"Policy Scepticism" and the Impact of Welsh Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) on their Host Region : Accounting for Regional Budget Constraints

This paper replicates the analysis of Scottish HEIs in Hermannsson et al (2010b) for the case of Wales in order to provide a self-contained analysis that is readily accessible by those whose primary concern is with the regional impacts of Welsh HEIs. A "policy scepticism" has emerged that challenges the results of conventional regional HEI impact analyses. This denial of the importance of the expenditure impacts of HEIs appears to be based on a belief in either a binding regional resource constraint or a regional public sector budget constraint. In this paper we provide a systematic critique of this policy scepticism. However, while rejecting the extreme form of policy scepticism, we argue that it is crucial to recognise the importance of the publicsector expenditure constraints that are binding under devolution. We show how conventional impact analyses can be augmented to accommodate regional public sector budget constraints. While our results suggest that conventional impact studies overestimate the expenditure impacts of HEIs, they also demonstrate that the policy scepticism that treats these expenditure effects as irrelevant neglects some key aspects of HEIs, in particular their export intensity

Could a reduction in alcohol consumption be good news for the UK economy?

The UK has one of the highest alcohol consumption rates per capita in the world being ranked 25th according to the latest global World Health Organisation report on alcohol (WHO, 2014). While there are several well documented detrimental effects of alcohol consumption on health, crime and productivity (e.g. Holmes et al, 2016), the sector also contributes positively to the economy through its production and sales activities

Greek Young Children’s Engagement with Media in the Home: Parents’ and Children’s Perspectives

Recent developments in literacy studies suggest that everyday media experiences of children should be included and inform school literacy. In light of this, in the present study, we map children’s access and patterns of use, as well as children’s and parents’ stance and views on media. From the analysis of interviews with children and questionnaires with parents, it was made clear that children have rich media experiences in the home, having access to print, screen entertainment and digital media, whereas the presence of video games in Greek homes is more limited compared with other countries. Parents seem to be affected by the ‘moral panics’ often surrounding young children’s use of media. Moreover, our study indicated that families with a more privileged social and educational background seem to be more oriented to print and digital media than families with a lower social status. In contrast, families of lower social and educational background tend to be more oriented to screen entertainment media. On the other hand, some significant differences with respect to the children’s gender were disclosed, which seem to be linked to the social expectations and the distinct social roles of what means to ‘be a girl’ and ‘a boy’. In conclusion, we suggest that a study including both the perspectives of parents and children on the latter’s media activities in the home can better address the limitations of (self)-reporting and complement observational studies of literacy practices

THE CHRONOLOGY AND STATUS OF NON NOK THA, NORTHEAST THAILAND

  Excavations at Non Nok Tha, in Northeast Thailand in 1965-1968 revealed for the first time in Southeast Asia, a stratigraphic transition from the Neolithic into the Bronze Age. Based on conventional charcoal radiocarbon determinations, early reports identified fourth millennium bronze casting. The proposed length of the prehistoric sequence, and the division of the Neolithic to Bronze age mortuary sequence into at least 11 phases, has stimulated a series of social interpretations all of which have in common, a social order based on ascriptive ranking into at least two groups which saw increased hierarchical divisions emerge with the initial Bronze Age. This paper presents the results of a new dating initiative, based on the ultrafiltration of human bones. The results indicate that the initial Neolithic occupation took place during the 14th century BC. The earliest Bronze Age has been placed in the 10th centuries BC. These dates are virtually identical with those obtained for the sites of Ban Chiang and Ban Non Wat. Compared with the elite early Bronze Age graves of Ban Non Wat, Non Nok Tha burials display little evidence for significant divisions in society

An Exploration Of Parameters Affecting Employee Energy Conversation Behaviour At The Workplace, Towards IOT-Enabled Behavioural Interventions

Energy conservation is one of the widely recognised important means towards addressing CO2 emissions and the resulting global issue of climate change. Furthermore, public buildings have been recognised as contributing significantly to the consumption of energy worldwide. More importantly, occupant behaviour, a factor that needs to be studied further, can have a high impact on the energy consumed within public buildings. Through our study, we have conducted an exploratory study on the parameters affecting employee energy conservation behaviour in public buildings, towards constructing a behavioural model that can be employed in IoT-enabled personalised energy disaggregation initiatives. We propose an extension to an existing model of employee energy behaviour based on Values Beliefs Norms (VBN) theory, with the addition of five parameters – comfort levels, burnout, locus of control, personal disadvantages and energy awareness. In addition, we discriminate between two groups of inter-related energy conservation behaviours at work – popular and unpopular energy conservation behaviours – and explain our resulting behavioural models’ utility towards IoT-enabled energy conservation, within workplaces. We find that promoting employees’ energy awareness levels, as well as positively affecting their environmental worldviews and personal norms are important factors that should be considered in behavioural interventions toward energy conservation at the workplace

Regional Impact Analyses and the Appropriate Treatment of public budget constraints under devolution: An application to Scottish Higher Education Institutions (HEIs)

There have been numerous studies of the "impact" of HEIs on their host regions. These have typically focused on the demand for goods and services in the host region. The best of these studies employ regional input-output analyses. However, there has developed a "policy scepticism" about the value of such analysis based on notions of either demand-side (binding budget constraints) or supply-side (binding resource constraints) "crowding out", to the point where the demand side impact of HEIs is regarded as negligible. In this paper we provide a systematic critique of this policy scepticism. While we reject the extreme form of policy skepticism we do acknowledge the importance of binding public sector budget constraints under devolution, and argue that such constraints should be accommodated in future impact studies. We focus our own impact analysis on the HEI sector's impact net of its public income by simulating the effect of switching public expenditure funds between HEIs and other activities using a modified HEI-disaggregated input-output model of Scotland. The results suggest that conventional impact studies do overestimate the impact of HEIs, but importantly that the policy scepticism that treats the demand-side impact of HEIs neglects some important impacts of these institutions, in particular their export intensity