Culpability and Willingness to Pay to Reduce Negative Externalities: A Contingent Valuation and Experimental Economics Study

Financial Economics,

Blood-based colorectal cancer screening: eliciting attitudes and determining predictors of interest in a multiethnic sample

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Issues of alcohol misuse among older people : attitudes and experiences of social work practitioners

This small-scale qualitative research focused on the experiences of social workers vis--vis older people who misuse alcohol. Based in an Older People's Team in the west of Scotland, the study explored service provision for alcohol misuse and examined whether practitioners felt the existing services provided by the Substance Misuse Team were effective in meeting the needs of older people with an alcohol problem. Using semi-structured interviews, data were collected from 18 participants, the majority (14) of whom were female and whose ages ranged from 31 to 54 years. Several key themes emerged including the extent of alcohol problems among older people and the complex reasons that cause older people to misuse alcohol. These reasons commonly related to the increasing challenges of old age. The data also demonstrated that current services are not meeting the needs of older people. Practitioners identified a need for an 'age-specific' approach to target more effectively the complex needs of older people. Recommendations from practitioners included ways to develop new and more effective services, including a more age-specific service, such as providing longer term support in older people's own homes, using a specialised support worker, and increasing staff training on alcohol use among older people

Microwave Electrodynamics of the Antiferromagnetic Superconductor GdBa_2Cu_3O_{7-\delta}

The temperature dependence of the microwave surface impedance and conductivity are used to study the pairing symmetry and properties of cuprate superconductors. However, the superconducting properties can be hidden by the effects of paramagnetism and antiferromagnetic long-range order in the cuprates. To address this issue we have investigated the microwave electrodynamics of GdBa_2Cu_3O_{7-\delta}, a rare-earth cuprate superconductor which shows long-range ordered antiferromagnetism below T_N=2.2 K, the Neel temperature of the Gd ion subsystem. We measured the temperature dependence of the surface resistance and surface reactance of c-axis oriented epitaxial thin films at 10.4, 14.7 and 17.9 GHz with the parallel plate resonator technique down to 1.4 K. Both the resistance and the reactance data show an unusual upturn at low temperature and the resistance presents a strong peak around T_N mainly due to change in magnetic permeability.Comment: M2S-HTCS-VI Conference Paper, 2 pages, 2 eps figures, using Elsevier style espcrc2.st

Food Scan: A Yelp for Dietary Restrictions

Food restrictions pose a serious issue for Chapman students, with consequences as extreme as anaphylactic shock and death. Our team started the Food Scan project with a simple goal of streamlining how individuals with dietary restrictions find safe places to eat or buy food. The project name highlights our intention to clarify restaurant menu items for users by displaying important allergen and dietary information. Using Human-Computer Interaction methods, our team chose to develop a technology that is usable, effective, enjoyable, and inclusive by involving users during the entire design process. By integrating multimodal interfaces (including speech to text inputs), we strive to make our application accessible to a highly diverse group of people. Our team strives to create enjoyable user experiences through throwaway-prototyping, a process that involves conceptual models that may eventually be discarded, in order to quickly test our UI with users. We conducted our first research survey on a sample of 29 potential users, with only 17.2% claiming to have a dietary restriction. Despite the small number of people affected by dietary restrictions, 89.6% of our research participants described an interest in previewing the restaurant menu before going to a restaurant, supporting the need for an app like Food Scan

The Three-Component System

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Relative Age Effects in Elite Olympic Weightlifters

