70 research outputs found
Priming Europe: Media Effects on Loyalty, Voice and Exit in European Parliament Elections
ArticleThis is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Palgrave Macmillan via the DOI in this record.Parties in government face a decline in EP elections after experiencing a surge in votes to win the national election. This occurs because voters are more inclined to give voice to their dissatisfaction with current government performance by voting for the opposition or exiting because less is at stake in secondâorder elections. These elections negatively affect the electoral fortunes of governing parties as voters opt to punish poorly performing national governments in EP elections. Meanwhile, greater reliance on the EU issue dimension in vote choice models is taken as evidence for the increasing Europeanisation of EP elections. We examine the role of the media in making the EU issue dimension salient in such a way that government parties may benefit electorally from this increased saliency. To examine whether visibility of government party actors in media coverage increases loyalty for the governing parties either directly or via priming the EU issues for voters, we combine survey data from the 2009 European Election Studies (EES) with data on news coverage of those elections that links the governing party to the EU issue. We show that where the government is visible in EU news coverage, EU issue voting tends to increase loyalty while decreasing the probability to vote for the opposition and thus improves the electoral prospects for governing parties. This is even more the case if the issue is primed by negative campaign coverage.Support for this research was provided by the Austrian Science Fund (S10902-G11)
How Much Can a Campus Save on Utility Bills by Turning a 5-Workday Week Into a 4ÂWorkday Week
The recent budget cuts campaign mandated
by the governor's office had all state agencies in
Texas looking for ways to reduce revenue
spending. One of the cost savings opportunities
perceived by many university officials is to
convert a typical 5-workday week into a 4-
workday week (e.g., Monday to Thursday) with
10 working hours each day during the
universities summer session. The potential
savings come from the fact that the universities
can be partially shut down during the prolonged
weekends (Friday to Sunday). It is believed that
the savings from partially shutting down an extra
workday is much more significant than the
marginal energy increase caused by the extended
working hours during workdays.
This paper analyzes the potential energy
cost savings of this approach for three real cases.
The savings can be largely estimated by
comparing whole-campus electricity
consumptions between typical weekdays and
weekends (or holidays). Energy overheads
caused by the extended working hours (two more
hours per working day) were also estimated. A
limited shutdown scenario (similar to a typical
weekend schedule) and a more aggressive
shutdown scenario (similar to a typical holiday
schedule) during the weekend periods are
presented. The potential savings opportunities
were from 0.32% to 1.53% of the annual
electricity bills for different universities
Optimization Measures for Sporting and Special Event Facilities: Design and Operation
Reducing unnecessary building energy costs
is becoming more of a priority. Rising fuel
prices and a global emphasis on energy
efficiency are key contributing factors. This
push towards energy efficiency certainly applies
to today's athletic and special event facilities.
High customer expectations and corresponding
large operating expenses have helped to make
energy conservation measures more of a priority
in the facilities design. The heating, ventilation,
and air conditioning (HVAC) systems in sporting
and special event facility present a unique
challenge to Continuous Commissioning (CC)
engineers. In such facilities, high occupancy
and equipment loads occur at the design load
condition, but only a small fraction of the
designed capacity is necessary for routine
operations. On the other hand, during games and
other events, system performance is critical.
Therefore, significant savings potential exists,
but care must be taken to avoid compromising
the peak load operations. Maintenance
uncertainties, equipment wear, and lack of
operator knowledge all combine to affect the
building operating costs. Continuous
Commissioning, a process developed by the
Texas A&M Energy Systems Laboratory,
addresses issues such as these and proves very
worthwhile. An overview of multi-purpose
arenas and their usage will be given, and
potential optimization measures and Continuous
Commissioning of these facilities will be
presented, along with some illustrative examples
Increasing abdominal pressure with and without PEEP: effects on intra-peritoneal, intra-organ and intra-vascular pressures
Intra-organ and intra-vascular pressures can be used to estimate intra-abdominal pressure. The aim of this prospective, interventional study was to assess the effect of PEEP on the accuracy of pressure estimation at different measurement sites in a model of increased abdominal pressure
Judicial decision-making within political parties: A political approach
How do German intra-party tribunals manage internal conflicts? More specifically, why do they accept some cases for trial but reject others? Required by law to strictly adhere to implement rule of law standards, German intra-party tribunals are designed to insulate conflict regulation from politics. Meanwhile, research on judicial politics highlights the role of political and strategic considerations in accepting cases for trial. Building on the latter, we develop a theory that emphasizes tribunalsâ political concerns such as winning elections. We test our hypotheses with a mixed-effects logit model on a novel data set covering 1088 tribunal decisions in six German parties from 1967 until 2015. Our findings indicate that political factors exert a strong effect on tribunal case acceptance. Tribunals are more likely to accept cases when suffering electoral loss and after losing government office. Moreover, tribunals dismiss cases more easily when their parties display relatively high levels of policy agreement
Increasing abdominal pressure with and without PEEP: effects on intra-peritoneal, intra-organ and intra-vascular pressures
Intra-organ and intra-vascular pressures can be used to estimate intra-abdominal pressure. The aim of this prospective, interventional study was to assess the effect of PEEP on the accuracy of pressure estimation at different measurement sites in a model of increased abdominal pressure
Where less may be more: how the rare biosphere pulls ecosystems strings
Rare species are increasingly recognized as crucial, yet vulnerable components of Earthâs ecosystems. This is also true for microbial communities, which are typically composed of a high number of relatively rare species. Recent studies have demonstrated that rare species can have an over-proportional role in biogeochemical cycles and may be a hidden driver of microbiome function. In this review, we provide an ecological overview of the rare microbial biosphere, including causes of rarity and the impacts of rare species on ecosystem functioning. We discuss how rare species can have a preponderant role for local biodiversity and species turnover with rarity potentially bound to phylogenetically conserved features. Rare microbes may therefore be overlooked keystone species regulating the functioning of host-associated, terrestrial and aquatic environments. We conclude this review with recommendations to guide scientists interested in investigating this rapidly emerging research area
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