1,301 research outputs found
Representing older people: towards meaningful images of the user in design scenarios
Designing for older people requires the consideration of a range of difficult and sometimes highly personal design problems. Issues such as fear, loneliness, dependency, and physical decline may be difficult to observe or discuss in interviews. Pastiche scenarios and pastiche personae are techniques that employ characters to create a space for the discussion of new technological developments and as a means to explore user experience. This paper argues that the use of such characters can help to overcome restrictive notions of older people by disrupting designers' prior assumptions.
In this paper, we reflect on our experiences using pastiche techniques in two separate technology design projects that sought to address the needs of older people. In the first case pastiche scenarios were developed by the designers of the system and used as discussion documents with users. In the second case, pastiche personae were used by groups of users themselves to generate scenarios which were scribed for later use by the design team. We explore how the use of fictional characters and settings can generate new ideas and undermine rhetorical devices within scenarios that attempt to fit characters to the technology, rather than vice versa.
To assist in future development of pastiche techniques in designing for older people, we provide an array of fictional older characters drawn from literary and popular culture.</p
Spatial fluctuations of a surviving particle in the trapping reaction
We consider the trapping reaction, , where and particles
have a diffusive dynamics characterized by diffusion constants and .
The interaction with particles can be formally incorporated in an effective
dynamics for one particle as was recently shown by Bray {\it et al}. [Phys.
Rev. E {\bf 67}, 060102 (2003)]. We use this method to compute, in space
dimension , the asymptotic behaviour of the spatial fluctuation,
, for a surviving particle in the perturbative regime,
, for the case of an initially uniform distribution of
particles. We show that, for , with
. By contrast, the fluctuations of paths constrained to return to
their starting point at time grow with the larger exponent 1/3. Numerical
tests are consistent with these predictions.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure
Nonequilibrium Stationary States and Phase Transitions in Directed Ising Models
We study the nonequilibrium properties of directed Ising models with non
conserved dynamics, in which each spin is influenced by only a subset of its
nearest neighbours. We treat the following models: (i) the one-dimensional
chain; (ii) the two-dimensional square lattice; (iii) the two-dimensional
triangular lattice; (iv) the three-dimensional cubic lattice. We raise and
answer the question: (a) Under what conditions is the stationary state
described by the equilibrium Boltzmann-Gibbs distribution? We show that for
models (i), (ii), and (iii), in which each spin "sees" only half of its
neighbours, there is a unique set of transition rates, namely with exponential
dependence in the local field, for which this is the case. For model (iv), we
find that any rates satisfying the constraints required for the stationary
measure to be Gibbsian should satisfy detailed balance, ruling out the
possibility of directed dynamics. We finally show that directed models on
lattices of coordination number with exponential rates cannot
accommodate a Gibbsian stationary state. We conjecture that this property
extends to any form of the rates. We are thus led to the conclusion that
directed models with Gibbsian stationary states only exist in dimension one and
two. We then raise the question: (b) Do directed Ising models, augmented by
Glauber dynamics, exhibit a phase transition to a ferromagnetic state? For the
models considered above, the answers are open problems, to the exception of the
simple cases (i) and (ii). For Cayley trees, where each spin sees only the
spins further from the root, we show that there is a phase transition provided
the branching ratio, , satisfies
The Grand-Canonical Asymmetric Exclusion Process and the One-Transit Walk
The one-dimensional Asymmetric Exclusion Process (ASEP) is a paradigm for
nonequilibrium dynamics, in particular driven diffusive processes. It is
usually considered in a canonical ensemble in which the number of sites is
fixed. We observe that the grand-canonical partition function for the ASEP is
remarkably simple. It allows a simple direct derivation of the asymptotics of
the canonical normalization in various phases and of the correspondence with
One-Transit Walks recently observed by Brak et.al.Comment: Published versio
Parasites on parasites:Coupled fluctuations in stacked contact processes
We present a model for host-parasite dynamics which incorporates both vertical and horizontal transmission as well as spatial structure. Our model consists of stacked contact processes (CP), where the dynamics of the host is a simple CP on a lattice while the dynamics of the parasite is a secondary CP which sits on top of the host-occupied sites. In the simplest case, where infection does not incur any cost, we uncover a novel effect: a non-monotonic dependence of parasite prevalence on host turnover. Inspired by natural examples of hyperparasitism, we extend our model to multiple levels of parasites and identify a transition between the maintenance of a finite and infinite number of levels, which we conjecture is connected to a roughening transition in models of surface growth
Exact probability function for bulk density and current in the asymmetric exclusion process
We examine the asymmetric simple exclusion process with open boundaries, a
paradigm of driven diffusive systems, having a nonequilibrium steady state
transition. We provide a full derivation and expanded discussion and digression
on results previously reported briefly in M. Depken and R. Stinchcombe, Phys.