PURPOSE: To determine if RAEs exist in elite Olympic weightlifters from the past five Olympic Games. METHODS: Using retrospective competition data from the International Weightlifting Federation database a total of 953 Olympic Weightlifters (595 males and 358 females) who competed in the Olympic Games between 2000 and 2016 were included in this study. Weightlifters who competed in multiple Olympic Games were only counted once and duplicates were removed from this investigation. The weightlifters were divided into subset weight classes; men lightweight (56kg, 62kg, and 69kg), men middleweight (77kg, 85kg, and 94kg), men heavyweight (105kg and 105kg+), women lightweight (48kg, 53kg, and 58kg), women middleweight (63kg and 69kg), and women heavyweight (75kg and 75kg+). Using the subset weight classes, the observed date of birth distribution vs. the expected worldwide date of birth distribution were compared using multiple chi square (χ2) goodness of fit tests with the alpha level set at (p≤0.05). Following up the χ2 test, standardized residuals were calculated for each month with values of ±2 denoting significant over-and under-representation. RESULTS: RAEs were present overall for Olympic weightlifters (χ2 = 189.428, p\u3c0.001), with significant over-representation in January (z= +12.6, 20.9%) and under-representation in June (z= -2.1, 6.3%), September (z= -3.2, 5.7%), and November (z= -3.0, 5.1%). RAEs were also present in all three male classes; men lightweight (χ2 = 74.773, p\u3c0.001), men middleweight (χ2 = 41.786, p\u3c0.001), and men heavyweight (χ2 = 39.395, p\u3c0.001) and women lightweight (χ2 = 37.251, p\u3c0.001). Significant over-representation was noted in January for men lightweight (24.1%), men middleweight (20.0%), men heavyweight (22.2%), and women lightweight (21.2%), and there was a significant under-representation for the month of November in men lightweight (z= -2.7, 2.8%). However, RAEs were not present in the women’s middleweight (χ2 = 18.632, p=0.068) or heavyweight (χ2 = 16.692, p= 0.117) classes. CONCLUSION: In males significant RAEs are present in Olympic weightlifters regardless of weight class. However, for females RAEs only exist for lightweight Olympic weightlifters. Indicating that RAEs are present in Olympic weightlifting is important because it will help maintain the amount of opportunity for all athletes regardless of when they were born in the year. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS: Coaches should be aware of the possible advantages of training age and the effect of physical maturation as a result of these RAEs. Coaches may use this information for athlete selection but the presence of RAEs should not discourage athletes from participating in the sport of weightlifting

Containment Basins And Bird Exclusion-A Historical Perspective

Most facility engineers with responsibility for hazing birds on containment basins use agricultural crop protection techniques. This approach is appropriate for basins with non-hazardous solutions. Basins containing toxic solutions require an entirely different approach. Detoxification, or exclusion with floating membranes, netting or Bird Balls™ are the best options

Evaluation of the bank stability and toe erosion model (BSTEM) for predicting lateral retreat on composite streambanks

Streambank erosion is known to be a major source of sediment in streams and rivers. The Bank Stability and Toe Erosion Model (BSTEM) was developed in order to predict streambank retreat due to both fluvial erosion and geotechnical failure. However, few, if any, model evaluations using long-term streambank retreat data have been performed. The objectives of this research were to (1) monitor long-term composite streambank retreat during a hydraulically active period on a rapidly migrating stream, (2) evaluate BSTEM’s ability to predict the measured streambank retreat, and (3) assess the importance of accurate geotechnical, fluvial erosion, and near-bank pore-water pressure properties. The Barren Fork Creek in northeastern Oklahoma laterally eroded 7.8 to 20.9 m along a 100-m length of stream between April and October 2009 based on regular bank location surveys. The most significant lateral retreat occurred in mid- to late-May and September due to a series of storm events, and not necessarily the most extreme events observed during the monitoring period. BSTEM (version 5.2) was not originally programmed to run multiple hydrographs iteratively, so a subroutine was written that automatically input the temporal sequence of stream stage and to lag the water table in the near-bank ground water depending on user settings. Eight BSTEM simulations of the Barren Fork Creek streambank were performed using combinations of the following input data: with and without a water table lag; default BSTEM geotechnical parameters (moderate silt loam) versus laboratory measured geotechnical parameters based on direct shear tests on saturated soil samples; and default BSTEM fluvial erosion parameters versus field measured fluvial erosion parameters from submerged jet tests. Using default BSTEM input values underestimated the actual erosion that occurred. Lagging the water table predicted more geotechnical failures resulting in greater streambank retreat. Using measured fluvial and geotechnical parameters and a water table lag also under predicted retreat (approximately 3.3 m), but did predict the appropriate timing of streambank collapses. The under prediction of retreat was hypothesized to be due to over predicting the critical shear stress of the non-cohesive gravel, under predicting the erodibility of the non-cohesive gravel, and/or under predicting the imposed shear stress acting on the streambank. Current research improving our understanding of shear stress distributions, streambank pore-water pressure dynamics, and methods for estimating excess shear stress parameters for noncohesive soils will be critical for improving BSTEM and other streambank stability models