondence analysis on the frequency table to assess the relationships between the virtues and nations. For the 15 virtues ratings, a MANOVA, and follow-up ANOVA’s were used to examine effects of nation, age, gender and religion. We found strong evidence for relationships between nations and blocks of culturally related nations and the importance attached to various virtues. There appear to be some country specific virtues, such as generosity in France, but also some relatively universal virtues, most notably honesty, respect, and kindness

    Four functional roles for case studies in emerging adulthood research

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    Case studies have four functional roles which, if more widely embraced, can help to advance theory and methodology in the study of emerging adults. These functions are: case-based theory development, individual-level prediction testing, theory exemplification, and idiographic psychobiography. We describe these functions and provide examples of how each one can add depth, richness and rigour to the burgeoning theory and research on emerging adulthood. We also discuss specifiability (the capacity of a theory to make predictions about, explain and interpret individuals) as a criterion of validity, to be considered as equivalent in status to the external validity criterion of generalizability. Finally we consider the protocols for case study sampling, including intensity sampling, deviant case sampling and significant case sampling

    Stable and Metastable Structures of Cobalt on Cu(001): An ab initio Study

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    We report results of density-functional theory calculations on the structural, magnetic, and electronic properties of (1x1)-structures of Co on Cu(001) for coverages up to two monolayers. In particular we discuss the tendency towards phase separation in Co islands and the possibility of segregation of Cu on top of the Co-film. A sandwich structure consisting of a bilayer Co-film covered by 1ML of Cu is found to be the lowest-energy configuration. We also discuss a bilayer c(2x2)-alloy which may form due to kinetic reasons, or be stabilized at strained surface regions. Furthermore, we study the influence of magnetism on the various structures and, e.g., find that Co adlayers induce a weak spin-density wave in the copper substrate.Comment: 11 pages including 4 figures. Related publications can be found at http://www.fhi-berlin.mpg.de/th/paper.htm

    Adiabatic description of nonspherical quantum dot models

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    Within the effective mass approximation an adiabatic description of spheroidal and dumbbell quantum dot models in the regime of strong dimensional quantization is presented using the expansion of the wave function in appropriate sets of single-parameter basis functions. The comparison is given and the peculiarities are considered for spectral and optical characteristics of the models with axially symmetric confining potentials depending on their geometric size making use of the total sets of exact and adiabatic quantum numbers in appropriate analytic approximations

    K2-137 b: an Earth-sized planet in a 4.3-hour orbit around an M-dwarf

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    We report the discovery from K2 of a transiting terrestrial planet in an ultra-short-period orbit around an M3-dwarf. K2-137 b completes an orbit in only 4.3 hours, the second-shortest orbital period of any known planet, just 4 minutes longer than that of KOI 1843.03, which also orbits an M-dwarf. Using a combination of archival images, AO imaging, RV measurements, and light curve modelling, we show that no plausible eclipsing binary scenario can explain the K2 light curve, and thus confirm the planetary nature of the system. The planet, whose radius we determine to be 0.89 +/- 0.09 Earth radii, and which must have a iron mass fraction greater than 0.45, orbits a star of mass 0.463 +/- 0.052 Msol and radius 0.442 +/- 0.044 Rsol.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA

    The impact of parenthood on environmental attitudes and behaviour: a longitudinal investigation of the legacy hypothesis

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    Willingness to engage in sustainable actions may be limited by the psychological distance of climate change. In this study, we test the legacy hypothesis, which holds that having children leads parents to consider the legacy left to offspring in respect of environmental quality. Using the Understanding Society dataset, a longitudinal survey representative of the UK population (n = 18,176), we assess how having children may change people’s individual environmental attitudes and behaviour. Results indicate that having a new child is associated with a small decrease in the frequency of a few environmental behaviours. Only parents with already high environmental concern show a small increase in the desire to act more sustainably after the birth of their first child. Overall, the results do not provide evidence in support of the legacy hypothesis in terms of individual-level environmental attitudes and behaviours. We argue that the transition to parenthood is a time where concern is prioritised on the immediate wellbeing of the child and not on the future environmental threats

    A global ensemble of ocean wave climate statistics from contemporary wave reanalysis and hindcasts

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    There are numerous global ocean wave reanalysis and hindcast products currently being distributed and used across different scientific fields. However, there is not a consistent dataset that can sample across all existing products based on a standardized framework. Here, we present and describe the first coordinated multi-product ensemble of present-day global wave fields available to date. This dataset, produced through the Coordinated Ocean Wave Climate Project (COWCLIP) phase 2, includes general and extreme statistics of significant wave height (Hs), mean wave period (Tm) and mean wave direction (θm) computed across 1980–2014, at different frequency resolutions (monthly, seasonally, and annually). This coordinated global ensemble has been derived from fourteen state-of-the-science global wave products obtained from different atmospheric reanalysis forcing and downscaling methods. This data set has been processed, under a specific framework for consistency and quality, following standard Data Reference Syntax, Directory Structures and Metadata specifications. This new comprehensive dataset provides support to future broad-scale analysis of historical wave climatology and variability as well as coastal risk and vulnerability assessments across offshore and coastal engineering applications
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