Does it make a difference? Examining consumers´ attitude towards sustainability efforts within the fast fashion industry through trust and perceived consumer effectiveness

In the context of environmental sustainability in the fashion industry, developing positive consumer perceptions and attitudes about efforts of companies to take responsibility, as well as trust is vital in terms purchase intention. Furthermore, perceived consumer effectiveness, a feeling of empowerment in consumers to contribute to solving environmental problems, is found to be a strong predictor of environmentally conscious consumer behavior. It remains yet unanswered, if these concepts apply to the setting of two well-known fashion brands, ZARA and H&M, and their sustainable clothing lines, and if favorable perceptions about these brands could enhance perceived consumer effectiveness. To answer these questions, we developed a framework that depicts the relationships between perceptions of social responsibility, consumer attitude, trust, purchase intention, and perceived consumer effectiveness. An online survey was conducted with an internationally diverse sample of 216 consumers, and the data was analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling. The results indicated that perceptions of social responsibility directly affect consumers’ attitudes towards ZARA and H&M, as well as trust and perceived consumer effectiveness. Trust was found to be a direct predictor of purchase intention. Consumer attitude and perceived consumer effectiveness, however, did not predict purchase intention. Results are discussed, and theoretical and practical implications are presented

Prediction of difficulty levels in video games from ongoing EEG

Real-time assessment of mental workload from EEG plays an important role in enhancing symbiotic interaction of human operators in immersive environments. In this study we thus aimed at predicting the difficulty level of a video game a person is playing at a particular moment from the ongoing EEG activity. Therefore, we made use of power modulations in the theta (4–7 Hz) and alpha (8–13 Hz) frequency bands of the EEG which are known to reflect cognitive workload. Since the goal was to predict from multiple difficulty levels, established binary classification approaches are futile. Here, we employ a novel spatial filtering method (SPoC) that finds spatial filters such that their corresponding bandpower dynamics maximally covary with a given target variable, in this case the difficulty level. EEG was recorded from 6 participants playing a modified Tetris game at 10 different difficulty levels. We found that our approach predicted the levels with high accuracy, yielding a mean prediction error of less than one level.EC/FP7/611570/EU/Symbiotic Mind Computer Interaction for Information Seeking/MindSeeBMBF, 01GQ0850, Verbundprojekt: Bernstein Fokus Neurotechnologie - Nichtinvasive Neurotechnologie für Mensch-Maschine Interaktio

It can happen anytime: experts dealing with the risk of a future İstanbul earthquake

This research focuses on the ways in which Istanbul earthquake professionals, i.e. members of civil society organizations for disaster preparation and search and rescue, scientists, engineers, and civil planners, navigate the current preparations for a strong earthquake that is forecasted to affect the city at some point in the coming decades. While state institutions have implemented several programs and are facilitating urban transformation projects in the name of preparing the city for an earthquake, I argue this a neoliberal governing approach, which I refer to as “disaster neoliberalism,” has displaced the burden of preparation largely to individual residents of the city while disempowering some civil society organizations and privileging private companies. At the same time, this burden on individuals increases as class status decreases. Furthermore, I demonstrate that my expert interviewees occupied a complicated position, the limits of which they navigated through the use of laughter and humor. I show that in many cases, they oppose the cynicism concerning earthquake preparations that is all too prevalent within the city through their professional and personal initiative. At the same time, this thesis argues that the common narrative that inaction about preparations is part of “Turkish culture” may reinforce this cynical view and may be problematic for future disaster preparations due to its reliance on an idea of cultural essentialism and Occidentalism

Influence of the hierarchical architecture of multi-core iron oxide nanoflowers on their magnetic properties

Magnetic properties of superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles are controlled mainly by their particle size and by their particle size distribution. Magnetic properties of multi-core iron oxide nanoparticles, often called iron oxide nanoflowers (IONFs), are additionally affected by the interaction of magnetic moments between neighboring cores. The knowledge about the hierarchical structure of IONFs is therefore essential for understanding the magnetic properties of IONFs. In this contribution, the architecture of multi-core IONFs was investigated using correlative multiscale transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction and dynamic light scattering. The multiscale TEM measurements comprised low-resolution and high-resolution imaging as well as geometric phase analysis. The IONFs contained maghemite with the average chemical composition -Fe$_{2.72±0.02}$O$_{4}$. The metallic vacancies located on the octahedral lattice sites of the spinel ferrite structure were partially ordered. Individual IONFs consisted of several cores showing frequently a specific crystallographic orientation relationship between direct neighbors. This oriented attachment may facilitate the magnetic alignment within the cores. Individual cores were composed of partially coherent nanocrystals having almost the same crystallographic orientation. The sizes of individual constituents revealed by the microstructure analysis were correlated with the magnetic particle sizes that were obtained from fi