Exploring disagreement: Using video-based interviews to understand a communal resource

Disagreement is a fundamental dimension of social life. In many situations, however, people are reticent to explicitly criticise the actions of others. It follows that if social researchers wish to study differences in people's common sense judgements of other's actions in an interview setting they need to carefully design how discussion of these differences are structured. This paper examines a research project that used context-specific video clips to structure interviews with users of a communal infrastructural resource. In digging into the practical detail of an interview encounter, the paper contributes to human geography's ongoing conversation about the practicalities of doing interview-based research

Autonomous vehicles, car-dominated environments, and cycling: Using an ethnography of infrastructure to reflect on the prospects of a new transportation technology

With growing concerns about air pollution and congestion, getting more people to move around cities by bicycle is gaining more attention than at any point over the past 50 years. At the same time, the spread of autonomous vehicles (AVs) is being positioned by some as a solution to these same problems. This raises interesting questions about the possible trajectories AVs could take when they become part of the traffic landscape of a street. Will they entrench existing hierarchies of use? Or will they help facilitate the expansion of cycling and other non-motorised forms of mobility? To begin to think about this question, the paper considers what a street is and how different users within a street environment share and cooperate. It then moves on to explore the technologies involved in the development of AVs and the challenges involved in their use on environmentally complex urban streets. With rules being central to how AVs operate, the fact that rules can mean different things to different people, and that they are both formal and informal, matters. To show why this matters, examples from an ethnography of infrastructure involving 81 adult road users are used to illustrate the ambiguities involved in making sense of the appropriate way to make a right-hand turn when cycling in a country that travels on the left. How AVs are programmed to deal with such ambiguities will have profound effects on the kind of infrastructural settlements that come to dominate how people share the street. These are judgements that will have important consequences for the development of cycling in the many places with car-dominated transport environments

Energy and system dependence of high-pTp_T triggered two-particle near-side correlations

Previous studies have indicated that the near-side peak of high-$p_T$ triggered correlations can be decomposed into two parts, the \textit{Jet} and the \textit{Ridge}. We present data on the yield per trigger of the \textit{Jet} and the \textit{Ridge} from $d+Au$, $Cu+Cu$ and $Au+Au$ collisions at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}$ = 62.4 GeV and 200 GeV and compare data on the \textit{Jet} to PYTHIA 8.1 simulations for $p+p$. PYTHIA describes the \textit{Jet} component up to a scaling factor, meaning that PYTHIA can provide a better understanding of the \textit{Ridge} by giving insight into the effects of the kinematic cuts. We present collision energy and system dependence of the \textit{Ridge} yield, which should help distinguish models for the production mechanism of the \textit{Ridge}.Comment: 4 pages, 6 figures, proceedings for Hot Quarks in Estes Park, Colorad

High pT correlations with strange particles in STAR

We present the highlights of the current identified strange particles DeltaPhi and DeltaEta correlations analyses, including system-size and trigger-pT of the jet and ridge, jet, ridge and away-side meson/baryon ratios, and the current state of the multi-strange baryon analysis. We see clear azimuthal peaks of comparable strength for all strange baryons and K0-short mesons. We see no observable species dependence on the same-side jet or ridge yields as a function of pT. However, while the away side and the ridge have Lambda to K0-short ratio similar to that of the bulk, the jet-only ratio is similar to that in $p+p$. The implications of these findings on current in-medium jet theoretical explanations are discussed.Comment: Proceedings for the Strangeness in Quark Matter 2007 Conference in Levoca, Slovaki

On the Fence: The Impact of Education on Support for Electric Fencing to Prevent Conflict between Humans and Baboons in Kommetjie, South Africa

Few studies test whether education can help increase support for wildlife management interventions. This mixed methods study sought to test the importance of educating a community on the use of a baboon-proof electric fence to mitigate negative interactions between humans and Chacma baboons (Papio ursinus) in a residential suburb of the City of Cape Town, South Africa. An educational video on the welfare, conservation and lifestyle benefits of a baboon-proof electric fence was included in a short online survey. The positioning of the video within the survey was randomised either to fall before or after questions probing the level of support for an electric fence. The results showed that watching the video before most survey questions increased the average marginal probability of supporting an electric fence by 15 percentage points. The study also explored whether the educational video could change people’s minds. Those who saw the video towards the end of the survey were questioned again about the electric fence. Many changed their minds after watching the video, with support for the fence increasing from 36% to 50%. Of these respondents, the results show that being female raised the average marginal probability of someone changing their mind in favour of supporting the fence by 19%. Qualitative analysis revealed that support for or against the fence was multi-layered and that costs and concern for baboons were not the only relevant factors influencing people’s choices. Conservation often needs to change people’s behaviours. We need to know what interventions are effective. We show in the real world that an educational video can be effective and can moderately change people’s opinions and that women are more likely to change their position in light of the facts than men. This study contributes to the emerging literature on the importance of education in managing conservation conflicts and the need for evidence-based interventions

Understanding the black-backed jackal

This paper reviews what we know about black-backed jackal ecology, drawing implications for managing human-wildlife conflict with this species. We review the research literature on the black-backed jackals in the context of other African jackal species and with regard to its diet (part 1), its breeding, territoriality and sociality (part 2), and its role as a ‘problem animal’ for small stock farmers (part 3). We argue that both the historical record (see also Nattrass et al., 2017) and the scientific research points to the need to understand the black-backed jackal as a very adaptable animal whose diet, breeding strategies and social arrangements are context-dependent. We draw implications for the management of black-backed jackal predation (part 4) and need for further research, especially on farmlands and landscapes undergoing a transformation in land use. The paper is part of an inter-disciplinary project about sheep farming and predators in the Karoo

Nevada Experiments and Operations Program (N Program) Management Plan

This plan briefly describes the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) institutional structure and how Nevada Experiments and Operations Program (N Program's) organization fits within this structure, roles and responsibilities, and management processes that govern N Program activities. This plan also serves as the Integrated Safety Management (ISM) Implementation Plan for N Program work. This plan applies to all work performed by and for LLNL that falls under the oversight of DOE/NV except LLNL activities in support of the Yucca Mountain Project Office (YMPO)

A brief history of predators, sheep farmers and government in the Western Cape, South Africa

This paper provides a brief history of the conflict between South African sheep farmers and predators (and we touch also on the debate between diverse stakeholders over how best to respond to that conflict). We focus in particular on black-backed jackals and commercial sheep farmers in the Western Cape Karoo, drawing on historical sources, colonial records, early ecological thinking and observations by farmers to paint a picture of this dynamic conflict. The paper forms part of an inter-disciplinary project about sheep farming and predators in the Karo

Exploring Early Parton Momentum Distribution with the Ridge from the Near-Side Jet

In a central nucleus-nucleus collision at high-energies, medium partons kicked by a near-side jet acquire a momentum along the jet direction and subsequently materialize as the observed ridge particles. They carry direct information on the early parton momentum distribution which can be extracted by using the ridge data for central AuAu collisions at \sqrt{s_{NN}}=200 GeV. The extracted parton momentum distribution has a thermal-like transverse momentum distribution but a non-Gaussian, relatively flat rapidity distribution at mid-rapidity with sharp kinematic boundaries at large rapidities that depend on the transverse momentum.Comment: In Proceedings of 20th International Conference on Ultra-Relativistic Nucleus Nucleus Collisions, Jaipur, India, Feb. 4-10, 200