Rev. Lett. {\bf 93}, 040602, (2004). In particular we derive an exact form for
the joint probability function for the bulk density and current, both for
finite systems, and also in the thermodynamic limit. The resulting distribution
is non-Gaussian, and while the fluctuations in the current are continuous at
the continuous phase transitions, the density fluctuations are discontinuous.
The derivations are done by using the standard operator algebraic techniques,
and by introducing a modified version of the original operator algebra. As a
byproduct of these considerations we also arrive at a novel and very simple way
of calculating the normalization constant appearing in the standard treatment
with the operator algebra. Like the partition function in equilibrium systems,
this normalization constant is shown to completely characterize the
fluctuations, albeit in a very different manner.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figure
Dyck Paths, Motzkin Paths and Traffic Jams
It has recently been observed that the normalization of a one-dimensional
out-of-equilibrium model, the Asymmetric Exclusion Process (ASEP) with random
sequential dynamics, is exactly equivalent to the partition function of a
two-dimensional lattice path model of one-transit walks, or equivalently Dyck
paths. This explains the applicability of the Lee-Yang theory of partition
function zeros to the ASEP normalization.
In this paper we consider the exact solution of the parallel-update ASEP, a
special case of the Nagel-Schreckenberg model for traffic flow, in which the
ASEP phase transitions can be intepreted as jamming transitions, and find that
Lee-Yang theory still applies. We show that the parallel-update ASEP
normalization can be expressed as one of several equivalent two-dimensional
lattice path problems involving weighted Dyck or Motzkin paths. We introduce
the notion of thermodynamic equivalence for such paths and show that the
robustness of the general form of the ASEP phase diagram under various update
dynamics is a consequence of this thermodynamic equivalence.Comment: Version accepted for publicatio
An introduction to phase transitions in stochastic dynamical systems
We give an introduction to phase transitions in the steady states of systems
that evolve stochastically with equilibrium and nonequilibrium dynamics, the
latter defined as those that do not possess a time-reversal symmetry. We try as
much as possible to discuss both cases within the same conceptual framework,
focussing on dynamically attractive `peaks' in state space. A quantitative
characterisation of these peaks leads to expressions for the partition function
and free energy that extend from equilibrium steady states to their
nonequilibrium counterparts. We show that for certain classes of nonequilibrium
systems that have been exactly solved, these expressions provide precise
predictions of their macroscopic phase behaviour.Comment: Pedagogical talk contributed to the "Ageing and the Glass Transition"
Summer School, Luxembourg, September 2005. 12 pages, 8 figures, uses the IOP
'jpconf' document clas
Exact joint density-current probability function for the asymmetric exclusion process
We study the asymmetric exclusion process with open boundaries and derive the
exact form of the joint probability function for the occupation number and the
current through the system. We further consider the thermodynamic limit,
showing that the resulting distribution is non-Gaussian and that the density
fluctuations have a discontinuity at the continuous phase transition, while the
current fluctuations are continuous. The derivations are performed by using the
standard operator algebraic approach, and by the introduction of new operators
satisfying a modified version of the original algebra.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
Ordering in voter models on networks: Exact reduction to a single-coordinate diffusion
We study the voter model and related random-copying processes on arbitrarily
complex network structures. Through a representation of the dynamics as a
particle reaction process, we show that a quantity measuring the degree of
order in a finite system is, under certain conditions, exactly governed by a
universal diffusion equation. Whenever this reduction occurs, the details of
the network structure and random-copying process affect only a single parameter
in the diffusion equation. The validity of the reduction can be established
with considerably less information than one might expect: it suffices to know
just two characteristic timescales within the dynamics of a single pair of
reacting particles. We develop methods to identify these timescales, and apply
them to deterministic and random network structures. We focus in particular on
how the ordering time is affected by degree correlations, since such effects
are hard to access by existing theoretical approaches.Comment: 37 pages, 10 figures. Revised version with additional discussion and
simulation results to appear in J Phys
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